Hugh Kretschmer

Untitled, Smoking, Hair, Photograph, Color, Smoke, Figurative, Photography

2015

LETTER O by Christian Stoll large scale conceptual photography playing with viewer's perspective incredible details in this body of work, a series of environmental stills playing w...

LETTER H by Christian Stoll large scale conceptual photography playing with viewer's perspective incredible details in this body of work, a series of environmental stills playing w...

Rimma Gerlovina and Valeriy Gerlovin Clock, 1987-94 Aluminum sculpture, mixed media and c-print photograph construction, c-print, felt tip marker 13 h × 13 w × 4 d in (30 × 30 × 6 cm) Rimma Gerlovina and Valeriy Gerlovin were founding members of the underground conceptual movement Samizdat in the Soviet Union, described in their book Russian Samizdat Art. Based on a play of paradoxes, their work is rich with philosophic and mythological implications, reflected in their writing as well. Their book Concepts was published in Russia in 2012. The work by Rimma Gerlovina and Valeriy Gerlovin is emphatically contemporary. The artist couple were part of the Moscow Conceptualists, their performance Costumes, from 1977, deepened their ongoing work with linguistic semiotic systems and their own bodies. Considering the context in which Gerlovina and Gerlovin made their work—that of political restrictions on public life, of unfreedom, and censorship—their collaborative togetherness must also be read as a space of possibility for political community and resistance. Rimma Gerlovina’s hair is featured prominently in the art of the Gerlovins as a constructing element of the body. Used for the linear drawings her braids transmit transpersonal waves reminiscent of an aura of live filaments. Long loose hairs function as threads of life; streaming in abundance, they allude to Aphrodisiac vitality and Samsonian strength. On the other hand, they are the haircloth worn during mourning and penitence. In New York they continued to make sculptural objects, and their photographic projects grew into an extended series called Photoglyphs. In their photographs, they use their own faces to explore the nature of thought and what lies beyond it. Since coming to the United States in 1980, they had many exhibitions in galleries and museums including the Art Institute of Chicago. The New Orleans Museum of Art launched a retrospective of their photography, which traveled to fifteen cities. Group exhibitions include the Venice Biennale, the Guggenheim Museum, New York, Smithsonian National Museum of American Art, Washington D.C., Bonn Kunsthalle, Germany, Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, and others. Samizdat or “self-published” began in the Soviet Union, and Samizdat art consists mainly of books and magazines published and distributed by the artists who made them. Samizdat art has sources in the innovative books and magazines turned out by the early 20th century Russian avant-garde—artists and writers like Olga Rozanova, Vladimir Mayakovsky, El Lissitzky, and Alexander Rodchenko. Artists as varied as Alexander Archipenko, Leon Bakst, Marc Chagall, Naum Gabo, Alexandra Exter...

Christian Boltanski, El Caso, Parkett., Zürich. 1989 in the collection of the MOMA Museum of Modern Art NYC Miniature booklet with 17 photographs, 2 x 3 1/8” (5 x 8 x 0,6 cm) ring bound with perspex covers and printed title Ed. 80/XX, signed and numbered (this one is not signed or numbered and might be an artist proof) Guilty, Not Guilty. Themes central to Boltanski’s oeuvre find devastating expression in this tiny piece of pocket pornography containing images of brutal murder re-photographed by the artist from the Spanish detective magazine El Caso. [Ref. Bob Calle - Christian Boltanski Artist's Books 1969-2007, p.60]. Artists' book featuring 17 b/w photographs held together with two metal rings: "Luxury edition of a booklet with real glossy photographs, small enough to be hidden behind the hand... It pictures the bodies of victims of violent crime. By showing these photographs of half-naked corpses, bought nearer by close-up shots, the artist transforms the viewer into a voyeur who virtually becomes a sadistic partner in the crime." -- from Catalogue: Books, Printed Matter, Ephemera 1966-1991. references "Livres" by Christian Boltanski. Paris / Köln / Frankfurt, France / Germany : AFAA / Jennifer Flay / Walther König / Portikus, 1991. No. 69 in "Christian Boltanski : Catalogue: Books, Printed Matter, Ephemera, 1966-1991" by Christian Boltanski, Jennifer Flay, Günter Metken. Köln / Frankfurt, Germany : Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König / Portikus, 1992, pp. 184 - 185. "Christian Boltanski : Artist's Books 1969 - 2007" by Christian Boltanski, Bob Calle. Paris, France : Éditions 591, 2008, pp. 60. Quote “There is in the work of the artist something of the high priest and something of the charlatan...