Link to Post:
http://structureandimagery.blogspot.com/2013/05/in-process-james-erikson.html
As part of his In Process series, Paul Behnke posts a photo-blog about the development of painter James Erikson's Slow Morning (2012).
Of his work Erikson says: "My paintings are abstractions in the sense that at some point in the painting process I’m abstracting from nature, whether consciously at the beginning or through some experience or memory I bring into the studio during the evolution of the painting. Sometimes the painting reminds me of something, a particular mood or memory of a place and it won’t go away -- that becomes the subject of the painting for me."
Link to Post:
http://www.gorkysgranddaughter.com/2013/05/clinton-king-april-2013.html
Christopher Joy and Zachary Keeting visit the studio of painter Clinton King.
King discusses the progress of individual paintings and his studio process. On the resolution of individual paintings he comments: " If it's mysterious to me and I really don't know why they look a little uncomfortable and there's a varying degree of response to them, I think they're successful… "
Link to Post:
http://hyperallergic.com/70299/whos-afraid-of-hot-pink-canary-yellow-and-midnight-blue/
John Yau reviews two exhibitions that foreground color: Paul Behnke: An Awful Rainbow at Kathryn Markel Gallery (through May 18) and Stanley Whitney: Other Colors I Forget at Team Gallery, New York (through May 12).
Yau notes that "In Behnke’s best paintings, our focus shifts between dissonance and order, large and small, solid planes and scraped 'unfinished' areas. Where an earlier layer has not been painted over, its color punches through the hole and grab us. Hot and cool colors abut, as well as complementary ones. You have the feeling that Behnke is trying to pull out all the stops, that he wants structure and chaos to coincide." Whitney, Yau writes, "extends his gamut, going from thin, crackled surfaces, to washy, translucent layers exposing painted over shapes, to solid planes of color. And he might suddenly paint wet into wet, suspending brushstrokes of maroon in a green rectangle. Clearly, there is little or no plan when he begins with one color and moves to the next. It is comparable to writing a poem word by word, rather than line by line."
Link to Post:
http://glasstire.com/2013/05/03/biggs-and-collings-suspicious-utopias-an-email-interview/
Michael Bise interviews Emma Biggs & Matthew Collings on the occasion of the exhibition Biggs and Collings: Suspicious Utopias at Fort Worth Contemporary Arts, on view through May 11, 2013.
Biggs and Collings comment: "At the moment in art culture, any proposal to do with “form” is considered bad. As something transcendent, it is automatically linked with considerations of ideology and hegemony, and is seen as an illusion that allows the viewer to remain blind to social realities. Hot contemporary art is interested in plugging in directly to those, and in this kind of art, form can be anything so long as it is explicable in terms of that connection. We, on the other hand, believe that plugging-in to social realities is often an illusion. We think institutional critique, for example, has become formulaic. We address this problem in the textual component of our show in Fort Worth. Our paintings don’t avoid difficult issues but neither do they spell them out as directly readable propaganda. We look at the material and the tangible. Things have to work: the colour has to be objective, it has to be meaningful on colour terms – the same with shape, line, tone – all the elements we use. We attack mystification ruthlessly. If there are comfortable illusions, we see our work as a blow against them."
Link to Post:
http://www.brooklynrail.org/2013/05/artseen/ted-stamm-paintings
Pac Pobric reviews a recent exhibition of paintings by Ted Stamm at Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York.
Pobric writes that in 1973 "Stamm began to focus more fully on the overall structure of his work, and soon after he discarded the more traditional square and rectangular supports. His attention turned elsewhere: to the shapes of shadows, or the design of a baseball diamond. What Stamm saw in these models was an escape from the burden of composition. If he took anything from his earlier experiments, it was that the shape of a painting should be specific and that the problem with more traditional configurations was their seemingly accidental nature. New structures allowed him to more deliberately choose the shape of his work, opening an expanded range of possibilities for art that could feel altogether fresh."
Link to Post:
http://figureground.ca/2013/05/03/a-conversation-with-rebecca-campbell/
Julia Schwartz interviews painter Rebecca Campbell.
Campbell remarks: "There is no illusion I have that I’m inventing anything. I’m returning to something that exists for all of us, so for me, things like death, things like light, because they have happened always does not make them rote or irrelevant. We each have to face death. We don’t get out of that. Nobody gets a free pass. Does that make it not meaningful, like there’s nothing new? The idea of being avant garde or new—Great poetry uses the same set of words, it simply reconfigures them into a way that allows us to be present again with the words. I think that about painting often. People do wonderfully inventive things with form, but there is sort of a finite system that we work within, and I don’t find that to be a downfall."
Link to Post:
http://www.supremefiction.com/theidea/2013/05/studio-visit-james-little.html
James Panero photo-blogs a visit the the studio of painter James Little. The exhibition James Little: Recent Work will be on view at June Kelly Gallery, New York from May 16 - June 18, 2013.
Panero's photo essay documents Little's studio, materials, and process which come together, Panero writes, to realize "a rhythmic sense of composition." He continues: "Shapes, colors, and values all work together to energize the paintings. Little's process requires constant adjustments and an attention to detail. Given the time he puts into each work, he may only create four large paintings a year."
Link to Post:
http://burnaway.org/2013/05/on-painting-and-rome-interview-with-jackie-saccoccio/
Ridley Howard interviews painter Jackie Saccoccio about her work and experience of painting in Rome.
Asked about the reference to portraitss in her recent paintings, Saccoccio comments: "As a starting point, I focus on portrait painting, mostly works from the 1500-1600’s. The original impetus was going through the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid. The presence elicited by some of those portraits—Holbein, Correggio and Ghirlandaio in particular—just got under my skin. So initially, I make notes about their paintings and then try to translate them into an abstract language with color and liquidity. Once I get painting though, its improvisational. The portraits are like one mark zooming way in, and then through to another space, unrestricted and untethered. Maybe celestial or spiritual, definitely transcendent. By making them more material, they become more psychological."
Link to Post:
http://blogs.artinfo.com/modernartnotes/2013/05/the-modern-art-notes-podcast-philip-taaffe/
Tyler Green talks to painter Philip Taaffe on the occasion of the exhibition Philip Taaffe Recent Work at Luhring Augustine, New York, on view from May 3 - Jun 15, 2013.
Commenting on the sources for his work, Taaffe remarks: "I have this idea in my head that I am referencing ancient art and the idea of the scribe. Several of the paintings in the exhibition are derived from what I think of as illuminated manuscript paintings, so in other words I am trying to get in touch with this earlier art historical reality and trying to update it in my own sense… the idea of the scribe, the idea of the mosaic patterning, has to do with ancient craftsmanship being brought up to date and being filtered through my own artistic desire, I suppose, in terms of what I would like to see in the world."
Link to Post:
http://www.nyartsmagazine.com/?p=9781
Christian Maychack interviews painter Jim Gaylord about his work.
Gaylord comments: "[Rorschach is] a very relevant concept for me right now in terms of the symmetry that’s happening in some of the work. I was thinking about why a Rorschach image is symmetrical, and there seems to be a reference to the body—our bodies and faces are symmetrical, and we’re used to seeing symmetry in life. So, I think a Rorschach image is such a provocative psychological device, and makes sense to us on such an instinctive level, because of that. If we saw half of a Rorschach, it would just be meaningless blotches, but when there is order imposed on it via symmetry, our mind says that it’s something we should recognize, and we make the next leap."
