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1/7/2011

Formally Speaking

Haifa Museum of Art, Haifa

Formally Speaking
I. Lines Made by Walking
II. And what shall we do with Painting in the 21st Century?

Participating Artists:
Francis Alÿs
Fikret Atay
Hanna Ben-Haim Yulzari
Amit Berlowitz
Guy Briller
Matthew Buckingham
Leor Grady
Shilpa Gupta
Hadas Hassid
Efrat Kedem
Avi Mograbi
Guy Raz
Gideon Rubin
Dafna Shalom
Eyal Yehuda
Lin Yilin
Yaara Zach

Curator: Ruth Direktor

Under a single umbrella title the two exhibitions wish to draw attention to formalist (or quasi-formalist) issues concerning the language of art. They set out to divert the pendulum from intense engagement with narrative and content to contemplation of art in terms of form or medium. The form will be a line, the most basic in art's reservoir of forms, and the medium-painting, the oldest and most veteran among media. Only that the line is made by walking, and therefore it is permeated with sweat and dust, with physicality and politics, and painting transpires within the scope of artists who also work with photography, sculpture, and video. 21st century formalism is a whole new story: the lines are spawned by walking; painting redefines itself in a post-medium age, and the language of art is already inseparably blended with the juices of life.

Formally Speaking (I) Lines Made by Walking

In 1967 English artist Richard Long walked back and forth on a piece of grassy field until a straight line was created. A black-and-white photograph of the line left by his walk on the grass is the only trace of the poetic-romantic-conceptual act which has become one of the works most etched in the consciousness of land and environmental art.

Inspired by Long's line and the cross between the minimalistic basic form and the physicality of the walking act, the exhibition features works containing manifestations of lines and walking. They draw attention to the formal, physical, and political force innate to walking-meditative walking, walking which is an act of protest, walking as an ecological act, walking as characteristic of the contemporary nomadic condition; walking which creates a line.

Formally Speaking (II): And what shall we do with Painting in the 21st Century?

The title of the exhibition is borrowed from a short poem by Leah Goldberg:

In answer

to the question: Why are lyrical poems being written?

And what shall we do with horses
in the twentieth century?
And with the gazelles?
And with the big rocks
in the hills of Jerusalem?

The question "And what shall we do with painting in the 21st century?" is neither apologetic nor nostalgic. The discussion about the death, or the resurrection, of painting is outside the range of concerns addressed by the show. Even if the existence of painting is self-evident, and needs no apologies or explanations, the question remains: What shall we do with it in the new century?

The answers are not necessarily found in painting alone. The discussion about painting also arises from photography, video, and objects which relate in various manners to the history of painting, its problems, and the way in which it infiltrates every engagement with images. An exhibition about painting held in 2011 inevitably refers to the spillover between mediums and to the fact that a lack of commitment to a given medium is one of the quintessential characteristics of artistic practice in recent decades.

The works in the exhibition, all dating from recent years, reflect different approaches to painting: some respond to the painterly tradition, some violate or abuse it, others try to draw away from painting (only to re-approach it), and there are also works which strive, nevertheless and despite everything, to be painting.

Image: Francis Alÿs, Retoque/Painting, 2008 (video still)

Press contact:
Eli Berga, Marketing Director, HMS
Phone: 04-9115999 eli@hms.org.il

Opening Saturday July 2, 2011 8:00 p.m.

Haifa Museum of Art
26 Shabbetai Levi Street, Haifa, 33043, Israel
Hours:
Sun, Mon, Tue, Wed 10:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.
Thu 4:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Fridays 10:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.
Saturdays 10:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m.
Museums ticket:
Adults NIS 30
Children (ages 5-18) NIS 20

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