Are you interested in contemporary art? Do you consider Barack Obama the second coming? Do you have $9,000 burning a hole in your pocket? If your answer to all three questions is yes, we have the painting for you. The online gallery Mixed Greens is offering this 63" x 63" acrylic portrait of the Illinois senator. It's by rising San Antonio artist Zane Lewis, who created it as part of his ongoing "Apostles" series. (Other subjects in the series include Charles Manson, Kim Jong Il,  Pope Benedict and Paris Hilton.) When I spoke with someone at the gallery yesterday, I learned that the Obama painting had until recently been on hold, but that it was now back up for sale.

On the other hand... if you have less than a grand to spend but still want to plaster your walls with charismatic candidate, there's the work of Sonja Shaffer. The Missouri artist and fervent Obama supporter has painted eight portraits of the senator that will be on exhibit starting May 2 in Kansas City. Ten percent of her total sales (the painting above is $550) will go towards the Obama campaign.

Obama, 2007
Zane Lewis
Cut acrylic paint
63" x 63"

Obama #3
Sonja Shaffer
oil on canvas
24" x 36"

A more adorable-than-usual piece of mail landed in editors' mailboxes last week: A wind-up plastic Hello Kitty figurine that serves as an invitation to artist Tom Sachs's opening at Lever House. In typical Sachs D.I.Y form, the missive is artfully distressed—the plastic-covered package looks slightly dusty and is printed so that the artist's name appears to be tacked on with Scotch Tape.

The centerpiece of Sachs's show, "Bronze Collection," will be a 21-foot-tall bronze-cast, all-white Hello Kitty, which will be installed in Lever House's courtyard, where Damien Hirst's nude Virgin Mother recently resided. While Sachs' cartoon character might be a bit more PG-rated, the lawn on the building's 53rd Street side will feature some potentially nightmare-inducing figures: oversized bronze Hello Kitty and Miffy (she's the bunny counterpart to Hello Kitty) fountains that spurt water from their eyes. The exhibit opens on May 8 and be on display through September 6.

Last weekend I did the reverse cultural commute and hopped a train out of Manhattan to see an art show—specifically, Frida Kahlo, the first major U.S. exhibition of the artist's work in fifteen years.  On display at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through May 18, the forty-two pieces, some never before exhibited publicly, span Kahlo's ground-breaking oeuvre, from self-portraits to symbolic paintings (including Frieda and Diego Rivera, a portrait that announced her marriage to the famed muralist) to still lifes. Among the masterpieces showcased are Henry Ford Hospital, an allegorical depiction of what many consider to be the first portrayal of miscarriage in contemporary art, and her vivid Still Life With Parrot and Fruit.  Sprinkled amidst these works are a trove of photographs of the artist, some by famous friends like Tina Modotti and Carl Van Vechten, which capture Kahlo's affluent childhood in Mexico City, as well as hint at her indiscretions (one is of Kahlo and Leon Trotsky, with whom she had a scandalous affair during his exile). And who knew Patti Smith and Kiki Smith were such Kahlo fans? The pair are among a handful of guest stars on the exhibit's audio tour, with the rocker admitting that she based her own formative relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe on Frida and Diego's stormy, creativity-fuelled marriage.

It's not every Saturday that you glance up from your brunch menu to see an enraged Julian Schnabel charging your table. But that's exactly happened to me and a friend at the restaurant Wallsé this past weekend.

As we were busy persusing the menu, we were suddenly rushed by a bearlike man wearing a blazer and a bright blue knee-length caftan. He gestured towards my companion's dining chair, which had, unbeknownst to us, been scratching up against a wall-sized, monochromatic painting hanging behind it.

"That's ruining my painting!" he bellowed, as we rose and dutifully shifted our table away from the artwork. "It's not your fault," the aging enfant terrible continued, "it's this restaurant's!" Then he threatened to remove his paintings if they didn't get more respect.

Our shaken server told us later that Schnabel, who lives just a block away, loans Wallsé much of its art—he's friends with its chef and owner, Kurt Gutenbrunner. The painting in question was not actually painted by Schnabel, although the artist's own canvases also adorn the restaurant. While Schnabs was visibly perturbed about his painting, at least he got VIP treatment: he and his companion were served long before the spatzle and bratwurst made it to our table.

Another Schnabel Encounter

Photo: Jim Spellman/WireImage.com

I recently got a rare peek into what has got to be one of the city's most visually stimulating apartments: the home of Manuela and Iwan Wirth directly above Zwirner & Wirth Gallery on East 69th Street. The occasion was a dinner that Hauser & Wirth and 303 Gallery were hosting in honor of artist Mary Heilmann.

Narrow Lane #2

The five-story townhouse, renovated by Annabelle Selldorf, has been outfitted to the hilt by the art world decorating guru Ricky Clifton. The inimitable Ricky, who was there that night, told me that the whole place was inspired by Mary's work. Flanking the patio's French doors were colorful horizontally striped drapes that recalled Mary's 2002 "Serape Panel." Feeling a chill, I wanted nothing more than to throw the fabric over my head, cut a hole in the top and wear it as a Mexican-styled poncho (Mary, a child of the Sixties and fashion plate herself would surely approve). The whole place had a strong Seventies vibe, like a cross between Greg Brady's attic bedroom and the home of Austina Powers, International Woman of Mystery.

The apartment, naturally, is filled with major contemporary art pieces. Aside from the handful of Mary's paintings, I spied two slick John McCracken wall reliefs (one black, one white), a Paul McCarthy "Santa With Butt Plug" sculpture and a Jason Rhoades chandelier, which spiraled down the center of the main staircase, painted a show-stopping Heilmann chartreuse.

Read W's article on Paul McCarthy from the November 2007 issue.

As Art Director of W and an aspiring art collector myself I'm always interested in checking out the work of up-and-coming artists. One talent I've been following is a New Yorker by the name of Carlyle Stewart, whom I first met at a benefit art auction last May. Carlyle creates collage paintings, photo montages and drawings. A lot of his work deals with American society, identity and the media. He explains his style as "a meditation on the malleable nature of what constitutes authenticity in today' s society."

The artist's most recent drawings incorporate an assemblage of iconic styles from artists including Warhol, Da Vinci and Disney. The result is a ravishing abstraction where it's hard to know whose line is whose. Carlyle's latest painting series (already sold out) is based on—no joke—the TV show Seinfeld. He told me that he plays the episodes one after another as he continually paints; each canvas is inspired by multiple episodes. The result has an uncanny resemblance to the work of Francis Bacon.

At quarter past seven on Wednesday night, the line to the Whitney Biennial opening was already snaking down 75th Street and inching toward Park Avenue. "At least everyone has to wait," one skinny-jeaned VIP snorted as he trudged to the back of the line.

At the cacophonous downstairs reception, artsy types were wedged shoulder-to-shoulder by the bar, nibbling skewered chicken and dodging shards from the wine glasses that seemed to be shattering on the floor every few minutes.

Rachel Chandler, a fresh-faced Whitney intern who moonlights as Beatrice Inn's Tuesday night DJ, was behind the turntables spinning mellow tunes. "A lot of the artists are really nervous so we're trying to play stuff to make them feel better," she said.

After wandering through the packed galleries—we were especially impressed by Phoebe Washburn's Gatorade-fed ecosystem—we headed to the Biennial's satellite location at the Park Avenue Armory, where large-scale installations and performance art pieces (like a dance-a-thon and "therapy sessions") will be in place through March 23. There, the ubiquitous Yvonne Force Villareal was holding court, wearing a Gap T-shirt designed by artist Rirkrit Tiravanija over her Dolce & Gabbana gown. (Gap is a Biennial sponsor and commissioned 13 artists to create limited-edition shirts.) We also met artist Eduardo Sarabia, who had transformed one room of the Armory into a replica of an illegal bar he owns in East Berlin, complete with chessboard tables and stools resembling elephant feet. The bar, serving Sarabia's own homemade tequila, will be open for business on March 9, 11, 14, and 19.

Photos by Nick Hunt/PatrickMcMullan.com

Some friends and I headed to MoMA on Saturday night anticipating the usual chardonnay, crudités and museum crowd that accompany most of its events. We didn't get the memo that the fête—celebrating the new Color Chart exhibition—would be a raging dance party.

After talking our way in (the soiree sold out on Tuesday and Craigslist did brisk trade in tickets the day of) we entered a museum transformed. There wasn't a carrot stick in sight as throngs of twentysomething partygoers clad in primary colors and wild makeup broke it down to the music pouring through speakers lining the main hall. (The DJs, all signed to the dance-punk indie label DFA Records, had set up shop beneath Rodin's statue of Balzac.) One flight up, gaggles of hipsters fueled by pink rum concoctions were playing Twister.

A few of the 1,500 guests even managed to gaze at the Warhols and Richters on display—the exhibition stayed open until the party ended at 1 a.m. The party was part of PopRally, an event series aimed at MoMA and PS1's younger patrons. The next PopRally event is on March 14 at PS1. For details, see http://moma.org/calendar/poprally/

Photos by Fred Benenson / www.fredbenenson.com

It's lovely to share art with the public—but what, really, is an opening bash sans velvet rope? Especially when Yvonne Force Villareal is involved. At last week's debut of Tim Noble and Sue Webster's "Electric Fountain," a giant light sculpture at Rock Center, her Art Production Fund team made sure barriers separated the fur-bedecked A-listers from the hoi polloi.

Yvonne Force Villareal

The list-worthy few clutched their plastic cups of hot cider as they admired the British artist team's neon blue and white apparition. Villareal beamed at her handiwork like a proud mama, remarking on the beauty of the light reflecting off the faces of her friends, many of whom were slow to arrive to the event, presumably due to the freezing temperatures. Most of the VIPs showed up closer to 7:30, right before a private reception at the nearby 620 Loft and Garden. There, the entrance was marked by a Union Jack created out of 1,500 candles designed by Michelle Rago, and waiters served warm meat pies and fish n'chips.