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Collie, 25. For six years Collie has been trying to free sculpture from its footing. His first New York show reveals the results. He hides magnets in simple bases and in aluminum or magnesium spheres, which then float free. At times they require nylon cord to hold them in place, but Collie's works point to directions in sculpture that are filled with potential. Through June 20.
ART OF NEPALAsia House, 112 East 64th. The rare religious art of the tiny Himalayan kingdom receives its first major showing. Gently curving sculptures, gilded and embellished with precious stones, are graceful incarnations of divinities, while cloth paintings of elaborate, mandalas chart the journey of the soul. The works span 15 centuries. Through Aug. 30.
BEN JOHNSONGallery 63, 721 Madison Ave. at 63rd. Johnson is the Lachaise of the canvas, a lover of woman who celebrates her in his art. His nudes are landscapes of the female figure, hills and valleys of flesh that burst into bloom with a profusion of poppies, or loll in fields of kelly green and American Beauty red. Thirty oils. Through June 13.
MIDTOWN
LUCIANO MINGUZZIViviano, 42 East 57th. No country can claim a sculpture tradition equal to Italy's. This exhibition and the one at Odyssia (below) offer a survey of some of its brilliant inheritors. Minguzzi, commissioned to do the final door for the Duomo of Milan, has finished it. Cast with 22,000 lbs. of bronze and 27 ft. high, the door when installed will complete the cathedral after 600 years. On view are the bronze figures that will form a historical panorama on the door, a touching procession of sinners and saints. Through June 27.
CONSAGRA & FRIENDSOdyssia, 41 East 57th. A remarkable display of virtuosity: Italian Sculptors Pietro Consagra, Alberto Viani, Quinto Ghermandi, Francesco Somaini and Leoncillo. Through June 6.
PAUL REBEYROLLEMarlborough-Gerson. 41 East 57th. The U.S. gets its first good look at a French painter who serves up frogs, couples and countrysides. As if performing a fertility rite in the paint itself Rebeyrolle stirs around a mess of green to convey the spume and spawn of swamp life and, with a calculated confusion of limbs, portrays lovers tumbling in a field, successfully suggests the mystery and fecundity of nature. Thirty oils. Through June 9.
IDELLE WEBERSchaefer, 32 East 57th. Paintings by hard-edge artist Idelle Weber, whose frozen figures stand silhouetted as they marry, brush their teeth or ride escalators. "The way people stand and the cut of their suits often tell more than their faces," says she. Through June 20.
PAUL WONNERPoindexter, 21 West 56th. The grim faces on this Californian's figures clash with the gentle waves of gouache in which he bathes them. But in landscapes he finds freedom and freshness: Studio Window, Malibu opens onto a ballet of sunshine dancing on leaves. Through June 13.
