Construction for Noble Ladies (1919) by Kurt Schwitters is a key work in the history of modern art, particularly within the context of Dada and the rise of collage and assemblage techniques in the early 20th century. Schwitters, a German artist, is most famous for pioneering a wholly unique, visual idiom he called Merz — a term he used for the rest of his life to describe the collage and assembler works he made with scavenged and discarded materials — essentially elevating trash into aesthetic form. Continue reading Modern Art Monday Presents: Kurt Schwitters, Construction for Noble Ladies→
John Chamberlain’s sculptures display his ability to manipulate detritus in the same way that other artist use traditional materials such as oil paint or marble. Building on the assemblage tradition, he transformed used car parts and scrap metal into expressive and poetic portraits (as classified them), that echo the emotional and dynamic power of Abstract Expressionism. Continue reading Modern Art Monday Presents: John Chamberlain, Sweet William→
In 1985, John Baldassari began using dots to obscure faces, which became one of his most recognizable devices. By removing the distinguishable features, Baldassari turns the figure into an archetype. In Buildings, Guns, People: Desire, Knowledge, and Hope (with Smog) includes dot-covered faces in generic photographs from political and social functions, turned on their sides. Continue reading Modern Art Monday Presents: John Baldessari, Buildings=Guns=People…→
With Miracle Mile (2013) Robert Irwin (b. 1928) reconsiders the properties of light, material, and color. This site-specific work subtly plays with the architecture in which it is housed and respondseto both Wilshire Boulevard and Primal Palm Garden, an outdoor installation that Irwin created at LACMA in 2008. Continue reading Modern Art Monday Presents: Robert Irwin, Miracle Mile→
Ukrainian-born artist Peter Krasnow (1886 – 1979) worked mostly in Southern California from 1922 onward, becoming an important advocate of modernism in Los Angeles. During the final years of World War II, he began a series of abstract paintings featuring interlocking rectilinear forms in candy-colored hues.
