Contributed by Zach Seeger / Kristen Mills’s “Believability” is a richly constructed, well-meaning, humorous-but-not installation of videos, sculpted environments, and cacophonous formal musings on the difficulty of personal and professional perseverance in an uncertain time. Just prior to our current collective crises came a burgeoning Chicago Imagist-inspired painting moment, formal and figurative, that seemed a … read more… “Kristen Mills: Plausible hope”
Memory: Mystery Car Rides
Contributed by Benito Esquenazi / In the twenty years that I was not painting I maintained a connection to my creative process by drawing and seeing art. One does not choose to be an artist. One is. I paused my painting practice in 1995. By then I had three kids. By 1998 I would have … read more… “Memory: Mystery Car Rides”
Two Coats Selected Gallery Guide: September 2020
Joan Snyder: Painting from the inside out
Contributed by Jason Andrew / In a 1976 Cincinnati Enquirer review of Joan Snyder’s paintings, the reviewer, Owen Findsen, surmised that she had “picked up a little of this, a little of that … and made it all uglier.” While he found her work offensive, even questioning it’s validity, for those like me who have … read more… “Joan Snyder: Painting from the inside out”
Interview: Brandi Twilley and life in the studio
Contributed by Caroline Wells Chandler/ I met Brandi Twilley back in 2008 when we started graduate school together at Yale. Both Southerners and eager for a change of scenery, we became fast friends. For over a decade we have talked extensively about art and creating a sustainable life around making work in NYC. This interview … read more… “Interview: Brandi Twilley and life in the studio”
Art and Film: DIY festival for readers who miss NYC
Contributed by Jonathan Stevenson / Even deprived of movie houses, cinephiles abhor a vacuum. Criterion may be their readiest source for a themed set of noteworthy films or the center-cut of an auteur’s oeuvre. Another option is to pan the metaphorical stream of mostly indifferent content for nuggets of gold. There’s especially fine below-the-radar fare … read more… “Art and Film: DIY festival for readers who miss NYC”
Projects: Red Shoes in East Hampton
Contributed by Abby Lloyd and Hadley Vogel / The progenitor of the East Hampton Tow wasn’t on wheels. It was a shed in the backyard of Hadley’s childhood home. She founded East Hampton Shed in 2012 with Nate Hitchcock, and for eight years, mostly during the summer, the shed functioned as a white-box gallery. After … read more… “Projects: Red Shoes in East Hampton”
Radical reorientation: Rural life, politics, and a pandemic in Joshua Tree
Contributed by Mary Addison Hackett / “How’s everyone doing?” is the occasional check-in I see posted among artist friends who haven’t completely jumped the Facebook ship. In a group devoted to issues relevant to online and F2F teaching during the pandemic, the check-ins are more dire. Artists are on edge, frustrated, and in some cases, … read more… “Radical reorientation: Rural life, politics, and a pandemic in Joshua Tree”
The objectness of Rachael Gorchov
Contributed by Jason Andrew / There is a long history of artists expanding the objectness – that is, the sculptural dimension – of painting. Picasso and Braque introduced this concept in their assemblage works; Vladimir Tatlin broadened it in his “counter-reliefs” alongside Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoventhe, the “Dada Baroness”. For the Dadaists, breaking the picture plane … read more… “The objectness of Rachael Gorchov”
Summertime blues: Clark, Fagan, Carrigan, Dubicki, Hocker, and Samelson in Torrington
Contributed by Laurie Fendrich / To walk into an open art gallery during this COVID-caused gloaming of the art world is perhaps to catch a glimpse of dawn. That’s what it felt like to me, anyway, when a couple of weeks ago I visited the not-for-profit Five Points Gallery at the Five Points Center for … read more… “Summertime blues: Clark, Fagan, Carrigan, Dubicki, Hocker, and Samelson in Torrington”