You really don’t need to sleep: post-Frieze and pre-FIAC, why not ride the high-speed Eurostar to Brussels and take in these exhibitions?Mark Leckey at WIELS, through January 1, 2015, Av. Van Volxemlaan 354A noisy, confounding, chockablock extravaganza, “Lending Enchantment to Vulgar Materials” incorporates sculpture, video, appropriation, enormous Felix the Cat inflatables, droning sound-systems, and much more. There are videos of faux-conferences the artist has given, like “In The Long Tail,” a brilliant, oblique satire of Wired magazine honcho Chris Anderson’s “long tail theory” that also sends up the entire TED Talk aesthetic in general. Leckey scrambles historical eras (and the division between authentic and fake), and satirizes himself and the art world without ever seeming to be anything but enamored with the creative potentials of both. Ayan Farah at Almine Rech Gallery, through November 12 (Abdijstraat 20 rue de l’Abbaye)These abstract paintings made using mud, clay, and the effects of rainwater conjure different imagery, from bleached or tie-dye-style stains to curliques of smoke. Sometimes the sewn-together compositions are as graceful and subtle as Agnes Martin, but Farah also isn’t afraid to let the field of raw, muted color be interrupted by what appear to be tire tracks. In an adjoining gallery, Piero Golia provides a nice and artificial counterbalance to Farah’s incorporation of the natural world, showing a series of enormous painted-foam works that resemble sci-fi space rocks.Lesley Vance at Xavier Hufkins, through November 15 (6 rue St-Georges)The American artist is a master of graceful swoops and streaks, pushing and pulling paint to create abstract still life scenarios. A series of new oil-on-canvas works from 2014 are complemented by a handful of watercolor-and-gouache studies.Filip Gilissen at Meessen De Clercq, through October 25 (2a Rue de l’Abbaye)You enter a portal covered with cheap, gold-colored filament, then find yourself disoriented in a darkened chamber full of the stuff. Muddle your way deeper through the party-store strands and emerge in a strange, circular room, where an enormous golden rack of T-shirts awaits, each one bearing the words “Just Keep Living.” This young artist manages to stage a minor spectacle with very modest materials (but do try not to get lost). Elsewhere in the gallery are solo presentations of sculptural work that recontextualize ordinary things: Coins; smartphone SIM cards (Tania Perez Cordova); Katinka Bock (a trio of lemons resting on a metal beam).Elaine Cameron-Weir and Aleksander Hardashnakov at Galerie Rodolphe Hanssen, through October 25 (Rue de Livourne 35 Livornostraat)Canadian-born, Brooklyn-based Cameron-Weir showcases bronze sculptures of Fruit Salad plants (bearing the wonderful technical name of Monstera Deliciosas), the bright metal stalks rising from uneven, rough-hewn hunks of marble. Hardashnakov’s small group of mixed-media paintings are also oddly stunning: Quick, sketchy compositions (sexualized horse-people; a young boy with a fox; a duck nearly subsumed by a black background) are paired with larger works whose framing devices are totally out of whack, like “Dead Elephant in the back of a truck,” 2014, a small graphite drawing of the titular subject tacked to an enormous bare wood panel. Dominic Samsworth at Mon Chéri, through November 8 (67 Rue de La Regence)Barebones abstraction crashes up against a world of idle leisure, with shaped canvases depicting the geometry of pools (made using pool paint) arrayed around a massive sculpture: Recreational furniture shrink-wrapped in a white plastic skin, resembling a bleached, beached whale left to die.ALSO WORTH SEEING: Louise Lawler’s “No Drones,” and “Whether(Weather),” a collaborative show between Catharina van Eetvelde and Stéphane Sautour, both at Galerie Greta Meert through November 8.
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