When it comes to modern music, not much impresses me these days. If you look back over the past few years at any Top 10 Albums list I might have compiled – in those years where I was even able to cobble together such a list at all – you’ll see it’s comprised partly of comeback records by classic rockers, greatest hits packages or tribute albums that revisit the material of a legendary artist. That’s rather pathetic, I know, for a writer who once embraced the tagline ‘Rock Critic at Large,’ but it is what it is. I don’t apologize for being unable to shake the feeling that the best years for popular music are, for the most part, 30 – or even 40 – years behind us. Continue reading Recommended Listening: Kurt Vile, Wakin’ On a Pretty Daze→
I was so crazy about Kurt Vile’s 2011 release, Smoke Ring For My Halo that I could not possibly be more excited to hear that he has a new CD coming out in 2013, entitled Wakin on a Pretty Daze. What makes this news even cooler is the announcment that the album cover art, seen as a street mural in the photo above, is by contemporary painter Steve “Stephen” Powers, whose fun and original work I was introduced to this past summer at an exhibit at Joshua Liner Gallery. This mural, which I am guessing depicts the names of songs found on the album, is located at the intersection of Front and Master Streets in the Fishtown neighborhood of Philadelphia, where Vile is from. Produced by John Agnello, and described by Vile as being comparable to Fleetwood Mac’sTusk, but “No cheese, just rock,” Wakin on a Pretty Daze is due out in the spring.
Oh, what a night! Thursday, September 6th, 2012 not only marked the party-filled kick off of Mercedes Benz Fashion Week here in NYC, but the evening also launched the reopening of many of our favorite Chelsea art Galleries after a too-long summer of dormancy. Well into the balmy evening (summer ain’t over yet!), the streets of Chelsea were as teaming with excited art fans as Times Square is with tourists at midday! The Art is back!
Funny Because It’s True By Stephen Powers
We started off our evening’s crawl on 28th Street with a much-anticipated visit to the Joshua Liner Gallery – where we try to never miss an opening reception! Currently, Liner is hosting Stephen Powers’ A Word is Worth a Thousand Pictures, which is just fantastic fun!
Pour Trait of The Artist
In this new exhibition series, Powers presents a panoramic assemblage of enamel on aluminum paintings that occupy both gallery rooms. These colorful and engaging works – which reminded me a bit of the complex Rebus Puzzles of the Concentration Game Show — range from 10-by 8-inches to 8 by 16-feet.
Fresh Peach
Adore (2 of a Series of 3)
Stephen Powers is perhaps best known for public artworks that fuse sign painting, graffiti, words and images, and he creates a new form of public art that is collaborative and personal. I enjoyed finding clever messages hidden in the larger works and isolating various details which emphasize the paintings’ wry humor. If you are a fan of Mad Magazine or The National Lampoon, Powers’ work will certainly resonate with you. See some of those details below.
Easy Street Closed for Repairs: Detail From Funny Because It’s True
All My Eggs Fit in One (Basket): Detail from Day Seizer
Undo My Life: Detail from Larger Work
Stephen Powers’ A Word is Worth A Thousand Pictures will be on exhibit through September 29, 2012 at the Joshua Liner Gallery, Located at 548 West 28th Street, 3rd Floor, New York City. Gallery Hours are Tuesday — Saturday 11:00 AM — 6:00 PM.
The Image Above Courtesy of the Jonathan LeVine Gallery. All Other Photos by Gail Worley
Worley Gig has taken a bit of a break from Gallery hopping this summer: partly because lots of the galleries are on their summer hiatus and partly because we’ve just been too busy doing other fun things. Oh, New York Contemporary Art Scene, how we have missed you. But what better way to get re-immersed in the vibrant Chelsea gallery scene than with Jonathan LeVine Gallery’s latest group show, Détournement: Signs of the Times, brilliantly curated by Carlo McCormick, which opened this past Thursday. We’d especially like to thank the gallery’s Associate Director, Malena Seldin for allowing The Gig to photograph the show in the empty gallery prior to the start of Thursday night’s opening reception.
