by Jana Astanov
Featured art work Sarah Nsikak, She Offered You a Garden, 2023
SPRING/BREAK, this year, has the feel of a utopian community get-together for those who care about meaning and creative re-imagining of reality. As always, at this spirited art fair, artists driven curatorial projects are the real excitement turning individual art practices into collaborative installations. This year’s concept, WILD CARD, recycles through the recent themes, giving curators the freedom to mirror an amalgam of issues, states and metaphysical conditions.
The Silent Treatment, curated by Ambre Kelly and Andrew Gori, presents a series of recent paintings by David Kramer, inspired by an epic move out of his 20-year studio in Williamsburg. Newly acquired obsolescence of such objects as type-writers meets the vision for our cities devoid of culture, neighbourhoods turned into investment portfolios and shopping experiences, rendering artists defunct and irrelevant. His text-based paintings loaded with subversive humour are both escape from the unavoidable reality of the cultural desert Williambsurg devolved into in the last 10 years, and a way of taking back control, as if it didn’t really hurt to be pushed out of one’s neighbourhood. It hurts though. One could wish we were all accountable and militant when it comes to fighting against the gentrification supported by the urban planning authorities and the mass exodus of the likes of Kramer courtesy of Hermes and Chanel. I am sad to report that so far, none of the luxury houses nor high street brands thought of curating the displaced artists in their prime outer borough trenches. This war is real, and Kramer’s paintings are the propaganda of all dead dreamers.
It’s easy to say “I don’t want your money, I want your truth”. Truth has multiple layers within the power narrative, but if you look at the world as a global market, the hierarchy of truth is established by the ethics of money, my take on the Why Not Gallery, Tbilisi-based art space presenting two Georgia-born but living abroad young artists, Shalva Nikvashvili @shalvanikvashvili and Tamara Lortkipanidze @unatamarra. The dark visions of Nikvashvili reverberate in Lortkipanidze paintings.
This is what you get when you introduce the colonized economies of the East with its suffocating and conservative religious society to the German dungeon kink.
Georgian experience continues with CH64 Gallery @ch64gallery curated by Salome Papashvili @15pineapples featuring works by Mishiko Sulakauri @streetdefault Gvantsa Jishkariani @naivesuperstar Sandro Pachuashvili @sssandrro and Tiko Imnadze. Gas pumps adorned in religious symbols by @tikoimnadze__ form a row of nuns dancing to the Euro-trance in the back aluminium alleys of 625 Madison graffiti walls. The raw gratitude to the Western democracy and its economic and cultural paradigms from which, like from love, no one can escape.
The politics of fractured reality are also present in a collaborative encounter between a Canadian painter Peter Gynd, and New York based Jody MacDonald.
Bulldozer perfect brush strokes with rainbow oil palette cover up the despair of the Canadian wildfires while inviting the viewer to cheerfully attend the bat extinction party of the Lower East Side, looking back at the 2007 NYC bat population fungal pandemic that eradicated 90% of the species. It’s mockingly grand and it’s terrifying.
But there is hope, assures Jacob Hicks, co-curator of As Above So Below, presenting a curatorial community project (all his friends from art school, yes!) defined as new mysticism that encompasses queerness, female agency, elemental power, transcultural saints, and indigenous wisdom entwined with technology. Real deal of vulnerability, surrender and idealistic accountability for what it means to be the guardians of the planet and oracles of the moon.
“Come Dance With Us and Our Dead In The Rainbows (If It Makes You Feel Good)” by Heather Renee Russ, @heather_renee_russ Christopher M Tandy @cmtandy and Cait McCormack @mister_caitlin transforms the office storage room into a multi-sensory temple of neon altars and queerness with the modern cathedral sound art by Christopher M Tandy, and an assemblage of relics by Cait McCormack Rochelle Voyles @voylescurio , Vincent Tiley @vincenttiley and Caitlin Rose Sweet @caitlinrosesweet.
The monumental center piece algae photograph by Heather Renee Russ, is a live collage photographic scan and a technological witchery as the plants intend to break out of the simulation through the glitch marks. Russ forces the biomass to reflect upon itself by projecting her own ontological suspicions. And if so, how can we make this world work for us all.
Discret Charm of Abundance curated by Gabrielle Aruta from Filo Sofia Arts offers a stellar line up of awe inducing art works representing the complex tapestry of multicultural identities including Isis Davis Marks @isisdavismarks, Mahsa Merci @mahsa.merci, Moises Salazar Tlatenchi @moises.salazar.tlatenchi Santiago Galeas @santiagogaleas and Haylie Jimenez @_h4yli3 and a solo show by Laura Camila Medina @lil___lau
Chapel of Traumaturgy co-curated by artists Z Behl @zbehl and Jesse Gengenbac @jesse_ggb, is a truly immersive environment, inspired by Western mysticism and movie set aesthetic and featuring @ceciliaaaaaaaaa__ @veeveeveeveevee @epilepticjesse @jonestownaloha @rhysgaetano @raysmithstudio @tonetank @itsbrunibitch It’s what makes you feel that art in NYC is still alive, and able to weave its magic into everyday life, blurring the boundaries in between. The curatorial statement, is an account of passion, friendship, and community building of like minded art makers and art lovers. Major Arcana Tarot readings by Minor Arcana Priestess of Charcoal on demand @jesse_ggb
She said “Devil” he said “Pick up the phone and leave your Fuck Stories” aka Yea Man Spa Global’s site specific installation and a collaborative project of a collective @yeamanspaglobal curated by Caroline Weinstock @carolineweinstock
There were so many projects we loved! To add to this list:
Kay Seohyung Lee curated by Pentimenti Gallery @pentimentigallery
Courtney Puckett @courtneygpuckett curated by Karin Bravin @sitespecificbravin
Sarah Nsikak @sarahnsikak curated by Marie Salomé @epstie
Lavender Scare, curatorial project by Dan Halm with @roberthickerson @michaelbirch @danielmsamaniego @richardstauffacher
Compared to the energy of Spring Break I was a little disappointed with this year’s Armory Show. It felt like an art market tour of collectors’ superiority complex which awards artists by dumping their labour of love into the black holes of storage units. Certainly, there were fabulous artworks on display, however, as human species we are unlikely to thrive within the vacuum of meaningless trendiness and market manipulations. Spring Break offers a glimpse into what’s possible when art collectives get together, and the curatorial visions contribute to the conversations on social responsibility, climate emergency, accountability and ontological standing.
Jana Astanov is an artist, a poetess, and an independent curator, born in Mazury Lake District of Poland and currently living in the Shawangunk Mountains, in upstate New York, while pursuing an MFA in Sculpture at SUNY New Paltz. She is the founder of CREATRIX Magazine and the author of five collections of poetry: Antidivine, Grimoire, Sublunar, The Pillow Book of Burg, and Birds of Equinox. Her latest collection of poetry Erogenous Universe Dreams Back is coming out in the Fall’23.
