September 14, 2022
It’s nearly impossible to view all of the visual art you can find in our City on an average day. So when our baseline collection is augmented with major art fairs, as it was last weekend, it’s frankly a bit overwhelming. There were at least three major ones to choose from: the Armory Show at Javits Center, Art on Paper at Pier 36, and Independent 20th Century at Cipriani in the Battery Maritime Building. Whichever ones you went to, you were sure to find works by hundreds of artists presented by scores of galleries.
Kin Connection by Leah Hewson at Pier 36.
Artist Galen Gibson Cornell explained his process to the Gazette. He took posters that he found in Europe and transformed them using an X-acto blade until they became something new and completely different. Whatever the posters’ original meaning may have been, they project an almost hypnotic vibe after Galen reimagined them. Alongside Galen’s work was Inherent Dangers by Roger Allen Cleaves. Their art can be found at Betrand Productions in Philly and the Poster Museum here in the City.
Penny repurposes paper currency as art and the passing of Queen Elizabeth this week gave the exhibit an odd sense of serendipity as viewers filed past a wall of reworked QE images. Harman Projects on Rivington Street is where you can find Penny’s work.
Miles Hyman‘s work feels richly dramatic, with heroic compositions, suggestive poses and lush colors that bring to mind vintage paperback book-cover art or those big posters they used to display in movie theater lobbies. And sure enough, there really was a book cover featuring Miles’ artwork nearby – a graphic novel adaptation of Shirley Jackson‘s The Lottery, in French. Miles was chosen by Louis Vuitton for a travel commission to Rome which is where he created some of the works on display here. You can catch more of his powerful images at Philippe Labaune Gallery on West 24th Street.
There were more than 80 galleries on the Pier and the number of artists and artworks was even higher. With so much ground to cover just to pass by and glance at everything once, it was clear from the start that giving every artist’s work the attention it deserves was not an option for a single afternoon’s visit. We popped into a few galleries that we felt drawn to and were sometimes rewarded by meeting the artists themselves. All in all, it was a wonderful experience and frankly, we’d go back a couple more times for a deeper dive if this show ran longer.
Works by Chen Dongfan at Art on Paper. Inna Art Space, NYC.
Next we went all the way downtown to South Ferry where another fair, Independent 20th Century at Cipriani in the Battery Maritime Building, was being held. Once again there was more art than one could properly appreciate in one afternoon. There were also some surprises in store – a number of paintings by art heavyweights Joan Miró and those of Giorgio de Chirico. Feminist author Kate Millett also created visual art and several examples of it were on view here as well.
Werner Büttner, Disappointed Pupil Leaves the House of Luxury, 1987
Francesco Clemente, Dormiveglia
A 1974 work by John Giorno, You Can’t Remember Where You Are Rainbow, seems to have anticipated both the brain fog of long Covid and the information overload of life in the 2020s.
“Luxembourg + Co presents a display of Joan Miró’s famous cycle of Masonite paintings from 1936 alongside a sculptural response by contemporary artist Peter Fischli. Presented on easels and spread throughout the booth in a sculptural manner, Miró’s Masonite paintings – made with oil, sand and tar atop Masonite boards originally intended as building material – constitute one of the artist’s most ambitious attempts to undermine the limited material conventions of painting.” ~OVR*
“RYAN LEE is pleased to announce Herbert Gentry At The Chelsea Hotel, a selection of lyrical paintings made during Gentry’s tenure at the Chelsea Hotel between 1971 and the late 1990s. A New York native who grew up in Harlem, Gentry established himself in the post-war art scene of Paris and Scandinavia before returning to New York to participate in downtown Manhattan’s thriving art scene.” ~OVR
““Gladiators! This word contains an enigma.” So wrote Giorgio de Chirico, the Greek-born, German-educated, and Paris-based Italian artist, around the time he painted his Gladiators canvases, presented at Independent 20th Century by Nahmad Contemporary. And enigmatic these fighters are indeed: looking at them today it is difficult to imagine they could be interpreted, as they were in the 1930s, to be paeans to Italy’s Fascist regime, with its cult of an athletic, virile antiquity.” ~OVR
“Salon 94 Design is bringing a selection of [Kate] Millett’s sculptural furniture works to Independent 20th Century, along with a series of her erotic drawings begun in 1970. The solo presentation anticipates Millett’s inclusion in the forthcoming Carnegie International, as her artwork is at last receiving overdue attention.” ~OVR
Juanita McNeely, Woman’s Psyche presented by James Fuentes, 55 Delancy Street.
Balcony bar outside Independent 20th Century (Casa Cipriani), NYC.
*OVR = ‘Online Viewing Room‘ log-in required (free).