The Chelsea Galleries were fun. Not all of the galleries appealed to my taste, but there were a few that stood out among the rest. Such exhibits that intereseted me were the Chinese calligraphy/squiggly line exhibit from Bryce Martin and “New Material” by Kim Doland. I also feel that I would have enjoyed Nicky Nodjoumi if I had seen it earlier in our tour.
The squiggly line exhibit fascinated me. I didn’t know I could find emotion in such a seemingly senseless collection. At first glance I didn’t know what to think of the gallery. I couldn’t see where any of the paintings required the skill and artistic outlook that it takes to have one’s art recognized. I also couldn’t understand how these pictures were inspired by Chinese calligraphy; they all just seemed like bunches of multicolored yarn on worn-out canvas. But after further observation I began to recognize the insight of the artist. I began to find meaning, or at least a personal meaning, in the layering, colors, and borders. Brightly colored lines were meant to stand out from the more bland colors of the other lines and the canvas. Each line was drawn under the second line but above the third line. I saw juxtaposition in the colors, and the layering represented an unending battle between brightness and darkness. When considering the exhibit as a whole, the paintings each represented emotions, from anger to jealousy to happiness. Different feelings were represented by different colors, and the squiggles and layers implied complexity in each emotion. I left the emotion with a different opinion from the one I walked in with.
My favorite gallery was the “New Material” gallery by Kim Dorland. There were so many things I liked about this, but what I liked the most was the ingenuity. I thought it was ingenious how he used glitter, feathers, and dried paint on top of dead wolves, bark, and a deer head in order to reduce painting to its basic constituents, thereby expanding the field by applying it in a new way. I also liked the environmentalist touch to the paintings. The graffiti on the deer head, the beer cans in the trees, and the fiery colors on some of the paintings illustrate man’s intrusion on nature, which is given a negative connotation throughout the gallery. The wolves, ghosts, and other scary objects are evidently moments from Dorland’s childhood that have stayed in his subconscious, but what they actually represent is fascinating. This ghost effect also characterizes the humans in the woodland area (all of the paintings have a woodland setting) as a boogieman, adding to the negative connotation previously mentioned. Particularly, I found it interesting that a demon-like figure standing by a lake was representative of his father. The fact that each painting has its own value to me and a separate meaning to the painter is what I have always enjoyed about art.
One thing I didn’t like about the tour is that there were so many galleries. I enjoyed a few of them, but I felt that by the end of the tour I was tired of appreciating pictures. This fatigue influenced how I viewed the later galleries. I didn’t find anything interesting in the sex gallery. As I watched the Israeli gallery I could tell that I wasn’t enjoying, but not because of the art. If we had seen this exhibit earlier I would have loved it, but so late I was just tired of interpreting things. After about 5 galleries my open mind had been filled and I no longer found appeal in the arts. However, I loved the Telsa cars. Those were amazing. I think those, combined with the highline and Dorland’s gallery made this trip very enjoyable and insightful.
