UPDATE: Saturday, November 23, 3 pm, please join us for “Ask the Artist,” where we will be yakking about the contemporary state of abstraction. Did you see Peter Halley’s show at Greene Naftali? Let’s discuss. If you haven’t been to Bushwick lately, you might want to head out to Theodore:Art to see “Houses in Motion,” a … read more… “Invitation: Houses in Motion, a tectonic tremor”
Tag: Sharon Butler
ICYMI: Elizabeth Hazan
Contributed by Sharon Butler / Elizabeth Hazan’s earlier paintings were highly resolved meditations on Google map imagery and aerial landscape views of Long Island’s east end. The terrific new work, recently on display at Johnannes Vogt in a solo show called “Heat Wave,” is moving into a less certain, but, for me, more satisfying state … read more… “ICYMI: Elizabeth Hazan”
Looking back: Richard Baker at Tibor de Nagy
Contributed by Sharon Butler / Last month, seeing Richard Baker’s paintings from the 80s and 90s at Tibor de Nagy took me back to my early days in New York. I had arrived in Soho in 1987 after finishing a two-year stint studying painting at MassArt in Boston, where I made modest surface-oriented abstractions. In New York, … read more… “Looking back: Richard Baker at Tibor de Nagy”
Two Coats Selected Gallery Guide: October 2019
Contributed by Sharon Butler / This month, in addition to the ongoing impeachment inquiry, which seems to expand minute by minute, there are plenty of great exhibitions to see; I also have a few invitations to share. Please join us: Saturday, October 12, 4pm, I hope upstate readers can stop by the Woodstock Artists Association and … read more… “Two Coats Selected Gallery Guide: October 2019”
Ideas and influences: Mike Cloud
Rather than parse the differences among us, Mike Cloud’s new paintings address the one experience we all have in common regardless of race, gender, ethnicity, wealth, or nationality: impending death. For his solo show at Thomas Erben, on view through November 2, Cloud has used stretcher bars, belts, fabrics, paint, and other materials to create … read more… “Ideas and influences: Mike Cloud”
Catherine Howe: Sly virtuosity
Contributed by Sharon Butler / Calling Catherine Howe’s whirling, monochromic flower paintings “the pleasure garden” is archly ironic, like calling de Kooning’s early paintings “women.” Although her canvases outwardly do describe floral forms, their deeper meaning lies in the large, threatening scale, the aggressively fluid use of materials, and the evident physical energy that went into their making. … read more… “Catherine Howe: Sly virtuosity”
Rachel Howard: A fascination with madness
Contributed by Sharon Butler / British painter Rachel Howard is in town this month, presenting “L’appel du vide,” her first New York solo show, at Blain|Southern. Howard is known for a visceral, intuitive approach to abstraction that embraces painting, sculpture, and work on paper. Last week, after she’d finished installing the show, she and her old friend (and Brooklyn gallerist) Stephanie … read more… “Rachel Howard: A fascination with madness”
Benjamin Pritchard and Natasha Wright: Dark, murky, and subterranean
Contributed by Sharon Butler / Recently, Natasha Wright and Benjamin Pritchard had concurrent solo exhibitions at the John Davis Gallery in Hudson, NY. Both painters are drawn to a raw style of power painting that conjures Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner in the pre-drip years, when they were thinking about Jungian analysis, the Collective Unconscious, and the spiritual … read more… “Benjamin Pritchard and Natasha Wright: Dark, murky, and subterranean”
Artist’s statement: Tamalin Baumgarten
Contributed by Sharon Butler / Tamalin Baumgarten’s haunting paintings are inspired by the landscape, history, and people of Cuttyhunk, a small island off the coast of Massachusetts. As a child, Baumgarten spent summers there with her family, and for the past few years she has been running the Cuttyhunk Island Artists’ Residency out of the family home. “For me, Cuttyhunk is a setting where … read more… “Artist’s statement: Tamalin Baumgarten”
Roadtrip: The Clark, MASS MoCA, Bascom Lodge in Western Massachusetts
Contributed by Sharon Butler / Several weeks ago I returned to Mount Greylock, the highest peak in Massachusetts, where I was an artist-in-residence at Bascom Lodge, the inn at the top of the mountain, in summer 2014. Peter Dudek, a NYC-based sculptor who teaches at Hunter and SVA, has been running the inn for the … read more… “Roadtrip: The Clark, MASS MoCA, Bascom Lodge in Western Massachusetts”