Recent Review
Posted on Sun, Jul. 28, 2002
Medicine show
BY DAMARYS OCAÑA
docana@herald.com
Sculpture has evolved perhaps
more than any other art form. It has exponentially
widened its range of materials and its meaning.
But you won't find sculpture's
possibilities put to universal good use
in the Kevin Bruk Gallery's current show,
Effexor 75. The exhibition of work by Miami-based
sculptors is named after an anti-depressant
in a lighthearted jab at depressingly 'lite'
and fluffy summer shows. But it is more
placebo than remedy.
Reserved in ancient times
for the immortalization of warriors and
kings and the worship of gods, and carved
from marble, wood, stone and metal, sculpture
was as near a replacement for nature as
art(ifice) could produce.
With art's 20th Century revolutions,
sculpture would transcend representation
and be abstract, surreal; it would be made
from neon, soil, chicken wire and Brillo
pad boxes; it would move and take on complex
ideas.
Today, sculptures are among
the most pluralistic art works in the increasingly
pluralistic world of contemporary art, even
if they are largely overshadowed by ultra-hot,
ultra-now photography and video.
Not doing nearly as much sawing
and bonding was David Rohn,
whose raw concrete wall, carved with the
simple likeness of an athlete in motion,
seems a poetic ode to the persistence of
longing in the face of resistance.
Effexor 75 @ at the Kevin
Bruk Gallery
[edited for this site] |
