Whether you like Roxy Paine’s work or not, you probably want to touch it. You can’t help it. Since 1990, Paine has created irresistibly tactile sculptures, installations, and even the occasional painting (like the one with the paint literally dripping off the canvas) that almost always reference some aspect of the natural world. His latest work is no exception. Maelstrom, a 130 x 45 foot stainless-steel sculpture, is currently on view on the rooftop of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. With Central Park clearly visibly in the background, Maelstrom does the nature vs. man-made structure thing, but, more than that, it creates an environment and a mood. Engineering Maelstrom was no small feat (you can watch the installation of a similar sculpture here), but this is only next in a long series of Dendroids, as Paine calls them. So far these Dendroids have made appearances at Art Basel in Switzerland, Madison Square Park, Central Park, and an empty field in Ohio.

Roxy Paine on the Roof: Maelstrom at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, April 28 – October 25, 2009

Don’t let the term ‘rogue taxidermist’ confuse you. Nate Hill is nothing less than an artist, his materials are just less common. Instead of paint, Hill rummages through the dumpsters of New York’s Chinatown at night for discarded animal parts which he uses for his projects. Projects is intentionally vague, since his work ranges from taxidermied animal composites preserved in jars to life-sized interpretations of Adam and Eve (yes, made entirely, almost repulsively, out of dead animals) to community events like the Human Petting Zoo, Fish ‘n’ Chicks, and Bouncy Rides. The next Bouncy Ride can be had at the Lorimer L stop on April 16 from 10-11pm.

You can see a calendar of events at the Club Animals blog.

Since its debut at the Centre Pompidou in 2007, H Box (H for Hermès), a portable “screening room for presenting major new video commissions” has traveled all over the world. It touches down next in Newport Beach at the OCMA where it will screen work by ten international artists, including Cliff Evans. Evans’ contribution ”Citizen: The Wolf and the Nanny” combines found images from the Internet with animation into a kind of moving collage.

You can see Evans’ work along with short films from Alice Anderson, Yael Bartana, Matthew Buckingham, Sebastián Diaz-Morales, Kota Ezawa, Cao Fei, Dora García, Shahryar Nashat, and Su-Mei Tse at at OCMA from April 12-September 6, 2009.