Installation at MoMA: “Pipilotti Rist: Pour Your Body Out (7354 Cubic meters)”

MoMA’s Marron Atrium, which soars 110 feet above street level, has been designated a temporary installation space since the museum’s renovations in 2004. Multimedia Swiss artist Pipilotti Rist was given the monumental task of creating an installation in this vast and multi-storied space and has succeeded in building a lovely, relaxing, and surreal environment.

Nobby Clark's London Blues is a melancholy tune, captured in 101 black and white photographs taken over 40 years of walking the city with a camera in his pocket. Clark's pictures don't show the London that visitors come to see. His is the London of grim working class neighborhoods, pubs, National Front marches, and gnarled old people. It's a place of diffidence and neglect and, occasionally, dignity.

And this major exhibit at Tribeca Arches has an unexpected kicker: on the upper floor of the gallery are a further 120 never-before-shown photos of the Rolling Stones, taken by Clark during the StarF*cker tour of 1976, at Earls Court. After the seeping grayness of the London pictures, the vibrant color of the Stones in action brings to mind - in a burst of pure energy -- the other London of the day.

It is a privilege to view the exhibit of Liza Lou’s beaded sculptures at L&M Arts. Lou has not had a solo show in New York since 2002, so this is not to be missed.

The gallery is housed in two floors of an ornate townhouse on the Upper East Side. One has to ring the bell to be personally let in, adding to the ambiance. Upon entering the lobby one encounters two minimal sculptures, “Tower” and “Continuous Mile,” (image left, detail) as well as the wall piece “Condition of Capture 1” and a small lithograph.

Modernist thinking reaches new levels in the recent paintings of Ron Gorchov. Working within a time-tested format of the concave and rounded, saddle-shaped canvas, Gorchov paints and over paints until his uneven colors and curious shapes echo forward and back. In viewing these works, you may think you see a positive form, then the space around that object or thing moves forward and that original thought recedes like a mirage - it's a mental play between perception and pre-thought. And it is also about the structure behind the surface, where angled, curved stretchers pull the taut, frontally stapled linen tight like a drum -- a surface for the artist to work his colors, often to a very thin, drippy consistency.

“Tame!” - Bill Henson at Robert Miller Gallery

After Australian photographer Bill Henson’s recent show in his homeland in which images of naked adolescents were seized from the wall and the show was shut down, I was expecting a controversial reception here in New York. With our economy in shatters, no one put up a fuss. But why should they? This show is a beautiful, formal exhibit of powerful and pleasing images. There is nothing shocking or offensive. Instead it is a show of a mature artist presenting well-crafted and sensuous photographs.

Never subtle, Ron English approaches many of popular culture's most recognized icons with tongue planted firmly in cheek; and with a master's precision in execution. His image mash-ups are stellar "popaganda" visual editorials: Surreal images such as his Marilyn Monroe portrait with Mickey Mouse breasts, his fat Ronald McDonald seen in Super Size Me, and his Homer Simpson Jackson Pollack piece. Last night, his New York art dealer, Opera Gallery, hosted an opening to "hear the story behind the creation of this global image." The "this" referred to is Mr. English's Abraham Lincoln - Barack Obama fusion portrait.

Currently on display at VanBrunt Gallery in Beacon, New York, is the exhibition Women of New Orleans. One would expect, from an exhibition with this title, some references to Hurricane Katrina. Yet here, the thoughtfulness, talent, and intelligence are the first things you notice. The star of the show is Dawn DeDeaux. A pragmatic thinker and elegant doer, DeDeaux turns glass, mold, and mud into focused visions that stick to your thoughts like barbed seed pods.

Never before have we witnessed such a collision of pop art with the world of marketing. From breath mints -- Hint Mint's artist series featuring Gary Baseman, Shag, Glenn Barr -- to limited edition collectible vinyl toys available at hip retailers such as Kid Robot -- Ron English, David Horvath, Frank Kozik, Baseman (image left, 7" Hot Cha Cha Cha Blue, 500 pieces) -- a whole cottage industry of graphic and subversive artists are augmenting their art careers by creating hip, edgy work that casual consumers can eat, play with, or in some cases even display next to their fine art collections. This is nothing new, as Warhol showed us back in the '60s with his Campbell's Soup Can series (1962). But today, their pervasiveness has given rise to a new kind of affordable collector.

As I have done for the past several years, my first stop in the Catskill region is to the home and studio of Tom Gottsleben. Whether it is his free-standing sculpture, his earth works, or his home, Gottsleben blends the natural with the man made in ways akin to the timeless approach I experienced earlier this year in the ancient art forms of South Korea. With Modernist tendencies at his core, Gottsleben holds nature, geometry and the spiritual as equal partners - a fact that is easily found in his sculptures of metal, stone and glass. These works are built from powerful shapes, forms and concepts, and settle somewhere between the physical and the ideal (as in "Chrysalis," left).

Fay Lansner's fine art career began in the middle of the twentieth century when Abstract Expressionists were breaking new ground. This was the post-World War II art world - a time when the American avant-garde was beginning to achieve upper art world status. Lansner was in the mix of the 10th Street scene, a second-generation New York School artist who was showing with the Hansa Gallery (early 1950s). Artists she knew and exhibited with were Philip Guston, Lee Krasner, Willem de Kooning and Jim Dine. In the early days, Lansner studied at Hans Hoffman's school (1948-49) with the likes of Larry Rivers and Lee Krasner, who happened to be the class monitor.

While viewing the works of Karim Hamid, I was reminded of the London School -- artists such as Euan Uglow and R.B. Kitaj. Uglow, because of the way both artists leave visible marks which let on as to how the painting's composition is formulated; and Kitaj, because of the distorted perspectives and odd anatomy for which both artists seem to strive. There's even a bit of Francis Bacon here, where fleshy, toothy grins float where faces should be, and incomplete, writhing figures fill chilling voids. A review of his resume online shows Hamid studied in Brighton University, in England, which should account for my impression that Hamid is influenced by the London School.

If you love to look at intricate, well-designed art work, there are three artists showing in Chelsea now that have very special qualities.

The two-person show at Kinz, Tillou + Feigen is a must see. Megan Greene's intensely detailed fabric and floral-based abstractions made with white pencil and gouache on black paper are stunning, edgy, and beautiful. The work is outlaw, along the line of a Hells Angels aesthetic, yet refined with the finesse one likes to see in fine pencil work.

Also at Kinz, Tillou + Feigen are the mixed media works of Lori Field, who offers wondrous drawn and painted collages (left) under an encaustic skin.

If you think that because in 2008 in America we finally have a gentleman of color and a woman who have realistic shots at the Presidency, we’ve buried the bloody hatchets of racism and sexism, then you must see the simultaneously exhilarating and harrowing exhibit Kara Walker: My Complement, My Enemy, My Oppressor, My Love.

Kara Walker, the young (a year shy of 40) African-American artist who is rapidly gaining fame and notoriety with her expansive and jarring silhouettes of larger-than-life scenarios from the antebellum South, is making waves, both positive and negative, with creations that slam the senses as they depict scenes of conflict, exhilaration, power wielding, and sexual reverie in the context of racial discrimination and gender bias.

Last week, in between installing my exhibition at Blue Star Contemporary Art Center and attending the openings for that show, I was able to visit a number of galleries in San Antonio. As I had experienced in my four previous trips to San Antonio, I found a lively art scene fueled by a proud community of hard-working artists, gallerists, curators, and directors supported by a good number of critical publications, city officials, and enthusiastic collectors. Make yourself available for a First Friday and you'll be amazed by the four or five thousand visitors that will pass through just about every art space in the downtown area.

Most art aficionados will recall Andy Warhol’s early work as an illustrator, when he made fanciful renderings of 1950s fashion footwear. Recently, I’ve come to know two artists who focus a considerable amount of time and effort on the art of the shoe. During a recent studio visit, I was treated to a sneak peak of the shoe paintings of artist and hat/clothing designer Yuka Hasegawa [right], as she prepared for her solo show at Gallery Milieu in Tokyo. Her shoe paintings ranged in style from smoky Surrealism to more concrete representations, each having a certain personality in mind for its wearer.

With its famous Speedway, the once champion Colts, and the popular Pacers, Indianapolis is first and foremost a sports town. What most do not know is that Indianapolis has an art scene, albeit limited, with one world-class institution, the Indianapolis Museum of Art (IMA), as its core. At the IMA, you will find a number of stellar art objects ranging from Asian and African antiquities to formidable examples of modern and contemporary art from Europe and the United States. For one, they offer one of the Ecce Homo (ca. 1510, left) paintings by Hieronymus Bosch, which features a relatively calm Christ before of a mob populated with the typical Bosch crazies.

During a recent visit to Brooklyn and Queens, I went to two galleries where I will be showing in 2008 and found intriguing shows. The first location was Dorsky Gallery Curatorial Programs, a pristine space with a world-class program that features four guest-curated shows per year. At this time, curator Joshua Altman, who is also the current director at Stux Gallery in Chelsea, offers his take on artists who create animations that, for the most part, ignore any standard animation techniques. The show is titled Extremes & In-Betweens, which refers to how the outermost positions of a character’s body movements set the mark for the changing movements in-between, a concern or approach that rarely, if ever, enters into the minds of the artists assembled here.

One of the best aspects of the Manhattan art scene, and perhaps my favorite, is its diversity. You need only go to a handful of galleries to experience a broad range of concepts and aesthetics. Once in a while, you hit a few shows that blow out the borders a notch or two, keeping the whole thing increasingly fresh and expansive.

This is the case with two current exhibitions, Michael Anderson: Media Violence at Marlborough Chelsea, and Hiroshi Senju at Sundaram Tagore Gallery. Michael Anderson’s art has painterly, fluid, reactive and compelling iconography culled from street posters.

The third and final leg of Frolic opened November 6th at the Taipei Gallery, an impressive space that unfolds from the lobby of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office building to an open second floor space. As was the case in the first two shows, curators Thalia Vrachopoulos and Jane Ingram Allen chose art that evoked whimsical thought.

Projected above the throngs of opening visitors is Yi-Li Yeh’s double video Orange Flower 1, showing a young woman dressed in a yellow, phallic-laden outfit as she runs through a series of martial arts poses while spewing flowers (life) from her outstretched arms.

The second of three exhibitions collectively titled Frolic: Humor and Mischief in New Taiwanese Art opened at Tenri Cultural Institute of New York on October 18th. The atmosphere at the opening, as it was at 2 X 13 gallery two weeks ago, was energizing. For the second installment, curators Thalia Vrachopoulos and Jane Ingram Allen offer the work of 13 young artists who, this time around, have a bit more of an Eastern focus esthetically.

Inspired by the exhibition’s focus on humor, Wen-fu Yu offers “God Bless You!” (above left), a mixed media installation composed of bird netting and white duck feathers.

Some of you who know me would have heard about the Intelligent Design Project that Michael Zansky and I have been presenting in a number of spaces throughout the U.S. . The third show in the series opened at Kasia Kay Art Projects on the 12th of October, and I look forward to hearing from anyone who sees the show in Chicago.

From this point on, I would like to tell you about what I saw in other Chicago galleries, all well worth a visit. First, in the west loop, I happened by four exhibitions that were real winners.

Born in Kapuvár, Hungary in 1923, Judit Reigl resides in Paris and is considered a major figure in European art – but not here. In fact, you could say she is relatively unknown in the U.S. save for shows like the one up now at Janos Gat Gallery, her first New York exhibition.

Reigl, like the show as a whole, is abruptly pure. It took me a few minutes to rewire my brain to think in terms of art that truly was made for cerebral pleasure, for the artist herself, and not for the making of a marketable object. And that, to me, is a very European attitude – or at least this was the case in the middle of the twentieth century.

The atmosphere on opening night at 2 X 13 was festive and tantalizing. The exhibition offers a sampling of works that put forth a diverse overview of the concept of humor. Nothing is too overt, and most works suggest some sort of social or emotional mores, but less specific than I expected. Curators Thalia Vrachopoulos (based in New York) and Jane Ingram Allen (based in Taiwan) managed to project, via their chosen artists and works, an eastern feel with western bent, making it all seem comfortably different.

Fay Ku’s large gouache on paper works reminded me very much of Amy Cutler's works, but the narrative in Ku’s art is a bit more problem-oriented. In one work, a woman spies her heavily overgrown pubis while in another, half tree, half nubile women attempt to swallow blowfish whole, which leads to punctured cheeks and problematic situations.

Gudjon Bjarnason employs chance, relying heavily on a very extreme form of controlled chaos. At the core of this exhibition are variously mangled minimalist metal sculptures that he fabricates and later destroys, either by dropping them from great heights or blowing them up with dynamite. Extreme, but Bjarnason is from Iceland – a land that tends to suggest extremes, from the immensely various amounts of available sunlight through the year, to the strangeness of the glaciers and volcanoes that dominate the landscape.

I came to know the Omega Institute through a show I co-curated with Kathleen Cooley (Fear is a Four Letter Word) at their last Being Fearless conference in New York City. Omega, as you may already know, is an innovative institute with a holistic approach to life and living that is progressive and full. I went up to their main campus in Rhinebeck for Family Week this summer and had a fulfilling and spiritually uplifting stay. While there, I happened by the Ram Dass Library at the center of the campus where the mixed media works of P.C. Turczyn were on display.

As a rule, library shows can be pretty mediocre, even amateurish, so I didn’t expect to be impressed – but I was impressed. Turczyn’s work, which is based on basic patterns found in nature, was meticulously crafted and beautifully designed. There was a palpable energy or force in the work that really grabbed my attention.

The chances of seeing a storefront in midtown Manhattan converted into a blank canvas for an artist to create an automatic, abstract work of art is pretty slim, given the real estate values in the city these days. But the Lab Gallery has been doing such outside-the-box thinking for some time. I had the good fortune of being associated with this progressive approach as a curatorial advisor through January of this year, so I like swinging by now and again to see what is going on at the Lab.

Amidst the cacophony of fast and loose summer group shows offered in Chelsea this year stands, literally and figuratively, one unforgettable exhibition. The art of Dustin Yellin is a cross between painting and sculpture, science and science fiction. His magical objects, some taller than the viewer, are comprised of dozens of layers of resin that are meticulously painted with acrylic and inks - layer atop layer - until a sinuous "life form" appears that looks like it would be at home in sea, sand, or air.

Each object is a comment on nature, genetic experimentation, color and form, culminating, in this reviewer's mind, in some of the freshest and most distinct art being made today.

"The art of our era is not art, but technology. Today Rembrandt is painting automobiles; Shakespeare is writing research reports; Michelangelo is designing more efficient bank lobbies," notes oft-quoted Howard Sparks.

Well, the sensible Barbara London, Associate Curator, Department of Media, The Museum of Art (MOMA), might just have forced Mr. Sparks to augment his theory an iota. With her entertaining new exhibit, Automatic Update, which runs until September 10th, London clearly showcases the reverse process, with five contemporary artists extracting art from technology.

Contemporary art from Asia seems to be increasingly abundant everywhere you look, from our leading museums to our most progressive galleries. So it is no wonder that more and more curators are scrambling to shed light on the differences and the distinctions from country to country. And it is hard to say where influences originate, and it is even harder to say what came first. But I do see an intriguing amount of crossover from American artists to Asian concepts and esthetics, and vice versa in Incarnation, a stellar show curated by Inhee Iris Moon.

And from what I understand from Ms. Moon, this is just a piece of a pie that is far more diverse and complicated. With all that said, I am thoroughly impressed by all the work in the exhibition, especially with respect to the curator's emphasis on art that reveals great clarity of vision, an emphasis on craft, and the indication of the larger, more wholly spiritual picture.

Shinduk Kang’s art is a breath of fresh air. The colors, materials, and techniques she employs are clean, ageless, and fine. There is a festiveness, and a reverence too, for the things she makes, while her focus is keen and sharp, making her art bold in a very easily absorbed way.

The main gallery at Tenri is lined, floor to 14-foot-high ceiling, with a patchwork of silky, translucent fabric that is generally used in making the inner slip of traditional clothing (Han Bok). The use, or reuse of these lightweight and durable fabrics also refers to another tradition in Korea, of using off cuts of fabrics as gift wrapping (POJaGI).