Category Archives: installation

Facade: Richard Wood at the Lever House

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I noticed Richard Wood’s new work being put up at the Lever House the other night. The artist is covering parts of the exterior with patterned fiberglass panels. The British artist designed William Morris-inspired natural patterns and mock Tudor styles in saturated colors to liven up the facade of the once-sleek, Modernist structure.

Prior to this installation, the Lever House had commissioned Barbara Kruger to cover the walls with her typically graphic slogans. Here we have another design-oriented, saturated, flat approach to taking over the building by covering it in the respective artist’s trademark style. It is as if different artists each have their chance to tag the building. Except of course, this is hardly illicit behavior. It is instead commissioned, no doubt for a pretty sum, authorized, and displayed like the status mark it is.

Installation by day- mostly complete

While Kruger’s installation got some flack on this blog, at least it said something. A trite, literal something–but it attempted a statement. Wood’s installation has no such purpose. It is a design–patterns I would buy an H+M skirt or IKEA tiles in quite happily. I think it is attractive. I cannot think of something more devoid of content.
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The interest is supposed to lie in playing historical styles against one another. The title of this project, Port Sunlight, is a reference to the history of the building just as his designs refer to the history of architecture. I don’t know–do you think that there is anything more to be said about it? If so, you can check out this press release with more details on it.
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Anna Jóelsdóttir: Near Chaos

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There is turmoil in the world, too many dots to connect; we are many outsiders floating around lost centers. I want my work to reflect that near chaos. – Artist Statement

Of the openings I went to in Chelsea last night, I saw a lot of more, or less, successful toyings with geometric shapes and color (nostalgia much?). What a relief then, to come upon Anna Jóelsdóttir’s show priest chews velvet haddock at the Stux Gallery.

For this exhibition, the Chicago-based Icelandic artist produced mylar installations, paintings, a really extraordinary journal, and a big game of pick up sticks. While that may seem like quite a range of objects, they were very much unified by a stark, sprawling, detailed aesthetic that was precise yet evocative. It was too crowded to get a good installation shot last night, so I pulled the images above from Stux’s website. The artist folds, cuts, and otherwise manipulates the painted mylar into a variety of complex forms. The mylar shows her typical thin streaks and spurts of color on a white background.

When the Bough Breaks

Jóelsdóttir’s paintings, also on white backgrounds with pulsing color connected by thin lines, create poetic yet direct images. Somehow even where there is chaos and tension, there is also a sort of peace. I’m not sure how well these paintings reproduce here, but seeing them last night I was struck by how refreshing and clean the white background was, and how well the artist used the thin crawling lines to explode the space. They felt very personal and immediate. I like how they reconcile what ought to be opposite characteristics, like emotion and coolness, and strength and delicacy. They’ll be up through the New Year if you have a chance to go by, and I recommend you do. More about the artist on her website.

Bent Horizons

Zee: Don’t Panic

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I held tightly to the rope with one hand while with the other I pulled my shirt over my face. The smoke was making me cough, and I could hear others around me coughing too. I couldn’t see them through the thick fog. I noticed how it changed and brightened into yellow. I held the rope tighter because I couldn’t see anything except a blinding kaleidoscope of slowly shifting light colors. As the waiver I had so blithely signed advised, I did not panic. (Luckily nor did I go into an epileptic fit.) When the guides told us we could walk around, I let go of the rope and started walking in slow motion through the colored light that changed in tune with the ambient droning.

If you have ever been on a boat in fog, you can approximate the disorientation this installation, Zee by Kurt Hentschläger, creates. In 10 minute intervals, small groups go into this immersive light and sound experience from which the artist hopes to create a mental landscape. It reminded me very much of Christopher Saunder’s Whitenoise Suite No. 3, left, partially because the performance ended with the same dense orange fog. It successfully unmoores you from your surroundings. Coughing from the smoke is distracting, but overall it plays with perception beautifully. What would be really interesting, and I think meditative, is to experience it for a longer period of time.
While toying with perceptions and light can create a beautiful enviornment, I find this kind of work to lack- how shall I say?- content. Or subject matter. Or a point. To experience an installation like this one is fun, but it is hardly a revelation. We know fog and lights can be manipulated. That larger caveat aside, it is fun, and it is being performed at 3LD Art & Technology Center through November 15.