white slope

White Slope

Chelsea 1.23.09

Terry Winters and Pipilotti Rist

Friday, I hopped on a bus for an 'art day' to be spent in Chelsea and at MoMA. My main reasons for going were the Terry Winters exhibit at Matthew Marks and the Pippolotti Rist piece, Pour Your Body Out (7354 Cubic Meters), at MoMA. Both shows were very much worth the trip. 

The Winters exhibition contained beautiful paintings based on loose grid systems of overlapping 'knots' (the title of the show was Knotted Graphs) that floated in layers of translucent colors. They were a welcome departure from the seemingly impenetrable linear abstractions of recent years. They were two very different shows in concept and execution, but I felt a slight correlation between the Terry Winters paintings and the Rist video piece that has to do with the implied sense of objects and light floating in Winters' painting and the immersion of the viewer experiencing Pour Your Body Out. 

It's a very tenuous connection. I mean, the Pippilotti Rist piece was conceived with the idea of enveloping the audience in a sensuous visual and aural experience, while the Knotted Graphs of Terry Winters only hint at possible movement of light and objects across the painted plane. However, I still felt a sense of lightness fluidity that parallels some of the water scenes and slow-motion action that played out across the walls at MoMA in Pour Your Body Out. 

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Chelsea

In Chelsea, I didn't have much of an agenda besides seeing the Winters exhibit. Other than that, I wandered in and out of some of the galleries and was happy to find a few nice surprises and artists that were previously unknown to me. In no particular order: 

Shinichi Maruyama at Bruce Silverstein

Bruce Robbins at Marlborough-Chelsea

Teun Hocks at P•P•O•W

Two group shows that I also enjoyed: 

Drawing at Margaret Thatcher Projects and Off The Wall at Lennon Weinberg

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The real and virtual worlds collide

I happened by the Jim Dine exhibit, Hot Dreams (52 Books), and had started leafing through some of the books hanging from the gallery ceiling when I heard my name called. I looked up to find someone staring back whose face I didn't know. 

I don't know many people who live in New York so the chances of running into them randomly was pretty remote. It turns out the voice belonged to Martin B., aka,  Anaba online. He mentioned that he was familiar with my blog and recognized me from my profile photo. We chatted for a bit about the various shows we'd been seeing, our shared history of living in Philadelphia and going to school here before parting ways after an half-hour. 

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I did a lot of walking on Friday and learned a very important lesson: if it's cold, always make sure to wear the pair of socks without the thick thread that presses on the two smallest toes...

wall for art/ art on wall

Unintentional art on the walls of the studio. 

works on paper 1.14.09

Ph  11409.1, 2009, acrylic on paper, 20" x 20"

Ph 11409.2, 2009, acrylic on paper, 22" x 30"

playing hooky

Warm Tips

Keeping my hands warm at the studio on Thursday with a good, hot cup of tea.  

Today, I took a 'cold day' and stayed home. It's the same as a 'personal day' except it's because you don't want to deal with a cold studio. I had every intention of going up there; thought about what I wanted to get done, got up early, got dressed, had breakfast and so on. Sat down at the computer, saw how cold it was outside and thought, "You know, I could put up those bathroom shelves that have been sitting around for almost three weeks...". You know it must have been bad for me to not go out because I'm pretty hard-core about dealing with the cold weather on my bike and the cold in my studio.

Stayed home, drank lots of tea, tried to catch up on a million and one things online and finally got to the shelves late in the day. I'd done a good bit of work in the studio over the past two days, so it wasn't a loss. That, and E was happy to have the shelves up.

A couple of things stood out for me on the web today:

As you most likely know by now, Andrew Wyeth died. Here's the NYT obit by Michael Kimmelman. Wyeth was one of those artists whose works you either liked or didn't-there seemed to be no light between those walls. 

Does anyone have an extra grand to spare? 'Cause that's what it costs to purchase the new Taschen monograph about Christopher Wool. I like Wool's work but, seriously, a $1,000.00? You don't suppose Taschen will be willing to barter for an original painting from a relatively unknown painter from Philadelphia, do you? Nah, me neither. That's ok.  I'll just practice patience. When I get my hands on that kind of money (once some art buyers' wallets start opening again), that thousand dollars will buy me a lot of art supplies. Art supplies will always win out over an over-priced coffee table book any day. Besides, it won't take long for some copies of the book to appear at The Strand or on Amazon. I give it a year or so. 

 

R.I.P. R.B. Strauss

I just found out about the death of Philadelphia art critic, R.B. Strauss, via Romanblog II. He's described on Romanblog II as, "...one of Philadelphia's finest art critics..." and I could not agree more. He will be missed.

Joanne Mattera Art Blog: Where's The Bailout for the Arts?

A must-read post from Joanne Mattera about the damage the economic meltdown has or could visit on the creative industries:

Joanne Mattera Art Blog: Where's The Bailout for the Arts?