Alex Paik: Studio Visit
Paul Behnke photoblogs a visit to the studio of Alex Paik. Behnke notes that "Paik's small, delicate, abstract compositions of paper, gouache, and colored pencil provide complex visual experiences form humble means." Paik writes of his work: "The work reflects my love of contrapuntal music, imitating the way that the theme of a fugue is […]
Russell Tyler: Analogue Future
Thomas Micchelli reviews the exhibition Russell Tyler: Analogue Future at DCKT Contemporary, New York, on view through January 26, 2013. Micchelli writes: "The thickly painted, brightly buzzing circles, rectangles and trapezoids in Analogue Future — which includes conventionally rectilinear canvases as well as several tondos — derive from the 8-bit graphics of primitive computer programs […]
Romare Bearden’s Odyssey
Andrew Alexander reviews the exhibition Romare Bearden: A Black Odyssey at the Michael C. Carlos Museum, Emory University, Atlanta, on view through March 9, 2014. Alexander writes: "Bearden’s depiction of the perils that befall Odysseus… can also be understood as parallels to the heroic story of African American survival — a collective and ongoing epic. […]
Jane Kent @ Pocket Utopia
Sharon Butler blogs about the exhibition Jane Kent: Knock Knock, new work at Pocket Utopia, New York, on view through February 16, 2014. Butler writes that the show features Kent's "buoyant silkscreen prints … generated from the quirky shapes of unfolded cardboard boxes… I particularly liked 'Blue Nose' for the off-kilter stacking, scalloped line, and central […]
Ad Reinhardt: A Protean Intelligence
Altoon Sultan blogs about a recent exhibition of works by Ad Reinhardt at David Zwirner Gallery, New York. Sultan writes that the exhibition demonstrated "the range of Reinhardt's output, his piercing intelligence, and his sharp eye… Thirteen of [of Reinhardt's 'Black Paintings'] are gathered in this one room of the gallery, skylit so you can […]
Sizing up Léger’s ‘The City’
Tyler Green considers what the recent exhibition Léger: Modern Art and the Metropolis at the Philadelphia Museum of Art said about the significance of Fernand Léger's contribution to Modernism, in particular the relative greatness of his painting The City (1919). Green writes that the exhibition "was successful in arguing for Léger as The Painter of Urban […]
Sideshow Nation II: At the Alamo
In a five-part series of photoblog posts, Anne Russinof documents many paintings from Sideshow Nation II: At the Alamo, curated by Richard Timperio, on view at Sideshow Gallery, Williamsburg, Brooklyn (through March 3, 2014). The epic annual exhibition is hung floor to ceiling and features the work of hundreds of New York artists. View the posts […]
Sofia Leiby: The Drama of Leisure
Alan Pocaro reviews the exhibition Sofia Leiby: The Drama of Leisure at Devening Projects, Chicago, on view through January 18, 2014. Pocaro writes: "Presented, according to the artist’s statement, as products of her 'free-time,' these airy compositions feel less like assertions of the soul’s liberation from constraints, and more like affirmations of work’s subjugation of the […]
Mira Schor: Notes from Underground
Joanna Roche reviews the recent exhibition Mira Schor: Chthonic Garden at CB1 Gallery, Los Angeles. Roche writes that in Schor's new work "interplay between above and below is key. Chthonic means underground and the concept of lying fallow has deep meaning for the artist. Her paintings—largely ink and oil on gesso on linen—suggest that underground […]
Kathryn Lynch: Interview
Haniya Rae interviews painter Kathryn Lynch on the occasion of the recent exhibition Kathryn Lynch: A Silent Language at Sears Peyton Gallery, New York. Lynch comments: "Really, it happens so subconsciously. All of a sudden something on my periphery will have this activity to it—a liveliness. Something I see as I pass by slowly gets […]
Rose Wylie: Studio Visit
A new film, produced by Jennifer Higgie for Frieze films documents a visit the the studio of painter Rose Wylie. Wylie comments about being moved by the visual impact of things: "the excitement of what I've seen should be communicated – should be in the painting I make." She also talks about the dialogue between […]
Ted Gahl: Interview
Corydon Cowansage interviews painter Ted Gahl on the occasion of the exhibition Ted Gahl: Sundays (Like the Brightest Light in the Theatre Shining On An Empty Stage) at DODGE Gallery, New York, on view from January 11 — February 23, 2014. Asked about using non-traditional materials in paintings Gahl comments "it's… that funny question of […]
The London Group: 1913-1963
Ana McNay reviews the exhibiton Uproar! The first 50 years of The London Group 1913-1963 at the Ben Uri Museum and Gallery, London, on view through March 2, 2014. McNay writes that the exhibition "celebrates the first 50 years of the group –which still exists today… In 50 works by 50 artists, it moves through […]
Maya Hayuk @ the Hammer Museum
Photoblog: installation views of an exhibition of Maya Hayuk's mural paintings at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, on view through January 26, 2014. The museum press release notes: "With their symmetrical compositions, intricate patterns, and lush colors, Maya Hayuk’s paintings and massively scaled murals recall views of outer space, traditional Ukrainian crafts, airbrushed manicures, and […]
Sarah Awad: The Women
Eve Wood reviews the recent exhibition Sarah Awad: The Women at Diane Rosenstein Fine Art, Los Angeles. Wood writes: "For this show, Awad's paintings are divided into two groups: large-scale female nudes and landscapes. Yet, compositionally, these two distinct categories are at once blurred though vaguely connected through space and movement. In Untitled Reclining Women […]
Louisa Matthiasdottir: Sensuous Discipline
John Goodrich reviews the exhibition Louisa Matthiasdottir: Paintings and Works on Paper at Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York, on view through January 11, 2014. Goodrich writes: "An extraordinarily self-possessed and disciplined painter, [Mattiasdottir] turned Hofmann’s often bombastic exuberance in a very different direction, towards a keen-eyed affection for the appearance of things, even when […]
Kandinsky: Blaue Reiter to the Bauhaus
Piri Halasz reviews the exhibition Vasily Kandinsky: From Blaue Reiter to the Bauhaus, 1910-1925 at the Neue Galerie, New York, on view through February 10, 2014. Halasz writes: "I’ve never been a passionate fan of later work by Kandinsky, but I found myself liking some of these paintings better than I’d expected, with the stand-out […]
Wayne Thiebaud: Reinventing Reality
John Yau writes about the work of Wayne Thiebaud on view in the recent exhibition Wayne Thiebaud: Memory Mountains at Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco. Yau writes: "Memory Mountains revealed that Thiebaud’s deepest ambition from the outset was nothing less than the reinvention of generic subjects, such as still-life, landscape and cityscape — which may […]
Forrest Bess: Painting Things Visible
After viewing the exhibition Forrest Bess: Seeing Things Invisible at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, Viktor Witkowski argues against the accepted view of Forrest Bess as a "visionary artist." Witkowski writes: "While the visions or dreams that Bess claimed to experience regularly have received most of the attention in numerous articles and essays on his […]
Simone Montemurno: When You Sign Your Name
Geoff Tuck reviews the recent exhibition Simone Montemurno: When You Sign Your Name at metro pcs, Los Angeles. Tuck writes: "In this exhibition Montemurno has provided the viewer with access to several points of view: a shared one with the artist as a participant in looking; one’s own perspective, as an independent viewer; and also […]