Go See: Ellsworth Kelly Paintings and Drawings at Matthew Marks Gallery, New York, through April 11, 2009

March 18th, 2009


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Installation view of Ellsworth Kelly “Diagonal” at Matthew Marks Gallery

American color-field painter Ellsworth Kelly is showing new paintings (circa 2007-2008) at Matthew Marks in Chelsea.  Since he first exhibited his work publicly more than 60 years ago, Kelly has had over 150 one-person exhibitions in museums and galleries around the world.  The “Diagonal” series is a collection of eight two-panel paintings consisting of a black or white rectangle overlaid with a contrasting canvas on top, extending beyond the perimeter of the one below.

Matthew Marks Gallery
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Ellsworth Kelly Diagonal
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522 West 22nd Street
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February 6 – April 11, 2009

RELATED LINKS

Exhibition Page [Matthew Marks]
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Good Form [New Yorker]
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Will Corwin’s Top 10 Shows in New York [Saatchi Online]
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Paintings that Converse with Antiquity [Wall Street Journal]
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NYTCAP art tour [Flickr page: J-No]


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Installation view of Ellsworth Kelly “Diagonal” at Matthew Marks Gallery


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Ellsworth Kelly’s “Dark Blue Relief” (2008) at Matthew Marks Gallery.

Like much of Kelly’s past work, his shaped canvases are subtle in their perfection, and the artist’s application of paint is technical and decidedly non-painterly.  The current exhibition, while purely Kelly, references the oeuvre of his contemporaries: “Blue Green Black Red” from 2007 is a nod to Rothko’s horizontal color spectrums, while the vertical strips of “Green Black White” play on Barnett Newman’s zips of the 1950s.

The diagonal canvases evoke a simultaneous feeling of harmony and imbalance, starting out slowly and reaching a crescendo of color and proportion.  Wall Street Journal art critic Lance Esplund writes, “[Kelly’s] balancing acts are well worth their ultimate impact, which hits like a hammer blow to the chest.”


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Ellsworth Kelley opening at Matthew Marks via J-No Flickr


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Ellsworth Kelly, “Blue Green Black Red” (2007), at Matthew Marks Gallery

Accompanying the main show of Kelly paintings at Matthew Marks is a smaller annex on West 24th street comprising colorful drawings and collage.  Will Corwin for Saatchi Online describes the body of works  as “cheerful” and a “welcome relief” from the usually austere Chelsea gallery offerings.  Overall, the new paintings and archival drawings form a complete picture of a bastion of the art world. As New Yorker critic Peter Schjeldahl sums up, “Most masters of modern art look a mite dated now. Not Kelly, who has proven to be as up to date as the Parthenon, advancing a classical balance, between eye and mind, which alerts the body and clarifies the soul.”


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Installation view of Ellsworth Kelly “Diagonal” at Matthew Marks Gallery


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Ellsworth Kelley opening at Matthew Marks via J-No Flickr


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Ellsworth Kelly’s “Green Black White” (2007) at Matthew Marks Gallery


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Lauren Hutton at the Ellsworth Kelly opening at Matthew Marks via J-No Flickr


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Ellsworth Kelley opening at Matthew Marks via J-No Flickr


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Ellsworth Kelly’s “Red Diagonal” (2007) at Matthew Marks Gallery


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Ellsworth Kelley opening at Matthew Marks via J-No Flickr


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Installation view of Ellsworth Kelly “Drawings 1954-1962” at Matthew Marks Gallery


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Ellsworth Kelley opening at Matthew Marks via J-No Flickr


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Installation view of Ellsworth Kelly “Drawings 1954-1962” at Matthew Marks Gallery

BRING A TEDDY, AND GET TEA FOR 2

Daily News (Los Angeles, CA) December 3, 2007 | JULIA SCOTT TEA FOR TWO: The Four Seasons in Westlake Village is having an afternoon teddy bear tea that is free for children who bring in a new teddy bear or toy. The deal is good every weekend in December before Christmas. Adults are $32; kids are normally $21. The tea comes with a tiered tray of tea sandwiches, scones and fruit. Teddies and toys will be donated to Toys for Tots. To make a reservation, call 818-575-3000 and ask for the lobby lounge. go to site snapfish coupon code

SWING HOLIDAY: With the search for holiday gifts, a perfect tree and a cute holiday dress also comes the quest for Christmas music that is new to your ears but does not drive you batty. Here’s a CD that qualifies on both counts: Duke Ellington’s “Nutcracker Suite,” the jazz master’s take on Tchaikovsky’s classic ballet score, replete with renditions of the “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy,” the “Russian Dance,” the “Waltz of the Flowers” and others. Seriously, folks, this music swings so hard I listen to it in July. Amazon.com has it for $10 under the CD name Three Suites.

OLD NAVY 20 PERCENT OFF: Get a printable 20percent off coupon for Old Navy at www.insidesocal.com/bargain. It is good until Thursday in stores only.

LINCOLN LUNCH BURGERS: A new lunch buddy introduced me to Boulevard Burgers in Woodland Hills. The place specializes in charbroiled, basic burgers that have lots of lettuce, a little sauce and a solid, meaty flavor. Nothing fancy here. Fries are good ‘n’ chunky as are the onion rings. A burger is $3, fries are $2, and you pay 60cents more for the combo that includes a soda. They have indoor and outdoor seating (on the street and on a back patio), which is a nice touch. To see the menu, go to www.insidesocal.com. Visit them at 21718 Ventura Blvd. 818-703-6005. website snapfish coupon code

$1 STOCKING STUFFERS: Avon has a decent selection of stocking stuffers for less than $1, including mini glimmer sticks for the eyes and lips, emery boards, little tubes of lotion, and a glide-on lip treatment with SPF 15. If you choose an Avon rep before shopping, you can have it delivered for almost nothing.

SNAPFISH DEAL: At Snapfish.com, get 20 percent off your holiday cards featuring pictures of the little ones (they’re so much cuter than we are). Get the coupon code, good until Dec.31, at www.insidesocal.com/bargain. You need to open an account with them to use the deal.

OUTSMART THE MAN: One reader got a great deal on a 46-inch LCD HDTV by outsmarting a retailer that teased a really low price on Black Friday but immediately “sold out” because they had stocked an artificially low number of the product. When he found out the Sharp Aquos HDTV, advertised at Circuit City for $1,299, was sold out, he headed over to Sears. It matched the price and shaved off 10percent of the difference. A clever tactic you too can use. So, my friend, we’re watching the Super Bowl at your house, right?

JULIA SCOTT

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 18th, 2009 at 4:43 pm and is filed under Go See. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.