Lee Bul, Perdu XX (2019), via Lehmann Maupin

On view through January 18th in New York, the South Korean artist Lee Bul presents a selection of new works unified under the title Interlude: Perdu at Lehmann Maupin, a solo presentation that  features recent mixed media paintings from the artist’s Perdu series that blend biomorphic and cybertronic forms, vividly yet delicately rendered in acrylic paint and mother of pearl.  The artist’s work, which incorporates these divergent forms into a new formal language, makes for an expressive wrinkle in her broader body of work. (more…)

Sophie Calle, Exquisite Pain (Count Down – 22) (2000), via Paula Cooper

Exploring divergent concepts and bodies of work in exchange over the course of a show currently on view at Paula Cooper Gallery in New York, photographers Sophie Calle, Bruce Conner and Paul Pfeiffer have gathered together under the title “Documents & Recitations.”  The show, which features a range of different images and works from each artist’s oeuvre, explores the format of the series to construct new narratives, and engage notions of individual memory and collective perception as translated through the medium of photography. (more…)

Rachel Harrison, Hoarders (2012), via Whitney

Combining sculpture, readymades, drawing and a playful conceptual bent, artist Rachel Harrison’s work over the past 30 years has challenged easy readings of consumption, commercialism and modernity, imbuing her lumpy, peculiar objects with a sense of wry humor and situational irony.  Opening a major retrospective at The Whitney this winter, the artist’s work gets ample room to breathe, to striking result.    (more…)

Rashid Johnson, The Hikers (Installation View), via Art Observed

On view this fall in New York, Hauser & Wirth presents The Hikers, an exhibition of recent works by Rashid Johnson that unites ceramic tile mosaics, collaged paintings, and a large-scale sculpture that work together to address Johnson’s recurring interest in currents of anxiety and escapism created by the political and social turmoil felt across the United States and around the globe. (more…)

Jessi Reaves, Going Out in Style (Installation View), via Herald St

Currently on view at Herald St Gallery in London, the New York-based artist Jessi Reaves has opened a new show of work, ‘Going out in style,’ which marks a continued evolution in her practice and her second exhibition with the London space. Presenting works that are contradictory in their forms and perceived functions, often oscillating between sculpture and furniture while never quite fitting squarely into either category, the artist’s work underscores a particularly resonant series of concepts and conundrums in the landscape of the present. (more…)

Merlin Carpenter, Untitled (2019), via Simon Lee

Artist Merlin Carpenter is a relentless shapeshifter, continuing a critique of modern art through a boundless series of projects and practices that often delve into ruptures and problems with the language of modern art. Exploring problems not of understanding, but of functionality in terms of art’s presentation and use, the artist explores just how aesthetics and value systems can be extended over the canvas. Emphasizing new levels and layers of observation intended to focus not only within the world of art-viewing, but in the world more broadly, the artist’s work makes a striking visual impact. (more…)

John Baldessari

Artist John Baldessari, who pioneered a uniquely humorous and challenging approach to painting and conceptual art making over the past half century, has passed away at the age of 88.  A leading voice in the development of conceptualism, his interest in ideas and their functioning over the image itself would make him an influential and dynamic voice for post-war art. (more…)

Calvin Marcus, City Pig/Wild Boar (2019), via David Kordansky

Opening his second exhibition at David Kordansky in Los Angeles this winter, painter Calvin Marcus returns to his enigmatic, always challenging body of work, turning his approach towards painterly composition towards increasingly complex, and increasingly nuanced compositions. Titled GO HANG A SALAMI IM A LASAGNA HOG, the show features four bodies of work—including paintings, sculpture, and photography across its three exhibition spaces. (more…)

Roger Brown, Runaway (1968), via Venus Over Manhattan

Counted among the ranks of the Chicago Imagists, Roger Brown possessed a unique sense of figuration and composition. Celebrated for their use of imagery, figuration, narrative, and patterning, this group of artists pulled from idiosyncratic sources to produce deeply personal and visually diverse work, shirking the cool, stylistic orthodoxies that dominated on the coasts in favor of a fluid, colorful style that mixed together disparate styles and techniques. (more…)

Francesco Clemente, India I (2019), via Vito Schnabel Projects

Artist Francesco Clemente opens a show of work at Vito Schnabel’s New York exhibition space, highlighting the artist’s famed nomadism and his embrace of varied geographies spread over the full expanse of the globe. Moving between Italy, the United States, India and elsewhere, Clemente has long embraced the practice of moving across sites, and allowing his aesthetic interests it follows. Clemente’s work traverses time and recorded history to probe the mysteries, ecstasies, incongruities, and, ultimately, the gravitas of the human condition, working through the metaphysics of spirituality, mysticism, identity, and the self, too render a body of work in a variety of mediums that is often charged with eroticism and intimacy, rich in references, and expansive in its openness to interpretation. (more…)

Matthew Wong, Starry Night (2019), via Karma

Passing away at the untimely age of 35, artist Matthew Wong left behind an impressive body of painted canvases, pieces that moved through a dynamic and compelling emotional range exploring light and shadow, space and bodies as shifting value systems rarely lingering in easy relief for any prolonged period. Opening just a few weeks after the artist’s passing, his current exhibition at Karma, Blue, continues this practice.

Matthew Wong, Blue (Installation View), via Karma

Wong casts the landscapes and interiors of his exhibition under the glowing spaces between light and shadow, the transitional states where light passes to dark, and day might fade slowly into the early hours of night. The works here, dusky and nocturnal, were intended as the coda, or sundown, to a previous series of day-lit oil and gouache paintings, exploring a watery, fluid treatment of both space and the light that bounds it. Delving in particular into the color blue, Wong was primarily fascinated with the idea of the color as a fluid ground upon which light and space could play out.

Matthew Wong, Solitude (2018), via Karma

Matthew Wong, Blue (Installation View), via Karma

Wong concerned himself with the “blueness of blue”: its fluidity, its affect, and its uncanny ability to “activate nostalgia, both personal and collective,” according to the show’s press release, and his interest in subject matter that drifts into the personal sphere is underscored by the scenes themselves. Meditative and bucolic, they move between improvisation and memory, taking on characteristics where space and time are just as hazy as the light that floats into the picture plane. The images here were witnessed in Sicily, often on walks while traveling with his mother, the result being a time frame in which the artist both looks back on his past, and seems to delve into it more deeply to seek out elements and ideas either initially hidden, or emergent with the inclusion of new sensations. Wong’s rendering of light is dappled, corpuscular: a contrast to the smooth gradations of his interiors, and occasionally feature spotlights, cascading from a door or window left ajar. These moments and symbols, often implying a space just out of site, contributes to the allure and mystery of these works, and the sense of sadness that seeps forth when considering a talent gone too early.

The show closes January 5th.

Matthew Wong, Autumn Nocturne (2018), via Karma

— D. Creahan

Read more:
Matthew Wong: “Blue” at Karma [Exhibition Site]

Mark Bradford, Sapphire Blue (2019), via Hauser & Wirth

Cerberus, Mark Bradford’s first exhibition at Hauser & Wirth in London extends across the gallery’s spaces in the city, compiling a range of works including film, new paintings and sculptural work, often moving between each format, the show sees Bradford returning to ancient mythology, a consistent source of inspiration for the artist. Engaging in particular with the many headed dog guarding the entryway to Hades, Cerberus, Bradford’s show marks an engaged and intriguing investigation of conflict and healing, trauma and time through works that negotiate states in the same way that the multi-headed creature stands between hell and the mortal realm.

Mark Bradford, Dancing in the Street (2019), via Hauser & Wirth

(more…)

Brice Marden, Elevation (2018-2019), via Gagosian

On view at Gagosian’s uptown exhibition space, artist Brice Marden has compiled a selection of pieces that continue his investigations of the languages of modernity, and the histories of abstraction that have informed his work over the past few decades. Marking in particular a continuation of his “Letter” series, the works on view incorporate networks of calligraphic lines and strokes, woven through fields of color and tone. (more…)

Peter Halley, Helicon (2019), via Greene Naftali

Working across a range of media over the course of his career, including painting, architectural installation, digital prints, and critical writing, artist Peter Halley has strived to illuminate the structures of social space and communication that shape our experience of contemporary life. Opening his second solo exhibition with Greene Naftali this fall, Halley is presenting Heterotopia II, an ambitious large-scale installation that explores relationships between painting and architectural space. (more…)

Janette Laverrière and Nairy Baghramian, Seating Platform Eyebrow (2009), via Marian Goodman

In some ways a celebration of the life and work of Janette Laverrière, Marian Goodman is currently hosting an exhibition of works at its New York gallery space that combines the designer’s ideas with that of Nairy Baghramian’s, centering the show on a collaborative project that the two worked on before Laverrièr’s death in 2011. Presenting sketches, drawings and maquettes of Baghramian’s works from 1999 to the present that were never intended to be realized, the show is an intriguing portrait of collaboration and friendship. (more…)

Kiko Kostadinov, OTTO 95.8 (Installation View), via Moran Moran

Currently on view at Los Angeles’s Morán Morán, London-based, Bulgarian designer Kiko Kostadinov presents a series of works unified under the title OTTO 95.8. Kostadinov’s practice, inspired by everyday uniforms and utilitarian work wear, includes objects that he creates to run parallel to his design work. Incorporating readymade and functional items, the compound constructions in this exhibition illustrate Kostadinov’s attraction to alien rather than familiar elements, a recurring theme informing every aspect of his practice.  (more…)

Raque Ford at Martos Gallery, via Art Observed

Art Week Miami is underway, and the city itself seems to have slowly built its own counterpoint to the sprawling complex of fairs across Biscayne Bay at the Miami Beach Convention Center.  While Miami Beach continues to draw massive crowds of both buyers and visitors, its luxe appointments have long found a compelling counterpoint at NADA Miami, set up inside the Ice Palace Film Studios, where the focus is on showcasing new art and to celebrating the rising talents from around the globe. Exploring new or underexposed art that is not typical of the “art establishment,” by their words, NADA Miami is also the one of the only major American art fairs to be produced by a non-profit organization, and is recognized as a much needed alternative assembly of the world’s youngest and strongest art galleries dealing with emerging contemporary art.

Anneke Russden at Galerie Tatjana Peters, via Art Observed

(more…)

Camille Kachani at Zipper Galeria, via Art Observed

Turning the corner onto the iconic drag of Ocean Drive, one’s attention is immediately drawn to the slender white tent laid out along the ocean skyline, a gleaming structure that houses the Untitled Art Fair underneath its minimalist structure.  Its annual home, placed squarely in the midst of boozey beachgoers, restaurant soundsystems, and the annual flood of Art Basel Miami Beach visitors, the fair has one of the more unique positions in a week full of unique offerings, one that balances some of the most familiar sights of the city with the impressive work on view inside.  Compounded by the floor to ceiling windows in the fair tent, the fair is an annual must-attend for those looking to get their dose of dynamic contemporary art and Florida sun in one go. (more…)

Jim Dine at Ben Brown, via Art Observed

Closing its doors this evening, the week of sales at Art Basel Miami Beach has kicked off, capping off a strong week for galleries in South Florida, and a strong opportunity to close out the year with a flourish.  Commanding a roster of over 200 galleries from around the world, the marquee event of the fall market season in the U.S., and one of the biggest social events of the art world calendar has gotten underway, with thousands flocking to the sun and sand of the Florida metropolis. (more…)

Elmgreen & Dragset, Before the Storm (2019), via Kukje

With the conclusion of another year, the art world has once again turned its attention to the bustling Miami cityscape for another year of of the Art Basel fair franchise on the tip of the Florida peninsula.  Bringing together the global art community for a week of fairs, exhibitions and parties on the streets of Miami and Miami Beach, the fair and its satellites will look to further its influence and footprint in the city. (more…)

Anish Kapoor, New Born (2019), via Lisson

Currently on at both of Lisson Gallery’s New York exhibition spaces, artist Anish Kapoor orchestrates a striking investigation of perception, space, time and movement through a selection of new works. This is Kapoor’s first show with Lisson in the U.S., an impressive note considering his nearly forty years with the gallery. (more…)

Nathalie Djurberg & Hans Berg, One Last Trip To The Underworld (Installlation View), via Tanya Bonakdar

Marking their first exhibition in New York in over 5 years, the artist duo of Nathalie Djurberg and Hans Berg have touched down in New York City for an expansive solo exhibition at Tanya Bonakdar’s expansive Chelsea exhibition space. The show, which marks the world premiere of four new video works, continues the pair’s collaborative vision and surreal landscapes, which explore the shadows of human subconsciousness. Using sculpture, stop-motion film, sound, and immersive installation the artists construct narratives that speak to emotional tension, confliction, sexual impulse, and violence.

The show is rife with dark humor and absurdity. Large-scale flower sculptures dot the floors of the space, each accented with a range of grotesque details and bizarre creatures flitting across their surfaces in mid-pollination. Countered by immense, full-wall videos, these pieces seem to create the landscape against which this action on-screen plays out. The gallery becomes a playing field for the subconscious, hints of tension and violence, desire and sexual aggression, all writ large on the walls as these sculptures translate that same energy into three dimensional space.

Nathalie Djurberg & Hans Berg, One Last Trip To The Underworld (Installlation View), via Tanya Bonakdar

(more…)

Karen Kilimnik (Installation View), via 303

Comprising her 12th solo show with 303 Gallery, artist Karen Kilimnik returns to New York with a new body of works, snaking through a range of materials and techniques that touch on painting, photography, collage, sculpture and video, all displayed in the Petersburger exhibition style.

Karen Kilimnik, the sports car rally + and the treasure hunt, england, Steed, Emma Peel, assorted villains + the butler – bentley (2007), via 303

(more…)

Matthew Barney, Embrasure (Installation View), via Gladstone Gallery

Artist Matthew Barney’s victory lap continues after the 2018 release of his latest film Redoubt, a wolf hunt in Idaho’s rugged Sawtooth Mountains that continues the artist’s ongoing preoccupation with landscape as both setting and subject. For his current show in New York, on view at Gladstone Gallery, the artist presents a set of new drawings, etchings, and sculpture that draw from the film, and expand on its allegorical and cosmological themes. (more…)