Invite-only Wesselmann x Matsuyama closes 27 September in New York
You need an invitation to see it, and time is running out. Wesselmann x Matsuyama, a two-artist show inside Pop artist Tom Wesselmann's former studio in Cooper Square in New York, runs until 27 September, according to The Art Newspaper.
The exhibition was organised by Wesselmann's estate with support from the gallery Almine Rech. It is invite-only, not open to walk-in visitors.
The hang is tight. Seven works by Wesselmann are paired with five works by Japanese American contemporary artist Tomokazu Matsuyama.
On the Wesselmann side, the line-up includes Still Life #35 (1963), a four-canvas painting with collaged elements. On the Matsuyama side, it includes We The People (2025).
The setting is part of the story. Wesselmann made most of his work in the Cooper Square studio space between 1994 and his death in 2004.
Wesselmann, who lived from 1931 to 2004, was associated with Pop art, the movement that borrowed images from advertising and everyday life. Matsuyama was born in 1976 in Japan, and his work responds to his bi-cultural experience of growing up between Japan and America, according to Almine Rech.
The two artists have shared a room before. Their work was previously juxtaposed in Pop Forever Tom Wesselmann &..., a 2024-25 exhibition at the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris.
What makes this stand out is scale and access. Paris offered 150 paintings and works centred on Wesselmann. New York offers twelve works in the place where one of the artists made them.
