Tag Archives: Museums & Galleries

(Art Puppets & Middle East History) Cabaret Crusades (Wael Shawky)

Posted on February 17, 2020 by

Puppets from Wael Shawky’s three-part video series Cabaret Crusades are here on view at the Met Breuer. I’m wondering about the relation between visual art and history (it could just as well be about religion and history) in a body … Continue reading →

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(Abstraction) Extreme Illusionism and Detailed Rendering (Vija Celmins)

Posted on February 16, 2020 by

Getting back to work about my impressions about some exhibitions that have since come and gone, this one being Vija Celmins: To Fix the Image in Memory. Vija Celmins  (pronounced VEE-ya SELL-mins) is one of those artists, women, whose career … Continue reading →

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(Rome Pieces) On the Wall & De-Material (Richard Tuttle)

Posted on January 18, 2020 by

About these images, one could create a spiritual allegory about the appearance of the presence of a god in the world. The Rome Pieces by Ricard Tuttle are discrete little things. The humble mark made of graphite lines and cut … Continue reading →

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OOF (Ed Ruscha) (New MoMA)

Posted on December 1, 2019 by

Ed Ruscha, OOF, 1962 (reworked 1963); oil on canvas “The single word, its guttural monosyllabic pronunciation, that’s what I was passionate about,” Ruscha has said of his early work. “Loud words, like slam, smash, honk.” The comic-book quality of these … Continue reading →

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(Lachrymose Diaspora) Coins Jewels & Things Lost & Found (Colmar Treasure)

Posted on November 25, 2019 by

With all due respect, the paltriness of the so-called Colmar Treasure, now on view at the Cloisters, is a lachrymose little testament. On loan from the Musée de Cluny in Paris, the “treasure” refers to the remains of valuables (coins, … Continue reading →

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Holocaust Objects Are Small (Auschwitz at the Museum of Jewish Heritage)

Posted on August 13, 2019 by

Probably because it was close by and in New York City, I went to see “Auschwitz: Not Long Ago, Not Far Away,” the big exhibition now on view at the Museum of Jewish Heritage, and then I went again. There … Continue reading →

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Fragmentary Colossal Head of A Youth

Posted on June 23, 2019 by

This colossal head Greek head from the 2nd century BCE found in a gymnasium at Pergamon in western Turkey and brought by way from the Pergamon in Berlin where he is still on loan in New York at the Metropolitan … Continue reading →

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Votive Objects & Material Religion

Posted on January 16, 2019 by

Went to see “Agents of Faith: Votive Objects in Time and Place” at Bard Graduate Center Gallery. I understood that I was off to look at objects, but what are votive objects? Something loosely to do with “religion.” What I … Continue reading →

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Vibrant Matter of Painted Objects (Yoshiaki Mochizuki)

Posted on November 24, 2018 by

Wandering around Chelsea last summer, we stumbled into Marlborough Contemporary and got to see Palenville, a solo show by Yoshiaki Mochizuki. It was not immediately clear what these things are. Jewel-like things, they turned out to be paintings. They are … Continue reading →

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(Lachrymose) Floating Jews and Other Black Squares (Chagall, Lissitzky, Malevich)

Posted on November 21, 2018 by

O Me O My, I’ve been lachrymose, this time at the Jewish Museum having seen Chagall, Lissitzky, Malevich: The Russian Avant-Garde in Vitebsk, 1918-1922. The exhibit is super cool, showing art made by Chagall with these two masters of the … Continue reading →

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