~BLINN & LAMBERT vs. LUKE TODD & BOBBY VITERI / in THEORY . . .
BEING . . .
A BRIEF COMPARISON of TWO VERY DIFFERENT – YET INTER-PLAYING EXHIBITS
THAT CLOSED – WITH GREAT STYLE & DEPTH – THE NYC 2017 ART SEASON.
BLINN & LAMBERT / ‘NEW GREY PLANET’ vs. LUKE TODD & BOOBY VITERI / ‘MEDITATIONS: A STUDY IN INNER PEACE’
RIGHT OFF THE BAT . . both shows, were more what you would call ‘PRODUCTIONS’, as opposed to straight-forward exhibits, such as . . paintings on a wall, drawings in frames, sculptures on the floor, or projections looping on the wall.
BOTH EXHIBITS . . were ‘experiences’. more than say, strictly being about viewing & contemplating.
both involved to differing extents: computers / digital programming. sensory expectation – toppling, is best I can say it.
ordinary objects – made . . new. but not like in surrealism. more like in sci fi. more like in surfaces – seen in a different . . light.
‘The Grey Planet’ being . . about a lot of light.
‘Meditations’ being about the light that’s shone, by a new . . ‘concept’.
‘The Grey Planet’ . . was about being immersed in the non-stop, strobing, room-filling . . colored ‘light’. that said: there is no peace . . but the non-stop & experience that outer state, now. until you exit the gallery.
fiercely projected ‘light’ . . was something you – moved through. and overtook . . your ego (!!).
‘Meditations’ . . was about the ‘light’ that goes on in your head / as you try to get your head around; the newness of expression that lies before you, and beckons: understand me, give me your hand, come trip the inner Peace (!!).
BLINN & LAMBERT / NICHOLAS STEINDORF & KYLE WILLIAMS
‘New Grey Planet’
DEC 15, 2017 – JAN 14, 2018 / the show is still UP !!!!!
catch the REAL ‘REAL’ – while you – can !!!
MICROSCOPE GALLERY, 1329 WILLOUGHBY AVE, 2B, BUSHWICK BROOKLYN
LUKE TODD & BOBBY VITERI
‘Meditations: A Study On Inner Peace’
Nov 17, 18 & 19, 2017
POP-UP / PETER SUTHERLAND’S RAW CHINATOWN STUDIO / Blink & you missed it.
but, don’t worry, these dudes ain’t going nowhere – but up.
they are already popping up in other spaces & places.
P4TG / PRAY FOR THIS GALLERY, 83 Canal St, Buzzer 200, Chinatown, NYC
I HAD THOUGHT . . .
the concurrent ‘STUDIO GHIBLI’ ANIMATION RETROSPECTIVE at the IFC CENTER would be the perfect head-on crash type of launchpad to get right into . . whatever was going to be served up by BLINN & LAMBERT in ‘New Grey Planet’.
the thinking being: well, BLINN & LAMBERT is all about ‘digital’ projection / perhaps some CGI animation / whereas STUDIO GHIBLI is only about hand-drawn / traditional storyboard story-telling . . animation, no digital sequencing / though both are about . . . projections / projected images. a tight corner of ‘conversation’, perhaps.
but that was the point !!
well, that was well-meaning, but in fact . . a no-go.
the more I thought about the raw comparisons, but esp . . after I had actually gone . . to the BLINN & LAMBERT opening & seen the show . . what really started to rub against each other in my mind like 2 quarters, you know, when you get change for everything that costs $1.50 / was ‘New Grey Planet’ vs. ‘Meditations’.
start with . . Color.
‘Studio Ghibli’ . . is not anything, if not color-saturated & color-obsessed / whether futuristic rain forest bold, or retro watercolor wispy. ‘New Grey Planet’ is so color-saturated & color-obsessed / it actually becomes the . . ‘subject’ !! no joke.
when you walk into the gallery venue, which is large and brilliant as a choice for this show, you are just hit head-on by vibrant neon light / as if you had walked into a tiny closet of a room, with a huge monster disco ball twirling in 3/4 of the space. you were blinded – by the color. tghe color stream – was the animation. the room was black as night (in the rural countryside, lol) & streams of color ran through you like a high-end radar / cat scan. it didn’t really matter what was being projected on the walls, and over the real-life quasi-scientific nerdy objects, presented as ‘diaramas’ in front of each loop / what mattered was your total immersion in color, and your struggle to stay . . oriented.
this is what I meant by . . experience. usually we go to shows that are all about the ‘plasticity’ of the art objects before you: their composition, their texture (thin or thick paint ?), their expressive brushstrokes or flat seamless spray paint. their material, paint, chalk, metal, wood. free-form, measured. their weight, their concept, their negative space. the hues, the palette. the romance. the joke. the Harlem dudes. the crazy-as-whack / symbolist cartoons.
Color in Studio Ghibli . . takes you places, and informs your emotions. beckons and teases, like a poem.
Color in ‘New Grey Planet’ . . becomes a means to its own end. it is the story-line. a bombardment of sensory pulses, that defy any story . . telling. ‘you’ . . maneuvering in the color – are the story.
and, whenever I got to that point, in the essay I was going to write, all thoughts of Studio Ghibli evaporated . . like a monster Spirit hovering over your shoulder as you wait for a train, and all I could think of was . . LUKE TODD & BOBBY VITERI /
and how their show . . ‘Meditations: A Study On Inner Peace’, was so much about ‘Color’ as a Subject, too.
except it was the exactly the opposite / of Blinn & Lambert !!
‘Meditation’ was about . . non-color !! though it had plenty of color in it, just not the usual suspects !!
and it was this absence of color that struck me more than anything else . . after the show had settled down in my mind.
it was such a non-palette experience. there’s that word again. everything was about surface / from the rusted patina of Viteri’s copper electroplate on etched steel panel, to the disappearing ‘blooming flower grid’ of Todd’s white plaster ‘Rose Extruder’.
‘Meditations’ felt . . industrial. and so funny re: its title / Inner Peace (!!)
‘New Grey Planet’ felt . . luminous. and so funny re: its title / Grey (!!) Planet
‘Meditations’ felt . . very how to say: meditation manual / scientific . . but brought my imagination alive / it was sparking . . sci fi. science fiction scenarios left & right, what with Luke Todd’s .. matrix / birth . . ‘Rose Extruder’ & the hand of man in creation & computers (it was programmed to some great effect), and could: wipe-out, too.
and, also of course, in his ‘blood bubbling – in a plastic tube’ / ‘Blood Rug’ Celtic knot on the floor.
even Bobby Viteri’s immensely mysterious ‘Cinderblock’ – crystal awakened primal / sci fi screamings.
whereas,
‘New Grey Plant’ – whose title spoke to sci fi … ?!!!!!!
just shocked me, plain and simple. there was no tripping into the future imagination, unless I guess Blinn & Lambert wanted to simulate you entering a . . transporter ???
I didn’t feel ‘lifted off’.
I felt small, and stupid, dumbstruck, and dysfunctional – which is in itself a very profound, and profoundly disturbing ‘situation’, is it .. not ?
it was less about sci fi, then it was about . . the present.
so outta control, so over-whelming, so vulnerable. inner peace, NOT.
KINETIC / MOVING / BOTH INWARD & TECHNICALLY. MOVING PARTS / & MOVING ART THEORY – FORWARD.
‘Meditations’ took me on a ride, not so much as with regards to ‘inner peace’ – but as to . . future thought (?!!)
object contemplation. wonder. attraction. addiction. out of my body. spinning in the universe of art / and new age ‘plasticity’. the ‘umami’ of color/non-color. the kinetic weirdness of the forms before me. and their newness. the awe of being in a room, in which the ‘infinite-ness of art’ is re-affirmed, and even in this, sends the poetic soul flying, esp the poetic souls . . that tetter – on the cutting-edge of the hardcore art scene.
kinetic within the artworks, again even the Bobby Viteri etched copperplate wall pieces were kinetic & . . and of course the Luke Tood kinetic sculptures . . were: kinetic.
within / and without / as in, concept.
is that . . Inner Peace ?
within / and, without.
‘New Grey Planet’ – stopped me in my tracks. and all I could feel was one sensory signal: STRUGGLE.
I didn’t care what those mundane pseudo-ordinary / scientific objects / or images were.
I could see them. I couldn’t break the ‘code’. I was immersed . . in spinning like a top.
I was struggling to breath in the . . the pulsing / hyper – kinetic light.
you swam in the kinetic.
I couldn’t go anywhere in my . . mind / that I could stop, and understand. never mind, un-ravel.
I was already somewhere.
on a . . new grey plant ?
with not enough oxygen, and too much . . colored light ?
color separation – that cut into you, like a knife.
‘Meditations’ was so . . Mind blowing.
‘New Grey Planet’ was so . . drop dead Optical.
BLINN & LAMBERT . . ‘New Grey Planet’
optical – to the max. sensory overload / a kind of radical . . reality.
color separation – to the max. blindingly, so. programmed thus. non-stop.
how to de-code ?
the objects – when you are struggling . . to stand ?
how to move / when the light is the room’s kinetic force-field.
LUKE TODD, ‘Untitled (Rose Extruder)’ – ‘Meditations: A Study On Inner Peace’.
programmed – to rise, again.
kinetic.
Radical. Imaginary.
LUKE TODD, ‘Blood Rug’ / silicone tbing, dye, peristaltic pump.
non-stop. pulsing. off-color. shades of imagination.
BOBBY VITERI, ‘Outter’, copper electroplate on etched steel panel.
PHOTOS: NANCY SMITH
