The current Almine Rech exhibition in New York is by Haley Josephs, Lucy Bull, Aaron Curry and is called I Want to Eat the Sunset. We’re Talking About the Cosmos, Even. And Love, I Guess. This exhibition presents creators whose work can engage a metaphysical discourse as much as art historical and intellectual traditions, whether figurative or abstract, in living color or in monochrome,
painting or sculpture. A glance at the artists’ reading lists may illuminate matters. For Bull, it’s anthropologist Michael Taussig’s 2009 study What Color is the Sacred?, in which he contemplates color as a “ polymorpous magical substance,” a notion that resonates with Bull. For Curry, it’s Albers’s lectures, including his 1935 talk “Abstract Art,” which concludes, “Art is spirit and spirit is eternal.” For Josephs, it’s Eckhart Tolle’s 2005 A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose, which invokes a “spiritual awakening.”
painting or sculpture. A glance at the artists’ reading lists may illuminate matters. For Bull, it’s anthropologist Michael Taussig’s 2009 study What Color is the Sacred?, in which he contemplates color as a “ polymorpous magical substance,” a notion that resonates with Bull. For Curry, it’s Albers’s lectures, including his 1935 talk “Abstract Art,” which concludes, “Art is spirit and spirit is eternal.” For Josephs, it’s Eckhart Tolle’s 2005 A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose, which invokes a “spiritual awakening.”
Gordon's work also features in The Just, the latest online exhibition at Aleph Contemporary. The artists in this virtual exhibition all make paintings that explore the ethical and moral dilemmas of human beings, their boundaries and territories , their conflicts and struggles. Each artist offers hope in the possibility of a momentary perception of aesthetic transcendence. Together they create an ambiguous human terrain , guiding us through the dark walls of this virtual gallery.
Chaiya Art Awards' Impact exhibition was featured recently in Church Times and can be visited online until September. The postponed 2020 Chaiya Art Awards will take place at gallery@oxo, in London, in April 2021. Impact features artists shortlisted for the postponed 2020 Awards, who were asked to respond to the effects of the pandemic “around the world, on families, society, health care, and beliefs.”
Explore a rediscovered collection of extraordinary paintings and drawings by over forty young Zimbabwean artists that have not been exhibited together for almost 70 years at The Stars are Bright, a new exhibition in Shoreditch. All of these talented painters attended Cyrene, a mission school founded in 1940 in colonial Zimbabwe and located amidst varied and colourful natural surroundings that inspired the visual imagination of the students.
Romare Bearden: Artist as Activist & Visionary explored the body of work of one of the 20th century’s most important visual artists and highlights his life as an educator, scholar, writer, songwriter, and social activist. The exhibition examined how an American artist agitated for social change through the power of his art and writing as, for over fifty years, Bearden depicted, defined, and celebrated the life that surrounded him. Artist as Activist & Visionary featured over 45 works including collages, watercolors, drawings, prints, and editorial cartoons through which Bearden explored race and racial stereotypes, often taking inspiration from history, literature, the Bible, jazz, the African American community, and his imagination. This exhibition at the Driskell Center Gallery can still be viewed in a Virtual Gallery
Another retrospective able to be viewed online is Rosie Lee Tompkins: A Retrospective at BAMPFA. Often inspired by her belief in God, Tompkins made quilts directed toward her own healing and spirituality and to honor family members. She employed a wide variety of traditional patterns, including half-squares, medallions, and yo-yos, exploring and adapting these approaches through her individual sensibility and integrating such favorite fabrics as velvet, artificial fur, and various types of glittery material. She also frequently incorporated embroidery—stitching words and citations of Christian scripture—as well as printed images on recycled clothes, which suggest the artist’s commentary on contemporary social, political, and cultural events.
2019 marked the centenary of the birth of Colin McCahon (1919-1987). Widely regarded as the most influential New Zealand artist of the 20th century, McCahon developed a singular vision over a career of more than four decades. His unique contribution to twentieth-century art is distinguished by his characteristic use of painted text, relentless exploration of religious ideas and integration of aspects of international modernism to the local regional context. McCahon’s inventive and deeply personal visual language traversed a complex territory addressing themes and subjects including Christian and Māori spirituality, emotional and symbolic journeys, the landscape, environmental concerns and the expressive potential of numbers and words. Colin McCahon: Letters and Numbers explores McCahon’s significance through a close examination of works in the collection of the National Gallery of Victoria. See also Gordon H Brown and Colin McCahon and From the Archive: Colin McCahon in Auckland at Auckland Art Gallery.
Of Earth and Sky, by Luke Jerram, is a large-scale poetry installation project taking place across Gloucester. The poetry was submitted by Gloucestershire residents and will be seen on a vast scale right across the city to create a sculpture trail. People will be able to discover and interact with this poetry in parks and public places across the city from Mon 24 August – Sun 1 November 2020. The text and poetry for Of Earth and Sky has been created by the Gloucestershire community through a major call out and workshops. Last year, Luke worked with Strike a Light, to bring Museum of the Moon to Gloucester Cathedral. The Dean of Gloucester, the very reverend Stephen Lake, said: ‘Gloucester Cathedral is proud to be a commissioning partner of this exciting new project for the city. Last year’s Museum of the Moon demonstrated the extraordinary power that world class visual art has to inspire people and this promises to be just as impactful.‘We are committed to supporting Gloucester’s developing cultural programme and look forward to collaborating with Luke Jerram once more.’
WaterAid are celebrating 10 years of water and sanitation as a human right by commissioning images from 10 photographers around the world. They commissioned ten visual artists to each produce one original new work on the subject of water and sanitation as a human right. The photographers come from countries across the Global South and diaspora communities, bringing personal perspectives on identity, race and representation to the central theme of what life is like with or without clean water and decent sanitation. WaterAid are using these striking new images to call on governments around the world to double their investments in providing clean water and good hygiene to those most in need, which takes on a renewed urgency in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. They are also running Art for Change, an art competition which goes to a public vote on 10 August. Grayson Perry is one of the judges. They are calling for art to help bring attention to the issues those without access to clean water are facing during the COVID-19 crisis. This winning piece of artwork will be used as a statement to world leaders ahead of the G20 Summit in November, calling for them to double their investment in water and hygiene in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Bloc Party - The Love Within.
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