New York Casa Frela Gallery “Harlem Roots,” Michele Brody’s recent show, paid homage to the neighborhood where she has lived for half a dozen years. Brody is an environmentalist/artist committed to community work (one reason for the show) and to sustainable art that incorporates seeds and living plants into simple but elegantly constructed installations.
2013 DeCordova Biennial
Lincoln, Massachusetts DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum Organized by curator Lexi Lee Sullivan, the deCordova’s third biennial had a retro vibe and ad hoc feel, featuring works from across New England that demonstrated connections to mainstream multi-disciplinary trends.
Donald Fodness
Denver Rude Gallery, Rocky Mountain College of Art Viewers entered Donald Fodness’s installation, LUVRZ B H8RZ, through a beaded curtain, the kind that separates one living space from another in apartments too tiny to warrant full-fledged doors.
The Next Step Forward: Lin Yan
Lin Yan comes from an illustrious Chinese art family. Her grandfather, Pang Xunqin, studied painting in Paris from 1925 through 1930 and developed something of a Western outlook; when he returned to Shanghai in 1931, he established the Storm Society, the first influential modern avant-garde group in China.
Beauties and Beasts: A Conversation with Mia Westerlund Roosen
A sculptor of note since the early 1970s, Mia Westerlund Roosen showed at the Sable-Castelli Gallery in Toronto, Willard Gallery in New York, then Leo Castelli from 1976–88, one of a handful of women represented by the legendary dealer.
Shift Capacity: Gereon Krebber
Pigeon deterrents, glue, nylon, marijuana, film, spray paint, wood. Such are the materials listed for Gereon Krebber’s Let’s talk about it later (2010). Without a doubt, Krebber loves materials that we would not expect in an art context.
Looking for the Wreck: A Conversation with John Umphlett
For the past 15 years, John Umphlett has developed a body of work in which his own body, placed under extreme duress, is a central feature. Whether dangling over cars, somersaulting through the air, or being slowly dragged through a gallery, Umphlett relentlessly explores the limits of bodily endurance through his provocative performance pieces.
Actualizing Potential: A Conversation with Simon Starling
Simon Starling’s complex interdisciplinary practice draws from a vast network of successively interconnected parts. Between craftsmanship, industry, process, site, technology, and art history, it’s immediately possible to get hooked on surface or superficial value alone—Starling’s work is easy to digest, humorous, quick-witted, and materially lush.
“No Man’s Land”
Helsinki Forum Box Entering the gallery brought viewers into contact with an unexpected obstacle: Ilmari Gryta’s full-size transit shelter. Coated in reflective material and situated in the dimly lit entrance, it halted movement as visitors examined their reflections and the reversed view of the street behind them.
Buster Simpson
Seattle Frye Art Museum Buster Simpson’s recent, and long overdue, retrospective proved a major undertaking on a number of fronts. The challenge for curator Scott Lawrimore was to contain Simpson’s far-flung sensibility, but not taxidermize it.
