Be sure to anticipate crowds of people on W. 27th street since many of the prominent emerging artist galleries host openings tonight. Derek Eller presents figurative works on paper by David Dupuis, Wallspace features a loose video adaptation of Goethe's Sorrows... by Amy Granat, Drew Heitzler, and Olivier Mosset, Foxy Production shows Hany Armanious’s Beuys-like installations, Mixed Greens presents a tremendous new drawing in ballpoint pen by Joan Linder, and celebrity collage artist Scott Hug’s media investigations hang at John Connelly Presents. Several other worthwhile exhibitions opening tonight can be found here.

Documentary photographer and filmmaker Danny Lyon presents a reading from his latest book Like a Thief's Dream at the Whitney, Friday 12 October. The artist has been known for his "New Journalism" photographic practice as well as his montages and occasional films — the best known of which center on renegade bikers and prison inmates.

In conjunction with Staring Back, Chris Marker’s current photo show on view at the gallery, Peter Blum in SoHo will be screening several films by the artist. Tonight at 7pm The Sixth Face of the Pentagon (1968), The Embassy (1973), and À Bientôt J'Espère (1967) will be shown. All three films, the second a fiction and the other two documentaries, are about the uncertainties and potentials of social political struggle. On Thursday, 18 October, the gallery will screen the Marker’s highly formative sci-fi dystopia La Jetée (1963) and Remembrance of Things to Come (2002), Marker’s more recent documentary effort — both films are almost completely composed of still images.

Next Wednesday, 17 October, the Guggenheim will host "Reagen-Era America", one of several panel discussions presented this month along with “Richard Prince: Spiritual America.” The panel's titular topic will discuss the political and cultural climate of the late 70s and early 80s, and will be moderated by Johanna Burton; participating commentators will be critics Todd Gitlin, Isabelle Graw, Julia Bryan-Wilson, and Gil Troy.