painting box: 2012

Charles Fine's 30 year retrospective is currently on view at the Ace Gallery in Los Angeles. It runs from October 26th till the end of January. The gallery is museum like, with many rooms and small spaces and hallways, and Fine has made good use of each space to set off the work. It's wonderful to see so much of his work together, to see his tables with arrangements of objects that are at the heart of the paintings and large sculptures, and then to see those paintings and sculptures too. There is much more to the show than I've included here, and well worth a trip to see the work in person.

Above: "Table of Contents" I,III, and IV. Details below.

Above: "Spin Cycle IV" 2005 Oil and asphaltum on canvas 114" x 96".

Above: A detail of "Devil's Bargain", 1999, Oil and asphaltum on canvas, also seen in the photo above this one.

Above: "Table of Contents V", 2012, details.

Above and below: "Flor de Incino", 2012, patinaed aluminum

Above: "Press IV", 2011, oil and asphaltum on canvas, 50"H x 47" W.

Above: Left: "Fieldmarks XII", 1993, oil, asphaltum, and alkyd resin on canvas, 87" H x 62" W. Right: "Overload", 1990, encaustic on steel and resin, 84" H x 97.5" W x 14" D.

Above: "Core II", 1992, encaustic on steel, 27" H x 18" W x 10.5" D.

Above: "Untitled (Large Eggcase)", 1986.

Above and Below: "Under Strange Skies", 1988, mixed media on wood with lead coffin.

Above: "Furnace Flowers I-V", 2006-2010, bronze, nylon, plaster, and silica.

Above: "Furnace Flower V", bronze, nylon, plaster, and silica.

Above: "Furnace Flowers (Group)", 2010

Above: Left: "Fieldmarks VI", 1994, oil, enamel, and asphaltum on canvas. Right: "Furnace Flower VII", 2012, bronze, ceramic, and silica on cement.

Above: "Furnace Flower VII", 2012, bronze, ceramic, and silica on cement.

Above: "Flower (Petralized)" 2010-2012, ceramic, cement, and pigment.

Above: "Table of Contents" detail

I've grouped these shows together because there is a thin line connecting them. Though Charles Fine's exhibit shows an entire body of work, and Gabriel Orozco's installation at the Guggenheim is a single project, the idea of grouping found objects, many from nature, creates a link between them. Fine has worked and traveled a great deal in Mexico, and has picked up many washed up items as well as seed pods and natural elements on the beaches of Baja, where this part of Orozco's installation was collected.

At the Guggenheim Museum in NYC through January 13 2013 is Gabriel Orozco's exhibition "Asterisms". This is a sculptural and photographic installation comprising thousands of items of detritus Orozco gathered from two sites...a playing field near his home in NY and a protected coastal biosphere in Baja California, Mexico, which is also the repository of industrial waste due to ocean currents. The pieces I photographed and included here are the ones from Baja California. The way this installation is done feels like a cataloging of items found, yet at the same time there is a visual pleasure in seeing the groupings. The island in Baja where this detritus was picked up is normally off limits to visitors as a whale sanctuary, but the project was sanctioned by the Mexican government, and Orozco was allowed to go there and take all these objects out.

Above: At first I thought these objects were wood or bone, but on closer viewing you realize that they're actually rolls of toilet paper.

Above: Winifred Nicholson (1893-1981), "Blue Hyacinths in a Winter Landscape".

Above: Milton Avery (1885-1965), "White Pitcher", 1946

Above: Giorgio Morandi (1890-1964), "Still Life", 1951

Above: Andrew Lord (b. 1950), "Swallowing", 1998

Above: Objects on shelves in our Studio.

Above: William Nicholson (1872-1949), "The Trailed Jug", 1917. Nicholson's son is the artist Ben Nicholson. Ben Nicholson married Winifred Nicholson, one of my favorite painters, whose "Blue Hyacinths" started this post.

Above: William Nicholson (1872-1949), "Scottish Still Life"

Above: This is by William Nicholson's son, Ben Nicholson (1894-1982), "1943-45, St. Ives, Cornwall". Ben Nicholson is better known for his abstract work.

Above: Harold Gilman (1876-1919), "Still Life of White Cup, Saucer, and Jug on a Table", 1917-18.

Above: Anne Redpath (1895-1965), "The Blue Tablecloth", 1940

Above: William Scott (1913-1989) Still Life, Collection National Museums, Northern Ireland.

Above: Giorgio Morandi (1890-1964), still life, 1962

Above: Nicolas de Stael (1914-1955), "Atelier Vert"1954.

Above: Alec Soth (b. 1969) from his project "Sleeping by the Mississippi"

Above: Georges Braque (1882-1963) "The Yellow Napkin", 1935.

Above: Georges Braque (1882-1963) "Still Life with Lemons and Pipe", 1950. Interesting to see how Braques style evolved in the 15 years between these two paintings.

Above: Alice Neel (1900-1984), "Still Life (Breakfast Table)", 1965.

Above: Mary Fedden (1915-2012), "Still Life with Amaryllis and Fruit on a Chair", 1980

Above: Sir Matthew Smith, "Lilies in a Vase", 1914

Above: Robert M. Kulicke (1924-2007), "Vase of Flowers". Kulicke is best known for his work as a framer. He is the inventor of the simple plexiglass box frame, and a welded aluminum frame that allowed consumers to frame art work for themselves. In 1951 he opened Kulicke Frames, becoming friendly with abstract expressionists like Robert Motherwell and Franz Kline, who asked him to design thin frames they thought suited their work. He started painting his small still life subjects after being exposed to 300 works by Morandi that he was commissioned to make frames for. The small Morandi paintings of bottles gave him the confidence to work on small paintings with modest subjects. You can read more in this obituary written by Roberta Smith for the NY Times.

Above: William Coldstream (1908-1987), Window in Hampstead, 1981

Above: From the book "Bringing Nature Home", by Ngoc Minh Ngo, arrangements by Nicolette Owen of the Little Flower School in Brooklyn.

Above: Claudio Bravo (1936-2011), "Carafes", 1987, oil on canvas.

Above: Alex Katz (b. 1927), "Still Life With Pitcher", 1950s

Above: Charles Mahoney, British Surrealist, "Still Life With Snakes and Ladder Board".

Above: Charles Mahoney, "Still Life With Landscape", 1959.

Above: Jonas Wood (b. 1977)

Above: Haim Steinbach (b. 1944), "Oz", 2009. Plastic laminated wood shelf, mount rabbit, rubber dog chew.

Above: Haim Steinbach (b. 1944), "Global Proportions", 2007

Above: Piero Golia (b. 1974), "Yellow Barbeque Cube", 2005

Above: William Scott (1913-1989), "Frying Pan and Eggs", 1949

Above: William Scott (1913-1989), "Table Still Life", 1951

Above: Photo by William Scott (1913-1989), "Still Life in a Frame", 1956

Above: Irving Penn (1917-2009), "Still Life With Onion Skin, New York", 1947

Above: Craigie Horsefield (b. 1949), "Three Garlic Bulbs, Cabbage Leaf", 2003, Dry Print

Above: Gerhard Richter (b. 1932), "Two Candles", 1982

Above: Evelyn Hofer, "My Telphone in the Tawaraya Inn Kyoto, Japan", 1985

Above: Francisco de Zubaran (1598-1664), "A Cup of Water and a Rose", 1630

Above: Odilon Redon (1840-1916), "La Coquille", 1912.

Above: Milton Avery (1885-1965), "Pink Still Life", 1938.

Above: Vanessa Bell "Still Life with Quill Pens", 1948-1950, Bryan Ferry Collection

Above: Robert Kulicke (1924-2007), "Zinnias in a Glass Jar", 1985, 10" x 8.5", oil on masonite.

Above: Robert Kulicke (1924-2007), "Flowers on a Dark Background", 1960, 8" x 7.25", oil on board.

Above: George Leslie Hunter (1877-1931), "The Pink Tablecloth".

Above: Elizabeth Peyton (b. 1965), "Still Life", 2007-2008

Above: Elizabeth Peyton (b. 1965), "Pati", 2007. It looks like a photo of Patti Smith in the background, but according to the Guardian it's Peyton's friend Pati Hertling.

Above: From the book "Bringing Nature Home", by Ngoc Minh Ngo, arrangements by Nicolette Owen of the Little Flower School in Brooklyn.

Above: Winifred Nicholson (1893-1981), "Nursery Bunch", 1927

Above: Leanne Shapton, from her NY Times blog, "Tuesday Blooms". This is "Dahlias From the Angel Tube Station Flower Stall", London, December 6 2005.

Above: S.J. Peploe (1871-1935) "Still Life with Books".

Above: Rachel Whiteread (b. 1963), "Vessel", 2008. Plaster, pigment, resin, wood, and steel.

Above: Rachel Whiteread (b. 1963), "Untitled, (Colours)", 2002. This is a still life of the negative spaces left in a bookshelf, the spaces that the books don't take up.