BRAUNSTEIN/QUAY - CATHARINE CLARK - BAER RIDGWAY
BOCONCEPT - ARTISTS' TELEVISION ACCESS - DLXSF
LIVE WORMS
06.27.09
(with assistance from Laura Chenault, RWM and Kathryn Arnold)

Braunstein Quay Gallery: Ursula Schneider - The River.

Review by Kathryn Arnold: The exhibition is work created by New York based artist Ursula Schneider titled "The River." The Hudson River serves as her point of origin for this set of formally arranged abstract paintings. The art is created using a novel set of mediums-- pigment and urethane on laminated nylon-- which participates and integrates with the subject matter/content while simultaneously providing a support for these large scale works which at first look like watercolors. Schneider's engagement with the inventiveness of materials evokes the memory of Eva Hesse. In many ways the art, at first glance, feels almost like the blended visions of an ikat weave. From a distance, one can easily make out the Hudson River but upon closer inspection, specific representations begin to melt away as the works begin to function in an abstract and formal manner. The series presented here aligns with the seasons, and only the 'December Hudson River' articulates a winter scene, feeling just like NYC in the winter looking across the Hudson.

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Baer Ridgway Exhibitions: William Thompson - Everest.

Review by Kathryn Arnold: This new exhibition of William Thompson's Mount Everest photographs (archival digital prints) impresses to the point where once you see it, you will be more than inclined forsake your digital camera!!! The detail is more intense, much finer than I can possibly imagine seeing with my own eyes. I'm informed they are shot with a film camera from a Learjet. The artist will be speaking on these sometime in July, according to the gallerist. Magnificent grand images.

Review by RWM: Amazing and wondrous pictures of the jagged mountain peaks. The works are observed rather than endured, i.e. they are not pictures taken while going up the trail. Here one will find wild nature at the top of the world observed from above the top of the world. Wonderful color schemes cast the rugged mountains in a different light-- beautiful images from a place that not everybody can go.

Review by Laura Chenault: William Thompson's breathtaking aerial photographs of Mt. Everest are beautifully printed on fine art paper. Hanging away from the walls and unframed, the views are the focus. The peaks of the mountains are beautifully lit by dawn light in one photograph and become undulating forms fading into misty skies. Beautiful photographs of an inspiring subject. Don't forget to check out the new bookstore downstairs with gorgeous books and other cool merchandise.

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Catharine Clark Gallery: Remix - Thorsten Brinkmann, Nicole Cherubini, Amir H. Fallah, Carmen McLeod, Hilary Pecis, Mickalene Thomas.

Review by Laura Chenault: Six artists working with a variety of medium are featured in this group show. Amir H. Fallah creates bright mixed media pieces that are playful and graphic, two featuring imaginary structures populated with shamans and other strange characters. Mickalene Thomas is showing a couple of large pieces, the most intriguing titled Photomontage #10, where an entire wall of the gallery is clad with seventies paneling hung a collection of black and white photographs featuring African American women in multiple layers of frames. They are fabulous and funky, and the play between the models, their environments, the layered frames and smatterings of animal prints combine perfectly.

Review by Kathryn Arnold: Out front, Ray Beldner works the sidewalk grill-- chefing up a complete meal and feeding the guests! Inside the gallery, I see a number of works I'll have to go back and spend some additional time with. The colors, especially of the pieces created from contemporary stuff-- are bright and vivid, with many neon hues, an aspect of the material culture from our time and place perhaps (but not the MacBookPro). Some of the 2D work remains within the abstract realm but often is seen taking on characteristics of branches and treehouses in a manner I would like to call inventive fabrication.

I enjoy how many of the aspects of the exhibition play along with Nick Cave's works that are close by at YBCA and which I just saw the Thursday before. There is one massive installation work (in the corner of the room farthest from the street) that catches my eye as it contains many similar characteristics of the works on the wall, yet in 3D. Perhaps to sum it up, a quote from the Gallery's webpage that cites Artforum's Charlie White (Cut and Paste, Charlie White on the Collage Impulse Today, Artforum, April 2009, pp. 210 - 215) will do... "The impulse to remix, reedit, and reorder media, as well as the analog desire to take tear, and tape imagery, meets the methods to do so with ease and endless availability." Hence the title of the exhibition "Remix." One nice show!

Comment by RWM: Fascinating artistic comments here about the nature of collage, assemblages, and the nude. The use of frames to encapsulate the nudes is unusual and gives one reason to pause and look again with fresh eyes. 

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BoConcept, 101 Townsend Street, San Francisco, CA 94107: Namita Kapoor - Karma Chromatic.

Comment by AB: Vibrant energized abstractions blend contemporary and traditional Indian imagery.

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ATA - Artists' Television Access: Ilana Crispi - Always Under Construction, Window Installation.

Comment by AB: Ilana Crispi's fluid "under-construction" window installation, meandering about the entrance to the gallery and even out into the street, will evolve in appearance throughout the course of the month. Salt crystals grow as "comets from Saturn" hurl towards the glass, all against a backdrop based on Durer's Melencolia I.

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DLX - The Deluxe: Artist Series Board Release Party for Isaac McKay-Randozzi's Stereo Sound Guest Artist Boards.

Review and images by Laura Chenault: Isaac McKay-Randozzi has designed two new boards for the Stereo Sound Guest Artist Boards Series. The first is a repeating graphic black and white photograph of a bridge, and the second features a red and yellow background overlaid with a black guitar. The artist is also showing his charming miniature billboards. Measuring just a few inches tall, they are lit urban photographs that become self-standing works of art.

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Live Worms Gallery: 6D - Views from 6 Artists.

Artists: Paul Baker, Irene Hendrick, Michael Travers Lee, Kathleen McMahon, Elizabeth Stahl, Zabrina Tipton.

Review and images by Laura Chenault: Three painters, two photographers, and one conceptual artist fill the gallery with an eclectic mix of art. Michael Travers Lee displays large photographs in both black and white and color of recognizable San Francisco locales and subjects from a unique perspective. For example, his piece of Castro Theater is focused on the Muni wires instead of the more obvious lights of the sign. Irene Hendrick paints subtle images that express captured moments in time. Somewhat photographic in their stillness, they are quintessentially paintings. Sepia toned colors dripping down the canvasses add to the cheerful dreariness.

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Corner of Broadway and Columbus Streets: Dorka Keehn and Brian Goggin - Language of the Birds.

Review and images by Laura Chenault: A public art piece by Dorka Keehn and Brian Goggin, Language of the Birds, features flying books strung high above this busy corner in North Beach. A nice homage to the beat poets and just a short stumble up from their infamous hangout, City Lights Books.

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