ArtSeen
Peter Acheson
By John YauIn scale, Peter Acheson’s untitled, abstract paintings and watercolors range from diminutive to small. In fact, one could reproduce all of Acheson’s paintings actual size in a catalogue that would fit comfortably on someone’s lap.
Queens International 2004
By Chris HowardSandwiched between last summer’s Open House: Working in Brooklyn at the Brooklyn Museum and P.S.1’s upcoming Greater New York 2005, the Queens International 2004, the second of a recently inaugurated biennial surveying work by artists living and working in the borough, will have most likely been overlooked by both audiences and critics.
Ouverture: Young contemporary artists from Emilia Romagna in New York
By Antony HudekLittle more than a block away from the construction site of the World Trade Center, on the second floor of a low-rise building oddly mismatched with its towering corporate surroundings, Ouverture is essential and urgent viewing for anyone concerned with the role of politically-conscious art on the threshold of Bush’s second term.
Tamara Gonzales
By Katie StoneI first saw Tamara Gonzales’s new show the night of the winter solstice. It was an appropriately blustery evening, and by the time I arrived, the gallery doors were fogged over from the warm breath of conversation.
Klara Liden
By Nick StillmanTwo rectangles of spidery broken glass act as a forbidding anti-decoration on a street-facing windowsill. A couple glass chunks, obviously freed from these larger bodies, are scattered hazardously about the rust-stained floor, which is made of ugly linoleum.
Thomas Lendvai
By William PowhidaPerception is the departure point for Thomas Lendvai’s brilliant installation, “A series of ‘nows’” (2005), at Plus Ultra. Using a sequence of wooden beams, Lendvai creates a kind of slanted drop ceiling that spans the gallery space.
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Katherine Bradford
By James KalmEther Nights is the title of this exhibition of recent paintings by Katherine Bradford, and one of the overarching themes is the idea of illumination, enlightenment, or the bringing forth from darkness. In these compositions Bradford is not only devising images that use the physical presence of light as a feature player, but she creates narrative metaphors reflective of a spiritual or intellectual enlightenment as well.
Charles Garabedian
By Ben LaRoccoIt’s hard to overlook the awkwardness of Charles Garabedian’s exhibition at Betty Cunningham Gallery. Seams and wrinkles in the canvas, ill-framed images, and inarticulate brushwork are all evident.
Jason Cole Mager, Michael Yinger, and Jeffery Kilmer
By William PowhidaA trio of young men comprise a show that hovers between angst and the desires that fuel their acute anxieties. Jason Cole Mager was asked to select two artists whose work would compliment his own.
Traces Everywhere
By Ben LaRoccoThe measure of a group show might be given in the quality of the narrative it constructs. According to these terms, a good group show could successfully elaborate, say, contemporary trends in abstraction or the history of figurative painting in England.
John Lurie
By Hrag VartanianA founding member of the musical group Lounge Lizards, John Lurie isn’t well known as an artist, but his latest show at Roebling Hall’s small Chelsea space showcases a rich style that is also infused with irony.
The Book as Object and Performance
By Thomas MicchelliIs it fair that an exhibition devoted to the book ends up reaffirming the vitality of contemporary video?
Calder/Miró
By Stephanie BuhmannAfter comparing selections from the oeuvres of Alexander Calder and Joan Miró in an exhibition co-organized by the Fondation Beyeler, Basel, and the Phillips Collection, it might be impossible to ever study either artist’s work again without thinking of the other.
