Picasso, Music & Negative Space
Andrea Kirsch reports on Picasso Guitars 1912-1914, on view at MOMA through June 6, 2011. Kirsch writes "like abstraction, for which music was both inspiration and justification, Picasso’s interest in negative space grew out of thinking about music; not musical form and language, but music production." In addition to thinking about the production of sound […]
Pat Steir at Cheim & Read
Steven Alexander dicusses Pat Steir's exhibition Winter Paintings at Cheim & Read through March 26, 2011. Alexander writes "One's initial reaction to these works is inevitably a sense of awe — at the sheer beauty and sensuality of the images, at the massive scale and the technical impossibility of Steir's control over her process." The […]
George Condo’s Schtick
Sharon Butler provides a great round up of the copious press surrounding George Condo's much discussed, mostly venerated exhibition George Condo: Mental States, at The New Museum through May 8, 2011. Butler comments: "When I saw the show I was struck by Condo's painterly brio, but I haven't given the paintings much thought since, except […]
Kathe Kollwitz: True Grit
Artist Philip Koch finds inspiration in the drawings of Kathe Kollwitz. Koch looks at Kollwitz's images of women as well as her illustrations for humanitarian posters. He describes an image of an old woman: "she is both incredibly solid and volumetric and at the same time is presented to us through the most elegant flat […]
When is a Painting Finished?
As part of his blog series about slow looking James Elkins ponders the "ferociously difficult" question of when a painting is finished. He examines 'unfinished' paintings from a number of painters including Parmigianino, Cezanne, and de Kooning "map[ing] out three of the fundamental ways that paintings can be unfinished, because thinking about how something is […]
The Hermann Nitsch Experience
There is something fascinating about "live" painting. Painting, is nearly always a private act by a single artist alone in his or her studio. Austrian painter Hermann Nitsch brought the act of painting into the performance art arena in the 1960s with his Orgien Mysterien Theatre performances. This week he painted live at Mike Weiss […]
Rembrandt & His School
The blockbuster exhibition Rembrandt and His School: Masterworks from the Frick and Lugt Collections is on view at The Frick Collection through May 15. Laura Gilbert gives a preview of the works on view which include more than 60 works on paper from the Frits Lugt collection and a "monographic" installation of the Frick's five […]
Jon Pestoni at Lisa Cooley
[PHOTOS] Beautiful installation photos of Jon Pestoni's exhibition at Lisa Cooley. Pestoni's paintings "not only consider the nuances of light, spatial tension, and materiality but they also display an abrupt, visceral engagement with color and gesture."
Gretna Campbell
A thorough look at the life and work of painter Gretna Campbell. Working from the landscape, Campbell was a plein-air painter "at the height of the Abstract Expressionist movement… The novelty of her painting, mostly landscape, was that it was large enough to incorporate a solid and specific structure associated with studio painting, but worked […]
Australian & Danish 19th c. Landscape
Altoon Sultan calls well-deserved attention to an alternative cannon of 19th Australian and Danish landscape painters. She writes: "Luminism was defined as a peculiarly American painting style. But really, it's not; I disagree with Novak who calls it "one of the most truly indigenous styles in the history of American art."
Esteban Vicente: Concrete Improvisations
Robert C. Morgan reviews Concrete Improviations: Collages and Sculpture by Esteban Vicente at the Grey Art Gallery through March 26, 2011. Morgan writes that Vicente's collages go "beyond simply using cut and torn scraps of paper. He would enhance the surface by employing other traditional materials as well. These would include gouache, charcoal, and colored […]
Building Up Layers
Amy Mercer interviews painter Leslie Wayne about her work. Wayne's abstract paintings,which are strongly influenced by landscape painting, layer "vibrant and dissonant colors built through the structural qualities of paint…" cutting, flipping and sculpting… "the material to evoke the power of the natural world." Recent Work by Leslie Wayne is on view at the Halsey […]
Frank Lobdell
On the occasion of the exhibtion Frank Lobdell '1948-1949' on view at Hackett | Mill though April 1, 2011, John Seed muses on Lobdell's work and influence as a teacher. Seed writes: "It is energizing, and exhausting, to read between the brushstrokes of a man who meant every word and every brushstroke."
Callum Innes: Watercolor
The Tate exhibition Watercolour is on view through August 2011. Tate Shots visits artist Callum Innes at his studio. Innes' demonstrates his watercolor painting process and discusses the role of watercolor both in his own studio practice and in contemporary painting.
Burchfield: Heatwaves in a Swamp: Part 2
[VIDEO] Part 2 of "A two-part video of the exhibition, Heat Waves in a Swamp: The Paintings of Charles Burchfield, curated by artist Robert Gober."
Burchfield: Heatwaves in a Swamp
[VIDEO] The newly launched Watch and Listen website from the Whitney Museum is a repository for videos and audio podcasts from the museum. Among the featured videos is "a two-part video of the exhibition, Heat Waves in a Swamp: The Paintings of Charles Burchfield, curated by artist Robert Gober." This link is to part one.
Philip Guston: Soul Beating
A must read article by painter David Reed. Reed remembers his time at the New York Studio School and the effect Philip Guston’s painting and teaching had on him and his work. Reed gives a fascinating first-hand account of Guston’s critiques at the Studio School and the ideas he was wrestling with in his transition […]
Rebecca Salter
Artist/writer Fiona Robinson writes about the "English Agnes Martin" – Rebecca Salter. Robinson writes that Salter's "labour intensive process retains that element of craftsmanship, which she acquired during her time in Japan at a formative stage in her career. Her layering of marks, dashes, washes is worked on, removed, covered, building up residues of […]
Cezanne: Small Show, Big Punch
Larua Gilbert reviews the little/big show Cézanne's Card Players at the Metropolitan Museum of art through May 8, 2011. Gilbert writes: "The Met's version includes three of Cezanne's five "Card Players" — an ambitious series that occupied him from about 1891 to 1896 — twelve preparatory drawings and oil studies for the series, and five […]
Bold Power in Subtle Colors
Artist Philip Koch looks at color through the work of Hudson River School luminist painter Sanford Gifford. Koch states: "There's a slippery quality to color… sometimes you get it, other times it just won't give you any traction at all… What's key… is Gifford's decisiveness, choosing to let one color dominate his picture."