Karl Haende "How to Have a Socially Responsible Orgasm and Other Life Lesson"
Harris Lieberman
This event has ended.
Haendel's exacting graphite drawings cull imagery from personal and cultural sources that touch on American production, consumption and conservation, as well as his painstakingly labor-intensive studio practice. The artist has likened his working process to that of a political commentator or editorialist, and his current exhibition provides both a meditation on authorship and a cautionary tale for these recessionary times.
Finding the recent national interest in recycling to be framed by a particularly American consumerist mindset, Haendel revisits World War II propaganda that encouraged the rationing of gas, food and other materials. Slogans like "Food is a Weapon: Don't Waste It!" hang alongside renderings of barking dogs, Humpty Dumpty, steam-engine trains and police tape, offering a potent set of symbols for industry and conservation alike.
Haendel accompanies these images with suggestions of a depleted economy too long dependent on overproduction and overconsumption, from his largely unframed, rough-hewn, teeming installation, to the graphite and spray-paint drawings that interpolate abstract patterning with representational crumples, and the packing materials littering the floor.
Media
Schedule
from May 02, 2009 to June 20, 2009
Opening Reception on 2009-05-02 from 18:00 to 20:00