Imagine the worst Howard Hodgkin painting come to life in a horrible nightmare hijacking your very existence: covering walls, floors, utensils, and everything else in sight. Such is the impact of the recent exhibition of Lucas Samaras at PaceWildenstein gallery. According to the press release there were more than 700 discrete pieces that made up this encrusted paint-laden sensory assault with prices ranging from $4,000 for notebook sized paintings on paper to $75,000 for large canvases appropriately entitled “Wounds”. The catalogue that accompanied the show was a 27-page poem by the artist, written in the form of a laundry list in a single column of words that proved elucidating to the abortion at hand (“I thought of things evicted from the womb” says the artist). Samaras brazenly boasted that his strokes of paint were “more complex than Pollack’s mesh” and in comparing himself to Picasso stated: “his brilliance resides not in his brush mark which is quite pedestrian.” “A single sale of recent work would redesign the pain threshold” said Samaras, but viewing the primary colors smeared over paper, canvas, and everyday objects without more artistry or finesse the pain was only ours, and it was far from sporadic. Perhaps an excuse for such lack of imagination in work that smacked of art school tendencies resided in the revealing comment: “Stoli (as in the vodka) opens the door to a pleasant reverie”. That was enough to create teetotalers of us all. The unintended comedy continued with Samaras declaring “Other annoyances are awaiting my pluck.” He sure wasn’t kidding. And, in a scenario one can only imagine as Pace owners descended upon the studio that must have appeared like a nuclear explosion in a toy factory, “The Pace group was discomfited, unwittingly displaying Gucci gears of diplomacy in traction.” But the bewilderment at a show weighted down by such an abundance of mediocrity was not lost on Samaras as signs of self-doubt manifested itself but not enough to cause him to prune the overripe fruits of his harvest. “A friend’s mother said, why do you do such stuff. Civilians as well as experts can rain on my parade.” As was evident from the downpour that was his show, such criticism did not dampen his own enthusiasm for displaying such a mother lode of painted matter. But, Samaras’ reasoning for the onslaught was unassailable: “Where will I put all the stuff I’ve done?”
UPTICKS: GOOD BAD PAINTING
Picasso said anyone can learn to paint but it takes a lifetime to learn to paint like a child. Dubuffet, Twombly, Guston, Basquiat and Baechler all evince a major strand of contemporary painting that captures something of the essence of the bright-eyed exuberance of childhood that at first blush could look likeSwell, crap. Not to say that such vein of painting doesn’t have a dark foreboding side to it, rather the formal and compositional elements look as if rendered without connection to standard notions of quality or competence. Twombly blackboard scribbles have sold for 5 – 6 million dollars; Guston’s cartoonish hooded characters in the millions; Basquiat’s have breached $2 million; and, Baechler has an auction record of $149,000. Somebody is ascribing value to the renderings of these painters that can’t seem to paint. A new breed of artistry-impaired artists is emerging and the support is flourishing. Take Chris Johanon for example, who makes drawings, paintings and installations with rudimentary crafted cars, freeways, and buildings that look like the work of an intoxicated Julien Opie. From the mid 90’s to now, the 34 year old artist has frequently exhibited in New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Chicago in a variety of modest galleries on his way to the Whitney Biennial and Jeffrey Deitch Gallery as his primary dealer. The prices for colored starburst paintings which are actually no more than a series of narrow blobs emanating from a central point on a canvas or board range from $2,000 – $6,000. Johanson’s works have a pleasant optical sensibility that is refreshing and optimistic in these tense times we find ourselves in post 9/11.
Thirty-four year old British artist Paul Housley recently had a travelling exhibit throughout various UK institutions and is presently showing at Nylon gallery in London, where he has had two one-person shows to date. Though he is without a New York venue, surely it won’t be long. Subject matter ranges form one-eyed cats, to gym bags, planes and portraits all done in a jewel-like fashion (always small in scale in lacquered in finish) that remains enticing and seductive despite the awkwardness of his interpretation, prices range from $1,500 to $5,000. Joe Bradley is a newcomer showing regularly only in Boston at Allston Skirt Gallery for the time being, who despite the rapidity of his touch has a wonderful deftness to his composition. An untitled painting of a mountainside with wisps of green for trees and flashes of blue depicting depth, captures the scene so well and forthrightly you feel a chill though it appears to have been completed between sips of a single coffee. Another painting that proves that less is more, which is not usually associated with this brand of sloppy art making, entitled “Natural Scene”, looks like a Monet water lily that accidentally got washed by a cleaning person. The problem when he is less successful is that the paintings look as though they were used to clean his brushes! The prices for Bradley who’s paintings are no bigger than 3′ x 4′ top out at only $1,000 a veritable steal.
Brendan Cass who has showed with Noirhomme in Brussels and in exhibitions in New York is the king of the bad painters: when he hits his mark he is truly on to something and when he misses, the fall is precipitous. Cass uses paint almost like a sculptural element pouring gallons and gallons onto the surface forming almost a relief-like structure in the process. There are shards of recognizable imagery scattered about abstract compositions, the colors have gone from muted to day-glo, and the support from canvas to glass and mirror. Bits of text are often incorporated, but are often indecipherable, the import of which is known only to the artist. Most spot on of late are cityscapes composed of simple block buildings with dabs of paint for windows which have added gravity in light of the tenuous nature these buildings now seem to possess in New York at the moment. Prices of Cass’ paintings range from $2,000 to $7,500.