Sofia Leiby, An excuse is a polite rejection (after JW) (2014), via Anonymous Gallery

There’s a telling line in the press release for The Negative Hand, a presentation of new works at Mexico City’s Anonymous Gallery, reflecting on the cave paintings as Lascaux: “by defining themselves, artists often define the systems around them as well, and inversely, by defining the systems around them, artist begin to define themselves.”  It’s an open-ended prompt, but one that feels particularly resonant in 2015: embracing the aesthetic fusions and detritus of modernity as equally worthy of examination and re-creation as any singular subject. (more…)

Image: Now I am quietly waiting… (Exhibition View), Bortolami Gallery

The long, arresting title of Tom Burr’s first show as a curator for Bortolami Gallery takes its inspiration from the poem “Mayakovsky” by Frank O’Hara.  In the poem, the author delves into the nature of one’s own identity, and the relationship to other, separate, identities that surround us in our daily lives.  Taking this text as a jumping off point, Tom Burr has assembled a selection of works that are interconnected by his relationships to their creators, be they personal, professional, or merely tangential.

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