Cathy Breslaw's Installation

Cathy Breslaw's Installation
Cathy Breslaw's Installation:Dreamscape

Monday, June 12, 2023

Art Is For Everybody at The Broad: Keith Haring's Art of the 80's Embraces Political, Social and Cultural Issues

Keith Haring: Art is For Everybody 
The Broad Museum, Los Angeles, CA
Through October 8, 2023 
Article by Cathy Breslaw 



You don’t have to be an art aficionado to have noticed Keith Haring’s iconic images of the barking dog and radiant baby. His neon-like colors painted with kinetic imagery, line drawings and child-like comic-style figures have been reproduced on buttons, clothing, mugs, posters, and murals across the globe. Contrary to many artists, he was not afraid of mixing his work with consumerism as he sold his merchandise at his famous Pop Shop in SoHo. 

Haring’s is a story of a young man who at 20 years old moved to NYC to attend the School of Visual Arts and in the following ten years garnered worldwide recognition for his art, and then died of AIDS in 1990. Fresh out of art school, he began using white chalk to make quick temporary drawings in subway stations throughout the city. Rather than seek out the gallery and museum art world, Haring wanted his drawings to be seen by a mass audience. 

So, it is ironic yet fitting that The Broad has created Haring’s first ever museum exhibition Art is For Everybody featuring over 120 artworks of drawings, paintings, sculptures, videos, installations, and archival materials. The Broad family are collectors of his work since 1982, and together with works from institutional and private collections, ephemera and documents provided by the Keith Haring Foundation, create an exhibition that is an impressive display of Haring’s work but also leads viewers to discover Haring’s personal world experience and what mattered to him during his short life. 

Themes of music, politics, sexuality, war, religion, and AIDS figured prominently as his pop and graffiti-like work grew out of the influence of street culture of the 1980s. While some of his imagery is composed of simple flat figures with lines indicating breakdancing and other upbeat activities, others could be incredibly dark, with images of blood dripping out of bodies and daggers piercing through hearts including a mix of skeletons, flying saucers, daggers, nooses, nails, blood, sex acts and more abstract shapes referring to calligraphy, hieroglyphics, and primitive forms. He has a clearly defined and recognizable pictorial language using mostly black lines to delineate shapes and forms within his works. Haring wanted his work directed to the audience without the lens of a gallery, and to shine a light on broad complex subjects of his generation including protesting apartheid in South Africa, raising awareness to the crack cocaine epidemic, nuclear disarmament and AIDS. 

The Broad show curated by Exhibitions Manager Sarah Loyer, spans 10 galleries. It includes representations from public art projects, public murals, subway drawings, and his love of music. In one immersive space, the backlit gallery is accompanied by a soundtrack of playlists made by the artist himself. Another gallery featured collaboration pieces by Haring and fellow artist LA II AKA Angel Ortiz as they worked together for six years during the 1980’s. Recreated in another gallery was Haring’s first major gallery show, with painted stripes in day-glo pink and orange on the gallery walls and in the center a mini Statue of Liberty. The range of Haring’s paintings also show an influence of African and Aboriginal art as well as an influence of pop-culture artists such as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein.and Jean-Michel Basquiat. 

Toward the end of his life, Haring focused his work on the AIDS epidemic, painting murals for gay men’s health centers, posters and art for the activist group ACT UP. Though his career only spanned one decade, he created more than 50 public works, thousands of subway drawings, paintings, posters and murals. In one of his journal entries, Haring stated: Art should be something that liberates your soul, provokes the imagination and encourages people to go further. 

Haring’s legacy, thirty years later proves this out in his exhibition. The Broad show takes us back to the street scene and graffiti art of the 1980’s in New York City. Haring’s use of bold colors and strong cartoon-like iconic drawings together with universal themes, make his work both strongly memorable and easily accessible to all people.











Friday, January 20, 2023

Seeking the Spiritual: Transcendental Painting Group (1938-1945) at LACMA

 

                                                                                  Emil Bisttram           Oversoul             oil on masonite              1941



                                                                                   Emil Bisttram        Creative Forces            oil on canvas        1936     


 


                                                                           Ed Garman                        Abstract No 283A               oil on board           1942        


                                                                           Ed Garman           Painting No 231                     oil on panel               1941
   
            




                                                                      Agnes Pelton                       Winter                        oil on canvas                     1933

Friday, November 4, 2022

New Bend at Hauser & Wirth, Los Angeles







 
                             The Right to (My) Life by Dawn Williams Boyd, (2017), Fabric, Mixed Media




                                          
                                  Ctrl-Alt-Del  by Qualeasha Wood, 2021,  jacquard weaving


      Holbein En Crenshaw, Washington Blvd. and Crenshaw, LA,CA, Eddie Aparicio (2018), sculpture

                                  Majin Buu,  Anthony Akinbola,  (2022),  Durags on wood panel




Monday, September 12, 2022

LACMA Exhibits Korean Art Never Seen Before in the U.S.: The Space Between: The Modern in Korean Art

 

                       Shin Nakkyun, Photograph of Choi Seunghui, 1930, Jipyong Collection, Research Institute for the Visual Language of Korea, Seoul,                                                                                                              The Estate of  Shin Nakkyun, digital courtesy Jipyong Collection.



                Kim Eunho, Portrait of King Sunjong, 1923, National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea, Estate of Kim Eunho,photo 
                                                                                        National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea.



                                                Min Chungsik(printed by Ju Myeongdeok), Magician 2,1930's(printed 1981)
,                                                                          Jipyong Collection,Research Institute for the Visual Language of Korea, Seoul.



                                       Kim Whanki, Jars and WOmen, 1951, private collection, Whanki Foundation-Whanki Museum.



                                  Han Youngsoo, Near Savoy Hotel, Myeongdong, Seoul,1956, printed 2019, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 
                                                                           gift of Robin-Hwajin Yoon Kim, Han Youngsoo Foundation.


Tuesday, April 26, 2022

Lee Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse: Fashion Meets Art at Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Alexander McQueen, Three Woman's Ensembles from the Deliverance collection, Spring/Summer 2004
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, gift from the collection of Regina J. Drucker









Paul Cadmus, Coney Island, 1934, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, gift of  Peter A. Paanakker, 
Art c Jon F. Anderson, Estate of Paul Cadmus/Licensed by VAGA, 
New York, NY photo c Museum Associates/LACMA




Alexander McQueen, Woman's Dress and Harness from the Plato's Atlantis collection, Spring/Summer 2010,
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, gift from the Collection of Regina J. Drucker in memory of Juliana Cairone

Alexander McQueen, Woman’s Dress and Shoes from The Widows of Culloden collection, Fall/Winter 2006-07, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, gift from the Collection of Regina J. Drucker in honor of Joseph and Genevieve Venegas,



Frans Pourbus II, Portrait of Louis XIII, King of France as a Boy, c. 1616, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 
gift of Mr. and Mrs. William May Garland, photo © Museum Associates/LACMA


Manuel Cipriano Gomes Mafra, Urn, c. 1865-87, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 
                                      gift of Barbara and Marty Frenkel, photo c Museum Associates/LACMA



Alexander McQueen, Woman’s Dress (detail) from the Plato’s Atlantis collection, Spring/Summer 2010, Los Angeles      County Museum of Art, gift from the Collection of Regina J. Drucker,


Thursday, January 27, 2022

Interscope Records Pairs Up with LACMA for Exhibition - Artists Inspired by Music: Interscope Reimagined


                                                Kehinde Wiley        The Watcher          oil on canvas          82 7/8" x 70 3/4"    photo courtesy of the artist   2021


 
https://abc7.com/lacma-interscope-records-art-exhibit/11512817/


                Cecily Brown    If Teardrops Could Be Bottled      oil on linen     29" x 31"     courtesy of the artist,  photo by Genevieve Hanson  2021



                  Rashid Johnson     Good Kid         ceramic tile, mirror, red oak, oil stick, spray enamel     37" x 37" x 3"    2021   courtesy of the artist
                                   and David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles     photo by Martin Parsekian, courtesy of David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles











Partial Installation Shot of the Exhibition



                                                                                                     Partial Installation Shot of the Exhibition