From MoMA’s “The Forever Now” to the New Museum’s “Surround Audience,” curators are twisting in knots over the digitalization of contemporary art. More conceptually penetrating and gorgeous than anything in either show are Marsha Cottrell’s unique handmade digital prints at 11 Rivington. Since 1998 she has been probing the interface between computer and ink, treating electrostatic toner as a rich, primordial mezzotint, and taking a devil’s advocate approach to the machines and programs under her intimate control.

The exhibition at the gallery’s two separate storefronts begins with a ten-point sampling of Cottrell’s past styles and ideas. Configured as a single work, Index 1 (Presence of Nature) (1998-2013) includes one dazzling explosion of architectural grammar from 2005, representative of a large body of improvisational design storms wrought from office systems. In comparison, Julie Mehretu’s endlessly celebrated panoramas seem distinctly flat, static, and formulaic. Other stops on Cottrell’s travels are represented by a couple of dark, astronomical mappings that twinkle with distant typographical quasars, and by down-to-earth, paper-centric experiments with translucent layering, smudging, and multiple printings. Perhaps the most refined work, from 2010, uses a pixel-wide grid of white lines to sculpt a mirage of sills and jambs raked by fading light, an enigma every bit as scrupulous as the optical sublime of Wayne Gonzales and Dan Walsh.

The new work on view intensifies such delusions of light and space, with the smooth-cornered window format of the Aperture Series suggesting, while denying, a night view from an airplane, or perhaps an old TV just as the cathode is dying. Pay close attention to the way the edge between outer frame and inner space is imagineered differently in each image: as Ben Day gradations; as translucent layers of onion skin; or as hard edge Vasarely-like topology. The cool intimacy of these works is counterbalanced by the galactic rapture of The Deliciousness of Staying Still (2015), a wall-sized collage of a sun floating in blackest space – no quasars or twinkles anywhere in the solid bank of glued office-sized sheets, each resolutely saturated edge to edge (apart from the sheet with the white circle) by slate-dry toner.

This format of a central white disk appears throughout the show in smaller works, sometimes eclipsed by a black moon. Cosmic eye tests of radiating lines that force illusions of blinding glare, as in a Gustave Doré wood engraving, these “Spectral Suns” often elicit secondary moirés at the limits of digital and optical resolution. With a different sort of exactitude, a series of squared up interiors probe reflected light and soft focus. These Seurat-textured mediations seem to mock the conspiracy between hard edge abstraction and institutional architecture. Aglow with silence and emptiness, Cottrell’s images of vacant “Old Museums” (as they are slyly titled) suggest the aftermath of a burglary.

The post The Deliciousness of Staying Still: Marsha Cottrell at Eleven Rivington appeared first on artcritical.

May 2 saw the season finale of The Review Panel at the Nationa Academy Museum. Stephanie Buhmann, Mario Naves and newcomer to the series Saul Ostrow joined moderator David Cohen to discuss shows dotted around Manhattan, taking us from the Lower East Side, via Soho and Chelsea to 57th Street.  The shows under review: David Maisel: History’s Shadow at Yancey Richardson, John Newman: Fit at Tibor de Nagy, Jackie Saccoccio at Eleven Rivington’s two spaces and Allan Wexler: Breaking Ground at Ronald Feldman Fine Arts.  The panel will be back for its tenth season at the National Academy in September.  Sign up to our bulletin to be the first to know the details.

The post May 2014: Stephanie Buhmann, Mario Naves and Saul Ostrow with moderator David Cohen appeared first on artcritical.

The post Weights & Measures appeared first on artcritical.

Lush Life is an exhibition curated by Franklin Evans and Omar Lopez-Chahoud which takes place at nine Lower East Side (LES) galleries: Collette Blanchard Gallery, Eleven Rivington, Invisible-Exports, Lehmann Maupin, On Stellar Rays, Salon 94, Scaramouche, Sue Scott Gallery, and Y Gallery.  Lush Life adopts Richard Price’s 2008 novel to title and organize the exhibition.  The novel is set in the contemporary LES and through a murder investigation exposes the dynamically changing community of the neighborhood, which despite its evolution retains a ghostly and vital link to its layered past.  The deep and varied history of the LES now includes the LES galleries as new community members, and the premise of community is reflected in the cooperative nature of the galleries’ and artists’ participation in the exhibition which uses Price’s novel to critically consider concepts of neighborhood and change.  Each gallery will be a sub-exhibition reflecting the idea of one of the nine chapters in the book.

Sue Scott Gallery – Chapter One: Whistle.  June 19 to July 31
On Stellar Rays – Chapter Two: Liar. June 23 to August 3
Invisible-Exports – Chapter Three: First Bird (A Few Butterflies). June 25 to July 31
Lehmann Maupin – Chapter Four: Let It Die. July 8 to August 13
Y Gallery – Chapter Five: Want Cards. July 8 to July 25
Collette Blanchard Gallery – Chapter Six: The Devil You Know
Salon 94 – Chapter Seven: Wolf Tickets. June 29 to July 30
Scaramouche – Chapter Eight: 17 Plus 25 Is 32. July 8 to August 7
Eleven Rivington – Chapter Nine: She’ll Be Apples

Artists: Christopher Drager, Claudia Weber, Coco Fusco, Dana Frankfort, Dana Levy, Dani Leventhal, David Shapiro, Derrick Adams, Elisabeth Subrin, Erik Benson, Ezra Johnson, Ishmael Randall Weeks, Jackie Gendel, Jackie Saccoccio, Jayson Keeling, Jessica Dickinson, Joanne Greenbaum, Jose Lerma, Judi Werthein, Justen Ladda, Kai Schiemenz/ Iris Fluegel, Karina Skvirsky, La Toya Fraizer, Leslie Hewitt, Manuel Acevedo, Mario Ybarra Jr, Matthew Weinstein, Melissa Gordon, Nana Debois Buhl, Nicolas Di Genova, Nina Lola Bachhuber, Oliver Babin, Patrick Lee, Paul Gabrielli, Paul Pagk, Robert Beck, Robert Melee, Rudy Shepherd, Scott Hug, Tim Davis, Tommy Hartung, Xaviera Simmons, among others.

The post Nine Galleries, Nine Chapters of Lush Life, a novel by Richard Price appeared first on artcritical.

CHAMPAGNE ON ICE

A remarkable swell took place after the doors opened, and not just fare-goers making for the various courtesy bars. The powerful and glamorous A-list crowd amassed quickly, imbibed, and prepared to consume art. The mood was generally upbeat and optimistic, if not exactly replicating the feeding frenzy of the “bubble” years.

INEFFABLE OBJECTS OF DISPLACED DESIRE

THE SWEET SMELL OF TRANSGRESSION

Power Londoner Jay Jopling’s White Cube was right at the entrance, with a “real” Damien Hirst skull painting, a wall-scaled Gilbert and George and a seductively ominous work by New Yorker Phillips.

DEEP CONVERSATION

Perhaps they are discussing how you can display a giant yellow swastika and not have that be offensive. McEwen’s solo, “I Am Curious Yellow,” complete with matching carpet, aimed only to please.

SHIVER ME TIMBERS

Paris’s Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin continues to showcase flashy theatrical work from a cutting-edge international stable, very art-fair friendly. New Yorker Coffin’s absurdist hero was one of the few literally over-the-top pieces to be seen this year.

HAVE NUDE, WILL TRAVEL

Veteran master of pop figuration Wesley made a statement with this utilitarian suitcase at the booth of Chelsea gallerists Fredericks Freiser.

GERING IN FLIGHT

57th Street dealer Sandra Gering, now partnered with Madrid’s Javier Lopez, showcases a range of punchy, graphics-oriented work, including this wall-scaled gouache and graphite piece by James.

PYROTECHNICS AND PASSIONS

Nares strong solo at the large, centrally-positioned booth of Chelsea’s Paul Kasmin, featured huge iridescent iconic brushstrokes isolated against dark saturated colored grounds. One of Nares’s movies, with its percussive formal manipulations, was also on hand, adding ambience.

STRIPES AND STRIATIONS

In from St. Louis for a brief 36-hour stay, abstractionist Lundsager was working with Greenberg Van Doren Gallery to plan her solo exhibition, slated for the weekend. A representative work hangs behind her in the storage closet. “I love being here,” she said of New York and its buzzy environs, formerly her home.

A DISCERNING EYE

I’LL BE YOUR MIRROR

“They’re acrylic with silver plating,” he explained. “They’re very temporal.” Best of all, “they kind of record you,” he elaborated. This might explain their popularity. Both works were sold—and Kassay is among the fair’s “hot” young artists.

ALL DRESSED UP AND…

It turned out the lattes were free, if you know Armory Fair-founder Paul Morris, or had another “in.” It seemed like more people were “VIP” than not, judging by the shortage of seating. We’ll see how many make it to the MoMA party, still standing.

The post The Armory Show 2010: A photo journal appeared first on artcritical.

on view at that artist’s solo exhibition opening Eleven Rivington today.

This was an artcritical PIC in April 2009

The post Ishmael Randall Weeks at Eleven Rivington appeared first on artcritical.