• Aspen: The Residue of Memory, a group show, and and Simon Denny: Full Participation, at the Aspen Art Museum. Through July 15.
• L.A.: Aakash Nihalani, Mark Jenkins and Yue Min at Carmichael Gallery. Opens Saturday at 6pm.
• Kansas City: Mathias Merkel Hess, William J. O’Brien and Arlene Shechet, SUM, at the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art. Opens Friday at 6pm.
• Atlanta: Picturing the South, at the High Museum of Art. Opens Saturday.
• Miami: Ed Ruscha: On the Road, at the Museum of Contemporary Art. Opens Thursday, in North Miami. (Plus, a profile of the artist — and his taste for Jack Kerouac — in Ocean Drive.)
• Miami: Transcultural Pilgrim: Three Decades of Work by José Bedía, at the Miami Art Musem. Opens Thursday, in downtown.
• Plus: Get all my latest New York picks on Gallerina…

• Lima: Milagro de la Torre, Indicios, at the Museo de Arte de Lima. Through July 1.
• Oakland: Jennie Ottinger, What To Do With Your Orphan: A Manual, at Johansson Projects. Opens Thursday; artist reception on Saturday at 5pm.
• L.A.: Shoots and Ladders: New Paintings by Simon McWilliams, at Skotia Gallery. Opens Saturday, in Culver City.
• L.A.: French Invasion!, French graffiti artists, at Fabien Castanier Gallery. Opens Saturday at 7pm, in Studio City.
• Chicago: First Fifty, at the Museum of Contemporary Art. Opens Saturday.
• NYC: Mark Dion, Phantoms of the Clark Expedition, at the Explorers Club. Opens today.
• NYC: Animated Spirits, Shields of New Guinea, at Cavin Morris. Opens Thursday, in Chelsea.
• NYC: Brent Green, To Many Men Strange Fates Are Given, at Andrew Edlin Gallery. Through June 23, in Chelsea.
• Plus: Get all my NYC picks over at Gallerina…

Am late on sooooo many things right now — this is one of them. I managed to catch the exhibit of Rammellzee’s so-called ‘Letter Racers’ at Suzanne Geiss before it closed late last month. And all I gotta say is: daaaaaaaaang. The man knew his way around his materials. Those high-tech looking toys you see flying in formation are actually beautifully assembled bits of junk: umbrella handles, cheap plastic watch bands, broken milk crates, Bic pens and bottle caps. (And lots of dust.)

For a good backgrounder on where these pieces emerged from, check out this NYT piece. And if you get a chance to see his work in person (no matter how small the show), do not miss it.

• L.A.: Mickalene Thomas, The Origin of the Universe, at the Santa Monica Museum of Art. Through August 19, in Santa Monica.
• Dallas: Erwin Wurm, Beauty Business, at Dallas Contemporary. Through August.
• NYC: Freehand Jobs, a group show at Pandemic Gallery. Opens Saturday at 7pm, in Williamsburg.
• NYC: Charles Yuen, at Valentine. Opens Friday at 6pm, in Ridgewood/Bushwick.
• Plus, see all my latest New York picks over at Gallerina…

A man and a woman kiss. They drown each other in flattery. They tell each other that they’re “the one.” They say no one understands. This may sound like the purplest of purple prose scenarios. (And it is.) But it’s actually a live performance that employs the transcript of a Sarah Palin interview by Glenn Beck as its script. Instead of Beck and Palin in the lead roles, however, it’s a couple of young lovers. The words may be the same, but the actions aren’t. It’s grody-fascinating to watch.

For the performance piece, I Feel Your Pain, Liz Magic Laser created more than a dozen theatrical shorts out of television news transcripts (staged as part of the Performa festival last year). Steve Kroft’s 60 Minutes interview with Barack Obama in the wake of the Osama Bin Laden assassination becomes a clubby conversation between two bros sipping soda. It was literally nauseating to watch. Not because the actors were bad. Quite the contrary. The performances are all strong (and Annie Fox, shown above, is particularly riveting to watch). It’s all just a reminder of the uncomfortably cozy relationship between politicians and some members of the media.

For a few pieces, like the ones mentioned above, Laser employs a single interview as script. For others, she weaves together similar language from several Q&As into one cohesive story. Interviews and speeches by Mary Landrieu, Christine O’Donnell and George W. Bush are spliced together into a single work that addresses culpability. It is a riveting work of political theater. Literally. (Though I could have done without the mime-clown character — I mean, why???? — that Laser introduces in a few of the pieces.)

You can catch video of the project at the Derek Eller Gallery through this Saturday, April 21. If you’re a political or media junkie, this represents an intriguing, outrage-inducing intersection. Find the screening times here. And yes, it’s worth it to sit through them all…