18 Nov TIO NYC: More Good Stuff to See (including art from Sanitation Dept.)
Before heading to the Left Coast, we made other stops worth sharing (in addition to the happenings in the link just below.)
Go here for other happenings in and around New York City.
Pace in the race:
Robert Longo, through December 18, 2021, at 540 West 25 Street:
Robert Longo is world-renowned for bold, eye-popping, in-your-face protest art. The artist achieves his ends – paraphrasing a long-standing quote – by occupying the space between movies and monuments with images that communicate violent physicality and psychological angst.
As summed up by Thaddaeus Ropac:
“While Robert Longo has worked in a variety of media – including performance, photography, sculpture and painting – he is best known for his large-scale, hyper-realistic charcoal drawings that reflect on the construction of symbols of power and authority. Inspired by Carl Jung’s notion of the collective unconscious, he explores the effects of living in an image-saturated culture – how we filter, retain and process the images that bombard us daily. The narrative strength and emotive impact of his works come from the transformation of the intimate practice of drawing into the monumental scale of painting, as well as the meticulous detail he achieves in charcoal…”
“Drawing from photos is a way of reclaiming the images that haunt us. By drawing them, I make them become not just something I am looking at but something that becomes part of me,” Longo has explained.
Case in point, his current show at Pace titled “Lazarus Manifold“:
“…The five drawings contemplate the crimes upon which America was built while also serving as records of various ongoing crises in the US. Detailed renderings of a Native American headdress; a field of cotton; a tattered flag; a pile of opioid pills; and the wing of a fallen bird are uniformly sized and installed in close succession. The order of the images indicates a chronology, and each work activates the next to gain a perpetual momentum akin to that found among the five spheres of a Newton Pendulum.
“‘Untitled (American Sinscape)’ is, in part, a tribute to James Rosenquist’s monumental painting F-111 (1964–65), which comprises fragmented images representing and denouncing American militarism. At 30 feet long, Longo’s new installation encourages viewers to meditate on American history. While the works examine the country’s past, they also allude to urgent social and political issues that persist today…,” Pace explains.
Also at Pace, 540 West 25th Street through 12/18:
Qiu Xiaofei’s latest solo exhibition,”Divination,” features his explorations in paintings since 2019. The exhibition marks the first presentation of the artist’s latest works outside of China, images which combines “the artist’s research into human consciousness and synesthesia with a more intimate, literary, and fantastical visual experience…”
Go here for more on these magical, brightly colorful works (in minor key palettes) that focus on birth, growth, aging, and death.
Elmgreen & Dragset, who have been collaborating since 1995, take over the first floor of Pace’s New York space for a show of large-scale sculptures titled “The Nervous System.” Their collaborative efforts creates “an almost surreal depiction of a dysfunctional home within the gallery’s walls.”
Elmgreen & Dragset, Boy With Gun, 2021, bronze, lacquer, aluminum, wood, perspex and light-box display, 88-9/16″ × 57-1/16″ × 15-3/4″ (224.9 cm × 144.9 cm × 40 cm)
Go here for more on this jarring show.
This solo exhibition titled “Materialism: Past, Present, Future” features new and recent work by DRIFT. The show includes sculptures from the artists’ “Materialism” series that features the raw materials that make up everyday objects.
“…Manifesting the phenomena and hidden properties of nature with the use of technology, DRIFT continues to traverse mediums creating interactive pieces that illuminate parallels between man-made and natural structures through innovative processes…,” explains Pace.
Go here for more on Drift’s work that serves to inspire a reconnection to our planet and its natural processes.
Wilfredo Lam at Pace, 510 West 25, through December 21:
Wifredo Lam was a Cuban-born artist, best known for his large-scale paintings which reference modernist aesthetics and Afro-Cuban imagery in the interest of exploring social injustice, spirituality and rebirth.
“…Born in the small town of Sagua la Grande at the turn of the century, his father was a Chinese immigrant and his mother a descendent of both Spanish conquistadors and African slaves. Lam’s distinctive style and exploration of Afro-Cuban visual culture, alongside his knowledge of European modernism, made a huge impact on the art world. Through his work, Lam was able to challenge assumptions about non-European art and examine the effects of colonialism.
“Having pursued a successful career within avant-garde circles on both sides of the Atlantic, he can be considered one of the most important artists to come out of the twentieth century…,” explained the Tate Gallery, London.
This exhibition of Wifredo Lam’s work in a show titled “The Imagination at Work,” features images on paper and rarely seen bronze sculptures that collectively trace the artist’s career from the late 1930s to the 1970s and explore the influence of Lam’s heritage in his art.
“..The Cuban artist, who early in his career associated with major European figures in the surrealist and cubist movements, invented a radically syncretic visual language that challenged the Eurocentricity of Modernism…,” says Pace.
For more on this eye-opening tribute to the widely accomplished Latin American artist, go here.
Sanitation Foundation: 2021 DSNY Art Show Public Gallery, Pace University, 41 Park Row, through January 28, 2022 – (and featuring Telluride local Caroline Towbin, Deputy Director of Development at the Foundation and images by her talented mom, also a homie, Lisa Barlow).
“Julius Caesar,” *80”x80”, by Michael O’Leary, was “inspired by Jackson Pollock (especially his pre-drip stuff) and Wassily Kandinsky.” Courtesy the TribeCatrib.
In the department of trivial pursuit, try this one on for size: Who or what created the country’s very first public Artist-in-Residence program?
Tick tock… Time is up.
Answer: New York City’s Department of Sanitation (DSNY).
And what exactly is the DSNY Foundation?
“The Sanitation Foundation is the official non-profit partner of the New York City Department of Sanitation (DSNY). Our mission is two-fold: to celebrate and support the essential Sanitation workforce and advance the Department’s ambitious zero-waste agenda. We accomplish this by fostering innovative public/private partnerships between DSNY, businesses, and community organizations. Our public engagement, education, and capacity-building programs support DSNY in achieving our shared vision for a healthier, cleaner, more sustainable NYC.”
Live and learn…
Per the DSNY website about its annual art show:
“The DSNY Art Show celebrates the artistic talents of the NYC Department of Sanitation workforce. It continues the Department’s longstanding commitment to the arts—from creating the country’s first public Artist-in-Residence program with famed Mierle Laderman Ukeles, to being an early supporter of Materials for the Arts, to curating employee art shows throughout the 1980s, to preserving and promoting the Treasures in the Trash Museum, to now partnering with Public Artists in Residence (PAIR), a municipal residency program that embeds artists in city government to propose and implement creative solutions to pressing civic challenges.”
“The now-annual exhibition aims to bring the public and the Department together to celebrate DSNY’s positive impact on our City in these turbulent times.”
In the age of climate change, treasures from trash is a cultural meme. It grows longer legs at the Foundation’s current show at Pace University’s Public Gallery.
“‘Sanitation Celebration is an exhibition featuring artwork by 20 DSNY employees, a specially curated collection of pieces from Nelson Molina’s “Treasures in the Trash’ collection, artwork from DSNY Artist-in-Residence Mierle Laderman Ukeles, and artwork from the new DCLA Public-Artist-in-Residence, sTo Len.”
The DSNY Art Show, a joyous mixed bag of an exhibition across mediums – paintings, drawings, sculpture and wearable art – is co-hosted by Pace University in downtown Manhattan and made possible by a partnership with Mack Trucks.
Barlows images, which follow, showcase the faces behind the art. Collectively they reveal a colorful prism through which to view the work of those who, in our world of celebrity worship, are seldom seen. Their creative vision reveals a propulsive sense of narrative, internal and external.
Caroline (in black and white) with the artists.
Caroline with Foundation’s artist-in-residence.
And these images from The TribeCaTribe:
“I have spent my life working on and around the internal combustion engine,” wrote Robles, 53, the DSNY’s first woman mechanic. “I love drawing them, painting them and working on them. That is my dichotomy, my belief in taking care of the planet, and my love for mechanical equipment. May we all find a balance one day.”
“Boots on the Ground,” by Brendan Harkin, is among the creations by Sanitation workers in the Pace University Gallery exhibit, “Sanitation Celebrations.” Photo: Carl Glassman/Tribeca Trib
“Bronx 7” by Joe Figueroa. “This piece represents most of the Bronx, especially District BX 07, from its brick buildings to the graffiti,” Figueroa wrote. “And the little green balloon at the right, floating to the skies above, is for one of our fallen brother, David Gonzalez.”
Former Sanitation worker Nelson Molina, above, and his “Treasures in the Trash” display. It is just a tiny fraction of the more than 40,000 objects, mostly found by him, that are part of a collection at an Uptown Sanitation garage. Photos: Carl Glassman/Tribeca Trib.
Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams, Brooklyn Art Museum, through February 20, 2022:
Dior, courtesy Brooklyn Museum.
Per the Brooklyn Museum:
“The New York premiere of the exhibition ‘Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams’ traces the groundbreaking history and legacy of the House of Dior. The exhibition brings to life Dior’s many sources of inspiration—from the splendor of flowers and other natural forms to classical and contemporary art.”
The New York Times weighs in and raises an interesting question:
“It may be a simple coincidence that the Brooklyn Museum unveiled a major Dior extravaganza, “Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams,” the week before the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute opened its fall show, “In America: A Lexicon of Fashion.” But after two years of lockdowns and sweatpants, it seemed like fate. A fashion horn of plenty!
“In many ways the two shows are like opposite sides of a coin. One is an epic — 22,000-square-foot — and very glamorous ode to a single European brand, often considered the epitome of French fashion, which has passed through the hands of seven different designers. The other is a tight — 5,000-square-foot — and somewhat unexpected argument for reassessing the stereotypes around this country’s style legacy, crammed with names most attendees will probably never have heard of, and almost determinedly diverse.
“But together they raised some interesting questions for Vanessa Friedman, the chief fashion critic for The New York Times, and Zachary Woolfe, The Times’s classical music editor, about what kinds of garments belong in a museum, and the nature of a fashion exhibition compared to a runway show. Parsing the answers became an extended conversation…”
Bottom line on Dior: Threads tuned up to 11.
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