Anyone care for Lisa's Breasts or Lollipops?

Despite social conventions that “everyone should be on their best behaviour”, eroticism can now be embraced as a recreational activity in Lisa Yuskavage’s third solo exhibition at the David Zwirner gallery. A vivid series of female nudes overly occupied in exploring their sexuality within surreal landscapes and dramatically lit interiors.

With each painting coexists a psychological and sordid narrative behind human beauty. This duality increasingly obscures the viewer’s ability to interpret and contextualise the fantastical worlds that the nudes are situated. A general conclusion that one arrives at from these vibrantly lush sceneries is that they serve as a playground in which the young women playfully reside. Yet their uninhibited behaviour hints at a sexual psychology that is perverse and even sadistic. For example in a small but psychologically powerful painting that evokes sensuality and danger is Stormy Mound (2011). A portrayal of a solitary young female kneeling promiscuously on a beautifully lush earth mound creates a psychological drama as the viewer is conflicted between feelings of sympathy for the isolated girl and mistrust due to her sexually implicit body language. This conundrum is heightened by the ominously violet skyscape and the whisking of Yuskavage’s brushstrokes; a desolate and uninviting atmosphere contrasted with the young girl’s invitingly carnal kneeling pose.

The duality of dangerous beauty is repeated in all of Yuskavage’s paintings, some more sexually explicit than others. In one of her many mundanely titled works Little Afternoon Feeding (2011), two young prepubescent female nudes seem, upon first glance, to be innocently picking and feeding one another lollipop shaped fruits. However upon close viewer inspection, the viewer is suddenly becomes aware of the youthful erotica conveyed through their bodily dispositions. Yuskavage bestows her figures with curvaceous bodies and breasts, it is the indecent acts that they partake in that stir senses of arousal and eroticism…I know I have been stirred several times. The painting contains a squatted woman feeding her seated counterpart in a richly lush environment. Immediately the viewer is confronted with a lewd sense of vaginal pleasure that is explicitly prompted by the sitter’s foot. Additionally, the seemingly benevolent feeding act subtly hints of masochism with the sitter submissively consuming what is being “given” to her. The erotic pathos that the artist paints revolves around a cyclic correlation between innocence, beauty, and sexuality conjuring concurent emotions of great endearment and perplexity. Is it possible that a group of youthful, innocent looking girls- angelic in countenance and voluptuous in form- have the capacity to ignominiously succumb to such dishonourable acts of carnal desire? This perceptual bemusement is compounded by the disturbing presence of village bystanders that- who are painted in many of Yuskavage’s outdoor compositions -overlook the artist’s young protagonists without any clear dissent or animosity. In fact, their voyeuristic dispositions seem almost consenting to the debauchery that Yuskavage’s young nudes indulge in, evoking the idea that just maybe, such public indecency can be acceptable; even perhaps inspiriting. Though the notion may sound inconceivable, the absurdity of it is strikingly evident in the waywardness that is exhibited in the richly painted diptych titled Little Outskirts(2011). The drearily yellow and umber skyscape with its beautifully vegetated foreground, is queerly juxtaposed with the explicit act of sadism exhibited by the two young girls- one of whom is kneeling on all four whilst her companion sits playfully on her backside. This painting is irrefutably the artist’s most deviant portrayal as is accentuated by the dainty insertion of flowers into the kneeling girl’s anus. Intensifying this highly aberrant spectacle is the voyeuristic demeanour of the meticulously dressed male onlooker in the background. As the observant Farmer leans suavely on his cane the viewer can only help but wonder what meaning lies behind this visual theatre of nymphomania?

The biggest and most spectacular of these theatrical paintings is a vivid green triptych which is amusingly titled, Triptych (2011). Green clouds and mountains dominate this three- panel composition and is overtly erotic as the rest of the works. On the right panel a carefree girl lies with only a thong and striped socks while sucking on a lollipop as she gazes into the distance; in the center, another figure lies on a table with her legs splayed, her dress casually hiked up exposing her vagina. Within the background, a group of village women- all of whom are contrastingly dressed from head to toe- appear to be sternly observing the girls’ reprehensible behaviour. This salacious psychological narrative coupled with the comparably large compositional scale, entice the viewer to intriguingly scan and glean in pursuit of knowledge and understanding behind the extreme dichotomies between rational and irrational, inhibited and uninhibited, exotic and erotic, and between innocence and sinful.

Such social paradigms combined with the visual surrealism that Yuskavage masterfully paints easily fudges the boundaries between what is real and what is fiction. It is also a psychological paradigm that doesn’t instantaneously strike the viewer at first sight. In fact, such is the visual complexity of Yuskavage’s narrative that as the viewer strives to search for cognitive answers they inadvertently become one with the village people, participating in voyeuristic acts that are as “uncivilised” as the lewd behaviour that the young girls perform- whether it be by themselves or with each other. Yuskavage’s adeptness with light and shadow is as sensuous as the nudes she paints (regardless of how young they are) and this exhibition will certainly leave all those unwary gobsmacked…whether or not they have a lollipop in their mouths.

Carsten Höller: (In)experience at the New Museum

Taking up almost the entirety of the museum, the exhibit “Experience” offers up various defined experiences that employ large-scale, interactive pieces. Visitors are also welcome to share in a secondary experiential level with the help of special headgear, which uses mirrors, creating an upside-down view of the world for the wearer. Employing size, light, optics, and sensations, Höller triggers any individual’s senses, removing them from typical daily life and, more importantly, the typical museum experience.

Unfortunately, “Experience” does not have the effect its artist and curators probably had in mind. As an exhibit, which largely utilizes spectacle, museum curators and staff grossly underestimated the show’s popularity. Visitors hoping to walk around a topsy-turvy world, courtesy of the aforementioned headgear, must wait in line an unexpected amount of time. Visitors must wait in another line to sign a legal release. Before they enter, a visitor is already waiting on, noticeably understaffed, lines (a recurring trait of the show). Once in, visitors may choose any floor to begin their sensory excursion. The fourth floor presents the option to wait on a line to go down a slide, meanwhile watching put-together adults (children below a certain height and weight are not permitted) make a big to-do about sitting in the slide, then hearing their overly dramatic screams as they fly down it. Your other option for the fourth floor is to sit on a grandiose Mirror Carousel (2005) filled to the brim with fanciful lights and mirrors, only to take the most boring and anticlimactic turn around the room possibly imaginable. The third floor provides audiences with another, even slower, line to experience the Giant Psycho Tank (2000), designed to replicate the feeling of weightlessness. Before anyone gets a chance to feel weightlessness, they’ll get to experience a great wait. It should also be noted that this piece is designed for the true exhibitionist, as most likely your naked backside will be viewed by anyone who happens to venture too close to the less than substantial viewing barricade.

Any impact of Höller’s work is dissolved rapidly by a slew of inefficiency and pieces not designed to accommodate vast crowds. It is clear that his work, which partakes in amusement park spectacle, is not equipped to mimic their efficiency and crowd-control, especially within the confines of a museum. The visitor is left venturing through a malaise of sensory overload compounded by inactive anticipation.

The Strange Attractor-Revision

“The Strange Attractor” an exhibition of new work by artist Stephen Willats encompasses both the scientific and the artistic by merging cybernetics, system research, and communication with film, photography, and collage. Willats work strives to transform the perception
of everyday objects into possibilities within the community of people that are interacting with those objects. The objects include anything the artist has come in contact with such as the corner of the street, a sign, or an animal. By allowing the viewer to manipulate their circumstances through text and images the artist gives free range to construct ones own reality.
The driving force behind the work is the city in which the exhibition is located;New York. By gathering information from the streets of New York, like iconic images, the pavement beneath ones feet, the faces of people, as well as a plethora of other images, the artist has created a complex system linking minute details of the city and the people dwelling within it.
The exhibition is located in a large spacious gallery with windows overlooking the city and the work spans the entire room. The pieces are placed so that the viewer must move around them in order to see them in their entirety.

The largest piece in the exhibition is entitled “Data Stream Portrait of New York.” The piece consists of a free standing wall, which is covered in small square images, linked by a thin black line. The photos consist of images of city life and moments that occur within. By assembling the work in this way the artist has left most of the interpretation up to the viewer enabling that viewer to make their own decisions about which image should be linked with the next. By moving from image to image viewers can create a story and relate that to their own experiences in the city.

“How the future looks from here” is another work within the exhibition. The piece is centered around a Brooklyn family who is striving for a harmonious future. It includes images of the family merged with text centered around a concern the couple has, and ending with that concern becoming a reality. The reality becomes a factor that the couple must deal with in order to move forward towards happiness. By choosing to change the way they think about technology and its influence within their lives the couple changes their reality in turn making them happy. Giving the couple and the viewer the choice to change their circumstances allows for the manipulation of reality and the changing of situations.

“The Strange Attractor” successfully conveys the artists concept of humans controlling their own reality through work that encourages the viewer to create their own story.

Michelle Lopez: Vertical Neck (Revised)

Michelle Lopez’s second solo exhibition at Simon Preston Gallery introduces us to a space of minimal approach where subtle shapes and smooth surfaces invite our senses to embrace a mystical presence.

In it reigns a contradiction between the toughness of the materials and the softness of the shapes. Consequently, the hard aluminum juxtaposition of these big leaning wall-based sculptures with smooth folds and wrinkles conveys an impossible scenario of delusion and caprice. Through multiple crumples and distortions, tough aluminum seems to be malleable and elastic. Michelle Lopez employs different material qualities in her pieces achieving perverted results; aluminum’s rigid appearance turns into flexible crumpled paper, wood’s natural solidness turns into curved melted plastic.

The body of work is embedded with a minimalist semblance. Blue Angel exemplifies the reductionist principle that is present all over the show; a simply crumpled mirroring surface which contrasts with its deep matte blue backside, supports the piece’s visual statement. A sober presentation allows focusing our gaze in the contradicting properties of the elements displayed.

The work’s austerity summed to its vertical orientation evokes spiritual solemnity. Moreover, the reduced number of colors employed intensifies it. Thus, the attention is addressed towards formal resonances, avoiding excesses that could divert us from the essence of the piece. In addition, the sculptures appear to be interconnected by their wall tangency fact that creates an atmosphere of unity where we become part of a whole entity.

The white space of the walls works as a magnetic field between the sculptures, creating a coherent unity through them. Is the tension between the powerful aesthetics of the sculptures -mainly achieved through inherent contradictions between shape and material, which carries out this invisible engagement. The void left between the pieces assumes a physical presence and functions as a real element. Is not easy to transform the no-form into form and Lopez achieved it with subtle sensitivity; when we walk through the gallery the art’s aura is almost touchable.

Another group of works, her maple plywood and grip's sculptures, Your Board, share the same features of Blue Angel in terms of deformation and austerity. However, they imply more obvious connotations; at the first gaze, the image of a skateboard would appear in our mind and simultaneously multiple associations with urban culture. The fact they are related to a real object -because the combination of wood and sandpaper-, differentiates this series from Blue Angel ones, where forms are completely abstract.

Spartacus Chetwynd: Home Made Tasers (REVISION)

As part of Studio 231
10/26/11 - 1/1/12
New Museum spinoff Studio 231 hosts a bizarre showing of contemporary artistic “talent.” Courtesy of Spartacus Chetwynd, the space has been transformed into a hybrid between a stage and a puppet show, with a dash of junkyard.

The museum’s website states that a variety of performances will be held at the space over the course of the exhibition. All of Chetwynd's performances are catered to their environments and in one performance at 231 all actors are to directly approach audience members, which is possibly a customization for the confrontational reputation of the Bowery. The press release warns that all of the actors are “amateurs” yet even in the derogatory sense, this proves to be an understatement. During one such performance, two actors appeared and casually approached and greeted the audience before inserting one lucky viewer in a rolling office chair. The two male performers stood on each side of her and told a child-like story in a make believe British-ish accent about the destruction of the Earth's natural environment. While one actor spoke, the other dispassionately moved the figurines in a small puppet box, which sat before the viewer. At the end of each seemingly unrehearsed stanza, the two men would wheel the spectator to the following mini stage to continue, and finally concluded their story in an alternate world where humans had to build a new Earth.

The space itself leaves much to be desired. As nothing concerning this is stated in the press release, one can only assume the appearance that the actors are living in the studio is unintentional. Fruits and snacks lie half-eaten on the floor and tables just steps away from a sculpture or puppet awaiting its next performance. The hand dyed costumes were the one element in the show that appeared professional, yet the actors dragged them on the floor as they walked barefoot throughout the gallery, colliding with various art objects along the way.

It is strange that a show connected to such an established institution such as the New Museum would be installed and preserved with so little care. Nothing about the Chetwynd show seems intentional or professional from the actors to the objects, and the affiliation with such a high quality museum with high expectations only further lowers the quality of the show.

My "Experience"

Carsten Holler: Experience at The New Museum
10/26/11 - 1/15/12


My hopes for Carsten Holler’s Experience at the New Museum were unusually high. While researching the exhibition I had imagined swirling around on the Mirror Carousel (2005), and gliding down the Untitiled (Slide) (2011). I also felt a titillating excitement when I thought about getting into the Giant Psycho Tank (1999) with others; clothes optional. Unfortunately, my visit did not live up to my grand expectations.

As I entered the lobby I was confronted by a series of lines reminiscent of the wait for Splash Mountain at Disneyland. At the end of these waits were two lengthy waivers: one for the use of Holler’s upside-down glasses and the other that outlined instructions for the “rides.” I skipped the line for the glasses and signed the other mandatory waiver. I was then ready for my “experience.”

I ventured up to the fourth floor in excitement for my descent on the slide, only to be faced with an even bigger line. Frustrated and annoyed I decided to hop on the Mirror Carousel, a swing ride and carousel hybrid, first to bide some time. After a minute or so I got off feeling unsatisfied due to it’s unbearably slow speed thinking maybe I had set my expectations too high.

I still had hope for the slide so I waited for my drop through the gallery to the second floor. I admit I felt uneasy as I stood and watched others enter the mouth of the metal structure. Sometimes the slide-goers would let out a scream that echoed throughout the museum that often resulted in laughter. I was then ready for the plunge.

I zoomed through to the bottom in a couple of seconds. Again, disappointment set in. Was this Holler’s intention? The rest of my experience was less than satisfactory. I was only inclined to go into the Experience Corridor, four rooms adorned with self-experiments, to escape the flickering Double Light Corner, a wall-mounted light installation sure to induce epileptic seizures, which plagued the second floor. After sniffing the “love drug” that warned of amorous feelings after inhaling, I made my way up to the third floor.

While witnessing another lengthy line for the Giant Psycho Tank, I decided to call it a day. At the end of my visit I felt disheartened and strangely disoriented. I think the most enjoyable part of my “experience” was knowing I hadn’t waited for those silly upside-down glasses.

Carsten Höller at the New Museum

A mirrored carousel, a three story tube slide, and a sensory deprivation chamber (among others) dispersed throughout an architecturally marvelous New York museum. The result? Carsten Höller’s Experience.

Höller’s highly publicized one-man show at the New Museum invites viewers to participate in a museum experience unlike any other. On view through January 15, 2012, the exhibition includes the most noteworthy pieces from the past two decades of the scientist-turned-artist’s career. His body of work breaks the conventions of audience/artwork interaction, and according to the exhibition’s press release, is “designed to explore the limits of human sensorial perception and logic.” Literally penetrating the museum’s lobby, second, third, and fourth floors, Höller’s work successfully transforms the museum environment and flips the dynamics and conceptions of the art institution on its head.

Naturally the most playful piece on view is Höller’s signature 102’ long tube slide installation. The aluminum and plexiglas slide punctures the poured concrete floors and ceilings of the museum’s interior, stretching from the fourth to second floor galleries. The interior space of the fourth floor is the most cohesive and unified gallery. Adjacent to the entrance of the tube slide is a mirrored carousel that invites viewers to step onto the platform and sit in slowly revolving seats. The industrial materials of the slide and gray museum interior are reflected in the mirrored surface of the carousel and ties the whole floor together. Live songbirds caged within a gigantic mobile fill the space with their chirps and project calmness over the chaotic industrious amusement park environment while slide participants wait to dive down the tube.

Upon being thrown high speed out the reverse end of the slide, viewers are assaulted with a series of flashing fluorescent lights that line the walls of the gallery. Meant to induce hallucinations, the flashing bulbs illuminate a collection of brightly colored animals that lethargically lay in the migraine-inducing gallery.

Located on the third floor gallery is Höller’s controversial Giant Psycho Tank. Here, viewers are encouraged to experience nude or swimsuit donned weightlessness in a foot of super saline water. Further, visitors have the option to wear special upside down glasses to physically alter perception of the space.

Adults and children alike carried almost drug-induced expressions as they navigated the museum space. Their boisterous smiles and laughter, otherwise inappropriate for the museum environment, suggests that Höller’s construction of the experiential exhibition received a high level of success.

The Wonderfully Strange World of Seher Shah (revision)

Within the walls of the Scaramouche Gallery is a collection of drawings, prints, and photographs by Pakistani- born artist Seher Shah. Object Anxiety exhibits a continuing exploration into the fusion between architectural engineering and cultural designs with relation to geometry, linear perspective, and symbolism.

A majority of Shah’s prints and drawings contain a singular ominous black quadrilateral that repeatedly bisects her compositions. Shah’s largest graphite drawing measures a modest seventy- two inches by one hundred and six inches and truly exemplifies the artist’s adeptness in creating stylistic juxtapositions. Object Relic (2011) portrays a vast architectural landscape composed of tightly detailed patterns that recede endlessly into space. Intersecting this pristine landscape is a penetrative black quadrilateral that originates from off the page. Similarly, a smaller scaled archival print titled Monument (2009) exhibits a symmetrical composition, which unlike Object Relic, acquires a lower horizon line behind a diminishing perspective of an architectural island. However, it is the quadrilateral that is located centrally on the island that functions almost like an ancient obelisk, granting this particular work a unique ambivalence between spirituality and occultness. Though Shah’s compositions are symbolically poignant, the historical background attached to them is just as compelling and most likely unknown to the viewer. Nevertheless, Shah’s fusion between block forms and intricate patterning leaves the spectator in awe.

The meticulously patterned backgrounds denote of a timeless culture that relates implicitly to the artist’s nationality. A smaller thirty by twenty inch drawing titled Monument Wall (2009) conveys most profoundly Shah’s bold distortion of spatial composition. She juxtaposes a group of idle quadrilateral and triangular forms with an intricate web of “frolicking” bands and patterns conjuring a- in what can only be described as- surreal skyscape. The employment of these two formal elements affords Shah’s works, a “perfect” balance between space, line, and form thus enabling both elements to harmoniously coincide with one another. Interestingly, (but perhaps the least fascinating) Shah presents a floor- based installation titled, Object Repetition (line to distance). The piece is constructed of several small, pointy plaster objects, which have been judiciously positioned to recreate a three dimensional representation of her two- dimensional architectural compositions.

In totality, Scaramouche Gallery’s gorgeous space permits each of Shah’s works to function as symbolic entities. Every mark and shape converges to form these expansive planetary landscapes that possess an extra-terrestrial aura and yet, its infinite architecture and ambiguous space evokes an exquisiteness that feels very much human.

Carsten Holler at the New Museum

Former entomologist Carsten Holler has turned his scientific experiments from bugs to humans at his show at the New Museum. The show is all about visitors' experiences and reactions, ranging from terrifying, childish delight, and unfortunately, boredom. This type of show, rarely seen in New York, definitely lived up to its title, and was successful in focusing entirely on the viewer and how they experience different environments and respond to different stimuli.

The biggest problem is that the beginning of the experience was not very well thought out. After checking your coat (and presumably your wallet too), you have to get on two lines. The first, to sign a waiver to go on the slide, goes rather quickly. The second, to sign a waiver and receive a pair of goggles that makes one see everything upside-down, is long, and requires that you leave a credit card on hold, which, if you already checked your wallet, is an annoyance. On the top floor is the mirrored carousel and the entrance to the slide. The carousel moves very slowly, and seems more of a distraction for people while waiting on another line to go down the slide. Out of the concrete floor comes a metal cylinder, which sharply inclines and then disappears down to the third floor. As people go down their screams echo off the museum’s walls. The wait is worth it. You zoom down the slide where the walls become transparent, and the visitors on the third floor can see you rocket by. The second floor has a foam landing and walls of flashing lights, which are supposed to make you hallucinate. Also on this floor is a fish tank with benches for you to lie on and a space for your head so you feel as though you are in the tank with the fish. This was relaxing and beautiful, and felt so peaceful and a total opposite to the adrenaline rush of the slide and the flashing lights. Less successful was a series of rooms on the second floor: smelling a vial of “love potion”, using a vibrator on your arm to make your nose feel larger, pressing a button to get poked in the arm, and watching a video on an ipod. There were many kinks: the lines and the contrast between works that make one feel excited and those which do not add to the show, but this type of show is important to contemporary art, and should continue to be developed. Viewer-focused shows that are meant to give a unique experience should be nurtured, not dismissed.

Andy Coolquitt, Agnes Denes, and Robert Smithson at Lisa Cooley

The works of Andy Coolquitt, Agnes Denes, and Robert Smithson may have completely different aesthetics, but they all engage concepts of energy and are unified by their use of geometric forms.

Denes’ works on paper are highly refined and systematic. Her Map Projections series maps the earth as different geometries found in nature, such as The Egg and The Snail. Earth’s latitude and longitude lines that form these new shapes are orderly and calculated. Denes’ Pyramid series explores pattern and geometry in an equally meticulous way. The fine lines of these lithographs are printed on black and white paper and sprinkled with a silver dusting that makes them shimmer up close. The familiar five-sided pyramid is twisted and stretched just enough so it is recognizable, but begins to look like it’s floating or moving through space. Titles like, Bird Pyramid for the Twenty-Second Century, suggest the pyramid is not only an ancient form, but also a geometry of the future.

Smithson’s drawing of The Spiral Jetty explores a natural geometry similarly to Denes’ work, but is casually sketched on paper with marker and pencil. Smithson’s iconic earthwork, in the shape of a spiral, explains the irreversibility that happens in nature without the expenditure of energy. The work is exposed and submerged over time by changes in its environment, and without repair, it gradually loses its original identity.

Coolquitt’s colorful found-object sculptures contrast the pristine paper works in the show. Rosemont Towers is a collection of lighters that the artist gathered from vacated crack dens over several years. Each lighter has its own individual characteristics, which are kept intact as they are stacked on top of each other in a tall tower-like form. Most of the lighters are empty and worn down, so they can no longer supply energy, referencing the individuals that once gathered in these abandoned spaces. In A Soft Striped Place, Coolquitt creates a comfortable meeting place where viewers can lean against soft fabric rectangles in one of the corners of the gallery. These soft forms invite conversation and closeness, which counterbalance their cool, minimal aesthetic.

Denes’ maps and prints convey that natural shapes have the ability to change into new forms while adhering to universal systems and patterns. Smithson’s Spiral Jetty coils out in natural space to form a perfect geometry that suggests duration at the cost of energy. Coolquitt’s forms invite the exchange of energy through conversation among the visitors in the gallery and reference the lost energy in abandoned spaces, people, and objects.

While the works of each artist don’t formally complement each other, there is a unity in each artist’s interest in systems, whether they be social or mathematical, and the use of geometry to create minimal works. However, the show is too vast in the artists’ concepts of energy in space, nature, and people for there to be a strong conceptual connection between each work.

Glen Fogel: Goldye

Goldye

The Lower East Side’s Callicoon Fine Arts Gallery is host to artist Glen Fogel’s second New York solo exhibition this year. Sentimentally titled Goldye, after Fogel’s late grandmother, Goldye is an installation consisting of a white 1991 Cadillac Seville, an mp3 player, two audio speakers, a mosfet transistor, an arduino circuit board, and a framed certificate of sale, made out to the artist’s grandmother— who was the original owner of the car— hung in the rear right corner of the room.

The Cadillac Seville fills the tiny Callicoon gallery, confronting the viewer head on as they enter, taking them by surprise since the space’s large front windows are reflective two way glass, only allowing the viewer to see through it from within the gallery. The inability to see inside suggests the feeling of privacy, which once inside, gives way to full on intimacy as the viewer inches around the vehicle. The size of the object versus the size of the space promotes the idea that the car is not so much a piece of art in a gallery, but that the space is a mere container for the automobile, nothing more than, say, a car garage.

The Seville's imposing presence is emphasized by the sudden but regular flashing of its headlights as it emits a guttural sound that we begin to recognize as the word “Shit”, drawn out over several seconds. What is heard is a recording of the artist’s voice as he recites the word slowly, dryly, and somewhat painfully. This verbal and visual “response” from the Cadillac, actually a looped recording, feels like a human reaction to the claustrophobic confines of the space combined with the inevitable physical contact made with visitors.

Goldye is an intriguing unification of the mechanical aspect of an automobile and the emotive quality of the visual and aural stimulus. More than that, though, Goldye feels like a monument. Fogel’s late grandmother, for whom the show is named, suffered a near-death experience approximately one year before her recent passing, and Goldye comprises a reenactment of this near-death event. In that regard, the lights can be explained as relating to the mythicized lights one reportedly sees upon their death, and the verbal repetition as Goldye’s response to her near fatal condition.

Callicoon Gallery is the perfect space for Fogel's Goldye because without the tight, somewhat uncomfortable forced intimacy with the work, we might not fully grasp the familial nuances inherent in the piece-- that presence of dark, comical sentimentality embedded in this and other works by the artist.