September 11 @ MoMA PS1

 This was one of my favorite pieces because it displays the bright colors of our precocious nation.

Now Showing @ Moma PS1 through January 9th, 2012

 

George Segal - American artist - 1924-2000 

'Woman on a park Bench' 1998 (bronze w/ white patina & metal bench)

         

In the room seen above one could reminisce about September 11th 2011, as we see various pieces incorporated into a brightly-lit room. There is a woman seated carelessly on a bench minding her own business. She holds dearly to her purse and seems as if she were about to smile, but not quite. There is material scattered along the center of the floor which resembles ashes done by Roger Hiorns a British artist born in 1978. It is an 'atomized passenger aircraft engine' and he left his work Untitled. In addition, the theme from Patriot (a solo by Mark O'Connor) can be heard playing in the background to add to the mood. The audio is 6:40 minutes long and it was incorporated by John Williams an American artist born in 1932.

 Filmmaker Jem Cohen's addition to the show is in the form of a 6:00 minute video with sound & in black and white. Little Flags (1991-2000) is an excerpt of a film made by Cohen who was recording a parade that was lead along Broadway to celebrate the end of the Golf War. In the film we can observe the crowd maneuvering around lower Manhattan in a sward of paper. Looking at the picture above (from the film) we can see the similarities between the film and the city on that September 11, 2001 morning.


Another piece (not shown) is a canopy of black bunting which welcomes the visitors to the 2nd floor of the museum. It was created in 2001 by Fiona Banner an English artist born in 1966 by using vinyl and rope. Black Bunting (2008) can be interpreted as a touch of celebration to this one-decade-after tribute without robbing from the mourning sensation implied by the color black.

Lee Ufan: Marking Infinity

Lee Ufan is a Korean artist-philosopher whose work was on exhibition for the first time in the United States at the Solomon Guggenheim Museum. This man has made it his business to bring nature into non-traditional spaces. He uses his philosophical background to invoke tranquility and gentleness into normally thought of as rough materials. He is fond of using stones beside steel (as seen below) and hard edges beside soft textures like cotton and fabric. Another of his great techniques involve using his brush while full of paint and tapping the canvas until the medium runs out. It creates a very interesting pattern which can be a metaphor for how uncertain we are about life itself and really not knowing where it might lead us. The bottom-most picture shows large brush strokes featuring a very difficult to make value scale which the artist achieves by layering. These same squares can be appreciated on a wall in a symmetric room at the museum in which the artist intentionally chooses to place the shapes on the sides of the wall instead of the center. Honoring nature's asymmetry in a mathematically square room.

Relatum (formerly Phenomena & Perception B) 1968/2011, steel, glass & stone

Relatum - residence, 1988. steel & stones

de kooning: A Retrospective at MoMA

Now Showing at MoMA de Kooning: A Retrospective September 18, 2011–January 9, 2012

De Kooning: A Retrospective is an exhibition at MoMA which shows some of the works of Willem de Kooning a Dutch American abstract expressionist artist. It presents a sort of chronological example of the artist's growth in a span of about 70 years. In exhibition you will find de Kooning's famous Women series making present the familiarity de Kooning had with the female body and its movements. There are also paintings like Seated Woman C. 1940 and his well known Pink Angels. c. 1945 (both seen below). I personally liked Woman With Bicycle (also below) for the careless happiness possessed by the woman which he emphasizes by painting twice and its ambiguity when it comes to the bike. The "bike's" simple shapes left many of the visitors I encountered at the museum wondering how to spot it. This ambiguity is fluent in many of de Kooning's paintings.

Woman and Bicycle, 1952–53. Oil on canvas, (194.3 × 124.5 cm)

Seated Woman, c. 1940. Oil and charcoal on masonite 54 1/16 x 36" (137.3 x 91.4 cm)

Pink Angels c. 1945 Oil and charcoal on canvas
52 x 40" (132.1 x 101.6 cm)

Color Wheel

"The color wheel palette"

"Witness - A look back to the future"

On September 11, 2001, New York city's history was changed forever.  "Witness - A look back to the future" is an exhibition that features works created by local artists, art professors as reflections about their feelings towards the World Trade Center tragedy. Another "sister" exhibition "10 Years Later" features work done by LaGuardia students and is overseen by Professor Bruce Brooks one of the artists taking part of the tribute. The exhibition can be enjoyed at LaGuardia Community College on the 5th and 4th floors of the E-building.

It is almost impossible not to have a feeling of pain and impotence in the presence of the artwork. Experiencing this reminds us how not only NYC changed, but also its artists as well. Through their work these artists have learned to deal with the shadow of that day in a way that aids them and their audience heal through this visual tribute. We may forgive, but here there's proof we'll never forget how September 11 changed all of us.

One of the pieces that welcome the visitors is a picture of sculptor Michael Rolando Richards' Tar Baby vs. St. Sebastian (shown below) . The contemporary African American artist created his "Tar Baby" in 1999, roughly two years before he met his demise in the 9/11 attacks. He was staying in his 92nd floor studio located at the World Trade Center. Looking at his sculpture which emanates an air of irony because of the similarities between it and its maker's fate.


I think it takes a certain type of person to be an artist. To a certain extent, it has to come from within. This allows artists to explore their capabilities and set them free. As a reward, they get to tap into varying states of their psyche which resurface in their artwork.

 Tar Baby vs. St. Sebastian, 1999
Resin and steel, 81 x 30 x 19

Michael Rolando Richards was a Costa Rican and Jamaican sculptor who perished on the World Trade Center attacks while staying in his 92nd floor studio. Here we see him beside his famous Tar Baby vs. St. Sebastian.