Chelsea Holiday Notes
Artists: Breuning, Buren, Dunham, Fischli & Weiss, Held Pearlstein, Hockney, Holland, Kelly, Richie, Ryman, Stux China, Xun
By: Charles Giuliano - Dec 15, 2009
Olaf Breuning
Metro Pictures
519 W. 24th Street
Through December 5
We were not previously familiar with the work of this artist. They were jokey, text based relief sculptures and wall scrawls. Overall, we found this at best of marginal interest. Were they not shown at Metro Pictures, a major gallery, we would not have bothered to comment. Sorry that our ersatz gallery tour begins on this sour note.
Daniel Buren
Bortolami Gallery
510 West 25
Through December 23
If you have followed the work of Buren, a conceptual artist who usually works with variations on stripes, this exhibition came as a surprise. They were large abstract works in sections with shaped, angular edges in varying color schemes. The elements projected from the wall with flat areas of color. The inner edges or moldings had different color which gave a relief sensibility when viewed on an angle. Overall, these were bold and engaging works and a notable development for the conceptual/ installation based artist.
Caroll Dunham
Gladstone Gallery
515 W 24
Through December 5
These new paintings by Dunham were given a rave capsule review in The New Yorker. The artist has long enjoyed the adulation of critics for his kitsch based, cartooney, painterly approach. The adulation has never made a lot of sense to me. But this time I find the works excessive and in poor taste. How clever of the artist to reduce female anatomy to a smarmy cliché. It seems we have progressed light years from when the works of De Kooning were discussed as sexist. His Women were always defensible as great examples of painting. Given the generational leap surely there are those who would make the same argument on behalf of Dunham. But there just seems to be such hostility, whatever the deconstructed motivation, in this reduction of women to orifices. Though they seems to occupy the same aesthetic terrain of Larry Flynt, arguably, the publisher of Hustler would not understand them or find them suitable for his skin rag. Which is why, perhaps, they are most likely to show up in Art Forum or Flash Art. For the latter, pun intended. These are examples of poor taste as high art. Nothing new of course. Just updated with mercenary intent.
Peter Fischli & David Weiss
Matthew Marks Gallery
522 West 22 "Sun, Moon, Stars"
526 West 22 "Rat & Bear"
523 West 24 "Rubber and Clay"
Through December 19
We saw two out of three installations for the Swiss, conceptual art partners. Upon entering "Sun, Moon, Stars" we encountered the large ground floor space with several rows of expansive tables. On these, under glass, were tear sheets from a range of European and American glossy magazines. They were organized by genre from fashion, to comics, and muscle/ violence. Many were ads often with the notion that sex sells. There was a range of products from cosmetics to travel and leisure goods. Mostly high end and expensive items.
For this installation the medium was the message. There was no editorial input from the artists who opted to display a vast amount of material. The selection of images is the surrogate for their taste and viewpoint. Which may or not be readily apparent to the viewer.
While the scale of the installation and its extravagance gave testament to the importance of the statement there was also a disconnection. With so much material on view the visitor must opt to decide the limit of time and patience. I found myself intrigued but not beyond taking in a sample of the images which led me to no clear conclusion other than some vague notion that he medium was the message.
Digging deeper, if you are so inclined, you may draw conclusions about the decline and fall of Western Civilization. As seen through ads in glossy magazines. But you already know that and like us probably do not travel in the circles of the super rich, horny and vacuous.
A couple of doors down, in a smaller "project space" we found the big stuffed rat laying on a pile of crumpled cloth next to a scaled down bear. They must have something in common but the point entirely escaped me.
David Hockney Paintings 2006-2009
Pace Wildenstein
534 West 25th Street and 32 East 57th street
Through December 24
Given the stature of the British born artist, associated with Pop Art but not a charter member, this double venue treatment was staged by Pace Wildenstein as one of the top events of the fall season. Again we saw only the Chelsea aspect of this double header.
There is a freshness of color, and child like exuberance in this exhibition of landscapes. They range in scale from small individual paintings to vast panoramas comprised of multiple canvases. It has been his manner of creating large works for some time.
Again there is much to like in these works. It is richly evident that the artist is having fun in making these pictures. There is also something playful in the avoidance f making serious art. It is a tribute to his level of acceptance that he is able to goof off and fool around in this manner. And the art world just loves him madly for doing it. But it is just a trajectory of a career long tendency that makes us wonder if he is a major artist, a minor major artist, or a major minor artist. You decide.
Loren Holland "The Virtues of Vice
Anna Kustera
520 West 21
Through December 23
This was a show of rather juvenile, bad work included here because it is an example of a tendency. If Caroll Dunham and Mike Kelly (discussed further on in this set of sketches) explore the erotic they do so with a measure of credibility. Rightly or wrongly it is an aspect of careers that stretch over time. They have fought to find their place in the mainstream of critical discourse.
This show of Holland, work that is new to me, is representative of young artists who show erotic work as a knee jerk bid for ready acceptance through controversial statements. Good grief how the art schools just crank this out with impunity. Nobody dares to tell the little darlings that they are ill advised to follow this trend.
So during any given visit to Chelsea one if likely to encounter this element of erotic juvenilia. In that sense Holland may not be better or worse.
Perhaps it is just a phase or like tats, nose rings, and tribal ear plugs he may be wearing this baggage into middle age. Who knows. he may even find a market for those designer, thongs with the chastity belt fetish. Now there's a little something to put under the tree of a loved one this Holiday season.
Mike Kelly "Horizontal Tracking Shots"
Gagosian Gallery
555 West 24
Through December 23
This exhibition of paintings, sculptures and video in the vast space of the Gagogsian Gallery just seemed thin and desperate. Kelly, one of the bad boys of contemporary art, is groping and reaching to sustain the level of shock that has been such a part of the impact and reputation of his work.
There wasn't much going on here as we managed to breeze through the show all too quickly with nothing really compelling us to linger.
He has created a series of edgy paintings of Asian transsexuals toying with enormous members. The gimmick here is that the organs are painted out and indicated as flat silhouettes. Kelly proves to be every bit as wretched a painter as his stable mate Damien Hirst. Who doesn't even paint his pictures which are assigned to assistants. We aren't sure who paints Kelly's pictures but he puts his name on them. And at Gagosian they sell for big bucks to eager clients.
Philip Pearlstein and Al Held "Five Decades"
Betty Cunningham Gallery
541 West 25
Through February 13
Call them the odd couple. It makes no sense why the gallery has opted to show mini retrospectives of the abstract painter Al Held and the figurative artist Philip Pearlstein. The commonality is that they are both major artists and this is an interesting capsule of their achievement.
Perhaps the most arresting work is a 1950s painting by Held in a crusty abstract expressionist manner. It is a rarely seen vintage painting. We next see him jump to minimalist abstraction in large arcs of flat color applied in a brushy manner. This overview cumlinates with complex, brightly colored large geometric paintings.
Through the decades Pearlstein has stuck to the figure. Initally they are pasty fleshed and somber. With time less so but fixated as always with the posed figure. Eventually with props to make a still life element to liven up the academic poses. There is always someting solid but dreary about the work that oddly lacks that human element. We never seem to know or or become involved with the models. These paintings render the nude but seem to avoid emotion or physical contact.
Matthew Richie "Line Shot"
Andrea Rosen Gallery
525 West 24
Through December 5
This is another artist whose work just escapes me. The installation combined several elements as usual. We found a complex cutout free standing steel sculpture. There were complex wall pieces involving sculptued relief and video projections.
Yet again it was all about something. But I just lack patience and motivation to delve into his multi valent metaphysical universe. When we are confounded and challenged to this degree we at least have to make up our minds whether the work is interesting to encounter. It must at least work visually. But all of it for me is just overwrought and terribly pretentious.
Robert Ryman
Yvon Lambert Gallery
550 West 21
Through December 23
Ryman has made a career of creating white on white paintings. They were the subject of a retrospective several years ago at MoMA. For many artists it was the most exquisite exhibition of that season. It was amazing to note the great range and variety that he brought to such a narrowly defined body of work. This exhibition with subtle grace continues that research.
Contemporary Chinese Art
Stux Gallery
530 West 25
Through December 5
This was a lively group show of painting and sculpture by contemporary Chinese artists some of whom Stux does and has represented. Stux was among several Chelsea venues participating in a mini festival. There is surely a lot of good work to be seen in this rich heritage. I liked seeing Stefan striking a pose with several chrome monuments to Chairman Mao.
Sun Xun
Max Protetch Gallery
511 West 22
Through December 23
In this exhibition the artist has drawn engaging figurative images directly onto the walls of the gallery. There are folded books fanned out horizontally below eye level. And a wall were light boxes of varying scale illuminate ink drawings. The overall impact of the installation was absorbing and informative. Xun appears to be conflating traditional ink drawing on a contemporary scale in a variety of approaches and themes.