James Wagner

Carrie Moyer Ballet M�canique 2008 acrylic, glitter on canvas 80″ x 60″

[detail (yeah, that’s real sparkle dust)]


Carrie Moyer First Instance acrylic, glitter on canvas 60″ x 40″

I thought we had gotten to the gallery pretty early in the show’s run, one week after it had opened, but when Barry and I started talking to others about the brilliant, glittering canvases in “Arcana“, Carrie Moyer‘s show at CANADA it seemed that everyone we knew had already seen it. What was also immediately clear was the fact that everyone really liked it, so this short post of images is really for those who haven’t yet been on lower Chrystie Street this month, and for those outside of the city who will miss it altogether.

My visit to Franklin Evan‘s studio at the Marie Walsh Sharpe Art Foundation Open Studios left me speechless, and that’s pretty much how I remain today, so these images will have to mostly represent themselves.
But I will say that the room never left my mind’s eye. It’s the one image I’ve been carrying around with me ever since, and through all the personal and cultural distractions of the last two and a half weeks it’s the thing I’ve most wanted to sit down and put up on this blog. I uncovered many other delights that day, but the total environment Evans had created in a real working space would have been unique in any company, and it was as awesomely smart as it was incredibly gorgeous.
Barry and myself have both been fascinated with Evans’s painting/drawing (and his curating) for years, and while I’ve always thought he was a creative treasure working, remarkably, under many people’s radar, I think that with this newest work he’s onto something which can’t be ignored, regardless of whether the viewer can share the intellectual complexity of the artist’s conceit.

Jessica Cannon The Blinding 2008 gouache on paper 9″ x 12″ (13″ x 16″ x 1″ framed)


Pamela Jordan Unititled 2006 oil on linen 21″ x 21″


Eric Heist Untitled (Megachurch) 2007 gouache on paper 22″ x 30″


Paul Mpagi Sepuya Self-portrait with John 2005 C-print 10″ x 8″ (edition 2 of 3)

Not satisfied with seeing them only online, Barry and I finally got to see the actual works available in the fifth annual BAMart Silent Auction last night. Having headed off to Fort Greene for the benefit party held in the lobby of the historic Brooklyn Academy of Music, we found ourselves surrounded by the art and a huge crowd of very enthusiastic patrons – of all ages.
The list has been very smartly curated once again, but this year represents something of a change in that many more emerging and local Brooklyn artists have been included than before. The expectation is that the event will be energized with the infusion of larger numbers of emerging and artists related to the community. Judging form the attendance and the activity at the computer stations in the room last night that bet seemed to be paying off already.
I looked at the list this afternoon however and I saw that on most items there’s still a lot of room left between the minimum bids and estimated values. Even though I know a lot of passionate people generally wait until the last moment [the auction closes Monday night at 8] to enter these “competitions”, there are now and should remain some terrific opportunities on every donor/purchase level. I’ve included a few images here only to show a bit of the range; You can be an art lover and a patron for only a few hundred dollars, and I probably only have to mention in passing that there’s also a Rauschenberg print, a great, still-affordable Louise Bourgeois edition which has already generously exceeded its estimate, an Alex Katz print, a Chuck Close photo diptych, a Don Baechler gouache and collage, and an exquisite Malick Sidib� multimedia piece.
Visit the benefit site for more information, including a funny how-to-bid-online-video from Andrew Andrew, and a complete catalog of the more than 150 works available.

[image of Eric Heist drawing from ArtNet; all others from BAMarts]

two pieces by Gabriel J. Shuldiner from the Parsons MFA show

[large detail of the triptych, from the side]

I wandered over to the Kitchen Thursday evening for the opening reception of the Parsons MFA Fine Arts Thesis Exhibition, here I saw these two works by Gabriel J. Shuldiner displayed. The triptych represents an interesting and significant departure from Shuldiner’s work I’d seen recently. Much of it was closer to the first image shown above.
There’s a lot of noise in the image of the triptych; it was very difficult to get a good picture of it. Even though it was hung just left of the other piece, its lighting was very different from the other, pretty weird, it turns out. So you’ll have to take my word for it: the surfaces of both works are very, very black, except for the irregular appearance of an underlay of emergency-orange paint on the first, paint which also covers the glass bottle neck projecting from its wonderful muck and which is responsible for the light cast on the walls wherever it appears on the deep side panels of both. Also, when you’re standing in front of it the pitch-black surfaces of the triptych look more like a stretched, pleated bolt of rich mourning silk than dried paint.
The room was really hot and very crowded, and there was a tiny black kitten in the immediate vicinity, so I forgot to get a picture of the label with the details of either piece. They are both approximately three feet high and, if I remember correctly, the lengthy list of elements describing the medium of each begins with “modified acrylic polymer emulsion”.
There is a lot of good work, in every medium, being shown by the twenty-one artists in this exhibition. It continues continues through May 16. The full list includes Emil Bakalli, Angela Basile, Michael Caines, Wai-Yam Cheng, Rebecca Curry, Matthew de Leon, Benjamin Finer, Jana Flynn, James Harley, Kyoung Eun Kang, Antoine Lefebvre, Seyhan Musaoglu, Mary Nangah, Jess Ramsay, Caitlin Rueter, Gabriel J. Shuldiner, Suzanne Stroebe, Lars van Dooren, Nikita Vishnevskiy, Genevieve White, and Stephen Wilson.

Ian Pedigo Untitled 2006 collage 13.25″ x 13.25″ [installation view]

Ours were the 33rd names (I had checked off the works on the list as they were picked) to be drawn at the Momenta Benefit Wednesday night, but Barry and I still managed to get our first pick, a choice made incredibly difficult, almost unnecessary, by the quality of the art which had been donated this year.
We’ve been big fans of Ian Pedigo‘s art (sculptures, collages and prints) for years, so we were very excited about finally being able to go home with one of his works.
Now we’re going to have to decide how to show it on our walls, since with this particular piece the argument about whether to hang simply or protect with a fame is more critical than it is normally: The projecting points of the thin, color-backed sheet of aluminum foil at the bottom don’t quite lie still.
The party was great fun, and we hope it turns into a huge success for Momenta. Sarah Meltzer‘s multi-level space was a dream location, and she and everyone else connected with the event should be thanked for their generosity.