Posts from the “Painting” Category

Awol Erizku: I Was Going to Call It Your Name But You Didn’t Let Me

Posted on December 15, 2016

Artwork: Awol Erizku, Come and See Me ft. Drake – PARTYNEXTDOO,R 2016, Acrylic on wooden panel, 72 x 96 i. Courtesy of Nina Johnson, Miami.

Born in Ethiopia and raised in the South Bronx, Los Angeles-based artist Awol Erizku beautifully embodies the zeitgeist with I Was Going to Call It Your Name But You Didn’t Let Me, a new series of 20 paintings and conceptual sound collage currently at Nina Johnson, Miami, now through January 7, 2017.

The exhibition takes a the image of the beautifully manicured hand of Queen Nefertiti holding a rose, appropriated from nail salon signage where ErIzku keeps his studio, as its central motif for a series of paintings. Throughout the works, elements of the cityscape take shape, be it the patches of buffed-out segments of paint, the ubiquitous cross outs of a graff writer who lives to hate, or the appearance of Rihanna’s adorable “badgirlriri” avi.

Bearing the titles of songs like “Where Do We Go” by Solange, “Love Can Be” by Yeek”, and “First Take” by Travis Scott, Erizku’s paintings are accompanied by a sound collage that includes work by Drake, Future, and Party Next Door, fusing the visual and sonic realms to create an immersive environment that evokes the here and now, invoking the cultural moment that speaks to people from all walks of life, resonating a deep, harmonious melody backed by a throbbing bass.

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Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Painting

Damian Elwes: New Paintings 2016

Posted on December 14, 2016

Artwork: Damian Elwes, Keith Harings Studio (New York, 1988), signed and dated 2016, mixed media on canvas, 60 x 74 in.

In dream theory, it is believed that the home is the symbol of the mind, so that when you dream of being at home, you are actively engaging in a metaphorical discussion with your unconscious about your innermost state of existence. For artists, the studio is a second home; it is the place to which they escape to commune directly with their souls in order to create.

Artist studios have long held fascination in the public eye, as it gives us an entrée to the place where masterpieces are born of blood, sweat, and tears—or any other alchemical mixture. Artists are sometimes among the most intrigued, wanting to see the world from the vantage point of those which they admire for their creations.

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Artwork: Damian Elwes, Picasso’s Studio (Paris, 1915), signed and dated 2016, gouache on board, 19 x 27 in.

Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Painting

Helen Lundeberg: Classic Attitude

Posted on December 11, 2016

Artwork: Helen Lundeberg, Naiad, 1968. acrylic on canvas. 30 x 54 inches (76.2 x 137.2 cm). ©The Feitelson / Lundeberg Art Foundation

American artist Helen Lundeberg (1908-1999) moved from Chicago to Pasadena, at just four years old. Lundeberg became involved in the Southern California arts scene in the early 1930s, when she and her husband, painter Lorser Feitelson, co-founded Subjective Classicism, which later became known as Post Surrealism, the first focused American response to the famed European movement.

In 1936, Lundeberg became just one of three women artists from the region to make public art for the WPA. She began her painting career as a social realist, creating large-scale murals including a 8 x 241 foot painting titled History of Transportation in Inglewood, before finding herself drawn to geometric abstraction and Hard Edge painting during the 1950s.

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Categories: 1960s, Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Painting

Art Basel in Miami Beach | Highlights

Posted on December 7, 2016

Artwork: Derrick Adams, Floater No. 2, 2016, Acrylic paint and collage on paper, 55 × 55 in., courtesy of Rhona Hoffman Gallery.

Top 6 Highlights at Art Basel in Miami Beach

So much art, so little time, it seems every time you think you’ve made the rounds, a mystery aisle pops up out of nowhere. Crave went the distance and combed the fair for some of the best work at Art Basel in Miami Beach.

Make a splash without saying a word with American artist Derrick Adams as he dives into a pool of color, light, and pleasure with his Floater series on view at Rhona Hoffman Gallery, featuring a delightful cast of African-Americans enjoying a dip in the water. The paintings are bright, bold images of a world without care, mesmerizing meditations on the necessity of rest, relaxation, and self-care.

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José Parlá, Roots. Young Arts, Miami, Photo by Kari Herrin.

José Parlá: Roots

“My grandfather, pilot Agustin Parlá once said to my father; ‘Son, find your place in History’ and my father said the same to me. And my old friend Don Busweiler once said, ‘Without roots the tree won’t grow.’ This has always stuck with me and remained present in the process of my work over the years.” reveals Cuban-American artist José Parlá (n. 1973).

Now based in Brooklyn, the Miami Beach native comes home for José Parlá: Roots, currently on view at the Jewel Box at the National YoungArts Foundation, Miami, through December 15, 2016. Presented by Rolls-Royce Motor Cars in partnership with the Savannah College of Art and Design, Roots finds returning to the city where he spent his formative years in the underground art scene of the 1980s and ‘90s, where he embraced graffiti.

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Artwork: Martin Wong, Untitled (portrait of boxer with roses) c. 1984. Acrylic on canvas, 30 inch diameter. Copyright Martin Wong, Courtesy P.P.O.W.

Martin Wong at P.P.O.W.

Martin Wong (1946-1999) moved to New York City in 1978 at the age of 22, settling in on the Lower East Side. The son of Chinese immigrants, Wong was born in Portland and raised in San Francisco, where he first delved into the world of art as set designer for the Angels of Light, an offshoot of The Cockettes. When he arrived in New York, he moved into the Meyer Hotel on Stanton Street, where he lived for three years, doing repair work to the dilapidated hotel and working as a night watchman. In 1981, he moved to a six-story walk-up on Ridge Street populated by heroin dealers and their clients. In total, Wong stayed in New York for 16 years, moving back to San Francisco to live with his mother after being diagnosed with AIDS in 1994.

Wong’s time in New York was dedicated exclusively to painting, where he captured scenes on the Lower East Side that evoked the beautiful, casual, fleeting temporality of life itself. Set amid the desolate, desperate crumbling tenements that had been abandoned and left to disrepair in a city that had all but been destroyed by the government’s policy of “benign neglect” that denied minority neighborhoods basic services, Wong discovered the spirit and the soul of the people shining through.

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Artwork: Barbara Kruger, Untitled (Cast of Characters), 2016. Digital print on vinyl, 60 × 120 in. Courtesy of Sprüth Magers.

Art in the Age of Anxiety and Rage

Emotion is one of the strongest forces on earth, capable of rendering people paragons of power or utterly vulnerable to external influences outside of their control. If 2016 has taught us anything, it is the ability to manipulate the masses by preying upon their weaknesses and shoring up support through fear and rage.

Unfailingly art speaks a thousand words without ever making a sound, reaching the innermost recesses of our being through sight alone. In this way, it can communicate to us—and for us—when words fail to articulate the sense that we’re going to Hell in a handbasket. Crave spotlights a selection of works at Art Basel in Miami Beach that give voice to the shadows that have seemingly come to life.

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Artwork: Titus Kaphar (American, b. 1976), Front Page, 2012. Oil on newspaper on canvas, 85½ x 57½ x 2½ inches. Courtesy of the artist and GMAF. Photography by John Lam. © Titus Kaphar

Titus Kaphar: The Vesper Project

Fact and fiction seamlessly merge in Titus Kaphar: The Vesper Project, currently on view at the Lowe Museum of Art at the University of Miami, now through December 23, 2016—reminding us of the ways in which mythology shapes our sense of the past, present, and future. For this exhibition Kaphar (b. 1967) has draws upon the Vespers, a fictional family living in nineteenth-century New England who “passed” as white despite the fact that their mixed-race heritage designated them black in the eyes of the law.

The story begins when a man named Benjamin Vesper experienced a psychotic break while looking at a painting by Kaphar on view at the Yale art Gallery and attacked one of the figures in the painting. He was admitted to the Connecticut Valley Hospital, where began to reveal details about himself and his family’s troubled history to both his therapist and, in private correspondence with Kaphar.

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Wynwood Doors, artwork by Tati.

Not for Sale: A Legacy of Graffiti & Street Art in Wynwood

Although art has always been a tool of the ruling class to elevate and reinforce its status and the bourgeois who hope to join the ranks, it is not exclusively this. There is a place where art is for the people, by the people. That place is the Wynwood District. Centered around the construction of Wynwood Walls, an outdoor museum to graffiti and street art that is free and open to the public, the neighborhood is home to block after block of public art.

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Liu Junqi, Bodhisattva Holding a Lotus Bud. (Mogao Cave 220,. Early Tang Dynasty). Mineral pigment on paper. 33 x 22 inches

Huayan Art: A Silk Road Legacy

The oldest surviving Chinese silk in the West was discovered in Egypt, and dated to 1070 BC. However, as silk degrades rapidly, it cannot be known just how far back the trade between ancient kingdoms goes. But it is known that throughout the course of history, the East and West were in regular dialogue with expeditions traveling to and fro across the Silk Road, bringing together the peoples of Europe, the Middle East, East Africa, India, China, and Java. As kingdoms rose and fell, control changed hands but what always remained was the desire to do business.

The Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes, also known as the Thousand Buddha Grottoes, is an oasis strategically located at the crossroads of the Silk Road in the Gansu province of Northwest China. First dug out in 336 AD as a place for Buddhist meditation and worship, the caves contain some of the finest examples of Buddhist art made over a period of 1,000 years, 45,000 square meters of wall paintings, rock cut sculpture, paintings, printed images, textiles, and manuscripts

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Photo: Glenn Kaino, Invisible Man, 2016, aluminum and concrete, 381 x 178 x 178 cm, courtesy of Kavi Gupta. Photo by Miss Rosen.

This is “Ground Control” to Collins Park

“It was the height of the space race in 1969, when David Bowie’s legendary Major Tom took his protein pills and put his helmet on. But even the world’s most advanced technology could not protect him from our human vulnerability,” Nicholas Baume, Director and Chief Curator of Public Art Fund, New York, writes in the curator’s statements for Ground Control, the Public sector of Art Basel in Miami Beach.

He continues, “The idea of ‘Ground Control’ struck me as apt this year, the year that Bowie himself departed our physical orbit for good, leaving his myth and music to ensure. The relationship between technological progress and human subjectivity continues to be an animating concern for artists, but our fascination with outer space has largely been replaced by an exploration on virtual space.”

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Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Graffiti, Painting

Art Basel in Miami Beach | Previews

Posted on November 29, 2016

Art Basel in Miami Beach | Everything You Need to Know

Art Basel in Miami Beach is the global destination for the worlds of art, glamour, and wealth, drawing more than 77,000 visitors to Magic City every winter. Featuring four days and nights of unrivaled luxury, Art Basel in Miami Beach attracts jet-setting artists, collectors, and celebrities from around the world. Since its inception in 2002, the fair has become the crown jewel of the American art scene.

The 15th edition returns this year with 269 international Modern and contemporary galleries from 29 countries, featuring work by some 4,000 artists. The VIP previews begin Wednesday, November 30, and the fair is open to the public Thursday, December 1 through Sunday, December 4. For all attendees taking flight this year, Crave Online has prepared a guide to everything you need to know about Art Basel in Miami Beach.

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Image: Sunrise carpet, by Nanda Vigo, 1987- Courtesy of Erastudio Apartment-Gallery

Design Miami | Everything You Need to Know

Now in its twelfth edition, Design Miami (November 30-December 4) returns to its premier spot, located just across the street from Art Basel. Design Miami is the meeting point for the design world’s elite, bringing together the most influential collectors, galleries, designers, curators, critics, and celebrities from around the globe. It all begins with the grand unveiling of a specially commissioned entrance by New York-based SHoP Architects, recipients of the 2016 Panerai Design Miami/Visionary Award.

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Artwork © Awol Erizku, courtesy of Nina Johnson

Art Basel in Miami Beach | Local Gallery Guide

As tens of thousands of art collectors, socialites, and celebrities descend on Miami Beach to take in the vast scope of Art Basel and two dozen satellite fairs, local galleries show out with the best. Crave spotlights some of this year’s best, including Awol Erizku: I Was Going to Call It Your Name but You Didn’t Let Me at Nina Johnson (November 28, 2016-January 14, 2017);Graciela Sacco: A donde va la Furia? at Diana Lowenstein Gallery (November 18-January 28, 2017); Lillian Bassman: Elegance at Dina Mitrani Gallery (now through December 30, 2016); Jorge Enrique: Borders at Waltman Ortega Fine Art (now through December 27, 2016); and Alexis Gideon: The Comet and the Glacier at Locust Projects (November 19, 2016-January 21, 2017).

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Gjon MIli. Picasso Space Drawing, France (vase of flowers), 1949. Gelatin silver print; printed c. 1949. 9 1/2 X 12 1/4 inches. Mounted. Annotated with credit, title and date in an unknown hand in ink and pencil, with credit and ‘LIFE Magazine ‘ stamps on mount verso.

Art Basel in Miami Beach | Must-See Exhibitions

With 269 galleries exhibiting at Art Basel in Miami Beach this year, the Miami Beach Convention Center will be transformed into intergalactic experience of art. With so many shows under just one roof, Crave spotlights must-see exhibitions in this year’s edition, including Gjon Mili at Howard Greenberg Gallery, Outer Space at Dominique Lévy, The Future is Our Only Goal at Galerie Gmurzynska, David Hammons at Mnuchin Gallery, Lynette Yiadom-Boakye at Jack Shainman Gallery, and Fabienne Verdier: Rhythms and Reflections at Waddington Custot.

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Malick Sidibé Nuit de Noël (Happy Club), 1963, Gelatin silver print Paper: 19,7 x 23,5 in © Malick Sidibé. Courtesy Galerie MAGNIN-A, Paris (will be on view at UNTITLED, Miami Beach, November 30-December 4, 2016 at Ocean Drive and 12th Street)

Art Basel in Miami Beach | Top 5 Places to Check Out

With two-dozen satellite fairs, a host of museums, galleries, and pop-ups across the city, Art Basel in Miami Beach will keep you on your toes all week. Crave spotlights some of our favorite places to check out while you are in town, including Christie van der Haak: MORE IS MORE at The Wolfsonian-FIU, PULSE Miami Beach, December 1-4, 2016 at Indian Beach Park, UNTITLED, Miami Beach, November 30-December 4, 2016 at Ocean Drive and 12th Street, Regeneration Series: Anselm Kiefer from the Hall Collection at NSU Art Museum, and Alex Webb and Rebecca Norris-Webb: Violet Isles at HistoryMiami Museum.

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Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Painting, Photography

Paint the Revolution: Mexican Modernism, 1910-1950

Posted on November 22, 2016

Dance in Tehuantepec, 1928, by Diego Rivera (Clarissa and Edgar Bronfman Jr. Collection) © Banco de México Diego Rivera Frida Kahlo Museums Trust, Mexico, D.F./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

At the age of 80, after nearly 35 years of continuous rule, Mexican President General Porfirio Díaz gave an interview announcing he would not run for re-election in the 1910 elections. Then he changed his mind—sparking the Mexican Revolution (which has been traditionally celebrated on November 20).

For ten years the conflict raged, plunging the nation into a civil war between the Constitutionalists and the revolutionaries lead by Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata. Foreign powers, most significantly, the United States, played a significant role in trying to protect their economic and strategic interests in Mexico. By the end of the revolution 10% of Mexico’s population of 15 million had died, while some 200,000 refugees fled, many going north of the border.

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Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Latin America, Painting

Empire: An Arturo Vega Retrospective

Posted on November 10, 2016

Artwork: Arturo Vega, Empire, 1989 Acrylic and Silkscreen on Canvas. 80 1/4 x 132 1/4 x 1 1/2 inches, Individual panels: 80 1/4 x 20 1/4 and 80 1/4 x 30 1/4 and 80 1/4 x 31 1/4 and 80 1/4 x 25 1/4

Arturo Vega: you may not know his name but you assuredly know his work, as the Ramones logo is one of the most replicated images on earth. The mastermind behind it all was a tireless workhorse who toured with the band for more than two decades and nearly 2,263 live shows as the art and lighting director. And when he wasn’t on tour he could be found in his loft at 6 East 2nd Street at Bowery in the East Village, producing artwork of his own, or on the scene, out supporting fledgling artists with advice, a place to work, or straight up purchasing their pieces to put money in their pocket.

Vega, who died in 2013 at the age of 65, hailed from Chihuahua, Mexico, where he was an artist and activist until the 1968, when he fled the country after being arrested en masse with 148 of the country’s most notable artists, poets, and intellectuals including filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky. With the government carrying out disappearances, torture, and extralegal executions, Vega fled to New York, which he had already visited a few times, establishing a network with prominent figures including music publicist Jane Friedman.

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Photo by Miss Rosen

Categories: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Manhattan, Painting

Jacob Lawrence: The Migration Series

Posted on October 14, 2016

Artwork: Jacob Lawrence. The Migration Series. 1940-41. Panel 15: “Another cause was lynching. It was found that where there had been a lynching, the people who were reluctant to leave at first left immediately after this.” Casein tempera on hardboard, 18 x 12″ (45.7 x 30.5 cm). The Phillips Collection, Washington D.C. Acquired 1942. © 2015 The Jacob and Gwendolyn Knight Lawrence Foundation, Seattle / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photograph courtesy The Phillips Collection, Washington D.C.

Over a period of six decades, more than six million African Americans moved from fourteen states in the South, seeking a better life for themselves and their families in the Northeast, Midwest, and West parts of the country. The first wave of the Great Migration occurred between 1910-1930, as about 1.6 million people left rural areas and moved to industrial cities in search of work.

The Great Migration was one of the largest, most rapid movements in history. Spurned on by acts of homegrown terrorism including lynching, murder, and church burnings, as well as apartheid under Jim Crow laws, African Americans became refugees in their own country.

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Jacob Lawrence. The Migration Series. 1940-41. Panel 58: “In the North the Negro had better educational facilities.” Casein tempera on hardboard, 18 x 12″ (45.7 x 30.5 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Gift of Mrs. David M. Levy. © 2015 The Jacob and Gwendolyn Knight Lawrence Foundation, Seattle / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Digital image © The Museum of Modern Art/Licensed by SCALA / Art Resource, NY

Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Painting

Walter Robinson: A Retrospective

Posted on September 28, 2016

Artwork: Picture Perfect Kill, Acrylic on canvas 2012, Mima and César Reyes Collection, Puerto Rico

American artist Walter Robinson (b. 1950) moved to Manhattan in 1968 to study art history and psychology at Columbia University, and quickly became a fixture on the art scene. He wrote for Art in America, co-published Art-Rite, was arts editor of The East Village Eye, and editor of artnet, as well as a prolific painter in his own right.

In celebration of his work, curator Barry Blinderman has organized Walter Robinson: A Retrospective, the inaugural exhibition at Jeffrey Deitch, New York, currently on view through October 22, 2016, which is accompanied by a monograph published by the University Galleries at Illinois State University. Featuring 714 paintings made between 1979-2014, Robinson’s work explores the relentless America desire to commodify everything. Blinderman speaks with Crave about Robinson’s work.

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Categories: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Manhattan, Painting

Marking the Infinite

Posted on September 13, 2016

Artwork: WINTJIYA NAPALTJARRI Women’s Ceremonies at Watanuma, 2007 Acrylic on Belgian linen 72 1/20 x 60 6/25 in.

After they began colonizing the continent in 1788, the British coined the term “Aboriginal Australia” to collectively describe all native peoples of the land. The Constitution of Australia, in its original form in 1901, makes references to the peoples twice, both times as a means to disregard them. These references were removed in 1967, but the damage had already been done.

DNA studies in 2011 prove that Aborigines emigrated to Australia directly from Africa up to 75,000 years ago. More than 400 distinct peoples have been identified, distinguished by their languages. Despite the British disregard, the peoples already had names, as well as arts, traditions, and cultures so deep that, despite two centuries of genocidal regime, they would not be erased.

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Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Painting

Pedro Paricio: Dreams

Posted on September 12, 2016

Artwork: PROMISED LAND, 2015. Acrylic on Linen, 81 x 116 cm, Pedro Paricio, Halcyon Gallery

We all dream, whether we are awake or asleep. Sometimes, without consciousness we simply slip away into another state, into a world of fantasy, desire, and fear. It is a world of imagination, where the only limits are that which we impose upon ourselves. But sometimes we cannot impose limits, so powerful is the drive to dream in our selves. And sometimes we abandon our dreams, but our dreams never abandon us; they simply lurk in the deepest recesses of our being, ready to reveal them selves when they can no longer hide.

Spanish artist Pedro Paricio understands this and he calls to them, allowing them to inhabit his waking life and be drawn from a palette of paint. Over the past two years, they drew him out, transforming his canvases into evocative scenes layered with meaning and depth. His new series of work began to manifest itself as Paricio’s work began to transform from the inner reaches of his Shaman series to something even more metaphorical.

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Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Painting