previews May 1997

Apocalyptic Wallpaper

Back in 1952, when Harold Rosenberg wanted to dish spurious examples of Action painting, he called them “apocalyptic wallpaper.” But a number of nineteenth-century writers saw something more than just decorative in the domestic patterns covering Victorian interiors. Apparently so do some artists, whose maddening, unsettling, repetitive designs paper the walls of the Wexner this summer. Curated by the Wexner’s Donna De Salvo and Annetta Massie, “Apocalyptic Wallpaper” features Robert Gober’s spatially disorienting Forest covering, Virgil Marti’s fluorescent Bullies prints, patterns of derriere

previews May 1997

Shiro Kuramata, 1934-1991

For Japanese designer Shiro Kuramata, functionalism was an ideology to be overturned, gravity a force to be overcome (or at least outsmarted), and light an element to be captured. What emerges from his idiosyncratic design philosophy is a perversely pleasurable, if not particularly tactile purism—doors rarely hindered by handles, glass and steel-mesh chairs that only begrudgingly acknowledge the ground, and colored acrylic blocks that seem to glow from within. Organized by Tokyo’s Hara Museum around designer Ettore Sottsass’ thematic schema, this first major retrospective features some forty

previews May 1997

Scene of the Crime

What began as a survey of West Coast art since 1960 has become, in the hands of curator Ralph Rugoff, “The Scene of the Crime.” Premised on Henri Michaux’s notion that the artist is “the one who, with all his might, resists the fundamental drive not to leave traces,” the exhibition asks visitors to play detective, criminal, victim, and bystander. Bringing together a planned seventy-five works by a slated thirty-six California-based artists, from John Divola’s ’70s Forced Entry Site photographs to Uta Barth’s recent “Blow up” series, “Scene of the Crime” is accompanied by a catalogue including

previews May 1997

The Architecture of Reassurance: Designing the Disney Theme Parks

For purist architects and cultural critics alike, Disney theme parks embody every abhorrent architectural tendency in American consumer society. Rather than rehearse this now-familiar lamentation, “The Architecture of Reassurance” suspends judgment, replicating Disneyland’s “hub and wienie” plan—plazas leading to a signature vertical landmark—in the galleries of the Canadian Centre for Architecture. Curated by cultural historian Karal Ann Marling, the show traces the evolution of “imagineering” from the original Disneyland in Anaheim to far-flung colonies in Marne-la-Vallée and Tokyo. June

previews May 1997

Tschumi:Projects in/of Motion

Though best known for the bright red folies that punctuate the Parc de la Villette in Paris, architect Bernard Tschumi is no one-hit wonder. This major exhibition finds Tschumi once again championing the architecture of the event, but now the event has moved indoors. Tschumi’s in-progress work like the Ecole d’Architecture in Marne-la-Valleé, France, and the Columbia University Student Center makes for a seductive presentation—state-of-the-art computer images accompanied by the architect’s hand-scrawled harangues. Most striking, however, is the Studio National des Art Contemporain in Le Fresnoy,

print February 1997

“Viewing Olmsted”

Why do we equate images of open space with democratic ideals? And what role has Frederick Law Olmsted, the extraordinarily prolific nineteenth-century landscape architect who carved green spaces in the middle of so many North American cities, played in the construction of this visual fantasy? Though not explicitly articulated, these questions haunt the Canadian Centre for Architecture’s exhibition “Viewing Olmsted: Photographs by Robert Burley, Lee Friedlander, and Geoffrey James.” Mounted on the 100th anniversary of Olmsted’s retirement, as if to test his prediction that it would take his parks

print February 1997

“Landscape Reclaimed”

“Landscape Reclaimed,” a consistently smart show comprising the responses of twenty conceptual artists to “landscape” and curated by Harry Philbrick, took full advantage of its site: a museum surrounded by aging, underappreciated Minimalist sculpture and sweeping suburban lawns generously punctuated with Dole/Kemp signs—in short, a site just waiting for Komar & Melamid to stage a local version of their America’s Most Wanted, 1994–. And that’s just what happened. Of the twenty artists represented in this show, it was the Soviet-born duo that engaged the community most directly with their sublimely

previews January 1997

Arakawa/Gins: The Mechanism of Meaning in Reversible Destiny Architecture

Back in the ’80s, when Magritte and Merleau—Ponty collided on their canvases, Shusaku Arakawa and Madeline Gins called themselves artists. Nowadays, they call themselves architects but refer to their “reversible destiny architecture” as “landing sites” for bodies weary of laws of perspective and gravity. Nine such projects—improbable spaces, imaginary gardens, self—interrogating constructions—are on display at the GUGGENHEIM MUSEUM SOHO. Curated by Michael Govan, director of the Dia Center for the Arts, this first extensive presentation of Arakawa/Gins’

previews January 1997

“No Place (Like Home)”

As national identities linger despite the pposed end of the nation-state and personal geographies grow more complexly placeless, the WALKER exhibits multimedia work, some commissioned for this show, by eight international rtists that reconsiders the notion of “home.” Organized by chief curator Richard Flood, with pieces ranging from Nick Deocampo’s grainy films and videos of abandoned army bases and ramped squats in the Philippines to Kay Hassan’s Technicolor found-poster ollages that equate the transience of the printed image and South Africa’s owing refugee population,

previews January 1997

“Icons: Magnets of Meaning”

Lipstick, Minicam, Kitchenaid, compound words specific to consumer society (okay, lipstick predates it a bit), are elevated to the status of “Icons” at SFMoMA. The appeal of the twelve featured objet types (from blue jeans, surfboards, and BMWs to the CBS Eye and the place-marking “@” of the Internet) goes beyond promises of total knowledge, speedy transcendence, and a fabulous ass. “By taking such icons out of context and looking at them purely as forms,” explains Aaron Betsky, curator of Architecture and Design at SFMoMA, “we begin to understand how they can become anchors in a world of sprawl.”

print January 1997

“NY NY: City of Ambition”

Someone forgot to tell the curators that this exhibition’s subject was twentieth-century New York, not Belle Époque Paris, and that it was to be installed at the Whitney Museum, not the New York Historical Society. The city of ambition never looked so cute. Ultimately, I’m not sure what’s more embarrassing: “NY NY: City of Ambition” or the critics who ooohed and aaahed over its daring juxtaposition of painting and photography. For me, that juxtaposition was the only redeeming aspect—not for the works themselves but for raising the important question of which cultural medium is privileged

print December 1996

Architecture

With a few exceptions, 1996 will not go down as a particularly good year for noteworthy new buildings. A glance around New York City would seem to suggest that great facades are things of the past. From the showrooms of Versace, Diesel, and Calvin Klein to the translucent peekaboo shower stalls at nearly every gymnasium, architecture seems increasingly to be an indoor sport, but one worth playing. In the art world, architecture and its attendant modes of representation materialize in the gallery—and, with seemingly greater frequency, break out of its white walls altogether. Think of Andrea

Ernest Pascucci