Allan McCollum, "The Dog from Pompei," 1991. Courtesy Friedrich Petzel Gallery.
In this week’s roundup: An-My Lê captures the American armed forces, Allora & Calzadilla explore physical and temporal displacement, Julie Mehretu examines the metaphysical aspects of art, and more!
- “Memory, materiality, monsters, and motion” provide the basis for Stop Motion, an exhibition at Friedrich Petzel Gallery that juxtaposes the work of artists Allan McCollum and Keith Edmier. “The new and newly combined pieces embody both artists’ desire to bring life to the inanimate, invisible, absent or imaginary. The concept of frozen time — or life stopped and examined at a single moment – forms the mirror side of this desire.” Stop Motion is on view September 9 – October 23.
- Murray Guy will present a solo exhibition with An-My Lê, featuring a “series of exceptional new photographs from the artist’s recent travels with the American armed forces.” The work will be on display September 16 – October 30. An opening reception is scheduled for Thursday, September 16 from 6 to 8pm, and a conversation between An-My Lê and Lynne Tillman will take place Saturday, October 16, at 4:30pm.
- Galerie Chantal Crousel (Paris) presents Allora & Calzadilla, which includes five works by the artists that are organized around physical and temporal displacement. “Gathering material elements from different social, geographical, and cultural systems into the field of a single image/form, the works presented here use metaphor as a structuring and distributional force to expand the frame through which normal circuits of meaning are determined.” The exhibition closes October 16.
- Visit this online London Poll and vote for artists Allora & Calzadilla, who are on the short-list for the next Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square. The official decision will be made by the Fourth Plinth Commissioning Group later this year and the winning artwork will be announced by the mayor of London early next year.
- Ballroom Marfa (Texas) presents Immaterial, an exhibition that “seeks to examine the metaphysical aspects of artistic production through a selection of artworks that challenge the use of material and space, formalism and abstraction. By using the exhibition as a forum to consider process-driven practices, Immaterial will consider art’s potential to transcend conscious states through a plurality of visual languages.” The exhibition runs from October 1 – February 20, 2011 and will feature work by Julie Mehretu, among other artists.
- On November 4, the BU School of Visual Arts presents the Contemporary Perspectives Lecture Series: Laylah Ali. “Best known for her androgynous comic figures, Laylah Ali uses everyday objects such as sneakers, band-aids and dodge balls, and juxtaposes them with such violent subject matter as political resistance and betrayal. Her meticulously-worked paintings of gouache on paper result in scenes that are controlled, yet saturated with tension.” This lecture is free and open to the public. Call 617.353.3371 for information.
- The Walker Art Center presents Charles Atlas‘s Ocean as “the world premiere of an extraordinary film that marks a key moment in Walker history and, with Cunningham’s death in July 2009, stands as the final living record of this stunning work.” The screening and benefit takes place on September 15.
- If you’re in or near Oakland, CA anytime between September 11 – March 6, 2011, be sure to check out The Marvelous Museum: A Project by Mark Dion. “Mounting an unprecedented expedition through the Museum’s art, history, and natural science collections, conceptual artist Mark Dion will create multiple site-specific installations and interventions throughout the art galleries, drawing upon the overlooked orphans, curiosities, and treasures from the collections.”
- The Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University presents The Record: Contemporary Art and Vinyl exhibiting the work of several artists from around the world, from the 1960s to the present, who use vinyl records as subject or medium. The exhibition includes sound work, sculpture, installation, drawing, painting, photography, video and performance. Carrie Mae Weems is among the selected artists whose work is on view September 2 – February 6, 2011.
- On September 9, Arturo Herrera and David Schutter will give an interactive artist talk about their joint exhibition of new abstract collages, drawings, and paintings. “Herrera, whose art is represented in the Art Institute of Chicago’s prints and drawings collection and is popular with study room visitors, creates drawings and collages using disassembled cartoon icons. For this exhibition, the two artists take on the theme of the double by presenting diptychs and experiments with handmade replication processes.”
- The National Museum of Contemporary Art Korea presents the Nuclear Power Plant Art Project in Yeonggwang and its first commissioned site-specific installation entitled, Earth-Water-Fire-Air by Kimsooja. This project is the power plant’s “first of the public art project series organized to transform the city of Yeonggwang into the place where man and the nature; energy and technology converge.” The installation is on display until September 19.
- A week in the unique life of Laurie Anderson has been documented in the UK’s Observer. “Through photos taken by Anderson, the magazine’s Show and Tell feature tells the tale of a week earlier this summer that included leftover chocolate Easter bunnies, a rain-soaked Lou Reed, and the Coney Island Mermaid Parade, of which Reed and Anderson were king and queen, respectively.”
- If you’re planning to visit the Musée d’Art Moderne et d’Art Contemporain in Nice, France, be sure to see Cai Guo-Qiang‘s Travels in the Mediterranean, on view until January 9, 2011. The exhibition displays a “28-meter long gunpowder drawing” that was specifically realized for the exhibition.
