David Malek at Rawson Projects, Brooklyn, New York

Left to right: David Malek, Inverse Icosahedron, 2011. Enamel on wood, 41 1/2 x 48 in.; David Malek, Obverse Icosahedron, 2011. Enamel on wood, 41 1/2 x 48 in. Photos: 16 Miles [more]

"Most ideas that are successful are ludicrously simple." — Sol LeWitt, "Paragraphs on Conceptual Art," 1967


David Malek, Obverse Concentric Hexagon, 2011. Enamel on wood, 41 1/2 x 48 in.

Earlier this year, the Museum of Modern Art hung a handful of Frank Stella's classic early paintings in its heavily trafficked atrium. This was something of a surprise since that space has generally been the site of the museum's most theatrical and ambitious projects, the performance, video, and sculpture that simply would not fit anywhere else. It has become, as Times art critic Roberta Smith put it in December, "the billboard for the new, feisty radicality" in vogue at MoMA. The presence of Stella's paintings in that space is unusual, but it is, of course, radical in its own way, bringing an unexpected pause to all of that earlier spectacle and perhaps also acknowledging the influence that Stella's early works exercise on artists today, from Ned Vena to Xylor Jane. (It also signals that the institution apparently does not hold grudges: Stella famously declared that the 2001 MoMA exhibition "Modern Starts" should have been called "Masturbatory Insights" and subtitled "Pointless, clueless and soulless.")

One of the artists fruitfully using some of Stella's 1950s and 1960s magic is the Brooklyn–based artist David Malek, particularly in his current show, "Hexagons," at the new Wiliamsburg gallery Rawson Projects, which features six hexagonal canvases, each dated 2011. Malek has painted them with cascading lines of colors that range from white to dark gray and shift at a rate that corresponds to Albert H. Munsell’s color system, according to the press release. In Obverse Concentric Hexagon, this technique creates a painting that suggests a long look straight down the middle of a hexagonal tunnel from darkness to light; in Inverse Concentric Hexagon, the reverse. To Malek's credit, the analogy to Stella only goes so far. Another set of twins — Inverse Icosahedron and Obverse Icosahedron — conjures three-dimensions, contra-early-Stella, by dividing the hexagons into various triangles. Space expands outward and recedes inward as the eye travels, respectively, to the lighter and the darker stretches.


Detail view of David Malek, Obverse Concentric Hexagon, 2011. Enamel on wood, 41 1/2 x 48 in.


Detail view of David Malek, Benzene 2, 2011. Enamel on wood panel, 41 1/2 x 48 in.

Seen together, the works possess a vaguely menacing quality, perhaps because of the uncanny doubling of the two pairs of canvases, and the fact that the remaining two works — a small one called Small Gray Icosahedron, hung low to the floor, and another large piece, Benzene 2, filled with six equilateral triangles (and named for a known carcinogen, the press release notes) — lack complementary partners. Noticing this, you may sense, as I did, an odd imbalance in the room, a crack in the group's otherwise perfect symmetry. As you look closer, other peculiarities appear, like a few errant paint drops on the shiny canvases or minute drips off their sides. What once looked logical, rational, and predetermined — a machine put in motion and set down out on canvas — begins to look strange, unfamiliar, fragile. Even as Malek is executing his rules, laying down hexagons mechanically, line by line, shade by shade, his system is coming apart.

Josh Smith's High-Wire Act

Installation view of "Josh Smith" at Luhring Augustine. Photos: 16 Miles [more]


Installation view of "Josh Smith" at Luhring Augustine, New York

Not so long ago, Josh Smith was one of the most divisive artists in town, a rare figure whose work could provoke fights between friends with otherwise likeminded views on contemporary art. I was among the skeptical. His art seemed to me indulgent and lazy, all of those giant fish, leaves, and signatures accumulating in an unending, unedited stream. His success seemed to herald the emergence of a new band of what Peter Schjeldahl, in the 1980s, dubbed “the new dumb painters.”

Schjedahl placed Julian Schnabel, Sandro Chia, and George Condo in that camp, and, in a review of the latter, argued that they “bet that their own innocent pleasure in painting proves that painting (and they) will be immortal.” Pleasure and immortality: I cannot think of better words with which to characterize Smith’s interests, particularly in the numerous works in which he spells his name with thick, generous waves of color. Those words certainly apply to the pieces in his most recent show, at Luhring Augustine. Smith, of course, does not paint like those artists (though it is tempting to see some of Schnabel’s bravado in the raw confidence he projects in his art). Rather, I think that his twin forebears — indulge me here for a second — are Jasper Johns and Martin Kippenberger.

Like Johns, Smith is interested in the symbolic order of things. But, instead of flags, numbers, and targets, he paints the letters that signify his name or those that convey the information for his shows. When he paints objects — those leaves, fish, and in his current show, skeletons — they are always enlarged to fit the size of the canvas and outlined with multiple streams of color. You could not mistake them for a physical thing in the world: they are instead foundational symbols for objects, ideas of what leaves or fishes or skeletons are.


Installation view of "Josh Smith" at Luhring Augustine, New York


Josh Smith, Untitled, 2010. Mixed media on panel (12 panels), 144 x 144 in.

These objects are also enablers, maybe even excuses, for Smith’s painting, filling the same role in his practice that the egg did in Martin Kippenberger’s. (“In painting you must look what fallen fruit is left that you can paint,” Kippenberger said. “The egg has missed out there, Warhol already had the banana.”) They allow Smith to get to work, to start spreading paint around the canvas, to really let it rip. Which is great, because when he really gets going, as he does frequently here, he makes thrilling art, rich with ideas and, yes, filled with layers and layers of visual pleasure. His subjects appear again and again, but they’re presented anew each time, fresh and bizarre.

Smith’s two major innovations here also channel Johns and Kippenberger. There are red stop signs painted on squares of aluminum, another symbolic product of culture that parallels Johns’ flag. In at least one corner of each there is a dash of paint or a handprint — always some expressive touch — to differentiate them, to keep Smith in the picture. And then there are the Stage Paintings, rickety wood platforms fitted with lights that are pointed to a sheet of canvas painted with his name. The artist is up on stage, dead center, in front of the lights and performing for the crowd. (“Dear Painter, paint for me!”) I suspect that their wit would have impressed Kippenberger; this comment, made by Smith in a recent Art in America interview, certainly would have: “I don't think I've ever made the same thing twice. I have never given myself the luxury.” Is there an ascetic hiding behind all those paintings?

Smith has big projects ahead. He’s creating a site-specific installation at the Brant Foundation and has been tapped by Bice Curiger for her Venice Biennale exhibition. As curatorial consensus solidifies around him, he’s responding with admirable ambition, painting larger works — some filling six or a dozen panels — and expanding his array of options. So far, the results are explosive. Just how dramatically can he scale his work without it losing its punch? All signs suggest that he will be here for the long haul, but we’ll soon know for certain. If it does work out — and again, I suspect it will — I hope for installations that are even more elaborate and peculiar. The Stage Paintings could be just the beginning: in future shows I imagine boxing rings, tight-rope assemblies, and three-ring circuses, all draped with canvases bearing two giant words: JOSH SMITH.


Josh Smith, Untitled, 2010. Mixed media on panel, 48 x 36 in.


Detail view of Josh Smith, Untitled, 2010. Mixed media on panel (12 panels), 144 x 144 in.


Josh Smith, Stage Painting 1, 2011. Wood, paint, fabric, lights, and hardware, 96 x 68 x 54 in.


Josh Smith, Untitled, 2010. Enamel on aluminum, 48 x 48 in.

Previously: Josh Smith, "On the Water," at Deitch Studios, Long Island City, May 25, 2010

Josh Smith, "On the Water," at Deitch Studios, Long Island City

Works from Josh Smith's On the Water, at Deitch Studios, New York. Photos: 16 Miles [more]

After this show, Deitch Projects will close and Jeffrey Deitch, its owner and guiding light, will become director of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. I wish he had found a more assuring way to say goodbye.

– Roberta Smith, "Art in Review: Shepard Fairey," The New York Times, May 21, 2010

Roberta Smith's assessment of Jeffrey Deitch's farewell show seems to match the general consensus among those that care about these things. His decision to end his nearly fifteen-year run as a consistently interesting New York dealer with a Shepard Fairey show is a bizarre move, but one hopes (and suspects) that he is rolling in cash from the adventure. (There are a lot of paintings to sell from the show and, one imagines, lots of prints available as well.) Still, for a master of theater who has hosted some remarkable shows over the years, it feels like a sad, tepid way to end.



I'd prefer to remember the Josh Smith show that Deitch hosted at his cavernous Long Island City space as his final official exhibition, (even though the show closed on May 2, 2010). It was, in a sense, as unusual as the Fairey show: a series of forty-seven paintings completed on the warehouse walls, partially funded by Luhring Augustine, Smith's gallery. It ran against many of Deitch's tendencies: it was subdued instead of spectacular, handmade instead of slickly produced.

Smith's quiet installation suited that strange LIC space, which almost always felt deserted except for a friendly gallery assistant and Dzine's 1993 "Pimp Juice" Cadillac Fleetwood, which sat for what seemed like years in the large garage that one first entered from the street, one half of the warehouse that often felt a little bit too big for even as ambitious a curator as Deitch. (The stunning 2008-09 Keith Haring show in the space was a clear exception to that statement.) Nevertheless, one could always count on some combination of entertainment, annoyance, and pleasure out there. ("The Pig" show — with its moving, stuffed-animal-covered Gelitin cars, its Paul Chan drawings, and its old Koons sculpture — comes to mind.)

Barbara Gladstone has apparently procured the space to use for private viewing rooms, and one of her most prized artists, Matthew Barney, uses the warehouse next door as a studio, so there will probably be some fine events out there, along the East River, in future years. Regardless of what happens, memories of the shows that Deitch presented out in Long Island City should provide plenty of material for those who want to make sense of his legacy and just may cause a few people to overlook the embarrassing Fairey show.

Charline von Heyl at Friedrich Petzel Gallery

Charline von Heyl, Black Stripe Mojo, 2009. Acrylic and oil on linen, 82 x 78 in. Photos: 16 Miles


Installation view


Charline von Heyl, Now or Else, 2009. Acrylic and oil on linen, 82 x 78 in.


Charline von Heyl, Momentito, 2009. Acrylic, pastels, and charcoal on linen, 78 x 82 in.


Charline von Heyl, Yellow Guitar, 2010. Acrylic, oil, and charcoal on linen, 82 x 78 in.


Installation view


Charline von Heyl, Pink Vendetta, 2009. Acrylic and oil on linen, 82 x 78 in.

Charline von Heyl
Friedrich Petzel Gallery
537 West 22nd Street
New York, New York
Through May 1, 2010

Julie Mehretu's Mural at Goldman Sachs, New York

Julie Mehretu, installation view of Mural, 2010, at Goldman Sachs, New York. Photos: 16 Miles [more]

There are better ways to spend $5 million than buying a single work of art. That said, if America's most notorious investment bank is intent on spending that kind of money to decorate its new office building at 200 West Street in New York, there are certainly worse artists to commission than Julie Mehretu. (The head of the commissioning committee, Jeffrey Deitch, can be thanked, in part, for that choice. The firm also funded a large Franz Ackermann mural for an incomprehensible $10 million.) Mehretu reportedly used $4 million of her handsome fee to cover fabrication costs, meaning that a fair number of assistants and supply companies made a fair amount of money as a result of the project.

The work, entitled Mural, is absurdly, gloriously gigantic, measuring 23 by 80 feet. It is fully visible from the sidewalk outside the building's lobby, though turnstiles near both entrances mean that only Goldman employees and their guests can see the work up close, which is a shame since so much of the appeal of her work is in its dense, layered intricacy. Wealthy, powerful institutions generally like large, flashy artworks, and she certainly seems to have delivered the goods. It's strange that Goldman employees supposedly don't like the work, which is one of the most fun — and painfully innocuous — pieces of art that I've seen recently.









More information is available at:

• The New Yorker, which has a profile of Mehretu by Calvin Tompkins (though, sadly, reading it requires a subscription);
• Art 21, which features videos about Mehretu's studio assistants and the conservator charged with installing the hulking panels (thank you to Joy Garnett!); and
  
• Roberta Fallon and Libby Rosof's Artblog, which has some sporty photos and commentary. Fallon smartly contrasts the visual networks in Mehretu's work with those in Mark Lombardi's drawings and declares succinctly: "Not very public, this public art." Agreed.
  

Chantal Joffe at Cheim & Read [Photographs]

Chantal Joffe [Installation view] at Cheim & Read.   Photo: 16 Miles     [more]


Chantal Joffe, Green Dress Black Knickers, 2009.


Chantal Joffe [Installation view] at Cheim & Read.


Chantal Joffe, Green Eyes Magenta Coat, 2009.   [more]

The press release cites Alice Neel as an influence, and I don't have any reason to argue with that.  I'd also mention Alex Katz if he had more paint and was prone to bits of controlled sloppiness.  Like our hometown hero (currently showing at PaceWildenstein), the Londoner paints cool, colorful portraits that some people will find quietly moving, others dull.  I tend to find myself more in the former category.

Joffe's been showing in England at Victoria Miro for a decade and most recently popped up in New York at another ampersand-marked gallery (Fredericks & Freiser).  (Yes, one of these would work nicely next to a nice, big John Wesley!)  Even in this market, one imagines that these will sell, which means we'll be seeing more of Ms. Joffe in the future.  That's fine with me.

Chantal Joffe
Cheim & Read
547 West 25th Street
New York, New York
Through June 20, 2009

Photo: 16 Miles     [more]

Ryan McGinness, Ryan McGinness Works., at Deitch Projects [Photographs]

Ryan McGinness, Ryan McGinness Works. [installation view], 2009. Photo: 16 Miles   [more]


Ryan McGinness, Ryan McGinness Works. [installation view], 2009. Photo: 16 Miles   [more]


Ryan McGinness, Ryan McGinness Works. [installation view], 2009

Ryan McGinness, Untitled (Black Hole, Black-on-Black), 2008.  Photo: 16 Miles   [more]


Ryan McGinness, Untitled (Sculpture Study 1), 2009.  Photo: 16 Miles   [more]

Ryan McGinness, Ryan McGinness Works.
Deitch Projects
18 Wooster Street
New York, New York
Through April 18, 2009

Andrew Kuo, I'm Dyin' Over Here, at Taxter & Spengemann [Photographs]

Andrew Kuo, Anatomy of a Wasted Work Day on October 9, 2008 (Stuffed-Up Nose Face), 2008. Photo: 16 Miles [more]

"I need to shut my eyes... I'll make "Guernica" pt. deux when I wake up for sure."


Andrew Kuo, Andrew Kuo, Anatomy of a Wasted Work Day on October 9, 2008 (Stuffed-Up Nose Face) [detail], 2008. Photo: 16 Miles [more]


Andrew Kuo, I'm Dyin' Over Here [installation view]. Photo: 16 Miles [more]

Andrew Kuo, I'm Dyin' Over Here
Taxter & Spengemann
123 East 12th Street
New York, New York
Through May 9, 2009

Jacob Kassay at Eleven Rivington [Review]

Jacob Kassay at Eleven Rivington [installation view]. Photo courtesy of Eleven Rivington.

“The point was to make people think you were faking when it was actually real gold,” Chris Burden declares in the latest New Yorker, explaining his decision to hire a security guard to protect a sculpture composed of four gold bars. Nothing surprises like sincerity.

At Eleven Rivington, Jacob Kassay has a handful of seemingly identical paintings hung on the walls; a few more are stacked on the floor, ready for buyers. Ignore that feint toward assembly line aesthetics: these pieces are smarter – more committed – than that.

Kassay builds up the thin layers of silver paint with a fair degree of uniformity, scattering thicker patches and scrawls in a few places. Then he sends them off for a run through a mirror plating process, which creates vaguely reflective surfaces. The primed, unpainted pieces of canvas burn.

This is the sort of show that we’ve been told the recession is supposed to vanquish: big, relatively expensive paintings from recent art school graduates. Kassay is only twenty-four. But let's be clear: you’d have to be that young to tackle Ryman, Stingel, Klein, Warhol, this aggressively and successfully in a single set of monochromes.

The works look like elegantly abused luxury goods.  There's the precious metal color, the sophisticated post-production, and some smoky, sexy burns. If you’re going to risk a few thousand dollars on a piece of art, why not buy something impossibly desirable? Unfortunately, it’s too late to grab one. Another contemporary anomaly: the show was sold out before the opening.

Jacob Kassay
Eleven Rivington
11 Rivington, New York, NY
Through March 29, 2009

Keith Haring, The Ten Commandments, at Deitch Projects LIC [Review]

Keith Haring, The Ten Commandments [installation view], 1985

Long Island City is pretty much deserted on most Saturday afternoons.  You can walk from the Queensboro Plaza subway stop to Deitch Projects without seeing more than one or two other people walking the warehouse-lined streets.  Desolate and empty, the neighborhood is actually home to some of the city's most interesting art spaces: P.S.1, SculptureCenter, and the Fisher Landau Center.  Matthew Barney has a massive studio nearby.  You feel disconnected from Chelsea, but you're actually in the heart of the art world.

You might feel the same way looking at Keith Haring's work.  He looked like an outsider when he first became a star in the 1980's.  Though he never really got canonized or copied, most people with some interest in art can still spot a Haring today.  That said, I've never met anyone who claims to love his art.  Jeffrey Deitch does, though, and has recently decided to devote some of his considerable energy to the artist, releasing a luxurious book, reinstalling a mural on Houston and Bowery, and showing the largely unseen series of monumental canvases The Ten Commandments.

Originally painted for a 1985 show in Bordeaux, Deitch and company have taken good care of the works.  They're clean and crisp; the trademark bright paint looks fresh.  All the classic Haring figures are present in these visual depictions of their title: cartoon people, televisions, dollar signs.  Most of the constructions are pretty straightforward - a hand plucking a dollar bill from two other waving hands, two heads fellating a cross.  Haring has clever moments, but they're certainly not here.  Still, the show is worth seeing.  Unlike most the artist's work, the form here wins over the content.  It's fun looking at painting this massive and paint this bright.  They're simple, sugary curiosities, only barely cloying.

More photographs.  

Keith Haring, The Ten Commandments [installation view] [detail], 1985

Keith Haring, The Ten Commandments [installation view], 1985

Keith Haring, The Ten Commandments
Deitch Projects
4-40 44th Drive
Long Island City, Queens, New York
Through February 15, 2009

Erik Lindman, House Wine, House Music, at V&A [Review]

Erik Lindman, 17 days, 17 long nights... but slow, 2008, at V&A New York.

It would be easy to dismiss Erik Lindman's latest paintings at V&A based simply on their titles. Obliquely referencing the early 1980's of Joe Yellow, Martin Rev, Alan Vega, and Prince, they imply a trendy pop culture nostalgia that belies work that is actually confident, sophisticated, and alluring.  

Shadazz (2008) and 17 days... (2008) define the two extremes of his practice, the former (Suicide reference) washed in blues that suggest the hazy passages of Nozkowski's recent paintings, the latter (Prince title) building diverse layers: fine splatters - sprinkles - first, then sweeping green and yellow strokes, and finally white concentric circles, which generate a near-compendium of painting techniques.  Joe yellow just took my heart by making it to the top 100 follows a similar format but concludes with quick neon sprays of color near the top and a weathered, burgundy heptagon that covers most of the work.  It could be a disco-infused Robert Mangold.  

In each case, one gets the impression that Lindman has buried and obscured dozens of layers that are only barely legible in the finished paintings; his painting is studied and nimble enough that it's not always clear how exactly he's constructed his art.  Not all of the titles are so abstruse, it seems important to mention here: the lone print for sale in House Wine, House Music, which photographically captures his clever use of nebulous color fields, is titled Fountain.  That should be a clue to the real scale of Lindman's ambition.

John Wesley, Question of Women, at Fredericks & Freiser

John Wesley, The Liar, 1993, acrylic on canvas, 44 x 60 inches.



John Wesley, Tattoo, 1993, acrylic on canvas, 53 x 72 inches.



John Wesley, Brown Woman Stretching, 1995, acrylic on canvas, 62 x 47 inches.