Wow I’ve heard of exploring the body through sculpture but this is next level, verging on performance art.
“Due to the inevitable presence of our bodies… a reflection on ourselves as a material.”
This work is visceral and arresting and I can’t get enough.
http://milenanaef.com/
I’m not familiar with her work but after reading this new yorker profile I knew I had to post about her. At the very least she is an interesting live performance artist and I am a sucker for those.
In some ways she does what every artist does or at least I would hope does, which is examine, subvert, hold a mirror up to society, question assumptions, question everything.
But she does it in an impossible to ignore, live way. It’s one of the things I love about live arts, it’s thereness, that is hard not to engage with. Sometimes if only to get away from it.
There’s also something to admire in her quiet braveness, ability to commit to the inevitable extremes of simple starting assumptions, and simply the variety of subversions and situations she engages.
I love an artist who loves to subvert expectations. Background Story series looks like a traditional chinese ink paintings but they are actually shadow play paintings.
I love that you can go and look behind the scenes. The detail on these is amazing.
He also has done a series resembling traditional Chinese characters – Book from the Sky, more subversion and also aesthetically pleasing.
Except that every single character, even in the books is not actually chinese characters at all, mind blowing.
I also like the Tobacco Project’s 1st Class cigarette tiger rug
i just love these. minimal in their own way. with a focus on these everyday materials. obviously aesthethic but whimsy in there somewhere too.
As a fan of light, and light related work this body of work by Helen Pashgian is right up my alley. A sprinkling of otherwordly, ethereal and sci-fi round it our for me. Her practice is very much focused on the physical. This deliberate meticulous focus on the material yields an ethereal experience seemingly concerned with anything but. Her work is part of the Light and Space Movement of the 60’s.
I’m not a fan of horses. I like the animal just fine but not really into horses in my art. But I just love these pieces by Debra Butterfield. My feelings compounded by the fact that they are in fact not made of driftwood as they look but instead cast in bronze. I think these look like a charcoal drawing rendered in 3d. Instantly recognizable as horse yet so minimal. True artistry. If you live in Chicago you can see one in person downtown in Seneca park just across from the MCA.
I was already interested in the pushing of boundaries of what a painting is. I’ve heard of seeing the brush strokes and having thick paint visible on the canvas, but this work takes things to another level.
But upon visiting his website I was presented with the image below. Apparently his work focused on “performative rematerialisations of paint.” I like that. Sign me up. You know I am all about any intersections with performance.
