Making Cindy Sherman Proud

Mercedes Helnwein’s immaculately executed drawings play out like dramatically lit, attractively cast indie flicks. To wit: In various works a jaded Lower East Side spinster type acts coy, wears torturously high heels, and poses half-naked with a duck. In this exhibition, aptly titled “Strange Days,� Helnwein (the Austria-born artist and talented offspring of the Austrian-Irish painter–photographer–performance artist Gottfried Helnwein) pictures a cast of strong, mysterious, seductive, peculiar women.

Check out this work and others at her New York solo debut, up at Bespoke Gallery through the weekend. —Rachel Wolff