At Bomblog George Negroponte writes about William Baziotes, an AbEx painter whose work, although included in most major museum collections in his lifetime, is not as well known as that of his contemporaries. “So where is Baziotes in our consciousness today, nearly 50 years after his untimely death and on the centennial of his birth in 1912? Probably somewhere at the edge of a discussion, respected but lost in the art world reality show of today. There are no astronomical prices by Baziotes recorded at auction. There�s not much critical attention. In a more attentive culture, Baziotes would have been safeguarded from this inexcusable neglect.”
Image above: William Baziotes, Dwarf, 1947. Collection Museum of Modern Art. Last exhibited in the AbEx show at Moma.
I saw the new James Bond movie, Skyfall, yesterday (my new favorite Bond film), and paintings are surprisingly plentiful. One subplot includes a stolen painting that looks very much like a Modigiliani, and in fact, it is. According to BBC News, Woman with Fan, painted by Amedeo Modigliani in 1919 (pictured above), was stolen in May 2010 from the Museum of Modern Art in Paris in a heist that included work by Picasso, Braque, Matisse and Leger. The paintings have never been recovered. (via Judith Bridgland)
Walking from the Upper East Side to Midtown yesterday, I braved the glut of Black Friday tourists to visit a few galleries, only to find that the Baldessari show, a series of new paintings based on fragments of art historical sources, on display at Marian Goodman, had closed on Wednesday. Note to self: pay more attention to dates. “On one hand I think the older an image is the more it is exhausted of meaning � where it is a clich�,” Baldesari said in a 2004 conversation with Ann Goldstein. “It�s dead. Because clich�s are dead. I like the idea of playing Dr. Frankenstein and reinvesting the dead, a metaphor, with life again. Because clich�s are true � they just have lost their meaning. And I can pump another kind of meaning back into it, but you are still aware of the source and where I�m directing the traffic.” The new paintings are inkjet prints, around 100 x 60 inches, overpainted with oil and acrylic. Image above, New Coat of Paint, 2012.
And, continuing the debate about sincerity vs. irony:
“on/sincerity,” at Boston University’s 808 Gallery through December 16. Curated by Lynne Cooney and Liz Munsell. Artists included: Magda Archer, Ivan Aragote, Juan Betancurth, Davis/Cherubini, Charles Gute, Jessica Gath, Kalup Linzy, Institute for Infinitely Small Things, Jesse Kaminisky, Carlos Martiel, Rob Matthews, Anne McGuire, Taylor McVay & Jordan Tynes, Laurel Nakadate, Platform2, William Powhida, Jordan Tynes, Analia Saban, Wayne Stokes, Douglas Weathersby, and Suara Welitoff.
“The theme of sincerity is approached through four fluid narratives to engage a few of the myriad readings of this commonplace yet enigmatic term: Artists who describe their collaborative processes and interactions with materials as both the means and the content of their work; artists whose work serves to build relationships and community through generosity and exchange; artists who employ their own bodies as expressions of intimacy, vulnerability, or the complexity of human relations; and artists who appropriate the manipulative visual languages of mass-media to create self-reflexive forms of communication…”
Image above: Analia Saban,
Representation of a Cactus, 2011, acrylic on linen
40 x 40 inches.
Courtesy Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York
(Thanks @bigredandshiny for pointing out the show)
——
Subscribe to Two Coats of Paint by email.
Wow this art is great I would love to see it on Art Radio its a great place to go to find great artwork, and this artwork would be a great addition to the site.