If Part One presented the various issues and dysfunctions of the artworld by a mid-career generation, Part Two offers some possible remedies by a younger generation who, despite all of the challenges, manage to maintain a sense of humor and generate reaffirming (and sometimes hilarious) art. What would be the choice, anyway? To quit making artwork entirely?
-Nick Lawrence, gallery owner/curator
The artists in Part II, Crisp, De Miguel, Lyon, and Paperina, all offer a new outlook, comical comments, and plenty of charisma. Part II presents a difference from Part I; these artists possess a different mentality. They grew up using the Internet, Simpsons, 9 11, saw road artists climb to fame, spent a decade in their lives at war, and entered adult life in the pinnacle of a great recession. The American fantasy they were promised their whole lives looks worthless. Their degrees do not always help get them jobs; it is as if the rug was pulled out from under them. Even confronting this hopeless stiff battle these artists have plenty of confidence that's paralleled having a sarcastic sense of humor.
Lyon's paintings swirl between a flippant joke and also a hallucination. They are comical and address the artwork craze by referencing the speed of cyberspace, the speed of NYC, along with the speed of life. Who has time to waste? These paintings are moments. They ask you to say, "fuck it," and act on impulse. They're to the point and fast, with thick lines, bold level colors, and cheeky brief text. Text like Fuck it and Desire it. A bug-eyed spike-toothed cartoonish figure carries a story through the entire show. Control is lost by this character, disappears, reappears, and acts on those terrible impulses everyone has, but feigns not to have.
There's a straightforward daring grunginess to the task that reminds among 80's road artists. There is this "who cares" approach, and a feverish should create artwork that's clear in his work. The paintings seem enjoyable to make, are enjoyable to look at, and they are - of course - humorous.
De Miguel's paintings are witty, mischievous, facetious, naughty, cheerful, and untroubled. The game is all about chance not strategy. These paintings don't seem strategic. They are honest, good natured, and potentially contemptuous of the art world, but not skeptical about freight+volume gallery artwork. They are committed to being what they are. The painting All over the world or Palomar portrays 2/3rds of a seagull shitting in the world. Fowl shit is raining down everywhere. The entire world is on the edge of war, revolutions, fiscal fall, and global warming. There is plenty of shit falling. Miguel's paintings reveal how the art world adores itself. In her painting New Yorkers Seeing a Painting Show depicts a scene of individuals flocking to an exhibit of cat paintings, as if it's the last cat painting exhibition on earth. Her characters are boldly soaking in each other and the cats without a care in the world. Who doesn't adore a great cat painting?
Paperina's paintings and cartoons are dry and frenzied. The artists are killed by her because she loves them. She takes the art stars off their pedestals, and reminds us they are human. She reveals how comical the art world is. The text in her paintings range from I won the Turner Prize so now the folks adore me and don't believe I am dumb, Martin Creed-work N 876, to Artwork is dead, and my favorite, When you put your hand in the Bible, do you think about timeless issues: why are we here instead of nothing? by Jenny Holzer. Her work looks at how dumb the act of creating art is. Paperina uses this dumbness to exploit the seriousness of the art world. These paintings are serious, but they're not self absorbed. They reside in the world of cartoons and anything can happen there. Cartoon characters can perish and come back to life. They exist within an alternative reality. Paperina's paintings exist in this truth. Anything goes. They are sociable, lively, and - above all - a riot.
Damien Crisp gives a no-holds-barred political criticism of the machine, through audio, text and Basquiat-indebted, "intention-for-the-jugular"-design drawings. Crisp is an activist, writer and artist from southeast Tennessee. He graduated from the University of Tennessee's painting program in 2005, moved to New York, and received his MFA from the School of Visual Arts in 2007. He resides and works in Guadalajara, Mexico. His work includes photography, painting, installation, objects, text and video. In 2010, he self-released the manifesto Slave (Enlarged) - a critique of contemporary art's corporate ethos - through his job The Ocean / The Waves Gallery and Unknown Press. The publication served as a backbone for the gallery opened, then closed, the same year in The Big Apple. As an activist, he's focused on alternative markets, direct democracy, and facing mistreatments of the corporate state as well as police. He was a body, a voice and reporter during Dwell Wall Street's time at Zuccotti Park, together with a trainer of hurricane recovery volunteers for Occupy Sandy.
Please join us for the public opening of The Decline and Fall of the Art World, Section II: The Other 99% on Thursday, Sept 12th from 6-9pm.
A lot of new galleries are setting up shop in the belly of the animal of Chelsea. Rents are expensive but the crowds are there. Some of these places are opening large and glitzy and appear as though they are willing to vie with the large lads (e.g., Bortolami Dayan at 510 West 25th Street). Some are barely opening at all.
This is the storyline with Freight It is a show with lots of of smarts and heart, even if it's a Is Just little recognizable in its funkiness. Still, in just one night, Freight Volume, in addition to Schwartz, whets the appetite. The gallery reopens this week if all goes well. For more information about Nick Lawrence Freight Volume Gallery New York you can find them in the heart of the city.
Freight Volume is located by the Lincoln highway in New York City Freight Volume at
530 W. 24th St.
New York, NY 10011
PHONE: 212 691 7700
