Luhring Augustine Chelsea Presents 'settle for a good fantasy' Group Show

Luhring Augustine's Chelsea gallery in New York is hosting a group exhibition titled 'settle for a good fantasy,' organized around a Fran Lebowitz quotation painted on the wall: 'Abandon the search for Truth; settle for a good fantasy.' The show's main room examines portraiture's fragmentary and erotic dimensions, with works by Shaun Pierson, David Seider, and Janice Guy that shift between intimacy and unknowability, described as a fractured peep show. Pierson's photograph of a voluptuous strawberry, hung beside the Lebowitz text, is presented as an emblem of photography's pursuit of fantasy. Guy's grids of self-portraits from the 1970s anchor the presentation. The exhibition includes Pierson's 'Untitled (Strawberry on Lace)' (2026), an archival pigment print in an artist frame measuring 8 by 10 inches (20.3 by 25.4 cm), with a frame size of 20 by 24 inches (50.8 by 61 cm), and Janice Guy's 'Untitled' (1977), eight gelatin silver prints printed in 2026. The gallery's premise frames photography as perpetually chasing an unattainable ideal, and the installation pairs that idea with images of curved, freckled backs and shards of women's faces seemingly pulled from darkness.