Press

At David Mann’s solo exhibition Sympathetic Strings, the artist drew a rich visual and metaphorical connection between his art and sympathetic strings. Sympathetic strings lie beneath the strings touched by a musician. They’re activated through the strings’ vibration, and appear in various instruments, including, most notably, the sitar. Mann uses these strings to visually create his multilayered paintings, and at the same time, his works pulsate with a unique energy and lyrical musicality, reminiscent of both nebulous forms under a microscope and the stellar vastness of space.

Continue to full article

Using CCTV footage, traffic cams, and other surveillance footage, Houston-based artist William Betts creates pixelated paintings with a CNC printer.His subjects are oblivious to the cameras watching them. Although the video frames are seemingly mundane, Betts abstracts and deconstructs the images further through his printing process, reflecting the inherent anxiety of “security” cameras.“I look at images as a collection of data,” the former software industry professional has said. “I use that data, either abstracting it or modifying it or manipulating it, to arrive at the image that I want.”

 

Having reviewed and written about William Steiger’s work during an earlier stage of his career, I am taken by the fact that his subject matter and his point of view appear to uphold a consistency.  I am not entirely certain as to what this means by today’s standards, but it seems to imply the artist’s ability to sustain a certain ethos, meaning that he returns again and again to explore and investigate both the visual and conceptual terms that carry these dated architectural and playland entertainment phenomena into the age of the Internet. Therefore, the transition between the Post-Industrial and the Informational Age appears all the more pronounced, if not, deftly poignant in articulating a shift in our consciousness through a painterly means of arbitration. 

Continue to full article

New York based artist, David Mann presents an exhibition of paintings inspired by the sympathetic strings found on instruments, such as the sitar, that are only heard when touched by the vibrations of other strings. The sounds of which are only but also covered by a top layer. This feeling of intimacy and immensity resonates throughout the show. The paintings are lacquered with layers of acrylic, oil and translucent glazes. Gradients of colour saunter across the expansive surfaces, which erupt with mineral spirit bubbles and are contoured by taut white lines. The paintings are aesthetically liberating but also carefully restrained, offering the viewer a precise yet ambiguous artistic experience.

Continue to full article

David Mann explores the evocative properties of color and light as he works in the gap between abstraction and representation. His best paintings provide a visual experience that is richly visual and psychologically engaging. With their luminous depths and mystery of means they sometimes provoke the kind of surprising disorientation one feels when stumbling upon a dramatic scene of natural beauty. The summary effect is paradoxical: paintings that are both lucid and enigmatic. This compelling duality has long been and continues to be a defining characteristic of Mann’s work.

Continue to full article

New York-based artist David Mann has been making art for decades, with his most recent work exploring abstract shapes configured in such a way that they appear both microscopic and galactic. For his latest exhibition, Sympathetic Strings, his first solo show, Mann explores the idea of sympathetic strings, or those found on instruments like a sitar, that lie just below the strings that are struck by the musician. These sympathetic strings are triggered only by the vibrations of the played strings.

Continue to full article

PULSE Miami Beach cleared their decks and closed on Saturday but the memory of the art seen continues on. The art fair expanded considerably from last year's edition by adding a second tent to its art fair set by the sea. PULSE plans an equal expansion for its upcoming edition in New York City in March 2016. With the expansion in Miami Beach also came a more polished fair. Video art played a much smaller part than last year but otherwise the fair kept steady in quality and booth presentation.

I became enamored with paintings by Tegene Kunbi after seeing them at PULSE New York in 2014. At that art fair, Margaret Thatcher Projects presented a solo show of the work. Channeling a variety of cultural influences, Kunbi creates paintings with bands of thick color made from thick brush strokes that infuse the works with texture.

By the time I passed by the booth at PULSE Miami Beach, there were only a few paintings remaining by Tegene Kunbi. Having seen an extensive array of paintings previously, the paintings remained strong and were standouts at this year's booth.

Continue to full article

Kunbi’s chosen vehicles of expression in this exhibition are stripes of many different colors. It might appear as though stripes are an overly familiar vehicle, having already been employed with such magnificence by Kenneth Noland, as well as by lesser artists like Gene Davis, Bridget Riley, & Gerhard Richter.

Kunbi’s stripes are different.

For one thing, his paint surfaces are rougher and freer (he works with a mixture of rollers and brushes, and often on several paintings at one time). There is a real textural interest here...

Continue to full article

The sun has yet to pass high noon with the career of the artist represented in “Tegene Kunbi: Danjerus Cable” at Margaret Thatcher Projects (extended through July 17). Born in Ethiopia in 1980, Kunbi is still only in his 35th year. 

After receiving his BFA from the University of Addis Ababa in 2004, he continued his education at the Universitȁt der Kűnste Berlin, and continues to be Berlin-based.

This is his second solo exhibition with Margaret Thatcher, and the explanation for its title (which is also the title of one of its finest paintings) is something he has yet to share with his gallery. Never mind. The radiance of his color schemes more than compensates for the mystery of some of his titles. 

Continue to full article

Sometimes you need to stay in your own backyard...  

Thanks to Clayton Colvin for the great studio visit, to Nelson at Stewart Perry Construction for the private tour of the historic Lyric Theatre that is currently under renovation, and to Michael Straus for giving us the opportunity to curate Drift.  We were happy to share opening night with Jo Nigoghossian who unveiled her commission Mast (Alabama).  

Continue to full article