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Josh Azzarella
09.19.2011 | Maury Gortemiller
Untitled #39 (265), 20 x 30 in., 2007, Ed. 7+3 a.p.
Artist Josh Azzarella manipulates appropriated imagery, transforming iconic images into scenes that can be alternately soothing and dispiriting. Carefully increasing, deleting or modifying existing pixels, Azzarella alters images already ingrained in the public consciousness. Scenes memorized and “known” are changed, so that the iconic becomes disembodied, the familiar becomes uncanny. Azzarella’s work alters the context and meaning of recognized imagery and questions how individual and collective memories form. The obfuscation of memories with realities and the creation of memories where none previously existed are all germane to his methodology.
Untitled #13 (AHSF), 20 x 30 in., 2006, Ed. 7+3 a.p.
Untitled #23 (Lynndied), 20 x 30 in., 2006, Ed. 7+3 a.p.
The results are works which simultaneously discomfit and reassure. Viewers may recognize the context, but the poignant thrust of Azzarella’s source material is dematerialized. With the foreground figures removed, Untitled #39 (265) recasts the afternoon of May 4, 1970 at Kent State as an ordinary sunny day. Similarly, Hajji Ali does not appear as the notoriously hooded and electrically-wired Abu Ghraib prisoner; rather, a lonely cardboard sits near a cinder block wall in Untitled #13 (AHSF). Azzarella’s omissions emphasize the marginal details, recasting events as mundane happenings void of pathos.
Untitled #15 (Tank Man), 20 x 30 in., 2006, Ed. 7+3 a.p.
Azzarella created a 9/11 tetralogy of sorts, whereby footage of the painful events is transformed into a more seemingly hopeful scenario. The jets do not crash; rather, they are depicted as effortlessly flying by the doomed structures in looped footage. There is no cataclysm; in effect, there is nothing to see. A fourth video depicts a “jumper,” someone who fell or leapt from the World Trade Center. This footage is slowed down, and the frame rate transition is altered so that the individual resembles a subtly shifting amorphous shape. Again, the sensational is abstracted and disaster is forestalled. Azzarella’s recasting of these defining moments speaks to the pervasive fears indicative of millennial culture, as well as the desire to assuage end-time anxieties. Specifically, our estranged relationship to time is put on display and amplified. The non-events of Azzarella’s videos, particularly his pieces concerning the World Trade Center, belie our collective longing for a singular calamity, the Apocalypse which is forever about to happen.
Untitled #9 (W.T.P.1), Om 21s, 2006, Ed. DVD 7+3 a.p.
Azzarella engages our collective fears and anxieties by manipulating media imagery. In preserving the structural integrity of the World Trade Center towers, notions of time, terrorism and simulacra converge upon the most visible symbols of capitalism. The omission of fiery spectacle suggests that a late 20th century longing for a corrective to globalism, a return to Western notions of time, the desire for the real, and the compulsion to whitewash history are symptomatic of contemporary fin de siècle unease. Azzarella limns the millennial condition as intrinsic to a world of unceasing representations and irrepressible globalism.
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Peter Happel Christian
09.15.2011 | Kyle Tata
Open Up from the series Half Wild, 2011
The photography of Minneapolis-based artist Peter Happel Christian explores the interaction between humans and the natural environment. Christian does not merely document the landscape of the natural world; rather, he creates actions, which he documents through a wide range of media, including photographs, artist books, and sculptures. In his artist statement, he writes that he will “make a habit of literally setting his camera aside and reaching into the world to physically interact with his subject matter.”
Untitled #2 from the series Black Holes & Blind Spots, 2010
Dallas Fort Worth Airport from the series Brief Notes on Existence, 2004-2006
Site Insight from the series Near the Point of the Beginning, 2006-2008
His series Brief Notes on Existence documents the environments of different locations in an unusual and humorous way. From 2004-2006, Christian collected dust bunnies from various American settings, ranging from museums, galleries, universities, courthouses, and his home. After Christian gathered and organized each group of dust, he then created cyanotype photograms of each individual piece. The resulting 170 prints are bound into handmade artist books and organized into 28 separate volumes, one for each location. Christian’s printing process has transformed these photograms from portraits of specific places into mystery-infused miniature renderings of clouds.
Structure for Sight from the series Weights and Measurements, 2006-2009
Through his work, Christian explores the physicality of land as well as the historical connections that humans have to this very physicality. In Near the Point of Beginning (2006-2008), Christian, along with professional geographer Dr. Bradley Shellito, rediscovered a historical site along the Ohio River known as “The Point of the Beginning of the Seven Ranges.” It was from this point in 1785 that the rest of the United States, westward of Ohio, was surveyed and divided into the states they are today. Although a monument represents this historical event near the Ohio-Pennsylvania border, the exact location of the site is unknown and only rediscovered through Christian’s completion of the piece. Like the rest of his work, the project highlights how historical events continue to shape our understanding of the built environment and natural world that surrounds us.
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This Week in Stock Photography
09.14.2011 | Jon Feinstein
Photo Copyright: Shutterstock
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Conor Backman Interview
09.13.2011 | Shana Beth Mason
For Another to Being in Primer, sheet steel, gesso, acrylic, automotive primer, 2011, 16 x 20 in.
Conor Backman (b.1988) studies sculpture and painting at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). His work has appeared in exhibitions held in Richmond, New York, Philadelphia, Santa Monica, New Orleans and Baltimore. He is currently co-owner of REFERENCE, an art gallery in downtown Richmond. Backman lives and works in Richmond.
Shana Beth Mason: What is the creative mission of REFERENCE? Does it have one, or—if not—will it in the future?
Conor Backman: I started REFERENCE in the spring of 2009 with James Shaeffer, Edward Shenk, and Ross Iannatti, whom I met at VCU. We felt that the work we and most of our peers were making or looking at was under-represented in Richmond’s galleries. Since opening, we’ve organized shows that include Richmond artists, providing a space for local burgeoning talent to exhibit. We bring in work from New York, Chicago, and other cities to expand the conversation around emerging contemporary art here.
SBM: With your own work, do you find yourself gravitating towards a particular medium?
CB: I’m currently working on a double major in sculpture and painting. I don’t really separate the two disciplines, my work is my work. I definitely have a different conversation between other painters and sculptors who are more focused on medium specific problems. It’s been interesting to see how each discipline comes together in its own unique way to inform a body of work that’s somewhere in between the two. I started school as a sculpture major, but lately have been making work that is very much about painting. So I think I’m really a painter at heart. I’ve come to really appreciate the painting tradition, and the limits it potentially brings to art making.
Untitled, oil on canvas, 2011, 44 x 72 in.
SBM: Currently, what’s the greatest challenge you face in your practice?
CB: Right now, I’m trying to stay focused in the studio and taking more risks with the work at the same time. I’m working through some issues I’m interested in investigating more deeply, while also staying uncomfortable and unfamiliar with my process.
As Smooth As It's Name, oil on canvas, 2010, 8 x 10 x 5 in.
SBM: So far, has there been a moment where you knew you could succeed in a career in visual arts for the long-term?
CB: I think it’s important for young artists to attempt to redefine a traditional model or expectation for success. Defining success through financial gain is a very easy way to go about it, or exhibitions on a resume, but I think its more complex than that. I definitely think about success a lot more than I probably should or need to, but never in a way that feels like pressure; more about admiring drive and ambition. I heard an interesting bit on the radio recently from a writer who doesn’t believe in talent, but rather in obsession and that it’s obsession that creates successful people. I think in a lot of ways, I agree. I know that I can’t see myself not being obsessed with art making for the rest of my life.
Extra, oil on panel, 2010, 7.5 x 9.5 x 2 in.
SBM: In the context of your painting, which aesthetic dynamic do you feel closest to? Appropriation? Narrative? Abstraction?
CB: I think in my best work, all three modes are at play. I’m interested in creating work that oscillates between these approaches and traditions. I’m not as engaged with artwork that has no connection to the real world, so the more abstract work usually makes references to or appropriates something existing, whether that is found objects or other abstract painting.
Base Composit, oil on canvas, 2011, 48 x 60 in.
SBM: What is the next step for you, as an individual artist, and Reference as a contemporary artist collective?
CB: We don’t plan on being in Richmond forever, so right now we’re trying to work out the next phase of this project, where it will happen, and in what form. I know that a large consideration is in our viewership, which has really opened up with the internet. It’s important that this current space is a physical one and I think our location in Richmond has a lot of benefits, but its also very interesting to account for the fact that most of our audience has never set foot in the space. It presents some interesting challenges that could lead to fruitful projects, exploring that idea in different ways.
Shana Beth Mason is an art consultant and critic based in Miami. She holds an M.A. in the History of Art & Connoisseurship (Modern & Contemporary Art) from Christie’s Education London. Recent contributions include The Art Economist, Sculpture Magazine, Artlog, Whitewall Magazine, Whitehot Magazine (Vancouver), Miami Art Guide and PODER (Miami) Magazine. Mason has contributed catalogue essays for Ilya & Emilia Kabakov, Salustiano, Oleg Tistol, Jorge Enrique and Francesco Lo Castro.
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