NYAB Event - "20/20/2013" Exhibition

"20/20/2013" Exhibition

Studio 10

This event has ended.

A group exhibition of work by Kevin Curran, Paul D’Agostino, Barbara Friedman,Joan Logue, Cathy Nan Quinlan and Adam Simon. These artists use art history as a participatory matrix for their practice. This exhibition also references the meta-dialogues of critical art historiography and appropriation.
Kevin Curran’s Rothko Blanket, 2013, was made as an iconic object and as a part of ‘art history.’ Curran’s impulse was to make the blanket accessible in a physical way, something to curl up with. He sought to remove the Rothko painting from a rarefied context by casually positioning the blanket on the floor or on a chair in contrast to on the white wall of a gallery or museum. In so doing, Curran literally brings Rothko’s painting down to earth. Rothko's discussion of his work in emotional terms and his struggles with depression were part of Curran’s selection. Curran said, “I wanted to make the image into something that could be warm and comforting to someone.”
Barbara Friedman’s work excavates performance and painting. Her pieces are made in situ in museums and derive from classical paintings. When working, Friedman adheres to each museum’s protocol and navigates the dynamics of public space. She performs as the artist with museum visitors while continuing the tradition of copying work to hone skills. Friedman’s intent, however, lies beyond this exercise. She aims to publicly participate with a collection of canonical works. In so doing, she becomes a part of their contemporary context.
Similarly, Adam Simon’s paintings reference the art historical canon. Simon steals images from art history, converts them into silhouettes and inappropriately combines them in paintings that echo his previous work using stock photo imagery. He leaves the details that are absent in the silhouette to be re-imagined by the viewer. The viewer is confronted with a painting about painting.
Il bacio diviso (The Divided Kiss), 2013, is one of Paul D’Agostino’s most recent works in a series called Nocturnes, paintings he describes as composed with an “iterative palette and process—pertaining to chromatic repetitions and execution-related gestures—and thus invariably present in diptych or triptych form.” Although his Nocturnes do not directly correspond to the tradition of 'nocturnal painting,' they do evidence certain thematic and formal similarities in their vesperal moods and palettes. They also share musically inspired underpinnings. In creating this Nocturne, D’Agostino aimed to suggest 14th- or 15th-century subjects and colors in the depiction of two figures juxtaposed in a sundered embrace.
Cathy Nan Quinlan’s work is primarily focused on developing strategies of “working from life.” The paintings in this exhibition are part of an ongoing series that began with an opportunity for Quinlan to see Giorgio Morandi’s etchings. Quinlan says these works were “motivated by the desire to continue them [Morandi’s prints] in paint.” Morandi used cross-hatching to model the form of an object and its context. Morandi’s small etchings can only be seen in close proximity, while Quinlan’s paintings are resolved at a distance.Quinlan’s work has been exhibited at Storefront, Norte Maar, the Valentine Gallery and Parallel Art Space. She is the founder of The ‘temporary Museum and author of “The Platonic Solids” and “My Collection.”
Joan Logue has made video portraits since 1971. Many are silent portraits (20 minute sittings) and include subjects like John Cage, Willem de Kooning, Joan Mitchell, Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns. Other video portraits include those of Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez and street people from Brazil, France, Spain and NYC. Her most current portrait is of Noam Chomsky. From1979 through 1999, Ms. Logue created a series of 30 Second Portraits for television: “Spots” on performance artists; composers; dancers; writers; photographers; traditional dancers from Burma, China, Japan, India, Korea and Spain; and New England fishermen.