In the summer of 1969, Peter Young left New York – and his studio on the Bowery – and set off for the American West, where he drifted around for nearly two years before settling down in Bisbee, Arizona, where he still resides.
John Yau
John Yau has published books of poetry, fiction, and criticism. His latest poetry publications include a book of poems, Further Adventures in Monochrome (Copper Canyon Press, 2012), and the chapbook, Egyptian Sonnets (Rain Taxi, 2012). His most recent monographs are Catherine Murphy (Rizzoli, 2016), the first book on the artist, and Richard Artschwager: Into the Desert (Black Dog Publishing, 2015). He has also written monographs on A. R. Penck, Jasper Johns, and Andy Warhol. In 1999, he started Black Square Editions, a small press devoted to poetry, fiction, translation, and criticism. He was the Arts Editor for the Brooklyn Rail (2007–2011) before he began writing regularly for Hyperallergic. He is a Professor of Critical Studies at Mason Gross School of the Arts (Rutgers University).
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India’s Nasreen Mohamedi Belongs to Everyone
After the filmmaker Nagisa Oshima was called the “Japanese Godard” for what must have been the umpteenth time, he wittily replied by calling Godard “the French Oshima.” I thought of Oshima’s response once more when I went to Nasreen Mohamedi: Becoming One at the Talwar Gallery (September 13–November 23).
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Jake Berthot Doesn’t Need To Be Original
For the past twenty years Jake Berthot has painted his vision of the Catskill Mountains, where he has lived since 1994, after living in Manhattan, much of it on the Bowery, for thirty years. A painter of what he calls “small sensations,” Berthot has included fourteen paintings and six drawings completed in the last three years, in his current solo exhibition at Betty Cuningham (October 17–November 30, 2013).
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Francisca Sutil’s Method of Counting Time
Francisca Sutil is a Chilean abstract artist who lived in New York from 1977 until 1992, when she returned to Santiago, Chile, where she currently lives and works. She came to New York to study printmaking at Pratt Institute. In 1978, she discovered papermaking and, within a short time that included a basic how-to class, mastered the process.
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The World According to Wirsum
Do you ever wonder how stupid the New York art world can be? Well, if you don’t have enough proof, here is another example to add to your cache. Karl Wirsum at Derek Eller (October 12–November 16) is the artist’s first exhibition of recent work in New York since 1988.
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Dark Paintings Done in a Dark Time: Lester Johnson’s Men
Lester Johnson (1919–2010) was an innovative figurative painter who has never quite fit into any of the accepted narratives of postwar American art, and that alone makes his work worthy of a longer look.
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Peter Acheson’s Obdurate and Tender Talismans
Some artists need to be gurus, always insisting on their elevated place in the hierarchy, while others are happy if younger artists look up to them, content to have companions on their solitary journey. Peter Acheson belongs to the latter group, which is one of the reasons why his current exhibition, Rusted Giacometti, is taking place at NOVELLA (October 13–November 17, 2013), the latest addition to the still-expanding, Lower East Side gallery scene.
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An American in Paris: Shirley Jaffe’s Paintings from the 1970s
About her work, Shirley Jaffe has stated: “I want a certain tenseness, a congestion or a combination of forms in which none is stronger than any other. I’m interested in the idea of coexistence.” In her current exhibition, Shirley Jaffe: Paintings from the 1970s at Tibor de Nagy (October 17–November 23, 2013), there are six paintings, most of which were done around the middle of the decade. They remain fresh.
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How to Kiss the Sky: Kyle Staver’s Recent Paintings
You don’t see Kyle Staver’s dark, moonlit domains so much as become their invisible and unacknowledged witness and ally. In an age riddled with cynicism and laced with irony, she envisions a shameless alternative in which mythological figures, such as Daphne, Andromeda, Syrinx, Perseus, and a satyr, are at home.
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The Poet-Magus of the Lower East Side
Imagine the following scenario: You and your wife live on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. You start a greeting card company, Ink Weed Arts, in 1951, just after the two of you get married. You are a poet and she is a dancer who works as a hand and foot model in advertising. The two of you want to offer an alternative to the insipid messages of Hallmark Cards.
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Weekend Studio Visit: Rick Beerhorst in Grand Rapids, Michigan
GRAND RAPIDS, Michigan — I first met Rick Beerhorst in 1986, when he was a graduate student in the MFA program at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana. One of his teachers was Peter Bodnar, whose small, quirky, symbolic abstractions with a spiritual undercurrent — they share something with Jain cosmology — have flown under the radar for many years. I know of two other artists who studied with him and hold him in high regard: Christopher Brown and Tom Lieber.
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Systems That Set You Free: Current Work by Steve Roden
At last, New York is getting to see a broad range of work by Steve Roden, an L.A.-based artist who makes paintings, drawings, sculptures, sound compositions and sound installations determined by self-invented systems.