Hi All-
I will be in Zionsville, Indiana for the summer, so I probably won't be able to do much posting. I'll do my best to keep updating over the next few weeks!
Wednesday, 16 June 2010
Tuesday, 8 June 2010
"Marcel, Marcel, I Love You like Hell [and so does Andy Warhol]!
My studies of Marcel Duchamp have led me to a number of profound conclusions. However, to quote my current art history teacher, Sara Sturdevant, perhaps the most significant conclusion in my experience has been, “Marcel, Marcel, I love you like hell!” Apparently I am not the only one. The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh currently has an exhibition on the relationship between the artworks of Duchamp and Warhol, entitled “A Twisted Pair.” Warhol took after Duchamp in many ways, aspiring, like the former, to challenge the viewer with optical illusions and controversial themes, including “sexuality…money, fame, and death” – a reflection on Pop Culture resulting from the counter-culture influence of Dada. While their first interactions were noted as early as 1962, many believe Warhol to have been acutely aware of Duchamp’s work far before then. Warhol was also a great collector of Duchamp’s work, owning over thirty pieces – an impressive collection considering Duchmap’s small output.
The curator of the exhibition, Matt Wrbican, draws a very literal comparison between the two artists over the course of the exhibition. He pairs each of their works, though somewhat simplistically, to convey the similar thematic and aesthetic trends that permeate the work of Duchamp and Warhol, as in the case of Duchamp’s “L.H.O.O.Q” and Warhol’s silkscreen images of the Mona Lisa. However, I very much appreciated the comparison between Duchamp’s “Coeur Volant” (Fluttering Heart), a silkscreen on paper work created between 1936 and 1961, and Warhol’s “Album of a Mat Queen,” a silkscreen ink and graphite work on linen, created in 1962. Within each piece, the artist delves into color study to create illusions of depth and movement. While the red within each piece recedes, and the blue pushes itself forward, their relationship allows for a sense of layered space that projects from the composition. At the same time, the varied amounts of each color in relation to one another result in a sense of vibration that encompasses each work, as though the artists have condensed the energy of opposing colors within similarly small frames. This dynamic force within Duchamp’s work explains its title, as the featured heart appears to “flutter” with the energy between the two opposing colors, red and blue, while he also applies the “colloquial French expression for the romantic emotion felt by lovers toward the object of their desire.” Warhol, in fact, owned a print of “Fluttering Heart,” (number 11/24 of the 1968 edition), and was likely very influenced by this color study in his own creation of “Album of a Mat Queen.” The comparisons that Wrbican draws between the two artists are very literal, as in the case of the similar colors and optical illusions between “Coeur Volant” and “Album of a Mat Queen.” However, they effectively reinforce the significance of each artist within the course of history, as he designates their position as reactions to what came before and predecessors to what comes next. A job well done.
Please note that all quotations are from narratives posted on the walls of the exhibition.
The curator of the exhibition, Matt Wrbican, draws a very literal comparison between the two artists over the course of the exhibition. He pairs each of their works, though somewhat simplistically, to convey the similar thematic and aesthetic trends that permeate the work of Duchamp and Warhol, as in the case of Duchamp’s “L.H.O.O.Q” and Warhol’s silkscreen images of the Mona Lisa. However, I very much appreciated the comparison between Duchamp’s “Coeur Volant” (Fluttering Heart), a silkscreen on paper work created between 1936 and 1961, and Warhol’s “Album of a Mat Queen,” a silkscreen ink and graphite work on linen, created in 1962. Within each piece, the artist delves into color study to create illusions of depth and movement. While the red within each piece recedes, and the blue pushes itself forward, their relationship allows for a sense of layered space that projects from the composition. At the same time, the varied amounts of each color in relation to one another result in a sense of vibration that encompasses each work, as though the artists have condensed the energy of opposing colors within similarly small frames. This dynamic force within Duchamp’s work explains its title, as the featured heart appears to “flutter” with the energy between the two opposing colors, red and blue, while he also applies the “colloquial French expression for the romantic emotion felt by lovers toward the object of their desire.” Warhol, in fact, owned a print of “Fluttering Heart,” (number 11/24 of the 1968 edition), and was likely very influenced by this color study in his own creation of “Album of a Mat Queen.” The comparisons that Wrbican draws between the two artists are very literal, as in the case of the similar colors and optical illusions between “Coeur Volant” and “Album of a Mat Queen.” However, they effectively reinforce the significance of each artist within the course of history, as he designates their position as reactions to what came before and predecessors to what comes next. A job well done.
Please note that all quotations are from narratives posted on the walls of the exhibition.
Saturday, 5 June 2010
Visual Overload
"Beyond Peaks Through Branches," 2010
Acrylic and reflective tape on wood panel.
As of two minutes ago, I was lying in bed, trying to sleep with very little success (it is currently 2:57 am). Visual Overload. Consider this my medical condition for the evening, one that has not only prevented me from falling asleep, but has been exacerbated by the artwork that I saw at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts earlier today (technically yesterday).
Elizabeth Mooney’s exhibition, “Shifting Panoramas,” is an attempt, in her words, “[to] present viewers with an abstracted vantage of place and space in an attempt to reconsider our ideas of beauty within the landscape. The intent with [her] work is to challenge the viewer to reconsider how they engage with nature and the accelerated pace at which the experience it.” To put it simply, her work falls short of this valiant purpose. Mooney’s mixed-media collages and paintings are a clichéd, unrealistic representation of human perception of nature, in which she portrays the environment as one of haphazard and chaotic forms, leaving little to the imagination. There is no ambiguity in her work, no granule of uncertainty to reflect upon, and this is where she loses grasp of her intention to challenge the viewer and of any credible representation of nature. In my experience, as I constantly perceive the world around me, I am often challenged to find scenes where lines are always deliberate and transitions always sudden; rather, I perceive a world of complexity, in which beginnings and ends – and the spaces between – are gradual and inseparable. Mooney creates a fictional canon of personal interactions with nature to which she suggests we must all subscribe.
To make matters worse, the images are crowded with an over-abundance of parts.– neon lines, undertones of wood, and sky-like backgrounds – each of which lack any relation to another. The result: An assembly of parts lacking a compositional whole. Her pieces additionally lack variation, quickly becoming hackneyed and trite. Within a matter of seconds, I wanted to turn around and leave. Once I had seen one, I had seen them all, and yet I still left feeling as though my senses were exhausted and overloaded....
Photo source: http://www.elizabethmooney.com/painting_B.html
Thursday, 3 June 2010
"Gods, Love, and War:" An Exhibition of Tapestries and Prints from The Carnegie Museum of Art Collection
Yesterday, I went to the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to wander through “Gods, Love, and War,” an exhibition of 16th and 17th Century Northern European tapestries and prints from the collection. The show is an astounding composition of thematically, symbolically, and technically aligned pieces, which despite their varying mediums and dramatic shifts in scale, wrap up perfectly like a little package. I want to buy the curator a drink....
The curatorial decisions that went into this exhibition were both thoughtful and thought-provoking, emphasizing the narrative and technical overlaps between the tapestries and prints, as well as the outstanding quality of the selected pieces. The assembled works formed an extensive reflection on the “artistic, social, and political values of the time.” However, it is the overlap that the curator draws between such different scales of art that conveys these meanings in thematic, symbolic, and technical terms.
Two of my favorite pieces from the exhibition were the “Winter” and “Autumn” tapestries from “The Seasons of Lucas” series from the late 17th Century. Produced by the Gobelins Manufactory in Paris, the wool pieces are so masterfully woven and dyed that each is truly breathtaking. I must admit that I have never had the opportunity to study tapestries in depth, but as I moved through the exhibit, I could not wait to study them in the future. However, from what I gather online, tapestries were some of the most valuable objects of the 16th and 17th Centuries. In addition to their compelling decorative purpose, they served as insulation for the cold, lofty castles of Northern European royalty.
Both “Winter” and “Autumn” depict peasants at “labor and leisure” and are laced with religious symbolism to carry out their moralizing purpose, which is characteristic of the Counter-Reformation. In ‘Winter,’ for instance, Boreas, a mythological figure representing the North Wind, blows the cold winter wind over the scene. “A fire rages in the distance, a visual tactic often used to depict the Last Judgment, the fire serves as a reminder of the consequences of [immorality].” Beyond its religious symbolism, the tapestry is noteworthy for the remarkable skill with which it is composed. The artist applies atmospheric perspective masterfully, creating a convincing transition from the foreground to the middleground, to the background that is fluid, compelling, and filled with beautiful pastel colors. The fluidity of color is so naturalistic and delicate, in fact, that the tapestry is reminiscent of a water color painting, particularly in the varying textures and colors that compose the ground. In my experience, the artist’s rendering of the scene was so compelling that it overshadowed the lack of a number of representational developments of the Renaissance, including linear perspective and naturalistic sense of scale.
The exhibition also includes a snappy little show of prints by the print-making masters of the Northern European Renaissance, including Albrecht Durer, Rembrandt, and Pieter Bruegel the Elder. During this period, prints flooded the art market due to development of the fine arts printing press in the mid-15th Century. These prints share many thematic and symbolic qualities with the tapestries of the period, including biblical scenes and scenes of common people laced with religious imagery. The integration of virtuosity in tapestries from the period is also integrated in the prints, but from what I can conclude from the exhibition, to a further extent. For instance, Albrecht Durer’s series on The Life of the Virgin, a series which he considered to be the masterpiece of his career, is a collection of sophisticated representations of the Madonna, which combine linear perspective, naturalistic treatment of landscape, and a skillful rendering of human interactions. “The Annunciation,” a print from his series on the Virgin, created between 1502 and 1504, exemplifies his application of these representational developments. Framed by a series of receding arches, he approaches the scene scientifically, treating space, light, and texture naturalistically and deliberately with fine hatching. He fills the scene with characteristic religious symbolism, including a vacant pot and open book – each a metaphor for the Virgin Mother – and a remarkably crafted dove atop Mary’s head. I am so pleased to have had the opportunity to view this series – a paramount achievement in Durer’s career – alongside some of the most remarkable tapestries of the period. The curatorial decision to organize an exhibition of tapestries and prints, each the end products of mechanical processes, results in a synergy of strengthened meaning through parallel themes, symbols, and virtuosity.
Please note that all quotations come from narratives posted on the walls of the exhibition.
The curatorial decisions that went into this exhibition were both thoughtful and thought-provoking, emphasizing the narrative and technical overlaps between the tapestries and prints, as well as the outstanding quality of the selected pieces. The assembled works formed an extensive reflection on the “artistic, social, and political values of the time.” However, it is the overlap that the curator draws between such different scales of art that conveys these meanings in thematic, symbolic, and technical terms.
Two of my favorite pieces from the exhibition were the “Winter” and “Autumn” tapestries from “The Seasons of Lucas” series from the late 17th Century. Produced by the Gobelins Manufactory in Paris, the wool pieces are so masterfully woven and dyed that each is truly breathtaking. I must admit that I have never had the opportunity to study tapestries in depth, but as I moved through the exhibit, I could not wait to study them in the future. However, from what I gather online, tapestries were some of the most valuable objects of the 16th and 17th Centuries. In addition to their compelling decorative purpose, they served as insulation for the cold, lofty castles of Northern European royalty.
Both “Winter” and “Autumn” depict peasants at “labor and leisure” and are laced with religious symbolism to carry out their moralizing purpose, which is characteristic of the Counter-Reformation. In ‘Winter,’ for instance, Boreas, a mythological figure representing the North Wind, blows the cold winter wind over the scene. “A fire rages in the distance, a visual tactic often used to depict the Last Judgment, the fire serves as a reminder of the consequences of [immorality].” Beyond its religious symbolism, the tapestry is noteworthy for the remarkable skill with which it is composed. The artist applies atmospheric perspective masterfully, creating a convincing transition from the foreground to the middleground, to the background that is fluid, compelling, and filled with beautiful pastel colors. The fluidity of color is so naturalistic and delicate, in fact, that the tapestry is reminiscent of a water color painting, particularly in the varying textures and colors that compose the ground. In my experience, the artist’s rendering of the scene was so compelling that it overshadowed the lack of a number of representational developments of the Renaissance, including linear perspective and naturalistic sense of scale.
The exhibition also includes a snappy little show of prints by the print-making masters of the Northern European Renaissance, including Albrecht Durer, Rembrandt, and Pieter Bruegel the Elder. During this period, prints flooded the art market due to development of the fine arts printing press in the mid-15th Century. These prints share many thematic and symbolic qualities with the tapestries of the period, including biblical scenes and scenes of common people laced with religious imagery. The integration of virtuosity in tapestries from the period is also integrated in the prints, but from what I can conclude from the exhibition, to a further extent. For instance, Albrecht Durer’s series on The Life of the Virgin, a series which he considered to be the masterpiece of his career, is a collection of sophisticated representations of the Madonna, which combine linear perspective, naturalistic treatment of landscape, and a skillful rendering of human interactions. “The Annunciation,” a print from his series on the Virgin, created between 1502 and 1504, exemplifies his application of these representational developments. Framed by a series of receding arches, he approaches the scene scientifically, treating space, light, and texture naturalistically and deliberately with fine hatching. He fills the scene with characteristic religious symbolism, including a vacant pot and open book – each a metaphor for the Virgin Mother – and a remarkably crafted dove atop Mary’s head. I am so pleased to have had the opportunity to view this series – a paramount achievement in Durer’s career – alongside some of the most remarkable tapestries of the period. The curatorial decision to organize an exhibition of tapestries and prints, each the end products of mechanical processes, results in a synergy of strengthened meaning through parallel themes, symbols, and virtuosity.
Please note that all quotations come from narratives posted on the walls of the exhibition.
Wednesday, 2 June 2010
The "Very Personal" Nature of Allen Ginsberg's Photography
Ginsberg's handwritten caption beneath the photograph states: "Kerouac wandering along East 7th street after visiting Burroughs at our pad, passing statue of Congressman Samuel "Sunset" Cot, "The Letter – Carrier's Friend" in Tompkins Square toward corner of Avenue A, Lower East Side; he's making a Dostoyevsky mad-face or Russian basso be-bop Om, first walking around the neighborhood, then involved with The Subterraneans, pencils & notebook in wool shirt-pockets, Fall 1953, Manhattan."
I once read a review of an artist, in which her work was characterized as being “very personal.”
My response: All art is personal.
Since I left Washington, I have continued to reflect on the Allen Ginsberg exhibition at The National Gallery and the “very personal” nature of his photographs. His photographs, along with his hand-written synopses included beneath each image on the wall, form keyholes through which visitors may peer into his experience among the Beat poets and “counterculture generation” from the 1950s to the 1990s. As an amateur photographer, Ginsberg combines a natural talent for photography with his critical observation of the world around him and his desire to capture and characterize it. This selective "moment in time" record of the changing post-war American culture exists as a series of insightful and witty photographs of his very noteworthy friends. These include William S. Burroughs, Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassady, and Gregory Corso, writers and symbols of the disaffected society. The level of comfort between Ginsberg and his close friends allows for a candid sense of instantaneity that captures the personalities of the Beats and artists from this time. In this sense, the “very personal” nature of his photographs forms the theme of the exhibition as a visual documentation of the human experience in a society drifting between the wars before the “counterculture generation” took its own shape as an artistic force. While Ginsberg is an amateur, he approaches his photography with a refined intuition and a desire to capture the instantaneity of the world around him. His compelling appreciation for and application of these themes characterizes him as a great artist – both as a poet and as a photographer.
Photo source: http://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2010/ginsberg/ginsbergfull.shtm
Sources Cited: "Beat Memories: The Photographs of Allen Ginsberg." National Gallery of Art. 2 May 2010. Web. 2 June 2010.
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