Waiting for Harries

November 7, 2014 4:29 am Leave a Comment

A PSA for the art community: The Whitney Humanities Center event “Conversing with Things: Drawings, Paintings, and Pastels” is not a gallery walk-through with the exhibit’s featured artist, professor Karsten Harries ’58 GRD ’62. The artist won’t be on hand to offer any “meanings” to his modern art pieces. Instead, any “conversing” will be a direct and unfiltered exchange between you, the works of art and hopefully some of your fellow attendees. So enjoy some sensual studies of flesh-like conch shells — just don’t expect to see the artist in the flesh.

The exhibit’s publicity materials don’t make this obvious: Every person who attended the 3:00 p.m. event last Wednesday arrived with the erroneous impression that we would be meeting Harries himself. But 30 oppressive minutes of waiting for the absent artist gradually made for an enjoyable, unique, experience — now that I’ve spoiled the surprise, yours won’t be the same. Admittedly awkward at first, the afternoon turned pleasantly communal and eventually liberating once we realized that the onus of “conversing” with the paintings fell entirely upon our own amateur-art-critic selves.

Our laid-back group’s transformation from passive audience to active appraisers appropriately parallels Harries’s own elevation of commonplace objects to artistic subjects. The venue, too, reflects Harries’s approach to identifying art amidst the ordinary. The Gallery at Whitney is comprised of the WHC’s busy main hall and a large meeting room at the end. As you walk down the hallway, Harries’ eclectic collection of eggplant studies, paintings of tropical flowers and 1946 sketches of post-war Munich are punctuated by flyers advertising a talk on Ebola and windows peering into WHC’s administrative offices. Even in the main room, massive street-level windows look out onto a busy downtown intersection; the gray New England sky ominously overshadows the artist’s diminutive and dreamy seascapes of tropical Viques, Puerto Rico.

The diversity and distinctiveness of Harries’s subjects define the exhibit. In his official description of the collection, Harries emphasizes an intentional lack of a singular narrative: “These pictures do not try to make a point. They do not demonstrate anything. They seek to respond to some often not particularly memorable objects, a rock formation, a seashell, roots, flowers, fruit, garbage and especially the sea.” Rather than the subjects themselves grabbing your attention, the dynamism of their representation mesmerizes you. Soft pastel portrayals of seaside rocks seem to bloom into gentle grey flowers reflecting the sunlight. The charcoal sketch of a dancing girl condenses into a drawing of a flower only after you’ve seen the piece’s title: “Hibiscus.” And in the three “Garbage” pastels, no signs of decay mar the refuse — every cabbage piece, papaya peel and eggshell emits a refreshing, tropical island energy.

My favorite example of Harries’s artistic vivacity is the wall containing three sets of pastels: “Conch Shells 1–3,” “Eros 1–3,” and “Annunciation, Christmas, and Good Friday.” They combine Harries’s penchant for realism with his use of abstracted human forms and biblical themes. Together, they represent a spectrum of verve and animation that Harries imbues in all his works. A lifeless shell nonetheless oozes with the sensuality of blushing flesh, pink and pale; abstracted images of female sexuality dance through the triptych of “Eros 1–3”; the final set celebrates the celestial conception of Christ, his birth and death.

The lack of a consecrated space for viewing the art was my only grievance with the exhibit. In congruence with the participant-centered turn of the experience, a stronger art gallery atmosphere was only achieved when I myself shut the curtains on the large windows and asked a staff member to turn on the gallery lights. The resulting soft radiance facilitated our focused meditation on the images and our silent dialogue with objects — the prayerful conversation that Harries intended.

One final PSA: If your secret society has a picture of “an orange view of the church in Avioth and a somewhat Feiningerish blue image of the start of a sailboat race,” please consider returning these paintings forthwith to the Gallery. According to Harries’s description in the program, these pieces were removed from his office a few years ago. Word on the street is that they may be hanging in a society’s tomb right now.

Even without those pieces, I recommend the collection — it is on view every Wednesday from 3:00–5:00 pm until Dec. 10. But to make the most of the experience, make sure that the viewing environment is on par with the art itself. And also, don’t wait half an hour for Harries to show up.

Fragile Posters, Enduring Themes

4:23 am Leave a Comment

When I think of World War II-era propaganda, I think of top-down attempts to bolster patriotism: women elated to be working in factories while their husbands proudly massacre cowering enemies. I don’t think of a grassroots campaign against governments in Mexico City. Or, I didn’t, until I went to see “Vida y Drama de México,” an exhibition at the Yale University Art Gallery that runs Oct. 17 until February.

While absurd caricatures and demonization of the enemy may slightly resemble standard propaganda, prints from the Taller de Grafica Popular — a small collective of poor teachers and devoted activists whose work makes up the exhibition — have a distinct style. The posters combine clear, journalistic fonts with neo-indigenous artistic styles to both send a message and reclaim the artists’ native culture.

Artistically, some posters are stronger than others, and the collection as a whole offers a spectrum from purely political to purely aesthetic. Some posters were printed solely to raise money for the TGP’s expenses, and so focus more on visual appeal. One such poster, “Raíces” or “Roots,” simply shows a tree, gray and shadowed, with its roots rising from the ground. Other pieces, like “Libertad,” combine romanticism and surrealism while also conveying political messages. The wall of “Villains” is complex and artistic; skeletons lurk in backgrounds, and every element of every print is a symbol. But some other posters are just words or generic caricatures of international politicians — one simply features Joseph McCarthy standing in a trashcan.

Other posters focus on internal issues. “El Día Internacional de la Mujer,” or “The International Day of the Woman,” is unique because unlike posters of its time, it both celebrates women and was crafted by a woman.

The issues addressed were those of immediate relevance to the artists, who had to constantly juggle their jobs, their activism and their printing. They printed their signs on fragile wood pulp and pasted them on telephone posts and building fronts to advertise for upcoming rallies. The posters, says the exhibition’s co-curator Lucy Gellman, “were meant to be ephemeral and transitory — they would oftentimes be washed away in the next rain.”

Yet they have certainly stood the test of time. Not only are these prints physically intact, but their messages remain relevant. Many prints are devoted to solidarity among workers; they plead for eight-hour workdays, health care, six-day weeks. This is surprisingly relevant given the Mexican government’s current efforts at undermining labor rights by allowing employers to modify contracts. Messages against the privatized oil industry are also pertinent today, given its recent re-privatization. One wall of prints focuses on promoting Mexican education reform, still a deeply conflicted issue; just last month, Mexican authorities found a mass grave of schoolchildren whose bus had been ambushed while they campaigned against new education laws. The TGP itself still operates, but its members must stay hidden to avoid being captured or imprisoned.

The endurance of the exhibition’s themes is a credit to Monroe E. Price ’60 LAW ’64 and Aimée Brown Price GRD ’72, who , in their collections, focused on discovering obscure works of art, particularly ones related to the Chicano movement. A central theme of their collection is “the relationship between art and politics,” which explains the refreshing timelessness of the issues the prints tackle. Where most art exhibits are either traditional or modern, these progressive posters effectively bridge the gap between the old and new, making it well worth the walk up all four flights of stairs to see this early intersection of art and activism.

What Is "Art"?

3:57 am Leave a Comment

On Wednesday night I walked into the Underbrook in Saybrook College. The stage was set for a confrontation — two armchairs on the opposite side of the stage with a space in the middle. A bookcase stood on stage right. One could easily see James Joyce’s “Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man” resting conspicuously on another title: CELL. On the bottom part of the bookcase I saw Nietzsche’s collection, which seemed to suggest, “Love is blind, and friendship closes its eyes.” This was a staging of “Art,” a one-act comedy by Yasmina Reza directed by Irina Gavrilova ’17.

The play is about three friends: Serge, Marc and Yvan. Serge buys an Antrios painting, which depicts fine white lines on a white canvas. Serge is proud of his acquisition, but Marc thinks it is a piece of “shit”. Yvan neither hates nor likes the painting. But he does not want to be on Marc’s side, so he pretends that the painting is captivating to anger him. The question of whether this painting is worth the 200,000 francs Serge paid for it puts the men’s friendship to the test.

Serge (Ivan Kirwan-Taylor ’18) is smart and arrogant. His demeanor is belittling. The painting is probably his first piece as a “collector.” Marc (Dillon Miller ’18) is no different. He is self-confident and he thinks others are wrong about the painting. He wants Yvan to feel the same way he does about the painting. Yvan (Tom Cusano ’18) is naive.

The playwright establishes these differences about the actors around ten minutes into the play. The rest of the play presents disjointed arguments that are not based on any topic. Serge and Marc argue about what one likes and what the other dislikes. They complain about each other and reveal their hatred for one another. One wonders how they became friends; what kind of friends invest their energies in demeaning each other? One may easily mistake Kirwan-Taylor, Miller and Cusano for professional actors, even though this is their first performance. Their voices are clear, despite going through fierce verbal exchanges.

Their characters’ lives seem to emerge straight from scripts. Serge, Marc and Yvan all adopt a confrontational voice. At some point they rise to an angry pitch that grows monotonous. Save for the occasions when they talk directly to the audience, a major part of “Art” is dull.

When Yvan’s speech breaks into an emotional appeal, one wonders whether he is under the influence of the wine he appears to have been drinking. He is desperate to connect with his friends and laments that he has spent most of his life “dying of loneliness.” When he asks for help, his friends advises him to leave his wife-to-be. They have no time for each other. Cusano plays the role of Yvan excellently — he knows how to be depressed and understands when to be confused. To a large extent he was the one who mainly made the audience laugh.

Serge is clearly using “Art” to vent his anger. He confesses to the audience that he does not even like the painting. He does not even attempt to explain why he considers the painting “incredibly modern,” but he wants his friends to admire it, to embrace it. Kirwan-Taylor is a perfect match for Serge — he knows how to adopt the voice of a person who has just joined high society. Throughout the play, save for the last part when he decides to listen to Marc, he maintains his self-confidence.

The focus of “Art” is on friendship — friendship fallen apart over stupidity. The Antrios painting is just a trigger. Perhaps this explains why the characters are shallow. They do not even debate the merits of the white painting.

There is no difference between the performance and the painting. If you look at it for some time, you start imagining all sorts of shading and hidden lines. But if you take a step back and examine it, it’s just a white canvas. Though at the end of the play Serge, Marc and Yvan learn to appreciate their differences, one wonders whether they have learned to untangled Yvan’s paradox: “If I am who I am because you’re who you are, and if you’re who you are because I am not who I am, then I am not who I am and you are not who you are.”

Painting and Power Tools with Nicole Eisenman

October 31, 2014 3:38 am Leave a Comment

Nicole Eisenman is a modern Renaissance woman. A RISD-grad and bona-fide art history buff with a teaching gig at Bard, she boasts a body of work spanning at least three mediums and residing in more than six prestigious museum collections (MoMA among them). Though she maintains the self-assurance of an artist who’s really “made it,” the painter, sculptor and part-time curator remains as down-to-earth and self-deprecating as they come. Eisenman is thoughtful without ever seeming to take herself too seriously and more than willing to chat with WEEKEND about Dracula, the time she accidentally took a bite out of a work of art, and why all budding MFAs should learn how to use power tools, ASAP.

Q: How did you get your start as an artist? When did you realize that your passion for art was something you wanted to make into a career?

A: That, for me, happened pretty young. I decided at some point in high school that I was going to apply to art school, and so I really had an idea pretty early on of what I wanted to do. It wasn’t so much a “career choice” as a pursuit of this passion I had for art-making, and I was — I have been — very fortunate to make a career out of it, and to make a living doing it. I don’t know that I ever pursued it as a career; it was more that I was always interested in art and wanted to do it, and the “career” kind of fell into place — luckily for me — as I went along.

Q: If you had to describe your work to someone unfamiliar with it in a few sentences, what would you say?

A: I am primarily a painter, although I draw, sculpt, print-make, curate and collaborate as well. My work is largely narrative, more often than not figurative, and it’s hard to pin down. Broad strokes, but I think that would be a pretty apt description of it.

Q: What does your studio practice look like?

A: [It’s] pretty straightforward. I come in here usually around 11 in the morning, and I work until 8 or 9 at night. I punch the clock everyday … Basically, I come in at 11, I have lunch looking at the work I did the day before; I play records while I work. And usually I’m distracted, texting friends as I work. I basically spend the day floating between my iPhone and my paintings and my record player.

Q: What’s your craziest art world story? (Because everybody in the art world is crazy…)

A: It’s true … there’s a lot of kook in the art world. Everybody is kooks in the art world; that’s why I try to avoid it as much as I can. [Laughs] My craziest art world stories are totally slanderous! Couldn’t possibly repeat them here. One silly thing comes to mind, though … I did take a bite out of a Robert Gober donut when they were on display at Paula Cooper back in the day. Even after I spit it out, it still didn’t occur to me that I had bitten into an artwork.

Q: Although it sounds like you might try to keep your distance from the art world, are there any events happening — in New York City or elsewhere — that we should know about?

A: I’m not sure I have a lot of super great advice, but the shows that are currently on my docket are Chris Ofili [at the New Museum] and Matisse [at the Museum of Modern Art]. And then there’s a Neo Rauch show opening soon at [David] Zwirner. Those are shows I want to see.

Q: Several biographies, such as one written for the Carnegie Prize, which you received in 2013, mention the influence of art history on your work. What do you consider the role of the history of art in a technical art education?

A: I think it’s an essential part of an artist’s education. I think it’s important to be aware of what’s come before us, probably for a lot of different reasons. But what I like to think is that all of us — all artists, as a subgroup of humankind — are in this big project together. We’re all moving the humanities and art forward together, and we’re part of a family. I feel like I’m part of a family tree of artists, and I want to know who I’m related to; I’m curious about art history because I feel like I have relations to these artists, and I think it’s a place to go to find inspiration.

History can be both inspiring and something to push back against; something to draw inspiration from and to resist. Not to resist in terms of not learning about it — obviously I’m interested in learning about art history and seeing everything — in the sense that young artists need to know about it so they can make an educated resistance against it.

Q: In light of your belief in the importance of art history, do you have any favorite artists, art movements or even particular works that inspire you?

A: It changes all the time. I look at the German Expressionists and the French Impressionists; Munch … I’m interested in everything. I’m looking at my bookshelf right now, and I see Blake, Brueghel, Picasso, Bonnard; I see a book about the pictorial history of monsters in Hollywood movies; I have a book of album cover art; of Hogarth … I mean, I really try to take in everything. It all feeds the beast.

Q: It’s kitschy but … if you could spend an afternoon with anyone — alive or dead — who would it be? (“Yourself” is also a potentially acceptable answer.)

A: I could do better than myself. I actually don’t think I’d want to have dinner with myself … I do that all the time, and it’s not that interesting. [Laughs] Anyways, it’s like Halloween-time, so maybe Dracula? Maybe we could make some kind of deal, and I wouldn’t feel like I would have to make all this art on a deadline … I feel like I could relax and slow down if I had another 500 years.

Q: In reading your bio on Koenig & Clinton’s website, I noticed you live and work in Brooklyn. Do you have any favorite neighborhood spots where you think everyone should go (or not go)?

A: Everybody should avoid the vape bar [Beyond Vape] on Grand Street downstairs from my apartment — it smells like people are smoking strawberry shortcake. That would really be a place to avoid. And a place to go … I like to drink beers at Achilles Heel; it’s a nice old-timey bar. I did a painting last summer called Achilles Heel, actually.

Q: You teach at Bard College. If your students learn one thing from you, what do you hope it to be?

A: Learn how to build walls. I think it’s really important that when you’re graduated from art school, you have some concrete skills: to know how to build things, how to handle a power tool, how to make stretchers and build stuff.

Q: And, more broadly, any advice for young artists?

A: I think my advice would be to keep your eye on what’s important and not to get sidetracked by the art world and having an art career. What’s essential, if you really believe in yourself as an artist, is to put the work — and not the career stuff — forward and to give it primacy in your thinking, so you’re not going to get obsessed with the art world, but obsessed with your process. The idea is just to keep your focus on what’s important and not to lose track of what’s essential, which is the making of your art. And then to be willing to do whatever the hell it takes; to be willing to work whatever crap-ass job you have to work to keep yourself flush in paint.

Things You Can't Do By Yourself

3:14 am Leave a Comment

Dear Rebecca,

My ex-girlfriend just watched my snap story. I know my story is good, but our breakup was bad. What does this mean, and what should I do about it?

Sincerely,

Receiving Mixed Messages

Dear Mixed,

Well that’s a millennial question if I ever read one.

First, until you’ve figured out her motivation, don’t watch her story or open any snapchats you might receive from her. Ignoring a snapchat is a power play (akin to turning “read receipts” on, and then reading your texts but not responding).

Before you assume that she’s hoping to get back together, you need to figure out the likelihood that she watched your story by accident. Check to make sure that she has watched your story’s every frame. Maybe her finger hovered too close to the screen, but she stopped watching as soon as she realized her mistake. If she watched only a few frames but not the entire thing, then this is probably the explanation. You should sigh and move on.

(As an aside, recently, a friend of mine considered deleting his snap story because he thought he had lost viewers between the first and second frames. If you experience the same issue, you should probably work on timing. Make the plot more dramatic and raise the stakes with shorter snaps.)

But if your ex has watched all eight frames of your current story, then that’s intentional. And yes, she could be pining after you, especially if she does this every single time you upload a story. If this is the case, you could test the waters by sending a personal snap. Try to see what’s up: Maybe she’s feeling like Taylor Swift in “I Wish You Would.” Or stay strong and remember that you are never ever getting back together, because you probably broke up for a lot of good reasons.

Or maybe she’s just bored and doesn’t think you’re going to care that much if she views your story. Maybe she just wanted to see what you were up to and observe your life from the safe distance of your snap story.

This is quite possibly the most logical explanation. So, if you’re this obsessed with knowing that she watched your story, you should probably check your own feelings. Are you over her? Or are you dying to watch her snap story? If the latter, snapchat just won’t help you figure out these emotions.

And finally, there is one more possible explanation: she might be snapchat-illiterate, with no idea that you can see who has watched your story. If this is the case, then thank God you’re not together anymore. Evoke the Lady Antebellum song “Better Off Now (That You’re Gone)” in your next snap story, and don’t even take the time check who’s watched it.

I’ll watch your story if you’ll watch mine,

Rebecca

P.S. My ex-boyfriend just updated his snap story with some videos of exam studying, and I watched every frame. I wonder if that’ll keep him up at night. (I kind of hope it does.)

Hey Rebecca,

How do you tell a girl that all you want to do is take her out to a casual but still nice dinner, split a dessert and then watch a RomCom with her?

Sincerely,

I just want to listen to you talk about your dog

Dear Just,

Here are some suggestions (in order of personal preference): Ask her in person, text, email, call or try Facebook Messenger.

But if you’re really asking about how to find a girl: My dog’s name is Roxy, I love Kitchen Zinc, I’d even watch a horror flick just to cuddle with you and you can find my email at the bottom of this column.

Waiting for your call,

Rebecca

Dear Rebecca,

I want to like art so I seem cultured to my friends/romantic prospects, but it is really hard for me to get into it.

How do I make museums exciting? What are your favorites?

Thanks in Advance,

Cultured Like A Petri Dish

Dear Petri,

I don’t know who you’re trying to impress, but you kind of sound like a jerk. If you simply don’t like art, why force yourself? I’m sure you’re passionate about other things, and that these things make you seem worldly, cool and fun.

But if you’re dead set on finding a way to love art, you gotta find a buddy. Personally, I’m usually able to get excited about anything by listening to someone who’s super passionate talk about it. That’s why I end up taking classes like Textiles of Asia, and that’s why I love watching documentaries. People who really care can make anything incredible.

So, choose a friend who you find really cultured, and go to stuff with them. I actually am really passionate about art, and I love dragging my friends to museums with me. Just this week I went to an exhibition opening in New York City and brought a friend along. I think we had fun (but maybe it was just the third glass of wine). If you don’t have any friends, the student guides at the Yale Center for British Art or the gallery guides at the Yale University Art Gallery will pretend to be your friends for an hour. And during that hour they’ll teach you about art. That’s a win-win, in my opinion.

Or, if you want to seem really offbeat and interesting, you can do it alone. Find some random materials in the Beinecke or works on paper from the Prints and Drawings collection at the YCBA. You can request to have them pulled and get up close and personal with the old stuff. I promise that’ll give you a go-to conversation topic for when you want to sound like you’re cultured.

If you really want the insider scoop about art on campus, I’ll even a share a secret with you: The coolest art space on campus is the Furniture Study at 149 York. It’s like IKEA from the olden days, but you don’t have to assemble anything. They have tours at 12:30 p.m. every Friday. Go now, thank me later.

But Petri, you seem to be into taking shortcuts. So what’s the TL;DR, you might ask? My next tour at the YCBA is on Nov. 14 at 2:30 p.m., and I’d love to be your friend for an hour.

Artfully yours,

Rebecca

Have more questions?

Email WKNDanswers@gmail.com or submit them anonymously here.

Reclaiming the Concrete Canyon

October 17, 2014 3:56 am Leave a Comment

There is something desolate and industrial about the walk up State Street to Interstate 91. Fallen leaves — thin, auburn, curled like fists — are left unraked and scattered messily on the pavement. The park by the intersection of Humphrey and State is empty but for a small playground with a tired pair of swings and accompanying metal slide. The same sunlight that caresses the collegiate Gothic structures and throngs of college students on Old Campus feels harsher and starker here. I can see the top of the underpass and just make out its rusting surface, burnt umber scars on the ash grey concrete. Pulled out of the warm, Disneyland-esque cocoon of Silliman College, I find the area run-down barren and impersonal. As I turn right on Humphrey Street to face the underpass, however, everything changes.

An explosion of color: The underpass is lit up by ecstatic strokes of azure, bright cerulean, magenta and chartreuse. Two large murals cover every inch of the inner walls. This is the Under 91 Project, a quest to transform the grim concrete canyon of the underpass that divides East Rock and Upper State Street from Fair Haven. According to Aicha Woods ARC ’97, one of the lead organizers of the Under 91 Project, “the differences are pretty stark between the more economically diverse East Rock side and the Fair Haven side, which has anecdotally always been a pretty rough area.”

The statistics tell the same story: violent crime rates in the Wooster Square, Mill River and Fair Haven area are higher than the citywide average. On a map of income distribution in New Haven, presented by the Data Haven Community Index, the left area of Interstate 91 is shown to have significantly lower income levels and a higher concentration of public housing than the right.

Walking into the passageway, I first see Alberto Colon, one of the commissioned artists, atop a tall ladder, putting the finishing touches on his masterpiece adorning the passage’s right wall. He’s going over with a spray can what seems to be a series of purple, bubble-like, hexagonal shapes, which he later explains to me are human cells. They are supposed to correspond to the large colorful gummy worm strings on the far end of the wall, which he says are DNA strands. The cells and strands flow from one end of the wall to the next without any border or breakage, fluid and continuous. This feeling of continuity is precisely what Colon was trying to communicate.

“I like organic shapes, I try to avoid having any straight squares or rectangles in my artwork,” he says, pointing out the smoothness of each stroke, a drastic contrast to the stiff lines of the actual architecture of the underpass. The diverse, vibrant colors of the DNA strands, coupled with their fluid, borderless presentation, fit neatly into the mission of the Under 91 Project, as explained by the project’s website: to reclaim the passageway as a connector rather than a rigid concrete divider. In doing so, the project aims to bring together the vibrant and diverse Jocelyn Square and East Rock communities.

The very process of putting together this mural was centered on the idea of bringing together a community. Not only was the selection process for the artists based on a door-to-door survey of the Jocelyn Square neighborhood, but the final murals were decided upon through community vote. When the artists were at the tail end of finishing their pieces, people from all corners of New Haven — inhabitants of the immediate area, college students, little children, their grand parents — were invited to leave their own physical mark on the walls of the underpass. Paintbrushes were handed out, and participants were asked to do whatever they wanted.

“We didn’t do a lot of advertising but turnout was much larger than we anticipated,” says Woods. “People were told to write initially within the set boundaries, but it totally exploded all over the walls.”

The evidence of that explosion sprawls before me. Underneath Alberto’s DNA strands, I find a chaotic medley of names (Romeo Yoniel, Shanda, Jay Vory), song lyrics (“Birds flying highhhh, you know how I feel”) love declarations (“Theo Loves Us,” “Xander Loves Bacon”) and thoughts (“I think Yale business students should have to do people’s taxes for free”). The words are anarchic and spontaneous, sentences and phrases snaking over and underneath each other.Illustrations are crammed into small spaces and scattered across the wall: bunny heads, flowers, Arabic characters, phrases in Spanish. I instantly recognize a collection of self-portraits as the work of a first grade artist, thanks to the two-dimensional, blocky style: opaque circle eyes, upright vertical lines as strands of hair, and wide, u-shaped mouths.

Stepping back to take everything in, I find a certain rhythm and harmony in the disarray and discord. I feel a sense of comfort knowing that so many people once stood where I now stand and baptized the wall with their exuberant, uninhibited self-expression.

“The public kind of went overboard last Saturday,” Colon says, laughing. “But that’s OK.”

I imagine that before the project, this was a place through which pedestrians would quickly shuffle, anxious to reach the other side. The underpass of Interstate 91 now seems to produce the opposite effect. It makes us amble, pause and appreciate. A car slows down as it drives through, the driver whipping out his phone to snap a picture. A man in sagging jeans and a bright red hoodie and his girlfriend in a rose-patterned skirt stop to admire the expansive mural on the left wall. As I follow their gaze from one end of the wall to the other, I realize that the mural contains an entire storybook narrative.

It begins with a depiction of outer space — three spheres that appear to be Earth, Mercury and Jupiter, orbiting each other. The dominant color of this mural is the electric crimson that one finds in Manga comics, Yugio cards and East Asian computer games. Then this outer-space world seamlessly morphs into an underwater one: Neil Armstrong, a motif transposed from the earlier mural, clutches his American flag as he stands next to a miniature space rover atop the rim of a large bathtub, as if about to dive in. In the center of the bathtub, sitting next to the chubby hand of a child, is a canary yellow rubber duck, imposing in its brightness.

To the right, the powder blue bath water suddenly swirls into a violent, onyx tide that has caught a container ship in its stormy wrath. Towards the far right of the mural, we enter the depths of the bath water sea, a rich, azure, Jules Verne-esque world of caverns, stalagmites and a large reclining octopus. At the final section of the wall, the sea transitions into a grass field of strong, vermilion stalks and a large butterfly, drawn with the meticulous, anatomical detail of an entomology textbook or a diagram at a natural history museum. A week ago, Woods tells me, a woman stood in front of this section of the wall, in tears. Her grandmother had told her before passing away that she would come back as a butterfly.

This continuous series of imaginary, child-like realms seem to suggest that the world around us — its grandeur, terror and danger — are simply projections of our own mind and consciousness. Just as a bathtub can be transformed into a mythological underwater world, a cold and dingy underpass can be wholly reinvented by sheer force of the imagination. Perhaps, as Woods believes, the stark division between the neighborhoods was “as much in our heads, as in the data of disparity or the barriers of urban infrastructure.”

However, despite its seemingly idealistic, Wordsworthian message, the art of Under 91 remains grounded and realist in its aims. As I turn around to leave, I notice, for the first time, the small patch of wall space at the entrance of the passageway. There are no underwater kingdoms or DNA strands here, but a painted portrayal of Interstate 91 itself: pale blue sky, wisps of cirrus clouds, the rusting grey asphalt of the underpass and two iron poles holding up an industrial metal sign, bearing the words “New Haven” in plain white letters.

The artists of Under 91 do not overstate the transformative power of their artwork: I-91 is still an interstate. But take a stroll through the underpass of Interstate 91 — maybe you’ll start to see it a little differently

Artivism?

October 10, 2014 3:06 am Leave a Comment

Sustainability art has never meant anything more to me than office ornaments made of recycled magazines, usually by independent artisans from some developing country, to be sold at Barnes and Noble in the gift section. So, since the Yale School of Art’s “Rock, Paper, Scissor, Lizard, Spock” show features, according to the website, “artists considering how to make work being sensitive to the environment,” I expected something along those lines. However, upon entering the gallery, I discovered the exhibition isn’t necessarily sustainability art so much as art about sustainability.

Still, I’m not sure whether each art piece entirely captures the environmentalist spirit. I guess if you’re deep, you might be able to see the connection between a flowered T-shirt on the wall and sustainability as a social, economic and political issue. (Flowers are…in…nature?)

Pieces like this one are at odds with less abstract installments — for example, the eight photographs, accompanied by captions, depicting the lives of New Haven residents on welfare. These photographs depict the tangible consequences of underprivileged communities’ limited access to food — particularly to fresh, sustainable produce. In the first photo, a woman proudly holds vegetables from her garden. She decided to grow her own food when her welfare was cut, and she needed to feed her children. In the caption, she writes that she’s happy she can now provide fresh vegetables to members of her community who otherwise cannot afford this type of produce. Another photo in the sequence, “No Meat, Mom, Really?” is the portrait of a young, unsmiling boy in front of his dinner for the night. The caption (written by his mother) reads, “He wasn’t ungrateful, but there was no smile.”

Other more political pieces include a poster with stars on top, stripes on the bottom, and, in the middle, written in clean, bold font, the words “I AM AFRAID.” In these three words, I read, “Yes, I am scared that the world will end because of climate change, and there is nothing unpatriotic about that.” One artist included photos from the late September Climate March in New York City: posters that read “There is No Planet B”, and angry faces, hopeful faces, inspired faces.

Nevertheless, most of the pieces toe the line between the purely political and the purely aesthetic. An oversized model of a broken CD lies on the ground, surrounded by real broken disks, a robot with spikes made of metal parts.

Because of the extremity of this disorder, I went and asked the receptionist which pieces were part of the sustainability show. She said all of them. I went back to the gallery, looked in, and thought to myself, “Maybe she doesn’t really work here.” Pieces weren’t grouped by theme or genre, and except for the eight photos, none had captions. I assume the curator doesn’t want viewers to consider the exhibition as unrelated fragments, but rather as a complete artistic statement. Unfortunately, the lack of dialogue between the separate installments made the entire thing a bit incoherent.

The exhibition flip-flops between the concrete and the abstract. It showcases real consequences of unsustainable practices alongside art with loose ties to environmental materials/causes/sentiments/ideas. The photos, essentially works of documentary journalism, felt incongruous with, say, someone’s experimental t-shirt art project, or a pyramid made of paint waste products. The former is heartbreaking; the latter is mind-boggling. If the showcase aims to be purely aesthetic, documentary doesn’t belong. Those photos should be someplace where they’ll get serious attention, where they’ll inspire dialogue and activism.

Still, I do feel that “Rock, Paper, Scissor, Lizard, Spock” is topical, especially given the recent New York protest. Combining art and environmental activism is a noble (if difficult) project. I left the show thinking seriously about the environmental movement, and realized that despite flaws in the curation, this exhibit succeeded. Here I was, contemplating sustainability, the meaning of art and how maybe I should go vegan.

Bad Habits

October 3, 2014 5:09 am Leave a Comment

“It’s not considered alcoholism until after college.” “The Dangers of Underage Drinking and Other Historical Posters” at the Cushing/Whitney Medical Library dispels this and other myths with lurid advertising from the 1950s to 1970s. Have you ever drunk alone? On the sly? Gulped down drink after drink? Does that sound like your Saturday night? Beware! These are the starting signs of alcohol addiction, the exhibition warns us. “The Dangers of Drinking” posters amplify just about everything associated with the ’70s: psychedelic typography, bright colors, opposite color wheel spectrum partnerships, a stringy moccasin leather jacket and a sense of over-the-top explicit suggestion coupled with a sense of overwhelming fear.

On the opposite side of the “Dangers of Drinking” posters are a series of informational comics exploring some of the things that (obviously) (inevitably) happen after too many nights of irresponsible drinking. A 1943 comic, “I Know All About Woman” features the inside of an army platoon hangout. One of the soldiers claims he can tell if a girl has syphilis just by looking at her, which of course the other soldiers challenge and just have to ask the army doctor about. After showing an informational pamphlet featuring a penis with a chancre (“sore,” the comic makes sure to clarify) and explaining the need of a microscope lens to actually see the syphilis bacterium, the doc puts Curley in his place. “If you can’t stay away from pickups or prostitutes, at least use a pro,” are Doc’s parting words. (I don’t know what a “pro” is.) Poor Curley. Go pro or go home!

From the Australian island comes an informational poster about the realities of AIDS. Namely, “You don’t have to be a queenie to get AIDS.” Yes, by today’s standards, pretty offensive to the queer population. The campaign does however attempt to destigmatize the disease by addressing it through a “normalized” heterosexual lens. “A man has sex … with someone who has AIDS. He goes back to his wife … who gets AIDS from him. They all get very sick.” A simple plot story that ends with a few gravestones and an impending sense of doom about your night out. What better way to inform people than to make them scared out of their wits? Most people would understandably choose a less painful, drawn-out death and the comic lays it on. Thick.

To isolate the drinking issue: When these posters were released, the legal drinking age in New York State was 18. There goes the argument of people binge drinking when they get to college because of the “exciting illegal factor.” By the late 1980s, traffic and adolescent studies would show that states with a minimum legal drinking age of 21 curtailed alcohol consumption and drinking-and-driving accidents. These results eventually prompted Congress to take action toward a uniform minimum legal drinking age of 21. Even so, the dangers of excessive and abusive drinking have remained on the forefront of many college campuses and administrative conversations. Maybe the real question here is how can we protect against something we don’t understand?

I wish I could say more modern advertisements of “Tobacco-Free Kids” or “D.A.R.E” escape the realm of finger-wagging paternalism to reach their target audience, but how many times have we all rolled our eyes when another one of those melodramatic voice-overs shows up on the television screen? Did these campaigns protect us? The posters from the 20th century don’t seem any less ridiculous and probably did as much (or as little) to protect adolescents as they do now. Something is missing here. Beyond the hilarity, beyond the sensationalism, if we really want to defend vulnerable populations, there needs to be a sense of true connection to what speaks to them. “The Dangers of Underage Drinking and Other Historical Posters” shows how campaigns might have always been missing their mark.

More Than Conversation Pieces

5:02 am Leave a Comment

Had you ventured into the courtyard of Jonathan Edwards College any time from the 1930s through the 1970s, you might have noticed a still, plaintive figure kneeling somewhere within the environment of grass and concrete and trees. Perhaps you admired the tentative play of sunlight on the black lead in which the sculpture is cast, or attempted to decipher the time told from the bronze sundial which the figure supports on its head. Maybe you whiled away lazy days studying, or lazy nights murmuring with friends under the starless sky, in its company. You might even have, with the sort of youthful irreverence present in every generation, etched your name among the graffiti marring the figure’s strained back.

It is with a decidedly different — a more constructive — kind of irreverence, I would say, that this unnamed garden statue of an African-born slave has been placed at the center of one of the rooms now occupied by “Figures of Empire,” an exhibition at the Yale Center for British Art that runs from Oct. 1 through Dec. 14. At first glance, the premise of the exhibition seems straightforward enough: It aims to explore, through a diverse array of portraits drawn predominantly from the museum’s collections, the impact of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade on 18th-century Britain.

However, the core attitude of the exhibition is to look at many of these works in ways that run counter to their creators’ original intentions — hence, the aforementioned “irreverence.” It is rich with examples of dignified portraits and conversation pieces featuring wealthy white members of British society, but our real focus is turned to those figures in the background, servants and slaves of African descent who have been consciously included as subordinate figures but whom the exhibition challenges us to examine as subjects in their own right. This is a project in reconstructing the historical and personal identities of such individuals through artistic analysis, even if efforts to locate them in official or family records have largely proven to be in vain.

As modern-day viewers, we already naturally feel — I would hope — some degree of discomfort with paintings like these, and as such it is with relative ease that we can adopt the critical eye that the exhibition asks of us. Because of this, it’s tempting to think of ourselves as temporally, physically and emotionally removed from these pieces; after all, it is by virtue of our distance from them that we can even begin to look at them in the way that we do. This illusion is shattered by specific and notable objects within the exhibition that do well to remind us not only of where we are but also of our connections to this seemingly bygone society. As it turns out, the garden statue is believed to have stood on the estate of our very own founding benefactor Elihu Yale, who made his fortune as a governor of the East India Company in Madras. A huge and rarely exhibited group portrait featuring Elihu Yale himself, accompanied, among others, by a slave boy wearing a collar and padlock around his neck, hangs at the start of the exhibition.

This is only one way in which curators Cyra Levenson, Esther Chadwick and Meredith Gamer engage the viewers in dialogue with the works on display. As Levenson says, the exhibition itself has “emerged from conversation” surrounding “complicated objects” like the ones described above, and it is a conversation they hope not necessarily to resolve, but rather to sustain and explore with their audience. Complicated objects give way to complicated questions, ranging from what constitutes a portrait (see, for example, the challenging “Bust of a Man,” which stands in the center of the second room) to how identity is constructed.

In order to foster this kind of dialogue among viewers, Levenson, Chadwick and Gamer curate subtle but productive dialogue among the pieces themselves. Within the 18th-century framework of the exhibition is a healthy representation of the ways in which people began to grapple with the moral issues surrounding slavery; in the second room, for example, the painstakingly constructed dignity of the conversation pieces belies the shifts which were beginning to occur during this time, as reflected in the abolitionist pieces on the other side of the room. “Figures of Empire” concludes with examples of Anglo-Africans themselves who used single-figure portraiture to construct their own identities much in the same fashion as their predecessors.

The exhibition encompasses a wide range of objects in negotiating an understanding of these “figures of empire,” and many of these objects can be challenging, even perplexing. In setting out such a variety of representations, however — traditional, alternative, satirical, empowering — “Figures of Empire” allows us to formulate a less restrictive view of a disenfranchised population. And that is something worth talking about.

Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that Elihu Yale made his fortune from the transatlantic slave trade.

Art Across the Divide

September 19, 2014 3:12 am Leave a Comment

Visiting “East of the Wallace Line: Monumental Art from Indonesia and New Guinea” requires something of a trek and directional know-how (in my case, supplied by a friendly Yale University Art Gallery security guard). The exhibit is tucked away into a little fourth-floor gallery; it feels almost like an intrusion to stumble into the intimate, teal-colored room after strolling through breezy white hallways and riding an elevator far too large for one person. Once inside, I am overwhelmed by over 120 objects from the 17th to 19th centuries, ranging from textile to brass to wood so old it no longer looks like wood; they are scattered along the walls and clustered in islands in the open space of the room, much like the scattered East Indies islands depicted in the map at the entrance to the exhibit.

“East of the Wallace Line” takes its title from the 19th-century British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace, who identified a divide — the Wallace Line — between the flora and fauna on two groups of islands in the East Indies. Although Wallace was concerned primarily with the natural world, the exhibit uses his ecological divide as a framework for presenting the artistic culture of peoples who lived in eastern Indonesia and western New Guinea. I almost wish there were examples of art from the other side, a counterpart exhibit called “West of the Wallace Line,” if only to serve as a point of comparison.

As I shuffle through the gallery, however, it nevertheless becomes apparent that there are plenty of contrasts to work with here — that we have, after all, an exhibit of distinctions within otherwise indistinguishable pairs, and networks of incongruities that perhaps aren’t so incongruous after all. There is, of course, Wallace himself, who independently developed the theory of evolution at the same time as Darwin, though it is Darwin whom we know better. There’s the underlying consciousness of the ecological mechanisms that preoccupied both men, of the diversity of traits individually propagated by the same core laws of evolution — and there is the distinction (and comparison) to be made between ecological and cultural diversity. There are, for the exhibit’s titular emphasis on monumental art — and its examples are captivating, don’t get me wrong — an awful lot of tiny and seemingly mundane (but no less aesthetic, and, in many cases, spiritually resonant) everyday objects ranging from combs to spoons to a woman’s hat. And then there is the exhibit’s assertion that the hodgepodge of cultures represented are somehow united by a single “shared sense of iconography and design.”

The exhibit does a subtle job of illustrating that our initial perception of these peoples as both physically and culturally isolated is not entirely accurate. It’s true that in the ecological world, physical separation gives rise to divergence, and this would have been the mental framework of Westerners like Wallace who arrived in the region believing it to be cut off from the outside world. We are presented, however, with healthy evidence of trade and exchange. For example, in one corner of the room hangs a particularly vivid shroud, used among the Rongkong Toraja exclusively for wrapping the dead. But when traded off to neighboring peoples, such shrouds took on ceremonial and decorative uses. This is how we start to see a justification for the wide range of objects on display and the coherence in design among different artistic traditions, how huge festival banners of Sulawesi can share the same sense of intricacy as canoe prow ornaments from Cenderawasih Bay. In a pleasantly surprising intersection of ecology and culture, one of the exhibit placards informs the viewer of how bird-of-paradise feathers from the region became a highly sought-after luxury in places as far away as Vietnam. The arrangement of objects themselves about the room is almost haphazard, and the island clusters into which they are seemingly compartmentalized turn out to represent mixes of cultures — masks from Timor are placed near ancestor figures from Flores, curation defined more by aesthetic relationships than by geography. Such adaptations were not only material; we learn also of tribes’ conversions to Christianity and Islam, tribes that still exist to this day. So here we come to perhaps the biggest paradox of all: the relationship between cultural exchange on one hand, and survival or the preservation of identity on the other.

A friend who accompanied me comments on the pristine condition of the objects on display, despite their age. In the same way, “East of the Wallace Line” reminds us of how cultures and communities can endure after centuries of history; while these objects left behind are now considered relics, their creators shouldn’t be. Before I arrived at “East of the Wallace Line,” I had to walk through another gallery in which a different exhibit was in the process of being taken down; I passed by a workman who was scraping painted letters off the wall into a garbage bag. For me, it was in this context, in a museum and a world in flux, that these objects of wood and textile and age and gravitas took on a strange sense of permanence.

Brave New Urban World

3:05 am Leave a Comment

I do not know anything about architecture. I do live in a building, and often observe and go into other buildings, but that’s basically the extent of how often I think about it. After visiting the Yale School of Architecture’s “Infra Eco Logi Urbanism” exhibit, I sat in my room and Googled the term “architecture,” which the Internet defines as “the art or practice of designing and constructing buildings.” This alone encapsulated a mere fraction of what I saw in the exhibit.

“Infra Eco Logi Urbanism” displays the design research of RVTR, an experimental architecture practice based in Toronto that combines academic and experimental research platforms, in the words of their website, to “continually evolve ecologies,” The firm completely reimagines the urban environment as we know it, replacing cities with “Megaregions” that encompass enormous areas of land, people and resources. The exhibit is framed around the “Great Lakes Megaregion” of their construction, a network defined as the most populous and geographically vast in a post-metropolitan world.

The ideas behind “Infra Eco Logi Urbanism,” while at times highly theoretical and difficult to grasp, have the potential to impact even the least architecture-savvy among us with its sleek coherence. A detailed description of the project greets visitors at the entrance, where the neatly-organized, medium-sized room takes the appearance of a vast landscape. Detailed charts, maps and pictures on wires hang from the high ceilings. To get from one end of the exhibit to the other, you must walk across a large map of the GLM plastered to the ground.

This configuration invites visitors to stop and admire the detailed, colorful networks sprawling across it. And the exhibit not only depicts plans for the new future, but also the concrete visage of GLM centers, presented as scaled building models with impressive, imaginative designs. In the case of one model, the designers chose to make use of existing water instead of land, presenting an apartment-like complex resting alongside a boat.

The key at the bottom of the chart delineates symbols for infrastructure and logistics, politics and food. This alone gives visitors a sense of how intertwined all of these systems are. To an extent previously unimaginable, “Infra Eco Logi Urbanism” envisions how life could be if these systems worked in accordance with one another (better, I think).

Not only is this exhibit a spectacle — beautiful and striking to the observer — it is also a calculated, potential reality crafted by architects. It’s not necessarily the sort of exhibit that makes for a fun, afternoon trip to “go check out some art.” We are instead confronted with the disturbing reminder that we, the humans, are messing up tons of stuff here on Earth — to such an extent that a group of people planned a completely alternative urban ecosystem.

The exhibit tells us that “the urban landscape’s whole image no longer corresponds to the activities carried out within it,” a notion that virtually abandons the part-to-whole governance that shapes our modern government and lives. “Infra Eco Logi Urbanism” acknowledges energy as a collective resource — in people, in culture, in natural resources. This makes for a most efficient and most orderly place, one that bears little semblance to the places we inhabit today.

Call it art, call it architecture, call me crazy, but I think this exhibit challenges us to reconsider how we organize and conduct our everyday lives. Although it suggests a radical reconfiguration of every aspect of life as we know it, the basic idea that people have the potential to organize themselves and their future world is empowering. At a time when there is more conflict in the world than I can possibly know or grasp, utopian visions of the future can help direct our expectations towards the positive. And it’s always nicer to think of what we can do than what we cannot.

Yale Daily News

Tag Archive: art