The painter Joe Fig describes the artistic process of stepping back and assessing one’s work as “this moment of seeming inactivity when the artist is working the hardest.” His new series of paintings flips this phenomenon, instead exploring the viewer’s process of contemplation and analysis. In the 10 paintings at Cristin Tierney, Fig documents museumgoers looking at works by Alex Katz (at the Guggenheim) and Wangechi Mutu (at the New Museum). Do they plant themselves front and center, or off to the side? How close do they get to the art? What are they doing with their hands? —Lucy Horowitz
