“Tour de Force,” the International Poster Gallery’s 20th anniversary exhibition, features Henri de Toulouse–Lautrec’s iconic “Eldorado” from the 1890s (“The Golden Age of the Poster”), Italian rarities by Marcello Dudovich and Leopoldo Metlicovitz and a Herbert Leupin maquette for an Object Poster for Swiss men’s clothier PKZ. Along with the exhibition, 40 rarely-seen posters from the gallery archives are on sale. “Our passion for posters remains constant,” said owner Jim Lapides. “Original posters continue to prove an important and enduring art form, and our gallery has introduced thousands of collectors small and large to their artistic and historical richness.” The show opens on May 1 and continues through June 30 at IPG, 205 Newbury St., Boston.

Lithographs, woodcuts and other works on paper by James Reed originating during an artist-in- residency at I-Park in East Haddam, Conn., and “symbolic” animal prints and paintings by Nancy Lasar can be seen from May 1 through June 30 at Gallery19, 19A Main Street, Essex, Conn. Reed’s work at the environmental wonderland resulted in a series of works depicting “bold, black crows,” those “intelligent, sometimes sinister animals and powerful mythological figures.” Lasar’s current work looks like it could have come from the inside of an aquarium, her mixture of media creating pleasing, dual reflections in her almost 3-D-like work. “Whether in drawing, painting or printmaking, the process for me is about layering and energizing space in such a way that objects are fluid, interconnected and full of energy and movement,” she writes in her artist statement. “I try to utilize a variety of lines, marks and media to suggest both stasis and openness to possibility and transformation as well as the passage of time.”

Manchester, England-based Simon Blackmore creates sculptures that are performance- based and installations that integrate sound and custom-made technology; the curious can see (and hear) for themselves during his “Audio Converters” exhibition from May 2 through June 5 at the Tremaine Gallery at The Hotchkiss School, 11 Interlaken Road, Lakeville, Conn. The show includes “Weather Guitar” — “a robotic guitar player that responds to variations in weather conditions via a simple weather sensor, visually akin to a small windmill, placed outside the gallery” which was recently on display at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum. Also on view are new creations from Blackmore, who is a member of the Owl Project collective group.)

Sculptor Joseph Wheelwright always seems to aim for the iconic — he recently announced his latest goal is to create a new wonder of the world in the form of a large head on one of Peru’s Andes Mountains. While that could take a decade to come to fruition, you can see a retrospective of past Wheelwright sculptures in stone, wood and bronze from May 6 through 31 at the Art Center in Hargate at St. Paul’s School, 325 Pleasant Street, Concord, New Hampshire. “This will be a retrospective of 40 works in wood, stone, bronze and bone,” Wheelwright said. “Three large stone heads will be presented out-of-doors near the main gallery at Hargate” — and his 2005 “Resting Moon” granite sculpture is permanently sited near the Lower School Pond at St. Paul’s.

You’ve got till May 18 to make it out to the Williams College Museum of Art (WCMA) to experience “Monika Baer,” the Berlin-based artist’s first museum exhibition curated by Lisa Dorin, formerly of the Art Institute of Chicago (where the show premiered last fall) and current deputy director of WCMA. The two-dozen-plus paintings were created between 1990 and 2013 and are “Often called both conceptual and performative … simultaneously spare and sensuous, oscillating between revealing and pretending to reveal themselves,” punctuating “atmospheric, monochrome passages with numerous recognizable motifs—keyholes, spider webs, brick walls, and paper currency, for instance — through which her canvases enter a dialogue with one another.” WCMA is located at 15 Lawrence Hall Drive (near the inter-section of Route 2 and 7), Williamstown, Mass.

Kinetic sculptor Kim Bernard says “Imagine cross-sections of hydrogen atoms, protons and electrons orbiting around, magnified a bazillion times” and you’ll have an idea what to expect from her “Spherical Harmonics” exhibition on view from May 21 through June 22 at the Boston Sculptors Gallery, 486 Harrison Ave., Boston. The show will feature “thousands of one-inch- diameter, black-and-red ceramic balls, clustered in patterns, hanging from the gallery walls”; Bernard will be sharing the space with Donna Dodson’s “Silent Scream: Personality Type and Body Language,” in which Dodson introduces us to “The Might Hippo,” 50 inches of finely shaped walnut wood, the next member of her family of animal-headed goddess figures.

 

Classically-influenced with a cutting edge, “Be in Touch,” a show featuring sculptor Konstantin Simun, who was born in Lenin- grad and now lives in Allston, and painter/multi-media artist Alex Khomski, takes place from June 9 through July 7 at Touch Gallery, 281 Concord Ave., Cambridge, Mass. It’s a special opportunity to see smaller works by Simun, whose iconic “Broken Ring” monument sits near St. Petersburg, Russia, where his works were featured at the Russian State Museum in 2012, and whose bronze Igor Fokin Memorial Sculpture, honoring the late puppeteer, graces Cambridge, Mass.’ Brattle Square. Khomski, who takes great pride in his study of old masters, translating their ideas to images of the 21st century “in which the observer defines the spiritual content of symbols” — and who is in the collection of Russia’s State Tretyakov Gallery — will be displaying his latest sculptures and multi-media works.

While social documentary photographer Milton Rogovin passed away at the age of 101 in 2011, his work remains to show those who follow in his footsteps how photography can serve as an invaluable format in letting the world see the struggle working-class citizens toil through in pushing for better conditions in which to earn a living. “I really don’t know any other photographer like him in his unbroken dedication to the under-represented and the poor — especially the working poor — in our society,” said Tony Loreti, chair of the visual arts department at the Cambridge School of Weston, which is currently hosting “Social Optometry,” a collection of Rogovin images. “Whether on the streets, in their work places, or in their homes, he had a wonderful ability to get emotionally close to his subjects.” The show can be seen through June 14 at the Thompson Gallery at the Cambridge School of Weston, 45 Georgian Road, Weston, Mass.

Brian Goslow