Contemporary Art: Foulkes & Pettibon @ David Zwirner New York

 

(Drivebycuriosity) - David Zwirner belongs to the global art gallery empires ( davidzwirner). I love to go to their Chelsea New York branch to discover fascinating new works of art.  Recently I saw there 2 interesting exhibitions: Raymond Pettibon "TH' EXPLOSIYV SHOYRT T" & Llyn Foulkes.

 I don´t know what "TH' EXPLOSIYV SHOYRT T" means but I found the Pettibon show entertaining. Above you can see some images from the exhibition.

The press release declares "Pettibon's work embraces a wide spectrum of American high and low culture, from the deviations of marginal youth to art history, sports, religion, politics, sexuality, and literature. Taking their point of departure in the Southern California punk-rock scene of the late 1970s and 1980s and the do-it-yourself aesthetic of album covers, comics, concert flyers, and fanzines that characterized the movement, his drawings have come to occupy their own genre of potent and dynamic artistic commentary" (explosiyv).

 

Above more images from the Pettibon show.






                    Where Did I Go Wrong?

Below you can see images from the Llyn Foulkes exhibition.  The press release says   
"including exemplary works from 1964 to 2005, the exhibition comprises three series that define Foulkes's six-decade-long career: mountainous landscapes, "bloody head" portraits, and narrative tableaux" (foulkes).

 

"Foulkes's singular oeuvre has inhabited and excavated the remains of the American West and its attendant promise of freedom and prosperity".

Above you can see "Where Did I Go Wrong?" (1991, 74 1/8 x 56 3/4 inches (188.3 x 144.1 cm) followed by "To Ub Iwerks (Portrait of Walt Disney)" (1995, 25 1/2 x 21 7/8 inches (64.8 x 55.6 cm) & "Art Official" (1985, 55 x 46 inches (139.7 x 116.8 cm).

 Above "Nob Hill" (1964-1965, 1/2 x 107 1/4 inches (166.4 x 272.4 cm) &  "The Splash" (1984, 72 x 96 inches (182.9 x 243.8 cm).


Enjoy!

Contemporary Art: Anselm Kiefer - From Cold To Warm @ Gagosian, New York

 

(Drivebycuriosity) - I am a fan of Anselm Kiefer. The German "is one of the most imaginative, original and serious artists alive", writes The Guardian ( theguardian). I agree. I am fascinated by his vast pictures, often covered with massive paint, ashes & condiments like sunflower seeds.

So I was very happy that my wife & I could see an exhibition with new works by the artist @ Gagosian in Chelsea (West 21st Street, New York gagosian ). The show is called: "Transition from Cold to Warm" (through July 14, 2017). I think the title is well chosen. The exhibition displays indeed a very different Kiefer. Usually his works are very serious & sinister and they refer to destruction, death, decay & Holocaust. But the new show was full of life, joy & lust.

The press release explains "The exhibition’s title, “Transition from Cool to Warm,” refers to a celebrated book of watercolors that he produced from 1974 to 1977, in which cool, blue marine land and seascapes transform into warm female nudes." (gagosian).



.

 

I show here my favorites (and some details of them), a very subjective selection as usual. Above this paragraph you can see "Ignis sacer" (2016, Oil, acrylic, and emulsion on canvas, 110 1/4 × 149 5/8 × 3 5/8 inches (280 × 380 × 9 cm). Ignis sacer means "poisoning caused by consuming ergot-infected grain or grain products, or from excessive use of drugs containing ergot" ( thefreedictionary).
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Above "Des Malers Atelier (The Painter’s Studio)" (2016,Oil, emulsion, acrylic, and shellac on canvas, 110 1/4 × 149 5/8 × 2 inches (280 × 380 × 5 cm).

 

Above "Aurora" (2015–17, Oil, emulsion, acrylic, shellac, and sediment of an electrolysis on canvas, 110 1/4 × 149 5/8 × 3 5/8 inches (280 × 380 × 9 cm) followed by "Schlange (Snake)" (2017,Oil, emulsion, acrylic, shellac, gold leaf, clay, and metal on canvas,149 5/8 × 110 1/4 × 9 7/8 inches (380 × 280 × 25 cm).

 

Above "For Segantini: die bösen Mütter (For Segantini: The Bad Mothers)" (2011–12, Oil, emulsion, acrylic, shellac, wood, metal, lead, and sediment of an electrolysis on canvas, 110 1/4 × 181 1/8 × 21 5/8 inches (280 × 460 × 55 cm).

 

Above some of Kiefer`s watercolors.


Gagosian also showed more than 40 of Kiefer´s new books, some of them you can see below. "Their pages painted with gesso to mimic marble, displayed in an installation of glass vitrines (press release).

Enjoy!

Contemporary Art: Psychological Investigation @ Christine Park Gallery New York

 

(Drivebycuriosity) - Contemporary art is full of surprises. There are so many discoveries to be made. Yesterday I passed Christine Park Gallery on New York´s Bowery, a branch of an art dealer in London (christinepark). There is a small room with just 4 paintings, but these works caught my eyes. They are created by the Korean artist Sangyoon Yoon. The gallery calls the show "These Foolish Things" (through June 11 2017).

According to the press release the artist "explores the relationship between the conscious and the unconscious". His paintings "are a psychological investigation into the structure of the mind, containing elements that represent or allude to the id, the ego and the superego".

I love these paintings. I like the composition, which reminds me a bit of Neo Rauch, and I admire the technique. Yoon implements economic brush strokes to create wonderful scenes.



                      Economic Brush Strokes

 

The curators explain "The watery lower level of Yoon’s paintings plays the role of the id. Below the placid, shimmering surface lies the depths of the unconscious mind, mirroring and yet separated from the conscious world above it".

Enjoy!

Photography: Manhattan`s Billboards - The Lilliput Effect

 

(Drivebycuriosity) - I am fascinated by New York City, where I have been living since 2012. I am amazed by the hustle & bustle and the sheer size of the metropolis. Part of the fascination are the huge billboards you can spot all over Manhattan. People and cars are dwarfed by them, which reminds me of Jonathan Swift's novel Gulliver's Travels. Here I show some pics to document this Lilliput effect.

 

On top of this post you can see an advertisement for Italian beer. Really! I spotted the billboard on Lafayette & Great Jones Street. Below that another image from Lafayette, closer to East Houston.

 

Above some images from SoHo close to Canal Street.

 

Above more billboards from Lafayette which seems to be really popular with advertisers.

 

Calvin Klein chose a wall on East Houston Street & Lafayette.

 

Other fashion houses prefer a place between Central Street & Lafayette.

Enjoy!

Economy: Should Jeff Bezos Get The Nobel Prize?

(Drivebycuriosity) - It is not too early to think about the next Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences. Months before the award is announced (October) there are intense discussions about who should receive the prestigious prize.  I think Amazon founder & CEO Jeff Bezos should be included inthese considerations. There are at least 2 arguments for that:

1. Bezos is maybe the most influential contemporary economist even though he is putting his theories into practice instead of constructing esoteric mathematical models to be published in academic journals. Amazon`s founder & CEO started his career as an economist and researcher for a hedge fund. He recognized in the early 1990s the enormous economic potential of the Internet and he made use of it (applied economics). He is a pioneer of E-Commerce and Godfathered a technological development which is changing global economy and is making life for most of us much easier. If the Prize is awarded for an important economic discovery, Bezos is a candidate for it.

The economic relevance of the Internet wasn´t so obvious in the 1990s.  Other economists had no clue and they dismissed the Internet. The prestigious New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, who received the Nobel Prize in 2008, predicted in 1998 that "the growth of the Internet will slow drastically" and claimed "by 2005 or so, it will become clear that the Internet's impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine's" (businessinsider).

About 10 years ago Bezos also discovered the cost advantages of storing information externally on huge computer networks. He created cloud computing, a new industry which offers cheap processing & storing of information. The cloud reduces the costs of managing corporations, researching complicated topics and multiple other complex tasks considerably. Thanks to the cloud, new ideas can spread faster, which is encouraging discoveries and inventions. The cloud boosts science, medicine, the technological progress and the global economy. 

2 Bezos is known to be obsessed with efficiency, cost cutting and customer satisfaction. This behavior forces his competitors & copy cats - like Walmart´s jet.com and many others  -  to also become more efficient and to curb their prices. Bezos´practical economics is now changing the global economy, making companies and other organizations more efficient. Amazon and other online retailers are keeping prices under control and are so supporting the Federal Reserve and other central banks fighting inflation.

 Jeff Bezos` practical economics is changing the world into a better place. Isn´t this worth the Nobel Prize?

Culture: Is The Prado Museum Overrated?

 

(Drivebycuriosity) - Madrid`s Prado Museum belongs to the most famous museums of the world. It seems every tourist who is visiting Madrid has to see this place. Many visitors of Madrid go just to the Prado and ignore the other museums. I think this is a mistake. The Prado is over-hyped and not Madrid`s best choice of museum.

The Prado lacks the variety you can expect from an outstanding museum. It doesn`t have the diversity you can observe @ New York´s Metropolitan Museum of Art, Chicago`s Art Institute, Paris` Louvre, London’s National Gallery or even the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Prado´s neighborhood. The Prado shows just art created before the 20th century and focuses on the medieval art and Renaissance artists, mostly from Spain. The Museum reflects the tastes of Spanish kings who once initiated the place. Therefore medieval Spanish painters dominate the collection, but there is no Picasso and no Dali (you can find them @ the Thyssen-Bornemisza & Madrid´s  Reina Sofia). I saw there of course lots of impressive paintings, like Hieronymus Bosch`s Garden of Early Delights, but  I got tired by the seemingly hundreds of crucifixions, portraits of medieval aristocrats and thousands of saints in ecstasy.

The Prado has another disadvantage: There is a strict photo prohibition. The guards are stopping anyone who tries to take a picture. This does not make any sense and it is unusual. Other famous museums - like New York`s Metropolitan & MoMa -  and Madrid`s Reina Sofia & Thyssen-Bornemisza allow taking pictures.

Fortunately was the "Beheading of Saint John the Baptist and Herod`s Banquet" by Bartholomäus Ströbel el Joven (1630/33) not as much guarded as the other jewels so I could take some snapshots. Maybe it is a warning for unduly photographers?

The Prado is certainly worth a visit but so are other museums in Madrid, especially the Reina Sofia & Thyssen-Bornemisza (here my reports sofia  thyssen).  Btw if you buy a museum pass in one of these museums, the admission to the others - including the Prado - is free and you can jump the lines at Prado´s ticket desk.