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Philip Slein exhibit evokes Pollock, George Lucas
(by Dickson Beall - July 08, 2009)
Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, the current group exhibition at the Philip Slein Gallery, presents artists looking back to abstract expressionism for their inspiration. The influences of space travel, digital imagery and special effects in cinema have given a 21st-century twist to the mark-making of these younger artists.
Not content with a contemporary art landscape constrained by the context of pop, post-minimalism and perceptual exercise, this group flips conceptual art on its head. For them, the idea is not the object. Their thing consists in imagining in the mind’s eye, then presenting the resulting works of art as real expressions of both inner and outer fragmentation.
The show includes some 20 works, by nine artists, who might easily have apprenticed with both Jackson Pollock and George Lucas. Think of the action of Pollock as seen through controlled aesthetics of Lucas. Although young, these are all established New York artists, accomplished in travel to other spaces and other times.
In “Blue Field Entoptic Phenomenon,” Gordon Terry drips and pours acrylic paints onto glossy acrylic panels, as he brings mind-bending control to strikingly organic shapes. Beautiful to the eye, a purple-blue planet quietly resides in deep space but could, in another context (say, a medical one), evoke terror. Random reflections from the gallery and street add yet other dimensions of ambiguity.
The flow from Oliver Warden’s brushing and pouring of paint embodies slow time — a geologic era that is in no hurry. Oil paint is piled onto “Caldera,” mixed on the canvas and, like volcanic rock, built into a topographic history. It’s the high energy of a neon-colored computerized pinball machine culture, joined with a poisoned nature and thrown out of control. Dangerously flowing lava and the oozing of life-threatening chemicals come together in a new and unknown environment.
In “Terra Incognita,” Britton Tolliver takes the viewer to unknown worlds where neither hope nor despair wins out. He builds sculptural shapes onto a terrain where organic lives alongside geometric. Using a dynamic palette and layering transparent greens, blues, oranges and pinks, Tolliver imagines a world of rough and shiny, order and chaos. This is a landscape illuminated by the fluorescent tubes of Dan Flavin.
My favorite work in the show, even before I knew the meaning of the title, is Marc Handelman’s “Force Multiplier.” Appropriating images is nothing new; here Handelman uses transfer techniques similar to what Robert Rauschenberg and the master of pop, Andy Warhol, have used. Handelman’s images are often lifted from the commercial world. This painting zooms in on a piece of advertising from the Obama campaign. Yet neither subject matter nor any representational image is needed for this to be what it is — a beautiful and coolly rendered work of art, an elegant and atmospheric landscape. This is a master at the top of his game.
“Dip in the Hip” is a small yet deftly painted acrylic and latex work by Emilio Perez, another artist who makes no preparatory drawing. Instead, Perez maintains an exuberant freshness in his work by cutting into layers of paint with a razor blade, shaping the latex acrylic, while cutting away sections and exposing a beautiful gray under-painting.
The rhythmic beauty of Perez’s swirling organic shapes contrasts with Erik Oost’s technical bravura, as he creates visual special effects from cubistic forms — a crystalline world that has fractured into panes of glass. In “Untitled,” Oost uses oil and spray paint to build planes of ominous greens, lush blues and tarry blacks against a background of smoldering reds and yellows.
Another action painter who moves directly to paint without any preparatory drawings is Daniel Hesidence. In “Untitled (1779/Pedestrians),” Hesidence pulls the viewer into what may be a sidewalk scene of blurs and smears — the movement of people passing quickly on the street. Or are we traveling with the artist through an interstellar mission? The source of the imagery doesn’t matter; the material of paint and the way it’s applied on different focal planes suggest movement and reflection, and that’s the only thing that matters. The whites, ochres and de Kooning pinks — brushed, slashed and thickly layered upon the canvas object — carry with them a dream-like suggestion of awe. Is this a confrontation with the sublime? Or a construct created by the mind’s eye?
Independent New York curator Joseph R. Wolin selected these mind-boggling works and translated them into an interpretive essay that accompanies the well-illustrated catalog. The exhibition holds up intelligent gallery standards that are plain and simple, as well as entertaining. Yet I wondered, where are the women artists in this assemblage? Maybe it’s just that galactic art travel is a guy thing. I don’t know.
I do know that, while local temperatures outside are soaring, New York cool visits St. Louis hot at Philip Slein. Go grab an eyeful of post-Pollock drip and dazzle the mind.
• Splinter of the Mind’s Eye continues at the Philip Slein Gallery, 1319 Washington Ave., through July 18.
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