Opening Banks Violette’s “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery. Photo by Art Observed.
From May 7th until June 20th, Team Gallery presents new work by artist Banks Violette. Last night, a crowd -among which fellow artists Dash Snow and Matthew Barney– gathered at Team Gallery and Grand Street to take a first look at the work. The exhibition consists of drawings of graphite on paper and one sculpture.  The iconography in the works is wide-ranging, but all revolve around transformation, death, faith and redemption. In one piece, Violette has taken the portrait of Bela Lugosi – the renowned Count Dracula in the 1931 film Dracula who later fell into obscurity – and depicted him as a Christ figure, thus blending evil and the benign. Violette’s drawing is hard edged, yet he succeeds in rendering his works with an air of ghostly vagueness. The works derive their power from a sense of the unclear and unreal.
Opening Banks Violette’s “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery. Photo by Art Observed.
Violette Banks: Not Yet Titled
Team Gallery
83 Grand Street, New York
May 7th, 2009 – June 20th, 2009
RELATED LINKS
Exhibition Page [Team Gallery]
The ghost of goth art [GQ]
Master of the Dark Arts (2005 article) [New York Times]
Death Becomes Him [Art Review]
Banks Violette: Kryptologo Cryptologist [Spike Art Quarterly]
Kill to get the money [i-D]
Banks Violette by Neville Wakefield, Banks Violette and Stephen O’Malley [Amazon]
Banks Violette (right) at the opening of his exhibition “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery.
Photo by Art Observed.
Banks Violette, Not Yet Titled, 2008-09. Via Team Gallery.
Opening Banks Violette’s “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery. Photo by Art Observed.
Banks Violette was born in Ithaca, New York in 1973. After attending the School of Visual Arts in New York, he received his M.F.A. from Columbia University in 2000. His relatively young oeuvre evokes the gothic and the dark, but often takes Minimalist and symbolic forms. He is associated with new gothic art, which combines Romanticism with harsh and violent imagery. New gothic art draws from sources such as mythology, slasher movies and heavy metal culture. Because the work is pervaded with a sense of death, some critics identify new gothic art as a response to 9/11. Other artists associated with this style are Olaf Breuning, Sue de Beer, David Altmejd and Matt Greene.
Opening Banks Violette’s “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery. Photo by Art Observed.
Banks Violette, ZODIAC (F.T.U)/74 ironhead SXL, 2008-09. Via Team Gallery.
Violette’s exhibition at Team Gallery is his fifth show at the gallery. For over the past decade, Violette has been exhibiting all over the United States and Europe. His work is collected by major museums and he has received a great deal of scholarly attention. In 2005, the Whitney Museum of American Art organized a solo exhibition around his work after he had been included in the Whitney Biennial a year before. Violette has also been active a curator himself. Currently on show at the Kunsthalle Wien is Elevator To The Gallows, a group show including works by Violette and others, that he co-curated with Gerald Matt. In March 2009, Walther Koning published the most recent book on the artist on a two-part exhibition held at Barbara Gladstone Gallery and Team Gallery in 2007. This Spring, Violette will have an exhibition at Art Basel. Violette currently lives and works from New York.
Elevator to the Gallows
Curated by Banks Violette and 
Gerald Matt
Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna
March 20th, 2009 – May 3rd, 2009
Opening Banks Violette’s “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery. Photo by Art Observed.
Banks Violette, Not Yet Titled, 2009. Via Team Gallery
Opening Banks Violette’s “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery. Photo by Art Observed.
Banks Violette, Not Yet Titled, 2008. Via Team Gallery.
Opening Banks Violette’s “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery.
Photo by Art Observed.
Banks Violette, Not Yet Titled, 2009. Via Team Gallery.
Banks Violette’s exhibition “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery. Via Team Gallery.
Ambie Stapleton and William S. at the opening of Banks Violette’s
“Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery. Photo by Art Observed.
Opening of Banks Violette’s “Not Yet Titled” at Team Gallery. Photo by Art Observed.
Concurrently on view with Banks Violette, is Alex Hubbard in Gallery-C, a project space within Team Gallery.
Alex Hubbard
Gallery-C
83 Grand Street, New York
May 7th, 2009 – June 20th, 2009
For Art Observed. By Gabriëlle Lucille.
