ISSUE12 /
SUMMER 2010
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Shoichi Ida in Chicago
dedicated to Kazu Toki
Robert Kushner
A recent memorial exhibition of Shoichi Ida's paintings, sculpture and prints at Perimeter Gallery, Chicago, gave viewers a rare in-depth glimpse into this remarkable body of work. Ida has long been one of Japan's most highly regarded, contemporary nonobjective, artists with prestigious awards and museum retrospectives. Although he has lived and exhibit regularly in America and kept up extensive professional relationships with American artists, his work is less known than it should be outside of Japan. In contrast to the current glut of East Asian art, Ida's works fall far from contemporary trends that favor kitsch, irony and slick execution. more...
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Snapshots of The Decay Of Empire
Mike Nelson: A Psychic Vacuum
Robert Kushner
Mike Nelson's brilliant installation insinuates itself into the very heart of urban decrepitude, a public market space the Lower East Side of New York City, a building abandoned, empty, peeling, slowly descending into ever increasing entropy. Even before any artistic intervention the building itself is a metaphor for Nelson's dystopian world view. Built as an idealistic replacement for the Lower East Side's pushcarts and vendors in 1940, this market complex was just a little too late for the thriving period of the this immigrant neighborhood. By 1995 this section of the Essex Street Market became an underused artifact and was closed. Ripening, marinating, waiting for Nelson's unique process of art making. more...