this post is for my dear friend john dodds. he gets these ridiculous junkets and schleps across the atlantic every now and again for some ghastly reason, like helping somebody edit some business strategy, or something.

anyway, when i was in london last year i would occasionally drag doddsy around some of the galleries, checking out the best and the worst of contemporary brit art. one of our favs was easily the damien hirst at white cube (both mason's yard and hoxton, darlink). since then i've continued to email him with directives to see various shows, both near and far, in the interest of cultural education [and not out of some selfish reason of living vicariously through him, of course.]

well, mr dodds is off to NYC next week and although i don't know the ny-scene as much as i do the london one, i promised him a list of arty type things to check out.

so here it is lovely:

top ten arty bollocks to visit in NYC

1. deitch projects. cute site, great artists, including a current installation by (gasp!) Barry McGee/

2. PS1/MOMA. I've not been, but i think that, like the Tate and the National Gallery, no matter how many times you've been, you should always go when you're in town. Plus, Australian artist Julian Dashper is going to be in a group show there, curated by Phong Buiof.

3. dia beacon. two words: donald judd. ok, so perhaps he's overrated by the oh-so-cynicals, but his work is still worth seeing. and the rest of the collection is, well, you know, ok i guess:
The Bechers, Beuys, Bourgeois, De Maria, Flavin, LeWitt, Nauman, Sandback, Serra, Smithson, Warhol and Weiner.

4. olafur eliasson's waterfalls. amazing, impressive and only on until the 13th october. go check out these works, supported by the NY public art fun - a fund that i'm a teensy bit in awe of.

5. gladstone gallery. with an impressive list of artists under their wing, i'd be checkin' this gallery out, especially if the Mario Merz exhibition is still up (Arte Povera Maestro).

6. 40 bond st, by herzog & de meuron. a spectacular-looking façade by the archi-stars du jour..

7. the banksy vs wooster mural. i know, banksy's overrated. but it's huge. and on wooster. and in NYC. for a while, at least.

8. dumbo arts centre. there have been a few cool shows pop up here and seems to be kind of a cool venue - almost artist-run-space-ish. ironically, the artist there for a while is a UK artist, but hey, you don't get around to see enough UK artists, right?

9. mcsweeny's 826. i don't know if you can just drop in there, but check out 826 - one of the cool things run by mcsweeney's - brainchild of author dave eggers (whose brilliant short stories How We Are Hungry i'm reading at the moment) and general awesome literature project. [doddsy swears he's not an author, but i beg to differ].

10. artslog art walk spaces. there are a swag of cool spaces in soho (the NYC one, not the WC1 one) and there was a recent night walk organised by artslog. i'm not sure if it's a regular thing, but you could do worse things than check out some of the places on the map.

have fun!