These Are a Few of My Favorite Things
Highlights from Independent May 14-17, 2026
When I was four years old, my favorite film was Robert Wise’s 1965 The Sound of Music, starring the sensational Julie Andrews as Fräulein Maria and my personal idol (I wanted badly to be sixteen going on seventeen), Liesl von Trapp, portrayed by Charmian Carr. With a run time of two hours and fifty-four minutes, I was rarely allowed to watch it straight through. Bedtime came too early. The clock always seemed to strike just after Julie Andrews comforts the fearful von Trapp children and overcomes their initial prejudice through her delivery of My Favorite Things.
The recurring intermission just after this musical number fixed the lyrics firmly in my head, and now, years later, they’ve taken on a new meaning. More than silly words to encourage small children, My Favorite Things is a model for slow looking, for appreciation of the little things, and for heightened attention, which is a remarkably restorative practice against the overstimulation of the contemporary visual landscape. New York Art Week, for example, held just so much stuff. So much money. So many booths. So many people. It felt difficult to appreciate any of the art. Crowded aisles, standoffish gallerists, I was feeling quite overwhelmed. But in creating a list of my favorite things, I don’t feel so bad.
Last week, Independent stood out for the participating galleries’ preference to show only one or two artists per booth, a strategy that gave viewers a clearer picture of each artist presented and created a rhythm across the booths. Here are my six favorite moments from Independent this May 14-17 at its new Pier 36 venue in far East Chinatown.
Eleanor Conover’s shaped canvases at Abattoir Gallery
I’ve been following Eleanor Conover’s work since a serendipitous encounter a few years back. Walking down Horatio toward the Whitney Museum, I caught a glimpse of Conover’s shaped canvases installed as a part of REGISTERED at White Columns. Her new works presented by Abattoir Gallery maintain what I have known of her stretcher structures, resisting not just the assumed rectangle of a painting but also the fixed depth of the canvas from the wall. Her canvases bow out from the wall like faceted gems reflecting the light, or like the literal mountain forms rising perpendicular to their base.
The canvases themselves are a composite of many sections quilted together, forming the architecture of their painting and breaking up space with the seams of each section. Conover’s marks in paint, dyes, and even drawing materials like graphite reinforce or defy the underlying structure. Sometimes the crazy network of stretcher bars peeks through a particularly sheer section of material. Some of the paintings even incorporate pockets sewn into the canvases to hold bits of rock, a reminder of Conover’s commitment to the landscape even through the language of abstraction.
Johan Samboni’s carved brick figures at SGR Galería
Samboni’s was my favorite sculpture on view at Independent, both for the material specificity of the work as well as the consideration of the installation. Where many booths seem to just set the sculpture on a basic pedestal (which is also often the wrong size for the artwork), Samboni’s brick figures were arranged on reclaimed wood shelves and rough-hewn sawhorses. When artists define the installation of their work by building the support into the work itself, they extend the artwork into space, changing its presence from one of random appearance to quiet confidence. The provisional feel of the shelves and sawhorses recalls the “obra negra” phase of construction described by Samboni, where brick and mortar remain exposed. Samboni’s references to an unfinished state connect to his discussion of cycles of erosion and rebuilding across family history and identity.
Dan Gunn’s puzzle-piece forms at Pentimenti
Dan Gunn’s forms are shaped birch wood pieces puzzled together and secured with nylon cord. The result is a strange hybrid between a sculpted 3D model of the object and a rendered 2D representation of its form. The negative spaces between the birch pieces create the drawing, a mesh that sections the space. I was particularly struck by his dishrag forms. Suspended from a single nail, they gently succumb to gravity in a way that seems to defy their wooden construction. Gunn’s work reflects on his experience growing up in the Midwest and on everyday objects that serve as indicators of regional identity. A Philly resident myself, I was on the lookout for galleries and artists with a connection to my city. Gunn is based in Connecticut, but Pentimenti is in Philadelphia. I’ve been observing a preference for hybrid art forms in the city—something that doesn’t fit neatly into the traditional categories of painting or sculpture. Gunn’s work is emblematic of that hybridity. His process is reminiscent of craft traditions like quilting, which rely on assembling smaller pieces to form the whole.
Ian Davis’s darkly humorous gatherings at Galerie Judin
Ian Davis’s meticulously painted scenes portray large gatherings of identically dressed figures, seated placidly or walking in formation. Relying on the uncanny unison of the figures’ actions, dress, and the orderly environment they find themselves in, the paintings relay a deep uncertainty and a sense of being just one tiny part within a larger organism. I couldn’t decide whether to laugh or cry at the reminder of fixity in systems beyond my control. I thought of Franz Kafka’s absurdist narratives, highlighting the incomprehensible mess of bureaucratic systems of power. As is the case with Kafka’s writings, Davis’s audience is never treated to a reveal or explanation. The paintings keep the viewer in a place of tension, wondering how these figures could have gotten themselves into this position and whether they will ever get out.
Rika Minamitani at Tomio Koyama Gallery
Rika Minamitani may be Nicole Eisenman’s long-lost cousin for her similarly striking use of color and blend of realistic and illustrative renderings of figures. The compositions rely on both humor and sincerity in their anecdotal compositions. The viewer feels like they have arrived mid-conversation. I felt a particular kinship with her painting of an octopus as the artist in the studio, many arms trying to accomplish many tasks at once. Even with eight arms, it’s a challenge to work at the speed of thought when inspiration strikes.
Kentaro Okumura at Vardaxoglou
Easily my favorite work I saw anywhere in New York last week, Okumura’s paintings are a texture and color dreamland. Ranging in scale from tiny to very large, the mark-making is fast, but the surface quality is slow. My favorite work was a small rusty cross hovering in a dimpled, heavily built-up field of blue and green paint. Working with abstraction, Okumura’s paintings maintain a deep connection to the embodied experience through the specificity of his color relationships and use of high and low contrast. Rather than represent the sight, Okumura creates the feeling of that experience, like the feeling of walking out of a dark room into a bright summer day, or the feeling of looking off over the ocean toward the horizon. We actually see neither water nor sunshine, but we feel them.
I could keep adding to my list, but I don’t want to dilute my designation of favorite. If I’m not careful, a few of my favorite things could turn into an exhaustive catalogue of all the beautiful moves made by the many artists represented by the 76 galleries at Independent. It’s worth reiterating that my willingness to go on adding to what I noticed and appreciated was made possible by the prevalence of solo or duo shows at the fair, a strategy that helped shift the experience away from shopping for a product and back toward really looking at and experiencing an artwork. And, not being a gallerist or business person myself, I suspect that this viewer experience may actually help collectors make better or more confident decisions about artworks they would want to live with. A viewer’s ability to assess what they like in an artwork is made easier through a slower pace, where people can notice the details and determine their favorite things.
Macy West (she/her) is a Philadelphia-based artist and writer. She received her MFA from Tyler School of Art and Architecture and her BFA from Louisiana State University. Her practice explores artistic and scientific visualization through painting, drawing, and printmaking. She has been included in exhibitions at Pink Noise Projects, Ice Box Projects, Frameworks Gallery, 82Parris, and Bond Millen Gallery. In 2025, she co-founded SENSUS magazine, a quarterly arts publication highlighting contemporary art in Philadelphia.
Space On Space is a media movement started in 2020. Originally a cathartic impulse to process the times, SOS has evolved into an investigation into the connections between land, power, and art. The outlet creates content and offers PR services to help artists, designers, and businesses take up more space in the media. At the intersection of art writing and public relations, SOS interrogates the line between mythmaking and the historical archive. The publication has produced three print magazines and a mountain of digital content covering artists from around the world. The magazine hosts parties, art talks, and poetry events. In a media landscape built for speed, SOS slows down—because depth is disruptive, and attention is power.
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