Central to Doug Aitken’s “100 YRS” exhibition at 303 Gallery is a new “Sonic Fountain,” in which water drips from 5 rods suspended from the ceiling, falling into a concrete crater dug out of the gallery floor. The flow of water itself is controlled so as to create specific rhythmic patterns that will morph, collapse and overlap in shifting combinations of speed and volume, lending the physical phenomenon the variable symphonic structure of song. The water itself appears milky white, as if imbued and chemically altered by its aural properties, a basic substance turned supernatural. The amplified sound of droplets conjures the arrhythmia of breathing, and along with the pool’s primordial glow, the fountain creates its own sonic system of tracking time.

Doug Aitken, 100YRS, 303 Gallery, 2013

Behind a cavernous opening carved into the gallery’s west wall is Sunset (black), a sculptural work that resembles cast lava rock in texture and spells out the word SUNSET as it glows from behind, its letters forming a relic of the entropy and displacement inherent in the literal idea of a sunset. Viewed from and obscured behind a hole in the wall, the sculpture appears as cosmic debris, as if pulled from a parallel world where a sunset is only an idea, obfuscated by detritus of the age of post-everything, a reductionist standpoint between the modes of pop and minimalism, its glow fading into the next realm.

Doug Aitken, 100YRS, 303 Gallery, 2013

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Karen Kilimnik, Installation view at 303 Gallery, New York 2011.

Karen Kilimnik’s current show at 303 Gallery in Chelsea is refreshingly spare and conceptually tight. Centered on a multimedia installation from 1989 titled The Hellfire Club Episode of the Avengers, the show also includes a few drawings from the late ‘80s and a handful of paintings and photographs from 2011. The disparate elements on view gel to create a sort of mini-opera, complete with a crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling. Right before you can scream “kitsch!” the show stakes the claim that performing arts-style drama is relevant in contemporary fine art, and it’s utterly convincing (unless you hate Sofia Coppola and Black Swan, then don’t bother, and p.s. you’re boring).

Karen Kilimnik, Master Hare, 3rd Lord Grantham 2011.

Carrying much of the dramatic weight here is the audio track in the Avengers installation. Re-mastered to be louder and clearer than the original, the track includes snippets of Madonna, Haydn, and the Rolling Stones, among others. It weaves its way into your experience, tying it in with a mood that could be described as “retro-sinister.” Apparently, the installation is based on a particularly saucy and controversial episode of the British cult classic spy TV series by the same name — but you don’t really need to know that to be drawn into the work. Unlike many installations that still feature the stultifying Bill Viola “art hum,” (a.k.a. pretentiously creepy mouth breathing sounds), Kilimnik understands the power of a good soundtrack. The audio, which is at turns catchy, ambient and suspenseful, lends a bit of drama to a trio of fairly pedestrian full moon photos, and overall imbues the show with a dynamic narrative that would otherwise be absent.

Karen Kilimnik, The Hellfire Club episode of the Avengers, 1989, mixed media Installation view at 303 Gallery, New York, 2011

The simplistic term “Scatter Art”, for which Kilimnik became known at the outset of her career, fails to describe how varied and formally acute The Hellfire Club Episode of the Avengers really is. Despite the staging and use of prop-like materials, Kilimnik knows how to throw stuff around in a way that feels way more considered than clusterfucked.  For instance, a faint white chalk drawing of an Edwardian manor on black paper ever-so-gently peels away from the black wall. A black velvet curtain on the same wall leads to nowhere, casually adding an unseen dimension.  Plastic axes and Halloween-grade cobwebs are manipulated in a way that transcends a haunted house aesthetic without stripping them of their store-bought oomph.  Although it might sound corny, a group of photos, Xeroxes, empty picture frames and shards of glass flesh out what is an immersive theatrical experience.

Karen Kilimnik, The Family in Scotland, 2011.

Few artists assimilate such disparate personal fetishes into their art as seamlessly as Kilimnik does.  In any given piece, she implicates widespread historical eras, painterly techniques, and psychological states.  The Ragamuffin of Kiddington Hall is as fey and dashing as any Fragonard, but with a touch of Brit rock attitude. Her drawings, which take their cues from advertising and employ a speedy illustrative touch, are impossible to date. They have a ‘60s vibe that looks simultaneously current, yet they were actually made in 1989.  Kilimnik’s signature knack for turning animal portraits into fetching character studies is also present in dog and cat paintings that are both fragile and endearing.

Karen Kilimnik, entre acte photo, 2011.

In essence, this show seems to be about the fleeting nature of… well, nature. It’s almost like if you were to stare at some of the works too long, they might dash off the wall or fade away like a passing trend. Kilimnik can be equally hard to pin down. According to the current issue of Interview magazine, she recently relocated to Montana from her longtime home in the Philadelphia suburbs. Who knows, maybe this accounts for the spaciousness of the installation. A full moon photo called My Walk in the Woods at Night underscores the noir vibe that prevails in this show, in lieu of her usual regally saccharine interior worlds. This time we’re outside, sort of… under the chandelier-lit night sky.

Inside Job, 2010 mixed media 29 3/4 x 21 1/4 inches

Can’t we all just learn to trust Sue Williams? So what if, after all her stylistic shifts, she’s showing a new body of work devoted to 9/11 conspiracy theories? And big deal that these are the exact same theories espoused by President Ahmadinejad of Iran that were publicly denounced by President Obama. For all of the artists who give lip service to taking risks, Williams actually brings it.  She left David Zwirner after only one show and returned to 303 to stage a mini-retrospective called Al-Qaeda is the CIA. Hell Yes.

Curated by artist Nate Lowman, the exhibition spans from Williams’ feminist works of the 1990s to new works that continue patterning techniques visible in her 2008 show at Zwirner. In her review of that show, Roberta Smith said, “The large paintings could almost be printed textile or wall paper…that they are made by Ms. Williams is an impressive feat, but that doesn’t diminish their by-the-yard deadness.”  Weird, since wallpaper has always been a major element in Williams’ work and also figures prominently here.

Giuliani, 2010 mixed media 12 x 16 1/2 inches

New collages expose opulent interior décor as a cheap cover-up for the darker parts of the human psyche. In Inside Job, fringed curtains pull away to reveal the most calligraphic nut sack you’ll ever encounter.  Other works combine drawings of Cheney and Rumsfeld with paint swatches and parlor-style wallpaper that would be a perfectly quaint backdrop for a Condi Rice piano recital.

Whether it’s domestic violence, dripping intestines, group sex, gaping assholes, or just the way a swaying blue line naughtily overlaps a red one, Williams has always been about exposing urge. Her large-scale, intestinal war paintings seem to posit that an inevitable pull toward destruction lives inside all of us. However, her increasingly deft line work and buoyant colors ultimately render the works more humorous than morbid.

With Polka Dots, 2009 Ink and acrylic on acetate 39 1/4 x 50 inches

Whether or not you buy into 9/11 as an inside job doesn’t really matter here—Williams’ all-in commitment to her vision is persuasive enough. It is obvious that she is an artist who despises complacency. In an era where it seems like everyone is trying to be a straight-A student of the world, she is in the back of the classroom carving a very delicately drawn “Fuck You” into her desk.