Stacie McCormick is a UK-based artist and the Founding Director of Unit 1 Gallery | Workshop and Workshop Foundation. McCormick’s painting practice follows the principle of discovery in manifesting the accident within the abstract gestural arena. Her works are often concerned with the unexpected sublime found and recorded in photography, poetry, video and sound. Onslaught Undone is on view through November 30 at Unit 1 Gallery 1 Bard Road London. photographs courtesy of Unit 1 Gallery
M+B and Ghebaly Gallery are pleased to jointly present a two-part exhibition of new work by Aaron Fowler. Unfolding across the two spaces, the exhibition features a new body of sculptures and spatial interventions in the artist’s signature language of memoiristic, maximalist bricolage.
Throughout, his all-over, jam-packed use of materials lends an improvisatory tone to compositions that are highly evocative of art histories, from Byzantine iconography to Dada to the Harlem Renaissance. Curator Amanda Hunt has called this “wild, weighty, massive” work, speaking equally to the material presence that each piece commands and to the ways that Fowler’s practice reaches quickly from the personal to wider American narratives of migration, upward mobility, and the mirroring of inward and outward journeys.
Read more at: https://www.mbart.com/exhibitions/171/
Exhibition will be on view through December 22 612 N Almont Dr., West Hollywood, CA 90069. photographs by Lani Trock
Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson’s first exhibition at 79 rue des Archives opens Martine Franck – A retrospective. A journey through the life of a free spirit (Belgian 1938-2012), from activist gatherings to meditative landscapes, political engagement to friendly portraits, this deeply human vision open to the history of art was associated with the Viva agency, which she helped create, then with the cooperative Magnum Photos.
A socially engaged photographer, Martine Franck became an activist for many of these causes she actively photographed, which required a great deal of courage and daring for the young woman who had been taught not to cross the boundaries. She famously laments:
“A photograph isn’t necessarily a lie”, she said. “But nor is it the truth. […] You have to be ready to welcome the unexpected” - Martine Franck
Read more at: https://bit.ly/1MI0Hbs
Martine Franck is on view through February 10, 2019 at Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson 79 rue des Archives — 75003 Paris. photos courtesy of Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson
Scale is not real; space is relative. Comparative value is continuously engaged; singularity is impossible within the human gaze.
Onslaught Undone is an investigation of spacial and experiential relativity in direct contrast to the accumulated visual, physical and aural experiences thrown at us in the digital age. “Switch off” is the frequent call to action; but “off” seems almost dead. We all want to be “switched on” and “tuned in”, a symptom of the over-stimulated, over-manipulated, too-much-information era. Through a virtually continuous conversation, artists Nemo Nonnenmacher and Stacie McCormick question the nature of contemporary experience, where disconnect becomes the unavoidable result of constant connectedness, translated into a collaboration of large-scale sculpture and gestural paintings. The two artists are riveted by the “real” and demonstrate a transformation of scale, mediating sensory input to counteract the speed of networks, creating a profound moment where the experience of the work itself constitutes an interpretation of the world. Read more at: https://bit.ly/2RzVUxK
Onslaught Undone will be on view at Unit 1 Gallery — 1 Bard Road London until November 30. photographs courtesy of Unit 1 Gallery
Swingers is a group show featuring seven artists who explore structures of desire within the context of the culture industry. Taking its title from Lutz Bacher’s 2018 series, the exhibition focuses on artists who use photography and video to scrutinize how desire has been calculated, monetized, and leveraged by consumer culture. While some works target the modern subject’s participation in a neoliberal paradigm where individuality and desire are harnessed as forms of capital, other artists pursue more personal approaches to mine the ways one’s subjectivity can merge with its own objectification. Aware of their status within this creative economy, the works in Swingers take different approaches to uncover how the representation and commodification of desire in turn mediates the relationship between self and other. Swingers is on view through December 15 at Greene Naftali 508 West 26th Street Ground Floor & 8th Floor New York. photographs by Emma Orfield Johnston
FAIRE are very serious about not taking themselves seriously. Their shows are infused with a raw improvisation that makes every performance a completely unique experience. They just play with the vibe given by the audience and then do their best to push the limits of that relationship. Read more here.
Autre magazine celebrated its new issue at the newly redesigned Hotel Figueroa in Downtown Los Angeles. The evening began with a four-course supper by chef Casey Lane at the hotel’s restaurant Breva, which was followed by a soiree by the pool at Rick’s. Madre Mezcal provided libations throughout the night. photographs by Oliver Maxwell Kupper
Nonspace marks Hauser & Wirth’s first exhibition in LA for world-renowned artist, Alexander Calder. Following the landmark Somerset exhibition From the Stony River to the Sky, the presentation in LA focuses on a radically different facet of the artist’s work with a two-part exhibition of primarily monochromatic, abstract sculptures that simultaneously fill space and coexist with it. Nonspace is on view through January 6, 2019 @ Hauser & Wirth 901 East 3rd Street, Los Angeles. photographs courtesy of Calder Foundation New York / Art Resource New York
The landmark, decade-long project, ‘Analogue’ (1998 – 2009) is comprised of 412 photographs arranged in grids and organized into 25 chapters. Originally conceived as a chronicle of the rapidly changing Lower East Side, where Leonard once had her studio, ‘Analogue’ evolved into a parable of cultural production, touching on issues of gentrification and the exchange of commodities as an extension of colonialism. The images in this installation depict storefronts and objects on the brink of obsolescence due to an expanding global economy and rapid technological advancements emerging at the turn of the millennium. An allegory for globalization, Leonard’s photographic series is the result of a peripatetic process that led her from the declining mom and pop shops of New York City to roadside markets in the Middle East, Africa, Eastern Europe, Cuba, and Mexico, tracing the circulation of recycled merchandise. The exhibition is on view through January 20, 2019 at Hauser & Wirth 901 East 3rd Street, Los Angeles. images courtesy of Hauser & Wirth
For going on two decades, the body, ecology and technology have been Davide Balula’s central interests. Whether using a canvas to collect sediment and organisms from a riverbed, creating wifi antennae that emit monochromatic signals, or installing heat lamps in the gallery to amplify the audience’s body heat, the material and the immaterial have always been of equal concern. The prosaic and poetic never assumed to be antithetical.
During the opening reception, Davide Balula presented two new performances: ATTENTION SPAN COLOR METER (Brain Activity) and SELF BREATHING LUNGS, with the participation of Julien Derancy, Louis Laurain, Laurent Pascal, Elisabeth St James.
Outsourced Affects is on view through December 22 at Galerie Frank Elbaz 66 rue de Turenne, Paris. photographs by Claire Dorn, courtesy the artist and Galerie Frank Elbaz
Manifesto (2015), the 13-channel film installation by visual artist Julian Rosefeldt. Manifesto pays homage to the moving tradition and literary beauty of artist manifestos, ultimately questioning the role of the artist in society today. ‘Manifesto’ draws on the writings of Futurists, Dadaists, Fluxus artists, Suprematists, Situationists, Dogme 95 and other artist groups, and the musings of individual artists, architects, dancers and filmmakers. Passing the ideas of Claes Oldenburg, Yvonne Rainer, Kazimir Malevich, André Breton, Sturtevant, Sol LeWitt, Jim Jarmusch, and other influencers through his lens, Rosefeldt has edited and reassembled thirteen collages of artists’ manifestos. Manifesto is on view through January 6, 2019 at Hauser & Wirth 901 East 3rd Street, Los Angeles. images courtesy of Hauser & Wirth
Impressions is an exhibition of recent videos by the American artist, Jillian Mayer. This will mark the artist’s first solo presentation in London. In Impressions, Mayer addresses the impact of technology on identity and broader humanity, something she attributes to her interest in the human experience. The exhibition features six videos presented on various devices, such as projectors, TVs and iPads. Impressions is on view through November 24 at Annka Kultys Gallery 472 Hackney Road, Unit 3, 1st Floor, London.
#followme is a group show composed of one-dozen-plus artists, among them, Scott Benzel, Steve Hash, Paul Verdell and Robert Lazzarini. The exhibition, curated by Michael Slenske, an arts writer and editor who opened Desert Center earlier this year, centers on themes of truth and deceit in an age when social media has turned the concept of following and gaining followers into a daily ritual. Follow @desertcenterlosangeles on Instagram. #followme closes this Sunday at Desert Center 7466 Beverly Blvd, Suite 207, Los Angeles. photographs by Oliver Maxwell Kupper
Medium of Exchange combines photographic tableaus with a scripted film. The freestanding photographs portray theatrical interplays between caricatured OPEC Oil Ministers and the western government officials who together control the oil industry. Solitary or group portraits are staged against backdrops composed of found images of oil fields and refineries, strewn with props relating to the commodities or cultural signifiers that shape each specific narrative. Medium of Exchange is on view through December 21 at Edel Assanti 74a Newman Street, London. photographs courtesy of Edel Assanti
Co-organized by The Museum of Modern Art and Laurenz Foundation, Schaulager Basel, Bruce Nauman: Disappearing Acts draws upon the rich holdings of both institutions and nearly 70 lenders. Encompassing Nauman’s full career and featuring a total of 165 works, the exhibition occupies the Museum’s entire sixth floor and the whole of MoMA PS1. This joint presentation provides an opportunity to experience Nauman’s command of a wide range of mediums, from drawing, printmaking, photography, and sculpture to neon, performance, film and video, and architecturally scaled environments.
Disappearing Acts traces strategies of withdrawal in Nauman’s art—both literal and figurative incidents of removal, deflection, and concealment. Close relatives of disappearance also appear in many forms. They are seen, for example, in holes the size of a body part, in the space under a chair, in the self vanishing around a corner, and in the mental blocks that empty creative possibility. “For Nauman,” said Halbreich, “disappearance is both a real phenomenon and a magnificently ample metaphor for grappling with the anxieties of both the creative process and of navigating the everyday world.”
Bruce Nauman: Disappearing Acts is on view through February 18 @ The Museum of Modern Art, and through February 25 @ MoMA PS1, 22-25 Jackson Ave, Long Island City, New York. photographs courtesy of MoMA
This Has No Name is the first major U.S. museum survey of New York-based sculptor B. Wurtz (b. 1948). For over forty years, Wurtz has developed a visual language that subverts the industrial austerity of Minimalism and centers the minutiae from daily life in ways poetic and whimsical. B. Wurtz’s idiosyncratic work in sculpture and assemblage revolves around the use of objects that refer, directly or indirectly, to the “acts of eating, sleeping and keeping warm,” inspired by an early drawing. By incorporating recognizable, everyday materials he has personally handled, Wurtz creates self portraits through materials, and peels away some of the mystery of artistic production to establish more intimacy between artist and viewer. This Has No Name will be on view through February 3, 2019 at ICALA 1717 E 7th St, Los Angeles. photographs by Oliver Kupper
On Sunday, October 14, Autre magazine hosted a mezcal bruncheon to celebrate our Fall/Winter 2018 issue and LA Eyeworks’ new collection at their iconic Neil Denari-designed flagship on Beverly Boulevard. Madre Mezcal provided cocktails and Tacos la Restirada provided brunch. Avant-garde percussionist and director of Monday Evening Concerts, Jonathan Hepfer, performed Iannis Xenakis 1975 composition, “Psappha.” photographs by Lani Trock
Artist Jordan Wolfson's (Female figure), 2014, is an immersive environment that features a robotic sculpture. For seven minutes, the robot gives monologues and dances to pop songs. Startling and unnerving, the work raises the specter of misogyny and exposes fissures in pop culture. It challenges the ways women are represented, and the ways images of women are consumed. (Female figure) will be on view through January 20, 2019 at The Broad 221 S. Grand Ave, Los Angeles. photographs by Oliver Kupper
Over the past thirty years, Lucas has created a distinctive and provocative body of work that subverts traditional notions of gender, sexuality, and identity. Since the late 1980s, she has transformed found objects and everyday materials such as cigarettes, vegetables, and stockings into disorienting, confrontational tableaux that boldly challenge social norms. The human body and anthropomorphic forms recur throughout Lucas’s works, often appearing erotic, humorous, fragmented, or reconfigured into fantastical anatomies of desire.
Initially associated with a group known as the Young British Artists (YBAs), who began exhibiting together in London in the late 1980s, Lucas is now one of the UK’s most influential artists. This presentation, which takes place across the three main floors of the New Museum, brings together more than 150 works in photography, sculpture, and installation to reveal the breadth and ingenuity of her practice. The exhibition addresses the ways in which Lucas’s works engage with crucial debates about gender and power, along with the legacy of Surrealism—from her clever transformations of everyday objects to her exploration of sexual ambiguity and the tension between the familiar and the absurd.
“Sarah Lucas: Au Naturel” features some of Lucas’s most important projects, including early sculptures from the 1990s that substitute domestic furniture for body parts and enlarged spreads from tabloid newspapers from the same period, which reflect objectified representations of the female body. Alongside the photographic self-portraits that Lucas has produced throughout her career, the exhibition features biomorphic sculptures including her stuffed-stocking Bunnies (1997–ongoing) and NUDS (2009–ongoing), the Penetralia series (2008–ongoing), and selections from her installations at the Freud Museum in London (2000) and the British Pavilion at the Venice Biennale (2015). These works, which complicate inscribed codes of sexual and social normativity, have never before been shown together in the US. Lucas has also created new sculptural works for the exhibition, including This Jaguar’s Going to Heaven (2018), a severed 2003 Jaguar X-Type—the car’s back half burned and its front half collaged with cigarettes—and VOX POP DORIS (2018), a pair of eleven-foot-tall thigh-high platform boots cast in concrete.
Au Naturel is on view through January 20, 2019 at the New Museum 235 Bowery New York, 10002. photographs by Adam Lehrer
Never Remember—the exhibition title a biting reversal of the slogan “Never forget”—takes place in the very gallery where Jasper Johns’s map paintings were shown thirty years before. Lowman’s Maps expand on his own shaped canvases begun in the early 2000s, depicting doodled hearts, trompe l’oeil decals of bullet holes, and air freshener trees.
Lowman’s Maps infuse the geometries of the United States with a gritty, gestural tactility, combining chance and intention in the generative possibilities of a single form. With sharp political skepticism, Lowman employs abstraction to point to the arbitrariness of borders and the limitations of jingoism, thus expounding on the complexities and contradictions of the American way. Never Remember is on view through December 15 at Gagosian 980 Madison Avenue, New York. photographs courtesy Gagosian
