FutureModern

Thursday, June 04, 2009

Alice Neel at Zwirner

Wow! this is a must see exhibition, along with the late Picasso's, the best of the season.

David Zwirner is presenting two concurrent exhibitions of Alice Neel’s work, the first since announcing its representation of her Estate.
• Alice Neel: Selected Works at David Zwirner, at 533 West 19th Street, May 14 through June 20, 2009.
• Alice Neel: Nudes of the 1930s at Zwirner & Wirth, at 32 East 69th Street, May 6 through June 20, 2009

Alice neel is a painter I have always been aware of, but almost entirely through the occasional reproduction here and there. Over the last few years I have rediscovered her work. This occurred the best way possible, accidentally, primarily in group shows, as an answer to the reflexive question "who did that?"

So last week when my painter friend Biff Elrod said to me, "Alice Neel has a knockout show at Zwirner" I took the subway uptown and we went to see it together. He was right, the exhibition of Alice Neel's early works at Zwirner and Wirth (69th Street) were gritty precursors to her later paintings.

A few days later we walked over to Chelsea to see the Picasso's, on the way we stopped by Zwirner (20th Street) only to be surprised with the other half of the exhibition. The element of surprise, stumbling upon an exhibition you didn't expect and finding that it exceeds all of your expectations, well that's really nice.

I'm not going to say a whole lot about these works, I've just seen the exhibition once and I am sure that there are other writers who can fill you in on the details of her life. (There's also a video available, which I haven't seen yet)

What I will say is that these paintings stand above almost all other representational paintings made in the latter part of the twentieth century. They represent the full complexity a pictorial image is able to present, both visually, conceptually and psychologically.

The images below are in chronological order. The 1930 painting Rhoda Myers Nude is at Zwirner and Wirth Gallery uptown, and the rest are at the David Zwirner Gallery in Chelsea.

Alice Neel
Rhoda Myers Nude
1930
Oil on canvas
29 3/4 x 26 inches, 75.6 x 66 cm
At Zwirner and Wirth Gallery (32 E 69th Street)

The next two were painted during the heart of WWII. Sam and Hartley is a poignant image of the darkness felt in those years.

Alice Neel
Sam, Snow (How like the winter)
1945
Oil on canvas
30 x 24 inches 76.2 x 61 cm

Alice Neel
Sam and Hartley
c. 1945
Oil on canvas
30 x 27 inches 76.2 x 68.6 cm

1950's, the male dominated anti-representational period of Greenberg and the Abstract Expressionists

Alice Neel
Ballet Dancer
1950
Oil on canvas
20 1/8 x 42 1/8 inches 51.1 x 107 cm

Alice Neel
Hartley
1952
Oil on canvas
32 x 20 1/4 inches 81.3 x 51.4 cm

Alice Neel
Rita and Hubert
1958
Oil on canvas
34 x 40 inches 86.4 x 101.6 cm

Alice Neel
George Arce
1959
Oil on canvas
36 x 25 inches 91.4 x 63.5 cm

1960's, the look in the eyes of Cindy is priceless and her handling of the plaid on the dress is wonderful.

Alice Neel
Cindy
1960
Oil on canvas
28 x 18 inches 71.1 x 45.7 cm

Alice Neel
Jerry Sokol
1964
Oil on canvas
40 x 28 inches 101.6 x 71.1 cm

Monday, April 20, 2009

Regrouping: Art Market at FIT

Regrouping: art world professionals examine the art market
Wednesday, April 22
Symposium: 7:00-8:30pm
Katie Murphy Auditorium, FIT
7th Avenue at 27th Street (d building)

This sounded like it might be interesting:

Following years of wild expansion and commercial vitality, the last six months in the art world - as in all business sectors - have seen rocky auction and art fair sales, abrupt gallery closures and publicly expressed dealer woe.

Our panel, moderated by FIT adjunct faculty member, independent art consultant and co-founder of NADA, Sheri Pasquarella, will attempt to assess where things stand and what the long-term picture might look like.

The selected panelists are Paul Morris, co-founder of the Armory Show, Lowell Pettit, art advisor, Walter Robinson, critic and editor of Artnet, Yvonne Garcia, director of development of the Bronx Museum, and Florence Lynch, curaatoe and director of Florence Lynch Gallery.

FIT on 7th Avenue

A public service announcement

Wednesday, April 08, 2009

John Waters's at Marianne Boesky

John Waters's exhibition "Rear Projection" at Marianne Boesky Gallery from April 3rd through May 2, 2009. The exhibition consists of thirty-six photographs and four sculptures and runs concurrently with his film "Rear Projection" which will be on view at Gagosian Gallery in Los Angeles from April 11 – May 23, 2009.

This was a nice exhibition, worth a second visit when maybe I can take some better photographs than those supplied by the gallery which are rediculously small.

John Waters
Installation View, 2009

John Waters
Control 2009
Fiberglass, silicone, urethane, acrylic, human and synthetic hair, fabric and wood.
approximately 48 x 30 x 30 inches
Edition of 5

Espèces d’espaces at Yvon Lambert

An exhibition of note: Espèces d’espaces at Yvon Lambert:

A group exhibition featuring works by Robert Barry, Louise Bourgeois, Michael Brown, Stefan Brüggemann, André Cadere, Carter, Enrico Castellani, Liam Gillick, Jenny Holzer, Roni Horn, Bethan Huws, On Kawara, Zilvinas Kempinas, Anselm Kiefer, Louise Lawler, Zoe Leonard, Jill Magid, Brice Marden, Jonathan Monk, Roman Opalka, Christian Vetter, Ian Wallace and Lawrence Weiner.
The exhibition runs from March 28, 2009 through May 16, 2009.

Visit the Yvon Lambert Gallery New York for more pictures.

Espèces d’espaces
Installation view 2009

Robert Barry
Steel Disc Suspended 1/8 Inch Above Floor(#3) 1967
Steel and nylon string
Installation dimensions variable:
Steel disc: 3 inches in diameter x 5/8 inches high

Alan d'Archangelo at Michell-Innes & Nash

Mitchell-Innes & Nash has a very nice exhibition of seldom seen works by the POP artist Alan d'Archangelo (1930-1998) The exhibition runs from April 2 – May 2, 2009.

This is an exhibition which helps to expand the narrow confines imposed by ideas of a "signature style" It was clear from the works exhibited that there is more to d'Archangelo's work than a centerline. An important exhibition which should not be missed.

Mitchell-Innes & Nash has a good set of images from the exhibition on their website.

Alan d'Archangelo
Place of Assination 1965-1967
Acrylic and collage on canvas, metal road sign, cut plastic and objects
99 1/2 x 189 inches
262.7 x 400.1 cm.

The image above gives a better idea of how this piece situates itself in space.

Sunday, March 29, 2009

Louise Fishman at Cheim and Read

Louise Fishman exhibits new paintings at the Cheim and Read Gallery from March 26 through May 2, 2009.

Louise has been painting for awhile and her works reflect it. I want to reintroduce a word into the vernacular for describing paintings, and that word is "tough."

Louise Fishman makes "tough paintings" in a period when most painters don't have a clue what this means. Ms. Fishman's paintings are direct, raw expressions of the action and thinking process of the making of a painting. There is no bullshit, just paint, laid on directly, with a forceful intent.

When one is willing to accept this premise, a premise that we are vicariously experiencing the process of making the painting and accepting it as a metaphor for affecting the world in which we live. This process, this process of making a mark, a mark made so deliberately and with intent, is a metaphor for all our of illusions we harbor about a life which we do not control.

The painting Telling, dark to the point of being nearly almost all black, touches on that point where we do not want to go. It sits silently, a testament to a specific point in psychological time.

Within all this bravado, using this forcefully directed implement which leaves its shadow as a mark, lies a hidden sensitivity to truths which lie obliquely to apparent events. These marks which have a history coincident with the object, the painting, itself. These marks, furrows in the paint, scratching, colliding or smearing towards some temporal truth, a point of stoppage.

Tough painting.

Louise Fishman
GEOGRAPHY 2007
Acrylic on canvas
72 x 65 inches
182.9 x 165.1 cm.

Louise Fishman
SLIPPERY SLOPE 2006
Oil on linen
88 x 65 inches
223.5 x 165.1 cm.

Louise Fishman
ARCTIC SEA 2007
Acrylic on canvas
72 x 65 inches
182.9 x 165.1 cm.

Louise Fishman
HEART ON FIRE 2007
Acrylic on canvas
66 x 39 inches
167.6 x 99.1 cm.

Louise Fishman
SWARM OF DREAMS 2007
Acrylic on canvas
66 x 39 inches
167.6 x 99.1 cm.

Louise Fishman
COOKED AND BURNT 2007
Oil on linen
66 x 39 inches
167.6 x 99.1 cm.

Louise Fishman
FIRE AND ICE 2009
Oil on jute
66 1/4 x 38 3/4 inches
168.3 x 98.4 cm.

Louise Fishman
TELLING 007
Oil on linen
70 x 56 inches
177.8 x 142.2 cm

Martin Borowski at Stellan Holm Gallery

Martin Borowski exhibition of new paintings at Stellan Holm Gallery March 7, through April 30, 2009.

Martin Borowski was born in Hoyerswerd, East Germany in 1970 and studied at the Dresden Academy of Fine Art. Somehow this seemed relevant to me in retrospect, an awareness of an artists roots in place and time,

My first impression of Mr Borowski's paintings evoked memories of Edward Hopper, not so much in their stylistic appearance, but in their quiet melancholy and stillness. The gallery press release uses the German word Sehnsucht, "that literally means "longing" or in a wider sense a kind of "intensely missing"

The photograph has changed representational painting, shifting it's focus towards a visual semiotic by allowing ones attention to subtly shift away from the capturing of a constantly shifting image. The image may be the same but the painter has the option to explore other structures and associations.

At the same time, the photograph is a cruel taskmaster with its insistent focus on "the correct detail of a single point reality." Painters know this isn't true and that they must "own" the photograph, if not, why bother?

I spoke with Martin Borowski at the exhibition opening, and he works with the painting images in Photoshop as a guide for the paintings. I do a similar thing, in a different way, and this "preprocessing" provides a visualization structure of the final image which leaves the painter free to just paint.

In this respect, Martin Borowski's paintings are deceptive. They are masterfully understated, with an attention to what detail is necessary and what is not, thus simplifying the image and honing its focus. This process of simplification abstracts the image creating a tension between the abstract structure and the representational space in the image, the paintings flicker between the two, shifting ones experiential focus.

However he starts on the paintings, they feel willed into existence using a brush masterfully guided with an absolute minimum of corrections. Again this is deceptive, it looks so right one accepts the painting as inevitable in its final state. There is a sense of Germanic 'control' in its execution, but it is as offhand as Velasquez in its directness of depiction.

Painting as Poetry

Borowski's paintings create their own world, a distillation of the artists memories and feelings at some point in time, hence my earlier reference to his youth in the GDR. His paintings have what I've always considered a Northern Germanic light, a cool grayish light, even in the summer. This chromatic paradigm establishes a certain psychological state, a distanced melancholy we pretend does not exist.

Each painting evokes a particular emotional or psychological state, one which is frequently incomplete in its resolution. It is ones sense of this missing element which evokes an inner response that longs for completion within the viewer.

There is a certain generic quality to Borowski's images, duplication of images, as well as extensive series such as Museum 11. In a way it is this generic quality which helps make his images universal, a brick is a brick. This creates a stage setting, Borowski's world, which the viewer can explor his own experience from the same stimulus. This is a form of poetry, this evoking of a psychological experience through images.

After some tens of thousands of years, we must ask ourselves why is it that man still makes paintings?