New York
Leo Castelli Gallery
Richard Artschwager’s work is not exactly Pop in the sense of Oldenburg’s sculpture or, for that matter, works by George Segal, Marjorie Strider, or Robert Indiana. The question has arisen more than once as to whether Artschwager belongs in the category of Pop at all. But where else? He appears to have liberated himself from all the trappings of maintaining a surface mode of aesthetics. Though he carries certain mannerisms with him, he is not burdened by the necessity to conform to any of them. For this reason, Artschwager might appear as a mystery unto himself. Considering his past exhibitions at Castelli, then Mary Boone, and eventually David Noland and Larry Gagosian (focusing only on New York galleries), the artist’s changes appear less remarkable than do his consistencies. His prowess and inventiveness draw less on shifting the premises of his art than on conjuring variations or on finding new semiotic conjugations. Artschwager deals with the reality of the everyday world, but not quite in the Pop Art sense. Instead, he distances himself from the politics of labels and the manifestations of style. …see the entire review in the print version of April’s Sculpture magazine.
