Link to Post:
http://mnaves.wordpress.com/2013/01/31/wit-at-the-painting-center-2/
Mario Naves posts his catalogue essay for the exhibition Wit, curated by Joanne Freeman, at The Painting Center, New York through February 23, 2013. The exhibition features works by Marina Adams, Polly Apfelbaum, Joanne Freeman, Joe Fyfe, Barbara Gallucci, Phillis Ideal, Jonathan Lasker, Sarah Lutz, Doreen McCarthy, Mario Naves, Thomas Nozkowski, Paul Pagk, Ruth Root, Fran Shalom, and Stephen Westfall.
Naves writes: "Eschewing the purity that was once abstraction’s sine qua non, the artists featured in Wit opt for an almost promiscuous inclusivity. No inspiration is suspect. High-flown ambitions–sure, we got ‘em; historical cognizance, too. But these artists are also characterized by a willingness to embrace a veritable laundry list of references: nature, narrative, comics, design, technology, science, representation and, not least, humor. Not that humor has been entirely absent from the history of abstract art: Malevich pranked Mona Lisa five years before Duchamp and Mondrian paid winning homage, in oil and canvas, to his beloved boogie-woogie music. Still, abstraction nowadays is more and more a repository of quirks, tics and pictorial double entendres, having as much in common with Buster Keaton, say, as Neo-Plasticism."
Link to Post:
http://www.pirihalasz.com/blog.htm?post=884652
Piri Halasz writes about several current and recent painting exhibitions on view in Manhattan that together provide a sweeping view of abstraction over the last 70 years. The shows include: Conceptual Abstraction at Hunter College's Times Square Gallery, Helen Frankenthaler, Morris Louis, Kenneth Noland and Frank Stella at Mitchell-Innes & Nash (through November 24), Hans Hofmann: Works on Paper from the 1940s at the New York Studio School, curated by Karen Wilkin (through January 5), and Ronnie Landfield: Where It All Began at the Kenny Gallery, High School of Art & Design.
Link to Post:
http://youtu.be/W4_bVYeVp_I
James Kalm tours the exhibition Reverie @ Zürcher Studio, New York, curated by Stephen Westfall.
Kalm notes that this is "a prime group of painters dealing with the contemporary challenges of formalist abstraction. This walking tour includes views of works by: Andrea Belag, Shirley Jaffe, Alix Le Méléder, Sylvan Lionni, Julia Rommel, Patricia Treib, Stephen Westfall, Stanley Whitney."
Link to Post:
http://abstractcritical.com/2011/08/purism-off-kilter-stephen-westfall-as-painter-and-curator/
David Cohen writes about painter Stephen Westfall's work and its influence on his recent curatorial efforts.
Cohen notes "At first [Westfall's] compositions strike the viewer as well-behaved structures of pattern with decorative correlates in the applied arts... But his visual wit goes beyond mere reference to recent abstract art history. A key element in his vocabulary is the disruptive kink he will admit into his patterning that sets it off kilter; never quite subverting the flatness of the picture plane, he nonetheless allows a breeze or ripple to run across the composition."
