All you Philadelphians (and those of you passing through town anytime between now and July 22 of this year): Terrific, terrific show of brush paintings by Ike Taiga and his wife, Tokuyama Gyokuran, at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. This is the first time their work has been featured in the United States, and once […]
Current viewings
Hype-Proof
Serra installation in the Sculpture Garden at MOMA For all the hype around the Richard Serra show at MOMA, I was still in awe, pure awe. There’s no way to not be, these works are insanely beautiful, massive, haunting, playful, and unforgettable. Seeing these with your inner child in full command is my best recommendation. […]
Take Me With You, Sigmar
Carol Vogel’s written and video reports (New York Times) on Sigmar Polke’s preparations for the upcoming Biennale have me longing, deeply longing, to see this new body of work, “The Axis of Time.” (One painting from that series is posted on Slow Painting.) Vogel visited him in his Cologne atelier and feasted on a studio […]
Joseph Cornell
Cornell could take you into the universe in the space of a thimble. Robert Lehrman, Cornell collector An extensive Joseph Cornell retrospective is currently on view at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem Massachusetts. Seeing the range, depth and subtlety of his work left me speechless. I spent hours in the show but will have […]
Indra’s Net at 88th and Fifth
Alyson Shotz, The Shape of Space, 2004. Cut plastic Fresnel lens sheets and staples. Highlight from a recent visit to the Guggenheim Museum: In the lobby, the first thing you see is a beguiling wall of light which turns out to be Fresnel lenses stapled together. I sat with and walked around this curtain of […]
Schjeldahl on “Global Feminisms” Show
Ingrid Mwangi (Kenya), Static Drift, 2001 While some may not be as enamored and delighted by Peter Schjeldahl’s art reportage as I usually am, here’s a passage full of ideas from his latest review of the “Global Feminisms” show at the Brooklyn Museum from the New Yorker. Of particular interest to me is his handling […]
Ideas, Passions and Extremes
Like thousands of other Stoppard fans, I’m reading Isaiah Berlin’s Russian Thinkers in preparation for doing a Coast of Utopia marathon in May—3 plays, one after another, starting at 11am on a Saturday morning. As soon as the New York Times and the New Yorker reviewed the plays and both referenced the usefulness of Berlin’s […]
Carnegie Museum of Art
More from Pittsburgh: Carnegie Museum of Art Modern Japanese Prints: 1868–1989 The show includes stop-in-your-tracks stunners by Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (1839-1892) who lived his life on the cusp between old and new Japan. Garnered from private collections, these Yoshitoshis from the 36 Ghosts series display his technical brilliance–vignetted color and the exactitude of a fine pen […]
The Mattress Factory
Just back from 4 days in Pittsburgh. AKA The Burgh. It’s my favorite misunderstood city. And one that offers a full complement of visual language experiences. The Mattress Factory Art Museum The Mattress Factory has been exhibiting experimental/installation art for 30 years and boasts 3 permanently installed James Turrells, a Yayoi Kusama, among others. A […]
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Met Bodies
The holiday crush of visitors at the Met Museum was daunting, so we took refuge in the antiquities. What kept catching our eye was bodies–the timeless and fascinating seduction of the human form, ubiquitiously present in the expression of art from the very beginning. Thank you Bryce Aragon for your companionionship on this Met meander. […]