Jessica Stockholder, Untitled, 2009, plastic tray, gray plastic, hardware, African wood, foam, cloth, styrofoam, ribbons, tape, 35x21x9 inches. Image via: Mitchell-Innes & Nash
This week at The L Magazine I discuss Jessica Stockholder’s show Mitchell-Innes & Nash and Nam June Paik at James Cohan Gallery. The teaser below.
Gallery audiences never know what kind of art experience New York will serve up. This week's foray into north Chelsea, for example, produced only two exhibitions worth discussing of the fifteen I visited: Jessica Stockholder at Mitchell-Innes & Nash and Nam June Paik at James Cohan Gallery. Both shows make it clear why so many artists take their cues from these vastly influential sculptors.
A predecessor to the fragmented form of contemporaries such as Rachel Harrison, Michael Mahalchick and Tony Feher, fifty-year-old Jessica Stockholder brings together manipulated and raw materials in her latest exhibition SailCloth Tears. Eight sculptures, all but one using the wall for support, sparsely populate the gallery. Those more familiar with her well-known large-scale installations of the 80s and 90s may see her new work's more compact form as a departure, though in truth she's been making these smaller pieces for a few years. The essential sensibility — a rainbow palette, disparate objects, and heavy investment in textural surface — remains the same.
Specific to SailCloth Tears, many of the works exhibit a subtle humor. Choosing to paint a shape vaguely resembling a face on the most absurd surface imaginable — a free standing yellow fluffy roll on a stick — doesn't make any sense. This is why it works — the surprise pleases. Another piece hangs a small wall-mounted antique frame with brilliant yellow paint on the corner, suggesting that the conditions of display inform what's inside the picture plane. It also boxes an untouched piece of black plastic with a fake alligator pattern — the pre-made texture glorified as art.
To read the full review click here.
Editors note: Due to a technical glitch, this post was removed and reposted.
{ 18 comments }
tony feher is underrated
tony feher is underrated
tony feher is overrated imo.
tony feher is overrated imo.
hi paddy
why i think he’s underrated:
he’s an established artist who shows at 2 prominent NYC galleries (d’amelio terras and now pace) who doesn’t get much critical attention or press. not that i’m out there looking for it, but i haven’t seen much of anything on him aside from a fluff piece in Art News last year in conjunction with an installation in Indianapolis. and he doesn’t do particularly well on the secondary market compared to his “peers”–even back in the day, when things were grand. so, for the sake of argument, if he is good then the above would be indicators of his being underrated, or at least, under appreciation or under the radar.
why i think he’s good:
his work is simple. this is important to me. the gesture is always simple. whether or not discovering what works or conceiving the piece takes a long time, or if finding the materials is a process in itself (which it is for him, as i understand it, he hordes things that capture his attention that he may use at some point), whatever the “prep work,” the final piece is always a simple gesture that is readily understandable in this sense. it is understandable insofar as how it was made. in this sense the work is transparent, which makes a clearing for the viewer to engage the piece as art, in a direct way.
the work is always beautiful. this i guess is my opinion. it is pretty.
there is a contemplative quality about the work: there is never a sense of haphazardness to it. the gestures, although almost always simple, conversely have a very deliberate quality. i never get the sense that his work is just thrown out there or he’s being “ironic” or making art that is a “joke” of some sort. it may be humorous at times, but more often, and almost always there is a sadness to the work, a loneliness.
his sculptures, including the wall ones currently up at d’amelio terras (haven’t seen these in person yet) always “create space.” by this i mean they are not just objects or assemblages in space but rather are engaging the space directly. this is more apparent in his floor or hanging pieces or “window treatments”. there is a deceptive decorative quality to his work, and it is deceptive because it’s not decorative just because it’s pretty and is colorful–it’s very much serious art.
the work is always made of found materials. this is interesting. the “things” that make up the pieces are always recognizable, again a transparency. a related example, i think, barnett newman–you know what you are dealing with and you know what you are engaging–there is very little mystery in this sense, it’s transparent. but these transparent gestures can also lead to “sublime” experiences (someone else’s description of newman that i agree with in this context).
i think he is an important link to the first sculptures in the (late 50s?) 60s on, that were the first to use color that was inherent to the material (like Judd or Chamberlain) as opposed to color as an add-on element; a link between them and the “new work” like the unmonumental crew. and that his work engages space, makes space, like, again, judd, and robert irwin, and others.
and lastly i had the good fortune of seeing his work in marfa, at the chinati foundation. he did three related installations (New American Landscape Painting) there in 2005, was working there when i was there. these were really amazing. and treated each of the three sites with care and responded differently to each site (he sought out and “discovered” one of them). they were fully realized and pretty incredible. The best images i could find.
bye
http://www.damelioterras.com/news.html?id=309&f=16,artist
hi paddy
why i think he’s underrated:
he’s an established artist who shows at 2 prominent NYC galleries (d’amelio terras and now pace) who doesn’t get much critical attention or press. not that i’m out there looking for it, but i haven’t seen much of anything on him aside from a fluff piece in Art News last year in conjunction with an installation in Indianapolis. and he doesn’t do particularly well on the secondary market compared to his “peers”–even back in the day, when things were grand. so, for the sake of argument, if he is good then the above would be indicators of his being underrated, or at least, under appreciation or under the radar.
why i think he’s good:
his work is simple. this is important to me. the gesture is always simple. whether or not discovering what works or conceiving the piece takes a long time, or if finding the materials is a process in itself (which it is for him, as i understand it, he hordes things that capture his attention that he may use at some point), whatever the “prep work,” the final piece is always a simple gesture that is readily understandable in this sense. it is understandable insofar as how it was made. in this sense the work is transparent, which makes a clearing for the viewer to engage the piece as art, in a direct way.
the work is always beautiful. this i guess is my opinion. it is pretty.
there is a contemplative quality about the work: there is never a sense of haphazardness to it. the gestures, although almost always simple, conversely have a very deliberate quality. i never get the sense that his work is just thrown out there or he’s being “ironic” or making art that is a “joke” of some sort. it may be humorous at times, but more often, and almost always there is a sadness to the work, a loneliness.
his sculptures, including the wall ones currently up at d’amelio terras (haven’t seen these in person yet) always “create space.” by this i mean they are not just objects or assemblages in space but rather are engaging the space directly. this is more apparent in his floor or hanging pieces or “window treatments”. there is a deceptive decorative quality to his work, and it is deceptive because it’s not decorative just because it’s pretty and is colorful–it’s very much serious art.
the work is always made of found materials. this is interesting. the “things” that make up the pieces are always recognizable, again a transparency. a related example, i think, barnett newman–you know what you are dealing with and you know what you are engaging–there is very little mystery in this sense, it’s transparent. but these transparent gestures can also lead to “sublime” experiences (someone else’s description of newman that i agree with in this context).
i think he is an important link to the first sculptures in the (late 50s?) 60s on, that were the first to use color that was inherent to the material (like Judd or Chamberlain) as opposed to color as an add-on element; a link between them and the “new work” like the unmonumental crew. and that his work engages space, makes space, like, again, judd, and robert irwin, and others.
and lastly i had the good fortune of seeing his work in marfa, at the chinati foundation. he did three related installations (New American Landscape Painting) there in 2005, was working there when i was there. these were really amazing. and treated each of the three sites with care and responded differently to each site (he sought out and “discovered” one of them). they were fully realized and pretty incredible. The best images i could find.
bye
http://www.damelioterras.com/news.html?id=309&f=16,artist
hi paddy
why i think he’s underrated:
he’s an established artist who shows at 2 prominent NYC galleries (d’amelio terras and now pace) who doesn’t get much critical attention or press. not that i’m out there looking for it, but i haven’t seen much of anything on him aside from a fluff piece in Art News last year in conjunction with an installation in Indianapolis. and he doesn’t do particularly well on the secondary market compared to his “peers”–even back in the day, when things were grand. so, for the sake of argument, if he is good then the above would be indicators of his being underrated, or at least, under appreciation or under the radar.
why i think he’s good:
his work is simple. this is important to me. the gesture is always simple. whether or not discovering what works or conceiving the piece takes a long time, or if finding the materials is a process in itself (which it is for him, as i understand it, he hordes things that capture his attention that he may use at some point), whatever the “prep work,” the final piece is always a simple gesture that is readily understandable in this sense. it is understandable insofar as how it was made. in this sense the work is transparent, which makes a clearing for the viewer to engage the piece as art, in a direct way.
the work is always beautiful. this i guess is my opinion. it is pretty.
there is a contemplative quality about the work: there is never a sense of haphazardness to it. the gestures, although almost always simple, conversely have a very deliberate quality. i never get the sense that his work is just thrown out there or he’s being “ironic” or making art that is a “joke” of some sort. it may be humorous at times, but more often, and almost always there is a sadness to the work, a loneliness.
his sculptures, including the wall ones currently up at d’amelio terras (haven’t seen these in person yet) always “create space.” by this i mean they are not just objects or assemblages in space but rather are engaging the space directly. this is more apparent in his floor or hanging pieces or “window treatments”. there is a deceptive decorative quality to his work, and it is deceptive because it’s not decorative just because it’s pretty and is colorful–it’s very much serious art.
the work is always made of found materials. this is interesting. the “things” that make up the pieces are always recognizable, again a transparency. a related example, i think, barnett newman–you know what you are dealing with and you know what you are engaging–there is very little mystery in this sense, it’s transparent. but these transparent gestures can also lead to “sublime” experiences (someone else’s description of newman that i agree with in this context).
i think he is an important link to the first sculptures in the (late 50s?) 60s on, that were the first to use color that was inherent to the material (like Judd or Chamberlain) as opposed to color as an add-on element; a link between them and the “new work” like the unmonumental crew. and that his work engages space, makes space, like, again, judd, and robert irwin, and others.
and lastly i had the good fortune of seeing his work in marfa, at the chinati foundation. he did three related installations (New American Landscape Painting) there in 2005, was working there when i was there. these were really amazing. and treated each of the three sites with care and responded differently to each site (he sought out and “discovered” one of them). they were fully realized and pretty incredible. The best images i could find.
bye
http://www.damelioterras.com/news.html?id=309&f=16,artist
hi paddy
why i think he’s underrated:
he’s an established artist who shows at 2 prominent NYC galleries (d’amelio terras and now pace) who doesn’t get much critical attention or press. not that i’m out there looking for it, but i haven’t seen much of anything on him aside from a fluff piece in Art News last year in conjunction with an installation in Indianapolis. and he doesn’t do particularly well on the secondary market compared to his “peers”–even back in the day, when things were grand. so, for the sake of argument, if he is good then the above would be indicators of his being underrated, or at least, under appreciation or under the radar.
why i think he’s good:
his work is simple. this is important to me. the gesture is always simple. whether or not discovering what works or conceiving the piece takes a long time, or if finding the materials is a process in itself (which it is for him, as i understand it, he hordes things that capture his attention that he may use at some point), whatever the “prep work,” the final piece is always a simple gesture that is readily understandable in this sense. it is understandable insofar as how it was made. in this sense the work is transparent, which makes a clearing for the viewer to engage the piece as art, in a direct way.
the work is always beautiful. this i guess is my opinion. it is pretty.
there is a contemplative quality about the work: there is never a sense of haphazardness to it. the gestures, although almost always simple, conversely have a very deliberate quality. i never get the sense that his work is just thrown out there or he’s being “ironic” or making art that is a “joke” of some sort. it may be humorous at times, but more often, and almost always there is a sadness to the work, a loneliness.
his sculptures, including the wall ones currently up at d’amelio terras (haven’t seen these in person yet) always “create space.” by this i mean they are not just objects or assemblages in space but rather are engaging the space directly. this is more apparent in his floor or hanging pieces or “window treatments”. there is a deceptive decorative quality to his work, and it is deceptive because it’s not decorative just because it’s pretty and is colorful–it’s very much serious art.
the work is always made of found materials. this is interesting. the “things” that make up the pieces are always recognizable, again a transparency. a related example, i think, barnett newman–you know what you are dealing with and you know what you are engaging–there is very little mystery in this sense, it’s transparent. but these transparent gestures can also lead to “sublime” experiences (someone else’s description of newman that i agree with in this context).
i think he is an important link to the first sculptures in the (late 50s?) 60s on, that were the first to use color that was inherent to the material (like Judd or Chamberlain) as opposed to color as an add-on element; a link between them and the “new work” like the unmonumental crew. and that his work engages space, makes space, like, again, judd, and robert irwin, and others.
and lastly i had the good fortune of seeing his work in marfa, at the chinati foundation. he did three related installations (New American Landscape Painting) there in 2005, was working there when i was there. these were really amazing. and treated each of the three sites with care and responded differently to each site (he sought out and “discovered” one of them). they were fully realized and pretty incredible. The best images i could find.
bye
http://www.damelioterras.com/news.html?id=309&f=16,artist
i think it is easy to dismiss his works because they are so deceptively subtle. There is contradiction in this work- clumsy vs elegance, symmetry vs formlessness, stupid vs. intelligence. But there is a consistent energy, wit, and honesty in the ways that he deals with materials and space. I do think that his work advances contingent, designative work (duchampianism) in ways different than Stockholder, Tuttle, FGT, and others. Its distinctive enough to merit some thought i believe.
i think it is easy to dismiss his works because they are so deceptively subtle. There is contradiction in this work- clumsy vs elegance, symmetry vs formlessness, stupid vs. intelligence. But there is a consistent energy, wit, and honesty in the ways that he deals with materials and space. I do think that his work advances contingent, designative work (duchampianism) in ways different than Stockholder, Tuttle, FGT, and others. Its distinctive enough to merit some thought i believe.
i think it is easy to dismiss his works because they are so deceptively subtle. There is contradiction in this work- clumsy vs elegance, symmetry vs formlessness, stupid vs. intelligence. But there is a consistent energy, wit, and honesty in the ways that he deals with materials and space. I do think that his work advances contingent, designative work (duchampianism) in ways different than Stockholder, Tuttle, FGT, and others. Its distinctive enough to merit some thought i believe.
i think it is easy to dismiss his works because they are so deceptively subtle. There is contradiction in this work- clumsy vs elegance, symmetry vs formlessness, stupid vs. intelligence. But there is a consistent energy, wit, and honesty in the ways that he deals with materials and space. I do think that his work advances contingent, designative work (duchampianism) in ways different than Stockholder, Tuttle, FGT, and others. Its distinctive enough to merit some thought i believe.
I saw Tony Feher speak about his work at Rutgers in 2000. While discussing one particular piece which comprised stacked Coke crates, he likened the work to the Berlin Wall because “it too could fall at any time”. The whole lecture was filled careless and haphazard analogies, often made up on the fly. The artist clearly thought narrative connections and intellectual investment was important to the work but invested shockingly little himself. I haven’t been able to take his work as seriously since.
I saw Tony Feher speak about his work at Rutgers in 2000. While discussing one particular piece which comprised stacked Coke crates, he likened the work to the Berlin Wall because “it too could fall at any time”. The whole lecture was filled careless and haphazard analogies, often made up on the fly. The artist clearly thought narrative connections and intellectual investment was important to the work but invested shockingly little himself. I haven’t been able to take his work as seriously since.
i think he’s embarrassed, in a humble way, about what he does, when he gives talks in front of official audiences, he doesn’t talk about the process that well, he goes more for the naive texan angle, which he isn’t. his work, to pick up a theme from mcreegan, is in contradiction to his public explanations. my interpretation of what i’ve experienced.
i think he’s embarrassed, in a humble way, about what he does, when he gives talks in front of official audiences, he doesn’t talk about the process that well, he goes more for the naive texan angle, which he isn’t. his work, to pick up a theme from mcreegan, is in contradiction to his public explanations. my interpretation of what i’ve experienced.
i think he’s embarrassed, in a humble way, about what he does, when he gives talks in front of official audiences, he doesn’t talk about the process that well, he goes more for the naive texan angle, which he isn’t. his work, to pick up a theme from mcreegan, is in contradiction to his public explanations. my interpretation of what i’ve experienced.
i think he’s embarrassed, in a humble way, about what he does, when he gives talks in front of official audiences, he doesn’t talk about the process that well, he goes more for the naive texan angle, which he isn’t. his work, to pick up a theme from mcreegan, is in contradiction to his public explanations. my interpretation of what i’ve experienced.
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