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Marlon Munoz
Prof. Hugo Fernandez
Art in NY-195.1386
May 8, 2007
Essay Review#4: Museum Of Modern Art (M.O.M.A.): Jeff Wall and Comic Abstraction
The names of the two exhibitions were the Comic Abstraction and Jeff Wall.
It took place at the Museum Of Modern Art which is a preeminent art museum located in
Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It is regarded as the leading museum of modern art in the world. Its collection includes
works of architecture and design, drawings, painting and sculpture, photography, prints
and illustrated books, film, and media. In this occasion, in the first exhibition, Jeff Wall
showed us his large-scale back-lit CIBA chrome photographs and art-historical writing.
Many of these pictures are staged and refer to the history of art and philosophical
problems of representation. And, the second exhibition is called Comic Abstraction. In
which, in recent years a number of artists have transmuted the lexicon (glossary) of
comic strips and films, cartoons, and animation into a new, representational mode of
"comic abstraction" to address perplexing issues about war and global conflicts, the
legacy of September 11, and ethnic and cultural stereotyping. The way these two
exhibitions were designed make visitors’ eyes look everywhere because you can find art
even in the ceiling. For instance, at the entrance of Comic Abstraction you can see
Speech Bubbles 1997 by the French Philipe Parreno. Made by Mylar and helium, this
work of art rests in the ceiling. Moreover, in Jeff Wall’s exhibitions the way the
exhibition was design was pretty simple with large-scale photographs hanging on the wall
with little explanation about them.
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The major retrospective of the work of Canadian photographer Jeff Wall
brings together over fifty stunning works produced between the late 1970s and the
present day, providing an overview of his entire career. Wall has exhibited his
photographs internationally for the twenty-five years and is one of the most intriguing
and influential artists working today. He has also played a key role in establishing
photography as a contemporary art form. Jeff Wall was born in 1946 in Canada. Growing
up in Vancouver, British Columbia, Wall pursued his artistic talent with support from his
family. Yet, his decision to attend the University of British Columbia and not an art
school surprised his relatives. This would be only one decision that seemed out of
character for an artist. Wall earned a master's degree in art and continued his doctoral
education at the Court auld Institute in London. One of his large-scale photographs that
called my attention was Mimic ,it typifies Wall's cinematographic style. A 198 x 226 cm.
colour transparency, it shows a white couple and an Asian man walking towards the
camera. The sidewalk, flanked by parked cars and residential and light-industrial
buildings, suggests a North American industrial suburb. The woman is wearing red shorts
and a white top displaying her midriff; her bearded, unkempt boyfriend wears a denim
vest. The Asian man is casual but well-dressed in comparison, in a collared shirt and
slacks. As the couple overtakes the man, the boyfriend makes an ambiguous but
apparently obscene and racist gesture, holding his upraised middle finger close to the
corner of his eye, "slanting" his eye in mockery of the Asian man's eyes. The picture
resembles a candid shot that captures the moment and its implicit social tensions, but is
actually a recreation of an exchange witnessed by the artist.
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The Comic Abstraction exhibition brings together thirteen contemporary
artists whose works offer a rich account of the interplay between abstraction and comic
models of representation. From Sunday newspaper “funnies” to Walt Disney’s cartoon
shorts, the appropriation of comics by artists has offered a bridge between the lowbrow
“stuff” that populates visual culture and rarified brands of fine art. In the United States
and Europe comics have stood at the nexus of the high low debate, while in Japan manga
and anime have never been differentiated from art. While many exhibitions have
explored the impact of mass culture contemporary art, they have generally focused on
figuration and easily identifiable pop characters and themes. This exhibition approaches
the topic from a different angle. It looks at the way artist, particularly those working in
the last fifteen years, have used images culled from slapstick, comic strips, film,
caricature, cartoons, and animation as springboards for abstraction, not to withdraw from
reality, but to address perplexing questions about war and global conflicts, the loss of
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innocence, and racial stereotyping. For instance, Speech Bubbles by Philippe Parreno
which were made with Mylar and helium..
This piece of art carries a political undertone. The work was originally conceived by the
Confederation Generale du Travail (French Union Association) to serve as a tool for
organized protest during the union strike. It allowed individuals to “mark their own
demand,”
Both of the exhibitions Comic Abstraction and Jeff Wall have shown people
that there are many forms of art to express your self. In other words, every artist who
took part in the exhibitions deserved credit for their work because it is a pacific and
unique way to protest and express suggestions.