John Yau writes in The Brooklyn Rail about the recent exhibition Abstract Expressionism: A World Elsewhere:

Any challenge to canonical thinking is worthy of consideration and, in many cases, useful. It can help us see things fresh as well as rescue them from the dusty halls of history. In that regard, Anfam recognizes that the period he focuses on is still contested territory, and he weighs in on it by including work by Sam Francis, Charles Seliger, and Mark Tobey, as well as photographs. I have quibbles with the exhibition, but that is to be expected. Mostly they have to do with who is not included, particularly since Joan Mitchell and Hans Namuth had work in the exhibition, but Norman Bluhm and Rudy Burckhardt did not. But this was Anfam’s exhibition, not mine. And saying that I would have done it differently is hardly surprising.  {Read More…}

I just got to see an excellent small exhibit right now at Tina Kim Gallery juxteposing 2 paintings each of De Kooning, Mitchell, and Richter from the 1980s. There are a couple of things I find interesting about comparing the work of these three artists. First, we see three distinct possibilities for abstraction – abstracting the figure (De Kooning); abstracting landscape (Mitchell); invented or created realities (Richter). Second, we see the development of three distinct treatments of pictorial space. De Kooning’s space is shallow, hovering right at the picture plane, built up with overlapping shapes and the interplay of positive and negative space. Mitchell’s space is voluminous, built up with broken strokes of color on color, and swelling out of the picture plane. Richter creates a deep atmospheric space through the relation of differing paint applications, color, and surface texture.

Despite their differences in gender, nationality and age, each worked solitarily throughout this era that was dominated largely by bombastic new voices, quietly producing what are still regarded as some of the most virtuosic works in their respective oeuvres. Though all of the works in this exhibition can be categorized under the same general rubric of “abstract painting”, each artist approached the canvas from a unique perspective. This juxtaposition of these six large-scale works provokes questions of process, intent and composition that are among the most fundamental to the genre of painting.

Willem de Kooning (1904-1997) / Untitled XII / 1985 / Oil on canvas / 79 9/10 x 70 1/10 inches, 203 x 178 cm / tinakimgallery.com

Joan Mitchell (1925-1992) / Grande Vallée II (Amaryllis) / 1983 / Oil on canvas / 86 x 75 1/2 inches, 218.4 x 191.8 cm / tinakimgallery.com

Gerhard Richter / Georg / 1981 / Oil on canvas / 78 3/4 x 78 3/4 inches, 200 x 200 cm / tinakimgallery.com

De Kooning, Mitchell, Richter @ Tina Kim Gallery, 545 West 25th Street, 3rd Floor through 11/15

Joan Mitchell / Pour Patou / 1976 / 76-1/2 x 44-3/4 inches / oil on canvas / Lennon, Weinberg, Inc.

This one is for my friend Patou. It seems I’ve become enamored of the small canvas lately and Joan Mitchell on a small scale is fascinating and inviting. The thick luscious paint and pastels feel juicy and approachable, maybe it feels a bit more human. The big retrospective at the Whitney Museum a few years ago set in my head this idea of Mitchell as a monumental fierce-sensitive lioness – a larger than life woman and unmatchable painter. The physical scale and energy of her large canvases can be overwhelming. It’s nice to see this other side and helps gives me a more complete picture of the artist.

Joan Mitchell was a gifted painter. In her primary medium of oil paint, she created powerful and unforgettable works. Her paintings project an impressive physical energy and at monumental scale demonstrate the full measure of her ambitious goals. But oil paint was not her only medium; in addition to exploring etching and lithography, Mitchell embraced the medium of pastel and created a substantial body of work. This exhibition surveys her work in both paint and pastel between 1973 and 1983, a decade bracketed by two major cycles of paintings. During these years, a dynamic interaction between her paintings and pastels becomes increasingly apparent.

The exhibition will include nearly thirty works in both mediums. The paintings and drawings from the early and mid-1970s are atmospheric, and among them are two of the works in which Mitchell developed a composition in relation to a poem typed on the sheet of paper. During the next several years, she introduced an emphatic vertical mark into both pastels and paintings. In the exhibition are three pastels and one painting from the series titled Tilleuls, a group of works named for a mature and impressive linden tree that crowned the terrace of her home in the country outside of Paris. A brilliant yellow floats above hovering bands of blue in a large Untitled pastel from 1979.

In 1982, Mitchell produced a greater than usual number of small-scale paintings. A close look at the paintings of this period strongly suggests that she was seeking to achieve in oil paint a kind of light that resulted from bold juxtapositions of pastel pigments. The unprecedented and challenging color combinations of several series of paintings she titled Gently, Merrily and Petit Matin – green and orange, magenta and green, red and orange, yellow and pink – reflect the influence of her work in pastel. One of the six large paintings made that year is Buckwheat. Mitchell juxtaposed the heat of cadmium colors against cool cobalt and flashes of cerulean blue and established a shimmering radiance that clearly evokes her admiration for Van Gogh, and is titled in reference to his paintings of wheat fields.

Joan Mitchell, Paintings and Pastels 1973-1983, at Lennon, Weinberg, Inc., 514 w. 25th Street, through June 21