Art Hag

Light and Space

I am super excited for James Turrell's upcoming exhibition at the Guggenheim (opens June 21st).  It will be the artist's first exhibit in a New York museum since 1980!  In anticipation for his show, along with fellow Light and Space artist, Robert Irwin's, upcoming installation at the Whitney titled, Scrim veil — Black Rectangle — Natural light, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (1977), Art Info posted History of Light: The Pioneers, From Robert Irwin to Anthony McCall, a brief and informative overview of the key players of the 1960s, Californian art movement, Light and Space, and its related practices and artists including Dan Flavin, Mary Corse, and Anthony McCall.

See the full article at blouinartinfo.com.  Click here to see my 2010 post on the Primary Atmospheres exhibit at David Zwirner which showcased a wonderful selection of work from multiple Light and Space artists.  Click here to check out my 2010 post on Pace Gallery's Robert Irwin exhibit, Way Out West.  And click here for my 2012 post on another Light and Space pioneer, Doug Wheeler's, magnificent installation SA MI 75 DZ NY 12 at David Zwirner.

Below are a few pics I took at the February 2013 Dan Flavin exhibit at David Zwirner which inaugurated the gallery's beautiful, new West 20th Street location. 

Nick Cave | Grand Central Terminal

On Sunday, I hopped on the subway and went up to Grand Central Terminal's Vanderbilt Hall to check out the second-to-last performance of Nick Cave's terrific Heard NY.

Both wings of Vanderbilt Hall featured roped off areas containing 15 of Cave's horse suits resting on sawhorses, along with a platform for a harpist and a percussionist to play.  Arriving at 10:40am for the 11:00am performance, the crowds for both show areas were already five people deep!  One section on the side of the roped off area was reserved for parents with small children.

Promptly at 11:00am, The Ailey School dancers filed out and put on their horse suits.  Each horse required two dancers - a head and a rear-end.  When all the suits were donned, the horses began to trot around their pens accompanied by the gentle harp, playfully interacting with viewers and inviting them to pet them.  The children seemed particularly thrilled to touch the charming, colorful horses.  After a few minutes, the harpist stopped playing and the percussionist took over with a powerful, infectious beat.  The horses began dancing wildly.  The William Gill-choreographed movements included the horses' heads bopping to the music as well as the horses' bottoms (separating from their front halves) springing up and energetically bouncing and spinning around, creating wonderful rustling sounds with their straw costumes.  After a few minutes of the joyful, reckless abandon, the drums started to slow down, as did the raving horses, until they became still, and it was all over.

As a part of a series of events commemorating Grand Central's centennial, Cave's Heard NY was a vivacious and extraordinary twenty-minute celebration that entertained both children and adults.  If only commuters were treated to such wonderful bouts of whimsy all the time.  March 25th - 31st. Learn more at Creativetime.org.  See my September 2011 post on Cave here.  And this is just awesome - Brooklynvegan.com.

Waiting for the dancers at Vanderbilt Hall

Some of the dancers getting ready

 

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Nick Cave and Nick Cave, together at last

Ai Weiwei | Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, DC

I took a trip down to Washington, DC on February 23rd to catch Ai Weiwei's According to What? at the Hirshhorn Museum before it closed on February 24th.  The first North American retrospective of Ai's work, the exhibit showcased sculpture, photography, and video, alongside nearly 100 black-and-white photographs taken between 1983-1993 documenting the time the artist lived in New York City.

The 55-year-old artist, political activist, dissident, and rock star (?), was imprisoned for 81 days in 2011 for tax evasion (though it is widely believed that the charges are false and he was likely arrested for his criticisms against the Chinese government) and his passport was revoked, prohibiting him from leaving China.  He famously helped design the 2008 Beijing Olympic Stadium only to reject the project because he thought the goverment was using it, as well as the Olympic games, as propaganda.  To comment on China's destruction of its history and culture (i.e. bulldozing historic sites to put up highrises), Ai often takes ancient artworks and destroys or devalues them (i.e. Dropping a Han Dynasty Urn or Coca-Cola Vase).  He also vehemently continues to criticize the Chinese government in the aftermath of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake in which thousands of schoolchildren died in their poorly constructed schoolhouses.  Some of the exhibit's most moving works are based on this tragedy.

If you missed According to What? at the Hirshhorn, the exhibit will travel to Indianapolis, Toronto, and Miami, before making a stop at The Brooklyn Museum in April 2014.  Don't miss it!  See my photos from the Hirshhorn below and read more about the exhibition at hirshhorn.si.edu, salon.com, and washingtoncitypaper.com.  Also, check out my April 2011 post on Ai Weiwei here.

Forever, 2003

Snake Ceiling, 2009, created in response to the 2008 Sichuan province earthquake that killed thousands of schoolchildren, crushing them in poorly constructed schools that did not meet building codes.  The piece was made using hundreds of backpacks, similar to the ones used by the children, and curves around a corner and stretches down a long corridor.  To the left of Snake Ceiling, an entire wall was devoted to Names of the Student Earthquake Victims Found by the Citizen's Investigation, 2008-2011, which listed the names of 5,000 young victims, while Remembrance, 2010, an audio recording reciting the students' names played.

Prints of Beijing's 2008 Olympic Stadium, 2005-2008, Divina Proportione, 2006, F Size, 2011, perhaps Ai's most famous work, the Bird's Nest Stadium, he designed it with the Swiss architectural firm Herzog & de Meuron for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.  Before the Olympics kicked off, the artist disassociated himself with the project, saying it was being used as propoganda by the Chinese government.

Kippe, 2006, made from parts taken from dismantled Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) temples

Map of China, 2008, composed of salvaged wood from dismantled Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) temples and assembled using traditional Chinese joinery techniques.

Grapes, 2010, made with 40 antique Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) wooden stools

Teahouse, 2011, made of compressed tea

He Xie, 2010, composed of 3,200 porcelain crabs.  In Chinese "river crab" is a homonym of "harmonious," and is internet slang for censorship.  The work was made as a protest to the 2010 government-ordered destruction of Ai's Shanghai studio.  An actual dinner of 10,000 river crabs was also held, but Ai was under house arrest and not able to attend.

He Xie, 2010, detail

Moon Chest, 2008, Ai cut 4 circles into each of these 7 chests made of huali wood, a precious wood, changing them from functional objects to solely objects of art.  This series includes 81 chests in total, with each chest being unique with the placement of its holes.  The upper and lower holes align when the chests are lined up, showing the phases of the moon.

Moon Chest, 2008, detail

Coca-Cola Vase, 2007, made with a Neolithic age (5,000-3,000 BCE) vase and paint

Dropping a Han Dynasty Urn, 1995-2009 (background), and Colored Vases, 2007-2010 (foreground) made with Han Dynasty (206 BCE-220 CE) vases and industrial paint.

Straight, 2008-2012, made with 38 tons of steel rebar taken from the 2008 Sichuan earthquake wreckage.  Each bar, mangled after the earthquake, was pounded back into shape - straight- at Ai's studio.

Straight, 2008-2012, detail

Cube Light, 2008

Cube Light, 2008

Ai Weiwei, Williamsburg, Brooklyn, 1983

Ai Weiwei in the elevator when taken into custody by the police, 2009

Assisting After Sandy

It's been a month since Hurricane Sandy damaged several areas in the northeast, and sadly, many are still struggling in the aftermath, including many artists and arts organizations.  Tis the season for giving, so why not help out if you can?

Re.Start is an online auction organized by New York Foundation for the Arts, Creative Time, and Paddle 8 that will donate proceeds from sales to relief efforts. NYFA will distribute half of the money raised to artists who suffered damage or loss from the storm (apply for a grant at nyfa.org), and Creative Time will distribute half to non-profit art organizations in need of assistance.  You have until December 11th to bid on 30 items by artists including: Ai Weiwei, Tauba Auerbach, David Hockney, Kaws, Takashi Murakami, Yoshitomo Nara, Catherine Opie, Gabriel Orozco, Raymond Pettibon, Kiki Smith, and more.

Time Out New York has a list of New York arts organizations in need of help and Brooklyn Based has a guide to local and broader, non-arts-related non-profits you can donate to. 

Ai Weiwei | Grass Mud Horse Style

Check out Ai Weiwei's "Grass Mud Horse Style," a parody of the gawd-awful "Gangnam Style." I love Ai but hate that I had to sit through this song which I've managed to avoid until now.
"Grass Mud Horse" is slang for "f*ck your mother," which the Chinese use online to avoid censors. Looks like the artist had fun filming this clip.

Doug Wheeler | David Zwirner

I'm an impatient person.  I hate to wait.  So when I first tried going to the Doug Wheeler exhibit at the David Zwirner gallery three Saturdays ago and saw the long line outside, I was discouraged.  When a gallery employee came out after a few minutes to inform all of us on line that the wait would be at least two hours, I immediately gave up and fled.  The following Saturday I returned thinking if I got to the gallery a few minutes before they opened, I would out-smart all the other gallery goers.  I was mistaken. Arriving at 9:45 that cold and wet morning granted me a two hour wait in line—about an hour and a fifteen minutes standing outside in the rain/snow, and another forty-five minutes waiting inside the front of the gallery with approximately thirty others. The gallery allowed groups of ten people into Wheeler's installation at a time for 15 minute intervals.  Before entering, everyone must take off their shoes and put on white paper slippers with elasticized ankles.  All the long lines, the waiting, and the footwear changing was totally worth it. Wheeler's new work, SA MI 75 DZ NY 12 (2012), is an amazing, breath-taking experience.

This is only the fourth "infinity environment" Wheeler has ever exhibited in public (the first was at a gallery in Milan in 1975, the second at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles in 1983, and the third at the Guggenheim Bilbao in 2000).  Like the first three installations, his current work "manipulat[es] architecture with neon and fluorescent lighting, creating entire luminous rooms in which the viewer experienced the sensation of entering an infinite void," (from the show's press release).  It "explores the materiality of light while emphasizing the viewer's physical experience of infinite space."

When I finally got to approach the installation, my eyes were immediately challenged.  I initially thought the wide entranceway was a wall, and hesitated walking through it.  Inside the installation, the large, empty, white space has no corners or edges.  The lighting, which slowly transitions from day to night, creates an ephemeral, hazy effect.  Looking at the work straight on is like looking into a white abyss—never-ending whiteness.  My first impression was of being inside a cloud, and then I thought of all the scenes in movies where characters walk into a magnificent white light symbolizing death.  I heard others describe Wheeler's work like being inside a spaceship or what they'd imagine heaven to be like.

Wheeler was born in 1939 and started off as a painter while attending what is now the California Institute of the Arts in Los Angeles.  Like his current work, his paintings explored space, light, and perception.  He was a part of the "Light and Space" movement in Southern Californina in the 1960s and 1970s and his work was featured in the terrific Primary Atmospheres: Works from California 1960-1970 exhibit at David Zwirner in 2010.  

While I may be impatient, I did not mind waiting to see Wheeler's SA MI 75 DZ NY 12.  In fact, I went back a third Saturday and waited a mere hour and a half to see it again.  The second viewing was no less effective or awesome. It is definitely worth the effort to see Wheeler's work at Zwirner.  It is a unique sensory experience.  Go see it before it closes this weekend!  Learn more at Davidzwirner.com. Through February 25th.

SA MI 75 DZ NY 12, 2012

SA MI 75 DZ NY 12, 2012

Paul McCarthy | Hauser & Wirth

Los Angeles-based artist Paul McCarthy has been exploring and reinterpreting the 19th century German folk tale, Schneewittchen, and the 1937 animated Disney adaptation, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, in a variety of mediums.  In 2009, Hauser & Wirth presented a series of McCarthy's drawings based on the "dark psychological and social undercurrents of the original 19th century tale" (from show's press release) and the sanitized, Disney-fied retelling of the 20th century version.  The gallery currently has on view The Dwarves, The Forests, a series of bronze sculptures of disfigured, grotesque dwarves that expands on the artist's examination of the children's stories.  

Along with the dark, malformed dwarves with phalluses protuding from faces that appear to be melting or falling apart, McCarthy created a massive carved wooden sculpture of an orgasmic Snow White and grinning Dopey (referencing Gian Lorenzo Bernini's sculpture Transverberation of Saint Teresa) and two maquettes of mystical forest landscapes that serve as models for sets for performances and films the artist is planning for the future.

While inspired by the German folk tale and the Disney story, McCarthy adds a personal touch to the works by combining his "memories and impressions of the deep forests and magical clearings on his own property above the Mojave Desert."  McCarthy's dark, intense, nightmarish take on the Snow White stories is way beyond Fractured Fairy Tales.  It has positively evolved from his 2009 show of drawings which I posted about here.  I'm looking forward to see where he takes Snow White and the dwarves next.  Learn more at Hauserwirth.com.  Closes December 17th.

White Snow Cake, 2011

White Snow Cake (detail), 2011

White Snow Cake (detail), 2011

White Snow Cake (detail), 2011

White Snow Cake (detail), 2011

White Snow Dwarf 4, 2011

White Snow Dwarf 7, 2010-2011

White Snow and Dopey, Wood, 2011

White Snow and Dopey, Wood (side view), 2011

White Snow Dwarf Head 5, 2011

Left to right: White Snow Dwarf Head 3, 2011 and White Snow Dwarf 6, 2010-2011

Left to right: White Snow Dwarf 6, 2010-2011and White Snow Dwarf Head 1, 2011

White Snow Dwarf Log, Male (detail), 2010-2011

White Snow Loving Forest, Female (detail), 2011

Nan Goldin | Matthew Marks Gallery

Scopophilia, the title of photographer Nan Goldin's latest exhibit at Matthew Marks, means "the love of looking."  In 2010, Goldin was given permission to photograph throughout the Louvre while the museum was closed.  Consisting of over 400 images, Scopophilia juxtaposes famed artworks from the Louvre's collection alongside autobiographical pictures of Goldin's friends and lovers. New photographs of paintings and sculptures from the institution and photos taken throughout Goldin's prolific career are grouped together into a mesmerizing 25-minute slide installation.

Organized into themes of love and desire, Goldin explains, "Desire awoken by images is the project's true starting point.  It is about the idea of taking a picture of a sculpture or a painting in an attempt to bring it to life," (from the show's press release).  Goldin succeeds spectacularly -- her photographs of sculptures look alive, her pairings of classic paintings with her contemporary portraits are striking, and her slide-show is compelling (I watched it twice).  Goldin's Scopophilia will give you "the love of looking" too.  Learn more at Matthewmarks.com.  Through December 23rd.

Cupid with his wings on fire, Le Louvre, 2010

Pygmalion and Galatea, Le Louvre, 2010

Young hermaphrodite sleeping, Le Louvre, 2010

Swan-like embrace, Paris, 2010

Silence, 2011

Crazy Scary, 2011

Installation view

St. Apollonia, Zurbaran, 2011 (above) and Kathleen, NYC, 1993 (below)

Half Length Portrait of a Girl, Guerin, 2011 (above) and Siobhan, Berlin, 1994 (below)

Portait d'un graveur en pierres fines, Pontormo, 2011 (above left); Pawel, NYC, 1996 (below left); St. Sebastian, Puvis de Chavannes, 2011 (above right); Clemens, Paris, 2005 (below right)

Simen Johan | Yossi Milo

Until the Kingdom Comes is an ongoing photography project by the New York-based artist Simen Johan.  Currently on view at Yossi Milo, Johan's photos digitally amalgamate images of plants and animals shot "in natural preserves, zoos, farms, museum dioramas or his own studio" (from the show's press release) with new backgrounds often creating tension and/or unsettling scenarios.  For instance, a rhinocerous sullenly lies in a sandy, barren landscape; an ice-covered stag is uncomfortably propped against a tree; a palm tree stands uprooted by the edge of the ocean; two flamingoes share an awkward, possibly strangling embrace; and an unfortunate frog hangs limply out of a tropical bird's beak.

Johan's photographs fascinate as they toy with our notions of the natural world, depicting nature and wildlife in surreal or nightmarish scenes, blurring "the boundaries between opposing forces, such as the familiar and the otherworldly, the natural and the artificial, the serene and the eerie."  As the artist states, "I depict 'living' as an emotion-fueled experience, engulfed in uncertainty, desire, and illusion."  Learn more at Yossimilo.com and see my post on Johan's October 2009 exhibit here.  Through December 23rd.

Untitled #163, 2011

Untitled #168, 2011

Untitled #159, 2011

Untitled #170, 2011

Untitled #162, 2011

Untitled #167, 2011

Untitled #169, 2011

Billy Childish | Lehmann Maupin

For over thirty-five years, artist, writer, musician Billy Childish has been producing a variety of creative works -- hundreds of paintings, over forty volumes of poetry, a series of autobiographical novels, and more than 120 blues/punk influenced albums.  I Am The Billy Childish, currently on view at Lehmann Maupin's Lower East Side space, gives visitors just a hint of Childish's prolific output.

Born in Chatham, Kent in 1959, Childish left school at 16 and worked on a dockyard and as an apprentice stonemason.  A portfolio filled with one hundred drawings earned him admission to St. Martin's School of Art where the artist's "defiance to authority led to his eventual expulsion from art school in 1981," (from the show's press release).  This clearly did not deter Childish from creating art in various ways, exploring themes of "war, history, social protest, as well as his own experiences of alcoholism, and the sexual abuse he suffered as a child."  The first floor of the gallery presents the artist's recent paintings depicting volcanoes, the German mountaineer Toni Kurz, Finnish composer Jean Sibelius, as well as scenes of the Wounded Knee massacre.  The upstairs gallery surveys Childish's music and litery projects, showcasing zines, books, and a collection of poems.  Also on view are 55 of Childish's album covers, some featuring cover art by Childish and by artists Peter Doig and Daniel Clowes.

Influenced by Edvard Munch, Vincent van Gogh, and Dada, Childish's paintings feature shadowy figures against vibrating stokes of intense color.  As the old saying goes, "write what you know," and Childish boldly and honestly writes, performs, and paints what he knows and experiences.  At the exhibition's opening, the artist was on hand to read from his fifth novel, The Stonemason, as well as from his new collection of poetry, I Fuckt Frida Kahlo.  Learn more at Lehmannmaupin.com.  Through January 21st.

Kurz Descending (Study), 2011

Lt. Sydney A. Cloman, First Infantry, on His Horse on the Wounded Knee, 2011

Lt. Sydney A. Cloman, First Infantry, on His Horse on the Wounded Knee (detail), 2011

Erupting Volcano, Chile, 2011

Sibelius (Man with Stick), 2011

Sibelius Amongst Saplings, 2011

(Elgar) Man Sat on Chairs, 2011