NY Semester on Contemporary Art

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Interview with Bridget Donlon at Dieu Donne

Dieu Donne is a non-profit organization that has emerging as well as established artists that create contemporary art through the use of hand papermaking. Susan Gosin and Bruce Wineberg founded it in 1976 to expose the importance of papermaking in the art world.(dieudonne.org) Located in Midtown, the space has two levels; the offices upstairs and the wet studio area where the hand paper is made. There is also a gallery space where exhibitions are held. For this interview, it will be talking to Bridget Donlon-the program manager at Dieu Donne.

 How did you first find out about Dieu Donne?

I used to work in commercial gallery out of college that represented artists that were in residency programs.  I knew one of the artists Kate Shepard that was represented in the gallery I worked at, where she and Ursula told me about Dieu Donne.  I decided that I wanted a different change from the commercial space and go into the non-profit field.

    2.    What type of work does Dieu Donne represent?

We don’t represent any artists; because we are not commercial space. For a Non-profit like us, they work in our residency program that they work for through contract. We have two different programs, one that gears towards Emerging New York space program. Our lab grant mid-career is for more established artists mostly with contemporary art.

   3.    How do you guys find most of the artists you represent?

Our Work Space Program where they apply for an open call Around 400 artists apply and only 4 spaces are available. This is only open to artists with new york state addresses. A panel of art professionals and Dieu Donne Staff reviews all. We are looking for mostly artists that have the potential with paper. Artists that seem interested to paper and to get out of the medium. That’s the first way we do it with a review panel.The Established Artist Program-Selection by recommendation, meanings that it’s not open call. People suggest names to Dieu Donne. There are a group of curators and art professionals who suggest artists to them and to see what their work is like. This is less formal because there is not application process.

  4.    In your experience, do artists just jump into papermaking, or do you find that they move from other art forms?

For the most part the artist never work from paper, coming fresh. Certain artists want to challenge and learn what they can. They want to learn about fiber, or the techniques. All of the artists are either painters or sculptures. They just want to learn how to make paper through our studio. 

  5.   If an artist wants to show his or her work at the gallery, how do they get in contact with you?

We only show work that is either connected to our studio or through our residency program. For example in order to get into our subscription series, they have to get an invitation.  Another example is that there was  a show from New Orleans that use our paper and then eventually an exhibition. Most of them come out from Dieu Donne.

 6.    What’s the ideal amount of artwork that the artist should have before having a gallery representation?  

All of our residence programs only have a handful of days because of the support from the studio collaborators. They are coming here just to make and they end up making a lot of work. The exhibitions are just a selection of edited group of work from the residence. We don’t have a large selection, so only a certain amount can be in the piece because it’s very experimental here.

7.     What is the biggest mistake that you see with emerging artists when they approach you?

We have been really lucky that all of the artists want to come back. One of the biggest mistakes I would say is that some artists burn bridges. When we do the open call residence program, we try to inform everyone about their status and some people have mean responses to us. Some have a sense of ego and they get mad and that reflects who they are. An artist should not have an ego or being super rude. It pays to be nice. If they keep applying and are mean, they won’t be mean. So lesson, be nice because it will help you in the future.

8.    What is the usual time that you feature an artist in your gallery? And how do you determine the timeframe?

Because we are a non-profit, we have annual reports to our funders. Our timeframe is determined by our funders and donations. The non-profit funding cycle depends on what we have in the gallery.

9.    When it comes to clients, do you get new collectors?

We do have a collector base. It’s not enormous because we are not commercial. We have clients that are interested in paper, connected to the printmaking field. We have a lot of times get collectors because they are fans of the artwork. We have art fairs to try and get more collectors. We just built a new website to have people easily donate more money. Annual additions are another way of engaging with collectors.

10.   How do you define a collector?

To be a collector is someone that wants to buy artwork. Not only donate, but also receive artwork. We have philamprothists that donate money but don’t expect artwork. We love both equally.

11.    Do you have “regular” clients or would you say that your clients are a mix of fist time and repeat purchasers?  

We definitely have people collect every year. They will sometimes buy one of our additions. They might like one type of artist that buy, but we don’t see them every again. It’s hard because we have a small staff to do a follow-up to clients and cultivating collectors. Non-profit cultivation is different because you are approaching the same people, but they are also donating and supporting all of our programs. It’s more complicated than a commercial space.

12.   Do you ever have to “search” for a piece for a client? If so can you provide an example?

A lot of times we work with art consultations or art advisors who work for corporate collections. There is this hospital, such as the Cleveland Clinic that buy artwork to decorate the wings. They want to support emerging artists that are contemporary. But there are rules such as no violence. I know that I would show an artist that has work that uses bright colors. That’s an example of trying to find an art for a client. The hospital would want to look at multiple artists.  Some have a specific size to go over a couch, but sometimes we don’t have very large pieces to do that.

13.    Who would you say is your biggest competition? And why?

There is the field of non-profit organizations that have artist spaces that produce. Our colleagues are the Lower East Side Print Shop, Brodsky at Rutgers University/ The center of innovative additions. Dieu Donne has very hand made organic works, where as these other organizations do more standard, basic printmaking that can be massed produced. We are all in the same boat in a way that we have to get funding. The nature of hand made printing is nice, but it’s more expensive because of the quality.

14.    What’s next for Dieu Donne? Meaning, what are your goals for the coming year (or years)?

We are going to start working with our new artists. We selected our 4 artists to work with. There names a Brie Ruais who does Sculpture, Lina Puerta-Installation work that has organic looking with mixed media. Linda Herritt- Big Installations made from lots of material and Lisa Segall who is an Interdisciplinary artist. We had a group of 8 people in the final. It came down to what the group of artists would work together and what would they get out of it.  We are moving in the next couple of years and always trying to expand. Work with more artists and do produces to the public. I curated a show in Upstate New York at Hamilton College-The Wellin Museum and we are going to have a big exhibition there and they are going to produce an exhibition catalog there.

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Visual Arts Center of New Jersey 12/5

Unfortunately I was sick on the last day of class, so my last post will be about the Visual Arts Center of New Jersey in Summit, NJ. One of the 4 exhibitions at the center was a show called “Adhere”, where a collaboration of different artists used tape as the main source of medium. Through the use of tape, it creates line, form, textures and sometimes color. With tape, it also creates different subjects such as popular culture. Two of the pieces that stuck out the most in this exhibition was Ya Hongxing’s Another Space No. 6 and Mark Khaisman’s Antique Serpai Rug 2. Hongxing’s piece consists of different stickers to form a detailed, realistic piece of lions, cats, fish, a girl in a motorcycle outfit, flowers and many more. The color is amazing, being that it is only made from adhesive materials. Khaisman’s composition is a detailed rug made from simply just packing tape. Because the material is transparent when it’s not on a box, a backlit is used to give more life to the rug. It also looks a rug that my parents would buy for our house.  This exhibition really got my thinking as how the idea of fine art is changing. A beautiful piece of art doesn’t just have to be made from oil paint, but rather simple office materials. 

Another exhibition I went to was “Shape of Play” by Don Procaro, who is known to have whimsical pieces of work. His sculptures are rather, unique. They are hybridized sculptures that are formed in different shapes and sizes, such as one has thin, spider like legs on the bottom. The free-forming statue conveys the idea of nomads waiting. When I was looking at them, I felt like if they were real beings that can talk, that they would have different personalities. With their weird shape and multiple color choices, they kind of make you uncomfortable, like they would start walking at any second. I really enjoyed his work because these sculptures weren’t just a tall slab of metal, but rather a playful, character-like design to them. To me, they should be in some indie-video game because of the bright colors to them. 

Overall I was surprised at the vast options of exhibitions at the Visual Center of New Jersey. For a small institution, it would almost seem like they wouldn’t have a lot. It shows that you don’t just have to go to New York City to see good art. It can be as close as a 15 minute drive. 

http://www.artcenternj.org/

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Nina Katchadourian and Cordy Ryman 11/20

Nina Katchadourian specializes in multiple mediums such as photography and video. When visiting her studio, she showed us some of her current work that involved her traveling on a plane. The materials that Katchadourian uses in her photographs are anything that you get from a flight; in-flight magazine, napkins, drink cups etc.  One of the photographs that she showed us was a picture of water crackers taken from a view that they looked like the twin-towers. It gives the idea of the “see something, say something” motto that all airlines and public transportation say. Another photo called “Sugar Fox” consists of sugar from a sugar packet and pouring it on a page that has a picture of a fox on it. This shows that photography can be manipulated through simple objects around you such as a magazine or snacks, instead of overly editing photos on Photoshop. 

The next artist we saw was Corey Ryman, who’s work is made from wood, cardboard, paint etc. One of the interesting pieces I saw was this sculpture that was created from long, rectangular wood pieces where some were painted white and some had a different color. He then layered the pieces on top of each other to create the composition. Usually I’m not a fan of abstract art, but his in particular is unique because it’s not a Donald Judd like piece where it’s just a hallow, steel square in the center of the room. There was clear thought and effort put into this work. What also made Ryman so interest that he was so open about having the class give comments on his work, which I feel like most artists wouldn’t do that. 

The overall experience was excellent and one of my favorite studio visits. Both artists were so laid back and didn’t try to make themselves better than anyone else. They also weren’t negative about us pursing a career in the arts. 

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Chelsea 11/13

Going to Chelsea galleries has been one of my favorite sites for this class, since I would like to work as a gallery assistant in the area. What makes Chelsea galleries so interesting is that each one is unique in it’s own way, with different types of artist work on display. Through the plethora of galleries, I have picked out a few that really stuck with me. 

1. Rachel de Joode, Katie Steciw and  Letha Wilson. “Touch Tone” Martos Gallery

With this exhibition, it collaborates the three artists to represent how the viewer might see today’s media. Rachel de Joode’s work focuses on abstraction and the interaction with the physical world. She references organic materials such as skin. One of her works Drawing or flowy conglomeration shows close ups of skin such as a drawing of a hand and a close up of an item that looks like if Caucasian skin tone was in ice form. Katie Steciw takes different photographs from either an Iphone or on the internet and creates a sort of collage effect with them. Her work was hung on the ceiling, to represent how we take in photography today. Letha Wilson’s work(which we saw before) takes “picturesque” photographs, rips them up and places them in cement. It was also really interesting to see some of her work that we saw in her studio up in the gallery. All three of these artists put a unique light on how photography can be manipulated and be aesthetically interesting, since I am not a huge photography person. 

(Image: http://www.martosgallery.com/touch-tone)

2. Mark Bradford. Be Strong Boquan. Hauser & Wirth. 

This exhibition was a unique one, in which there was a combination of video and fine arts work. The video “Spiderman” shows just audio and text with a black stand-up comedian. His inspiration was from Eddie Murphy who made horrible comments about sexuality. A performer was cast in “Spiderman” to talk about homophobia and AIDS with certain groups of people through the use of comedy. There is also a laugh track , which would represent the audience agreeing with these stereotypes. “Spiderman” proves that video art can be considered high art, because of how uncomfortable an audience today watching this. Bradford had also done a large piece called “Waterfall” in which the material consists of drapes and scraps from old paintings. He layers on the recycled scraps to create a waterfall-like rhythm to the piece. Usually with these kinds of works, I would just walk away. But with how Bradford rips apart the scraps and then layers them makes it eye catching to me. 

3. Jeff Koons. Glazed Blue Balls. Gagosian Gallery.

Now, this stuck with me in a negative way. Jeff Koons takes works from the past, ranging from Titan to El Greco and places a blue ball on top. When you approach the pieces, the balls show your reflection, indicating that you are in connection with this master artist from the real world. This honestly made my blood boil. Usually I don’t mind contemporary artists, but for him it’s a different story. It represents how even if you put little to no effort into your work, as long as your are famous it doesn’t matter. It is also a horrible representation of art today and why people think that art is stupid and that anyone can do it. 

The overall experience of Chelsea was positive. There were a lot of artists that I enjoyed and that did not make me angry. I still have my goal in working in a Chelsea gallery post-college.  

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Paddy Johnson and Erin Sheriff 11/6/15

Art F City is a contemporary art blog that has a plethora of posts ranging from reviews of shows to silly, animated gifs. It provides a sense of community where people can have different opinions about the art world. Located in DUMBO, we met with the founder Paddy Johnson.

Paddy Johnson created Art F City in 2005 as a personal blog . Johnson originally worked in different galleries as an assistant, but got fired from each one because she didn’t feel like doing the required tasks. She never had experience writing a lot, except for writing cover letters. The process of how Johnson writes a blog post is that she tackles a story right at the moment. For example if she is writing about a particular artist show, she has to write it right that second, or else it’s not relevant anymore. Art F City has two full time people and while they are sometimes given what to write, most of them have a choice. I like how Johnson gives them the freedom to do that because it shows that Art F City is more organic than some other art blogs. They now have an officially mission since they applied as a non-profit three years ago. 

Paddy Johnson is honestly an interesting character to me. On one hand, It bugged me that she was given to work at galleries that many people strive to get and then just doesn’t do her job. On the other hand, if starting your own business makes you successful, then there is nothing wrong with that. 

Later on, we saw the artist Erin Sheriff in Bedstuy, who does a mix between photography and sculpture. For her photographs, she creates cyanotypes through a large light bulb in the studio that acts like the sun. She also photographs her sculptures, where she was inspired by mid-century sculpture that was meant to be walked around. Sheriff creates this relationship between photography and sculpture and how they both can make a successful composition. When she created monographs from each side of the sculpture, it creates more dimension to the piece. Sheriff also gets inspiration of areas from art history such as minimalism. While her sculptures are abstract, I feel that in comparison to a Donald Judd piece, it has more of a reaction. Judd’s sculptures are only constructed with minimalist ideas, such as the rectangular steel structure in the study room with the only objective of being in space. Sheriff’s sculptures(with the monograms) almost represents itself as human figures posing. 

I really enjoyed Erin Sheriff and her work. I would have never thought to combine sculpture and photography together. Since I don’t work in either photography or sculpture, it’s cool to look at her work through a different perspective

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Monograph (no. 1), 2011 (Image: http://sikkemajenkinsco.com/index.php?v=artist&artist=52d1be034f110&thumbs=true&slideNum=5)

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Bushwick 10/30/15

It was a studio visit in Bushwick. Through it’s industrial setting, we were able to see two different artists. 

The first artist we saw was Letha Wilson, a contemporary photographer. She describes herself as more of an amateur because she shoots typical landscape photos. What separates her from an average photography however, is through the use of mixing the photos with huge blocks of concrete. The concrete blocks gives texture to the photos and makes you have to focus more on the piece. Wilson also manipulates photographs by putting them on steel. An example is a piece she did that created a ripple effect on the photograph. Another piece had the photograph curved into a cone. Wilson’s way of constructed the photographs was to see how effected they were when being hung on the wall and how it’s gravity would be effected. At first I didn’t think I was going to like Wilson’s photography, but once we got to explore her studio I really enjoyed how the photographs fit really well into the concrete, creating a sort of energy in the piece. In “Art in America”, she described her works as having intense sensory input, which makes the piece successful in my opinion. 

Then we saw Erika Ranee, an abstract painter. Her paintings are layered with different material such as memos, letters etc. In her studio, she had showed us her current paintings that used the collected material. One piece was called “Call Me” where it had a large eye in the center of the composition, creating pressure to call someone. There was another piece that was a collage of old letters from the south where on the back is supposedly has a picture that represents racism. Her work Happy Clouds reminds me of a Paul Klee painting with the use of line and color. Ranee’s work is a mixture between William de Kooning and Rothko with how she uses color and her brushwork to create these abstract paintings. Even though her work is very abstract, there is something eye catching about it. It’s like there is a rhythm to each painting that makes it more alive. 

The overall experience was better than last week. Not only were these artists not negative, they were also similar in art style. While they worked in different mediums, both have an abstract style with the use of layering. In particular with Wilson’s merging of photos and concrete and Ranee’s use of collage with the multiple materials. 

While these artists wouldn’t be my top favorite, I still preferred them over some artists that we saw(like Randy Wray for example).  

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Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program and NYFA 10/23/15

The Sharpe-Walentas Studio Programs awards an artist free studio space for a year through admission. While there were many artists, we saw only three.

The first artist was Randy Wray who mostly works in sculpture and painting. One particular piece he talked about was in the center of his studio, where he created it with recycled material. He uses the paper as paint and categorizes it by color. Wray believes that the material dictates the piece and that it is one of the most honest mediums. I had no connection with his pieces not because sculpture is not my choice of medium, but just how silly they look. It also didn’t help that before we went into his studio he told everyone that we will all be poor. 

Artist number 2 was Mike Cloud, who works with photo collage and paint. He creates canvas into different shapes from store-bought stretchers. Cloud’s work focuses on symbolism in his art. I actually really enjoyed his artwork and had asked him about a piece he did in 2006 called Chicken on the Star of David Maze where it has a toy chicken stretching his legs against two canvas that have the Star of David on them. He said that he uses sculptures to create a piece that wasn’t inspired in the 1950s. Cloud was also a great speaker in how he talked about history and art. 

The last artist we saw was Jessica Segall. Segall currently has a bee hive in her studio and talked about how she loves hallow, narrow spaces. It’s clear that she is inspired by the environment because of her map of bee keeping and the solar panel that is a ouija board. I found this very interesting and different from what I have been seeing for the past month because while it’s not a grand painting, it’s relevant  to our climate and it helps bring awareness about nature. I feel that people should do more art with the use of materials from nature.

New York Foundation for the Arts(NYFA) is a service organization that provides resources for artists ranging from jobs to grants. One of the speakers Peter Cobbs, who is a Drew alum talked about his experience going from being a musician, to going to law school and eventually ending up at NYFA. It was refreshing hearing about their success and it gives me hope for the future when I’m starting to apply for jobs. 

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Blog Analysis: Hyperallergic

Writing about art can be difficult at times. Depending on who is writing, it can come out as either dry and boring or can sound overly pretentious with a little bit of art jargon. Contemporary art blog Hyperallergic creates a perfect balance between the two. Hyperallergic is described as a site for ranging perspectives on the art world. It was co-founded by Veken Gueyikian and Hrag Vartanian. Many art-based websites including Artsy, an online database describes Hyperallerigc as “…a witty, provocative artblog-meets-magazine that is at once playful and serious and impossible to stop reading.”

The format of Hyperallergic gives a plethora of different types of blog posts, ranging from articles, to posts about galleries, to photo essays etc. On each blog post, people can comment on them as well.  One example of a blog post that is more on the serious side is “In the Bronx, a Photo League Captures the People and Places Threatened by Rezoning” written by Julia Friedman. The article is about photographers from the Bronx Photo League that are taking pictures of residents that are family businesses owners that will be effected by a rezoning plan where they live on Jerome Ave. The rezoning idea was formed by The Department of Planning to create better housing and offer more access to jobs in the community. To respond, the photographers at the Bronx Photo League spread across Jerome Ave to take pictures of the residents to showcase the thriving community. All of the people that were photographed in the pieces were either candid or had a slight pose at the places they worked at, showing how organic the community is and that the idea of rezoning should not be planned out. Kevin Medonza, one of the people photographed talks about his experience with the community through his relationship working with Pepe Sartor  at a window and glass store. He presents Pepe as a father-like figure, making sure he wasn’t in trouble and that he always fed every day. The article shows some of the works with captions describing who the person is and what their business was about. It gives the viewer a visual of what these people look like and how their community is already established and that with rezoning it could destroy not only their family-owned business, but also themselves. This article caters to an audience that is against gentrification and pro- small family-owned buisnesses who are struggling with getting kicked out by bigger corporations.

While the article presented is on the more serious side, Hyperallerigc also has a plethora of quirky and interesting articles. On their “Most Popular” section, it shows articles that people had most commented on. “Portraits of Famous Artists with Their Little Known Quirks” by Allison Meier that was published last year is one of the many examples of Hyperaallerigic’s witty blog posts. The article is about the book Artists, Writers, Thinkers, Dreamers: Portraits of Famous Folks and All Their Weird Stuff by James Gulliver Hancock, a Brooklyn artist that illustrations artists with their unique quirks. Some of the illustrations had famous artists such as Andy Warhol, where some of his quirks were that he liked to do crafts with his mother and that he died from his galbatter, even though he was actually shot three times, and that Di Vinci did graverobbing in the past to study the human anatomy. While the article seemed amusing, one person commented on the Frida Kalho section that all of her ingeries should not be quirks.

A recent article by Claire Voon “Did Drake’s New Video Get It’s Bling from James Turrell’s Light Installations?” is an example of Hyperallerigic’s theme of staying witty and playful through referencing pop culture. Drake’s recent music video “Hotline Bling” shows a backdrop of neon lights that look like Turrell’s light installations. Accourding to the article, Drake went to LACMA to see Turrell’s retrospective and really enjoyed it. There had seem to be questions to whether or not Turrell was actually involved. Recently Turrell commented from The Art Law Blog that he did not have any sort of involvement with producing Hotline Bling. This blog post had  a total of 33 comments, which is a good amount, with some angry that Drake used Turrell’s background idea for his song. One commenter joked about how the use of light on his body makes up the idea of form in his video.  

Overall Hyperallergic is a great blog to look at if you are interested in reading different types of art posts. It’s laidback attitude gives the reader a chance to dive into the blog without having to feel like they are going to read something stuffy and boring. While it’s whimsical, Hyperallergic is also a pronounced art blog with different sponsors from highly acclaimed art intuitions such as Sotheby’s Institute of Art. Anyone, even with some people who don’t have a strong background in art can greatly enjoy Hyperallergic.

http://hyperallergic.com/

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Sculpture Center 10/16

(Image: ArtForum http://artforum.com/words/id=55154)

Gabriel Sierra’s exhibition Numbers in a Room creates the use of design and architecture to produce a unique form of space. The viewer walks around the objects as they feel as though the walls are becoming one with them. In an interview conducted by ArtForum, Sierra has always been fascinated  with how we move through space and created these geometric forms to increase his fascinated. This sculpture relates to the geometric abstraction style from Latin America and it would make sense for Sierra since he is a Colombian artist. 

When walking through the space, It gave me a sort of claustrophobia rather than having the body in space relate to the sculpture. But at the same time I feel as though Sierra intended to do that so that the viewer can react to the space. Sierra’s work reminds me a bit of Donald Judd’s open table sculpture at the Donald Judd foundation on the third floor. Everyone walked around the rectangle metal sculpture, as it was in the center of the room. It utilized the relationship between the person’s body and the space around the object. 

Anthea Hamilton’s exhibition Lichen! Libido! Chastity main attraction is a giant butt sculpture that represents an entryway to a building skyscraper that was suppose to be built. The buttocks is from a male designer that was 3D lazered to get the accurate results of what his actual butt looked like. The curator Ruba Katrib commented on the relationship between the butt and the idea of an unique entryway by Italian architect Gaetano Pesce in an interview by artnet news saying “It was a hypothetical idea at the time and an act of architectural commentary. I think it says a lot that he imagined that the people entering this building in an elite district of Manhattan would be traversing between a spread ass.” 

What makes both Hamilton’s and Sierra’s sculpture a success in the Sculpture Center is the way that they make contemporary at through the eyes of the sculpture. While Hamilton’s butt sculpture seems very odd and out there, the position of the body creates the illusion that the viewer is about to enter a building. Sierra’s intese geometric sculptures create a sense of movement with the relationship between the viewer and the space. 

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Raymond Saa Stein 10/9

Raymond Stein’s current exhibition at William Paterson University screams with color and pattern. He uses cardboard boxes from fruit baskets and paints the pattern with household paint. The cardboard is layered on top of each other, giving it more volume. Raymond’s way of creating vibrations through the color is by having opposite colors next to each other such as blue and orange. 

While the grand cardboard creation on the free standing walls in the gallery was interesting, he talk about his smaller pieces was interesting as well. Raymond’s son a couple of years ago had really bad seizures to the point of hospitalization. So he created smaller 4x6 pieces of patterns that he had hand sewn together. The patterns are simple, but as represent something a child would create. It’s with these 4x6 pieces that they represent his son. 

A thought that came to my head after he had talked about his son was that some of the color vibrations is his larger pieces could represent someone’s brain when they are having a seizure, with the different color shocks to the brain. 

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Dia:Beacon and The Storm King Center 9/25

Dia: Beacon brings us to more minimalism art. The space that we first entered through had a large room dedicated to the current exhibition Excurus: Homage to the Square3 by Robert Irwin.

(Image: Dia:Beacon website http://www.diaart.org/exhibitions/introduction/128)

Each room has a transparent wall where as the viewer is walking through, they can see another person in a different room. It also has beams of light in each room to give it some sort of an aesthetic appeal. Homage to the Square3 gives the illusion of depth where you think it goes on forever through the construction of the  passage ways. The dimness of the lights creates more space and also makes the piece. Ken Johnson’s article “Review: Robert Irwin Shows a Calming Installation at Dia:Beacon” noted that Homage to the Square3 has some sort of a utopian rule in relation to the idea of pulling ones self away from society. Johnson also noted that a lot of contemporary art that is being created more for shock value and how it’s nice to see something so simple. I agree with what Johnson has to say about contemporary today, but Homage to the Square3 can also be argued that this is just walls with pretty light beams and that this is more of a pretty room than an actual piece of art. Irwin’s piece goes along with other pieces of minimalism art during the late 90s, according to Art sInce the 1900: 1945 to the Present and how the use of light and space to create changes in the art.(pg. 698)

After Dia:Beacon was The Storm Kind Center.  The land has an array of different sculptures that people can walk around and  touch them. One sculpture  I thought was interesting was Luke Stettner’s a,b,moon,d

The outdoor designs represent archeological digs and ancient architecture designs. The unique pattern represents code and language from ancient times, and also relates to the idea of a child being confused by the letter C. Stettner creates these dark trenches by filling them with homemade charcoal. With the area being outside and the different angles of the trenches, it creates a personal effect where there is a different way of expressing language through simple installation effects. Instead of using light like Robert Irwin’s piece, it uses the outside world to create the viewer’s visual experience. 

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The Whitney Museum 9/18

When approaching the exterior of the brand new Whitney Museum, it gives off mixed feelings. On one hand its unique, 21st century design can attract people to come and visit the museum. However, on the hand according to Michael Kimmelan’s New York Times article “A New Whitney”, some people would look at the Whitney as more of an industrial factory with wires and pipes around the outside. 

Once we got inside the museum, we were given time to look around the different art pieces. One particular piece that stood out was Eva Hesse’s No Title. 

While this is still considered to be minimalism art, the work would be described as “post judd” because of it’s irregular form with how the rope is hung, therefore not making the object as simple as a Judd piece. To sculpt the ropes together, Hesse dipped the rope in latex to create the texture like it was bits of a web.  The use of materials gives the concept of structure vs unstructured, such as how the rope is hung with the wires. Unlike a Judd sculpture, Hesse’s work gives more emotion and connection with the viewer through the use of weight and how the ropes seem so flexible that they can be pulled and clumped together. This work goes beyond the definition of minimalism by creating an organic form that can be related to real life. 

We continued on into the museum and looked at some more art. This time we cam across some video art.  Nam June Paik’s V-yramid brought an interest to my attention. 

V-yramid consists of 40 televisions that are stacked in a zig-zag like formation. All of the tvs show different scenes ranging from music to the different cultures of television. The use of stacking the tvs creates a sense that televisions are dominating human life. In Art Since 1900: 1945 to the Present in the 1973 section, it mentions that since most Americans by around the 60s have access to a television, it gives the artists tools to create and manipulate this medium. (pg. 604).Since video art was cheaper to produce than film, it was easy for artists such as Paik to do this. In a sense, it puts video art in “high art”. 

The overall experience at the new Whitney Museum felt similar to a contemporary art gallery. Jerry Saltz’s article “How the Whitney might just solve the impossible problem of contemporary art” he mentions how museums such as the Met used to be presented as “royal showrooms” showing off all of the world’s art from the classical time. Now Satlz believes that museums are more of a funhouse, showing snazzy art of the present that people question whether it’s art or not. I agree with what Satlz has to say about the modern museums such as the Whitney are becoming more of an entertainment spot, but I also think that the world has changed since the met was built. The met was geared towards the wealthy Americans that lived on the upper east side that needed to compete with the other European countries. Now museums are for everyone and by having this “fun house” effect, it brings more of a diverse group of people that can appreciate art. 

[gbaresich]

Donald Judd Foundation  9/11

The trip to the Donald Judd Foundation would be an interesting one for me.  Donald Judd was a minimalist sculptor who first started out as a writer. He had done some painting for 15 years, but eventually moved on and became more interested in the idea of specific objects. Space and 3 Dimensional is greatly used within his pieces. Judd bought the current building in the late 60s that used to be a factory on 101 Spring Street, where he would create his studio. The use of permanent installation would be shown through how he places certain objects. 

The building had 5 floors. The 2nd floor was called the “Social Room” where it had a kitchen and a table with flat chairs. When walking around, there was a sense of how open the space was and how nothing felt cluttered. An example of that is with how there is nothing on the table, not even bowls, to create more space. The 3rd floor was the “Study” where Judd had done some of his work up here. What was so interesting about this room was the large steel rectangle structure in the center. Everyone gathered to one side of the open rectangle near two chairs after walking around it. With it being placed in the center, it creates a use of the space through movement. Also, it makes the viewer look outward. The 5th floor was his bedroom where it had his bed, but also a box with knifes in it. I asked the tour guide about that piece and it was a pieced called Box Number 48 and the knives were removable from the box. I thought that it was a random object to have near a bedside. 

Overall experience of the Donald Judd Foundation was good. Although I’m not the biggest fan of minimalism,  I liked the use of space on each floor, especially on the 3rd floor. In Judd’s “Specific Objects” he mentions how “Actual space is intrinsically more powerful and specific than paint on a flat surface”. It relates to how each room is set up and why it makes the Judd Foundation aesthetically successful. 

In the 1965 section of Art Since 1900: 1945 to the Present artist Robert Morris was among the minimalist artists that followed similar views as Judd. Morris believes that works should not have any relationship and make them as simple through the use of space, light and the point of view from the viewer.(pg. 537) With the steel rectangle, it doesn’t give off any personal feelings, but rather just simply space.

[gbaresich]

MoMA 9/4

The first trip with the Contemporary Art Semester class was at the Museum of Modern Art. Even though I have been to the museum many times before, since growing up outside of New York City and having easy access through just hopping on a train,  I still really like it since some of my favorite artist’s work is there. 

One of the first pieces we saw was Monet’s Water Lilies.  

While everyone has heard and/or seen photos of his work, it’s still an amazing experience seeing it in person. Even though the work is not as realistic as some other artists , Monet is able to successfully make a reference to the real world with the water and reflection. The use of thick paint and areas of color such as soft greens of the lilies against the purple-blue water create an experience where it makes the viewer believe that they are actually looking at a pond full of water lilies. The term for that is creating “art for art sake”.

Next we saw other artists such as Joan Miro, Salvador Dali, and Rene Margritte who fit under the umbrella of surrealist artists. While Miro’s work is more abstract and can be described as work a five year old can create and Dali’s work is more realistic, they both follow the definition of surrealism where conceptual ideas. Margitte’s The False Mirror is an example of that with the use of the iris being some sort of a mirror for the viewer. 

One of the last artists we saw was the artist Jacob Lawrence. Before this trip, I have never heard of him before. There was a current exhibition called “One Way Ticket: Jacob Lawrence’s Migration Series and Other Works” where it has his work and many other African American artists. When I entered the room where his work was, I was taken back. Lawrence had created small paintings  with visual captions below that talked about the migration of African Americans from the South. The fact that these paintings were so intimate made a greater impact for each person that saw it. While the use of tempera had simple brush strokes, it made it seem like you were reading a story from a book, which is appropriate for the captions bellow each work. Overall it was really great learning about an artist I have never heard of and really enjoying his work.