Tag Archive "kara-walker"
‘Americanana’ at the Hunter College Art Galleries, N.Y.C.
In the midst of election season, an exhibition exploring the use of American vernacular imagery and style is particularly apt. The interest in folk art, as with folk tales, is historically associated with nationalism and the search for originary stories that always involve a lot of white-washing, if not outright fictions. In the U.S. the far right is always ready to raise the flag and other symbols associated with 19th century, white, agrarian society – the real America. Americanana, organized by Katy Siegel for the Bertha and Karl Leubsdorf Art Gallery, Hunter college (through Dec. 4, 2010) includes thirteen artists ... More » »
Art Basel Miami Beach goes for the gold
How many gold sculptures did we see at Art Basel Miami Beach today. Uh, we lost count. Here are just a few of the artists.
Chelsea bits and pieces
Cate and I spent last Saturday afternoon in Chelsea and a couple things leaped out as really good. More pictures here. Chris Ofili
Christmas Presents in Dublin; or what I did during the holidays
Albert Edelfelt (1854-1905)Conveying the Child’s Coffin (1879) oil on canvas, 120 x 204 cm, Ateneum Art Museum Central Art Archives / Hannu Aaltonen ‘Northern Stars and Southern Lights: The Golden Age of Finnish Art 1870-1920’ at the National Gallery of Ireland In the visual arts the first Finns who come to mind are probably the architects Alvar Aalto and Eero Saarinen followed by a group of designers from the 1960s working for firms such as Marimekko, Ittala and Arabia, and more recently the video artist Elja-Lisa Ahtila and filmmaker Aki Kaurismaki.
Weekly Update 2 – Cute is all around us
This week’s Weekly has my holiday roundup story on the cute in art. Below is the copy with some pictures. More photos at flickr.Aw-some ArtDevil monkeys, crocheted skulls and heartbreak made achingly sweet. Cute is the current art darling, pushed mostly by young artists but also some midcareer folks like Jeff Koons, who knew before the rest of us that irony would one day turn stale. Koons’ Puppy—a massive Chia Pet seen ’round the world—was loved by the general public and art insiders alike. Its arrival signaled that cute puppies were in and sourpusses could take a hike. Matthew Porter, ... More » »
The art of history, politics and other thoughts in Chelsea
Duke Riley, a drawing from his installation After the Battle of Brooklyn. After seeing Kara Walker show at the Whitney Thursday, one of our goals of Saturday’s Chelsea run-around included seeing her work at Sikkema Jenkins. But we saw lots more,, and an awful lot of it had historical and political thoughts in it. Riley’s submarine, modeled after drawings for such a vehicle from the pre-sub era. Roberta is checking out the insides, which, much to her surprise, had some beer cans strewn about. Duke Riley at Magnan Projects was spectacular. Riley, if you remember, is a guy who has ... More » »
Highlow is here
That’s what I’m going to call it. The new wonderful interweaving of all art genres in magazines and exhibits here there and seemingly everywhere. You probably saw the cover of this week’s New Yorker with the Kara Walker image “Post Katrina-Adrift.” Wonderful image, great artist, a “high” art powerhouse, and she’s got her first big solo museum retrospective opening at the Whitney in October. (Kara Walker: My Complement, My Enemy, My Oppressor, My Love, on view October 11, 2007-February 3,2008). Kara Walker’s cover in this week’s New Yorker magazine. And if that’s not great enough, P. 74 of the same ... More » »
Late Breaking News: Art on NPR yesterday
Did you hear All Things Considered yesterday? There was a marvelous piece on Kara Walker‘s retrospective at the Walker Art Center Interviews with Walker, with Yale School of Art Dean Robert Storr, with Thelma Golden of the Studio Museum of Harlem. Great story and with links and more on the NPR website where you can listen to the report. The wonderful news for us East Coasters who are big fans of the artist’s work is that the show is coming to New York to the Whitney Museum, October 11, 2007 – February 3, 2008. You West Coasters can see the ... More » »
Weekly Update – Heat in the galleries
This week’s Weekly has my essay dealing with emotional heat in some local art. Below is the copy and here’s the link to the art page. For more pictures of these shows check my flickr sites for Saving Faces, for Caleb Weintraub and Mauro Zamora, and the ICA. Libby has some good shots of the ICA show here. Heat and Why It MattersTaking posterity head on. Kara Walker’s cut paper and projected light piece in Fables at ICA. In today’s global art scene—where a Malaysian artist making abstract paintings in Brooklyn can show work in a Philadelphia gallery—it’s hard to ... More » »
Cai Guo-Qiang and Kara Walker: Black Cloud and Katrina’s deluge
detail from Nontransparent Monument by Cai Guo-Qiang, showing airport security at work Disaster is what has befallen us and made us into people we really don’t want to be. That’s what I got out of Cai Guo-Qiang’s installation group atop the roof at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (see Roberta’s post here) and also out of Kara Walker’s exhibit downstairs in the contemporary section. As Roberta mentioned, we were in New York Sunday to be part of a panel discussion on the effect of electronic media on art criticism, part of the International Association of Art Critic’s annual meeting (AICA, ... More » »
