Jonathan Goodman reviews Elisa Jensen: 100 Boats and the Fair Wheel, recently on view at David & Schweitzer Contemporary, New York.

Goodman writes: “[Jensen’s] offering, which argues for a bronze-age reading of Brooklyn contemporary art, consists of a wall installation of diminutive golden boats, a group of small paintings, a few larger paintings, and a bench on which to view the exhibition in its entirety. The walls are painted in black, and add to an experience of mystical involvement, an unspoken but pervasive experience in the artist’s work. Jensen takes a strong interest in the Celtic imagination; this is both part of her background and an intellectual and emotional pursuit. The show amounts to a miniature retrospective of the artist, whose efforts can be seen as not-quite-occult investigations into phenomena beyond our ken. This means that the works have to be understood not only with the eye but also with the imagination. Doing so allows her audience to appreciate the art’s direct mediation with invisible, but also cultural, matters.”