Piero Golia "Suddenly, in the middle of the summer" @ Gagosian | Beverly Hills

Nero Marquino NAE Fruit Bowl, 2018

Nero marquino marble

4 15/16 x 10 5/8 x 11 inches

Intermission Lamp Prototype #8, 2015-2108

EPS Foam, hard coat, pigment, brass, light bulb, electrical wire and socket

Interesting that for the works on pedestals, they are paired in such a way between upright light and its supine counterpart in heavy/dark. Lights, mediums, and dark which may also lend itself to saying light and dark media or even light and heavy as issues of concrete mass more so than phenomena.  Whatever the case, the contrast in terms along a continuum between such differences (lights and not lights, verticals/horizontals, et al) is played with here as it pertains to domestic living, certainly no shortage of formal and functional balances ensue.  Instead of fruit bowls, I thought about Golia's pool project in Santa Barbara however many years ago; that was 2011 for Museum of Contemporary Art Santa Barbara's (nee Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum) "Home" show.  There are multiple posts here on dayoutlast. Unfortunately, none include Golia's swimming pool because it was unfinished at the time; from what I have gathered online, it is complete and usable. See images   below.

 Swimming, indeed a great summer pastime, this one is not so much about child's play or fitness laps but rather a continual, spiral stepping down and up, much like the back and forth between light and dark, horizontal and vertical, and possibly an allusion to the proportions of beauty, the golden ratio,  the inward and outward turning helix.  Certainly, a restlessness abounds, especially as summer heat reminds us of bright light and empty pools, or should I say fruit bowls?

Adam McEwen "Nighthorses" @ Gagosian | Beverly Hills

Down Elevator, 2016

Graphite

9 3/4 x 5 x 1/2 inches

Ed. of 5

Damien Hirst "The Veil Paintings" @ Gagosian | Beverly Hills

Veil of Perfect Harmony, 2017

Oil on canvas

120 x 90 inches

Veil of Faith, 2017

Oil on canvas

144 x 108 inches

Veil of Eternal Happiness, 2017

Oil on canvas

108 x 72 inches

Veil of Love Everlasting, 2017

Oil on canvas 120 x 90 inches

The confectionary aspect of this work is unmistakable and in line with other Hirst works, even diamond-encrusted skulls.  What I can’t figure out is what compels me to view these works or even consider them further. Perhaps it’s the train-wreck factor, which is to say it’s like a car wreck that one can’t top looking at, which leads me to Andy Warhol and then it starts to make sense as sensational, the easy fix of glitter or cake frosting.  That said, once digested, its sustainability is a short-lived thrill, again like a pop-tart, pop-art, pop-song. Typically this would lead to a desire for more (kind of like crack), but in the case of these paintings not so much.

What is worth considering is how colors interact spatially at what distance and how no amount of resolution will actually resolve such abstract conditions.  For a moment, I was going down the road of a Wayne Thiebaud gum ball painting before I started thinking more carefully about how these paintings situate within the larger context of painting history, generally, and, seemingly more importantly, Damien Hirst, specifically.  Throughout his career there have been moments of color understanding, let’s call it, where it seems like he’s throwing everything at the canvas or conversely organized (the same back and forth of Gerhard Richter in certain respects) in some kind of holistic attempt to understand infinitude (the sublime) and its alter or its extra.  Whatever the case, the body of works seems all over the place, questionable at best, especially in its return and lack of development beyond the early 90’s Visual Candy Series. See here. 

Twenty-plus years ago, I was curious about the formaldehyde sculptures a more direct confrontations with visages of time, slices of reality in a way that slices of cake could never.

Adriana Varejão "Interiors" @ Gagosian | Beverly Hills

Rome Meat Ruin, 2017

Oil on aluminum and polyurethane

100 3/16 x 18 1/8 x 10 1/4 inches

Fabricated ruin. Grid awareness with color variation in grout and tile. Color as surface or substance; continuous or variable, a matter of perspective and distance?

O obsessivo, 2004

Oil on canvas

110 1/4 x 88 9/16 inches

O illuminado, 2009

Oil on canvas

90 9/16 x 220 1/2 inches

Perspective. Geometry. Roman bath... blood bath.  

Labyrinth of unknowns. 

Green Sauna, 2003

Oil on canvas

76 3/4 x 114 3/16 inches

Reconciling curvilinear/rectilinear within image as well as work itself. 

Round corners of painting frame itself; columns. 

Darkness foregrounds interior light; value reveals depth. 

Flatness/depth in a Minecraft world. 

Cf. Analia Saban architectural interiors (also using bath/shower as subject). See here.

A diva, 2004

Oil on canvas

104 5/16 x 86 5/8 inches

Work that unfolds slowly over time with respect to spatial perception itself a function of light; internal light. Therefore, by extension when I stand before the work, whatever dimension it takes, I am in the dark/ness as viewer. 

The Guest, 2004

Oil on canvas

18 1/8 x 27 9/16 inches

An internal violence percolates and is most noticeable when inside uncontrollably becomes outside.

O mistico, 2005

Oil on canvas

35 7/16 x 28 3/8 inches

Painting the negative space (inverting the painting process to call attention to how the relationship between tangible surface and less tangible space are not so easy to perceive as it may seem within a continuous web). 

cf. Mondrian below

cf. John McCallister below. also here

Ruina de charque, 2001

Oil on wood and polyurethane

21 5/8 x 81 1/2 x 63 inches

Tile signifies refined process and order above an organic, meaty underneath. 

Interior space as both body and architectural layer.

Ruina de Charque - Nova Capela, 2003

Oil on wood and polyurethane

47 1/4 x 104 5/16 x 22 1/16 inches

Interior is either homogenous or heterogeneous, classical or Baroque, a continual movement between such poles, dependent on time and relative spatial position as it pertains to artwork and/or body of artworks.

Overall, I was less interested in these three wall works, the most recent ones in the show. Even though they seemed to make sense as a kind of evolution where interior space bursts forth in relief (a space between 2 and 3 dimensions), they come across as simultaneously decorative and regressive with respect to natural and pictorial space. An image of cracking seems clear enough in its referents of decay and decline within substance. Unfortunately, I keep thinking about the paintings of architectural interiors as well as really old oil paintings, especially the ones with so much surface cracking.

Blue Song - LA, 2017

Oil and plaster on canvas