The Pursuer

Taking its title from a 1959 Julio Cortázar story, The Pursuer gathers 13 artists around loose themes of chronology and self-identification. The artists’ wide-ranging approaches spin the exhibition into a compelling narrative of materiality, and they grapple with the preservation of an immediate past as time lumbers forward.

Whimsical realism is provided by Candy Jernigan’s found-object assemblages and pencil drawings. “Found Dope: Part II” is made up of drug vials and an illustrated map detailing where and when each was found. “Ten Kinds of Beans” is a drawing of exactly that, as well as “Homage to Goya.”

Paul Sharits dominates much of the main room with drawings and notes toward his chromatic films. Sharits’ sketches draw parallels to his abstracted explorations of color and systematized movement. Well-planned curation led to the placing of Sharits’ drawings next to works by the young Ida Ekblad. In both, tight composition is paired with rich, wild use of the medium.

Alex Hubbard’s video “The Paranoid Phase of Nautical Twilight I-III” shares structural elements with Kerstin Brätsch’s painting “Are You Game?” In both, large circles resemble clock faces and invoke clockwise movement: Hubbard’s in a chainsaw cutting through a wall from behind, while the shading in Brätsch’s work implies a sort of escape from the cyclical nature of time.

One of the show’s most arresting works is the awkwardly placed “Untitled/Project for The Andy Warhol Museum,” by Alex Bag. The over-saturated video features Bag herself in a variety of roles as a TV flips through stereotypical daytime programming: sensationalist talk shows, news footage of natural disasters and the “set-up” from infomercials. Parts of the video bear resemblance to Warhol’s screen tests, and Bag’s embrace of incoherence forces fresh interpretation of assigned and assumed identity.

The Pursuer proves to be a solid summer group show; its mixture of 1980s post-pop humor and serious whimsy provides a pleasing diversion from a 95-degree day. > Through Aug. 13, [Greene Naftali Gallery], 508 W. 26th St., 212-463-7770.