Hemphill Fine Arts opened two shows this past weekend, showcasing James Huckenpahler’s digital prints in Mindless Pleasures and David Byrne’s furniture design in Furnishing the Self – Upholstering the Soul (Chairs). And while both shows are housed in the same gallery space, they displayed art at opposite ends of the spectrum in both medium and in feel. The first of the two shows at Hemphill is Huckenpahler’s computer art presented in Mindless Pleasures. His work…

>> This week’s arts pick goes to the Curator’s Office, who will be hosting performance artist Kathryn Cornelius in her first private gallery solo show, Common Ground. Cornelius, who has taken her wry performances around the world, will display two videos and two photograph series that show her searching for a kind of inner spirituality in an overconnected, digital world. Jeffry Cudlin writes in the exhibit brochure, “In these pieces, Cornelius appears silent, collected…

There’s this unwritten rule for contemporary art history students: don’t do a thesis on a living artist, ’cause they’ll contradict you faster than you can say feces-spattered-canvas. So it’s with great caution and wide ambiguity that the Corcoran’s Contemporary (re)defined attempts to organize contemporary work in a large two-part exhibition. This is a buckshot at art related by chronology, with packeted galleries casing recent trends in art like material based abstraction, graffiti, and text or…

The visual arts scene around D.C. this week includes lots of new gallery and museum exhibits — keep reading for our picks. >> On Saturday, the long-awaited, 48th Annual Corcoran Biennial opens to the public. Curated by Jonathan Binstock and Stacey Schmidt, the Biennial (for the first time in years) includes several area artists as well as several international art stars. Look for the work of D.C. area artists Colby Caldwell, James Huckenpahler and Jeff…