OPTIC NERVE: The Prints and Multiples of Sean Mellyn (1993-2013)
JUNE 20 - AUGUST 1, 2013
 
CURATED BY MICHAEL STEINBERG
 
UNDERLINE Gallery is pleased to announce a major retrospective of the prints and multiples of Sean Mellyn. From a 1993 drypoint, Boy In The Bubble, to two new digital prints created to celebrate the exhibition – Tour Group and The House What Eye Built – the artist’s innovative utilization of a broad range of printmaking techniques will be on view. Commenting on the various modes of editioning, Mellyn writes:
 
“There seems to be a pecking order with perfection in print-making - Silkscreen being the most accident-prone and the now almost perfect digital techniques are flawless representations. I've been working on how to make accidents before the image is scanned, or to try and do something that will corrupt the file.”
 
Mellyn has worked with such distinguished master printers as Jean-Yves Noblet, Jennifer Melby, Andre Ribuoli. Additionally, he was invited to create several editions at New Mexico’s Tamarind Institute, where he worked in collaboration with master lithographer Bill Lagattuta. One of the works he produced there, Boy With Mask, is included in a traveling exhibition and book celebrating Tamarind’s fiftieth anniversary. Among the significant print collections that have acquired prints by Sean Mellyn are New York’s Museum of Modern Art, The Whitney Museum of American Art, The New York Public Library and The Brooklyn Museum of Art.
 
While the current show encapsulates many of Mellyn’s major themes, his on-going concern with issues of vision – seeing and being seen; surveillance and paranoia; and art historical issues such as the cataracts in Monet’s eyes – emerges very clearly.
 
Mellyn notes: “I really started using eyes after 9/11 as it was clear that we would soon become a people watched. I always thought it’s so ironic that reality tv shows would be such a big deal; that it’s less Warholian 15 minutes of fame, and more scrutiny in government - judgement- busted kind of way.”
 
In addition to the print editions on view, the show will feature the highly-collected three dimensional multiples Mellyn has created. These include t-shirts, handkerchiefs, Paper Monet plates and a number of small sculptural objects. Some of these works were originally done as to benefit such institutions as The New Musuem.
 
Optic Nerve: The Prints and Multiples of Sean Mellyn (1993-2013) has been curated by Michael Steinberg, who, as a publisher, gallerist and collector has had a long involvement with Sean Mellyn’s work.
 
UNDERLINE Gallery is a visual arts gallery that underscores important, innovative works by some of today’s most talented artists. The Gallery’s unique perspective–often marked by color, dimension, humor, and spirit–reflects an intimate and non-exclusive environment that facilitates art appreciation. A variety of price points and a range of small and large-scale works bring together a community of artists, curators, art lovers, and collectors.

SIMON DENNY
All you need is data: the DLD 2012 Conference REDUX rerun
 
June 20 – July 27, 2013
 
Petzel Gallery is pleased to announce an exhibition by Simon Denny entitled, All you need is data: the DLD 2012 Conference REDUX rerun, from June 20 to July 27, 2013. This is the artist’s second exhibition with the gallery. A catalogue published by Koenig, including an interview with Hans Ulrich Obrist, texts by Karen Archey, digital law expert Michael Littger and an introduction by co-curators Bart van der Heide and Saim Demircan, will accompany the show.
 
All you need is data: the DLD 2012 Conference REDUX rerun focuses on the 2012 edition of Munich’s annual Digital Life Design (DLD) conference dld-conference.com/. The conference is a high caliber platform for the exchange of ideas between digital media, the sciences and culture, which had the theme “All You Need Is … DATA?” in 2012. Denny’s exhibition was first presented at the Kunstverein Munich at the beginning of the year, alongside the 2013 DLD conference.
 
For his exhibition, Denny has created a display structure for 89 canvases that represent a visual summary of events that took place at DLD12, harvesting insights from the many speakers such as Jack Dorsey (Twitter), Jimmy Wales (Wikipedia), Sheryl Sandberg (Facebook), Chris “Moot” Poole (4chan) and David Karp (tumblr), among others. The viewer is lead through the exhibition following a railing system that displays individual canvas “screens” that feature photos, pull-quotes and reconfigured stage and graphic designs from the conference. This content is flattened and depicted using iOS “skeuomorphic” style with app-like components. Only print media is used to illustrate the entire high-tech conference chronologically from beginning to end, forming what critic Kevin McGarry has described as “a structuralist memento mori”.
Simon Denny explores the materialization and commodification of “future visions and experiences,” and the lifespan of information in the context of fast paced, tech-driven commerce. The exhibition is a revealing format for how predetermined futures are promoted from the perspective of the digital economy. As such, the ‘REDUX’ in the title suggests a revisit of these future forecasts and is also indicative of the ‘Director’s Cut’ or a re-edit as a means of artistic appropriation.
Simon Denny was born in New Zealand in 1982 and received his degree at the Städelschule, Staatliche Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Frankfurt. He has had numerous solo exhibitions, with shows at the Aspen Art Museum and Kunstverein Munich in the past year. He will be included in this year’s Venice Biennial as well as have an exhibition at MuMOK, Vienna this summer as a winner of the Art Basel Statements Baloise Preis in 2012. He is also a nominee for this year’s German Nationalgalerie Preis at the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin. Simon Denny lives and works in Berlin.
Petzel Gallery is located at 456 West 18th Street New York, NY 10011. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10:00 AM – 6:00 PM. Gallery hours will switch to our summer schedule, Monday through Friday from 10:00 AM – 6:00 PM starting July 8th through the end of the exhibition. For press inquiries, please contact Andrew Black at andrew@petzel.com, or call (212) 680-9467.
For general inquiries, please email andrea@petzel.com.

October 18, 1977 opens at Klemens Gasser & Tanja Grunert 524 West 19th St, New York, NY on Thursday, June 20, 2013- Friday, July 19, 2013. Summer hours start July 8: Mon-Fri 10 am – 6 pm
 
An exhibition organized by Birgit Rathsmann in collaboration with Michele Abeles, Erica Baum, Neil Bender, Becket Bowes, Tania Cross, Grayson Cox, Anthony Lepore, David Lukowski, Oliver Kossack, Jessica Mein, Filip Noterdaeme, Dominic Nurre, Paul Pfeiffer, Jochen Plogsties, Claudia Pena Salinas, Daniel Rich, Siebren Versteeg, Jenny Vogel, Kristof Wickman and Jeff Williams.
 
New York, NY April 18, 2013 — On a single night, three terrorists in a high-security prison die, allegedly by their own hands; a fourth is hospitalized with allegedly self-inflicted stab wounds to the chest. Ever since, the events of the “Death Night” of the members of the Baader-Meinhof group have reverberated through German society and culture. But what might those events mean to artists in another country gripped by fear of radical terrorists, albeit a generation removed and an ocean away? How might today’s artists respond to iconic pieces that addressed the events in their immediate aftermath? Those are the questions that guided Brooklyn artist Birgit Rathsmann as she worked with 19 other artists from the U.S. and Europe to develop October 18, 1977. The exhibition is a meditation on that infamous night when Andreas Baader and three others were found dead or wounded in their prison cells — as well as on the images that earlier artists created in response to the events of that night. Rathsmann “commissioned” new pieces and collaborated to varying degrees with the participants in the exhibition. This created a dialog among artists who share Rathsmann’s interest in the questions raised by the events of October 18, 1977 and those raised by earlier artworks that address those events. In other words, Rathsmann didn’t curate this show; she served as its catalyst. Many of the questions she and the exhibition’s other artists examine have lingered for 36 years: Did the terrorists have a suicide pact? Was it set into motion when they learned that a hijacking intended to win their freedom had failed? If so, how did Andreas Baader and another terrorist manage to get guns into the isolated, high-security cells where they were held in solitary confinement? How did Baader manage to shoot himself in the back of his head? Why were there no fingerprints on either of the guns? How was the sole survivor of that night able to stab herself in the chest four times? Is there evidence to support her allegation that the deaths were summary executions rather than suicides? Those and other questions about that night encapsulate the dramatic relationship between the state and violent non-conformists — a relationship that becomes more relevant with each new act of mass violence. A number of works in October 18, 1977 respond directly to the eponymous cycle of 15 paintings by Gerhard Richter which depict the dead terrorists and the prison where they died. The paintings are in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art (169.1995), far from the location of their creation and the events that inspired them. Other works in this exhibition directly address specific aspects of the deaths and their cultural setting: the psychological effects of prolonged solitary confinement, the aesthetics of mid-twentieth century German institutional architecture, and the era’s proliferation of ‘zine-like publications that openly expressed sympathy for terrorist organizations. Some works even go so far as to imagine alternative histories. Taken together, the works in the exhibition present a multifaceted examination of that confounding historical moment in the Germany of 1977 and its lingering cultural influence — an examination that’s especially relevant in New York City of 2013.
 
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For more information please contact: HYPERLINK “mailto:gassergrunertsummer@gmail.com” gassergrunert@gmail.com 646.944.6197 For press inquiries and images contact: Margaret Fasel HYPERLINK “mailto:margaret@gassergrunert.net” margaret@gassergrunert.net 816.289.2693

RICCO/MARESCA GALLERY is pleased to present Rebecca Norris Webb: My Dakota. This exhibition brings together works from Webb’s acclaimed book recounting the sudden loss of her brother through intimate landscape portraits of her home state of South Dakota. My Dakota serves as a lyrical elegy, depicting the hypnagogic process of grieving and visually chronicling the fragility of life and the inexplicable changes that occur while mourning.
 
Rebecca Norris-Webb moved to South Dakota at the age of 15. The artist originally found expression as a poet, before exploring photography after college. For Webb, language could not fully capture the totality of the world around her, nor satisfy her innate curiosity for visual exploration. The artist’s latest book, My Dakota, blends poetry with photographs of her home state as a multi-layered portrait that marries aesthetic representation with lyrical record. The heart of the book lies in the enigmatic photographs where the artist is seemingly searching for significance behind continuation and meaning beyond an emotional chasm. Reflections and windows play a significant role in the series as a way of capturing memory within the present while exuding a sense of abandonment and disconnect from life’s fleeting moments. Rooted in sentient exploration, each work is open to interpretation – giving viewers an outlet to draw their personal recollections and emotive conclusions.
 
My Dakota transcends artistic privy and instead maintains a core universal empathy. The artist states, “Looking back at My Dakota, I now realize that I was photographing this dark time in my life in order to try to absorb it, to crystallize it, and, ultimately, to let go of it. Not only did my first grief change me, but making My Dakota changed me as well, both as a human being and as an artist.”
 
My Dakota was first shown in 2012 at the Dahl Arts Center in Rapid City, South Dakota, and will be exhibited at the North Dakota Museum of Art in Grand Forks, North Dakota from June 5 - August 6, 2013. Friday, June 21: Lecture at Aperture Foundation, 547 W. 27th, 4th fl., 7:00-8:30 pm (with Alex Webb) and Q&A led by Sean Corcoran, Curator of Prints and Photographs, the Museum of the City of New York, and Denise Wolff, Aperture Senior Editor; book signing to follow; Saturday, June 22: Artist talk/walk through of “My Dakota” at Ricco/Maresca Gallery, 5-6pm.
 
REBECCA NORRIS WEBB, MY DAKOTA
June 20 - August 17, 2013
Opening reception Thursday, June 20, 6-8PM

For Immediate Release
 
Geoff Chadsey
Angela Dufresne
Vera Iliatova
Jake Longstreth
Marcial Ramos
Cynthia Talmadge & Kevin Zucker
Craig Taylor
Andrew Witkin
Alexi Worth
 
June 20 – July 26, 2013
Opening reception: Thursday, June 20, 6 - 8 PM
 
slap that cunt • autumn • failure • cars • fear • cages • ephemerality • shadows • chaos • duality • escape • violence • hotels • the subconscious vs. the self • breakage • cocaine • redemption • pornography • honesty • the periphery of society • Armani • not giving a shit • loneliness • transcendence • alcohol • grit • sex • killing • insomnia • glamour • aggression • morality • voyeurism • darkness • deceit • narcissism & superficiality=tools for avoiding intimacy • I’m dripping • anxiety • ego • let’s disappear • beauty • relief • night • anger • obsession • the road • prostitution • style • self-destruction • dreams • loneliness • starting over • trash • escape • light • perversion • a man alone in a room • sex is not about sex • guns • mood • Pandora’s box • disconnect • flesh • suicide • sacrifice • instability • decay • isolation • let’s fuck • redemption through violence • homosexuality • writing • Mercedes • alienation • mirrors • blood • taupe • guilt • vanity • revelation • defiance • depression • decadence • discovery • self-reflection • venetian blinds
 
"What fascinates me are people who want to be one thing but who behave in a way contradictory to that. Who might say, ‘I want to be happy, but I keep doing things that make me unhappy.” - Paul Schrader
 
- Katherine Kennedy and Monya Rowe, 2013
 
Curated by Monya Rowe Gallery
 
Katherine Kennedy is the singer for Autodrone and is currently studying Russian Language and Culture at Columbia University, New York.
 
Gallery summer hours
June: Tuesday – Saturday, 11- 6 PM
July: Tuesday – Friday, 11- 6 PM
August: Closed
 
For more information or images please contact the gallery at 212 255 5065 or info@monyarowegallery.com
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Marianne Boesky Gallery is pleased to present Sunsets and Pussy. This exhibition brings together two classic themes of summer wonder – so saccharine and ubiquitous we forget their awesome power. Spanning three generations, artists Ed Ruscha, Lucien Smith, Betty Tompkins, and Piotr Uklański each engage in the delight of exposing the clichéd beauty and banality inherent in these timeless images.
 
For further information regarding Sunsets and Pussy or images of the works, please contact Veronica Levitt at 212.680.9889 or veronica@marianneboeskygallery.com.

Mike Weiss Gallery is pleased to present a questionable low point in our program: Birth of a Legend, by nomadic artist Cameron Gray. Roberta Smith and Jerry Saltz claim that “Cameron Gray is too big too fail,” and Paddy Johnson of Art Fag City asked for “more cheddar” with her order of Cameron Gray. Gray’s latest exploit serves up a Dionysian smörgåsbord of state-of-the-art digital technology, where kaleidoscopically bright palettes and hypnotic kitsch run rampant. With your senses utterly titillated and suitably doped, you‘ll discover his artistic touch is as light as his work is raucous; speed of play carefully calibrated, execution satirically dead-pan, and content spot-on HOT. Straddling the line between comfort and the disquietingly uncanny, Gray’s gargantuan installations flash, blink, twirl, and pulsate off the walls in utter pandemonium, culling visual and auditory white noise from the vast Internet in something akin to a holy art apocalypse. As Gray descends into the deepest realms of the web world, we can only look on and marvel at the chaos that we have created.
 
Frequently likened to the second coming of Koons and thoroughly rooted within postmodern sensibilities, Gray is an incredibly articulate forager of the irreverent. In I Was Made For Dancin’, All, All, All Night Long, Gray achieves near tantric nirvana, emblazoning a glossy, hollowed Leif Garrett poster with psychedelic patterns and prismatic forms; two all-seeing eyes flicking every which way as he sluggishly sings the work’s eponymous and utterly cheeky song. Acid Zen Garden imbues a glowing cherub figure and assorted fauna with Gray’s unrivaled knack for mischief. Like-wise, in Ice Cream for John Wayne, a duo of melting waffle cone treats take residence upon John Wayne’s dreamy visage. Not content to simply tear the ‘mask’ off such iconic machismo, Cameron spatters many a surrounding wall with fluorescent, glow-in-the-dark paint—effectively taking on Abstract Expressionist bravado as well.
 
A shaman of digital technique and reprographic means, Gray sets forth an alternate universe rife with under-auto black lighting and over-the-top pop, instinctively splaying nonsensical sights and sounds across an ambitious range of mediums: video collages chock-full of outlandish abstractions, including an all-encompassing 12 foot wide work comprised of 27 monitors; an epic 7-foot-tall pin bricolage in which 3,000 photographic images abut embedded 3-D video, spinning disco-lights, and utterly unrelated bric-a-brac; manipulated c-prints of classic American icons; and circular, Archimboldo-like smiley-face sculptures in which fake food is adhered to densely-patterned, wood-mounted table-cloths, with fake plastic ‘turkey dinners’ forming the eyes of one piece, and a glazed faux Jell-O mold its nose. Simultaneously chaotic, organic, orgasmic, and narcotic, Gray delivers the Cadillac of collage, the epitome of hyper-stimulation, and the ultimate state of transcendence – a meaningless yet tantalizing void, where nothing is sacred. Indulge yourself this summer in this orgiastic, optical feast and celebrate with us the 10-year anniversary of Mike Weiss Gallery.
 
Cameron Gray, Birth of a Legend.
 
Born in Geneva in 1980, Cameron Gray lives and works in London, Basel, and Los Angeles. Graduating egregia cum laude from Bruce High Quality Foundation University, Gray also holds no less than six degrees from such prestigious institutions as Yale, Columbia, and UCLA. Prior to his ascension into the upper levels of the art historical pantheon, Gray will have participated in two Venice Biennales, including the one to take place in 2015, and three Whitney Biennials, including those in 2016 and 2018. In 2012, Galerie Eva Presenhuber included his work in the seminal show I Wanna F*ck You But We‘re Just Gonna Cuddle, and one of Gray’s massive pin collages was a show-stopping success in The Gag Reflex is Mysterious at the Santa Monica Museum of Art in 2011. Grey‘s work is included in the Ludwig-Forum für Internationale Kunst in Aachen, Germany; the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts in Kaohsiung, Taiwan; the Yale University Art Gallery in New Haven, CT; and 17 other prominent collections. Cameron Gray is currently represented by Mike Weiss Gallery, David Zwirner, Thaddaeus Ropac, Sprueth Magers, White Cube and Pace Beijing, amongst others.
 
Your mom loves Cameron Gray’s work. Ask her, she told us so.