(An Appropriate Distance)

 

FROM THE MAYOR'S DOORSTEP

 

 

Maybe some of my readers have never heard of The Art Students League of New York, founded in 1875, but it's that rare institution where teachers teach and students learn -- all without enrollling in courses, taking exams and receiving degrees.  Such a setup seems to suit artists  fine, so over the years, the League has attracted a remarkable body of teachers & students  Many of these were included in three recent shows that I truly wish I had gotten around to writing about while they were still up. Read More 

 

 

"Mac and Mark" is the sacrilegious way I refer to two excellent painters associated with German Expressionism, Franz Marc (1880-1916) and August Macke (1887-1914). Together with Wassily Kandinsky, Gabrielle Münter, and other German and émigré artists based in & around Munich, these two Germans formed the group that exhibited in 1911 and 1912 under the name of Der Blaue Reiter, and published Der Blaue Reiter Almanac in 1912.  Both Marc and Macke – good friends with each other -- were killed in action during World War I, so to commemorate these promising careers cut short by forces beyond their control, the Neue Galerie is staging a highly colorful and engaging show, "Franz Marc and August Macke: 1909-1914"  (through January 21). Read More 

First the Virgin Mary, at the Frick. Now a cross, the symbol of the Crucifixion, to illustrate my review of "Armenia!" at The Metropolitan Museum of Art (through January 13). But can I help it if art made way back in the Middle Ages still has the mysterious power to enchant us, and if the art which has survived since then is mostly religious?

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One major topic of gossip these past few months in the little sub-community of the art world that I inhabit has been the 98-minute documentary entitled "The Price of Everything." The main reason we are interested is that for all practical purposes, its hero is our own Larry Poons, who has thus emerged at the unlikely age of 81 as a movie star. But the film has other attractions as well.

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What could be more appropriate for the Christmas season than an image of the Virgin and Child? And here is The Frick Collection, giving us not one but two fine versions of that subject, in "The Charterhouse of Bruges: Jan Van Eyck, Petrus Christus and Jan Vos" (though January 13).

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For some reason, the top color-field painters of the 1960s (and even a little bit later) seem to be “in” this season in the Manhattan art world, or at least accepted as members in good standing of the ‘60s crowd (as opposed to being ostracized because Clement Greenberg admired them, and although few if indeed any of the younger artists most directly descended from them are deriving the slightest benefit from this new climate).

I say this not only because of the many solo shows I’ve so far reviewed this fall, nor even because of the exquisite mini-show of “Jules Olitski: 60’s Sprays” currently at Leslie Feely but most of all because of three group shows that include some of the artists I most admire and have been or will be mounted in unfamiliar big-league venues.

In this category I would first place “The Joy of Color” at Mnuchin on East 78th Street (closing December 8), second, “Epic Abstraction: Pollock to Herrera,” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art (opening December 17), and “Spilling Over: Painting Color in the 1960s,” at the Whitney Museum of American Art (due in March).  Read More 

Moving on up from Chelsea to midtown we come to Yares Art on Fifth Avenue, and a truly lovely exhibition of fifteen (count ‘em, 15) classic color-field paintings entitled “Morris Louis: Spectrum.” This show will be on through January 12, 2019, though if you plan to visit it between Christmas and New Year’s, you will need to call the gallery, as they had not yet decided which days during that period they would be open when I visited the show). Read More 

This time, my destination in Chelsea was “Walter Darby Bannard: Paintings from 1969-1975” at Berry Campbell (through December 21), but on the way I stopped in to see “Walton Ford: Barbary” at the handsome new “flagship” gallery of Paul Kasmin at 509 West 27th Street (through December 22). Read More 

Pleasure of a more recent vintage awaited me on my next trip to Chelsea. The source is the latest show of Alvin D. Loving (1935-2005), better known as Al Loving, and occupying the handsome new space of Garth Greenan on ground level at 545 West 20th Street. There are only eight pieces of work in “Al Loving: Space, Time, Light” (through December 21), but they come from between 1977 and 1993, which is perhaps my favorite period in this gifted artist’s long career. Read More 

On September 28, Roberta Smith in The New York Times ran a long article about seven abstract painters having exhibitions in Manhattan. Along with Larry Poons, Frank Bowling, and Ed Clark – all of whom I too reviewed on September 28 -- she celebrated two further shows in Chelsea “Mary Weatherford: I’ve Seen Seven Gray Whales Go By” at Gagosian (closed October 15) and “Elizabeth Neel: Tangled on a Serpent Chair” at Mary Boone (closed October 27). On October 5, I saw these two shows, as well as "Lines Thicken: Stuart Davis in Black and White" at Paul Kasmin (through December 22). Read More