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These two proposals show two radically different strategies to artistically approach the Ben Franklin Parkway. For Richard Serra, it’s the global reputation of the artist that makes his work a natural fit for this global stage. For the Holocaust Memorial, a park designed pluralistically, it’s the magnitude of the event it commemorates that elevates this design for this stage. And both proposals are now on track to land on the Parkway in the next year.
Read MoreThe art produced in Philadelphia is not, for some miraculous reason, outside of the problem of the unresolved status of contemporary art. It is, rather, like art produced in so many other places, subject to the larger social-historical problem of art’s function. To begin to reimagine platforms of reception, I believe that constant reflection of the unresolved problem of the social function of contemporary art needs to be made.
Read MoreWhy don’t we know about Paula Modersohn-Becker? The book reveals she showed her work but a few times while she was alive, she died young at age 31, and the modernist style and nudes, made in the last year of her life, 1906, were a shock when discovered. No one quite knew what to make of her work. “Greatness” an early critic said; in the same decade of 1910s another said “odd.” This book is the first in English to give a definitive account of her life, exhibition and critical history, and art historical assessment.
Read MoreSylvie Franquet’s reMembering is nothing less than a treatise on how art history has plundered the female form and women’s idle hands. Franquet’s intimate, reconfigured tapestries now on view at London’s October Gallery recall my own mother’s needlepoints of tulips and roses, little girls and blue skies–laborious forays into home decoration. Well made, but uninteresting–a condescending opinion of mine, I admit, that haunts me today. Indeed, I once asked my mother to produce a pair of text works; she acquiesced, but grudgingly, complaining, “I don’t like your conceptual works! How about a nice flower!”
Read MoreThe approach to Napoleon’s doorway is jarring, as visitors are met by the repeat-pattern, floor-to-ceiling American flag wallpaper inside that makes the average patriotic displays at a 4th of July picnic appear like an affront to the U.S. Constitution by comparison. Numerous visitors at the First Friday opening were visibly uneasy at this unanticipated, flag-waving jingoism in their midst, but beneath the edifice lies a powerful critique.
Read Morethe written image. presents a thought provoking array of works which, in a variety of ways, visually examine the symbolic and conceptual complexity of words and language. The exhibition has been skillfully curated by Susanna Gold, and the presentation in her bright Bryn Mawr home, which spans a series of rooms, is refreshingly pleasant.
Read MoreSomething about the design of the geodesic dome captures the imagination, and the evolution of the design demonstrates how certain abstractions transmogrify when released into the consciousness of a society. Johnson’s work shows us the jump from abstraction to a series of structures which seek to embody both utopian and utilitarian ideals. Geodesic domes may be an imperfect example, but Johnson’s project does capture something of the mystery surrounding the idea-to-object process, and suggests that the results are intriguingly impossible to predict.
Read MoreFor their December 4–5 performances at the Kimmel Center’s Perelman Theatre, the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia opened with a pair of jovial works by Gioachino Rossini (d. 1868) and Charles Gounod (d. 1893) (two composers renowned particularly for their contribution to opera), and then dedicated the rest of the program to works by living composers–including world and US premieres.
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