Concise, critical reviews of books, exhibitions, and projects in all areas and periods of art history and visual studies

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Shepard Fairey
Exh. cat. Berkeley and Los Angeles: Gingko Press in association with Obey Giant, 2009. 446 pp.; 780 color ills. Cloth $59.95 (9781584233497)
Exhibition schedule: Institute of Contemporary Arts, Boston, February 6–August 16, 2009
For most people, the familiar poster of Barack Obama with the caption, “HOPE,” introduced them to the work of the street artist and graphic designer, Shepard Fairey. This unofficial poster, which resulted from Fairey’s grassroots efforts, provoked a well-publicized lawsuit by the Associated Press over Fairey’s use of a copyrighted photograph by Mannie Garcia as the basis for the red-white-and-blue image of Obama on his poster. This poster, the same image slightly changed for the cover of Time magazine’s person-of-the-year issue (December 29, 2008), as well as Obama’s letter of February 22, 2008, thanking Fairey for his support, were included… Full Review
March 10, 2011
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Jeffrey T. Schnapp, ed.
Exh. cat. Milan: Skira, 2009. 320 pp.; 141 ills. Paper $39.00 (9788857201757)
Exhibition schedule: Canadian Centre for Architecture, May 20–November 8, 2009; Wolfsonian-Florida International University, Miami Beach, September 17, 2010–February 20, 2011
It is somehow appropriate that I began writing this review on a plane. In an attempt to squeeze in a few extra productive hours between a busy conference and a hectic end of the semester, I resort to technology: not just the jet engine that propels me across the continent at the speed of over four hundred mph, but also the netbook computer and the available on-board internet, which allow me to instantly access my notes stored on a distant hard drive. It is an exhilarating experience, but it is also exhausting, as I cannot but long for the days… Full Review
March 9, 2011
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Eduard Vallès, ed.
Exh. cat. Barcelona: Museu Picasso de Barcelona, 2010. 423 pp.; 250 ills. €30.00 (9788498502466)
Exhibition schedule: Museu Picasso de Barcelona, May 28–September 5, 2010
Focusing on the work of two key figures in the development of modern art in Barcelona at the turn of the nineteenth century, the Picasso versus Rusiñol exhibition offered insights into a number of significant cultural and historical themes. To begin with it explored Picasso's artistic formation and creative development through a study of his juvenilia, even if this term did not always seem applicable to many of the paintings displayed. Beyond tracing the trajectory of works marking Picasso's becoming an artist, the exhibition developed a wider perspective on this theme by exploring his relationship with the painter, collector, and… Full Review
March 3, 2011
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Kerry Brougher, Philippe Vergne, Klaus Ottmann, Kaira M. Cabañas, and Andria Hickey
Exh. cat. Washington, DC and Minneapolis: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden and Walker Art Center, 2010. 352 pp.; 120 color ills.; 175 b/w ills. Cloth $65.00 (9780935640946)
Exhibition schedule: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC, May 20–September 12, 2010, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, October 23, 2010–February 13, 2011
One of the great things about looking at Yves Klein’s work is that a viewer can have a “transcendental” experience contemplating, say, one of his monochromes while simultaneously being hyper-aware of the way the gloriously saturated signature blue pigment functions as a critique of the genius-ridden art market. This is due to the fact that there are various Kleins: ironic Klein, misogynist Klein, sincere Klein, the Klein of beauty and exquisiteness. This is an artist who self-published a book, Yves Peintures (1954), which consisted of reproductions of his paintings that in fact did not exist; who offered empty space in… Full Review
February 24, 2011
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Trevor Schoonmaker, ed.
Exh. cat. Durham, NC: Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, 2010. 216 pp.; 200 color ills.; 25 b/w ills. Paper $45.00 (9780938989332)
Exhibition schedule: Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, NC, September 2, 2010–February 6, 2011
The Record: Contemporary Art and Vinyl at the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University is, quite appropriately, a mix. And, like any good mix, the exhibition includes perennial hits, lesser-known works by familiar artists, and more than a few unknown gems. Drawing upon vinyl records as “metaphor, archive, icon, portrait or transcendent medium” (as described in a wall text), the exhibition offers a wide-ranging view of how this single object has remained a catalyst for visual artists over the past forty-five years and, as all exhibitions should seek to do, merges a rigorous curatorial program with an almost guilt-inducing… Full Review
February 10, 2011
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Susan Harris, Jan Howard, and Pat Steir
Exh. cat. Providence: Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, 2010. 116 pp.; 79 color ills.; 29 b/w ills. $35.00 (9700615343822)
Exhibition schedule: Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, February 19–July 3, 2010
Pat Steir is perhaps best known for her large-scale paintings of waves and waterfalls, but a recent exhibition at the Rhode Island School of Design focused solely on Steir’s drawings. Organized by Jan Howard, Curator of Prints, Drawings and Photographs at the Museum, and Susan Harris, an independent curator, the exhibition reveals Steir’s abiding interest in the nature of line in both drawing and writing. Drawing and writing are each symbol systems based on line from which the viewer, bringing layers of references to bear, constructs meaning. Steir’s perception that writing and drawing are essentially the same enterprise remains the… Full Review
February 10, 2011
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Allison Louise Cort and Paul Jett, eds.
Exh. cat. Washington, DC: Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, 2010. 160 pp. Paper $40.00 (9780295990422)
Exhibition schedule: Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, May 15, 2010–January 23, 2011; J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, February 22–August 14, 2011
In 2005 the National Museum of Cambodia opened its metal conservation laboratory after having received training and support from experts at the Freer and Sackler galleries of the Smithsonian Institution and the Getty Conservation Institute. That laboratory was the first of its kind to be built in Cambodia after the devastation of the preceding decades and has trained a generation of specialists in the treatment and preservation of ancient metalwork. For the past five years the conservation laboratory has been fulfilling its mission of maintaining the cultural legacy of the Cambodian people, and this exhibition originated as a way to… Full Review
January 20, 2011
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Lisa Melandri, ed.
Exh. cat. Santa Monica: Santa Monica Museum of Art, 2010. 64 pp.; 35 color ills.; 32 b/w ills. Paper $30.00 (9780974510873)
Exhibition schedule: Santa Monica Museum of Art, Santa Monica, California, September 11–December 18, 2010
Widely celebrated in the United States during the 1950s, Italian artist Alberto Burri (1915–1995) was subsequently forgotten. Forgotten by U.S. institutions, at least, as the nation solidified its claim as the cultural center in the era of Pop. Not so in Italy, where his place in the twentieth century as a key, postwar artist is now firmly established. In Rome, there is no shortage of catalogues to consult and exhibitions to visit. But in Los Angeles (or in English), many have never heard of him. Combustione: Alberto Burri and America, at the Santa Monica Museum of Art, sought to… Full Review
January 19, 2011
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Elizabeth Cowling and Richard Kendall
Exh. cat. Williamstown, MA and Barcelona: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute and Museu Picasso, 2010. 354 pp.; 310 color ills.; 9 b/w ills. Paper $45.00 (9780931102868)
Exhibition schedule: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA, June 13–September 12, 2010; Museu Picasso, Barecelona, October 14, 2010–January 16, 2011
The exhibition Picasso Looks at Degas at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute opened with a statement attributed to Picasso: “Good artists copy; great artists steal.” That Degas was among those judged worthy of theft—discerned as early as the young Spaniard’s first show in Paris (1901)—was first connected to Les Demoiselles d’Avignon by Robert Rosenblum (in Je suis le cahier: The Sketchbooks of Picasso, ed. Arnold Glimcher and Marc Glimcher. Exh. cat. London: Royal Academy of Arts, 1986, 53–60). In Picasso: Style and Meaning (New York: Phaidon, 2002), Elizabeth Cowling opened the way to a broader affiliation by… Full Review
January 6, 2011
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Klaus Biesenbach, ed.
Exh. cat. New York: Museum of Modern Art, 2010. 224 pp.; 345 ills. Cloth $50.00 (9780870707476)
Exhibition schedule: Museum of Modern Art, New York, March 14–May 31, 2010
Over the course of a career that spans more than thirty-odd years, Marina Abramović has maintained an unwavering commitment to a form of performance that tests the psychological and physical extremes of the body. The word “commitment” indeed might be the singular most defining characteristic of her art, as well as her approach to the practice of being an artist. Among an early, important group of artists who moved away from the utilization of inert materials in favor of a direct employment of their own bodies (as tool, medium, performer, instigator, facilitator), Abramović’s recent retrospective at the Museum of Modern… Full Review
January 4, 2011
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