Visual Arts
The places where Pieter Saenredam worked were never the same after he committed them to paper and paint. His single known painting of a building in Amsterdam -– of the old town hall –- became iconic during the life of the artist.
“Galileo’s Muse” is a gem of a book: shedding new light on a figure as well-examined as Galileo is no simple task. Author Mark Peterson does so with aplomb, while also telling a fascinating story of the evolution of mathematics and the arts.
Man Ray | Lee Miller, Partners in Surrealism explores the relationship between two of the most celebrated surrealists of the 20th century, but the pattern of influence comes off as revealingly lopsided — the female artist of the pair more often than not inspired the male.
Part of the great experiment that is Artisan’s Asylum: meeting your neighbors, realizing you need someone to help you solder/weld/create a 3d prototype, and then wandering amongst the open workspaces until you meet a co-collaborator.
This is the fourth installment of Debra Cash’s coverage of events associated with the Institute of Contemporary Art’s Dance/Draw exhibition.
Wendy Artin is not just about representation. Her paintings bring up all sorts of questions about the complexities of beauty. How do we build up beauty from matter? What happens to beauty over time? Does an object lose its beauty when time wears away at it?
Inescapably erotic, flowers are all about desire. What are they but a glorious exhibition and frame of their own genitals?
What makes one opinion better than another? (Some opinions have been challenged more than others. Tested opinions are worth more than untested ones.) Can’t one enjoy an aesthetic experience without having to put it into words? (Absolutely, but those of us who write art criticism don’t have the luxury.)
“Dance/Draw” at the ICA is a major exhibit about how moving bodies leave traces, what curator Helen Molesworth, not particularly originally, calls the “afterlife of dance.” To a lesser extent, it’s also about how visual artists think about motion when they’re not focused on particular bodies.
Visual Art Commentary: Silence Is Complicity — Why Museums Must Use Their Voice to Defend Democracy