KON TRUBKOVICH – SNOW

Posted on 2014-03-10

For this exhibition, the artist has produced three new paintings from his “Mama” series. This project consists of paintings of stills taken from a home video of the artist’s mother at a party on her last night in the USSR before emigrating to America in 1990. Trubkovich further distorts these images before rendering them by hand in oil on canvas. The resultant paintings are ambiguous: highly intimate and humanely collective, they are images of her, and abstracted compositions depicting the portal of a screen; they are evidence of her history, and by extension a description of the artist himself. Unable to fully capture her essence, these works succeed in capturing the essential act of memory; stuck in the static frame, Trubkovich’s subject is recalled from the past, where it will continue to exist imperfectly, both on film and in memory.

A similar effect is achieved by the “Lenny” drawings also on view. Here, the artist has taken a mug shot of the late comedian Lenny Bruce, disrupting and distorting the image beyond facile recognition. Like the “Mama” works, Trubkovich conceives of these as self-portraits of another sort. Indeed, their subject comes about through self-projection rather than perfect rendering; they lie between the anonymous and the personal, oscillating in the space that separates the two. As a tragicomic figure from a bygone era, Bruce’s shadowy presence produces a dull, fleeting sense of loss, as well.

These works’ quiet nostalgia is reflected in the artist’s recent “Snow” series, examples of which are included in this exhibition. Here, Trubkovich has translated footage of the sky into paintings and drawings of varying hues, adding an overlay of mark-making that suggests flakes of snow or the disruptive flecks characteristic of old film; the ineffable spatial atmosphere of these works is akin to the unspoken task of unrequited recollection implied by the “Mama” works.

Opposite – Koltsevaya, 2014

Exhibition runs through to April 26th, 2014

Marianne Boesky Gallery
509 West 24th Street
NY
10011
New York

www.marianneboeskygallery.com

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MARVIN GAYE CHETWYND

Posted on 2014-03-10

The exhibition focuses on two bodies of work, each the subject of a major new publication. A recent group of the artist’s Bat Opera paintings, produced last year during a residency in Monteverdi, Italy – appears in conjunction with a new volume published by Sadie Coles HQ and Koenig Books, extensively documenting this long-running series. Also on view is an array of collages which Chetwynd was invited to create for a new edition of Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, released this year by Four Corners Books. The exhibition reflects the various stages which led to the creation of each publication, with dummy runs of the two books viewable alongside the final versions.

Alongside her improvisatory performances featuring handmade sets and costumes, Chetwynd has also worked for over a decade on Bat Opera – a cycle of miniature paintings portraying bats of all shapes and sizes in a variety of quixotic settings. In one, a bat spreads its wings before an Italianate backdrop of pine trees and a palazzo. Elsewhere, bats’ faces mass together in a cluster of glistening eyeballs and bared teeth.

These latest works indeed reflect the sweeping thematic range of the Bat Opera genre, which is at odds with its concise and unchanging format. Chetwynd shifts between individual portraits of bats – portrayed heroically or forlornly before billowing skies – and swarming colonies. Several of the portraits channel the pomp of regal or military portraiture, or perhaps the melodramatic poses and kitsch fantasies of Heavy Metal album covers.

Exhibition runs through to April 26th, 2014

Sadie Coles HQ
69 South Audley Street
London W1

www.sadiecoles.com

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BRAD KAHLHAMER – THE FOUR HAIRS

Posted on 2014-03-10

The exhibition centres around a large wall installation entitled The Four Hairs, with elements spanning from paintings and water colours, collages, vintage photos and Xeroxes to objects and sculptures. It offers a profound insight to the many facets of Brad Kahlhamer’s work and his own personal mythology. In his realm he mixes contemporary Native American culture, urban street culture, subjective experiences and mythical symbols and deals with topics such as identity politics and urban, global culture.

Another major work in the show is Please Pay Me So I Can Pay Them. It is comprehensive and detailed, mixed media painting on a full-size bed sheet. Here, historical allusions to Native American crafts and symbols are mixed with contemporary materials such as spray paint and ballpoint pens. A large collage and a group of watercolours complement the central pieces with texts and images, referring to Kahlhamer’s background both as an art director at Topps Company and as a musician.

Opposite – Negra Calavera, 2009

Exhibition runs through to March 29th, 2014

Andréhn-Schiptjenko
Hudiksvallsgatan 8 2tr
113 30 Stockholm
Sweden

www.andrehn-schiptjenko.com

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