Collage

Art, Still Not Dead!

I CANNOT TELL A LIE, much as I would like to. This wonderful bit of Photoshopping was sent by a reader who calls himself Mr. Eyeballs. I wish I could say I found it myself. // // Who knew just how contemporary that Mona Lisa smile could be? A stylized expression in Leonardo’s day, it suddenly looks quite current removed from a Renaissance setting and inserted into a post-modern one. The bloody amputation might be a bit over the top, but the figure’s facial mien—part simper, part sneer—would do nicely in a Vogue photo shoot. Continue Reading
Winter Sampler at Denise Bibro Fine Art

THE WEEKS BETWEEN MID-DECEMBER AND EARLY JANUARY are a slow news time in the galleries. That makes it a very good time to introduce artists whom galleries are interested in taking aboard or ones they simply like but cannot accommodate on the roster. Denise Bibro’s Winter Salon is a lively sampler of 21 artists, six of them invited guests. Recognition comes slowly to artists like David Barnett, sui generis and not readily pigeonholed in a particular movement or line of descent. Continue Reading
Consider the Oyster, Sometimes

The pleasure of a theme show lies in seeing how individual artists interpret the theme and in weighing one interpretation against another. Conceived and curated by Ingrid Dinter, this group exhibition is based on M.F.K. Fisher’s 1941 cookbook Consider the Oyster. Of the 50-plus works in the show, the best—with few exceptions—are those that make an effort to curtsy to the theme. Those artists who have an affinity with Fisher’s whimsy or sense of poetry are the most rewarding. The exhibition opens with Dan McCleary’s straightforward portrait, “Man with a Pearl Earring.” Continue Reading
Joel Carreiro, Bricoleur

NEW YORK REMAINS A MARKET TOWN but it is increasingly hard to call it a creative center. Even what comes to market tends to cluster around the contemporary commonplaces that clog Chelsea and its satellite on the Lower East Side. Much good work is exhibited outside the official precincts. If you can make it to the Quick Center for the Arts at Fairfield University, you can see what I mean. On view is a splendid mid-career survey of works by Joel Carreiro, currently head of the M.F.A  Continue Reading