Jean Tinguely, Ballet des pauvres (1961), all photos via Besiana Vathi for Art Observed

One of the pioneering artists in the concept of kinetics and movement in their works, Jean Tinguely is the subject of an expansive retrospective, Machine Spectacle, currently on view at Amsterdam’s Stedelijk Museum, charting the artist’s creative trajectory and body of work, and highlighting his fascination with movement and formal progression as the focus, rather than the means of his practice.  Using movement and change as modes of critical inquiry, the works on view underscore Tinguely’s understanding of the modern condition, examining capitalist spectacle and modern culture in conjunction with his work’s internal series of aesthetic decisions.

Jean Tinguely, Le Cyclop РLa T̻te, collaboration with Niki de Saint Phalle (1986)

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Michelle Grabner, Untitled (2016), via Art Observed

Artist Michelle Grabner has work on view at James Cohan Gallery in Chelsea this month, continuing the artist’s explorations of intersections between physical and social contexts for her chosen materials, and the resulting conversations between the contexts of fine art and the artist’s own life and practice. Read More »

John Currin, Newspaper Couple (2016), via Sadie Coles

Artist John Currin returns to the traditional forms of the marriage portrait for a new exhibition this month at Sadie Coles’s Davies Street exhibition space, bringing his uniquely vivd painterly techniques and often wry sense of humor to bear on a series of five new canvases.  Drawing on Currin’s long study of historical forms and context, the show continues the artist’s simultaneous study and subversion of the act of portraiture. Read More »

Wade Guyton, Untitled (2015), via Petzel

Marking an expansion and elaboration of his ongoing engagement with the materiality and phenomenology of digital media formats, Wade Guyton is presenting a series of inkjet printer-based works from late last year at Petzel Gallery this month.  Comprised of scanned and reprinted pages from the New York Times, Guyton’s body of new works reflects on both the commodity value and disposability of both images and their technologies in the modern landscape.   Read More »

Andy Warhol, Knives (1981-82), All images are by Osman Can Yerebakan for Art Observed

Nahmad Contemporary is currently presenting an impressive three-person exhibition at its Madison Ave exhibition space, contextualizing the work of both Christopher Wool and Wade Guyton through the artistic lens of Andy Warhol, making the latter artist’s impact all the more apparent in the work of the former two.  Combining the appropriation of existing imagery and the borrowed aesthetics of mainstream commercial imagery with a certain sense of spare visual arrangement, the show is a striking visual tour de force, connecting diverse focal points and concepts over a shared sense of composition and technique, especially in the sense of the gallery space as a transformational context. Read More »

Robert Morris, Untitled (Williams Mirrors) (1976-77), all photos via Anna Corrigan for Art Observed

Now through January 14, Sprüth Magers in Berlin is hosting a historical exhibition of works by Robert Morris, exploring a series of six works developed over the course of the artist’s career, and often drawing on the use of mirrors and reflective surfaces to expand the viewer’s perception of space.  Pulling from some of the earliest works in Morris’s conceptual practice up to a work completed in 2014, Refractions traces Morris’s engagement with movement, space and the body, often in relation to the gallery space itself.

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Gordon Matta-Clark, Conical Intersect (1975), via Marian Goodman

Reflecting on the far-reaching impact of artist Gordon Matta-Clark’s career, Marian Goodman Gallery has opened an exhibition of works by the American artist, combining collages, drawings, video and other works that trace the artist’s enigmatic explorations of space and use, and the artist’s place as a negotiator between these states of stillness and movement.

Gordon Matta-Clark, Cut Drawing (1974), via Marian Goodman

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Andrew Kuo, 100% (9/25/2016) (2016), via Art Observed

Andrew Kuo’s work functions at an intersection of the cognitive and formal.  His paintings, jagged and winding swirls of color executed in meticulously arranged grids, draw on histories of formally precise, minimalist painting from across the 20th century.  Yet at the same time, his work twists these forms through a framework of subjectivity, using corresponding texts at the bottom of his paintings to turn them into charts and datasets of sorts.  The amount of time dwelling on various subjects, personal details or grand metaphysical questions are implied through his works, often tinged with a wry sense of humor.

Andrew Kuo, TRIP (7/15/2016) (2016), via Art Observed

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Julian Rosefeldt, Manifesto (2015) © Julian Rosefeldt and VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

Following its Australian and German debuts throughout 2016, Manifesto, German artist Julian Rosefeldt’s highly anticipated multi-channel video installation starring Academy Award-winning actress Cate Blanchett, comes to Park Avenue Armory’s cavernous Drill Hall.  Projected on soaring screens dispersed around the empty space, Rosefeldt’s tour-de-force recites a range of influential manifestos from the history of art and philosophy through an impressively diverse range brought to life by Blanchett’s virtuosic and versatile acting ability.

Manifesto at Park Avenue Armory Photo by James Ewing Read More »

Rita Ackermann, Kline Nurses (2015), via Art Observed

Taking over Hauser & Wirth’s temporary exhibition space at 548 West 22nd Street, Rita Ackermann is currently presenting a broad range of new works drawing on her ongoing investigations into the modes and structures of mainstream painting.  A relentless experimenter with the conception, construction, and presentation of the painted canvas, Ackermann’s work here spans a range of varied approaches that further her dual interrogations of the material bounds of the painting, and the gestural or technical conceits used in its realization.

Rita Ackermann, Kline Rape III (2016), via Art Observed

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