ALICE NEEL - DRAWINGS AND WATERCOLORS 1927-1978 3/27/15

I  LOVE to look at drawings - love  being a word that I rarely ever use, as it is so over-used, but in the case of ALICE NEEL DRAWINGS AND WATERCOLORS 1927-1978  at David Zwirner Gallery (537 W. 20th St. closing April 18th) - it is totally applicable. Seeing  Alice Neel’s drawings in all their diversity of medium, style and subject - beginning with small sketches that are moodily saturated with deep colors leading us into the intimacy of her personal world - be it one of angst or heady joy is a revelation.  Faces are carefully characterized, but often the hands are left fluttering on the page - an afterthought to the penetration of character that is conveyed in the “map” of the face.

Until this exhibition, I was unaware of the extent to which Alice Neel was a masterful draughts(wo)man and the range of her delineations. In this comprehensive and museum-quality exhibition we come upon large ink and gouache drawings that rival Renaissance masters. The detail and power of observation - executed with a confidence and skill that never turns away from the emotional amplitude of the human physiognomy - seen through the eyes of a woman who searches deeply to gain a foothold into their reality.

Alice Neel felt driven to capture in various media - ink/pencil/watercolor/gouache - with empathy and an affinity of circumstance, her family, friends, and neighborhood locals, but she also had an unflinching steely ability to rip into what she perceived as social and political hypocrisy. From the whimsical cartoony sketches of moments of post-coital release to the easy flow of the line when she depicts her daughter-in-law Ginny floating in a sea of white - the line as effortless as the buoyancy of the light emanating from the paper’s surface, we are etched by the scope of her insights.

After seeing ALICE NEEL DRAWINGS AND WATERCOLORS, I wanted to rush home and draw;  co-mingling the people in my life - preserving them through the gestures of line, and form - my hand and their beings chiseled into my art cosmos. For an artist that is the ultimate reward.

http://www.davidzwirner.com/exhibition/drawings-and-watercolors-1927-1982/

BJORK RETROSPECTIVE AT MOMA 3/14/15

Saw the Bjork retrospective at MOMA and  loved the SONGLINES part of the exhibition (on the third floor,) which is essentially a biography of Bjork as vocalized through her albums beginning with DEBUT (1993) up to BIOPHILIA (2011.)  It contains wildly crazy, beautiful outfits, personal notes, photos, and the poetry of her handwritten, scribbled down words, written in pencil as if ephemeral to be erased with time. One walks through the exhibition with earphones hearing B talk, viewing the costumes she wore, and  songs from the albums that accompany that particular time period. She is a great singer and her emotions are an open wound pouring out of her throat like the blue lava that is sliding down the rocks in an accompanying video.  Mannequin sculptures looking like Bjork - dressed in her singular attire seem to have walked out of a futuristic world with roots going back to Ancient times; wearing those earphones we find ourselves isolated and enveloped into a playful, wondrously magical environment - driven along by a commanding anguished voice.

Downstairs, despite having to wait on line and there being no seating In the black, darkened room which made me personally very uncomfortable - is a video commissioned by MOMA titled BLACK LAKE ( from the song with the same title from the 2015 Vulnicura album,) depicting Bjork beating her chest in exaggerated pain - but the intonation suggests this is no exaggeration.To pummel oneself over LOVE lost is something I have never seen or heard so penetratingly conveyed - flesh being torn up to reveal the betrayal of one's life-sustaining organ - lacerated and defeated. The thrashing gestures pounding against her frail body have a certain theatricality, but her resonance and tonal cries convince us of their authenticity.

The image of a heart floats throughout the exhibit. In the video performance projected unto two screens - the specifics of the last 9 months together, and the 11 months apart - after her decade long relationship with Matthew Barney ended - are engraved into Bjork's body. The tongue screams, whispers and enunciates the bitter shards of loss.

STILL ALICE 3/10/15

What must it be like to realize that you no longer connect to the world around you; that one’s footing is untethered? That everything is unknowable, but yet has a tinge of familiarity. The present is a labyrinth of  disassociation;  we are floating in an ether where we futilely shadow box to gain mastery of the seemingly simple task of being oneself. STILL ALICE attempts very straightforwardly to depict the mesmerizingly desolate story of Dr. Alice Howland - a renowned Professor of Linguistics at Columbia University - whose field of study deals with words and communication - and the ironic turn her life takes, as she realizes that she is slowly losing the ability to access the power of language and memory - the underpinnings of books, years of study and exploration are now desperately failing her. Alice at  the age of 50 has been diagnosed with Early Onset Alzheimer’s disease. 

A beautiful performance by Julianne Moore as Alice - a woman, heroic in her efforts to create strategies to navigate the abyss. Alice is a warrior in a fight she knows is un-winnable; filaments of who she was, and who she is slowly becoming to her family and professional colleagues, exist at the core of this daunting drama. What makes this film so personally harrowing is the fact that we all can empathize with the possibility of being in a similar situation sometime in the future and even in the present. Those moments when a name slips away from our tongue and gets knotted up in our brain refusing to reveal itself; when we blindly stare at the computer and wonder what is this blank slate we are so intently gazing at; or finding oneself in the middle of a street momentarily wondering how we got there and in which direction should we transverse.

Alice never becomes an “empty vessel.” There are remnants of what is “still Alice.”  Expressions of a parent’s love, compassion, as well as past familial conflicts are never entirely erased; glimpses of the poetry of longing and physical touch come to light to surprise those who thought Alice had all but disappeared into the void. A searing honesty that refuses to cover up the truth of her situation prevents this movie from being insipidly maudlin, and reinforces the admiration we feel for this courageous woman who is valiantly fighting to preserve her mind from oblivion.

WOMEN'S VOICES FOR CHANGE ARTICLE RESPONSE TO "MARCH CHALLENGE" 3/8/15

My article for Women's Voices for Change where I get personal!

http://womensvoicesforchange.org/change-grace-graupe-pillard-responds-to-our-march-challenge.htm

Grace Graupe-Pillard  is an artist whose practice includes making drawings, paintings, photographs, installations, videos, Internet-based artwork, and large public sculptures. In a two-part article for Women’s Voices, writer Suzanne Russell focused on Graupe-Pillard’s recent series of composite photographs that insert her naked image into well-known artworks (see the photo above). This is her response to our recent “March Challenge,” in which we urged our readers to find ways to bring some change—however minimal—into their lives.

“Today I am challenging myself to do the very things I did not have the courage to ‘fail’ at in my youth.”

I am a visual artist who has reached an age that I never thought would come to pass—being classified as a “senior citizen,” complete with Social Security, Medicare, and the discounts accorded the elderly on mass transit, movie theaters, and museums, as well as the 10-percent-off-on-Tuesdays “specials” for retirees. Though I welcome those perks, I am not old!  Not me!  I am as youthful as ever, as curious as ever, as passionate in experiencing the drama and vicissitudes of life as ever. YES, I am at “the top of my game—ironically, just when I now accept that there is an endpoint to this haunting journey called life. Psychological barriers hover before me, nagging at my eternal inner child: Hurry up and complete projects; wrestle with the unknowable, feeling as though one day soon, as the finality of time lurches towards me, I must crawl my way through those curtains—which eventually will become mountains—that the future is slowly building to block the arteries and passageways that I have been breathlessly moving through.

I recently began writing movie and art reviews, making and editing videos, challenging myself to do the very things that I did not have the courage to “fail” at in my youth, but had secretly dreamed of undertaking. The thread of ideas that has run through my artwork has now expanded into moving images; playful—yet quite serious—ransacking of Art History, altering iconic imagery to include women’s voices and bodies; screams of pain at the loss of those I have cherished; dancing naked to the a cappella music streaming in my head; and railing against the forces of injustice and the ever continuing collapse of the humane treatment of our fellow human beings.

My paintings now have the maturity given to those who allow themselves to collaborate with the medium itself; to create a dialogue with the canvas, and to accept the interaction that occurs between the paint, the outside world, and delving into the truthfulness of one’s self.  After many years of effort I am discovering that this wonderful excitement and tedium finally pay off in a tangible way. My eyesight might be getting weaker, but I “see” better than ever. That is not to say it is not difficult. The challenges will, I hope, always exist, and understanding and compassion must remain in the forefront as our vision deepens with dusk.

Born in NYC, Grace Graupe-Pillard is a painter, public artist, photographer and educator who also makes videos. She is represented by Carl Hammer Gallery, Chicago, IL and has exhibited in many venues and group exhibitions including P.S. 1 in New York City, Bass Museum, Indianapolis Museum, The Maier Museum, The Aldrich Museum, The Drawing Center, The Hunterdon Museum, The Frist Center, and The National Academy Museum. Her photos and videos have been presented at Lars von Trier’s Gesamt, Warsaw Jewish Film Festival, Scope Miami, Scope London, Art Chicago, Art Fem.TV, Cologne OFF, Found Footage & SHOAH, among others. More on the artist can be found at http://ggp.neoimages.net andhttps://vimeo.com/graupepillard.