Author Archives: jolanta

Nina Meledandri: The Metaphysics of Twilight Mark Daniel Cohen It is not quite as dark here as we thought. On the contrary, the interior ispulsating with light. It is, of course, the internal light of roots, a wanderingphosphorescence, tiny veins of light marbling the darkness, an evanescent shimmerof nightmarish substances. — Bruno Schulz, “Spring”   […]

Destiny, Photography as Appropriation of the World Matthias Harder A dinner with thefood half cold or an ashtray on a windowsill – we ordinarily do not takeintense note of such situations or objects; their symbolic content is often overlooked.When, in accordance with a Buddhist tradition, a photographer says a prayer ofthanks for a meal, when […]

UNREASONABLE ENGAGEMENTS Perry McPartland At its high watermark of acceptance and supererogation, some marks of malaise seems to occur withinthe reigning cultural form. In its unchallenged authority, now stabilised andinstitutionalised, the rude vitality which originally fired it appears spent.Its forms cease to pulse and act merely as promulgation for their sponseringculture. Our contemporary panorama seems […]

Color as Language Piri Halasz Can color be a language? In graduate school, I chose Kandinsky’s use of color for a seminarpresentation, in hopes of answering this question, but was disappointed. AlthoughKandinsky had ideas about what each color said, I found discrepancies betweenwhat he thought, and the correspondences that Goethe, for example, found. Yearslater, I […]

The Missing: The Photography of Andrea Frank and Cleverson Raul Zamudio Like the positive-negativedichotomy, my attraction to the photographic work of Andrea Frank and Cleversonstems from what their work alludes to that draws attention to something absent.For though they are artists that are engaged in photography and its discourse,they have arrived at this practice through […]

John Perreault: Pataphysician Robert C. Morgan John Perreaulthas always struggled to separate the things he likes to do from the things hedoes best. In this way, he maintains a discrete repertory of objects, words,and events. He writes poetry. He writes criticism. And he makes serious art thatappears flippant. He makes paintings with toothpaste and does […]

Brown Blue – Laura Owens @ MOCA, Los Angeles Rosanna Albertini Laura Owens atthe Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, an exhibition of five years of work.The artist is young, fifty seven paintings in the show. They are puzzling, itseems they can’t stand the pressure of our common sense: the more one triesto analyze them, […]

David Shterenberg Selma Stern It is difficultto find an artist of the 20th century who has been more neglected by art historythan the artist David Shterenberg. His works were banned in the 60s and 70s andneither Russian nor foreign art critics were allowed access to Shterenberg`sart works. When the Russian avant-garde was reviewed by art […]

Art / Fashion: Artist’s essay Shun Sasaki I’m tryingto express the primary forms. Fashion presents the work of contemporary art thatuses the highly readable visual language of clothing and appearance. The artists,or designers, use clothing forms to examine issues of identity, particularlygender, and to examine the societal forces that dictate the way we look. We […]

City as Open Book Slawomir Marzec In the late autumn1975 inhabitants of German village Kleinsassen were agitated by sudden message:stranger arrived. The stranger set a tent (which during winter became an igloo)in ruins of monastery and began its reconstruction alone. All sorts of guessesand rumors on his subject circulated in the neighborhood, however nobody supposed,that […]