"Slow Glass" at Lisa Cooley Gallery

(originally published 7/28/08 on ArtSlant.com)

“You’ll never get it if you don’t slow down, my friend.” This sly warning, from Mario Garcia Torres’ "11 Years Later/11 Minutes Later (2006)", is one viewers of "Slow Glass", a group exhibition at Lisa Cooley, would do well to heed; though containing only a handful of works, this is a show to spend time with.

Heather Rowe’s "The Space Above the Ceiling" (2008) serves as a meandering guide down the length of the slender gallery. Hanging overhead, its elegant execution causes it to rise like a balloon even as its negative space bears down on you like a heavy conscience. It’s impossible to escape its presence for a second.

Lawrence Weiner’s "AT THE SAME MOMENT" (2000), perches just inside the storefront window, its content and placement immediately referencing the material for which the show is named: science fiction writer Bob Shaw’s magical glass that slows down light, thereby trapping scenes and allowing them to be transported and viewed from an entirely new setting.

Lizzie Hughes’ and Emma Kay’s works build on this by exploring themes of translation and de-contextualization, respectively. Hughes’ "Untitled (Translation Piece)" (2008) demonstrates how language can become garbled in a veritable game of Telephone. Kay’s works distill two influential narratives, The Bible and "The Interpretation of Dreams", down to the objects that appear in them. The objects become signifiers, talismans, keys to a set of beliefs. There are hundreds of articles listed; all of them will carry you off on a giant tangent.

Mario Garcia Torres’ slideshow "11 Years Later/11 Minutes Later" (2006), is the final piece in “Slow Glass”. Its subtitled dialogue (originally written by Paul Auster for the film Smoke) is shelled out slide by slide at a tantalizing pace, the methodic click of the carousel bouncing off the walls of the gallery. That sound, Rowe’s looming sculpture, and the rhythm of all those words on display eventually conjur a weird, lethargic suspense, leaving you feeling deliciously time-warped.

"I'll be your mirror... so you can break into endless shards" at Heist Gallery

(originally published 7/28/08 on ArtSlant.com)

"I’ll Be Your Mirror… So You Can Break Into Endless Shards", on view through August 10th at Heist Gallery, located on a busy stretch of Essex Street, is an uncanny reflection of the Lower East Side itself. The show is a cacophony of colors, textures, faces, youth, sex and religion. John Travolta makes an appearance in a cowboy hat, as does a lit-up bodega Virgin Mary, and there are plenty of empty pill bottles, wounds, and underwear to go around. All of this teeming life and raucous offering is crammed together tenement-style into one tiny room.

The exhibition as a whole, starting with the title, is achingly earnest, the combined output of approximately thirty churned-up artists, and has the feel of an end-of-semester art school crit. Some works, like Ryan Watkins-Hughes’ installation of prescription meds and blurry sickbed portraits, "Love is a losing game, but who gives a shit?" (2008), and Christopher Martino’s gouache and graphite rendering of a man surrounded by blacked-out windows, "Apex" (2008), aim for a world-weariness but still come off as vulnerable. Amongst these are wide-eyed photographs where you can feel the artist holding their breath: Jeanne Mischo’s quiet "Family Moments 1" (2008) and Jonathan Feinstein’s solemn "Portrait of Amani" (2007).

There are many works that turn said mirror onto the outside world, offering social commentary on the passing strange (fast food America gets a nod in Conrad Kofron’s "Untitled" (2007), and an over-the-top oligarch moll is haloed in Tatiana Kronberg’s "Mariya 3" (2006)) and the perversely fascinating (Marta Edmisten’s "Blind Dating" (2007), which places grainy surveillance shots of awkward suitors alongside their bravado-laden personal ads.

"I’ll Be Your Mirror" falters from the volume of work that curators Julie Fishkin and Matt Lucas included; there are endless shards indeed, some duller than others, most notably David Smith’s too literal bad joke "Velvet Polyester" (2008). But a solid group of these artists reveal messy, tremulous, and feverish interior lives, and they are compelling to watch.