The New Museum

The End Of The Art World…As We Know It

Written & Photographed by Kenn Sava
This is Part 3 of my series on the end of The Met Breuer also concludes my look at what I saw before the March 12th “temporary closing,” Part 1 looked at some of the history of the Breuer building, Part 2 looked at some of the most memorable moments and its legacy. Part 3 looks at where we are now, and wonders about the future…

Forlorn. The Met two months deep into its “temporary closing,” seen on May 21st.

When the clock struck 6pm on March 12th and I walked away from The Met Breuer on my last visit, much was unknown. I didn’t even know it would be the last time I would visit it. Five months later, a few questions have been answered, but the answer to most of them remain unknown. As I wrote in Part 1 and Part 2, March 12th turned out to be the very last day of The Met Breuer, which remained closed until The Met turned the Breuer building over to The Frick Collection in July, ending the Gerhard Richter: Painting After All show, which I saw on its last day, with it. Now, looking back on The Met Breuer (TMB), it’s becoming clearer that more than it has ended. In the ensuing five months, among Manhattan’s Big 5 museums, and the Brooklyn Museum, only The Met has announced plans to “hopefully” reopen on August 29th, (after being closed for five and a half months- unprecedented in my lifetime, and losing TMB along the way, as they “celebrate” their 150th Anniversary). As the fall season in the NYC Art world rapidly approaches, it looks right now to be a non-event.

A number of people I’ve spoken to in the Art business have lost their jobs or are scaling back their operations. I’m sure they are the tip of the iceberg among Art business professionals who have been laid off or furloughed. The rest gamely soldier on, hopefully safely. The Art Fair world (including The Photography Show, which I’ve extensively covered the past three years) ever-increasingly a staple of the Art business, has virtually disappeared overnight world-wide. While some events and shows have moved online, I think most people would agree, it’s not the same. Yes, Art & Photography can be sold online, and it is in large amounts, but it’s not the same as seeing it in person. I look at as much Art as anyone does online, and with rare exceptions, like Closer to Van Eyck, which I wrote about in January, wondering if it was the future of seeing Art, it’s just not the same experience. For me, looking at most Art online can only give one an idea of the piece. 

So, whither to the Art world, and Art in NYC?

The shuttered Matthew Marks Gallery on West 22nd Street, received a small business Paycheck Protection Program loan from the Small Business Administration of between $350,000 and $1,000,000. Note- All loans quoted in this piece are sourced from the Small Business Administration, here. Seen in June, 2020.

Nothing has been heard from any of NYC’s “big 5” museums or the Brooklyn Museum about their plans since March, beyond The Met’s reopening announcement, which is dependent on City and State approval. Some galleries are open. Some galleries are “open by appointment only.” Some galleries here are not open. Some are gone, as in out of business. Email from the Art world has provided little to no additional insight. I began to look elsewhere for answers to some of the countless questions.

The American Alliance of Museums conducted a survey of its member museums and its findings are dated June, 2020. I found the report chilling but not surprising. The result that has gotten the most publicity so far is the answer to-

“Do you believe there is a significant risk of your museum closing permanently in the next 16 months, absent additional financial relief?”

16% of 648 responders answered “YES.” With Art museums making up 20% of responders, doing some extrapolations, I calculate that as being “YES” from 24 out of 152 US Art museums. Since there’s no way of knowing how (or if) the NYC museums responded, we still have no way of knowing how they stand. I, for one, would be very surprised if any of Manhattan’s “big 5” museums or the Brooklyn Museum were to permanently close in the next 16 months, but who knows.

As concerning as the survival question, very surprising to me is the response to the question- “Months of Operating Reserves Remaining?” 56% of all US museums have 6 months OR LESS of operating reserves on hand. 67% of all museums responding have LESS than 1 year on hand (as of June, 2020, presumably). Again, I doubt the “big 5″+ Bklyn are among them. But, I am starting to wonder what their “staying power” is.

Each of them has been spending money like it’s going out of style this century- but not on Art, leaving each of their collections lagging those elsewhere in Modern & Contemporary Art! Consider-

The Brooklyn Museum seen on August 7, 2014, during its terrific Ai Weiwei: According to What? show, 10 years after its new entrance opened.

In 2004, The Brooklyn Museum remodeled at a reported cost of $63,000,000., which included adding this new entrance and outdoor plaza, a new lobby, a boardwalk, and “Vegas-style fountains with jets of water that dance1.”

In 2006, MoMA moved their exhibitions, including the historic Matisse-Picasso show, to their storage facility in Queens, dubbed MoMA Qns, while they undertook an $858,000,000. renovation.

In 2006 the Morgan Library and Museum opened their 90,000 square foot expansion of their 225 Madison Avenue campus designed by Renzo Piano. Cost= $75,000,000[1 Here.]. 

In 2007-8, the Guggenheim Museum spent $29,000,000. renovating their immortal Frank Lloyd Wright building that I tried to help save in 1984 from their dubious expansion2. (Though we’ve been living with it since, yes, I still consider it dubious.) 

The New Museum presents an attention grabbing silhouette that contrasts with the rough and tumble history of the Bowery at the expense of the gallery spaces inside. There are too many odd, small and strangely placed galleries that are easy to miss and must be very problematic for their excellent curators. Seen here in April, 2017.

December 1, 2007, the New Museum opened its new 50,000 square foot building on the Bowery. Cost= $50,000,000.3

The Whitney, seen shuttered on May 27th. What is it with NYC museums and Renzo Piano? And WHY? Five years after this building opened, it still says absolutely nothing to me. Inside, the lobby is useless and the galleries just “Ok” in my opinion. My bet is that over time, the 13,000 square feet of outdoor space will come to be seen as a mistake. The big question so far, beyond the Whitney’s board, is why have so many of its major shows felt truncated or petered out? Vida Americana is the first one that doesn’t

October, 2014, The Whitney Museum’s final show closed at the building Marcel Breuer designed for it at 945 Madison Avenue and that they occupied since September, 1966, almost 50 years. In 2015, they reopened on Gansevoort Street in a building also designed by Renzo Piano. Cost= $442,000,0004.

MoMA’s famous main entrance shuttered during the protests, seen on June 27th.

The second “new” MoMA of this century was open, officially, from October 21, 2019 through March 12th, 2020, at a cost this time of $450,000,000. (400 million for new construction, 50 for renovation of the last “new” MoMA)5. Total cost of 21st century MoMA renovations and expansion= $1.3 BILLION. Though I referred to “the gorillas in the room” in my look at the “newest” MoMA, beyond spending that $1.3B on Art, there is another gorilla they could have spend it on.

The sun is setting on the New Museum building, seen here in April, 2019, in more ways than one. Plans have been announced to expand into the building to its right, once that building is torn down, with a design that has nothing to do with its existing design, and once again, leaves me scratching my head. As we just saw with MoMA- getting it right the first time would have been much smarter. Ever notice how this never happens to The Met, the kings of museum renovations? Nonetheless, the New Museum have had a run of excellent shows, including unforgettable retrospectives of Raymond Pettibon and Nari Ward. For those of you keeping score at home, Renzo Piano has nothing to do with this expansion- as far as I know.

In June, 2019, the New Museum announced plans to expand the building they only opened in 2007. Cost- $63,000,000.6 Their total 21st century building & renovation costs= $113,000,000. Note- The New Museum has no permanent collection. Under the Paycheck Protection Program, The New Museum received $1,000,000. to $2,000,000. in loans.

Fotografiska – New York across Park Avenue, seen on August 15th.

December 14, 2019, the Fotografiska- New York, a new Photography museum opened on Park Avenue South. Cost not known to me. They renovated an entire landmarked six story building, so it wasn’t cheap. They were open for 3 months before the shutdown.

The Met. Not exactly how they drew up celebrating the 150th Anniversary of their founding. They’re probably hoping to get another chance on the 150th Anniversary of the 1000 Fifth Avenue building in another couple of years. Hopefully, they’ll have a better logo then, too. From a distance, this looks like “15C,” no? Seen May 21, 2020.

And, all this while The Met has done countless renovations including the entire Greek & Roman Wing and the entire American Wing. When the closure hit, they were also knee deep in their European Paintings Skylight renovations. In 2011, Thomas Campbell, then Director, announced a renovation to their Modern & Contemporary Wing using TMB as a satellite for shows in the 8 year interim, at a cost of $800,000,000, plus renovations and rent of the Breuer, only to see The Museum fall on financially hard times, in spite of record attendance due to a legal loophole changing the admissions policy. Mr. Campbell resigned, and the plan was scrapped. On September 22, 2018, The Met announced it had made a deal to ‘sublease” the Breuer building to The Frick Collection in July, 2020, so The Frick could renovate their own building. Daniel Weiss, President/CEO. said The Met would save $45 million under the deal7. Cost of renovations to The Frick Collection is reported to be $160 million. It’s unknown if that includes whatever they’re paying to The Met for their “sublease” on the Breuer building8. I don’t think it does since this figure was published before The Met and Frick agreement was made public. 

The Met’s plaza under reconstruction to install fountains seen in May, 2014. Their $65,000,000 cost was paid for by David H. Koch, who’s name was controversially installed in gold letters on both fountains when they opened in September, 2014, to protests.

In November, 2018, Daniel Weiss and new Director Max Hollein announced a $70,000,000. plan to renovate the Africa, Oceania and the Americas Wing and a $600,000,000 dollar plan to renovate their Modern & Contemporary galleries (down from the $800,000,000 original plan,) “now that the museum is on track to balance it’s $320,000,000. annual budget by 2020,” according to the NY Times, November 18, 20189. There has been no word yet on whether their budget will still be in balance this year, or on the status of announced renovation plans. 

Why all of this building, renovating and huge outlays of capital?

2019 Visitors per the Art Newpaper
Metropolitan Museum- 6,479,548
Museum of Modern Art- 1 ,922,121 (MoMA was closed for renovation for 4 months)
Guggenheim Museum- 1,283,209
Whitney Museum- 1.030,945
Other NYC Art museums- less than 1,000,000 each.

The museums were in a race to compete with each other for visitors. It seemed like each and every year new attendance records were set in NYC. The museums felt the need to go bigger and better to keep up and keep drawing record numbers (and to lure donations of money, naming rights, and Art- particularly since they have now been priced out of buying many of the masterpieces of Modern & Contemporary Art they missed when they were new). These seemed to feed on each other in an unprecedented cycle of museum building and renovations this century.

Then, on March 13, 2020, the music suddenly stopped. Only Daniel Weiss, it seems to me, was left with a chair. In September, 2018, a year and a half before the pandemic, he saved The Met $45,000,000. by getting The Frick to sublease the Breuer building. Wait. What? An NYC museum getting OUT of an expensive expansion project? We didn’t know it then, but that may have marked the beginning of the end of these projects. Between that and how deftly he has handled The Met’s precarious finances to this point, he has earned a job for life, in my opinion. Still, looking back on March 13th from the vantage of five months it seems obvious to me that that was the day the Art world, as we knew it10, ended.

The closed front doors of the Whitney Museum, May 27th. It looks like when these doors do reopen, the blockbuster Vida Americana will as well. The Whitney & The Guggenheim each received between $5,000,000 and $10,000,000. in small business loans under the Paycheck Protection Program. The Met and MoMA received nothing under this program.

Five months later, the best that can be hoped for in 2020 is these museums were open for a total of 6 1/2 months- from January 1st through March 12th and September 1st through December 31st (the best case scenario at the moment). If so, they will be EXTRAORDINARILY lucky to reach half of 2019’s numbers. Given a new reality of fewer open days, shorter hours and admissions limits, that would appear to be extremely unlikely. The bigger question is WHEN will the big numbers return to the museums? The biggest question is- What happens if they don’t soon? Or ever?

It’s possible we are heading into dark times. Given scarce public funding, philanthropy fills in the gaps for  the museums. Despite the fact that sources of museum funding has come under closer scrutiny, in the near future there may be too many places in need of funding for those willing to fund. That closer scrutiny may give way to necessity. That before most of them reopen 16% of museums (of all kinds- not only Art museums) say there is a “significant risk” of permanent closure is a number that may or may not rise as things develop. NYC’s Art museums may be a bit more insulated than most, but they have made some huge decisions that may prove to be very shortsighted. 

One building that won’t be open soon is the new Hauser & Wirth behemoth on West 22nd Street towering over and horribly out of place among its residential neighbors. Frankly, it’s already an eyesore. As numerous small galleries go out of business around it, Hauser received $1,000,000.-$2,000,000. in Paycheck Protection Program loans in July. Yet, they have the money to build this?

Of course, ALL of this leaves out one very important group- living Artists. Most Artists (not named Jeff Koons, who received a PPP loan of $1,000,000. to $2,000,000.) are largely left on their own, and, whether they have gallery representation or not, are relying on the internet to sell their work. When you consider the workforce as a whole, they are a bit “lucky” to even have that outlet. Many others have no ability to work or earn without physically going to a  workplace.

Still, I’m sure there are many Artists around the world who are beginning to wonder “If this gallery isn’t showing my work to people in person, what am I paying them for?,” adding even more fuel to the “We NEED a new model!” movement I’ve heard from countless Artists & Photographers these past five years, from which there is no going back. The vast majority of Artists in the world don’t have gallery representation and have been making their own way in the Art world for their entire careers. In my opinion, and in my experience, this movement is only going to continue and grow.

Since no one yet knows how long this is likely to last, it’s also unknown if those loans are sufficient to tie over those who received them. (Full disclosure- Amount given/loaned/granted or donated to NighthawkNYC= $0.) For the rest of the Art world, as it is for the rest of us, it’s “God Bless the child who’s got his own,” as Billie Holiday sang in 1941. Right now, I can’t help but wonder- Will the day come when any or all of the museums who’ve spent tens, hundreds of millions, or billions of dollars on renovations or new buildings come to rue the day they did? As they presumably prepare to enter the “brave new world” we all face, wherever we are, IF  they are among the 34% of museums who told the AAM they have 4 months of Operating Revenue Remaining as of June? They will.

It seems to me in their race to outdo each other, they may be in danger of shortsightedly overlooking the REAL race. The most important race. The race to survive. 

*-Soundtrack for this Post is “It’s the End of the World as We Know It” by R.E.M. from Document, 1987 seen here in their official video, brilliantly Directed by James Herbert-

NighthawkNYC.com has been entirely self-funded and ad-free for over 6 years, during which over 250 full length pieces have been published. If you’ve found it worthwhile, you can donate to keep it going & ad-free below. Thank you!

Written & photographed by Kenn Sava for nighthawknyc.com unless otherwise credited.
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NYC’s Museums Are “Temporarily Closed”- UPDATED

Written & Photographed by Kenn Sava

Tonite, as I write, all of Manhattan’s “Big Five” Art Museums and the Brooklyn Museum are “temporarily closed” due to concerns over the coronavirus, marking the first time this has happened since 9/11.

Gerhard Richter, September, 2005, Oil on canvas. The Artist created this four years after 9/11. Seen at Gerhard Richter: Painting After All on March 12, 2020, the final day The Met Breuer was open before its “temporary closing.”

Extraordinary measures for extraordinary times. 

Unfortunately, this comes at a moment when there are a number of important shows going on including-

Vida Americana: Mexican Muralists Remake American Art, 1925-1945 at the Whitney Museum

Dorothea Lange and Donald Judd at MoMA

Jordan Casteel and Peter Saul at the New Museum

Gerhard Richter: Painting After All at The Met Breuer

each of which only recently opened. 

I was able to see both Vida Americana and the Gerhard Richter this week before their sudden closings, which came without notice, and while I mull them over, I will say it would be a real shame if the closures turn out to be extended and prevent more people from seeing both of these shows, though of course, the health and wellbeing of visitors and staff must come first. In particular, Vida Americana is, perhaps, the most important Painting show I’ve seen in an NYC museum since Kerry James Marshall: Mastry graced The Met Breuer in late 2016 to 2017. 

The Gerhard Richter show, while a terrific feat of curating by Sheena Wagstaff and her team in bringing in major works from all over which are very handsomely hung, offers an opportunity to see his work through the eyes of our time and in light of both what has come since, as well as what has been discovered about what was done before and during his time by Artists who were in eclipse for too long. In my opinion, Mr. Richter, perhaps a bit like Andy Warhol, winds up with quite a few works that don’t seem to have aged all that well and it will be interesting to see if the future finds these works speak to them. There are other works who’s gravitas is plain- like the exceptional Birkenau series, (unforgettably installed adjacent to 4 incredibly rare surviving Photos taking inside Auschwitz II Birkenau by a member of the Sonderkommandos), the beautiful Forest series, and a number of fine works that seem to have been overlooked thus far. This show is a great opportunity for each viewer to assess, or reassess, for themself.

5pm, March 12, 2020. Minutes before closing at The Met Breuer, a staff member is still busy cleaning the doors. When they’ll get opened again to the public is anyone’s guess. I heard one guard say to another, “See you May 1st.” Was that his guess? The Gerhard Richter show is scheduled to open at MOCA, L.A. on August 15th, making it unlikely to be extended in NYC.

Here’s hoping the closings will be brief. But, if they are not, and, with the postponing of a number of Art & Photography shows this past week around the country, how long will it be before the galleries follow suit? In addition to any and all of the other effects it may have, all of this makes me wonder what the effect of the coronavirus may wind up being on the Art world, and the Art market, which has seen an unabated, meteoric, rise over the past three decades. 

In the meantime, stay healthy out there.

Mid Tuesday afternoon, March 17, 2020. Normally, West 24th Street in the gallery district of Chelsea would see a steady stream of foot and vehicular traffic going to the galleries lining both sides of the street from end to end. Today? I could have safely laid down to take this shot.

UPDATE- March 13th, one day later. Many, even most, of the NYC galleries have announced either closures or “open by appointment only.”

Gagosian on West 24th Street, scene of Jonas Wood’s latest NYC show, would normally be open.

While I expect many other non-Art businesses to close temporarily in the near future, a good many, especially smaller, businesses would be in extreme financial peril if they were to close for an extended time, particularly in the never more expensive NYC business environment.

The scene over on West 21st Street. The terrific Sarah Sze show was here late last year. Today, that jogger doesn’t have to worry about running into anyone, and the street looks like it did before the galleries came here.

It’s hard not to think about how that reflects on the “Art business.” It also makes me wonder how these “appointment only” galleries know the health status of whoever they are choosing to let in, among other things.

NighthawkNYC.com has been entirely self-funded and ad-free for over 6 years, during which over 250 full length pieces have been published. If you’ve found it worthwhile, you can donate to keep it going & ad-free below. Thank you!

Written & photographed by Kenn Sava for nighthawknyc.com unless otherwise credited.
To send comments, thoughts, feedback or propositions click here.
Click the white box on the upper right for the archives or to search them.
For “short takes” and additional pictures, follow @nighthawk_nyc on Instagram.

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Art In Manhattan, 2017- And Then There Were Five

It was a year of discovery. A year where I discovered some great Artists I previously hadn’t known, finally caught up with some I knew about but hadn’t gotten to see much of their work, and got lost exploring some remarkable Retrospectives- for Raymond Pettibon and Robert Rauschenberg, both accompanied by memorable satellite shows. Most of these are represented in my monthly NoteWorthy Show selections throughout the year. But? There was more! So, I’m going to take this moment to pause and look back at the revelations of 2017, look at some memorable shows I didn’t write about at the time, and finally, highlight a pair of men who, I feel, had an exceptional 2017 in Manhattan Art.

No doubt about it- the biggest discovery this year was a long overdue deep dive into the world of Contemporary Photography. From seeing well over 100 Photography shows, to spending five long days at “AIPAD: The Photography Show” (with well over 120 galleries from all over the world showing work), to going through hundreds of PhotoBooks, and meeting many Photographers, legendary, famous, or not quite yet, along with the staffs of two of the world’s leading Photography organizations- Aperture and Magnum, both celebrating major anniversaries this year. Rarely did a week pass when Photography wasn’t in the the picture. Of course, in a world were there are now more cameras than people it’s impossible to get to see everyone who’s doing great work. As happens each year, NO matter WHAT I do to prevent it, this year too, there were shows I didn’t find out about until they closed. UGGGH!!!! Along the way, there were quite a few revelations, and a good many other things solidified…at least for the moment.

First, the revelations. In Photography, particularly among those younger than 50 (I say 50 only because I seem to know/have heard of many of those over) and unknown to me, Gregory Halpern was the biggest revelation I had this year. His book “Zzyzx” won the prestigious Aperture Best Book Award for 2016, but I didn’t know that when I discovered his work at Aperture’s booth at AIPAD. I had never heard of him.

Gregory Halpern, “Untitled,” 2016, from his “Buffalo” series. Click any Photo for full size.

The work, “Untitled,” was a Photograph Aperture had run in the Spring, 2017 issues of it’s excellent quarterly magazine, in a pictorial by Mr. Halpern, titled “Buffalo.” I didn’t know that then, either. I simply saw the work, and then couldn’t get it out of my mind. It now hangs a few feet away. Out of everything I saw at AIPAD, particularly by those younger than 50 and unknown to me, this work grabbed me and didn’t let go. I went home that night with one thought on my mind- “WHO is Gregory Halpern?” After researching him most of the night, (including finding his incredibly honest and insightful answer to one very important question), serendipitously, I got to meet him the next day, and spoke to him about his book. It turned out to be a classic case where some things are better left unexamined. Gregory was so forthcoming in his answers about specific images I came too close for comfort to losing some of their mystery.

Gregory Halpern standing next “Untitled,” at Aperture’s Booth at AIPAD, March 31st.

In addition to being, in my eyes, one of the most talented Photographers of his generation, he is, also, one of it’s best writers. He’s the co-author of one of the most popular and respected Photography Manuals of 2017, “The Photographer’s Playbook,” and his occasionally published articles always enlighten and leave me wanting more. A Harvard grad, he’s now a professor in the College of Imaging Arts and Sciences at Rochester Institute of Technology for some very lucky students. As if all of that isn’t enough, his wife, Ahndraya Parlato is, also, one of the revelations of the year as a Photographer. Her Photographs “glow”- in one way or another. Her most recent book, “A Spectacle and Nothing Strange,” is ethereal…mesmerizing…magical.

Leaving aside age or era, the work of Fred Herzog was, also, unknown to me. Early pioneers of color Photography have taken decades coming to the attention they deserve, such was the disdain color held among the Photographic cognoscenti for color Photography. With the publication of “Fred Herzog: Modern Color,” in February, 2017, an Artist who was fairly well-known, and appreciated, in his native Canada finally began becoming wider known in the USA. His work was memorably shown by Equinox Gallery of Vancouver at AIPAD this spring, where, I felt, it stood out.

Fred Herzog, “Main Barber,” 1968, seen at Equinox Gallery’s AIPAD booth.

Fred Herzog considers Saul Leiter THE master of early color Photography, and even with a giant like William Eggleston to consider (who’s 1976 MoMA show, “Photographs by William Eggleston,” which can be “visited” here, is widely credited with making color Photography “acceptable” in the world of “Fine Art”), it’s hard to argue with him. No Photographer new to me, regardless of age or period, had a bigger impact on me this year than Saul Leiter.

Saul Leiter, “Through Boards,” Circa 1957. This image appears (cropped) on the cover of the now classic book, “Saul Leiter: Early Color,” 2006, which launched the “Saul Leiter Renaissance.” It’s, perhaps, my very favorite Photobook. Sadly, now out of print, it would take real diligence to find a very good copy for less than $100. But, there are many worse uses of time. Photo by the Saul Leiter Foundation.

It took until 2006 for Saul Leiter to be recognized- FIFTY EIGHT years after he started taking color photographs. As with William Eggleston, Mr. Leiter was, also, a devoted Painter. I can see it in both of their work, and I believe it’s part of the reason their work speaks to me, perhaps, more than the work of any other Photographer of any period. It was his friend, no less than the great Artist Richard Pousette-Dart (who’s also an under appreciated Photographer), to encouraged him to pursue Photography.

“Walk with Soames,” 1958, This was 20 YEARS before William Eggleston’s ground breaking MoMA show “legitimized” color Photography in the Art world! Photo by Howard Greenberg Gallery.

Mr. Leiter saw and used color in his Photography in ways no one else has, achieving effects that today’s finest digital manipulators can only dream of. Saul Leiter didn’t need Photoshop to get his results. As very good as his Black & White work is, like Turner or Van Gogh, Saul Leiter was a true Poet of color, perhaps the greatest Master of Color in Photography, though it’s, of course, impossible and pointless to qualitatively compare.

“T,” Circa 1950(!).Photo by the Saul Leiter Foundation. Daring. Gorgeous.

A number of established Photographers had terrific shows in NYC in 2017 that I didn’t get to write about here. Among them are Mark Steinmetz, Mike Mandel, Raghubir Singh (though marked by controversy), Richard Avedon, Herman Leonard, Michael Kenna, and Edward Burtynsky. But, I’m going to address one I simply can’t let pass, because I continue to think about it.

Richard Misrach’s Photo, “Effigy #3, near Jacumba, California,” 2009, Pigment print mounted to Dibond, right rear, with Guillermo Galindo’s Musical Instrumet/Sculpure “Effigy,” 2014, center2014. Barely visible are two strings between the forearms. The grey rectangle on the lower left side of the pedestal is where a speaker is mounted.

“Richard Misrach: Border Cantos,” (at Pace, 510 West 25th Street), was an utterly remarkable and serendipitous collaboration between renowned Photographer Richard Misrach & Composer/Sculptor Guillermo Galindo on the subject of our southern border, those protecting it, and those trying to cross it. To accompany Mr. Misrach’s large, atmospheric Photographs, Mr. Galindo created a whole orchestra of Musical Instruments out of objects found along the border, and proceeded to compose and record a 4 hour score that was looped in the show’s back room to meditative effect, ingeniously installed so that the music being played was coming from speakers mounted inside the display of the specific instruments that were playing at any given moment. (The Artists have an excellent website for this show where you can, also, hear these remarkable instruments.)

Instruments, like this. Guillermo Galindo, “Tortillafono/Wall Vibraphone,” 2014, Metal. The discarded metal cap of an electrical box from the failed SBInet (Secure Border Initiative) surveillance program was turned into a mallet and string instrument sits in front of Richard Misrach’s “Artifacts fround from California to Texas between 2013 and 2015,” 2013-5, 86 x 57 inches, Pigment prints mounted to Dibond. Photos of items found along the border.

And this- Guillermo Galindo, “Teclata,” His description- “On this keyboard, empty cans, bottles, and a plastic cup act as piano strings. The surface of the instrument is decorated with Border Patrol ammunition boxes.”

The surround sound effect was like sitting in the middle of a small chamber music group. The instruments, themselves, were beautiful as sculpture, and the music, which sounded to me like a cross between Harry Partch (who, also, made his own instruments) and John Cage, on instruments that looked like Rauschenbergs, had me asking if it had been released on CD. Why not?

Richard Misrach, “Playas de Tijuana #1, San Diego,” 2013, Pigment print mounted to Dibond, 42 x 160 inches.

Mr. Misrach, who has spent forty years working in the American Desert on his renown “Desert Cantos” project, showed a remarkable selection of images taken since 2004, but more intensely since 2009 (the collaboration with Mr. Galindo dates back to 2012), that told the story in slices. The effect of the music, the images and the sculptures (musical and non) was hypnotic, and ultimately meditative on the situation, the people protecting the border, and the refugees, while at the same time, even for those directly untouched by this story, the show spoke to a larger sense of walls, borders and refugees, and resilience. The Artists found, or created, beauty in this situation, reflecting the very perseverance that is at the essence of survival.

Richard Misrach, “Wall, east of Nogales, Arizona,” 2014, 68 x 84 inches, Pigment print mounted to Dibond

On the Painting & Drawing front, the most important Painting/Drawing gallery show I haven’t addressed was Kara Walker (at Sikkema Jenkins and Co.). Before it opened the buildup was downright intense. First, these posters began appearing, which certainly raised eyebrows until you notice (along the lower left side) that the text was written by the Artist. The show was also featured in a cover article in one of the last print issues of the Village Voice. I can’t remember the last time an Art show made the Voice’s cover, but this was the last time one did.

 Kara Walker sounds a bit weary in the poster, and particularly in the “Artist’s Statement” that appears on the show’s page on the Sikkema website.

“Dredging the Quagmire (Bottomless Pit),” 2017 Oil stick and Sumi ink on paper collaged on linen, 18 feet long, seen in the show’s first room. A “bottomless quagmire” is what the history of and current state of race and gender relations does feel like at this moment in time.

In the lower right side, this almost submerged head seemed to echo Ms. Walker’s weariness in her Artist’s Statement. “But frankly I am tired, tired of standing up, being counted, tired of ‘having a voice’ or worse ‘being a role model.'”

After all the anticipation and buildup, at the packed opening, Ms. Walker, herself, was only to be seen for a little while, at least while I was there.

Kara Walker at the opening, September 7, 2017, with part of  “U.S.A. Idioms,” 2017, Sumi ink and collage on paper, almost 15 by 12 feet, in the background.

While she continues to create her signature Silhouettes, showing a gorgeous 2017 work titled “Slaughter of the Innocents (They Might be Guilty of Something),” that’s almost 18 1/2 feet long, the bulk of the show consists on her ink and collage works, that have increasingly come to the forefront of her shows as time has gone on, most recently in her Cleveland Museum show, “The Ecstasy of St. Kara,” 2016, and at MoMA’s “Unfinished Conversations: New Work from the Collection,” which closed on July 30, 2017, where her “40 Acres of Mules,” a Charcoal Drawing on 3 sheets totaling almost 18 feet long that was acquired by the Museum the year before, was on view in what was something of a one-work preview for her Sikkema show.

“Slaughter of the Innocents (They Might be Guilty of Something),” 2017, Cut paper on canvas. For me, one thing Ms. Walker’s Silhouettes all seem to ask is “Why do you see, what you see?”

Whereas it’s hard for me to imagine the care, patience and deliberation it must take for Ms. Walker to create one of her silhouettes, her Drawing & Collages look like they are done in bursts of raw energy and passion. At times the images approach the quality of a caricature of an event. No matter the differences in creation, when you see her Silhouettes and Drawings side by side they’re unmistakably by the same Artist.

While the Silhouettes, mostly, seem to leave quite a bit to the imagination, including the race of each character, her Drawings & Collages do not, especially when it comes to violence. Nothing is held back, hinted at or hidden. In the Drawings and collages, she has taken away the curtain inherent in Silhouettes in depicting racism and gender crimes. We see the faces, skin color, eyes, and what each one is involved in doing.  You can choose to look away, but otherwise, it’s pretty hard to “miss” what’s going on. The results are shocking, though they have precedent going back to Goya’s “Los Caprichos,” and “The Disasters of War,” and Daumier through Warhol, as well as in the work of Photojournalists and “Conflict Photographers” from all over the world. In Kara Walker’s work, though, the time is centered between 1788, when slavery was legalized in the US, through post Civil War “Reconstruction.”  Where the Silhouettes present a shadow of the figure, and the actions, the Drawings shine direct light. In fact, there are almost no shadows in her drawings- there’s no where for the perpetrators to hide.

“The Pool Party of Sardanapalus (after Delacroix, Kienholz,” 2017, Sumi ink and collage on paper, Almost 12 feet long.

Eugene Delacroix, “The Death of Sardanapalus,” 1844, Oil on canvas, Louvre, Paris. Kara Walker is, also, an astute student of Art History. In her work, Sardanapalus lies horizontally near the upper left corner, apparently, taking no interest in the orgy of death going on, as he does, lying arm on elbow on a huge red bed in Delacroix’. Her Ed Kienholz reference is a bit harder to track down, but it might be this one.

In “Christ’s Entry into Journalism,” 2017, the ground is, also, gone. The figures hang in the space of the paper, though some sense of perspective remains- as you get closer to the top of the sheet, they get smaller.

“Christ’s Entry into Journalism,” 2017, Sumi ink and collage on paper, 140 x 196 inches.

In this work, Ms. Walker’s figures cut across time, with some appearing to be contemporary. To the right of center, a figure “rocks the mic.” In the lower center is a figure that appears to be a modern riot trooper, in a helmet with face shield and body armor. He appears to have clubs in each hand. Right next to his left hand is what appears to be a black head, in a hoodie, on a platter, being carried by a woman, who looks away, while others nearby watch, some with shock on their face, some pointing to the scene. Just behind them, an extended arm holds and American flag, while above them a figure gives a Nazi salute with one hand while holding a Rebel flag with the other. Up top, a lynched figure hangs from a tree branch while women on either side of him perform acrobatics, with Klansmen standing next to them. In front of that naked black women are attacked by a group of men, while, again, others see what is going on. In the center of the work, the decapitated hoodied head looks straight across at a Civil War soldier pointing a gun at him, across time. Is this 1863? Or 2016?

“Storm Ryder (You Must Hate Black People as Much as You Hate Yourself),” 2017, Oil stick and Sumi ink on paper collaged on linen.

The primacy of Drawing in her work was reinforced with the recent release of one of Ms Walker’s Sketchbooks from 1999, when the Artist was 29, as a book appropriately titled, “MCMXCIX.” It contains Drawings that, in style and subject, visitors to the Sikkema show will immediatley recognize. Interestingly, as Raymond Pettibon does in his shows (the latest concluding on June 24th, shortly before Ms. Walker’s opened), she prefers her larger works be tacked to the walls.

“Future Looks Bright,” 2017, Oil stick and Sumi ink on paper collaged on linen.

Kara Walker may be growing tired of being a “role model,” of being “a featured member of my racial group and/or my gender niche,” (as she says in her Artist’s Statement referenced above). Of course, I can’t imagine being Kara Walker, but I can understand that it gets to be “too much.” I’m not sure, however, what her other choice is. I mean, I’m sure she COULD do something else if she REALLY wanted to. After seeing all the work and passion she put into this show? I guess I’m just not convinced that she really DOES want to do something else. Yet.

Finally…Looking back on 2017… Last year I wrote that I felt Sheena Wagstaff had the best year in NYC Art. She’s had a very good 2017, too. But, this year, I think that The New Museum’s Massimiliano Gioni & Gary Carrion-Murayari. had special years, highlighted by the truly exemplary, and revolutionary, “Raymond Pettibon: A Pen of All Work” retrospective, which they then remounted simultaneously in Maastricht and Moscow. I feel it was “revolutionary” because totaling an unheard of 800 works, including brand new works created by the Artist for this show (some on the very walls of the New Museum), they gave an exhaustive look at Pettibon’s career, yet the show never slowed, never failed to keep and even raise interest. It even included work Pettibon did as a small child that he has now ammended in his own, unique style. Word has recently come that Gary Carrion-Murayari, who kindly answered my questions on the Pettibon Moscow show he co-curated, has also been named as a co-curator for the New Museum’s 2018 Triennial, so he could be ready to have another “big” year. Stay tuned!

The end result is that Massimiliano Gioni, Gary Carrion-Murayari, and the New Museum have served to put the “Big Four”1 Manhattan Museums on notice that, on their 40th anniversary, we are going to have to get used to saying the “Big Five.”

———————————–
A Special “Thank You!” to all the Artists who gave me their time and shared their thoughts with me in 2017, and to David White & Gina Guy of the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation and Gary Carrion-Murayari and Paul Jackson of the New Museum.
“Thank you!” to the Hattan Group and Kitty for research assistance, and to The Strand Bookstore for being open until 10:30pm seven nights a week. R.I.P. Owner, Fred Bass this week.

*- Soundtrack for this Post is “Heroic Elegy, Op. 36,” (1918), by Ernest Farrar, in honor of the 100th Anniversary of WW1, which was featured in another memorable show, “World War 1 & The Visual Arts” at The Met this year, as a way of honoring it, and all the Artists, and Musicians, lost during it. Shortly after “Heroic Elegy’s” premiere, Second Lieutenant Farrar was ordered to the Western Front. Two days after he arrived there, he was killed at the Battle of Epehy. He was 33. I first heard it while I was driving in Florida on September 11, 2002. The classical station there played it in honor of the first anniversary of 9/11. So taken with it was I that I pulled over and listened to it with my eyes closed, then immediately set about researching it’s composer. Though he wrote other fine works, “Heroic Elegy,” is special. It’s lightning in an 8 minute bottle. As beautiful as it is, there’s a quality, a confidence, in it that seems to promise so much more to come that he, tragically, never got the chance to give us, like the other Artists & Musicians lost far too early in this most senseless of wars.

“On The Fence, #17, The Good Riddance” Edition.

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  1. With all due respect to The Frick Collection, who the powers that be that came up with “the Big Four” left out. ↩

Exclusive! A Visit to Raymond Pettibon’s Moscow Show

A retrospective of 400 works by controversial American Artist Raymond Pettibon in Moscow, Russia, of all places, in this tempestuous year of 2017?

This I gotta see.

But, since the MTA doesn’t go to Russia, I missed it. Still, the idea of this Artist in this place at this time, what this show could include, and the reaction of local viewers left me scrambling to find out as much as I could. I even ran ads on craigslist in Moscow seeking reactions from show goers. To this point, I’ve found almost nothing about it in the media, save for this one article in the Russian press, in which writer Igor Gulin says, according to translation, that Pettibon is an Artist “who for a long time left the punk aesthetics of his youth, but did not lose a drop of rage.” Finally, my International Art Researcher friends over at the Hattan Group agreed to go and cover the show for me. So, thanks to their kindness, and efforts, I am able to present an exclusive look at what shaped up to be one of the most intriguing shows of the year, through their eyes and Photos.

A ticket for the show. Let’s go in! All Photos courtesy of the Hattan Group. Click any for full size.

Midway through the run of the most recent NYC Pettibon show, “Th’ Explosiyv Shoyrt T” at David Zwirner, which I wrote about here, came word that a retrospective in Moscow called “The Cloud of Misreading” (on the website), or “The Cloyd o’ Misreadyng,” on Pettibon’s hand-painted mural, below, was due to open on June 7 in Moscow’s Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, and would include 400 pieces. Founded in 2008, by Dasha Zhukova and Roman Abramovich, Moscow’s Garage Museum is a fairly new, and rising, star on the global Modern Art scene. That it’s gotten off to a fast start can be seen in NYC, where as I write the show, “Proof: Francisco Goya, Sergei Eisenstein, Robert Longo,” that originated at the Garage in Fall, 2016, is now at the Brooklyn Museum. And, as if Moscow wasn’t enough Raymond Pettibon, the New Museum’s blockbuster retrospective, “A Pen of All Work,”  which I wrote about here, traveled to the Bonnefantenmuseum, in the Netherlands, where it opened on June 1, with 700 pieces. Phew…Raymond Pettibon and the curators are clocking some serious frequent flier miles. We’ll hear from one of them later.

The show’s entrance features one of Raymond Pettibon’s famous hand-painted murals. I hope the Russians are up on their “Pettibon English.”

Given all that’s gone on in the past year the timing of this show is most auspicious. Especially since Raymond Pettibon has never been an Artist to mince words, pull punches, or look at the USA (or anything or anyone else for that matter) through rose colored glasses.

Pettibon’s large, hand-painted mural, seen here and in the following three details, features that most alien of sports to Russia- Surfing.

Pettibon’s murals are painted over at the end of the show they were created for. This one lasted until August 13.

Before it opened, I wondered if some of his “stronger” works, or topics, would be omitted. Certain of Pettibon’s long standing subjects, say, Surfing or Charles Manson (Note- I wrote this piece before word came down today, November 20th, that Manson died earlier today. I also note that Pettibon has been unusually silent on his Twitter page for the past week, so, he’s had no comment on it as yet.), would seem to have little resonance in Russia to this outsider. After the show opened, I was able to “visit” it online through the exhibition brochure, which includes color photos of all 400 works on view, and which can be downloaded here.

The center vitrine contains Pettibon’s early Zines, Record Covers and excerpts from his archives. On the wall to the right are works pertaining to drugs, death/murder, and the hippie sub-culture.

Pettibon’s world famous 4 Bar “Black Flag” logo, seen in the vitrine, speaks a universal language. Of it Igor Gulin says, “In 1977, he painted a logo for his older brother Greg’s Black Flag group. Four black bricks are a constructivist version of an anarchic flag, in which the rage of protest does not flare up, but crumbles. There is no integrity, vigorous unity, but there is a strained friction of the elements, frightening the rhythm between them.  In this seemingly elementary thing, one can see the prototype of Pettibon’s future work.”

The show was curated by Gary Carrion-Murayari, of the New Museum, NYC, & Massimiliano Gioni, Artistic Director of the New Museum, NYC, the team that curated the New Museum’s unforgettable 800 work “Raymond Pettibon: A Pen of All Work,” here, earlier this year. They are rapidly becoming major players in the larger Art World, in addition to raising the standing of the New Museum here in town.

This room features works highlighting abstraction in nature. A wall of Pettibon’s classic Wave works, right, joins other works depicting marble, crystal, rocks. Notice that most of the works on these 3 walls, including the huge Wave piece, right (which may be worth upwards of a million dollars), are not framed, but simply tacked the walls. In the back room, straight ahead, are works pertaining to recent “US foreign policy.” As for Surfing in Russia? Here’s where the surf’s up.

Gumby and Vavoom, two of Pettibon’s alter egos are featured on the wall to the right. To the left are works depicting trains and locomotives.

Works pertaining to Christianity, left, with the other half of the train and locomotives wall, right.

On the back wall are works that include images of fighting, on the right works that include nudes. One visitor commented that the show contained “a lot of sex.”

Mr. Carrion-Murayari introduces Pettibon and the show this way– After becoming an underground legend, beginning with his work in early days of the L.A. Punk scene, he says, “The stark imagery and darkly humorous captions of these works made Pettibon an underground legend long before he came to the attention of the larger art world. By the early 1990s, Pettibon’s vision gradually expanded to encompass the breadth and complexity of American history and culture. The tenor of his work shifted from strident to poetic, with a gradual softening of his graphic style and expansion of his subject matter. In the past thirty years, he has created iconic series of drawings on subjects as varied as surfing, baseball, cartoons, natural history, love, war, and his own artistic aspirations and failings. The title of this exhibition evokes the creative use of language that has evolved in Pettibon’s work over the course of his career.”

“No Title (Nobody Reads Dostoyevsky…),” 1986, Pen and ink on paper. Stalin also appeared in Pettibon’s David Zwirner show, where it looked like it had been used for target practice due to the paint splatters left on the wall from when Pettibon had worked in the gallery space.

Looking at the selection of works, I became fascinated by just which works were chosen and what they might reveal about any “message” in the show. I went through the show’s brochure and created a list of subjects and which works fell into them.What did this exercise tell me? Pettibon in Moscow is full-force Pettibon. No topic was “taboo.” All of the Artist’s, by now, well-known subjects are represented in depth.

Even more fascinated, I asked Mr. Carrion-Murayari what went into selecting the works for this show. He replied-

“In terms of the selection of the works, it was of course impossible to represent more than a small percentage of Raymond’s total oeuvre and even impossible to show all the variety of series or recurring images that he has produced over the years. We focused on three general areas of thought within his work: work on politics, work on the dark side of America and American culture; and work on creativity and the artistic or writerly temperament. We tried to represent some of his most iconic series and also demonstrate the way certain ideas and images pop up again and evolve over the duration of his career. We looked at thousands of drawings just to get to the final 800 or so that we included in the show, but even so, there were a number of early drawings that had appeared in books or zines that we searched for over the course of many months and were never able to track down. It’s entirely possible to imagine a dozen alternative Pettibon shows that would be equally as rich and surprising.”

“No Title (Will you give…),” 2007. Pen and ink on paper.

I then asked him what role Raymond Pettibon played in the selection of works for this show, if any. Mr. Carrion-Murayari said-

“Raymond wasn’t so involved in the selection of the specific works for the show. He pretty much left it to us, as he has done for many of the museum shows he’s done over the years. For the show at the New Museum, he was most focused on creating a number of new drawings specially for the exhibition and then of course on making the fantastic site-specific wall drawings at the New Museum, the Bonnefantenmuseum, and the Garage.”

“No Title (This one reminded…),” 2008, Pen, ink and gouache on paper.

Not to mention that, as I noted in my piece on the Zwirner show, Pettibon was, also, holed up in David Zwirner’s 519 West 19th Street space for the first part of this year creating the works for “Th’ Explosiyv Shoyrt T,” which opened barely 2 weeks after the New Museum show closed. So far in 2017, Raymond Pettibon has had THREE museum shows, that featured 1,900 works, AND a gallery show of a further 100 NEW works, making an even 2 grand. Phew. And on the 7th day…

Here are some of the other works on view at the Garage-

“No Title (I’d rather starve…),” 1987, Pen and ink on paper.

“No Title (We can’t start…),” 2012, Pen and ink on paper.

“No Title (I wanted moreover…),” 1999, left, and “No Title,” 2004, Both pen and ink on paper. Believe it or not, baseball appears to be gaining popularity in Russia.

“No Title (Duly facing myself…),” 2000, Pen and ink on paper

“No Title (It taught, it…),” 2003, Pen and ink on paper.

A closer look at a wall with works pertaining to US “foreign policy,” includes some of the following-

“No Title (The U.S. has…),” 2015, Ink and acrylic on paper.

“No Title (Till the map…),” 2008, Pen, ink and gouache on paper.

“No Title (CCCP, Sputnik, Cosmos…),” 1990, Acrylic on canvas. A rare Pettibon Painting.

“No Title (Advances in medical…),” 2007, Collage, pen and ink on paper.

“No Title (It is normal…).” 2001, Pen and ink on paper.

No Title (To Jill St. John…),” 1985, Pen and ink on paper.

This has been a year that would be extraordinary for any Artist. For the first 10 months of 2017 it was possible to see one, or three, major Raymond Pettibon shows somewhere in the world at any given moment. Since these shows are planned long in advance that they are happening (coincidentally ) at a time of such tumult in the country and in the world makes for one of the most auspicious run of shows in memory.

No matter the location, a highlight in each of these shows for many viewers are Raymond Pettibon’s Wave and Surfer works, which seem to lie at the center of his output these past 40 years. 4 of the 5 highest auction prices (1 million dollars, plus) for a Pettibon work depict one or both, for whatever that’s worth. Yet, they are a very small part of his huge output (numbering over 20,000 works as of earlier this year).

“No Title (Is some one…),” 2013, Pen and ink on paper…and tacked to the wall. Is doing so a remnant of “punk” attitude and street beginnings?

He could sit back and do them indefinitely and, no doubt, sell every single one he does. But, he doesn’t. In the last show of his new work, at David Zwirner, there was only 1 large Wave Drawing out of 100 works. In fact, the biggest one he’s done recently was the one for the wall painting for the Garage’s show, up top, which was painted over when the show came down. It’s far bigger than any of the 4 that sold for a million dollars or so at auction, yet it was done to only be on view for a short time.

It’s now gone…like the waves it depicts- a phenomena of nature, beautiful while it lasted. Like the mural (or the show), you had to be there to see it, and get it’s full effect. If you weren’t? You missed it.

*-Soundtrack for this Post is “Surfin’ USA” by Chuck Berry & Brian Wilson, and recorded by the Beach Boys.

My thanks to Gary Carrion-Murayari and Paul Jackson of the New Museum.
My thanks and gratitude to the Hattan Group for getting to the Garage show and allowing me to publish their photos.

“On The Fence, #15 , The Cloyd Woyd.”

NighthawkNYC.com has been entirely self-funded & ad-free for over 7 years, during which over 275 full length pieces have been published! If you’ve found it worthwhile, PLEASE donate to allow me to continue below. Thank you, Kenn.

You can also support it by buying Art, Art & Photography books, and Music from my collection! Books may be found here. Music here and here.

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Raymond Pettibon’s Burning Bush

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Raymond Pettibon: A Pen of All Work, at The New Museum featured a multi-faceted lobby Mural by the Artist that touched on long time themes, and added a few messages.

High above, to the left of center, the Artist painted these words…

“I have been rewriting ‘that modern novel’
I spoke of to you…On th’ whole it is a failure, I think,
tho nobody will know this, perhaps, but myself…iyt is a simple story, simply told. And yet iyt hath no name.”

This show fills THREE FLOORS of a quite prestigious Manhattan Museum. Please define “failure,” Raymond. Unless, you’re pulling our leyg…again?

Raymond Pettibon: A Pen of All Work, a Retrospective that also marked his first major NYC Museum show, closed at the New Museum on April 16. I was there almost to last call, drynking in as much as I could, though I was past being intoxxxicated on the 800 Drawings, fliers, album covers, ’zines, Artist’s Books and his films the museum displayed over those 3 full floors1, plus the fascinating, multifaceted mural he did in the lobby, seen above, and below.

“Beyond it lays everything tht mattered.” That tells you right off how the Artist feels about this, the logo he designed for the legendary band HE named Black Flag, that featured his brother, Greg (who also founded SST Records, who sell Pettibon’s work to this day, without ever mentioning his name). The period it represents really is such a small part of his, now, 40 years of work. It’s (also) the #1 tattoo in the land, here painted on the Museum’s elevator doors. Still on the outs with his brother, he says he rarely draws it any more, so this time, he added very small text above each bar, which reads-“Doors nor windows.””Beyond it lays everything tht mattered.””He isn’t under there, he’s in the woods.” and “The last sentence is somewhat obscured to me.” from left bar to right.

Homage to classic NYC Baseball. Another part of the mural (all since painted over) showed Brooklyn Dodger Jackie Robinson, waving a huge bat, and the Yankee star, Whitey Ford, right, in individual Drawings, not in action against each other.

It might be a while before you see this in a Museum, again. That elevator goes to THREE floors filled with Pettibon. Some “failure.”

Installation View of the 4th floor on its closing day, April 16. In the center is a room with work the Artist created for this show inside.

Barely, had I had time for this buzzz to peak when lo and behold…Here comes A-NOTHER Raymond Pettibon show, “TH’ EXPLOSIYV SHORT T,” at David Zwirner, 19th Street, with NINETY-NINE more, recent works, only a couple of which were in “A Pen…”(they were part of the lobby mural, tacked to the wall)! And? These 99 works were being shown in the very space where Raymond Pettibon had created them. Whoa! So, unless I completely overdose on Pettibon first, you might, as I’ve opted to do three pieces- because I think his work is that important and timely- one on each show, and a third piece that looks at the place Raymond Pettibon’s Art is now. Since the David Zwirner show, where I met Raymond Petitibon on April 29, still has some time to run before it closes on June 24, I’ll start with A Pen of All Work, my “NoteWorthy” show for April, before the trail grows cold on it, though for you lucky folks near Maastricht (correctly spelled), the Netherlands, it just reopened at Maastricht’s Bonnefantenmuseum, on June 2, with 700 works, where it will run through October 29. 2

Try everything, Do everything, Render everything, Ink on paper, date unknown. And? He proceeds to do just that…

Mr. Pettibon is somewhat unique in the Art world because of the way he got here, achieving legendary status through his work for bands before he got a Gallery to represent him. So? The Art world is not as familiar with the early work, while his early fans may not be as familiar with what he’s done lately (though, of course, he has many fans who have been with him the whole way, too). I’ll try to show a mix of work here, while trying to give a sense of what this remarkable show was like.

I have to think back to the Picasso Retrospective which filled ALL of the old MoMA in 1980 to recall a show of comparable size. Still, if there was a common theme to be found it was that “his entire body of work is very much a confrontation against ideologies,” to quote Massimiliano Gioni, the New Museum’s Artistic Director, on the excellent audio guide. Whatever you’ve got? Pettibon will confront it, and given how much confronting he’s done, everyone involved did a superb job of installing it, organizing all of these works by themes.

Timeless. Unfortunately. No Title (Fight for freedom!), 1981(!), Pen and ink on paper

The 2nd floor mostly focused on Pettibon, himself, looking at his early work with an eye on how he created his own “alternate media” in the form fliers, zines, record covers, Artist’s books, films & videos, et al, and how he goes about his craft, including samples from the archive he uses as source material, and to draw inspiration from on a daily basis.

A bit of Pettibon’s never before seen archive of source material includes Iwo Jima, Giuliani, and 9/11.

Also on 2, along with a good part of his past, part of Pettibon’s current legacy was on view in full effect, as seen below. He forged his own way of getting his work seen, first on fliers, then on record covers, zines, Artist’s Books, and then added film and video, all before finding acceptance in the Art world, something he says was delayed by 10 years due to his association with punk. A visit to stores like New York’s Printed Matter feels like visiting the work of many of the “children” of Raymond Pettibon, as his example has been, and is being, followed by countless Artists, Photographers, Musicians and Writers right now. Including thiys one. Though, perhaps not the first Artist to work in any of those media, his methods, and his path, remain most influential.

I had to cross the Framers Union picket line to see this show, who were on strike because Pettibon prefers to tack his work to the walls with straight pins. With 800 works in this show? That’s a LOT of lost work for framers. Ok…I’m kidding. I’m pulling your leyg now. Looking at this photo, you can see how very far Pettibon’s work has come. In the glass case are GORGEOUS copies of his (now rare) early gig fliers that were posted with no thought of posterity in the late 1970s. Behind them, on the wall are 2 tacked up drawings, and one painting(!), left, next to 13 framed drawings of no less than the Manson family. Out of the 20,000 Drawings Pettibon has done, only a small percent have been framed. With the prices being paid for his work? I’d bet that just about every piece that is tacked to the wall here is being seen that way for the last time. Framers? Get ready.

Also on the 2nd floor is the American premier of the virtually complete original art for his first book, Captive Chains, 1978, an homage to comic books/Texas Chainsaw Massacre/ Betty Page that is laced with S&M imagery as well as first rate drawings, different in style than what most of his fans may be familiar with. Pettibon has been quick to downplay/under-play/denigrayte his self-taught Drawing skills- including these! Captive Chains begs to differ. Sorry! No faylure here. These are both terrific, and now classic. Perhaps most interesting, a number of its pages are full page drawings with no text, something almost never seen in Pettibon’s work since. In fact, it seems to me his career has followed the trajectory of his work being more about image primacy early on to now when text and language have come more and more to the forefront. One indication of this is that many drawings lie unfinished in his studio at any given time while they await the inspiration of texts to complete them. Sometimes for years.

The complete original art for Captive Chains, 1978. 68, ink on paper Drawings seen in the USA for the first time, and yes, they’re tacked to the wall.

One page. Ugh…I’m sorry. Putting a tack in this is like putting one in my hand.

Pettibon is fond of recycling old characters from the comics and television, including Batman, Superman, Gumby and the obscure side-kick character, Vavoom. While Batman and Superman are famous, Gumby, a long time personal favorite, is in eclipse. A claymation character created by Art Clokey3, he was able to walk into books and live in them, as well as visit other times in history. Vavoom was a side kick on the Felix the Cat cartoon show, a character, who’s only vocalization was, literally, an earth shattering shout out of his own name. Both Gumby and Vavoom are alter egos of Pettibon, and stand-ins for the Artist. Very interesting choices, to say the least.

The old cartoon side-kick, Vavoom (seen here in No Title (A beautiful, actual…), 1987 ink on paper, only able to say his own name is an interesting alter ego for an Artist who is so intensely literate.

…so is Gumby. No Title (I borrow My…), 1990, Acrylic on board.

In a long, rear gallery on the 2nd floor, was an amazing selection of Pettibon’s superb Baseball Drawings.  Along with surfing, the Artist’s passion for Baseball is lifelong. As with his other work, unless you’re a Baseball Stat expert, like he may well be, it takes some digging to begin to understand why Pettibon is choosing to depict a certain player at a certain point in his career. (More on this in my Post on the Zwirner show.) While his early punk work continues to gets so much attention, other areas of his work live in neglect. If there’a another Baseball Artist in Pettibon’s league? I don’t know of him/her.

Against the world. No Title (1.12 Bob Gibson), 2015, Pen, ink, pencil, acrylic on paper. “1.12” was Bob Gibson’s E.R.A. in 1968, when he won 22 games and lost 9. His St. Louis Cardinals lost in Game 7 of that year’s World Series. Could anything better capture his intimidating presence than this?

The 3rd floor sees Pettibon looking at the various “tribes,” and subcultures in recent American history- surfers, hippies, punks, the Manson family, and musicians.

Even The Beatles “get Pettibon-ed,” to coin a phrase, about who is the “largest” member. No Title (Few know this…), 2015, Ink on paper. Pettibon continually revisits history (usually, American), often years later, as here. In the 2000’s, he began addressing events closer to “real time,” like the War in Iraq. One thing I haven’t figured out yet? His work’s “penis obsession.”

His Surfer and Wave works strike me as living at the center of his work, the heart of it. Beyond punk, Manson, religion, politics, war- all the rest of it. Here’s a world Pettibon knows intimately having grown up near the water in Malibu, where he indeed surfed, though, as he told Dennis Cooper in Raymond Pettibon, (Phaidon), “I don’t surf much any more, but I grew up with it. I was never a card-carrying surfer.” Usually, he depicts a solitary man in the middle of a gigantic wave, testing himself against nature, symbolically against the world, against the nature of things, against chance, and against himself. As his 2005 work, ”Man stands as in the center of Nature, his fraction of time encircled by eternity…”, which wasn’t in this show, sums up perfectly. At moments like those, the “truths” that present themselves (or rather, that Pettibon presents) are often zen-like koans- they’re ineffable. They can’t be distilled further. All but the tiny place where board meets water is out of his control. How long will the ride last? Will he survive? Be maimed? What goes through the mind while it does, and at times like those? It’s not just a man’s game, either. He shows us girls and women surfing, sometimes topless.

Monumental. No Title (As to me…), 2015, Pen ink, watercolor, acrylic on paper 55″ x 113″. Another of his large Surfer Drawings sold for 1.5 million dollars in 2013, “failing” to reach four times the high estimate.

No Title (Don’t complicate…), 1987, Ink and gouache on paper, 24″ x 18″, MoMA. If I could choose one work of his? This might be it…at the moment. You styll have 300 other Pettibons, MoMA.

The 4th floor sees Pettibon’s extensive, long-running, devastating and ever-timely political and war works, along with works relating to the power of media. Brace yourself- Pettibon doesn’t play favorites. Democrats and republicans come in for just about equal poundings- from JFK through Obama. It culminates, and the show concludes, with an inner gallery of work Pettibon created for A Pen of All Work.

Twas ever thus. No Title (You’re supposed to read the green first, Congressman Ford), 1976, Red, blue pencil on paper.  An early work about Gerald Ford by “R. Ginn.” The name “Pettibon” comes from his dad.

The layout of the 4th floor is interesting in the choice of having the most timely, most controversial and most “explosive” work including pieces regarding Ronald Reagan, Gerald Ford, Donald Trump (one from the 1980’s, and one from the 2016 campaign) and atomic explosions….

No Title (“End the war…), 2007, Pen, ink, gouache on paper, 30″ x 22,” left, seen with No Title ( The war, now…), 2008, Pen, ink, gouache,  acrylic on paper. Don’t worry. There was a whole wall about JFK, and yes, Obama got “Pettibon-ed,” as well.

A wall of work on religion, another ongoing theme.

surrounding an inner space, where the feeling is, surprisingly, both personal and intimate, it felt to me. Inside, the Artist pays homage to his mom, talks about his craft, and, apparently, nature, life, some of his wishes at this stage of his life (he turns 60 on June 16), all in works created for this room, and some on its walls.

The show includes some treasures. His mother, 95 as of last December, saved some of his childhood drawings from the 1960’s and 19 of them were on view that Pettibon has now added texts to! Pettibon pays homage to his Mom in a wonderful, Artful, way in this final gallery, which brings the show full circle.

Inside the final room on 4, containing works Pettibon did especially for iyt includes this version of Whistler’s Composition in Black and Grey, the Artist’s Mother, an homage to his own Mother, now 95, who he has says has always been his biggest fan, at times his only fan. The feeling this room gave felt like walking around in his head at the moment. He added the writing above it because, he thought, Whistler’s Mother looks like Mary Baker Eddy.

So…Moms? Hold on to your kids drawings!

A view of another part of the final room.

No Title (Pinned to the Earth), 2017, Ink on paper. In the final room, birds are featured since their feathers are used for quills- drawing instruments. Uh-oh. Someone else wants to chime in on this one…

“On The Fence, #5, Picking-A-Petite-Bone”

Painted on the wall of the final room.

PHEW. Some “failure!” It sounds HUGE, and it was, but it was a mere pittance (4%!) of the over 20,000 Drawings Mr. Gioni says Pettibon has created to date. And counting. He’s already added at least the 99 drawings in the David Zwirner show to the total. And? The one he did for me there.

No Title (When I see…), 2006. Pen, ink, collage on paper. Pettibon has been doing collages since around this time, and says one may include up to 70 drawings. As if his work wasn’t cryptic enough!

Beyond that, in a show that contains work that goes back to the 1970’s, it’s fascinating that nothing here feels “dated,” and virtually all of it holds up. Over 800 of any works is a pretty good indication of quality, even out of a body of 20,000. I’m still looking for a “bad” Pettibon.

No Title …(Do you really believe…), 2006, Pen and ink on paper.

After spending some weeks with these works, and Pettibon’s work in general, I find Mr. Gioni sums up the mystery of “understanding” Pettibon’s work the best I’ve found so far when he says on the audio guide, speaking of his political works, but I think it’s valuable to keep in mind, regardless of subject- “Pettibon plays with a variety of voices, in this case a cacophony of voices. The texts that are inscribed in the works of Pettibon are rarely a direct confessional expression of the Artist’s opinion, and they are instead a collection of what could be defined as the collective unconscious…” Proof of this is that we learn very little about the Artist, himself, from his work. Unless he comes out and tells us, directly, in interviews, and even then? Watch out for his “tall tales!” The point of the work is not personal (about the Artist, himself). It’s more about self, than “himself.”

My Heart Tells Me (Self Portrait), 1990, Ink on paper.

Personally? I felt like I was seeing the work of 800 Mensa members.  If you want to know why he is a major, and in my opinion, crucially important, Artist of our time, the “Pen,” and a pretty nice one, called the New Museum held your your answer. A wall card says the show’s title comes from a poem by Lord Byron. Ok. Another way to look at it is that the New Museums truly was A “Pen” (as in an enclosure) of All (well, A LOT) of his Work “that matters,” as he painted in the lobby.

No Title …(Good prose is…), 2013, has been turned into a styling Tote Bag by MZ Wallace, proceeds go, appropriately, to the New York Public Library.

I must also say that I feel that this show was a huge coup for the New Museum. As far as I’m concerned, this is the show that takes the New Museum to the next level. “Big 4” Museums? That sound you hear is someone breathing down your necks in contemporary Art. As for Mr. Pettibon, himself? I wonder. This show could have been held at MoMA (who, according to their site own over 300 of his works, on say, the whole 6th floor) or  it could have filled The Met Breuer (The Met lists 3 of his works online). Either would have, most likely, given him quite a bit more exposure, which might be critical given the timely nature of his work. I would love to know if either was ever an option, and why they passed if they were. Raymond Pettibon’s time is (still) now. Maybe MORE now than ever. Still, all of that having been said, I’m glad that it happened at all! I mean no disrespect to the New Museum. On the contrary, I heartily applaud them on doing such a superb job, on all accounts. Bravo! While I won’t compare qualitatively, “A Pen of All Work” will be one very hard show to top in NYC in 2017. Meanwhile, his Art continues to find favor elsewhere around the world. If you are anywhere near Maastricht, the Netherlands before October 29, don’t miss iyt! Raymond Pettibon also has a show about to open at the excellent Garage in Moscow, Russia. But? Sadly, this one is over.

“And the only sound that’s left
After the ambulances go
Is Cinderella sweeping up
On Desolation Row.”*

When I left A Pen of All Work as the show closed that last time, I walked out on to the Bowery, the erstwhile “Skid Row,” or “Desolation Row,”(hence, this Post’s Soundtrack), where C.B.G.B. used to stand a few hundred feet away, back in the day before gentrifucation. Yes, punk is long gone, but Raymond Pettibon’s “failed modern novel” gets more and more attention than ever, now worldwide. Pondering all of this, I felt that Pettibon seemed to be akin to a modern day biblical, or zen, prophet- complete with his own burning bush, wandering in the desert, speaking in tongues.

800 works in, I’m listening harder than ever.

*- Soundtrack for this Post is “Desolation Row” by Bob Dylan, from the classic Highway 61 Revisited, and published by Bob Dylan Music Co.

Special thanks to Kitty, who’s research assistance made thiys Post possible.

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  1. 800 pieces, per the show’s audio guide, which you can still access, as I write this, here. ↩
  2. Update- July 20- You can read my Post on “TH’ EXPLOSIYV SHORT T” here. ↩
  3. (who passed in 2010. I wonder what he thought of these… ↩