artform
LUDOLOGY
Deliver to us, in JPEG form, a pair of artworks—one from before 1900 and one from anytime after—that have an interesting visual connection (that is: one any viewer can plainly see). Most interesting juxtaposition wins! Artillery will choose a winner from the entrants....
STAYING SANE(ish) WITH DR. TRAINWRECK — (print exclusive) Dear Dr. Trainwreck
Dear Dr. Trainwreck, How can I, a layman, tell the difference between someone I have to cut some slack for because of their mental health diagnosis, and someone who is just being a jerk and blaming their diagnosis? Don't some conditions make conversations around this...
THE ABSTRACT FUTURE at Jeffrey Deitch
The seminal Jeffrey Deitch exhibition “Post Human” (presented in 1992 and reimagined in 2024) explored evolving concepts of identity in the digital era. “The Abstract Future” feels in some ways like its spiritual sequel. Brilliantly curated by Alia Dahl, the gallery’s...
LEE FRIEDLANDER at Castle
In the shadow of social media, describing a nude portrait of a woman as “authentic” or “not performative” is often a subliminal way of acknowledging that the image has been composed according to an “alternative” set of stylistic constraints: soft, flattering lighting;...
YANG FUDONG at Marian Goodman Gallery
Yang Fudong’s "Sparrow on the Sea" drifts like a fugue. Commissioned for the LED façade of M+ museum in Hong Kong, the silent, black-and-white film now plays in L.A. with full sound, anchored in a dream logic that warps memory and time. Three actors of different...
DON BACHARDY at The Huntington
The wall text for “Don Bachardy: A Life in Portraits”—an exhibition at The Huntington featuring over 100 drawings and paintings—asserts that Bachardy persisted in creating portraits during a time when art was more experimental and less representational. I felt that...
JORDAN ROUNTREE at Baert Gallery
When we are small, adulthood comes to us in impressions: a staticky scene from a horror film, an overheard whisper. As adults, we see childhood memories through a similar film. “I Hear a New World” seamlessly weaves together these visions of curiosity and nostalgia....
The Street Photographer and the Taliban
The term “street photographer” comes with a certain set of associations: Street photographers work in public, snapping candid photos of commuters or loiterers at telling moments. They take photographs of strangers in the crowd from the perspective of a stranger...
For My Jaded Angels
The first draft of this article was entirely different. It was a polemic. A scorched-earth condemnation of art. Ten thousand words. The next wave in a storied line of seismic criticism. As such, I titled it Towards a Number Laocoön (“number” as in more numb, not...
The Tote Bagger’s Guide to the Los Angeles Art Book Fair
Our reporter on the ground works her way through this year’s labyrinthine fair with the help of its most visible symbol: The tote bag. The Printed Matter Art Book Fair goes high and low, and tote bags are its connective tissue. The fair provides a platform for...
DUELLING REVIEW: Viola Frey at The Pit
When The Pit announced a show by the late ceramicist Viola Frey, it piqued my editorial interest. I myself first became aware of Frey when I began taking ceramics courses with other sculptors, who would often speak of her as a totemic influence on their practice and...
ARTIST TAKEOVER Ramekon O'Arwisters
ESIRI ERHERIENE-ESSI at Night Gallery
There is a moment in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass when the Unicorn says to Alice: "Well, now that we have seen each other…if you'll believe in me, I'll believe in you.” The private question of whether one sees themselves reflected in the art that is...
THE MOMMY LEAKS THE FLOOR at New Theater Hollywood
One of the performers—if “performer” is the right word—in The Mommy Leaks the Floor, a new work by Asher Hartman staged at New Theater Hollywood (May 16–25), is Pablo, a real-life infant, born earlier this year. Throughout the play, cradled in his mother’s arms on the...
JASON FOX at David Kordansky Gallery
The flattening of high and lowbrow imagery is certainly not new, indeed the painter Jason Fox has been mining this territory since the early 1990s. In his current show at David Kordansky Gallery, “Why Are You Sitting in the Dark?,” Fox refines his enigmatic...
CAROLEE SCHNEEMANN at Lisson Gallery
This, remarkably enough, is Carolee Schneemann’s first solo exhibition in Los Angeles, six years after her passing. Schneemann may be late, but her show isn’t. It may indeed be a case of too little; the sparse hanging (8 wallworks and an installation) barely hints at...
THE JERRY MAHONEY SUCCESS SEMINAR Sophie Becker and Henry Gunderson
The central question of all ventriloquism is: Who is in charge? We know the puppet is not alive, but a good ventriloquist can move the puppet’s body so naturally and throw their voice so convincingly as to make the audience doubt their first instinct. However, the...
