Artist Hung Viet Nguyen is a magician and an alchemist. His paintings evoke the beauty of nature, its wonder and its spiritual quality. He takes the real and reconfigures it, shapes it into a mysterious, reverent space. With images that are both landscapes and stunning mosaic-like patterns, the Vietnamese-born, Los Angeles-based artist transports viewers into paintings that resemble an enchanted realm. [Read more…]
Florine Stettheimer: Painting Poetry
at the Jewish Museum, NYC
Reviewed by Arabella Hutter von Arx
In 1916, when Florine Stettheimer was 45 and had been painting for over 20 years, she had her first solo show at the Knoedler Gallery in New York. Half way through the show, she wrote in her diary: “I am not selling much to my amazement.” And, at the end, “Nothing sold.” She did not get the recognition she expected as an artist through the sale of her paintings. Reviews were derisive or indifferent at best. It must have hurt. Had her paintings sold, she would have joined the ranks of painters such as O’Keeffe and Aaron Douglas and Arthur Dove and Gaston Lachaise, her Modernist friends who lived from their art. Instead, she was denied an escape from her position as an upper class idler. From then on, she refused all solo shows. She embraced brazenly her identity as upper class, at least publicly. She overpriced her paintings to prevent any sales. [Read more…]