Ellen Kooi, Out of Sight @PPOW

JTF (just the facts): A total of 11 large scale color photographs, hung unframed in the front gallery space, a second adjoining room, and in the office area. All of the prints are either Ilfoarchive on dibond or Enduraprint on plexiglas, made between 2007 and 2011. Physical dimensions range from 27×45 to 31×107, with editions either 10+2, 12+2 or 20+2. A monograph of this body of work was published in 2010 by Filigranes Editions (here). (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: Dutch photographer Ellen Kooi can neatly be categorized as one of the increasing number of contemporary photographers employing cinematic staging as a signature technique. Her images of children set amid flat Dutch landscapes sit roughly in the middle along the spectrum of realistic recreation and obvious fabrication, using theatrical lighting and unexpected perspectives to create open ended scenes and narrative fragments that reference childhood fairy tales with a sense of heightened realism.

While stories and dreams can of course take place anywhere, these pictures are firmly rooted in the Dutch soil and in the visual traditions of Dutch landscape painting across the centuries. Children in rubber boots squish across mudflats, a girl stands tall on a tree stump over looking a misty expanse of farmland, and another hides her face near a drainage canal flanked by weeds. With a compositional nod to Wyeth, a girl peers up at a lonely house perched on the hillside, carrying what looks to be a dead seagull. And we are left to only imagine why the boy sitting in the amazingly tall weeds is bathed in an alien green glow or why the girl is scrambling across the roadside in the twilit night.

In each of these images, the land itself plays much more than just a supporting role; it often dominates the figures, creating a sense of expansive natural scale and power compared to the children. Kooi has taken the realistic genre painting of the past and infused it with some modern mystery and uncertainty, taking idyllic landscape formulas and overlaying them with moods a bit more menacing.
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Collector’s POV: The works in this show are priced between $8000 and $16000, based on size and the place in the edition. Kooi’s work has not yet entered the secondary markets in any significant manner, so gallery retail is likely the only option for interested collectors at this point.

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

Artist site (here)

Ellen Kooi, Out of Sight
Through June 18th

PPOW Gallery
535 West 22nd Street
New York, NY 10011

Rinko Kawauchi: Illuminance @Hermes

JTF (just the facts): A total of 15 large scale color photographs, framed in white with no mat, and hung in the atrium gallery space at the top of the store. All of the works are chromogenic prints made between 2009 and 2011. The prints on display are square format, each 40×40; no edition information was available. A monograph of this body of work is forthcoming from Aperture (here). (Installation shots at right.)
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Comments/Context: Every time I see Rinko Kawauchi’s work, I am reminded that photography has not lost its ability to capture the pure unadulterated wonder of the world around us. Her images of seemingly mundane objects and fleeting moments are radical in their effortless simplicity and genuine freshness, her optimistic curiosity discovering child-like interest in things most of us would pass by without a second glance. Her shows have the effect of stripping away jadedness and cynicism, taking us back to a view of the world that is more naturally engaged and actively inquisitive.

What I like about this newest selection of images is that they have been edited with much tighter hand, making the whole much more thematically coherent than previous shows I’ve seen, which have tended to wander with more randomness from subject to subject. Virtually all the pictures on view turn on their use of light. What might seem like a ridiculously overused photographic construct actually works here, as the images sparkle with flashes and beams of immaculate whiteness, on surfaces, in the air, and through the frame. Kawauchi’s light glistens through watery mist, glances off of a scooter side mirror, stripes a sidewalk, gets lost in the smoke of fireworks, slips through the forest, and passes through a transparent bubble. She jumps from the immensity of a solar eclipse to the minuteness of a tiny frog perched on a thumb, touching the tenderness of a dead swallow and the poetry of a swirling sea in between.

Regardless of her subject, Kawauchi never seems to lose sight of delicacy and openness. At first, a blast of flash against an ordinary pink rose at night seems harsh and amateurish; look again and it has a quiet haze that is quite remarkable. Even shots that might be mistaken for stock photography are somehow infused with her life affirming attention; it’s like we are being taught to see all over again. Kawauchi’s work doesn’t fit into any neat categories or curatorial frameworks; hers is an authentically original vision, and this well chosen small show is evidence of the power of an alternate viewpoint.

Collector’s POV: This isn’t a selling show, so no prices were available. Kawauchi’s work has only recently entered the secondary markets; with only a few lots sold in various sizes, it’s hard to draw many pricing trends from so few outcomes. As a result, gallery retail is still the best option for interested collectors. I don’t believe Kawauchi has gallery representation in New York at the moment, so FOIL Gallery in Tokyo (here) will be the place to go.

Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

Reviews/Features: T Magazine (here), Time Light Box (here)

Rinko Kawauchi: Illuminance

Through July 16th

The Gallery at Hermès
691 Madison Avenue
New York, NY 10065

Auction Results: Photographs, May 19, 2011 @Bonhams London

The recent results of the Photographs sale at Bonhams in London were quite soft, with a Buy-In rate over 50%, few positive surprises, and Total Sale Proceeds that missed the estimate range by a wide margin.

The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):

Total Lots: 102
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: £240200
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: £340900
Total Lots Sold: 50
Total Lots Bought In: 52
Buy In %: 50.98%
Total Sale Proceeds: £166080

Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):

Low Total Lots: 81
Low Sold: 42
Low Bought In: 39
Buy In %: 48.15%
Total Low Estimate: £155900
Total Low Sold: £100680

Mid Total Lots: 21
Mid Sold: 8
Mid Bought In: 13
Buy In %: 61.90%
Total Mid Estimate: £185000
Total Mid Sold: £65400

High Total Lots: 0
High Sold: NA
High Bought In: NA
Buy In %: NA
Total High Estimate: £0
Total High Sold: NA

The top lot by High estimate is lot 56, Irving Penn, Five Dahomey Girls, Two Standing, 1967/1985, at £15000-20000; it did not sell. The top outcome of the sale was lot 47, Hans Haas, Hans Haas at work photographing the world under the ocean, n.d., at £14400. (Image at right, top, via Bonhams.)

92.00% of the lots that sold had proceeds in or above their estimate. There were a total of 3 surprises in this sale (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate):

Lot 5, David Octavius Hill & Robert Adamson, Four portraits, 1840s, at £4560 (image at right, bottom, via Bonhams)
Lot 47, Hans Haas, Hans Haas at work photographing the world under the ocean, n.d., at £14400 (image at right, top, via Bonhams)
Lot 77, Mario Testino, Kate Moss in Blue Cafe, 2005, at £5280

Complete lot by lot results can be found here.

Bonhams
101 New Bond Street
London W1S 1SR

Auction Results: Photographs, May 18, 2011 @Bloomsbury London

It’s a slow climb uphill for Bloomsbury to establish a viable Photographs department, and this sale marked some incremental progress from last year in terms of value on offer, Buy-In rate, and Total Sale Proceeds. The auction still missed the low end of the range by a wide margin and plenty of lots went unsold, but it’s a small improvement that can be built on.

The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):

Total Lots: 225
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: £283100
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: £405750
Total Lots Sold: 127
Total Lots Bought In: 98
Buy In %: 43.56%
Total Sale Proceeds: £209858

Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):

Low Total Lots: 207
Low Sold: 89
Low Bought In: 118
Buy In %: 57.00%
Total Low Estimate: £254750
Total Low Sold: £150078

Mid Total Lots: 18
Mid Sold: 9
Mid Bought In: 9
Buy In %: 50.00%
Total Mid Estimate: £151000
Total Mid Sold: £59780

High Total Lots: 0
High Sold: NA
High Bought In: NA
Buy In %: NA
Total High Estimate: £0
Total High Sold: NA

The top lot by High estimate is lot 125, Irving Penn, Five Dahomey Girls, One Standing, 1967/1974, at £10000-15000; it did not sell. The top outcome of the sale was lot 21, PH Delamotte for Negritti & Zambei, The Reception of Napoleon III and Empress Eugenie by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, 1855, at £10980.

81.10% of the lots that sold had proceeds in or above their estimate. There were a total of 11 surprises in this sale (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate):

Lot 4, Frank Meadow Sutcliffe, With the Wind and Tide, 1880s, at £1159
Lot 13, Fred Judge, Conway Bridge and Castle, c1910, at £3660 (image at right, bottom, via Bloomsbury)
Lot 33, John Edward Sache, Collection of Images of India, 1860s, at £2684
Lot 34, Felice Beato, The Dumi Gate and Emanbarra, Lucknow; Bailey Guard Gate from the Inside, Lucknow, c1858, at £854
Lot 66, Arvid Gutschow, Untitled, c1930s, at £2684 (image at right, middle, via Bloomsbury)
Lot 89, Edouard Boubat, Self Portrait in Mirror, 1951, at £4880
Lot 94, Andre Villers, The Hands of Pablo Picasso, 1960, at £5490
Lot 121, Robert Capa, Omaha Beach, D-Day, 6, June 1944, 1944/before 1955, at £6710 (image at right, top, via Bloomsbury)
Lot 130, Albert Rudomine, Female Nude, 1930s, at £1464
Lot 175, Richard Sadler, Weegee, Coventry, 1963, at £854
Lot 218, Roksana Ciurysek, Butterfly, 2010, at £2684

Complete lot by lot results can be found here.

Bloomsbury Auctions
24 Maddox Street
Mayfair
London WS1 1PP

Roe Ethridge, Le Luxe @Kreps

JTF (just the facts): A total of 12 large scale color works and 2 sets of bookshelves, framed in white and not matted, and hung in the entry, the main gallery space, and the office area. All of the works are c-prints, ranging in size from roughly 37×25 to 77×52. The photographs were made between 2005 and 2011, and have been printed in editions of 5. The bookshelves are alternately made of stainless steel (1 unit) and pine wood (9 units), from 2011. A monograph of this body of work was recently published by Mack Books (here). (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: It has taken me quite a while to get my head around just what exactly Roe Ethridge is doing in his photography. The first couple of times I saw his work, all I could discover was a sense of impersonal randomness, often executed in a glossy commercial style, mixing appropriated and original work with equal facility. Without any apparent connection or narrative to link the works, I simply couldn’t find my way in, and was left mystified by the ordinariness of it all.

This show of new work was my first experience in seeing a larger group of images actually sequenced by Ethridge, rather than simply catching a glimpse of a picture or two taken out of context. What I found was that I started to understand how this approach operates, especially in the open-endedness of what the pictures taken together might (or might not) imply. It sounds corny I’m sure, but it’s almost as if the space between the pictures is what Ethridge is after, rather than the specific images themselves.

What’s actually on the walls is a puzzling group of seemingly unrelated subjects and styles: a group of images from a commission by Goldman Sachs to document the building of its new offices (still lifes of wet sand pits and mottled concrete floors, workers installing glass curtain walls), a plastic shopping bag against a glossy red brick wall, a shiny over-pixelated bow, an appropriated Point Break poster with the artist’s face superimposed over Patrick Swayze, two aerial views of Tokyo with rainbow lights and glittering gold haze, a grid of women in bikinis, etc. In seeing these all together, I began to see a strong relationship to the work of Wolfgang Tillmans. The similarities between the two are structural I think, not stylistic; Ethridge has substituted an impersonal often commercial view for Tillmans’ deadpan observations of small moments, but the effect is the same – it’s how the pieces are put together and recontextualized that generates the insights. This idea of the pictures as a scaffolding for the narratives that fall between them is reinforced by the empty bookshelves installed in the gallery. Whether wood or steel, all they do is provide structure; the information is missing, to be supplied by the viewer.

As stand alone images, I continue to have trouble with many of Ethridge’s slicker efforts, as I don’t think they hold up particularly well on their own. But as an environment (or perhaps as a book I imagine), I finally saw the core of his originality. The ideas are a bit obtuse and reach beyond what we normally think of as the normal boundaries of “self-contained” photography, but as digital images exponentially proliferate, perhaps Ethridge’s approach to mash-up and shuffled rework of any and all may signal a new way of thinking about conceptual relationships within photography.

Collector’s POV: The prints in this show are priced between $12000 and $28000 (with intermediate prices at $14000, $18000, and $24000), roughly based on size. Ethridge’s work is not consistently available in the secondary markets; prices for the few lots that have sold at auction in recent years have ranged between $12000 and $20000. As such, gallery retail is likely the best option for interested collectors at this point.

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

Reviews: New Yorker (here), TimeOut New York (here)

Roe Ethridge, Le Luxe
Through July 2nd

Andrew Kreps Gallery
525 West 22nd Street
New York, NY 10011

Auction Results: Photographs, May 17, 2011 @Christie’s King Street

Christie’s went 8 for 8 with its High lots in its recent Photographs sale in London, driving the Total Sale Proceeds up above the top end of the estimate range with some room to spare. A failed run of 12 straight passed lots by Don McCullin inflated the Buy-In rate (above 38%), but the rest of sale performed quite solidly otherwise.

The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):

Total Lots: 102
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: £695500
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: £1013000
Total Lots Sold: 63
Total Lots Bought In: 29
Buy In %: 38.24%
Total Sale Proceeds: £1169075

Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):

Low Total Lots: 39
Low Sold: 17
Low Bought In: 22
Buy In %: 56.41%
Total Low Estimate: £136000
Total Low Sold: £72000

Mid Total Lots: 55
Mid Sold: 38
Mid Bought In: 17
Buy In %: 30.91%
Total Mid Estimate: £562000
Total Mid Sold: £485875

High Total Lots: 8
High Sold: 8
High Bought In: 0
Buy In %: 0.00%
Total High Estimate: £315000
Total High Sold: £611200

The top lot by High estimate was lot 61, Peter Beard, Hunting Cheetah on the Tarn Desert, 1960/Later, at £50000-70000; it was also the top outcome of the sale at £217250. (Image at right, bottom, via Christie’s.)

92.06% of the lots that sold had proceeds in or above their estimate. There were a total of ten surprises in this sale (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate):

Lot 45, Helmut Newton, Portrait of Margaret Thatcher, Anaheim, California, 1991, at £27500
Lot 55, Desiree Dolron, Xteriors VII, 2004, at £103250 (image at right, top, via Christie’s)
Lot 58, Guido Mocafico, Dendroaspis Jamesoni Jamesoni, 2003, at £30000
Lot 61, Peter Beard, Hunting Cheetahs on the Tarn Desert, 1960/Later, at £217250 (image at right, bottom, via Christie’s)
Lot 73, David Hockney, David and Ann on the Subway, November 18, 1982, at £23750
Lot 78, Helmut Newton, Violetta with Monocle – Big Nude IX, Paris, 1991, at £16250
Lot 80, Helmut Newton, Chez Patou, Paris, French Vogue, 1977, at £12500
Lot 91, Jeanloup Sieff, Nude on a Cube, 1972, at £7500
Lot 97, Irving Penn, Turning Head (B), Self-portrait, 1993/1996, at £27500 (image at right, middle, via Christie’s)
Lot 102, David Bailey, Michael Caine, 1965/1989, at £6875

Complete lot by lot results can be found here.

Christie’s
8 King Street, St. James’s
London SW1Y 6QT

Ori Gersht: Falling Petals @CRG

JTF (just the facts): A total of 13 large scale color works and 1 video installation, alternately framed in white or black and not matted, and hung in the main gallery space (with a closed off viewing room in the back for the video). All of the works (both single images and diptychs) are either archival pigment prints or c-prints mounted on dibond, ranging in size from 14×16 to 51×80. The works were made in 2010, and have generally been printed in editions of 8 (there are 3 works printed in editions of 6). The video is a dual channel HD video projection with sound, made in 2011. (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: My first reaction upon walking into Ori Gersht’s new show was that Japanese cherry blossoms have to be one of the most classic and therefore overdone subjects that an artist might tackle. Not only is there the backdrop of centuries of Japanese art depicting these specific trees in bloom, but plenty of famous photographers have more recently brought their own unique perspectives to the blush of pale pink in springtime. Whether the angle is the renewal of life and the turning of the seasons or the fragility and grace of the flowers and their symbolism of innocence and natural beauty, this is subject matter that has been discovered over and over again, perhaps not exhausted, but certainly not unexplored.

Gersht’s images of the trees in bloom are surprisingly dark and almost sinister. Taken at night, they have a peculiar glow, where the light catches the petals against a muted, enveloping evening. Up close, many are turned into distorted impressionistic clusters of pink and blue dots, where pixelated texture breaks the image down into tactile gestures. Wider landscapes have familiar compositional hallmarks (a tree branch or gnarled trunk isolated for effect), and yet the scenes seem almost nightmarish in their otherworldly flash lit silence; nearby, swaths of floating petals covering the water become nearly abstract. In all the images, simple ephemeral beauty has been found to have an ominous almost desperate side hiding underneath.

Without the knowledge of the backstory provided by the press release, I would never have known that Gersht was influenced by the trees’ symbolism for kamikaze pilots from World War II, or by the location of some of the specimens in Hiroshima’s irradiated soil. Given these narrative hooks, the menacing quality which has been drawn out starts to make more sense. While the surreal mood (and coloration) is obvious, I doubt that one could discern the military connections without some help. That said, and although not every image is startlingly memorable, Gersht has successfully infused this subject matter with a more complex set of emotions than is normally associated with the cliche of lovely spring flowers.
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Collector’s POV: The single image prints in the show are priced between $8500 and $25000, with the largest of the diptychs slightly higher at $30000. Gersht’s work is not consistently available in the secondary markets; prices for the few lots that have sold at auction in recent years have ranged between $3000 and $17000. As such, gallery retail is likely the best option for interested collectors at this point.
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Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)
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Transit Hub:

Review: TimeOut New York (here)
Exhibit: Santa Barbara Museum of Art (here)

Ori Gersht: Falling Petals

Through June 24th

CRG Gallery
548 West 22nd Street
New York, NY 10011

Auction Preview: Photographie, June 10, 2011 @Van Ham

Later this week in Cologne, Van Ham finishes up the Spring season in Germany with a various owner Photographs sale. As usual, there is a generous selection of lower end German/European material, with a special section of vintage architectural images of Cologne headlined by Werner Mantz and Hugo Schmölz. Overall, there are a total of 398 lots on offer in this sale, with a Total High Estimate of 793380€.

Here’s the breakdown:

Total Low Lots (high estimate up to and including 7500€): 383
Total Low Estimate (sum of high estimates of Low lots): 626380€

Total Mid Lots (high estimate between 7500€ and 35000€): 15
Total Mid Estimate: 167000€

Total High Lots (high estimate above 35000€): 0
Total High Estimate: NA
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The top lot by High estimate is lot 1146, Floris Neusüss, Sabine, 1961, at 16000-18000€.

Here is the list of the photographers who are represented by five or more lots in the sale (with the number of lots in parentheses):

Hugo Schmölz (21)
Albert Renger-Patzsch (16)
Werner Mantz (14)
August Sander (11)
Weegee (7)
Margaret Bourke-White (6)
Brassai (6)
Germaine Krull (6)
Paul Wolff (5)
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(Lot 1035, Joachim Brohm, Franzosische Zeitzone, 1985, at 2800€ , at right, top, lot 1074, Frank Gohlke, Landscape, Moorhead, MN, 1977, at 2800€, at right, bottom, and lot 1149, Arnold Odermatt, Stansstad, 1966/Later, at 2800€, at right, middle, all via Van Ham.)

The complete lot by lot catalog can be found here.

Photographie
June 10th
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Van Ham Kunstauktionen
Schönhauser Straße 10 – 16
D – 50968 Köln

Florian Maier-Aichen @303

JTF (just the facts): A total of 8 large scale color images, generally framed in white and not matted (the two smallest works are framed in black and matted), and hung in the main gallery space (with a partial dividing wall). All of the works are c-prints, ranging in size from 16×13 to 82×106. The works were made in 2011, and have been printed in editions of 6. (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: Florian Maier-Aichen’s show of new work at 303 finds him moving further and further away from the traditional frameworks and definitions of photography. While all of the end products in this exhibit are photographic prints, Maier-Aichen has employed a dizzying array of artistic techniques and media (including painting, drawing, watercolor, animation, sculptural installation, and Photoshop) to expand the boundaries of the form. As a result, these works feel very process heavy; the “how” seems to dominate the rest of the ideas he is offering, making the “why” less clear.

Two of the new works seem to extend his exploration of broad romantic landscape, connecting back to his previous images most closely; one aerial depicts unexpected yellow blotches of farmland in a sea of blue and green, while another captures a steep fjord with boats in surreal tricolor fuzziness. A third takes a dated suburban scene from Los Angeles and transforms it with Photoshop snow and hand painted cars, creating a juxtaposition of incompatible styles and an impossibility of memory.

The rest of the works in the show drift away from a quasi-documentary approach toward interpretation and abstraction via rephotography. Two large pictures began as drawings/paintings on canvas, night scenes of stars against dark skies, with tree silhouettes or childlike waves as framing; up close, they are quite textural. Two others are photographs of animation cells and watercolors, one a swirling mass of happy abstraction, another a cartoon mix of landscape and a floating circular target. The last documents a copy of a Kenneth Noland painting being submerged in a flood of dark red water.

As Maier-Aichen moves away from the traditions of photography toward a new frontier of mixed media, I think it becomes harder and harder to understand or judge his work in a purely photographic context. Intellectually, I am intrigued by what he is attempting to do, as it represents a new confluence of ideas; the tools are being used in original, less “realistic” ways. Visually though, I continue to be less than moved; as his work gets more symbolic and impressionistic, it may indeed be leaving photography behind. There’s clearly a conceptual redefinition going on here, but the resulting images need to be more than just inventive process.
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Collector’s POV: The prints in the show are priced between $25000 and $120000, with several at $70000. Maier-Aichen’s work has become consistently available in the secondary markets in the past few years, with prices generally ranging between $25000 and $180000.
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Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

Review: New Yorker (here)
Interview: Art in America (here)

Florian Maier-Aichen

Through June 25th

303 Gallery
547 West 21st Street
New York, NY 10011

Gillian Wearing: People @Bonakdar

JTF (just the facts): A total of 9 works in a variety of media, including photography, video, and sculpture, displayed in two gallery spaces on the first floor and two divided spaces on the second floor. Four of the works are bromide prints in painted wood frames, sized between 63×45 and 63×52. These works are available in editions of 6+2AP, and were made between 2008 and 2011. One work (Snapshot) is a group of 7 videos in framed plasma screens, hung together on a single wall with an audio voice over provided on headphones. It comes in an edition of 2+2AP, and was made in 2005. The video Bully comes in an edition of 3+2AP and was made in 2010; the video Secrets and Lies comes in an edition of 5+2AP and was made in 2009. The two sculptures are painted bronze on plywood plinths, in editions of 3+2AP, from 2010 and 2011. (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: Gillian Wearing’s new show (her first in New York since 2003) contains a handful of photographs that play a supporting role to three richer and more psychologically searing videos. All of the works on display explore a related emotional landscape: the complex intersection of individual identity, private stories, and public personas/roles. The result is an often disturbing and unsettling experience, where Wearing confronts hidden narratives and agonizing misunderstanding with remarkable nuance.

Secrets and Lies and Bully are two of the most intense video pieces I have seen in quite a long time, so much so that they become difficult to watch as they progress. Secrets and Lies is staged in a small confession box-like room, where individuals in three quarter poses tell their private stories from behind creepy featureless rubber masks. Their disguises give them the freedom to tell their stories of murder, abuse, and other sad and painful traumas; standing in the claustrophobic chamber hearing these sordid tales was just too much and I literally had to move back a bit. Bully is equally powerful and arresting. It restages a tormenting bullying incident with a group of actors; I won’t give away its twist, but when the tables turn, the outcome is both harsh and poignant.

Snapshot gathers together seven videos and runs them simultaneously along one wall, framed in brightly colored wood frames like photographic portraits. This piece examines the nature of static portraiture, in that the images of the women at various stages of life move a little, just enough to add contour and contrast. When seen together, each moving image is an echo of a specific type of photographic style, matched with a related women’s role: the youngest girl plays a violin, the awkward teen stands stock still Sander-like, a young woman lies fetchingly on a chaise in a swimsuit, a young mother tends her baby, a middle aged woman poses for a studio portrait, an older, tired woman nervously eats chips in a car, and an elderly woman sits in an armchair in a dated flowered dress. The piece successfully tackles group memories, families, and women’s identities, spanning the history of black and white and color imagery.

I found the photographs in the show to be less striking and original. Three of the works are portraits of Wearing echoing famous images of Warhol, Mapplethorpe and Arbus. While the masking and staging are entirely successful (apart from the large eyes peering out from inside the bodies), the reverent inversion and identity mixing wasn’t as resonant for me; I understand the connection being made to artistic heroes and influences, but the visual idea seemed a bit too obvious. The single image of a bursting bouquet of artificial flowers is also well executed, but this “the flowers are fake” theme has been explored before (Vik Muniz in the 1990s as one example).

So while I didn’t find the photography in this show to be its strongest element, the three jarring and sophisticated videos are certainly worth a detour, even if video art lies beyond your normal area of interest.
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Collector’s POV: While it seems to happen more and more infrequently these days, once in a while, I still run into the buzz saw of conscious gallery misdirection when trying to gather prices for these reviews. In the past, I have had nothing but helpful, direct interactions with the staff at this gallery, but on this particular visit, I got a comical parody of a gallery run-around. Rather than exhaustively detail my five different inquiries to three different staff members and the subsequent exasperating sales pitches, let it suffice to say that the only actual price I ever received was $30000 for the 64×45 floral photograph; I was unable to get prices for any of the other works on view. I hope my fellow collectors who really want to follow up on Wearing’s work will have better luck extracting useful, actionable information than I did.

Wearing’s photographs have been only intermittently available in the auction markets in recent years, with only a handful of lots on offer; prices have ranged between roughly $10000 and $50000. As such, gallery retail is likely the best option for interested collectors at this point, assuming you can get someone to tell you the prices.

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

Reviews: NY Times (here), T Magazine (here), ARTINFO (here)

Gillian Wearing: People

Through June 24th

Tanya Bonakdar Gallery
521 West 21st Street
New York, NY 10011

Cao Fei: Play Time @Lombard-Freid

JTF (just the facts): A total of 12 works, displayed in the main gallery space, the back alcove, and on the outdoor terrace. There are 8 photographic works on view: 2 single image c-prints, framed in blond wood and not matted, each 35×47 in editions of 10, from 2011, and 6 c-print diptychs, framed in blond wood and not matted, each print 24×32, also in editions of 10, from 2011. The show also includes 2 single channel color videos with sound (one on a small flat screen, the other projected on an entire wall), both from 2011, 1 wooden tabletop sculpture, from 2011, and one garden installation. (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: In a relatively short span of time, Cao Fei has cemented her artistic position at the nexus of pop and youth culture, expanding how we experience and think about new trends and online communities. In recent projects, she has explored the virtual world of Second Life and documented cosplayers in the context of day-to-day China. This show continues this line of experimentation, remaking recognizable children’s TV characters and simple games by playing with the edges of reality and fantasy and adding in layers of subtle social commentary.

All of the photographs in this show come from the PostGarden series, where candy colored characters (the CBeebies from the BBC) have left their idyllic world and now travel through muddy dirt piles, highway underpasses, and smoking wastelands. Her images capture the stuffed figures escaping across an open field, pushing a shopping cart, living in a tent camp, and digging a grave for their dead father. The works are like a fairy tale gone bad, where honest simplicity and trusting innocence unexpectedly meet difficult reality. Many of the images are actually diptychs with an I Spy game built in, where the paired works have a handful of differences the viewer is supposed to try and spot. Even though this feels a little gimmicky, the technique definitely encourages a close inspection of the details, reinforcing just how odd the whole narrative structure really is.

A similar cartoon character device is used in one of the short videos, where the jaunty smile of Thomas the Tank Engine is grafted onto the front of a dusty truck hauling grimy trash and construction debris across town to the city dump; fun childhood adventures have been exchanged for ugly, mind numbing work. A second video uses silhouetted hand puppets to play out clever shadow stories with dark undertones and ominous political undercurrents.

In all of these works, things are not what they seem, and innocent cartoon symbols have been taken out of context, creating an entirely different “play” experience. Depending on your level of jadedness and sarcasm, it’s alternately sharply satirical and and sadly dispiriting to see these bouncing happy characters endure the harsh realities life has to dish out. In Cao Fei’s works, the soft, warm glow of these fantasy worlds has been drained away, leaving behind something more complicated and much less easily interpreted.

Collector’s POV: The photographic works in this show are priced as follows. The 35×47 single images are $13200 each (framed); the diptychs are also $13200 each (framed). Cao Fei’s work has only recently begun to enter the secondary markets, mostly in Asian Contemporary Art sales. As such, gallery retail is still likely the best option for interested collectors at this point.

If you don’t have an 11 year old boy in your house (like we do), you likely won’t have any idea what a Tech Deck is (it’s a small hand held replica skateboard that can be manipulated with your fingers). But if you can identify this trendy toy, I can absolutely guarantee that Cao Fei’s laminated wood miniature skatepark is the single most kid friendly artwork that you will see in a gallery this year. It combines various architectural features with ramps and rails, coming together in a dense tabletop extravaganza that will make your child’s eyes light up; don’t enjoy it too much, or you’ll be off the lumberyard cursing yourself as you try and recreate it.

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

Artist site (here)
Review: NY Times (here)

Cao Fei: Play Time
Through June 25th

Lombard-Freid Projects
518 West 19th Street
New York, NY 10001

Robert Mapplethorpe, 50 Americans @Kelly

JTF (just the facts): A total of 51 black and white and color photographs, variously framed and matted, and hung against red striped walls in the main gallery space, two smaller side rooms, and the hallway that connects them. Each photograph is labeled with information on the person who chose the image (name, state, profession, age, race), along with quotes about why the image was chosen, what it meant to him/her, and opinions about Mapplethorpe and his work. There are 46 gelatin silver prints and 5 dye transfer prints in the exhibit. Dates range from 1976 to 1989, with a few posthumous prints mixed in. Edition sizes start at 4+1 and continue up to 15+3, with several intermediate sizes. Physical dimensions range between 10×10 and 23×19, most in square format. (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: This exhibit is like a simple but well designed science experiment, testing the powers and limits of “crowdsourcing”. The story begins with 50 people, one individual from each of the 50 states, a broadly diverse sample based on age, gender, race, occupation, and lifestyle. This group was then exposed to a 2000 image online archive of the work of Robert Mapplethorpe and asked to choose one single picture each that was found to be of interest. These 50 pictures have then been displayed in no particular order as one gallery show, along with the comments and opinions of the participants on wall labels. As a construct, it seems like the kind of intellectually interesting idea that might produce something surprising or unexpected.

What actually emerges from this process is something quite a bit less novel. The kind of imagery that apparently resonates with “everyday Americans” is a watered down, more conservative Mapplethorpe: obvious flowers, Lisa Lyons nudes, children, classical body forms, and celebrity portraits. This show contains almost nothing controversial or provocative, by any broad definition; the elegance and precision of Mapplethorpe’s art is what has risen to the surface, as embodied in generally safe subject matter.

While there are plenty of thoughtful comments, reactions and opinions expressed by the team of selectors (including by those who had never heard of Mapplethorpe before), I don’t think professional curators have much to fear from this kind of democratization. An entirely random selection of 50 works from the archive would have produced an almost equally effective show; the only difference here is that the “explicitness” meter has been quietly but consciously turned down by the participants. As such, even though the photography on view is as exquisite as ever, this show isn’t really about Mapplethorpe or even his legacy. It’s more an investigation of the respectful mainstreaming and popularization of art, of how we choose to see what we want to see, somewhat regardless of the originality or intent of the artistic voice. For me, the exhibit was a strong reminder of why we need smart curators who challenge and jolt us, who take chances, make connections and explain backstories. Left to our own devices, we’ll still enjoy the pretty pictures and happily pick our favorites, but we’ll likely miss (or ignore) an entire layer of potential understanding (sometimes uncomfortable) that might have made us actually stop and think more deeply.
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Collector’s POV: The works in this show are priced between $8500 and $105000, with the majority under $30000; a few images are marked “price upon request” or “not for sale”. Mapplethorpe’s prints are ubiquitous in the secondary markets, with dozens of images coming up for sale in any given year. Prices range from a few thousand dollars for obscure images to well into six figures for his most iconic and well recognized works.

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)
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Transit Hub:

Foundation site (here)
Reviews: New Yorker (here), John Haber (here)

Robert Mapplethorpe, 50 Americans
Through June 18th
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Sean Kelly Gallery
528 West 29th Street
New York, NY 10001

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