conceptual art – Page 14

February 10, 2023May 12, 2024, by Saul Ostrow

Impossible Failures at Zwirner

Opinion

A photo of Pope.L in his studio, dated 2022 — Pope.L, studio, 2022, photo courtesy of David Zwirner Gallery 52 Walker

When I heard about Impossible Failures it promised to be an exciting exhibition, in that it was to bring together Gordon Matta-Clark (1943–1978), a White post-Minimalist artist best known for his site-specific works of cutting through buildings and homes, and Pope.L (b.1955), a Black artist who used to describe himself as the friendliest Black man in America, and is known for his public performances and installations, which address Black racial stereotyping and other such hypocrisies. In a not un-interesting way, the resulting exhibition is a curatorial mash-up in which the works in it are overwhelmed. As such, this is not an exhibition where the works of each artist supply a context for the other, nor does it explore Matta-Clark’s legacy by focusing on Pope.L’s overlapping strategies. Instead it might be thought of as a collaborative installation authored by the curator Ebony L. Haynes.

January 23, 2023December 30, 2022, by Susan Hoffman Fishman

Keeper of the Waters

A city next to a body of water

Description automatically generated with low confidence — *A Living Water Garden*, Chengdu, China

For the last 50+ years, eco-artist and environmental activist Betsy Damon has devoted herself to community building – the coming together of individuals to achieve a common purpose. Since the 1980s, after a decade of engaging the public through public performances in New York City, she has worked at the intersection of art and science, focusing on the topic of water and on creating models for communities in the United States and China to know and become stewards of their own water sources. The brief descriptions below, highlighting four of Damon’s many exhibitions, ecological and sustainable design projects, publications, and organizations are only a brief glimpse into her prolific and important body of work.

January 11, 2023December 22, 2022, by Hovey Brock

Crazy River Umwelt Series Part I

Featured Project

Map

Description automatically generated — Hovey Brock: *Blackleg Tick,* 2021, 24” x 36”, acrylic on panel

A central theme in my Crazy River project has been highlighting the emotional toll of the climate crisis by putting under a microscope, so to speak, my own feelings about not only the impacts of the crisis but the knowledge that humans’ actions are the cause. This series of three on-line essays, thought experiments if you like, expands that project to change the POV to non-human actors that are inextricably bound with the habitat in the Western Catskills: the black-legged or deer tick (Ixodes scapularis), the white-tail deer (Odocoileus virginianus), and Japanese knotweed (Reynoutria japonica). All three have seen their habitat change dramatically through climate change and human interventions. Using my imagination and research, I try to enter the umwelt of all three species, an impossible task, as Thomas Nagel pointed out in “What Is It LIke to Be a Bat,” for which artistic license may give us the best chance to accomplish. My intentions in doing so fall along three axes: theoretical, aesthetic, and spiritual, dimensions all essential to my own art practice. What follows is a look at the umwelt of black-legged ticks from the perspective of theory.

January 9, 2023December 9, 2022, by Etty Yaniv

Jody MacDonald: Under the Veneer of Whimsy

Jody MacDonald, *Everywhere All Over. All Over. Everywhere.* (detail), mixed media, 168″ x 180″ x 96″, 2022.

Jody MacDonald dissects in detail the concept of “identity” through a cast of small-scale 2-D and textile-based 3-D surrogates. She uses repurposed materials to create figures and detailed, miniature accessories (wigs, clothing, shoes furniture) set inside elaborate, mixed media environments with clues which shed light on the complex, often conflicting narratives.

December 26, 2022December 9, 2022, by Sandra Moore

Table of Contents at Time and Space Limited in Hudson

Text

Description automatically generated

In October 2021, at the periphery of the parking lot outside of the Time and Space Limited Center in Hudson, artwork by Linda Mussman appeared—about 20 large dictionaries and encyclopedias opened out on a crude wooden table. For several months, round the clock, these dictionaries were exposed to rain, sunlight, and snow, and rifled through by winds. Peach-colored streetlight bathed the texts some nights, and bright sunlight bleached the pages some days. The grass around the table receded and then returned with – mirabile dictu – a green shoot briefly fighting its way between 2 volumes.

December 19, 2022December 9, 2022, by Art Spiel

whispered conversations at Stand 4

Curator Jennifer McGregor in conversation with the artists

Kate Collyer, Bundle: Alaska, 2022, mixed media and video, dimensions variable. Courtesy of the artist.

Artists Kate Colyer, Lorrie Fredette, and Megan Porpeglia talk with curator Jennifer McGregor about their framework to create whispered conversations, on view at Stand4 Gallery and Community Space in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. The collective was active during COVID via Zoom reading about the natural world. They created bundles in response to their individual trips in 2021. These were shared through the mail to instigate a series of new artworks. Jennifer McGregor was brought in as curator to help shape the exhibition.

December 10, 2022December 7, 2022, by Alexandria Deters

Tell me, where did you START? Conversations with Designer Robert Stadler

A person sitting in a chair

Description automatically generated — Robert Stadler, 2022. Photo courtesy of Carpenters Workshop Gallery.

Before my first Facetime conversation with the Austrian designer Robert Stadler, I had looked through images of his works but I did not know much about Stadler himself. Going into our first ‘meeting’ I wanted to get to know him, his personality. What kind of questions could I ask him? What would be the mood of our dialogue? Would we get along? Would Stadler be stiff and severe? Humorless? Well, I had no need to worry. From the moment we greeted each other, his personality came through. Stadler is soft-spoken, easy to laugh, kind, open to converse on whatever topic, and most importantly does have a sense of humor that seeps into most of his work.

November 29, 2022November 26, 2022, by Taylor F. Engle

What it Means to Be Human: HEES Displays Paintings and NFTs at Bechtler Museum and Aktion Art

HEES. “SEE ME FLY.” 2021-22. Acrylic, mixed media, and paintstick on raw canvas with 55 in LED screen insert- 4 NFTs play simultaneously, 84×96 in. Courtesy of Aktion Art.

A former-beauty-photographer-turned-artist, HEES’s creative journey has been one of consistent, self-taught innovation. The creator pivoted to painting 36 months ago, when he realized it was time for him to take on a new form of expression.

November 28, 2022December 30, 2022, by Art Spiel

Light and Matter: 2022 South Korea Sculpture Biennale

Art Spiel Photo Story

A picture containing text, library, scene, room

Description automatically generated — Michael Whittle Butterfly on the Sun, Seongsan Art Hall, Changwon Ink on UV-resistant plastic, 61’ x 48’

The Changwon Biennale is the largest recurring sculpture show in South Korea. During the fall of 2022 it showcased 69 artists under the title, Channel: Particle Wave Duality. Curated by Director Cho Kwan Yong, Chief Curator Lee Tahe Hoon and Curator Hyojin Nam, the show considered the broad sense of how light and matter interact at the intersection of art and science. Alongside three-dimensional works, it included sound art, video screenings and installations. The small group of international artists who were invited this fall to South Korea to create their work onsite in the biennale exhibition halls worked for three weeks with support from the Korean government and the care of the local team.

October 14, 2022October 14, 2022, by Roman Kalinovski

Michael A. Robinson — Somma at DISPLAY

Michael A. Robinson’s site-specific project Somma, at DISPLAY in Parma, Italy, is the sum of many parts, all operating in tandem. The installation appears simple, featuring three wall-mounted LED works and metal arcs and hoops suspended from the ceiling. The space’s glossy floor and glass façade and door reflect the light emitted by the LEDs, potentially multiplying their presence based on the viewer’s position and the level of ambient light.