Contributed by Sharon Butler / For artists like Robert Rauschenberg, Claude Viallat, Elizabeth Murray, Blinky Palermo, Rochelle Feinstein, and Michael Venezia, painting has arguably been about the object more than about the image, and in the past decade or so, a slew of artists working with found materials, furniture, lumber, and more have adopted a painting-as-object, amalgamated approach to art making. This year, museum curators have begun to take notice.
At the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Lincoln, Massachusetts, curators Dina Deitsch and Evan Garza have organized “PAINT THINGS: beyond the stretcher,” an exuberant exhibition that focuses on work merging painting, sculptural form, video, performance, and installation strategies. The curators selected artists who are exploring materiality, context and space–physical, social, political, or emotional. I wish Clement Greenberg, the art critic who championed color and flatness in the 1940s, could see the show. I wonder why painters were so intrigued with Greenberg’s notion of medium specificity back in the day?
Looking at the work in this show, though, a better title might be “Things with Paint.” Do these artists identify as painters or do they just happen to use paint in these particular pieces? Does it matter?
“PAINT THINGS: beyond the stretcher,” curated by Dina Deitsch and Evan Garza. deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, Lincoln, MA. Through April 21, 2013. A catalogue with essays by both curators is now available.\
About the author:Sharon Butler is a painter and the publisher of Two Coats of Paint.
Photos by Clements Photography & Design, Boston, unless otherwise specified. Courtesy of the deCordova.
The work by Franklin Evans offers interesting possibilities. He seems to explore them primarily in terms of planes and space. The color is high, but it seems more to establish spatial and planar relationships than about color itself. At least, this is what I get from the photo. The gallery could do a little better and remove their lighting. It doesn't need to be in the way.
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Contributed by Natasha Sweeten / On a warm, sunny day that teased people outdoors, I stepped into Zwirner to catch Joe Bradley’s current exhibition, “Vom Abend.” Nine large...
So much energy in this exhibit, glad to have this way to get some sense of it.
The work by Franklin Evans offers interesting possibilities. He seems to explore them primarily in terms of planes and space. The color is high, but it seems more to establish spatial and planar relationships than about color itself. At least, this is what I get from the photo. The gallery could do a little better and remove their lighting. It doesn't need to be in the way.