4 NOW Gilles Giuntini Anahita Mekanik Edmond Praybe Carolyn Sheehan clockwise from left: Carolyn Sheehan, Untitled, 2014, mixed media on paper, 48 x 32 inches Gilles Giuntini, The Modesty of Claret Petacci, 2014, mixed materials, 34 x 38 x 24 inches Anahita Mekanik, Deliverance, 2013, mixed media, 60 x 18 x 18 inches Edmond Praybe, Evening Light, 2015, oil on panel, 12 x 16 inches December 1 - 19 Opening Reception: Saturday, December 5, 3 - 5pm First Street Gallery caps off the year with 4 Now, an exciting new exhibition that celebrates the unique and dynamic visions of four of its newest artists, Gilles Giuntini, Anahita Mekanik, Edmond Praybe, and Carolyn Sheehan. Gilles Giuntini fabricates complex intimate narratives that reference both historical and personal events. These carefully crafted pieces are at once seductive but beyond reach. The viewer is drawn in, but kept at a distance. This physical tension is at the core of each piece. Through irony and humor Giuntini weaves disparate scenarios into something familiar...a world of paradox and hypocrisy.    Anahita Mekanik is a story-teller who speaks through the random objects that find their way into her life. The more damaged, old and ordinary these are, the more potent are the memory and message they carry. By giving a new soul to these abandoned treasures, she participates in the universal ritual of transformation.   Edmond Praybe makes paintings that attempt to reevaluate perceptions of the environment he inhabits while celebrating the union of observation, invention, and memory. The works are literal explorations - made on-site or at least partially so - as well as artist explorations, dealing with a variety of attitudes concerning color, structure, scale, and narrative. Edmond searches for broadly identifiable themes and feelings in the image, while also depicting a specific sense of time and place in each piece.   Carolyn Sheehan creates art works that are best described by color and images. She combines creativity and imagination with emotions in every piece with the sole purpose of not only creating an aesthetic that impacts the feelings but causes pleasure as well. Every piece is worked like a sculpture: three dimensional and take shape in a style in which the icon is always the focal point.       For more info go to:http://www.firststreetgallery.org/exhibitions/2015-2016-season-archive/4-now-press-release/    Gallery Hours: 11 am - 6 pm, Tuesday through Saturday 526 West 26th Street, Suite 209, New York, New York 10001 646-336-8053 · 646-336-8054 (fax)

Zavaglia at Lyons Wier Gallery

Verso detail: Martina 2015, Hand embroidery: One ply cotton, silk, and wool thread on Belgian linen with acrylic paint background
14.5 x 30.5 in / 36.8 x 77.5 cm

Martina 2015, Hand embroidery: One ply cotton, silk, and wool thread on Belgian linen with acrylic paint background
13.5 x 10 in / 34.3 x 25.4 cm
14.5 x 11 in / 36.8 x 27.9 cm (framed size)

“About Face” is an incredible portrait show.  Zavaglia has made small, intimate portraits of very ordinary looking faces intensely extraordinary by hand embroidering.  There are some paintings and some large paintings that are no less extraordinary as the paint is mimicking the threadwork.  Both examples are just stunning.  Even the “plain” painted backgrounds to these portraits are interesting and filled with thoughtful texture and intensely neutral colors.  The faces themselves take on a bas relief feel as they are built up with actual texture and layers upon layers of threads.  Don’t just look at the meticulously rendered front of these pieces.  On display is a 360 degree view of one and the back is just as psychologically disturbingly beautiful as the front is a mastery of the unexpected beauty of mundane.   I have a fascination with art featuring the mundane and everyday rendered in a way that reveals beauty. 

“About Face” is up through December 12^th at Lyons Weir on West 24^th street.    

http://www.lyonswiergallery.com/zavaglia.html

 

Morandi

Natura morta (Still Life), 1952
Oil on canvas
16 1/8 x 18 1/8 inches (41 x 46 cm)
Framed: 22 1/16 x 24 3/16 x 2 3/16 inches (56 x 61.5 x 5.5 cm)
Private Collection
© 2015 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/SIAE, Rome

 

 

 

 

I just don’t get it.  I really don’t mind Morandi.  He is okay.  Nearly everyone I meet raves and raves on end about him…nearly everyone but me.   To hear people talk, you would think he has been unofficially promoted as a modern master.  It’s not just artists, but even critics are jumping on that bandwagon.  I am a skeptic.  I want to go see his work and be enveloped in the spectacle of magical art.  There no drama.  There is no wave of fresh idea or crescendo of prophetic paint handling.  There are no subliminal color relationships being explored or nearly impossible to define drawn perspectives to behold.  Morandi isn’t painting or recording the fleeting movement of light.  Morandi just is.  And it isn’t.  I have gone to see three of his shows in the last 7 years.  I have seen drawings, paintings, and etchings.  I know the back story.  Every time I went I heard rave reviews anticipated seeing work that would blow me away.   I just can’t get excited about this work nor can I understand the deeply devoted followers of his genius that continue to grow in numbers.  I see inconsistently drawn combinations of the same gaggle of inanimate objects in every shade of dirty turp gray possible, in low light, in thin paint, and in shallow space.  I see a platform for the modern celebration of mediocrity.  I think he is okay.  He is just not great in my opinion.  Please go down to David Zwirner on 20^th street anytime through December 19^th and see the show.  You might be blown away…then again, maybe not. 

http://www.davidzwirner.com/exhibition/giorgio-morandi/

Eric Aho

Eric Aho, Wilderness Studio, End of Winter, 2015, oil on linen, 50 x 60 inches

The work of Eric Aho was first introduced to me recently.  His show, Wilderness Studio, is up at DC Moore until November 4^th.  This is also another painting show that is simply not to be missed.  These large, gestural pieces are rich in intelligent color choices and satisfying mark making.  I was really impressed with not only the intensity of the work, but for the allowance of resting space for the eye.  My favorite two pieces happened to be of cabins in the woods in winter.  (Surprise, surprise!!!!)  The super rich blaze red orange paint sharing the canvas with large, flat, complimentary aqua blue made for such an exciting, vibrating image.  I also loved the dark flat shape of the structure, indicating multiple planes of wall with only slight changes in outline angle.  Don’t take my word for it… go to DC Moore on 22^nd street in Chelsea and see!!!

More at: http://www.dcmooregallery.com/

Elizabeth O'Reilly at George Billis

Elizabeth O'Reilly, Window Reflections, oil on panel, 2015, 13 x 10 inches

Elizabeth O’Reilly’s work is flat up close.  The “economy of paint” makes for thin washes of observed color and shapes laid on slick.  The paint is transparent oil, heavily diluted, and dry on the surface.  The integrity of color, definitive use of shape, and impeccable drawing makes these images transform at a short distance to lush, colorful, deep spaces.  The interesting play of light, reflective surfaces, juxtaposed to deep open windows, and brilliant use of white as color make this collection of intimate paintings one of the best shows to see as a painter right now.  The show closes November 14 so if you are a painter get in there fast!

See more: http://www.georgebillis.com/elizabeth-oreilly.html

My personal favorite: 

Elizabeth O'Reilly, Black House, Blairstown, oil on panel, 2014, 7.5 x 11.75 inches