The Junior Varsity
Vol. 1
Fall, 2011
Joshua Abelow
Joshua Abelow has relocated the majority of his paintings from his mother’s house
in Frederick, Maryland to a dingy, yet charming basement studio near the Bedford Avenue
L train stop in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Williamsburg. With paintings organized in
a series of rows, his studio resembles less the romantic atelier of an artist’s studio and
more the backroom to an emporium of abstract art. Claiming to have already documented
over nine hundred works, Abelow delineates this is only the tip of the iceberg. “We haven’t
begun to document most of the drawings,” he says, as he points to a back table piled high
with flat files containing compositions spanning the last ten years of his creative output.
While most of the paintings exhibit modernist idioms such as geometrical shapes
and dull colors, others are layered with biomorphic designs, figural drawings, jocular
phrases, and occasionally the artist’s cell phone number. Initially appearing to be a few
compositions reproduced ad nauseum, with further examination one can see that each
painting in his multitudinous body of work is unique - for every design a color pattern is not
repeated, every quip, a new background. How these paintings came to be is anything but
fortuitous - Abelow has punctiliously recorded every pattern, motif, symbol and axiom in
several notebooks as if every adage was a single character in his own language. He has
collected every technique he has used to make a painting and systematically applied them
to specific algorithms thus creating an expansive oeuvre. The end result is the construction
of a prolific body of work that Abelow has at his disposal to create a new conversation in
every exhibition.
Self Portrait, 2011, oil on linen, 12” x 9”, and Self-Portrait, 2010, oil on linen. 16” x 12”
Untitled (Abstraction “FW”), 2010, oil on burlap. 24” x 18” and Untitled (Abstraction “FV”), 2010, oil on burlap, 24” x 18”
Paintings in progress
What extemporaneously attracts a viewer to
Michaux, Jacques Lacan, Gilles Deleuze and Félix
Abelow’s work is its modernist appeal. Borrowing
Guattari were parallel to inquiries of the crisis of
design techniques from Bauhaus and De Stijl,
faciality by artists like Dubuffet. For example, where
these early motifs of avant-garde
Deleuze and Guattari saw the
aesthetics provide the backdrop
face as something that united the
for almost all of his paintings.
intrinsic self with the chaos of the
Abelow notes that this inclination
outside world, Dubuffet’s portraits
to 20th century aesthetics can
performed as effigies to reality 2.
partially be the influence from
Both theories are alike in that the
his grandmother, Paula Brunner
face serves as a bridge between
Abelow, an artist from Prague who
an external multiplicity and the
studied at Cooper Union. Ignorant
perennial, internal psyche. By
to her work, one can assume that
combining tropes of both design
she must have engaged in similar
and figure in his paintings, Abelow
dialogues with modernist titans
exhibits this idea by giving
such as Henri Matisse, Paul Klee,
countenance to 20th century
and the artists associated with
design thus communicating the
Art Brut all who are echoed in
history of modernist motifs to
Abelow’s art. For instance, the
contemporary audiences.
Fanrasue,
Jean
Dubuffet,
1952,
oil
childlike allure of his figural works
and sand on canvas
suggests the same feral authenticity
Abelow’s exploration of
sought by Jean Dubuffet. Not only
modernist art is not limited to his
do both share a keen sense of
paintings; his flowing graphite
puerile beauty, Dubuffet’s effort to
drawings are analogous to similar
challenge institutionalized notions
pieces done by Matisse, who both
of elegance by mixing paints with
share an affinity for the mellifluous
sand – a technique he entitled haute
line. Often times these drawings by
1
pâté - are echoed by Abelow’s
Abelow are done without removing
the pencil from the surface of
portraits painted on stretched
the paper until the composition
burlap. Furthermore, like Dubuffet
is complete. Also constant is the
and additional modernist artists, one
portrayal of the artist himself,
of the most reoccurent themes in
characterized by a long nose and
Abelow’s work is the face.
wool cap often times in less than
amiable situations. Although not as
This affinity toward
dark and as Phillip Guston’s own
physiognomy and modernist
satire of the artist (which he once
aesthetics should not come as
Self-Portrait, Joshua Abelow, 2009.
depicted as a masochist flagellating
a surprise to anyone, as Daniel
oil on burlap 12” x 9”
himself), Abelow’s portraits are akin
Marcus outlines: “the story of
to the humility constant within a
modernist painting could be written
prepubescent boy’s paranoia. Naked, painting, or
as a story of the face – beginning with Manet’s
penetrating a young Giorgio Di Chirico’s mouth with
Olympia and ending in crisis, with Jackson Pollock’s
this nose, Abelow’s illustrations of the artist reflect a
Eyes in the Heat”. Marcus’s 2011 essay details how
cynicism toward the creative process omnipresent in
investigations of physiognomy by writers like Henri
seasoned artists.
1 In English translates to “Matter Painting”, refers
to raised, relief-like style of painting. Jean Fautrier along with
Dubuffet used this technique along with others associated with
the Post-War French informel artists.
2
Marcus, Daniel. “Eyes in the Heat: Jean Dubuffet,
Cathy Wilkes, Josh Smith.” Art Forum, June 2011.
While aesthetic comparisons to Dubuffet, Matisse and others are
inevitable; Abelow’s conceptualization of these pieces brings him in dialogue with later conceptual artists like Sol Lewitt. If one were to compare
the notebooks of Abelow and Lewitt it would become apparent how parallel each artist’s work process is. Both carefully plan out several works
before any physical transformation occurs. Whereas Abelow will write
down in his sketchbook instructions on how each painting is created, Lewitt’s approach is far more mathematical. For example, Lewitt fastidiously
cataloged all sketches for his proposed series Incomplete Open Cubes
from raw approximations to calculated grids ensuring that no shape reoccurred, reflecting his belief that “the idea becomes a machine that makes
art.”1 It was this methodology toward art making that led critics in the seventies to investigate Lewitt’s scrutiny of rationalization. While most writers
of the time such as Lucy Lippard and Donald Kuspit championed Lewitt
as someone who rationally attempted to find universality in art, Rosalind
Krauss was opposed to this observation. In her essay “Lewitt in Progress”
she writes that the multiple explorations he takes into finding new forms is
the opposite of logical thought and in fact the rationality that others championed him for is found not in multiples but “with only the first two or three
terms.” She claims that his artwork portrays an “absurdist nominalism”
that manifests that there are no “universal truths or transcendental ideas”,
in other words Lewitt is reversing the nominal process by creating multiples to be categorized by a single idea. To emphasize her argument she
alludes to Molloy, a text by Samuel Beckett where the protagonist labors
through an irrational process of sucking stones. 2 This “absurdist nominalism” she labels Lewitt with can be applied to Abelow as well, who like
Lewitt would rather physically create the infinite variables possible with
each work rather than allude to the concept’s enormity. Abelow’s notebooks behave in the same matter as Lewitt’s – refraining from a proliferation of pictorial references, almost all works are outlined with instructions
on how to create them. Abelow has given instructions for proper mixtures
of paint along with descriptions of shapes and designs to fabricate his
entire oeuvre from a rubric alone without graphic assistance. This captious
note taking repeals conceptual allegories to Dubuffet’s feral approach and
rather echoes the late 19th century artist and theorist Maurice Denis’ postulation “that a picture, before being a battle horse, a nude, an anecdote
or whatnot, is essentially a flat surface covered with colors assembled in a
certain order.”
1 Baume, Nicholas. Sol Lewitt: Incomplete Open Cubes. (Hartford, CT: Wadsworth
Aleneum Museum of Art, 2001), 35.
2 Krauss, Rosalind. “Lewitt in Progress.” October. 6. (1978): 46-60.
FROM
MOLLOY
BY
SAMUEL
BECKETT
(SUCKING
STONES
EXCERPT)
I
took
advantage
of
being
at
the
seaside
to
lay
in
a
store
of
sucking-stones.
They
were
pebbles
but
I
call
them
stones.
Yes,
on
this
occasion
I
laid
in
a
considerable
store.
I
distributed
them
equally
between
my
four
pockets,
and
sucked
them
turn
and
turn
about.
This
raised
a
problem
which
I
first
solved
in
the
following
way.
I
had
say
sixteen
stones,
four
in
each
of
my
four
pockets
these
being
the
two
pockets
of
my
trousers
and
the
two
pockets
of
my
greatcoat.
Taking
a
stone
from
the
right
pocket
of
my
greatcoat,
and
putting
it
in
my
mouth,
I
replaced
it
in
the
right
pocket
of
my
greatcoat
by
a
stone
from
the
right
pocket
of
my
trousers,
which
I
replaced
by
a
stone
from
the
left
pocket
of
my
trousers,
which
I
replaced
by
a
stone
from
the
left
pocket
of
my
greatcoat,
which
I
replaced
by
the
stone
which
was
in
my
mouth,
as
soon
as
I
had
finished
sucking
it.
Thus
there
were
still
four
stones
in
each
of
my
four
pockets,
but
not
quite
the
same
stones.
And
when
the
desire
to
greatcoat,
certain
of
not
taking
the
same
stone
as
the
last
time.
And
while
I
sucked
it
I
rearranged
the
other
stones
in
the
way
I
have
just
described.
And
so
on.
But
this
solution
did
not
satisfy
me
fully.
For
it
did
not
escape
me
that,
by
an
extraordinary
hazard,
the
four
stones
circulating
thus
might
always
be
the
same
four.
In
which
case,
far
from
sucking
the
sixteen
stones
turn
and
turn
about,
I
was
really
only
sucking
four,
always
the
same,
turn
and
turn
about.
But
I
shuffled
them
well
in
my
pockets,
before
I
began
to
suck,
and
again,
while
I
sucked,
before
transferring
them,
in
the
hope
of
obtaining
a
more
general
circulation
of
the
stones
from
pocket
to
pocket.
But
this
was
only
a
makeshift
that
could
not
long
content
a
man
like
me.
So
I
began
to
look
for
something
else
...
I might do better to transfer the stones four by four, instead of one
by one, that is to say, during the sucking, to take the three stones remaining
in the right pocket of my greatcoat and replace them by the four in the
right pocket of my trousers , and these by the four in the left pocket
of my trousers, and these by the four in the left pocket of my greatcoat,
and finally these by the three from the right pocket of my greatcoat,
plus the one, as soon as I had finished sucking it, which was in my mouth.
Yes, it seemed to me at first that by so doing I would arrive at a better
result. But onfurther reflection I had to change my mind and confess that
the circulation of the stones four by four came to exactly the same thing
as their circulation one by one. For if I was certain of finding each
time, in the right pocket of my greatcoat, four stones totally different
from
their
immediate
predecessors,
the
possibility
nevertheless
remained
of my always chancing on the same stone, within each group of four, and
consequently of my sucking, not the sixteen turn and turn about as I wished,
but in fact four only, always the same, turn and turn about...................................
elswhere
than
in
the
mode
of
circulation.
For
no
matter
how
I
caused the stones to circulate, I always ran the same risk. It was obvious
that by increasing the number of my pockets I was bound to increase my
chances of enjoying my stones in the way I planned, that is to say one
after the other until their number was exhausted. Had I had eight pockets,
Abelow’s production level undoubtedly brings him in conversation
with painter Josh Smith. Smith caught the art world’s attention with his
first solo show in 2003 at the Galerie Catherine Bastide in Brussels, which
showcased the innumerable identities of painting by generating scores of
compositions unremittingly. Although using a language of painting assumed to be investigated at length, Smith’s reprocess of Abstract expressionism ventures beyond former scrutiny of the subject1. By creating a
profusion of non-pictorial canvases he destroys the aura of the singular
plastic art object. “I didn’t want [the paintings] to be perceived as silly and
romantic the way that painting sometimes can be” Smith says, “I wanted
to make sure that regardless of what the ideas in the paintings were, they
were presented in a straightforward and worthwhile way”2. The manifestation of a copious amount of paintings in a single gallery, all painted within
a few months of each other, occasionally hung in a grid and with dispassionate titles did precisely this – present the viewer in the exhibition the
very idea of painting, it’s epithet as a trope of the artistic process, without
the redundant talismanic perversion of many works of art.
Whereas Smith creates an endless body of work to destroy the
aura of painting, Abelow wishes to prolong a painting’s emanation, albeit
with the same expansive volume of compositions. This is partially through
his process, which as said before he documents closely. In opposition to
Josh Smith who viscerally responds to a canvas without prior inclination to
what will occur when he paints, Abelow has calculated specifically what
the painting will look like before he touches brush to canvas. Furthermore,
where Smith will write his name on a canvas to showcase both ownership
and style in his work, Abelow often times paints his cell phone number on
images – an invitation to interact with the viewer directly instead of through
the semantics of art making. In this way Abelow wishes to cross the bridge
between artist and viewer much more willingly than Smith who cleverly
disguises himself through a schema of multiplicity.
1 Gerhard Richter’s systematically produced non-referential paintings of the
seventies and eighties were some of the first to critique Abstract expressionism’s credos
of automatism and existentialism. Richter used homemade squeegee’s to rub large bands
of paint applied to the canvas and through his melodic, structural process he was able to
create palettes which referenced both Abstract expressionism and landscape painting – a
reactionary aesthete towards Greenbergian notions of intrinsic compositions. Smith applies
the same evaluation of mid-century fetishization of the painting by producing numerous
works that utilize the aesthetics of Abstract expressionism.
2 Josh Smith, introduction to the catalogue, Josh Smith: Abstraction (New York
and Berlin: Luhring Augustine Gallery and Holzwarth Publications, 2007), unpaginated (in 3
Volumes)
Exhibition view of “84 Paintings” at Wilkinson Gallery in 2009.
Fiona Mackay, Morag Keil and Manuela Gernedel
The idea of painter as maker of multiples is an idea ingrained
within the conscious of many contemporary artists. Besides Smith and
Abelow a notable example is “84 Paintings” an exhibition at Wilkinson Gallery in London where artists Fiona Mackay (b.1984 Scotland),
Morag Keil (b.1985 Scotland), and Manuela Gernedel (b.1982 Austria) exhibited paintings produced in late 2009. As the press release
explains; “no emphasis was put on the project to produce a final event
or exhibition, the conclusion would inevitably be 84 works”, the three
artists showcased the titular amount of paintings leaning against the
walls of the gallery, all of which were produced in a two-week period. Why then is there a trend in contemporary art making to make a
manifold amount of paintings without a seeming passionate regard to
the fetishization of the original, revered work of art? Is it a reflection on
the multifarious images that proliferate our age of information? Or is it
like Smith – to emphasize painting’s tropes while destroying its aura?
Perhaps it’s like Lewitt – to portray the multifarious creations that can
be manifested from a single idea. Unlike the artists exhibited at the
Wilkinson Gallery and Josh Smith who all appear to be in a race to
create the most extensive output, Abelow’s work tends to be an investigation to find individuality within multiplicity.
Joshua Abelow is an artist based in New York City. He
is currently represented by James Fuentes Gallery and runs the
exhibition space ART BLOG ART BLOG.
http://www.jamesfuentes.com/
http://joshuaabelow.com/
http://joshuaabelow.blogspot.com/
This essay was written by James Michael Shaeffer, curator
based in Richmond, Virginia. He also helps run the art space
REFERENCE Art Gallery
http://www.jamesmichaelshaeffer.com
http://www.referenceartgallery.com
http://thejuniorvarsity.tumblr.com