PRESS & PUBLICATIONS
As another semester winds down, some of us may be looking to visit a few outstanding shows before heading into the studio, out to the country, or back home for the summer.
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On a trip to a few Bushwick galleries last weekend, I was drawn to a couple of small pieces by James Hyde in "Solid Pull," a group exhibition
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As New York welcomes the College Art Association to town for its 2013 annual convention, taking place February 13 to 16 at its usual New York location of the Hilton Hotel, a panel discussion at the New York Studio School on the eve of the meeting brings together distinguished art historians and critics to share their experiences and insights into the often vexed dual processes of writing about art and making it.
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Right after his last exhibition, Stuart Davis Group, which consisted of five large paintings made between 2006 and 2008, at the Boiler in Williamsburg
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This group exhibition takes its title from Joni Mitchell’s famous song “Big Yellow Taxi.” But unlike Mitchell’s
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I wanted to get this post published before it was too late to send anyone to see this wonderful short-run (only ten-days) group show of sculpture
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If time permitted, I would have written an essay this month about the glorification of youth and cool by the art press, through the lens of the
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Galerie Lelong presents Stretching Painting, an exhibition featuring the work of ten artists who engage "supporting" elements of painting
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Perhaps it's the brighter economic picture that has galleries doing something they haven't dared do much of over the last two years
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(US, 1958) From the first glance, James Hyde's paintings look
like art. This may even be a radical position for an artist today
to take--ever since Marcel Duchamp signed a urinal and exhibited it
as an artwork, avant-garde practice has involved crossing over into
the realm of non-art, intentionally shrugging off high art's
conventions. Some of Hyde's materials nod to this position (he
often uses Styrofoam, silk, industrial carpet and vinyl tape) and
sometimes a work is not attached vertically to a wall. But the work
comes together according to an aesthetic logic, a part-whole
relationship that exists in things that are made with
intentionality. As art, and unlike nature, Hyde's works direct your
attention. He makes them to refer to the history of painting.Hyde,
on the other hand, has employed an approach within painting that
achieves the transcendent potential of fiction without risking the
narrowing effects of narration. In his work he has broken with
modernist abstraction's illusionistic picture--even if there is
space in one of his paintings one is always prevented entry into it
by one's awareness of the physical object. The surface of a fresco
painting, layered strokes of paint over a background wash, is
linked to its projecting Styrofoam base. You want to see the
surface as an illusion, but cannot deny its limitations because of
the clear presence of its underpinnings. Hyde also encourages
references to useful objects and everyday situations--handles,
shelves and guard rails can be seen in past works. Minimalists
favored industrial materials like steel, aluminum and plastics and
used them hermetically, which prevented them from touching everyday
experience. Hyde makes art that seems thoroughly vernacular; the
materials furnish accesses for the viewer, meeting her halfway, and
perhaps invoking in her the desire to believe in the work, or to be
transported by it.
(Excerpted from James Hyde: Lean Narrative - Alison Green)
For additional information about this artist, visit Mutual Art
