Cézanne and Beyond

On a trip to Philadelphia over Memorial Day weekend, I headed (along with a cast of thousands) to see the Cézanne exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The art of Paul Cézanne (1839-1906) had a tremendous influence on artists who came after him and this show does an excellent job of clearly demonstrating the manifestation of his influence in the art of his successors.

Paul Cézanne, Card Players, 1890-92, oil on canvas, 25 3/4 x 32 1/4 inches, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Jeff Wall, Card Players, 2006, transparency in lightbox, 46 x 50 inches

The first room compares Card Players by Cézanne with Canadian photographer, Jeff Wall’s Card Players. While Cézanne paints male workers taking a break in a simplified composition, Wall’s light box shows three old women playing cards in a room filled with kitsch objects. Wall views his photographic process as very similar to that of painting; his photographs are always staged and often have obvious art historical references. Wall claims that, “a painting is never the rendering of a moment in time, but an accumulation of actions which simulates a moment or creates the illusion of an event occurring before our eyes.” In that way, he sees his and Cézanne’s process as quite parallel.

Paul Cézanne, The Smoker, 1890-92, oil on canvas, 36 1/2 x 29 inches, Hermitage, St. Petersburg

Fernand Léger, The Mechanic, 1920, Oil on canvas, 45 5/8 x 35 inches, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa

In the same room we find a portrait, The Smoker, by Cézanne of a worker from his estate quietly and pensively resting his head in his hand. On the adjacent wall, Léger’s The Mechanic of 1920 also depicts a worker taking a break from his job but through Leger’s use of primary colors in defined forms, the painting creates a completely different mood than that of Cézanne. Leger said, “Cézanne taught me the love of form and volumes” but in order to find his own style, he had to go to “the limits of abstraction.” Leger believed that you should learn from your mentors, but eventually you must develop your own style.

Alberto Giacometti learned about Cézanne from his father who was a painter and lover of French modernism. In 1920, Giacometti first saw 28 of Cézanne’s paintings in person in the French pavilion at the Venice Biennale. Later he learned a lesson from Cézanne that he applied to his own work-don’t try to copy nature but instead, try to translate one’s sensations. The similarities in composition and posture between Cézanne’s Seated Man from 1898-1900 and Giacometti’s Diego in a Red Plaid Shirt from 1954 are striking, but each artist also very much has his own style.

Paul Cézanne, Still Life with a Dessert, 1877 or 1879, oil on canvas, 23 1/4 x 28 11/16 inches, Philadeliphia Museum of Art

Pablo Picasso, Still Life with Compote and Glass, Oil on canvas, 1914-15, 25 1/4 x 31 1/2 inches, Columbus Museum of Art

The still lifes on view include those by Giorgio Morandi who probably only saw reproductions of Cézanne’s work; Ellsworth Kelly’s simple line drawing of geraniums; Matisse’s similar compositions to Cézanne but with bold and colorful patterns; Charles Demuth’s Orange Tree; and Pablo Picasso’s 1908 Still Life with a Bowl and a Jug depicting larger than life vessels which appear to reach out to the viewer due to the odd perspective of the table-giving the viewer almost a bird’s eye of view of the objects. Arshile Gorky takes all of this a step further abstracting the still life objects into biomorphic shapes of color that are not easily identifiable. Gorky was self taught and at the beginning of his career he would set up still life models in the style of Cézanne. His 1928 Pears, Peaches, and Pitcher almost looks like a direct copy of a Cézanne work. Cézanne’s still lifes are quite straightforward including a table, some decoration and pattern in the background but always in subdued hues, and gestural brushstrokes and shadow which break the fruit up into planes. At the same time, these works are profound. He creates reality that is also an illusion. His later works use multiple point perspective which hover between reality and ambiguity and that is why Cubists such as Picasso and Braque are drawn to his work.

Jasper Johns, whose work one would not immediately associate with that of Cézanne, was strongly influenced by his work and studied it very carefully. In fact, his 1957 work, Drawer, challenges the viewer in his/her notion of reality versus illusion. By pulling only one element from one of Cézanne’s still lifes, Johns creates a painting of a drawer as well as an actual drawer and this makes one look at art differently.

Paul Cézanne, Madame Cézanne in a Red Armchair, 1877, Oil on canvas, 28 1/2 x 22 inches, Musuem of Fine Arts, Boston

Henri Matisse, Women in Blue, 1937, Oil on canvas, 36 1/2 x 29 inches, Philadelphia Museum of Art

Pablo Picasso, The Dream, 1932, Oil on canvas, 51 1/4 x 38 1/2 inches, Private Collection

The following room compares three portraits of women seated in red armchairs. Cézanne’s portrait of his wife uses subtle patterns in the wallpaper behind her while her form is built up in small blocks of color. Nearby Matisse paints a woman in a fancy blue dress whose form is stiffer. He creates a representation of a beautiful shape where the costume is ultimately more important than the figure itself. Her facial features are simplified and flattened. The subject becomes not the woman but the color and pattern. Matisse said that Cézanne’s painting “jotted question marks that make me work harder to develop my own style.” Picasso’s The Dream from 1932 is a portrait of his lover, Marie Therese. His style involves a sensual image of an undulating figure with an exposed breast using flat planes of color and sweeping curves. He isn’t painting a direct likeness of the woman, but attempts to convey her grace and beauty. Max Beckmann, another admirer of Cézanne paints his female portrait using dramatic elongated forms and harsh black outlines.

Paul Cézanne, Mont Sainte-Victoire, c. 1902, Oil on canvas, 33 x 25 5/8 inches

One of my favorite Cézanne works in the show was a small, quiet work called The Pont de Maincy from 1879. He uses linear green brushstrokes for foliage contrasted with a clearly defined gray bridge; he also masters the reflection of the stones from the bridge in the water. It was neat to see having just been to the Caillebotte show which was all about the painting of reflections. But it is Cézanne’s Mont Sainte-Victoire paintings which are astoundingly beautiful. They are always variations on the same earth-toned palette utilizing greens, blues and oranges which remind me of the Sonoma County countryside. Clearly delineated brushstrokes fill the canvas.

Brice Marden, Grove Group V, 1976, Oil and wax on canvas, 72 x 108 inches

In 1976, Brice Marden abstracts those same colors and just pulls out the green and blue  to create an oil and wax work on canvas entitled, Grove Group V. Jasper Johns, like Cézanne, enjoyed revisiting the same subject over and over.

Jasper Johns, Painting with 2 Ball, Encaustic and collage on canvas, 1960, 66 x 54 inches, Collection of artist

While Cézanne repeatedly painted Mont Sainte-Victoire, Johns used familiar motifs from pop culture over and over. He used things the mind already knows as a subject so that he could have room to work on other levels in order to explore the process of painting itself. The energy then comes from the density of paint in his work, and not the subject matter.

Ellsworth Kelly, Lake II, Oil on canvas, 95 x 149 3/8 inches, Beyeler Collection

Like Marden, Ellsworth Kelly sees something and translates how he sees it in a new way. In 1953, outside a train window, he saw fields of mustard and lettuce and created a blurred landscape of  horizontal bands of color in a beautiful collage. He also was mesmerized for 40 years by his visits to the Metropolitan Museum of Art where could view The Gulf of Marseille Seen from L’Estaque from 1878 by Cézanne. He eventually lifted the the shape of the water out of the Cézanne painting and made it a painting in and of itself, Lake II. He presented it as an object alone; in this way, he took Cézanne one step further.

Paul Cézanne, The Large Bathers, 1906, Oil on canvas, 82 7/8 x 98 3/4 inches, Philadelphia Museum of Art

Cézanne is also quite well known for his large paintings of bathers. These radiate a sense of calm to the viewer. He does not depict a myth because narrative is inessential. Cézanne believed that paintings do not need to tell a story; they need to be felt. There are six wonderful drawings by Jasper Johns of ink on tracing paper in which he experiments with Cézanne’s Bathers composition. They are absolutely beautiful.

Gustave Caillebotte at the Brooklyn Museum

“Gustave Caillebotte: Impressionist Paintings from Paris to the Sea” is a good show, not a great one, but certainly enjoyable especially if you are not that familiar with his work. Caillebotte (1848-1894) came from a well-to-do family and was an acclaimed yachtsman, rower, and boat designer. Though he was a member of the Impressionists, his early work is more traditional than his peers in technique. It isn’t until his later paintings that he loosens his brushstroke and paints plein air. This exhibition focuses on the work he did related to water and reflection as it was a real interest and strength of his.

He participated in five of the eight Impressionist exhibitions and collected the work of his peers. He financially supported many of the artists because he could, and because he believed in their work and became good friends with them. At the time that Caillebotte was painting Paris interiors they were considered quite vulgar. Not only did he show people working, but he often created jarring perspectives that the Parisians were not accustomed to in painting.

Floor Scrapers, 1876, Oil on canvas, 31 1/2 x 39 1/2 inches

The Floor Scrapers, a smaller version of his famous painting with the same subject is an early example of his exploration of light and reflection on the shiny hardwood floors. I love this work. The composition is wonderful and clearly carefully crafted. There is  a great deal of negative space in the bottom left corner which he fills with the reflection. He also painted bridges in the city to play with light and shadow.

Paris Street: Rainy Day, 1877, Oil on canvas

One of my favorite pieces in the show is quite small and actually merely a study for his most famous work which hangs at the Art Institute of Chicago, Paris Street: Rainy Day, from 1877. The study is simply an exercise in creating the reflection of the rain on the cobblestone street. I find it fascinating because it shows the meticulate nature of his process. At this point he still sketched from life but returned to his studio to paint. This would change as the influence of his Impressionist peers grew.

While visiting his family’s countryside estate at Yerres, twelve miles outside of Paris, he continued his interest in depicting figures in action. However this time they were involved in water activities: fishing, boating, rowing. He also visited Petit Gennevilliers and Argenteuil to take part in sailing. Visits to Normandy, where he often spent summers, allowed him the opportunity to paint steep cliffs as well as sailboats and beautiful landscapes. Similar to Monet, he began to paint outside and his brushtrokes loosened. He also preferred that his landscapes not include figures and had the bizarre perspectives that became his trademark. I prefer his urban interiors to the rural landscapes because they are more unique and refreshing.

His half models of boats are also on view and though not intended for decorative purposes, are stunning.

The show is open through July 5th.

Hernan Bas: Works from the Rubell Family Collection

I am not sure I would have even gone to this exhibition had I not seen the show currently up at the Chrystie location of Lehmann Maupin. Born in Miami in 1978, Bas uses romantic, melancholic and old world imagery in his work. The Rubells, a famous family of collectors from Miami, have amassed a collection of 38 of Bas’s works over a decade. They too must have seen something special in his artwork just as I did (they just saw it sooner). Humanity seems to be an underlying theme in the works on view. He is an artist who is not afraid to reference his own experiences, interests, and history in his work.

Fragile Moments, 2003, Two DVD projections and two stereo soundtracks, Ed. 1/10, Variable dimensions, Duration: 7 min. 16 sec.

The first room houses a video projected onto the two walls of a corner. Entitled Fragile Moments from 2003, the videos are both black and white with accompanying soundtracks. One plays Sunrise/Sunset and one plays the sound of ocean waves crashing. The waves crashing is appropriate since the video has an image of an ocean with a miniature model of a ship that appears to be a kite held up as if it were sailing the seas. The other screen depicts images of people, landscapes, nature, flowers–what appear to be childhood memories. Both videos show the fragility of human experience. I very much enjoyed this work.

The Swan Prince, 2004, Acrylic and gouache on canvas, 30 x 40"

There is something very haunting about his paintings. I get hints of Edvard Munch in his earlier work which could be from his dark palette. I can’t quite put my finger on what exactly it is about his work that I am so drawn to. Perhaps it is the humanness of it. It is not decorative and it is not derivative but deals with the human condition and personal experience.

The show is a nice manageable size and is only around until the 24th of May so hurry to the Brooklyn Museum to see it. If not, the show at Lehmann Maupin is up until July 10th.

Chelsea Visits and Finds/Affordable Art Fair

While wandering around on a Saturday in Chelsea, I came across some amazing shows and some great buys.

Nam June Paik, Enlightenment Compressed, 1994 (Courtesy James Cohan Gallery)

Shows to see are Nam June Paik at James Cohan Gallery.

Jacqueline Humphries, Installation View

Jacqueline Humphries at Greene Naftali.

William Powhida, Acquisitions, 2009, pencil on paper

William Powhida at Schroeder Romero.

Hernan Bas at Lehmann Maupin (Chrystie Street location).

Ruben Ochoa, Installation view Peter Blum

Ruben Ochoa at Peter Blum (now closed).

Simon Evans, The Wiff of Actors, 2005, Ink, whiteour and paper collage on card
11.675 x 16.375 inches

I also stumbled upon a benefit art sale for Steep Rock Arts with wonderful works by Simon Evans and a unique collage by Ruth Root for only $1000.

The IPCNY (International Print Center New York) has a show of prints selected by Polly Apfelbaum. There were many works I loved:

Baldridge, Double Dilly, 2008, intaglio and woodcut, ed. 30

$650 framed print by Glen Baldridge whose work I had been interested in about 6 months ago.

Ann Hamilton whose prints ($950 unframed) I had seen at the Gemini Gel opening I wrote about in an earlier blog.

Shinique Smith 2008, Purple Pansy, screenprint, archival inkjet, and collage, 30.25” x 22.5” image and sheet, edition of 10

A Shinique Smith (I have written about a studio visit I had with her) print that is a bargain for $2000 framed. She is an artist who is going places.

Affordable Art Fair

Artist Greg Haberny

The AAF has been a bit of a disappointment the past couple of years and this year the majority of work on view was not very good. That being said, one artist’s work stood out and left a lasting impression on me. In fact, I even bought his work. Affordable and yet not derivative, it has two of my favorite qualities in art. Greg Haberny is a bitter man speaking out against materialism and capitalism in his work. He told me that most people miss the hidden meaning in his art. He is represented by Mccaig-Welles Gallery in Brooklyn, POW has shown his work in London. POW also shows the infamous graffiti artist Banksy’s work and Greg told me he is currently working on a project with Banksy. Greg uses popular imagery as well as text to shock and make powerful statements, but there is also something beautiful in its ruggedness and beaten up look. He is an artist to buy now while the getting is good. His work is really accessible price-wise. You can see examples of his art and learn more about him on his website: www.suckerchump.com.

Conversations with Contemporary Artists: Guy Ben-Ner at the Guggenheim

Still from Stealing Beauty, 2007 Single channel video DVD, Courtesy Postmasters Gallery

Born in 1969 in Israel, he received his MFA from Columbia in 2003, and he currently lives and works in Tel Aviv. Best-known for video works of him and his family in odd environments which lie somwhere between fact and fiction, he has also represented Israel in the 2005 Venice Biennale and will have an upcoming solo exhibition at Mass Moca. His work is both profound and lighthearted. During his talk he spoke about two works, “Stealing Beauty” from 2008 and “Second Nature, “2008, made for the Liverpool Biennial which has never been shown in New York before.

Ben-Ner, Still from Stealing Beauty, 2007 Single channel video DVD, Courtesy Postmasters Gallery

He screened seven minutes of “Stealing Beauty,” a video shot without permission in various IKEA stores throughout the world over a period of a year. He joked that the workers at the stores were the real editors of the video because Guy had to stop filming when he and his family were asked to leave. This video, shot with his real wife and children, attempts to take advantage of the “feel at home” idea that stores like IKEA often sell. The idea of private property and how it is connected to the idea of family was at the heart of the work. It is humorous but there are some serious undertones to it. It’s a very entertaining work. Here is a link to a trailer on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8ygeihSPlk

Second Nature, 2008, single channel video DVD

“Second Nature” stemmed from a desire Guy had to work with animals. He hired professional animals and their trainers (the crow has been in Harry Potter movies) to act out the Aesop fable “The Fox and the Crow.” He plays on the notion of training the animals to do banal taska by asking the trainers to stop what they are doing and act out a scene from Samual Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot.” The trainers go through the motions, but cannot act. Then Guy is shown as the director of the work but he only speaks in rhyme–in that sense, he is going through the motions. It is less humorous and more thought provoking.

Guy told the audience he had always known he wanted to make videos but never in a loop and always narratives. I encourage you to check out his work.

Art Chicago

Though the overall fair was a bit of a disappointment as far as quality was concerned, I did manage to find some good works. I am hoping that now that they have found the right number of galleries to show they work on bringing the quality back to its original glory of the days of the Navy Pier.

Recommended works:

Brandon Anschultz, Drop (Give the Thunder Up), print, unframed $500

Robert Rauschenberg, Airport Series: Switchboard, 1974, Color relief and intaglio on fabric with collage, 34 1/2” x 36 1/2” x 7 1/2” Edition: 40, $35,000

A stunning early work by Robert Rauschenberg is special due to the fact that even though it is an editioned work, it is a three-dimensional work with fabric and collage elements. The colors leap out at the viewer and for its size it is a bargain at  $35,000.

Chuck Webster, Untitled, 10x8 inches, acrylic, watercolor, color pencil. $1200

Chuck Webster, Untitled, 10 x 8 inches, acrylic, watercolor, color pencil, $1200

Chuck Webster was mentioned in my Dieu Donne blog. I really like his work and these small pieces are affordable and quite spectacular in person.

Chris Ballantyne, 24x32 inches, acrylic on panel, $5000

Chris Ballantyne’s landscape paintings and prints often take a bird’s eye view of man-made forms set in expansive planes of grass or ocean. The familiar geometries of rooftops and parking lines are thus rendered abstract. Ballantyne’s aesthetic was influenced by his family’s many moves during his childhood across the southern coast of the United States for his father’s work with the U.S. Coast Guard. His experience living in various suburban areas gave him a sense of the homogeneity of residential development across the country as well as an awareness of expanding urban areas gradually encroaching on the natural landscape and ways that suburban development is primarily determined by emphatic borders around private property. Since earning his MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute in 2002, the artist has been interested in creating an “uneasy sense of quiet” through paintings, prints, drawings, sculptures, and murals in which an uninhabited architecture is arranged to interrogate the balance between nature and culture.

Danica Phelps, Chart, 2006, Pencil and watercolor on paper, 29 7/8 x 22, inches, $1900

Danica Phelps, an emerging conceptual artist who recently had a solo show at internationally renowned gallery Zach Feuer, had a work at the fair entitled, “Chart,” a pencil and watercolor on paper. It is simple yet refined in its monochromatic palette. Her work is autobiographical in that the subject matter is based on events from her everyday existence. It is personal but somehow manages to avoid becoming too intimate. The work is an affordable $1900.

Joshua Jensen-Nagle, A Delicate Elegance Lost, 2008 Pigment print diasec mounted 20 x 20 in. $1600

Joshua Jensen-Nagle, Looking Over Endless Crowds, 2009 Pigment print on aluminum 58 x 58 in. $7800

Joshua Jensen-Nagle, Quiet Hours and Lonely Days, Pigment print diasec mounted 43 x 43 in. $4200

The photographs by Joshua Jensen-Nagle are hauntingly beautiful. Placing the viewer in gorgeous foreign environments, the works evoke the romanticism of the Grand Tours of Europe. Created in an edition of 4, the works sell for $7800.

Stephen Inggs, Horns III, 2004, Hand painted silver gelatin emulsion on 100% rag paper, Art size: 106 x 108 cm / 41.7 x 42.5 inches, $3875

Stephen Inggs black and white photograph, Horns III, literally stopped viewers in their tracks. Reminiscent of Georgia O’Keeffe’s skulls, Horns III captures a classic aesthetic.

Nadav Kander, Chongqing IV (Sunday Picnic), 2008/2009, chromogenic print

This Nadav Kander work is available in two sizes: 30 x 40 in. (actual size 30.3 x 38.6 in.) image on 38 x 46 in. mount, Edition of 5 + 2 AP, $5,900 50 x 60 in. (actual size 46 x 58.7 in) image + 1-2” borders, Edition of 3 + 2 APs, $12,650

Nadav Kander captures the irony of experiences that occur on a daily basis in China. People picnic under an overpass in an industrialized area as a fisherman passes on the river. China’s desire for progress is at odds with its love for all things historical. Not only does the subject matter pack a punch, but compositionally, this work is stunning, especially in its larger size.

The Generational: Younger Than Jesus at The New Museum

I have been flip-flopping about this show long before I ever set foot in the museum. Initially I looked forward to it, and then began to dread it based on reactions I had heard from friends. Then, after stepping off the elevator on the fourth floor, my pessimism was palpable. I looked around the room and was uninspired; shrugging my shoulders I wondered if anything was going to interest me or seem new and not derivative. Luckily, there were some pleasant surprises.

The show is filled with work created by people born around 1980. 50 artists from 25 countries were selected for the exhibition though there is no overarching theme for works selected. Loose connections can be made when looking at technology and identity.

Katerina Seda, Wall of Grandmother drawings

Though unmoved by Josh Smith’s large-scale collages, Katerina Seda’s videos of her mimicking a mother, father and child and of her grandmother drawing kitchen utensils from memory (the drawings hang on the wall next to the video screen) are the most interesting works on that floor. She is originally from the Czech Republic, but her work demonstrates that familial relations, explorations of identity, and aging are universal notions that we all deal with.

Keren Cytter, Der Spiegel, video still

Another video that caught my eye was by the Israeli artist Keren Cytter. Entitled “Der Spiegel” (the mirror) the work deals with issues of loneliness, jealousy, desire as a middle-aged woman grapples with the realities of her fading sexual attractiveness by two younger women. The characters enter, exit, overlap, are clothed, are naked…it is hard to follow but the work stayed with me long after I left. I am still trying to figure it all out—what was it trying to say? And I could certainly relate to it which bothered me.

Jakub Julian Ziolkowski, The Great Battle Under the Table, 2006

An impressive work by Polish artist Jakub Julian Ziolkowski called “The Great Battle Under the Table” from 2006 shows elements of influence from Hieronymous Bosch (every space filled with beasts and odd looking creatures), Francis Bacon (figures tortured), and James Ensor (bright colors).

Detail

The viewer sees something new and disturbing in each square inch of the canvas—soldiers, skeletons playing the guitar, bugs and pregnant figures. It is almost impossible to figure out a narrative but I found myself unable to stop looking at the work.

One of the most unusual works (though it was not very novel in conception) in the show is “This is Jessica” by Chu Yun from Jiangxi, China. Rotating in shifts of 4-6 hours, groups of volunteers are paid to ingest sleeping aids in order to sleep in front of viewers in a pristine white bed during exhibition hours. The “living sculpture” seems to be a protest of the members of this generation being labeled as hyperactive.

Liu Chuang, Buying Everything On You

I think my favorite work in the show was “Buying Everything On You” by Liu Chuang, a Chinese artist, who approached people on the street and offered to purchase everything on their person. Once he acquires the items, he lays the items on plinths reminiscent of taxonomical research and/or funereal rites.

Overall the works in this show that impressed me were few and far between –but the ones I was drawn to were very impressive and if it weren’t for this exhibit, perhaps I would not have known about them otherwise.