George Inness’ Constant Cohesion
Kevin Muente reflects on George Inness' painting Near The Village, October in the collection of the Cincinnati Art Museum. Muente writes: "Tonal shapes read harmoniously throughout. Grass plains flow and mysteriously turn into a stand of trees. Buildings in the village Inness handled in a similar fashion to an overturned log in the foreground. The […]
Diebenkorn’s Fields of Silence
Deborah Barlow writes about the her experiences viewing Richard Diebenkorn's Ocean Park paintings on view at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. through Septmber 23, 2012. Barlow notes that a "facet of this work and this artist that is important to not overlook is what Ocean Park has come to say about Diebenkorn himself. […]
Conversation with Alfred Leslie
Teri Tynes talks to painter Alfred Leslie about his recent exhibition The Lives of Some Women at Janet Borden Gallery, New York. Tynes writes: "The images of women in 'The Lives of Some Women' similarly reflect… unnatural realism, pictures where light sources are unjustified. Beyond this approach, the images reflect on the layering, semi-erasures and […]
Bad Painting Revisited
Taking Michael H. Miller's post of images from the 1978 New Museum exhibition Bad Painting as a catalyst, Sharon Butler asks if the label should be revisited in a contemporary context with "some specific examples, because the changing nature of what we consider bad painting is a fascinating subject for a good discussion. If these […]
Charline von Heyl @ the ICA
Joanne Mattera blogs about a recent exhibition of paintings by Charline von Heyl at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA. Mattera writes that von Heyl "plies color against black and white, and she uses a variety of picture-making materials in her paintings. Some are rich and drippy; others, rendered more minimally with charcoal and a […]
Renoir Paints a Picture
Katherine Luer blogs about Pierre-Auguste Renoir's extraordinary drive to paint late in life and posts a video of Renoir painting in 1915. She writes: "Renoir suffered from debilitating rheumatoid arthritis for [the] last three decades or so of his life. His hands were deformed, his joints severely damaged, and he was wheelchair-bound for most of […]
Karl Benjamin (1925 – 2012)
Suzanne Muchnic reports on the death of painter Karl Benjamin, July 26 at the age of 86. Benjamin's work was recently on view in the exhibition Karl Benjamin and the Evolution of Abstraction, 1950-1980 at Louis Stern Fine Arts, Los Angeles. Muchnic notes that "in a 1986 essay Benjamin wrote: 'I am an intuitive painter, […]
Painting and Its Discontents
Allison Meier blogs about two exhibitions of recent MFAs and one featuring MFA alumni: The Joan Mitchell Foundation 2011 MFA Grant Recipients at CUE Art Foundation (through July 28), RISD MFA Painting 2012… at 532 Gallery Thomas Jaeckel (through July 26) and Pratt Alumni Painters at the Pratt Manhattan Gallery (through July 28). Meier writes that the exhibitions […]
Homer Watson: ‘Canadian Constable’
Gary Michael Dault considers the paintings of Homer Watson (1855–1936), dubbed the "Canadian Constable" by Oscar Wilde. Paintings by Watson are on view at the Homer Watson House & Gallery, Ontario, Canada through September 30, 2012. The exhibition focuses on two early paintings that Dault notes are in a style that owes its "affiliation to […]
Iva Gueorguieva: In the Studio
A video of painter Iva Gueorguieva in her studio, posted on the occasion of the exhibition Iva Gueorguieva: Recoiling Earth at Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects, on view through August 23, 2012. Gueorguieva discusses the essential nature of studio time and the important, magical nature of the painting process: "A lot of what I do has […]
George Hendrick Breitner’s Snapshots
Leslie Anderson blogs about the paintings of George Hendrick Breitner (1857-1923), whose works are included in the exhibition Snapshot: Painters and Photography, Bonnard to Vuillard, on view at the Indianapolis Museum of Art through September 2, 2012. Anderson writes that Breitner's "immediate grasp of [photography's] potential in his own artistic process is evident in the […]
Josef Albers: Painting on Paper
Rozalia Jovanovic posts a fantastic slideshow of works from the exhibition Josef Albers in America: Painting on Paper at the Morgan Library, New York, on view through October 14, 2012. The museum notes that the exhibition's focus on exploratory studies "will reveal a private side of Albers's work… On view will be early studies (1930s–early […]
Revisiting Pollock’s Mural
Tyler Green revisits a two part interview with Pepe Karmel co-curator of the 1998 MoMA Jackson Pollock Retrospective, about Pollock's monumental, breakthrough painting Mural, which is currently undergoing a well publicized conservation. In part one Karmel notes that "It's an important painting for Jackson Pollock because it's the moment that announces his future as a […]
Julia Schwartz: In Conversation
John Seed interviews painter Julia Schwartz about her work and process. Schwartz's work is currently on view in Turbulence at George Lawson Gallery, Culver City (through August 4, 2012) and her exhibition Trading Maps for Stars will be on view at Bleicher Gallery, La Brea from September 15 – October 15, 2012. Seed writes: "When […]
The Color Picture Now: Feeling Foremost
Carl Belz considers "color as a vehicle of emotional content" in the work of three painters: Ronnie Landfield, Sandi Slone, and Darryl Hughto. Belz writes that "each [artist] has now been painting for more than four decades, and each has in the process periodically made ambitiously large pictures, as well as pictures that are frankly […]
Noah Davis: Savage Wilds
Erin Langner reviews the exhibition Noah Davis: Savage Wilds at James Harris Gallery, Seattle, WA, on view through August 24, 2012. Langner writes: "The six new paintings comprising Savage Wilds by L.A. artist Noah Davis pop wildly with disparate references, ranging from talk show host Maury Povich to Mondrian. Evocative of flat screens with TV […]
Two Very Different Kinds of Abstraction
Sam Cornish reviews two exhibitions that might represent poles of abstract painting: Arturo Bonfanti: Paintings, Reliefs and Sculpture 1960-1972, at Austin Desmond and Frank Bowling: Recent Paintings at Hales Gallery, both on view through July 27, 2012. Of Bonfanti's work, Cornish writes that "One of the interesting ways in which they fight against being simply […]
Douglas Melini @ Feature Inc.
Kris Chatterson photo blogs images from the exhibition Douglas Melini: A Sharing of Color and Being Part of It at Feature Inc., New York, on view through August 11, 2012. The gallery notes: "Working with the contrast between a minimal palette and intensive patterning (a dialog that allows the paintings to be simultaneously quiet yet […]
Denyse Thomasos: 1964 – 2012
Jillian Steinhauer remembers painter Denyse Thomasos, who died unexpectedly July 19 at age 47. Steinhauer quotes John Yau: "Thomasos is known for her abstract paintings in which images of housing blocks, tiered parking garages, warehouses, scaffolding and abstract passages occupied an expanding, hyperbolic space. Her multi-layered, constructed space evokes something between a merry-go-round and a […]
Painting Is History
James Kalm visits the exhibition Painting Is History at Winkleman Gallery, New York, featuring work by Charles Browning, The Chadwicks, David Fertig, Joe Fig, Valerie Hegarty, and Steve Mumford, on view through August 10, 2012. Kalm notes that the exhibition theme "plays off the traditional roll of painting as the recorder of history, and how, […]