John Hawke
JOHN HAWKE is a contributor to the Rail.
Unbroken Kilometers
By John HawkeRecently, I had the opportunity to drive up to Dia:Beacon with an interesting pair of travelers: the man Art in America called "the most powerful and controversial environmental artist NY has ever known" the infamous master builder of New York’s infrastructure, the late Robert Moses, and that ever elusive land artist, the late Robert Smithson.
Mark Lombardi: Global Networks
By John HawkeThe Drawing Center presents a retrospective exhibition of 25 graphite and colored pencil drawings, ranging in size from 30 inches across to over eleven feet, of the late artist Mark Lombardi (1951–2000).
Landslide
By John HawkeDespite the title Landslide, this Smack Mellon exhibition is equally concerned with landscape art, which presumes a stable and distant vantage point, as with the sloppy side of raw matter, which might indicate more of an engagement with 1970s Land Art. Curator Rebecca Graves describes the intention to present the work of eight artists who use "revisionary tactics to approach the tradition of landscape art."
Water, Water
By John HawkeWater provides the aqueous conceptual glue binding together the work in this 12 artist group exhibition. Curator Lilly Wei conceived the exhibition "on a playful note, [as] an early Spring show that looks forward to Summer." I am not sure if this curatorial conceit serves the art well, as it establishes a very literal common denominator which perhaps dilutes the potency of the individual pieces, turning them into eclectic examples of "water art." Nevertheless, a few of the artists presented here break this surface tension.
John J. O’Connor
By John HawkeIn his first solo show, John J. O’Connor presents drawings which push schemes of faux systemization to the maximum, resulting in unforeseen and beautiful blooms of decorative data. He begins by trying to chart the indeterminate—areas of itch on the body, passing mundane memories—then uses these amorphous graphs to generate large-scale drawings in colored pencil and graphite.
Rendez-Vous
By John HawkeRendez-Vous is one part of the ambitious, multi-venue program now underway throughout Williamsburg and DUMBO, entitled Paris in Brooklyn, Brooklyn à Paris.
I’m With Nature
By John HawkeBrooklyn Front presents an alluring array of paintings by Paul Brainard and Ryan Steadman, ranging from the uncanny to the goofy to the aggressively blank.
Kim Jones: "New Work"
By John Hawkeat Pierogi A dumb, looming head in space eyes the visitor from the first drawing of Kim Jones’s “New Works” at Pierogi. The lips are fleshy, the ears pronounced.
GALLERIES
By Tomassio Longhi, John Hawke, and Jennifer CoatesLeslie Brack’s recent show of small oil paintings of collages, entitled Art in America, depicts an idiosyncratic array of images (a Led Zeppelin album cover, a postcard of Miami at sunset, a Gerhard Richter painting) that serve as grounds over which figures, both animal and celebrity, or text, cut and pasted, ransom-note style, are overlaid.
Brian Walker
By John HawkeLost in Queens: A Natural History Museum in 7 Parts is the program for the research and projects by Brian Walker at Plus Ultra. Walker presents an aerial view of Queens populated with numbered icons of animals both extinct and extant, as if indicating habitats or “finds.”
Art in Lisbon
By John HawkeGo straight east from Williamsburg, cross the Atlantic Ocean, and the first landfall will be at Lisbon, Portugal. What follows is a visitor’s analysis of the art scene in Lisbon—how it functions and whom it favors.
JIM OSMAN and SUSAN SMITH Remains of the Day
By John HawkeFive Myles presents Remains of the Day, an exhibition of architectural fragments in two and three dimensions, curated by Lilly Wei.
Raw
By John HawkeCurator Denise Carvalho organized this intriguing and well presented 11 artist group show.
www.CharlieCitron.comCarol Peligian: The Seductive Quality of the Impossible
By John HawkeA shaggy beef jerky floats on a milky pink ground in the foyer painting of The Seductive Quality of the Impossible, Carol Peligian’s well presented show of paintings and drawings at East, a smart pocket watch of a gallery in Williamsburg.
