Sam Cornish interviews John Elderfield about Helen Frankenthaler's work from the 1950s on the occasion of the exhibition Helen Frankenthaler: Painted on 21st Street - 1950 -1959, at Gagosian Gallery, New York, on view through April 13, 2013. Elderfield remarks: "Looking again at about thirty of Helen’s great 1950s works, I was especially struck by
Geoff Tuck reviews an exhibition of paintings by Henry Taylor at Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, on view through March 30, 2013. Tuck writes: "Henry Taylor reveals much about human nature in [The 'We' Hours, 2012], as he does in other paintings in the show. Taylor challenges us to move beyond a reliance on recognizable
Robert Moeller reviews the exhibition Paint Things: Beyond The Stretcher at the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, Lincoln, MA, on view through April 21, 2013. Moeller writes: "As [exhibition curator Dina] Deitsch so aptly states, 'The artists collected in this exhibition paint things. They literally paint things. And by doing so they welcome the notion
Caroline Picard interviews painter Ann Toebbe about her work on the occasion of the exhibition Ann Toebbe: The Inheritance at Ebersmore, Chicago, on view through March 30, 2013. Toebbe remarks: "I have a knack for flattening space. It wasn’t considered a great asset in my early training in drawing and painting but I have cultivated
A Bascove reviews the exhibition Jaune Quick-to-See Smith: Water and War at Accola Griefen, New York, on view through April 6, 2013. Bascove writes: "The figures in these paintings are unique to the land of Native Americans, transmitting the force of its endurance. There is a recitation of the struggles of indigenes peoples and the
Curator Nick Moore writes about the Intimate Abstraction, and exhibition of works by John Bunker, John Eaves, Patrick Jones, Frank Bowling, at The Searchers Contemporary, Bristol, on view through April 5, 2013. Moore notes: "The title of this exhibition derives partly from the size of the gallery and the choice of smaller works to include
Bradley Rubenstein interviews painter Susan Bee about her life, her career, and her recent work. Asked about her newest work (which will be on view at Accola Griefen Gallery, New York from May 23 to June 29, 2013) Bee comments: "I have become very taken by the idea of theatricality and artifice. I am creating
Nadiah Fellah talks to painter Vera Iliatova on the occasion of the exhibition Vera Iliatova: Days of Never at Monya Rowe Gallery, New York, on view through April 13, 2013. Iliatova comments: "Color is very important in my process and it is the first thing that I think about when I start each painting. For
After visiting the recent exhibition Franz Kline: Coal and Steel at Baruch College's Sidney Mishkin Gallery, Tim Keane blogs about the origins of Franz Kline's classic black and white paintings and their unique ability embody a "kinetic" effect. Keane writes: "To the extent that they represent an object outside themselves, Kline’s black-and-whites grasp the kinetic
William Eckhardt Kohler reviews an exhibition of paintings by Peter Williams, on view at Foxy Production, New York, on view through March 23, 2013. Kohler writes: "The paintings of Peter Williams... are, in no particular order, hallucinogenic, acerbic, pained, beautiful, confessional, obsessive, critical, jarring, wild, weird and profoundly human. They are born from Williams' experiences
Ed Winkleman talks to painter Amanda Church about her work. Asked about the particular combination of abstraction and representaion in her work, Church notes: "when I was spending a lot of time in LA I would sketch from things around me: buildings, swimming pools, trees and flowers, and sometimes people. These drawings eventually became paintings
Julia Schwartz interviews painter Jennifer Wynne Reeves about her work and practice. Reeves recalls: "In High School I became very interested in theatre and was the lead in several plays and musicals. Theatre brought me out. I loved it. I found a family there. We had a great program, a large auditorium as well as
Thomas Micchelli blogs about Matisse's 1948 painting Interior with Egyptian Curtain (Phillips Collection) currently on view in the exhibition Matisse: In Search of True Painting at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, on view through March 17, 2013. Micchelli writes: "Matisse has painted not one picture but three abutted together: the window, the curtain
Dan Coombs reviews an exhibition of works by Albert Oehlen at The Zabludowicz Collection, London, on view through August 11, 2013. Coombs writes that Oehlen "seems to sustain his practice through a belief in painting’s formal possibilities. He is ... willing to get lost in colour, shape and line. The more recent work is intense
Zachary Keeting and Christopher Joy talk to painter Darina Karpov at her exhibition Sudden Leap Into the Interior at Pierogi, Brooklyn, on view through March 17, 2013. In a 2011 interview with Andrew Frank for BOMB, Karpov noted: " It’s very appropriate to see my work through the temporal lens and to think of it
Paul Behnke photo blogs visits to several painting shows on view in Chelsea in March, including: Andrew Masullo at Mary Boone Gallery (through April 27), Baker Overstreet: Frown Upside Down at Fredericks & Freiser (through March 30), Hope Gangloff at Susan Inglett Gallery (through March 23), and Al Held: Alphabet Paintings Cheim & Read (through
Xico Greenwald reviews the retrospective exhibition A Formal Realist: The Works of John Dubrow at the Demuth Museum, Lancaster, PA, on view through May 19, 2013. Greenwald writes: "Dubrow’s work amounts to a full-throated argument for the continued vitality of painting today... Westbeth View North, 2001-2005, is also a smashing work. Painted from a studio
Alan Pocaro reviews an exhibition of paintings by Judith Geichman at Carrie Secrist Gallery, Chicago, on view through March 30, 2013. Pocaro writes: "Working within the sparest of parameters, Geichman’s paintings are thrilling displays of dexterity. Her square supports and strictly achromatic blend of acrylic and enamel paint evoke the kind of old-school, unabashedly mid-century
Ron Scott interviews painter Chris Hyndman on the occasion of his solo exhibition Susanne Hilberry Gallery, Michigan, on view through March 30, 2013. Hyndman comments: "I’m very interested in digital surfaces, screen technology surfaces, and the way they give us imagery. They have a particular kind of texture, color, and a thinness, which produces a
Julian Kreimer remembers painter Denyse Thomasos (1964-2012). Kreimer writes: "The question [Thomasos] faced throughout her career, the one that led her towards wall-works, is one that many artists grapple with, and is particularly acute for painters: how to reconcile her interest in politics with her calling as an artist. The vast scale of her major