Art Spiel – Page 22 – Contemporary Art and Culture

October 23, 2024December 22, 2024

Prejudice and Belonging – the Ethiopian Pavilion in La Biennale di Venezia
by Etty Yaniv

Tesfaye Urgessa, Pavilion of ETHIOPIA, Prejudice and belonging, 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia. Photo by: Andrea Avezzù. Courtesy: La Biennale di Venezia

The first national Ethiopian pavilion at the 60^th Venice Biennale, housed in the elegant sixteenth-century Palazzo Bollani, may be challenging to find, but the effort is amply rewarded. In his solo exhibition Prejudice and Belonging, Ethiopian artist Tesfaye Urgessa presents figures that inhabit a broad and complex emotional spectrum where fragility and strength coexist. Ethiopian iconography and European modernist figurative painting converge, creating a striking visual dialect articulated throughout the ten large paintings and small portraits that fill the three interconnected rooms.

October 21, 2024December 6, 2024

kith and kin – the Australian Pavillion at La Biennale di Venezia
by Etty Yaniv

Photo Story

**Photo by Matteo de Mayda. Courtesy: La Biennale di Venezia**

Archie Moore’s monumental installation, kith and kin, for the Australian pavilion at this year’s Venice Art Biennale, has been awarded the Golden Lion for Best National Participation. It is a recognition well-earned. This multi-layered, profound installation more than fulfills the 60th Venice Art Biennale theme of “Foreigners Everywhere.” It does so with a poignancy, depth, and nuance that are increasingly rare in contemporary mega installations engaging with heavily charged subject matter, such as the history of Australian First Nations. kith and Kin confronts colonial legacies head-on while embracing humanity’s shared lineage. It serves as both a memorial to pain and loss and an understated reminder of our common ancestry.

October 17, 2024October 17, 2024

Art Spiel Picks: Boston Exhibitions in October 2024
by Andrew Fish

Highlights

Signal to Signal by Crystalle Lacouture at Trustman Gallery, Simmons College in Boston, MA.

As Boston’s fall season unfolds, the city comes alive with a vibrant tapestry of exhibitions, from the creative heart of the SoWA Arts District to the bustling streets of Back Bay. University galleries join the celebration, offering a rich array of materials and themes that captivate and inspire. While the leaves change color and the evenings grow cooler, the art scene radiates warmth, keeping the city’s creative pulse strong and steady. Here are some standouts this month.

October 16, 2024October 16, 2024

Bascha Mon’s Life and Journey of Dreaming at Tappeto Volante
by Etty Yaniv

In Dialogue

A Celebratory Retrospective of an Artist’s Life and Journey of Dreaming, Perseverance, Activism, & Unconscious Expression.”

The retrospective of Bascha Mon’s paintings at Tappeto Volante offers a focused look at an artist whose career has been shaped by both creative achievements and personal struggles. Mon first gained recognition in the 1970s and 80s, with numerous exhibitions and critical acclaim. However, her trajectory was interrupted by health challenges that led to a long period of seclusion. During this time, she continued to work from her basement studio in New Jersey, expanding her creative vocabulary across various mediums while remaining largely out of the public eye. In recent years, Mon turned to digital platforms like Facebook and Instagram. Paola Gallio, the exhibition curator and gallery co-founder, describes this phase as “dissolving the physical isolation that had once defined her situation.” These platforms allowed Mon to reconnect with the art community and sustain an active, visible presence. Gallio emphasizes that “Mon’s modest basement studio became a metaphor for boundless creative space,” where the constraints of physical isolation were replaced by the limitless possibilities of virtual engagement. For deeper insights into the retrospective, Gallio’s interview with Art Spiel offers further reflections on Mon’s artistic journey and the significance of this exhibition.

October 15, 2024October 14, 2024

Contours and Strokes: Between Traditional and Contemporary Art Forms
by Chunbum Park

Mika Kanemura performing at the gallery. calligrapher: Komei

When one looks at Franz Kline’s Abstract Expressionist paintings involving Gestural Abstraction, they cannot help but read a Chinese or Japanese character in calligraphic form. In fact, a relationship can be established between Kline’s “abstract” lines and marks from the calligraphic strokes of Sumi ink made by the masters of the traditional art form—Japanese calligraphy.

October 14, 2024December 7, 2024

A Leg to Stand On—Melissa Stern at DIMIN
by A.E. Chapman

*Melissa Stern: A Leg to Stand On*, installation view

In Melissa Stern: A Leg to Stand On, the domestic meets the fantastic in the aptly named The Living Room, the front room exhibition space at DIMIN complete with a cozy two-seater sofa. Featuring her drawings and sculptures, Stern’s trademark humor and sense of play persists while the underlying thread of darkness that pervades her oeuvre feels especially heightened in this presentation. Deeply shaken by a fall during a winter walk in 2021, the artist’s works in the exhibition explore the precarious and fragile construction of the human body. Cobbling together disparate elements such as vintage shoes, wooden branches, scrap pieces of bannister railings, a doll’s lost arm, linoleum, wallpaper, resin, clay, paint cans, bolts, and screws, Stern balances absurdity with familiarity.

October 13, 2024October 13, 2024

The Art of Being Watched: Julia Weist and Surveillance Culture
by Jac Lahav

All persons to whom license certificates have been issued shall not lend or allow any other person to have, hold or display such certificate; and any person so parting with a license certificate or displaying the same without authority shall be guilty of a misdemeanor *Image courtesy the Artist and* *Moskowitz Bayse*

Julia Weist’s new exhibition Private Eye, currently on view at Moskowitz Bayse in LA, blends artistic practice with journalistic research to investigate how big data operates in America. In 2021, companies in the United States spent over $110 billion on big data. Weist’s work taps directly into this massive industry, which buys and sells our personal information without consent.

October 11, 2024October 10, 2024

Gary Petersen: The Shape of Walking at McKenzie Fine Art
by Riad Miah

*Garden of Music (after Bob Thompson),* 2024, acrylic and oil on canvas, 54” x 94”

For artists working within the realm of geometric abstraction, understanding the weight of art history is vital. The hard-edge lines, a keen understanding of color theory, and structured patterns—all form part of a visual language that has evolved over a century. Artists today, when approaching geometric abstraction, face a unique tension. On the one hand, they inherit the legacy of giants such as Piet Mondrian, Wassily Kandinsky, Josef Albers, and Kazimir Malevich, whose works laid the foundation for what we understand as “geometric art.” On the other hand, the question looms large: How does one continue to make geometric abstraction in 2024?

October 10, 2024December 7, 2024

Fall Reads: Nine to Note
by Paul D'Agostino

Book Review

Here’s a set of reviews of nine recently published and forthcoming books I’ve enjoyed reading, reflecting on, and recommending of late. In the mix are two emotionally trenchant novels, a narratively enigmatic novella, a gauzily glowing volume of poetry, a vast survey of contemporary text-based art, a history of groundbreaking women photographers, a critical examination of the sociopolitics of walking, a collection of interdisciplinary essays about narrative slowness, and a revised historical glimpse into the early days of US comic strips. They’re all worthy titles to add to your fall reading list. Several would also make excellent additions to a fall or spring syllabus.

October 9, 2024October 10, 2024

Art Spiel Picks: Philly Exhibitions in October 2024
by Claire Haik

HIGHLIGHTS

Hanne Friis, The Mountain, hand-stitched faux leather and steel, 37 13/16 x 54 5/16 x 37 13/16 inches, at Locks Gallery, photograph courtesy of the gallery

Sometimes, we are confronted with artwork that hums with possibilities so profound you can feel them taking root in your chest and making a new home. You stand in the gallery, soaking it in, and you want to share it with as many people as possible. That said, I hope you take a good chunk of time to sink into the transcendent earthy abstractions of Warren Rohrer at Locks Gallery. Afterward, head upstairs and marvel, open-mouthed, at the unexpected forms created by sculptors Hanne Friis and Lynda Benglis. Then, journey over to Fleisher/Ollman Gallery and get lost in Sarah Gamble’s glittering forest interiors and interdimensional abstractions, filled with mystery and magic.