Posts from the “Painting” Category

Hilma af Klint: Mundos Possiveis

Posted on May 21, 2018

Ain’t nothinn like getting the 25th anniversary issue of BUST Magazine in the mail and thinking on all the amazing work Laurie Henzel & Emily Rems have done throughout the years.

In one of those episodes of Psychic Friends Network, a little over a year ago I started saying, “I really want to write for BUST!” Then, a couple of weeks later Laurie hit me up with a plum assignment and we kept it moving from there.

Needless to say, I was thrilled to write a piece for the new issue on Hilma af Klint, the European painter whose abstract work predates that of Kandinsky et al. But she kept it under wraps throughout her life – and following her death as The High Masters advised.

The spirits understood the world as not ready for a woman to bring this to the world, and it is only now that historians are beginning to page through some 26,000 pages of notes and 1,200 works of art from this secret series.

What most touches me is the message that she brings to us: the resolution of contradiction and conflict through the understanding that life is an ever shifting balance of complements.

Categories: Art, Bust, Painting

Rammellzee: Racing for Thunder

Posted on May 2, 2018

RAMMΣLLZΣΣ. Photography Keetja Allard

Hailing from the outer limits of New York City and maybe even the earth itself, Rammellzee (1960-2010) arrived on the downtown scene aged 19, fully realised, like Athena springing from the head of Zeus, clad in armour, ready to take on all comers.

A singular figure in the early years of graffiti and hip hop who stood apart in a world filled with charismatic talents and revolutionary pioneers, Rammellzee introduced his philosophies of Gothic Futurism and Ikonoklast Panzerism in his artwork and performances. He donned characters and costumes as extensions of himself, comfortably shrouding himself in mysticism, mythology, and legends.

Did he go to jail in the 70s for robbing a bank? The world may never know – but now a new exhibition titled RAMMΣLLZΣΣ: Racing for Thunder tells the story of the elusive artist through those who knew him best. Organised by Red Bull Arts New York Chief Curator Max Wolf and cultural critic Carlo McCormick, the artist’s largest survey to date presents an inclusive selection of work from the icon throughout his three-decade career along with oral histories told by those who knew him best. Here, friends and colleagues share memories of Rammellzee, the man behind the mask.

Read the Full Story at AnOther Man

RAMMΣLLZΣΣ. Photography Brian Williams

Categories: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, AnOther Man, Art, Exhibitions, Graffiti, Manhattan, Music, Painting

Remembering Peggy Cooper Cafritz

Posted on April 18, 2018

Jas Knight, “Summer” (2015). Oil on linen 18 × 22 inches. Photography Jeremy Lawson.

Never let it be said that one person can’t change the world. African-American philanthropist, activist, and collector Peggy Cooper Cafritz (1947–2018) did just this, over and over again. As a doyenne of arts and education in the nation’s capital, Cooper Cafritz was a force of nature.

Hailing from Mobile, Alabama, Ms Cooper Cafritz moved north in 1964 to attend George Washington University, with a mission to fight against segregation at the tail end of Jim Crow. As a senior in 1968, she had a vision of what would become one of her greatest accomplishments: a public high school that served artistically gifted students of colour from disadvantaged neighbourhoods.

In 1974, Duke Ellington School of the Arts. Ellington officially opened, providing professional training in music, theatre, paintings, and dance, along with an academic curriculum. Notable alumni include comedian Dave Chapelle, singer-songwriter Me’Shell Ndegéocello, and operatic mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves.

Ms Cooper Cafrtiz did not stop there. Her dedication to cultivating talent extended far beyond the school grounds as she took a hands-on approach in developing one of the largest private collections of African-American and African art that includes work by Kehinde Wiley, David Hammons, Kerry James Marshall, Mickalene Thomas, Carrie Mae Weems, Emory Douglas, Barkley L. Hendricks, and LaToya Ruby Frazier, to name just a few.

Tragically, more than 300 pieces of the collection were destroyed in July 2009 after a fire at her home. It was a loss that would have devastated many, but Ms Cooper Cafritz, in her inimitable grace and determination, soldiered on. Working with co-editor Charmaine Picard, Ms Cooper Cafritz created Fired Up! Ready to Go!; Finding Beauty, Demanding Equality: An African American Life in Art (Rizzoli), a stunning volume that showcases 200 of the lost works.

On February 18, just five days before the book’s official release, Ms Cooper Cafritz died at the age of 70. Her death came as a shock to the artists whose careers she helped to nurture and cultivate. Two months on, Ms Picard and a host of leading artists remember the life and legacy of Peggy Cooper Cafritz.

Read the Full Story at Dazed

Lorraine O’Grady, “Art Is… (Girlfriends Times Two)” (1983/2009). C-print in 40 parts 16 × 20 inchesCourtesy Alexander Gray Associates, New York. © 2017 Lorraine O’Grady/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Peggy Cooper Cafritz. Copyright Marquéo

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Books, Dazed, Painting, Photography, Women

Kehinde Wiley & Amy Sherald; The Official Obama Portraits

Posted on February 16, 2018

When the official portraits of former President Barack Obama and Mrs. Michelle Obama were unveiled on Monday, February 12, at the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC, all the world had something to say. Love them or hate them, one thing is sure: nothing about the portraits was in keeping with the traditions of the White House.

As the first African American President and First Lady, the Obamas brought vibrant colour and dynamic style to the conventional representation of supreme power. The choice of Kehinde Wiley, 40, and Amy Sherald, 44, was a political as well as aesthetic act, reinforcing the Obamas’ ongoing commitment to African American artists that includes the inclusion of Alma Thomas and Glenn Ligon in the official White House art collection.

With an intrinsic understanding of legacy, the Obamas know that political progress, like art, requires us to step ahead of the status quo and recognise that it may take them time to catch up. To some, the work of Wiley and Sherald might seem avant-garde but within the realms of art, they are very much of the here and now.

Read the Full Story at Dazed

Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama” – 2018Amy Sherald, on display at National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution.

Categories: Art, Dazed, Painting

A Portrait of the Legendary Barkley L. Hendricks

Posted on February 15, 2018

“YOCKS”, 1975© Estate of Barkley L. Hendricks. Courtesy of the artist’s estate and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York

In October 1968, Bobby Seale, the co-founder of the Black Panther Party, made it plain in a court of law, when he faced conspiracy charges as part of the Chicago 8, stating: “We’re hip to the fact that Superman never saved no black people. You got that?”

Seale gave voice to a fact that was widely understood. So long as black folks are denied the opportunity to share their vision with the world, their lives and stories would be marginalised, misrepresented, or eradicated from the historical record.

Seale’s words were not lost on African American artist Barkley L. Hendricks (1945-2017), who donned a novelty Superman t-shirt, sunglasses, and nothing else for a self-portrait titled “Icon for My Man Superman (Superman Never Saved any Black People – Bobby Seale)” in 1969. The North Philadelphia native embodied the height of cool, a sensibility that dates back to 15th-century Nigerian Empire of Benin and has found its way across the African diaspora for six centuries.

Adopting the “cool pose,” with his arms folded across his chest against a simple grey backdrop framed in red, white, and blue, Hendricks tells it like it is. He is calm, fearless, and aloof, fully in control, poised, and dignified. Such is the strength of the painting that it was chosen as one of the primary images to promote Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power, the landmark traveling exhibition which originated at Tate – opening just a couple of months after Hendricks’ death on April 16 at the age of 72.

“If you’re gonna do it, you might as well be memorable,” Hendricks told Thelma Golden, the Director and Chief Curator of the Studio Museum in Harlem, in the seminal 2008 monograph, Birth of the Cool (Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University), which has just been republished to include a memoriam to the artist and a selection of new images from his oeuvre.

The book, edited by Trevor Schoonmaker, Curator of Contemporary Art at the Nasher, brilliantly presents a masterful look at the figurative painting, a selection of which can be seen in the next iteration of Soul of a Nation, which opened earlier this month at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas, as well as in the exhibition catalogue, available from the Tate, which features Hendricks’ painting “What’s Going On” (1974) on the cover.

But Hendricks’ genius goes far beyond the known. In his death, a wealth of previously unseen works have been revealed. Today, at Jack Shainman Gallery, New York, will present Barkley L. Hendricks, Them Changes, the first ever exhibition of newly discovered works on paper made contemporaneously with his famous portrait paintings.

These works take us inside Hendricks’ process, giving us a look at the way he crafted and mastered a visual language entirely his own. “While best known for his bold life-sized portraits, Hendricks is also an accomplished photographer, landscape painter, watercolourist, draftsman, assemblage artist, carpenter, and jazz musician,” Schoonmaker wrote in the introduction to Birth of the Cool, reminding us that the man behind the easel was just as fascinating as the subjects he painted.

Here Elisabeth Sann, Director of Jack Shainman Gallery, shares insights into Hendricks’ singular career that never fails to surprise and delight people from all walks of life.

Read the Full Story at Dazed

Misc. Tyrone (Tyrone Smith)”, 1976© Estate of Barkley L. Hendricks. Courtesy of the artist’s estate and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York

“Noir”, 1978© Estate of Barkley L. Hendricks. Courtesy of the artist’s estate and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Dazed, Painting

The 10 Best Art Exhibitions of 2017

Posted on December 22, 2017

Artwork Emma Amos (America, born 1938). Sandy and Her Husband, 1973. Oil on canvas. Courtesy of Emma Amos. © Emma Amos; courtesy of the artist and RYAN LEE, New York. Licensed by VAGA, New York.

The beauty of an exhibition is that you must go to it. You must be in its presence for a personal encounter in real time and space. You cannot scroll, swipe, or post your way through it: you must be there, in the moment, to experience it in the flesh and receive its understanding, knowledge, and wisdom though perhaps never a word will be said.

In celebration, Crave has compiled a list of the 10 best art exhibitions of 2017 that take us from the turn of the twentieth century right up to the present moment, with historic exhibitions of African American art on both sides of the pond, as well as long-awaited retrospectives from the likes of Rene Magritte and Raymond Pettibon.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Artwork: Betye Saar, Rainbow Mojo, 1972. Paul Michael diMeglio, New York.From Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power at Tate, London.

Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Painting, Photography

Altered States: The Library of Julio Santo Domingo

Posted on December 12, 2017

Photo: Still Kicking, a Polaroid of artist Jean-Michel Basquiat taken shortly before his death from a heroin overdose in 1988.Taken from Altered States: The Library of Julio Santo Domingo

Weed. Acid. Coke. Opium. Erotica. The Occult. There are many paths to achieve an altered state where mind and body blast off, leaving behind the mind-numbing banality of everday life. Fascinated by the possibilities of achieving transcendence on earth, Julio Santo Domingo (1957-2009) amassed the greatest private collection of sex, drugs, rock, and magic in the world – featuring some 100,000 books and objects by luminaries from Andy Warhol, Timothy Leary, and the Marquis de Sade to Charles Baudelaire, The Rolling Stones, and Aleister Crowley to name just a few.

Writer Peter Watts teamed up with designer Yolanda Cuomo to create Altered States: The Library of Julio Santo Domingo (Anthology Editions), the definitive book drawn from the collection, which now resides at Harvard University. Here, alongside a preview of images from the book, which has just been released, Watts tells us about Santo Domingo’s passion for enchantments of all sorts.

Read the Full Story at AnOther Man

Office wall in Geneva illustrating both Julio Santo Domingo’s eclectic, unorthodox hanging style and the wide range of material in the library. Note the stone phallus in the center of the pictureTaken from Altered States: The Library of Julio Santo Domingo

Categories: 1980s, 1990s, AnOther Man, Art, Books, Painting, Photography

Club 57: Film, Performance, and Art in the East Village, 1978–1983

Posted on December 6, 2017

Artwork: Kenny Scharf (American, born 1958). Having Fun. 1979. Acrylic on canvas. Collection Bruno Testore Schmidt, courtesy the artist and Honor Fraser Gallery, Los Angeles

By 1978, the East Village art scene was coming into its own, and a new movement began to take hold in the basement of New York’s Holy Cross Polish National Church at 57 St. Marks Place. Club 57, as it was known, was home to a group of young artists including Keith Haring, Kenny Scharf, Fred Brathwaite aka Fab 5 Freddy, Klaus Nomi, Tseng Kwong Chi, Joey Arias, John Sex, and Marcus Leatherdale – all of whom were redefining art and photography, fashion and design, film and video, performance and theatre.

The no-budget venue and social club broke all the rules, transforming the ways in which we experience art to the present day. In celebration, the Museum of Modern Art, New York, presents Club 57: Film, Performance, and Art in the East Village, 1978–1983, a major exhibition and catalogue organised by Ron Magliozzi, Curator and Sophie Cavoulacos, Assistant Curator, Department of Film, with guest curator Ann Magnuson.

Read the Full Story at Huck Online

Artwork: John Sex (American, 1956–1990). Amazon Temptation, 1980. Silkscreen. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Department of Film Special Collections

Categories: 1970s, 1980s, Art, Books, Exhibitions, Huck, Manhattan, Painting, Photography

James Rieck: Rapture

Posted on October 28, 2017

James Rieck. One: Number 31, 2017. Oil on canvas, 24 x 72 in / 61 x 183 cm.

A disembodied voice floats through the room, a soft falsetto that sweetly croons, Step into a world / where there’s no one left / but the very best / No MC can test.

And then the beat drops. One, two. One, two. You snap out of the reverie, back to the here and now, as your heart throbs, your blood flows, the bass pounds. You’re flush, radiating heat, feeling alive, overcome by the moment. Rapture.

It is everywhere you want to be, this sensuous feeling of release. Of being and becoming, of presence so compete it feels like a disembodied experience. It is that moment when body, mind, and soul are one, the ephemeral made eternal. It is so intense it only last a moment but it feels as though time has stopped. It is being high in its greatest sense, released from the mortal realm.

It is here that we are free from the banality of daily life, connecting the sacred and the profane through the experience of art. As American artist James Rieck observes, “It’s easy to lose yourself in a painting, or any form of art, as a means to escape from the world or the self. There is no limit to where it can take you, if you let it.”

James Rieck. Le Bonheur de Vivre, 2017. Oil on canvas, 24 x 72 in / 61 x 183 cm

In his Rapture, his newest series of work currently on view at Lyons Wier Gallery, New York, through November 4, Rieck evokes the feeling of bliss that exists in the intersection between art and archetype. Rieck’s subjects are models extrapolated from mid-twentieth century magazines that evoke bourgeois ideals, and sets them inside museums and galleries alongside classic masterpieces of Western art that use sex as their subject.

By juxtaposing these figures of pristine Puritanical splendor beside works like Matisse’s Le Bonheur de Vivre, Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s Bather Drying Herself, and Andy Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe, we step into a world where art’s power and influence in both demystified and amplified at the same time.

This is in large part due to Rieck’s framing of the work, tight crops that leave everything above the nose out. The eyes, being the windows to the soul, are invisible, and in doing this, not only is the subject rendered anonymous but makes space for us to participate. The model is not a person but a vessel into which we can slip, breathing in the rarefied air of the work of art.

James Rieck. Jeune Garçon au Cheval, 2017. Oil on canvas, 24 x 72 in / 61 x 183 cm.

But perhaps more than the framing it is Rieck’s color palette that renders us in a state of limpid titillation. Each work is a symphony of hues and tones that create an intense feeling of synesthesia. Does anyone else want a cupcake or an ice cream cone, a lemon tart or a slice of strawberry shortcake?

The high is so sumptuous you can literally taste it, smell, it, breathe it in. It is like a bouquet of violets and a tall glass of lemonade. It is a spell the whisks you away, like the loveliest lust. It is the safest sex, non me tangere, yet you still can’t help but feel like something has transpired.

Rieck explains, “Museums and art galleries are designed for you to let yourself ‘go’ in public. They are vehicles for the art experience of private passions in shared settings…. We can all want to feel the real pleasures that come from art and the places that hold it.”

Amen.

James Rieck. Baigneuse S’Eessuyant, 2017. Oil on canvas, 24 x 36 in / 61 x 91 cm.

Categories: Art, Exhibitions, Painting

Carolee Schneemann: Kinetic Painting

Posted on October 19, 2017

Artwork: Eye Body, Transformative Actions For The Camera, 1963. Courtesy of Carolee Schneemann

You may remember Lady Gaga’s meat dress as something of a scene – but it doesn’t hold a candle to Meat Joy, the Carolee Schneemann happening from 1964 that inspired it. Where Gaga took an existing idea and transformed it into a publicity stunt, Schneemann invented something that had never been seen or done – and it nearly cost her life.

Picture a group of young men and women clad in their undergarments experiencing the pleasures of the flesh: of the carcasses of fish and chicken, along with sausages, touching their bare skin. Imagine being in the same room as they gathered on the floor to engage in an experience of sensuality the likes of which had never been realised before. Envision a man in the audience becoming so enraged he leaped from his seat, dragging Schneemann off to the side, and beginning to strangle her.

This happened during the Paris edition and went on until two bourgeois women jumped from their seats and fought off the attacker until he stopped. Then Schneemann got back into the happening and continued on with the knowledge that her explorations could unleash a cataclysmic storm. But Schneemann is an unstoppable force – she is freedom incarnate. Uninhibited and unafraid, she has been challenging the patriarchy by virtue of being true to herself.

Born in 1939 to a country doctor and a farm wife, Schneemann grew up close to nature, embracing the life and death cycle of the earth. When her father refused to support her decision to go to college, she won a full scholarship to study painting at Bard College, in New York, which she attended until she was expelled on the grounds of “moral turpitude.” Where others might have given up, Schneemann persevered, creating a body of work so singular and so challenging that to this day she has no equal in the field.

Her pioneering investigations into the female body, sexuality, and gender have tapped into archaic visual traditions and wrestled with social taboos, transforming Schneemann into a vessel of transgression and subversion in search of truth. In celebration, MoMA P.S. 1, New York, presents Carolee Schneemann: Kinetic Painting (October 22, 2017- March 11, 2018), the first comprehensive retrospective spanning her prolific six-decade career.

In conjunction with the exhibition, Prestel has released a catalogue of the same name, while the Artists Institute has published Carolee’s Issue 02, which illustrates the ways in which other artists, advertisers, and pop culture figures have drawn heavily from her work. Schneemann speaks with us about Meat Joy as well as her career as “both image and image maker.”

Read the Story at Dazed

Artwork: Meat Joy 1964, chromogenic color print. Photo by Al Giese. From performance at Judson Church, November 16-18, 1964 New York. Courtesy of C. Schneemann and P.P.O.W, New York

Artwork: Nude on Tracks,1962-1977. Courtesy of Carolee Schneemann.

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Books, Dazed, Exhibitions, Painting, Women

Jane Friedman: How to Find Artists That Can Change the World

Posted on October 3, 2017

Photo: Mark Sink, Grace Jones, ca 1988

Artwork: Arturo Vega, “Supermarket Sign(Steak Sale)”, 1973. Acrylic on canvas 48 x 72 x 1 1/2 inches

Located in the heart of New York’s East Village, Howl! Happening was established in memory of artist Arturo Vega, who designed the iconic Ramones logo. Vega, a Mexican national, fled his native land in 1968 when the government rounded up 148 of the country’s most notable artists and intellectuals, putting their lives at risk. Vega fled to New York where he had prominent connections, like Jane Friedman – the woman made rock’n’roll journalism a legitimate business.

New York native Jane Friedman grew up on Broadway, as her father handled public relations for legendary shows along the Great White Way. Friedman followed in her father’s footsteps, and along the way, she realised her talents would be best served by supporting the greatest artists of the time. She went on to craft a new lane in the media, representing artists like Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa, as well as doing PR for the famed musical Hair. She was also Patti Smith’s manager throughout her career.

Friedman has been a behind-the-scenes fixture in downtown New York, working with artists and musicians to ensure their success and legacy. When Vega, one of her dearest friends died in 2013, Friedman set up Howl! Arts, a non-profit organisation that preserves the culture of the East Village and the Lower East Side in a rapidly gentrifying city that has effectively erased so much of the New York’s fabled past.

Taking its name from Allen Ginsberg’s famed 1955 poem, Howl! Happening: An Arturo Vega Project is the cornerstone of the organisation. A gallery, performance space, and archive located around the corner from where CBGBs once stood, Howl! Happening has been home to a series of phenomenal shows including exhibitions by Patricia Field, Lydia Lunch, Taboo!, PUNK Magazine’s 40th Anniversary, and The East Village Eye – as well as on-going events and performances that showcase the very best of the community, which continues to thrive despite the exponential explosion in the cost of living.

This month, Howl! presents Love Among the Ruins: 56 Bleecker Gallery Street and the late 80s New York, a group exhibition that looks back at the famed East Village gallery and performance space that served as a vital intersection of music, fashion, art, and nightlife during one of the most vital and devastating period of New York history. Featuring works by nearly 100 artists including David LaChapelle, Nan Goldin, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Dondi White, Stephen Sprouse, and George Condo, to name just a few, the exhibition is on view through October 7, 2017.

Friedman speaks with us about what it takes to cultivate a community of artists that can change the world, while staying true to your roots, and shares images from the ongoing show.

Read the Full Story at Dazed

Straight to Hell flyer

Photo: Mark Sink, Keith Haring, ca 1988

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Dazed, Exhibitions, Manhattan, Music, Painting, Photography, Women