Anne Daems' Parsley and Pearls

(originally published 6/30/08 on ArtSlant.com)

At first glance, Anne Daems’ exhibition at Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery looks almost like a group show. Three grainy photographs are hung immediately to the left of the entrance; they each depict a single, young, attractive person on the streets of New York, from Daems’ series "72 girls (and some boys) that could be models". Then, rather abruptly, is a long stretch of works from "Scribbles for Drawings Make New Drawings". These look a lot like someone photographed the pen scratch pads at art supply stores, and in fact they are prints of Daems’ color-test doodles. Interspersed with "Scribbles" are more photographs from "72 girls"; four small graphite drawings with text; and finally a 35-minute video titled "My father’s garden".

Unfortunately, most of the show is dedicated to the "Scribbles" work. Daems is an artist interested small moments, often finding poetry in them. It’s understandable to extend this purview to her doodle pads, but ultimately it’s overly precious. Not every art mark is worth preserving.

Daems’ other drawings—"The woman had always some parsley in her bosom" (2006), "Kenneth’s beauty spots" (2007), "2 rubber bands to hold her stockings" (2005-6), and "A woman with high heels came back from the park" (2008)—however, are lovely; bemused studies rendered in simple lines with a smattering of color and typewritten text. They’re strange and infectious and I could look at a hundred of them.

"72 girls" (2007) doesn’t add anything to the catalogue of lonely moments captured by photographers on the streets of New York; instead they demonstrate an intense need on Daems’ part to crawl inside the minds of these beautiful creatures (it’s a much more subjective series than, say, Philip-Lorca diCorcia’s "Heads"). Daems exhibits the same inquisitiveness with extended close-ups of children’s faces in "My father’s garden" (2008). Because these lingering takes happen over a span of time, they are more successful than the still photographs in making us privy to her subjects’ inner dialogue.

"My father’s garden", shown in several parts, dovetails all of Daems’ interests: simple rituals (there are quiet sequences of a Japanese tea ceremony, a man patching holes in a tree, and a woman doing laundry), youth (the aforementioned meditations on children’s faces), and small absurdities (a balloon decorated with pigtails and a face slowly whirling in front of a window). "My father’s garden" yields what the disparate elements of the rest of the exhibition do not—inspired tropes that reflect back solidly on Daems’ position as fascinated observer.

File Under Philippe Gronon

(originally published 6/30/2008 on ArtSlant.com)

Philippe Gronon’s exhibition at Yossi Milo Gallery, comprised of highly rendered photographs of safes, elevators, and card catalogues, is a room of doors waiting to be opened. One’s fingers itch to spin the combination locks and tug the handles. Behind the wall, ropes would pulley and cylinders would tumble and then cavities would appear, holding passengers, jewels and cash, unfamiliar air.

The setup is deceptively simple—there are five photographs of safes hung in a row on the east wall of the gallery; across from them, three photographs of card catalogues, and on the north and south walls, single photographs of elevator doors. All are silver gelatin prints scaled to the actual size of the objects they depict. Whether or not Gronon’s aim is to create an illusion or simply represent the objects with absolute accuracy, there is a definite photography-as-sculpture aspect to his work. All of the photographs are printed full bleed and most of them are hung unframed, effectively repositioning them as 3D objects (one photograph, "Safe" (1991), has even been trimmed flush with the curved edges of the lockbox itself. Ceci n'est pas une pipe !). There is a great amount of detail; shooting with a studio camera, Gronon captures the cold texture of steel and the softness of worn wood, and chips and scratches in metal surfaces are indistinguishable from imperfections in the emulsion. The only thing working against a complete mirage is the lack of color.

The strongest piece in the exhibition—Gronon’s first in the US—is "Elevator, Lyceum Kennedy, New York" (2005). Standing in front of this life-sized photograph puts the viewer in the funny position of waiting for an elevator that will never arrive. There is a humid handprint the shiny door, and a smudged window just above eye level acts as a portal to another layer altogether. This piece especially evokes the vertiginous quality of a movie set—buildings and trees and fire hydrants that turn out to be flat when you peek behind them. Gronon’s show manages to possess both the dispassionate principles of New Objectivity and the whimsy of Alice In Wonderland, and for that reason alone it’s worth seeing.