November diary: where to go and what to see

November is upon us, the winter wardrobe is out of hibernation and 2017 is looming on the horizon. It’s Nice That present its monthly list of exhibitions in the UK and across the world that will provide inspiration on the long, cold nights or short cold days. This month we recommend the Paris Photo Fair that celebrates its 20th anniversary this year, a scholarly look at cartography in London, and a touching collaboration between a brother and sister in Salford. Enjoy!

Elmgreen & Dragset, Changing Subjects
Flag Art Foundation, Chelsea, New York, from 2 November

This mid-career show presents old and new works from the Scandinavian duo – expect immersive installations with unsettling themes. “Changing Subjects, designed by the artists, presents new and existing works from the duo’s twenty-year-long collaboration that address existential issues linked to identity, sexuality, and mortality, as well as an examination of social value systems and the expectations that surround them,” says the gallery.

Teller on Mapplethorpe
Alison Jacques Gallery, London, 18 November – 7 January 2017

To coincide with what would have been the 70th birthday of the iconic American photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, Alison Jacques has invited acclaimed UK-based, German-born photographer Juergen Teller to curate an exhibition of Mapplethorpe’s work. Teller worked in collaboration with The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation in New York to make his selection. 

Paris Photo Fair
Grand Palais, Paris, 10-13 November

1,244 artists will come together under the glass roof of Grand Palais, Paris, for the 20th edition of art fair Paris Photo. Works by the likes of Edward Burtynsky, Andrey Tarkovsky, David LaChapelle and David Hockney can be found alongside an international array of talent. Also of note is a sister exhibition, The Pencil of Culture, that will look at 10 years of photography acquisitions at the Centre Pompidou.

Rachel Maclean: WOT U :-) ABOUT?
Tate Britain from 14 November to 2 April

Multi-media artist Rachel Maclean uses green screen to build fantasies which are at once dreamy and nightmarish. “Within her fantastical settings Maclean parodies fairy tales, children’s television programmes, beauty product advertising, internet videos, and pop culture playing all the extravagantly costumed characters herself.  At once seductive and nightmarish, glossy and grotesque, her films destabilise power dynamics and consumer desires,” says Tate.

Maps and the 20th Century: Drawing the Line
The British Library, London, 4 November 2016 – 1 March 2017

If you’re feeling a bit lot this month, The British Library is holding an exhibition that charts the “power, presence and enduring appeal” of maps. From the first map of the Hundred Acre Wood to a 1962 Soviet moon globe, an impressive myriad of topographical imaginings are featured and displayed. The show looks at the important role maps have played during the 20th Century and sheds light on world events and conflicts as well as looking at how technology has developed map making.

One and One Is Four: The Bauhaus Photocollages of Josef Albers
Museum of Modern Art, New York
23 November 23 2016 – 2 April 2017

In this show, MoMA exhibits the lesser known photographic works of Josef Albers, a central figure in 20th Century art and Bauhaus practitioner. Here, the artist’s photo collages created at the Bauhaus between 1928 and 1932 are on display, and they demonstrate themes of seriality, perception and the relationship between handcrafted and mechanical produced, issues which were explored throughout his career. A dozen of Albers’ collages will be on show, many of which have never been exhibited together.

Alinka Echeverría – Becoming South Sudan
The Ravestijn Gallery, Amsterdam, Until 3 December

Alinka Echeverría is a British-Mexican artist working in the field of expanded photography. Her work engages the cross sections of documentary photography, visual anthropology and conceptual art. Becoming South Sudan is a body of photographic work that documents the independence day preparations in the country’s capital Juba in June 2011. “What Echeverría delivers is actually strikingly intimate set of portraits that transcend the conventional patriotism of national consciousness; consciousness that in the case of South Sudan could not have been in any way fully realized concept back in 2011,” says the Gallery. “The question remains whether it is that today.”

Maria and Matt Carroll: Ups and Downs
Salford Museum and Art Gallery, Salford, Until June 4 2017

Maria Carroll has collaborated with her brother Matt to create works for this exhibition. Maria has always been an inspiration to her family, manifested in her innate visual and artistic approach to the world around her.

The use of vibrant, strong colours and striking images to visualise her world will inspire and uplift. Maria, who has Down Syndrome, is part of a large family born and brought up in Little Hulton. Her artistic collaboration with Matt, better known for his work with Central Station Design, is used as a therapeutic way to positively face hurdles in their lives.

Paul Nash
Tate Britain, London, until 5 March 2017

This show covers all aspects of the artist’s varied career, from his work as an official war artist to becoming one of the most important figures in British surrealism and abstraction, co-founding Unit One with other modernists Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore.

Josef Albers: Grey Steps, Grey Scales, Grey Ladders
David Zwirner Gallery, New York, 3 November – 17 December

This exhibition collects Josef Albers’ black, white and grey works, inspired by a passage from the artist’s influential book on colour theory Interaction of Color (1963) where he examines how our perception of colour is affected by the ones around it. "To this end, we study gradation by producing so-called grey steps, grey scales, grey ladders. These demonstrate a gradual stepping up or down between white and black, between lighter and darker.”

Sauce by Animade
6.30pm – 10pm, 15 November, Protein Studios

Animation studio Animade is hosting the second edition of Sauce, an evening of creative talks, this time featuring Golden Wolf, Sophie Koko Gate, Johnny Kelly and Mutant Jukebox, among others. The theme is procrastination.