Author Archives: Linnea

15,145 Pages. No, I’m not talking about Dickens or Proust.

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15, 145 pages. Several hundred drawings. It was hardly what the landlords of Henry Darger expected to find in their deceased tenant’s room. Darger had an uneventful life of poverty and janitorial work, so his long novel and extremely detailed drawings charting the wild adventures of his favorite characters, the Vivian girls, were quite the surprise. I watched the awesome PBS documentary “In the Realms of the Unreal,” which charts the biography of Henry Darger and how his life affected his writings and drawings.

Among his various works, including a biography, he is famous for the 15,145-page, single-spaced fantasy manuscript called The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glandeco– Angelinnian War Storm, Caused by the Child Slave Rebellion, along with several hundred drawings and watercolor paintings illustrating the story. Darger’s work has become one of the most celebrated examples of outsider art. It shows the power of imagination and obsessiveness over the humblest circumstances. 


To my joy, I was walking by the American Folk Art Museum yesterday, and saw that they are currently showing an exhibition called Up Close: Henry Darger and Coloring Books. What luck!

Remember That You Will Die: Death Across Cultures

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Remember that you will die: Death across Cultures is probably one of the nicest exhibitions I’ve seen in a while, combing East and West, art and craft, history and culture as it does in a small but rich way. The Rubin Museum of Art is creating a top notch space for the art of the Himalayas in a way that draws connections and entices the viewer to learn more. Top skull and left skull pocket watch of European origin. Right, Lord of the Charnal Grounds mask used by dancers and below image of hellfires of Eastern origin. The different memento mori are rather more similar across cultures than one might think. All present death in terrifying aspect. The image below only solidifies the horror– o the horror!


However, as the museum notes, “Yes, you will die. But at least you can write about it.” And thus they offer a very fun essay contest that will let you take a stab at death, if only with a pen. I’m planning on entering myself. 

New and Old: Uta Barth at Tanya Bonakdar

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…to walk without destination and to see only to see. (Untitled 10.1)
 

…to walk without destination and to see only to see. (Untitled 10.2)
 

…to walk without destination and to see only to see. (Untitled 10.3)
 

...to walk without destination and to see only to see. (Untitled 10.4)

This new series of photographs by Uta Barth on view at the Tanya Bonakdar gallery is a contemplative, lovely, very contemporary body of work. I love how there is a sense of process suggested by the similar subject over time and season. Initially, I didn’t connect these large, color works as the product of the same artist who created the small, black and white photos in the back room, which seemed more concerned with negative space than lyricism. Yet Barth created both, albeit 30 years apart. Do I like them both? Yes of course. If I had to choose a faovorite however, the group of small black and white photographs Every Day, below, carries the day with me…by far! Click on the image to enlarge it and get a sense of the playful capture of the everyday and the beautifully framed shots.


Every Day
 


All Images are courtesy of the artist and Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York