With a view toward a beneficent yet up-to-the-minute public image, the corporate communications firm Global Consulting Group is hosting a contemporary art show in its Financial District digs. New York artist/curator Matt Keegan rounded up the thirty-odd contributors, most near the beginning of their careers. Some take gentle nips at the hand that feeds them; others inject playfulness into the buttoned-down environment. Martha Friedman has installed a pyramid of hyperrealist polyurethane-foam cantaloupes on a conference-room table; across the hall, artist-in-residence Pia Lindman meets with staff members to construct a gestural vocabulary of the workplace, from “boo-yeahs” to the finger-pointings that mean “I’m on the phone.” A video captures her end of the exchanges, and minimal drawings of the gestures line the walls. Employees love Rachel Foullon’s redecoration of the break room for its warm brown color scheme and mellow lighting (and are unfazed by her oblique allusions to the Donner Party). Other works include a melancholic digital piece by Paul Ramirez Jonas and a similarly keyed video by Alex Villar; online projects; and an “art resource cubicle.” Daniel Bozhkov’s stained-glass citrus tree on a southerly window casts gorgeous yellow, green, and orange glows in the afternoons: In an office context, such sensual appeal practically constitutes a critique.
