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 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: "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.
Posts
