The Los Angeles-based GR2, part of the greater Giant Robot family, is currently running it’s fourth Post-It Show through Jan. 13th.
A diverse group of artists drew, colored, painted, cut up and glued Post-its, resulting in a colorful and chaotic sea of paper squares. GR2 is selling each Post-it for $20- how’s that for an entry price?
If you’re interested in purchasing a piece from the show, you can select up to four artists on the website. At the end of the show, GR2 will send you a randomly-selected Post-it by one of your preferred artists. The roster includes the very talented: APAK, Marc Bell, Jill Bliss, Jen Corace, Evah Fan, Daria Tessler, Yellena James, Saelee Oh, Luke Ramsey, and dozens more!
Sometimes I get really psyched, thinking that I’ve “randomly” discovered an artist of an entirely unrelated circle. Then, with a little more digging, I realize that the artist is actually quite connected to people and places I already know. This was the case Cat Lauigan who has shown at a number of my favorite galleries including Giant Robot, Jonathan Levine, Hatch and Canteen.
Nonetheless, I’m psyched to have come across her work. I’m especially fond of the stripe-y, geometric, slightly-psychedelic pieces I’ve included here. Her work centers around mesmerizing graphics, and her colors achieve a fun balance of vibrancy and earthiness. Lauigan currently has work available at Fontanelle from $150-350.
Jason Vivona is an artist/ designer whose work is avant-guarde yet affordable- a rare combination! His colors are incredible as is his work’s underlying tension between soft beauty and repulsiveness. The drawings and paintings shown here are all from his latest show, Eternal Beauty Rest, at Gallery Six in San Francisco. All are available and priced under $150.
Aside from drawing and painting, Jason is also the Art Director for We ride at night, an innovative art/skateboard company. His work has also been published in Juxtapoz, a publication at the forefront of low-brow/ underground art.
About Jason’s work, Gallery six states that it “presents a combination of abstract expressionism, skate-punk culture, and design.” The reference to abstract expressionism took me by surprise, but it seems to refer more to Vivona’s process than to specific aesthetic qualities of his work.
At a distance, Jason’s work appears soft and vaguely cute (smiley faces! neon pink!) but up close it reveals a darker intricacy. Up close the colorful forms are actually teeming with bizarre narratives that include the juxtaposition of naked figures, robots, basketballs, stars, phallic symbols, eyes, wings and intestines. His work has a grotesque, distinctly surrealist quality, as if we are viewing the recreations of his graphic dreams. Vivona uses an unusual combination of materials to create his distinct look including latex, aerosol, gouache, ink, tea and wine.
Maxwell Loren Holyoke-Hirsch, a San Francisco-based artist, has a great show, Megarealms, open through the end of the month, in which his bright, imaginative paintings and collages are clustered like mosaics.
In an effort to learn more, I read Maxwell’s interview for the show and was really disappointed by the presence of self-aggrandizing and hyperbolic statements. First, Maxwell makes the claim that he “is the hardest working illustrator and artist based in San Francisco, California.” Secondly, he attempts to explain the title of his show and goes down an ugly path: “A place I have created from the conscious and subconscious mind, a Megarealm is where I explore the areas of my brain, ideas, of thought itself, as they pertain to an image.” This statement feels contrived and purposefully obtuse, and as far as I’m concerned, the gist of what he’s saying is fairly obvious, that he used his brain to create his work.
Despite the over-the-top interview, Maxwell succeeds at creating art that is fresh and compelling which, in the end, is what really matters. Below I’ve picked out my favorite pieces available through the gallery’s website.
September 11th, 2009 · No Comments
Today I’m profiling Jennie Ottinger whose work is on display at Johansson Projects in Oakland, CA until Sept. 18th.
Ottinger’s technique reminds me of the Impressionists, most notably Sargent, for the way her brushstrokes, especially in her figurative pieces, appear messy and chaotic but at closer glance are actually quite deliberate. My favorites in this series are the houses and streetscapes where she really captures the beauty of the mundane in an honest and unexpected way.
Many of her pieces have a degree of ugliness in them such as Royal Family, Men in Suits, Man Chat (below-left) and Man with Cane (below-middle). And I can’t help but compare the two paintings below to the German Expressionist, Max Bechmann’s, Self-Portrait (below-right). Suffice it to say that sometimes the truth, or our perception of the truth, is ugly.
For more on the artist, check out her interview on Spraygraphic.
September 10th, 2009 · No Comments
Fecal Face profiles the Aug. 30th opening of Flotsam’s Wonder Tonic @ Soap Gallery. The exhibit, which brings to mind psychedelic carnival/sailors’ watering hole by Mike Shine is extended through Sept. 28th. If you’re in San Francisco, it definitely looks worth a visit! I love the painted buoys. As a sailor myself, I can’t help but wonder if they’re waterproof…
Serena Mitnik-Miller is a San Francisco-based artist who draws a lot of inspiration from her home near the ocean. This summer Serena was in Pipeline: Art, Surfing, and the Ocean Environment at SFMOMA. Mitnik-Miller’s paintings distill the purity and organic nature of her subject. She uses abstractions and geometric shapes to portray the water, and the effect is beautiful and utterly calming.
Besides the show at SFMOMA, Serena also showed in and curated the Ocean + Beach show at Needles and Pens this summer, which also showcased artists who live in beach communities and are inspired by life near the water.
If Mitnik-Miller’s paintings and curating is not impressive enough, she is also a very talented skateboard and surfboard artist.
