As is often the case, long-time gallery owner Linda Durham had a fuzzy idea scratching at the back of her brain. It wasn't as wild and far-fetched as many of her schemes: Run for mayor! Make a living selling contemporary art in Galisteo! Open a side gallery in Tribeca! Go to Iraq during a war! No, this idea was more subtle, more confined to how we look at and appreciate art.
Like many aficionados, Durham appreciates subtlety, breathes a sigh of near-Bhuddist relief at the sight of art with just enough work put into it and no more. Sure, there are die-hard minimalists and then there are those who simply appreciate the craft of not overdoing things. And this is the point of Durham's newest group exhibition
The Minus Touch
. Or at least, Durham says, it started out that way. "I had an idea for a very minimal show with a few artists whose work
is very elegant and very understated. But then it became something else." Some of the artists Durham contacted to participate thought the word "touch" was more interesting than the word "minus" and an element of interactivity was born.
This takes the form of a collaboration between Eric Garduño and Matthew Rana. On one small wall of Durham's elegant and angular space, sit two stainless steel shelves, industrial restroom accessories, cold and institutional. Above the left shelf is a large beautiful, blank sheet of archival paper. Below the paper, on the shelf, is a small, plain ceramic dish filled with purple ink. On the shelf to the right is a small, neat stack of pungent bar soaps, approximately hotel-sized. Discreet text reminds the viewer of the recent Iraqi elections and the practical (and now iconic) dyed-finger technique for preventing voter fraud. At the point the text suggests achieving solidarity with the Iraqi people, I get a little agitated-preachy art is not my bag. But forgiving that weighty touch, there is something undeniably potent in dipping a finger into the ink bowl and then making your mark on the page before you. It helps to know this ink is the very same ink, obtained from the very same supplier, used for the elections in Iraq. It helps to know that, in a minor way, you are making a commitment to this piece of art because the ink will not come off for approximately 48 hours. It will become blackened and crusty and when you are out to dinner in a respectable restaurant people will look at you like you are a cattle-mutilating pervert. It may get on other parts of your hand. It may get on your clothes. It will certainly cover at least one sheet of paper each week for the duration of the show creating, in essence, fingerprint drawings made by all the participants in this curious practice. Will the drawings be beautiful or important? Not so much as the point of the piece which, all solidarities aside, boils down to this: thoughtfulness.
The remainder of the exhibition as well is a lesson in thoughtfulness. By and large it isn't far from the simple idea Durham had to begin with, but the point comes through in each work and from every artist that what removing excess leaves one with is some thinking space. Tim Litzmann's work on acrylic panel creates luminescent blocks of space/time that are almost difficult to look at due to conspicuous radiance. But once you commit to staring down one of the monochrome panels, they will whisper to you a secret wavelength of calm simplicity, a pleasantness I believe pharmaceutical researchers work around the clock in vain search of. Particularly euphoric is "Untitled Orange," a small work on paper that appears to plumb near-cosmic depths with not much more than a square of paint and something similar to mylar. It has that theoretical physics, finite but unbounded kind of vibe.
Durham regular Phil Binaco captures a room of his own for his structured, precise mark-making on wax that vacillates, depending on one's distance from the surface, between appearing as coded tablets of ancient mathematics or fields of pure energetic interference, polite congregations of ions agreeing to synchronized performance. Though these are flat, wall pieces, it would be a mistake to call them static.
Martin Cary Horowitz of recent giant, gold hand grenade fame reveals his less political and more, well, thoughtful side with a discreet selection of sculptural works as well. The most resonant is a piece comprised of twin, shallow arches of bronze that span the wall horizontally and are covered in what looks to be a single layer of gold leaf, each individual sheet's wrinkles and folds still visible, but the surface pressed and waxed smooth-as lovingly hand-worked as anything that has ever existed.
The Minus Touch
shimmers with powerful effect, not so much like the proverbial church of modernism, more like a massage; a dissolution of clutter, a realignment with the senses and a glimmer of the thoughtfulness that ought to be routine. I can't buy a piece, but I think I'd pay by the hour to just sit in the gallery.
Reception 2-4 pm Saturday; through April 23. Linda Durham Contemporary Art, 1101 Paseo de Peralta, 466-6600
The annual juried student exhibition at the College of Santa Fe has rolled around once again; you know, the event where the college finds a couple of hack pseudo-celebrities like, uh, me and artist Franky Kong to select the work. Okay, okay, Kong is a thoughtful artist and an accomplished curator and we'll leave it at that. Point is, I'm pretty sure that last year I was down right rude about that show because it, uh, sucked. This year the show does not suck. I wish I could take credit for my keen jurying ability, but the fact of the matter is that quality work is happening, and happening consistently, at the college. There was enough work, not just to fill the room, but to do it with something approaching cohesion, which is handy, since the title or theme or what-have-you is
Fit
. Now, pulling out a cohesive show means some committed, earnest work doesn't make the grade. Let me be clear with those regrettably marching to the gallery to pick up rejected work-not getting into the show means about zero in the scope of things. But if it makes you feel better, go ahead and disparage the jurors for favoring ironic hipsterism over dedicated craft. Guilty as charged. Still if the crafty people could infuse their work with a smidge more cultural awareness and the hipsters could take some time to develop some craft, just imagine the show we could have next year.
Reception 5-7 pm Friday. College of Santa Fe, Fine Arts Gallery, 1600 St. Michael's Drive, 473-6508
