Sunday, November 10, 2013

Exhibit Review: James Nares' "STREET"— A Night out at the Reinberger Galleries

The Cleveland Institute of Art's (CIA) Reinberger Gallery has seasonal exhibitions that we've come to enjoy over the last few years, especially since our oldest son began studying there. What particularly motivated us to go down to the exhibit opening was that James Nares, whose film STREET is featured, is the partner of a friend of ours, a lovely woman we've gotten to know over the past two summers in Vermont.  It always gives one a stronger connection to and interest in an exhibition if there is a personal connection to the artist.

STREET was beautiful and well worth the visit—mesmerizing and evocative. (Thankfully—because otherwise what do you tell your friend!?) We lived in NYC for 6 years and we still think of it as an alternate home so it was enjoyable to have that kind of immersive return and see it in such a broad yet focused way. Also technically very impressive! 



And of course we did that thing which I'm sure anyone who has spent time in NY has done - Oh, that's the Path corner, oh, that's right by X's apartment, Oh, isn't that where there used to be that bodega where I picked up flowers on the way home? But the real stars are the thousands of faces. Everyone looks so beautiful and interesting in the HD slow-mo—I imagine that reflects the artist's own loving feelings about humanity.

Here is the explanatory blurb from the CIA webiste: British-born artist James Nares spent one week in September 2011 filming 16 hours of footage from a moving car traveling the streets of Manhattan. He used the kind of high-definition camera usually reserved for capturing speeding bullets ripping through apples, then edited the footage down to one hour of super-slow-motion street activity put to music. The result is a trippy, dreamlike experience that played at The Metropolitan Museum of Art this past spring and will air on a loop in CIA’s Black Box Projection Room.

And we did get to say hello to James!

Other things you will see at the  exhibit are recent works by Richard Anuszkiewicz, that play with our perceptions of color and seem to swim before the eyes in huge vivid paintings that come off the walls.

Richard Anuszkiewicz: Recent Work 
 Photo from CIA site, Richard Anuszkiewicz, Mardi Gras. Image courtesy of Loretta Howard Gallery, New York, NY.


HEXEN 2.0 Suzanne Treister 2009-2011 
  




















Also there, Intricately detailed print work by Suzanne Treister, in a show called Hexen 2.0 and looks at the history of scientific research. I like the use of Tarot Cards as the organizing principle.

From CIA site: Suzanne Treister, Queen of Chalices- Ada Lovelace. Image courtesy of the artist and P.P.O.W Gallery, NYC.











Arpita Singh: Men in Turmoil









And a third and also very different exhibition of paintings by Arpita Singh, called Men in Turmoil. Less visually appealing to me than the other artists.
 From CIA Site: Arpita Singh, Women in Blue Men in Black. Image Courtesy Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi, India and DC Moore Gallery, New York.



The great thing about going to Reinberger exhibitions is that they are a manageable amount of gallery space to get through in one evening, and still have time for dinner in Little Italy!

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