Performa Playbill: Ragnar Kjartansson

I anticipated sitting through no more than a half-hour of Ragnar Kjartansson's 12-hour Mozart marathon, Bliss, a Performa 11 commission presented at New York's Abrons Arts Center on Saturday, Nov. 19. Kjartansson is a fascinating artist, but as described by the advance press material, "Bliss" sounded like a nightmare. The production is a full staging (including sets and costumes) of Mozart's 1786 opera The Marriage of Figaro, but cast and orchestra continuously repeat from noon until midnight a less than three-minute excerpt from an aria in the opera's final scene. Audience members were invited to come and go as they pleased.
 Read More

Finding His Frame: Q+A With Howard Hodgkin

The London-born painter Howard Hodgkin turns 80 next year, and in spite of rather delicate health continues to dazzle and provoke audiences in equal measure. A spirited and colorful mix of show-stoppers and head-scratchers fills his current exhibition of 21 recent paintings at Gagosian's Madison Avenue gallery in New York, through Dec. 23]. There's classic Hodgkin, such as the intimate and moody Dark Evening (2011), with a centralized image that suggests a nighttime seascape, overpainted with more or less evenly spaced circular daubs of blue and white. Works like this could be counted among the best of Hodgkin's long career. Then there are some surprising, experimental efforts, including the spare And the Skies Are Not Cloudy All Day (2007–08), which, at nearly 7 by 9 feet, is one of the largest Hodgkin has produced. In Action Painting fashion, the expanse of bare wood is interrupted here only by feverishly applied green brushstrokes clustered near the top of the composition. The motion of the artist's body is evident, and the work thereby conveys his presence.
 Read More

Flesh for Fantasy: Pedro Almodovar's The Skin I Live In

Billy Idol's 1984 hit "Flesh for Fantasy" crept into my mind at one point during a screening of the new Pedro Almodóvar film, The Skin I Live In. Both song and movie are pop confections with S & M overtones. The Spanish director's film, however, is a forceful combination of suspense yarn and bondage fantasy, with a number of white-knuckle sequences and a few truly harrowing moments. Those expecting a typical Almodóvar story—humorous plot and cheeky characters—are in for a surprise. The psychosexual thriller is a steely homage to Alfred Hitchcock (especially in his Vertigo days) and auteurs of more gruesome fare, like Brian de Palma (Carrie) and Jonathan Demme (The Silence of the Lambs). Almodóvar's distinctive mark emerges in the particularly Almodóvarian way the twisted, gender-bending story and well-defined characters evolve.
 Read More

Park Avenue Cascades: Q+A With Bryan Hunt

Sculptor Bryan Hunt made a splash in the art world of the late 1970s and early '80s, with his bold "airships," sleek, dirigible-shaped constructions in wood and metal that jut out from the wall or floor. At the time, they seemed a wry comment on Minimalist sculpture, and put a fresh spin on the sleek modernist forms of Arp and Brancusi. Not long after, the Indiana-born artist confounded some critics, but gained new admirers, when he introduced a series of highly textured and impossibly fluid waterfalls rendered in bronze.

Over the years, Hunt has continued to explore and refine his work in both of these series. In 2006, New York City's Department of Parks & Recreation installed a 21-foot-tall "airship," at Coenties Slip Park in Lower Manhattan. Following the success of that work, the same organization, in collaboration with the Fund for Park Avenue Sculpture Committee, invited Hunt to present an exhibition of 10 monumental outdoor sculptures this fall along the Park Avenue mall, between 51 Street and 59 Street. With works from 1977 to 2006, the show constitutes a retrospective of the artist's "waterfalls" series. Illuminated at night, the exhibition is free and open to the public through November.
 Read More