Meet the Beetles

A double-parked installation on West 16th Street between 8th & 9th, by Bolivian artist, José Maximiliano Siñani Paredes Sánchez. Siñani, who now lives and works in New York, reinterprets everyday objects to expose another reality. . . with much humor.

The Heart of Wetness

This evening, we sipped Curacao-tinted Prosecco at the chapel of the surf—a magnificent, torrential, calligraphic Raymond Pettibon show at Venus over Manhattan on Madison Avenue.  Spanning 25 years (1987-2012), the show aggregates 40 of Pettibon’s surfer-thermed paintings ranging from intimate black ink wash images to colossal indigo-slashed pieces often accompanied by handwritten poetic Lichtensteinian texts, that put one at the core of the wave, feeling at once powerful, vulnerable and alone.

Freight Elevator as Gallery

One of the rarely seen—and exclusive—art installations in Chelsea: a freight elevator in the former Nabisco factory, now the Chelsea Market, encrusted with carefully cut and silhouetted sports memorabilia. The artist (and sports nut)—the elevator operator himself, allowed me to take a few photos of his magnum opus.

Mirror Man

Art Spiegelman’s retrospective at the Jewish Museum is a revelation, of the inner workings—anguish, humanism, intellect, humor—and the eloquent, prolific output of this storytelling artist and genius. For Spiegelman, the explored life is worth living, and he lives up to his name,“mirror man” in German—let alone his first name. A well-written, organized and documented show—you should see it.

Balthus, Cats & Girls

The best part, perhaps the most genuine component of the Balthus: Cats and Girls show now at the Met is its coda, a separate room labeled Mitsou. Based on his found and lost stray cat—these beautiful 40 pen and ink drawings resemble woodcuts, and show a precocious talent, as they were made when Balthus was just 11 years old.

Calder Jewelry:  Show & Tell

Election Evening:  I went from civic duty at PS 9 to a soiree at Salon 94.
A swank Upper East Side townhouse gallery off of Fifth Avenue—from which Fran Leibowitz had just exited—Salon 94 was the gracious host to a show of
Alexander Calder’s exuberant and spectacular jewelry, intimate mobiles and stabiles.  Meandering through the two stories and the curved seashell staircase were Calder family members and friends, resplendent in his bold, tribal, playful metallic leis, breastplates, cuffs, brooches, and earmobiles. 

It was as if we entered a time warp or a déjà vu—on exhibit too were the other guests—some topless, with raccoon bands of makeup or black /white faced like Frank Gorshin in an early Star Trek, affectless stretched faces and bearded ladies—striking poses for klieg lights and a Polaroid photographer who posted their images on the wall.  We met party presence Andre J regal in red patent leather harness and leopard lederhosen.  Upstairs, we saw the Studio Museum’s Thelma Golden schmoozing just outside an abundant open kitchen, where cooks proffered tofu and cilantro baguettes, open-faced steamed pork dumplings and shortbread cookies studded with coffee beans.  Red and white wines were flowing. 

The ultimate experience though, of the whole evening was the opportunity to touch and actually adorn myself with Calder jewelry!

Amphibious Landing

Turn over many a flat rock or peer into the almost neon green mosses in the Berkshires and you will delight in finding these “salis,” unreal in their hyper-orange, almost gelatinous bodies.  I still like to hunt for these amphibious creatures.  Their brilliance lingers, and inspired me to create this print, an homage to their form, color and gentle sweetness.  And now, anyone who shares in the wonder of discovering salamanders can enjoy them in a playful duvet cover.

Produced by the newly launched BYCO, the first micro-financing site exclusively for designers, Salis will be featured for sale for the next 60 days.

Salis the duvet cover is printed on one side on super soft microfiber, and has an invisible zipper closure at the bottom.  Salis is available for sale in full, queen and king sizes until October 11. 

Read the press on 2Modern Blog

Read about BYCO in the New York Times

Bucolic Telecommuting Illustrated

Berkshire Magazine, the New York Magazine of the region asked me to create an illustration for an article on the current state of telecommuting in the area.  A mashup incorporating pen and ink drawings with collaged elements, this piece represents the dream:  to be able to Skype wirelessly with colleagues all over the planet from a dock on Lake Garfield or the middle of an idyllic field in the Tyringham Valley.

Read the article.

42nd on Warren

One of my pieces, 42nd 5th & 6th, a collage made from ephemera I found on that street, will be in Well Put Together: The Art of Collage & Assemblage, a group show at the CCCA Gallery, 209 Warren Street, Hudson, NY. The opening reception is April 6 from 5-7pm. The show runs through May 17.

A Delightful Discovery at the Metro Show:  Larry Lewis

Meandering through the mazes of booths at the Metro Show this afternoon, I was arrested by an image—a bold, graphic colorful portrait of a woman staring frontally, and assumed it was by Seymour Chwast.  But as I got closer and walked around this gallery booth, I learned the work was by a little known artist from New Canaan, Connecticut, Larry Lewis.  Lewis who was born in 1919, and lived a relatively hermetic existence in the house he grew up in, spent his free time—when not working as a corporate secretary—making art.  He had formal training at the Art Students League, and had a few shows of his paintings, but created this large body of collage art for himself.  Working on these pieces privately, he did not show them to many people; perhaps maybe only his niece. 

Over many years, and especially from the 60’s until he died in 2004, he delighted in using the Xerox machine to blow up vintage newspaper ads, and movie ephemera as the basis for books and books he created of tabloid-sized pop collages, exuberant in color and bold graphically, with interesting juxtapositions and humor.  This trove of work—redolent of Joseph Cornell, Stuart Davis and of course, Warhol—has not yet been widely seen—beyond New Canaan’s Silvermine Arts Center—where there was a show of his work in 2011. 

When Lewis died, he left all the art and other contents of his home to his niece, who meticulously went about preserving, documenting and finding a professional venue for her uncle’s work.  This weekend at the Metro Show, New Haven’s Giampietro Gallery is formally introducing the New York art world to Larry Lewis’ work.  Giampietro will be putting many of his books online in the coming weeks, and plans to show more of his work in the next few years.