4/26/2006

Victor Pesce

26 comments:

Painter said...

Victor Pesce
@ Elizabeth Harris Gallery
529 w20 St.
NY, NY 10011

Dennis Matthews said...

reminenscent of James Nutt, eh? very strange work here thanks for putting it up.

JD said...

Interesting; his work, at least that I've seen, has been all Morandi-like still lifes. He was also in a two-person show recently in Williamsburg, and they were all small paintings of boxes, very tender and subtle. I really respect Pesce; he's a great colorist, and he has a beautiful touch. I agree with BB, though, I wonder if the work is ambitious enough. As I'm typing this, I also wonder what makes us feel that work is ambitious or not. Can someone who makes subtle and quiet work, a la Morandi, get noticed today? Is it our actual cultural zeitgeist that demands a certain "hot temperature" in order for art to be relevant, or is it just the market?

no-where-man said...

"inspired by Giorgio Morandi's still lifes and Brice Marden's early monochromes"
so says the NYT's.
my first thought was Yevgeny Zamyatin

zipthwung said...

vermillionmouth would be better for me if there was white underpainting or less translucency. Have to see it in person I guess, but thats the sort of thing that makes me like or dislike a painting.

I like diebenkorns edges, for example.

no-where-man said...

does http://www.cyber-counter.com/ let you choose your sponsor? damn this site gets alot of hits!

Painter said...

Hi No Where Man.
no it doens't let you chose your sponser. I think there are better ones out there. I just found this one and put it on, I was so amazed that I could figure something like that out. I went on Ed Winkleman's counter and it is much more in depth.

Max said...

In the past, it seems, Mr. Pesce has been a sort of minimalist still life painter. I think it is interesting how he is branching out to extend his highly tuned principals to other subject matter. Here, the portrait.

In his still lives, Pesce often omitted shadows to increase the simplicity of his subject matter, allowing it to operate in the painting in a limited dimensionality. Maybe in his portraits, the strangely simplified eyeballs and lips are meant to fill a similar function, giving us a portrait that is bled of certain aspects of its expressive qualities to let compositional qualities become more prominent.

He's treading on strange ground as a painter, keying off odd elements of his subject to press everything into a sort of minimalist color field painter's drunk-dream.

no-where-man said...

yes, it is so much fun i was tracking countries last night that hit one and making a flow chart... my roomates are like YOUR SUCH A DORK, speaking of i was checking your code (is that creepy, maybe i am creepy) and i think if you take out, this text it will go away with out hurting the counter. or you could change it to whatever you want.

no-where-man said...

ok posting on here with the html is tricky

remove the first open link and closed link tag around the copy for Mesothelioma clinical and that should get rid of that 4 u.

i don't know if this is something u care about, i am a little brand focused today.

jpegCritic said...

oh and Painter, just so you know...
In terms of the counter, divide the number
by 3 for a page like this to get an accurate
number. This counter counts http requests
rather than page visits. The requests for this
page are 2 images and 1 html file. Not to
be annoying, but I'm all for accurate assesments.

jpegCritic said...

Oops I tested again, Painter, I'm wrong. Disregard.
I know a lot of counters did that, but not this one.

no-where-man said...

jpegcritic, that would be one that breaks it down into:
Returning Visitors, First time Visitors, Unique Visitors,..

y don't ya take me out for drinks and i can teach yall a thing or 2 about the interweb.

sorry that was totally of topic.

jpegCritic said...

Thanks no-where. I'd like a drink right now.
But I hold that some counters simply read
the httpd log-file and iterate the requests.
I've implemented them myself. This one parses
the log-file correctly.

On topic, its nice to see Pesce posted after Jacquette.
Strategies aside, the effect of both (especially Pesce's
still-lives) offers a stillness only painting can offer... The way
surface can addresses you in a way no photograph can, an
address that has to meet you halfway.

no-where-man said...

wow - thx. your right i am drinking

however also looking at 3 fields of output as affor mentioned from a counter right now...

prob. just crazy talk.

cheers.

jpegCritic said...

Not crazy, it's just has a smarter way of parsing. First requests, then ip address or referrer, then timestamp.

JD's question is something I'm also interested in: Quote: Can someone who makes subtle and quiet work, a la Morandi, get noticed today?

Any thoughts? Gallace? -- or uh -- Jacquette?

youth--less said...

With this kind of painting its all about how the edges meet. Looks like he's outlining. No good.

Check out how Vuillard did it. Magic. You can't even figure out how he does it. The planes meet, they touch, they kiss.

http://image.artfact.com/housePhotos/sothebys/H046-L%2000260417.jpg

jpegCritic said...

Hmmm when I think about edges I think about Bailey or Newman... the quality of such. Vuillard' colors meet and create interesting unthought-of spaces. Pesce is a great colorist, but he doesn't try to approach Vuillard's use of spacial manipulation with color. But I love the color of both!

zipthwung said...

Edges:

1) Blurred, sharp or in combination.

Uses:
a) creation of space (blur the bg, keep the fg sharp)
b) visual interest -calls attention and leads the eye around, while reducing visual fatigue -or alienation as hegel has it. Thesis, antithesis, synthesis.

2) Taped or freehanded.

Freehanded edges like stella where the line is painted by painting the space around the line. Insane!

Taped edges where you can see the increased amount of paint at the edge where the tape has been pulled up. Pull the tape at a perpendicular away from the edge to prevent tearing of the paint skin...

One trick is to paint ypur first edge, let it dry, and that creates a raised dam to block the flow of your second edge. Using tape you can get so anal you could be a machine. Both painted areas achieve the same height - perfection of unified surface.

Stencil - air brush it. Yeah. Get a Badger brand gun and go to town.
Even paint surface, cheaper than oils and you are a cyborg, too.
You can use commercial available masking film, mylar (acetate sheets and an exacto blade) cardboard (non corugated) or your tools (go David Smith!)

Which brings me to spray paint. Initial investment is less than an air gun but at 5 bucks a can its more for outdoor and portable use. Tag away. You can buy tips for the can to make adjust the spray.

Finally, collage. Cut out your shapes and paste them on with gel medium (its archival).

Or simply print on canvas with pigmented inks.

Like you believe in Walter Benjamin's "aura" anyway.
Fuck you.

jpegCritic said...

zip, I believe in the aura of my old-school
aperture grille crt and let me tell you, it
shows off vermeers way better than the frick.
And vuillard's space -- not edges man -- have
you ever seen a real woman vibrate into walls
like vuillard's do? May be not benjamin's aura,
but more like an aura cast by some quantum
mechanical freak-show.

youth--less said...

yes i have seen that

but i was talking about how the edges are created. each brushstroke coming up to the edge and stopping at the perfect point. how it touches the adjacent plane. finesse. paying attention. u know...painting?

no-where-man said...

I sing the body electric. and i have witnessed Walter Benjamin's "aura"

no-where-man said...

what of preformace art? is the documentaton useless?

no-where-man said...

just sayin people make comments all the time about other media in photo, jpeg what have u ... i don't see how it is impossible to make any comment what so ever on a painting, amid online.

jpegCritic said...

Dayam little-missie, you need to calm down. So I
won't blog anymore.. no skin off my back. Big
whoopee. But we're not idiots. We just experience
things from a different perspective, ontologically
speaking. And it's not like we haven't stood in
front of paintings before, and it's not like we
haven't made our own. And I hold that even the
nearsighted might have something worthwhile to
contribute on the subject of painting (I'm
farsighted, though). But before I go, let me just
say that you might want to watch your narrow and
exclusive view of yourself as a viewer of art.
'Cause while you spend all your anger and energy
protecting whatever territory you have to protect --
whether it be your bourough or your world-view --
the rest of the world might just pass you by one
day, and declare you dead. There are many modes of
experience other than yours, missy. And though
benjamin was alluding to something larger than the
viewing of art, my experience happens to be quite on
target in the benjeminian post-aura sense. Does that
make me an idiot? I think it just makes me different
from you. Sure you can ask me not to blog, but that
might not make a dent in your own estrangement from
the world as you will one day come to find it. You
can ignore it but you can't dismiss it.

no-where-man said...

whoa hey there, frustrated drunks have produced some of the greatest work we have - i think the question is y are u on this board if you don't find it useful, - darling. your like one of these censors who are really just validating a way to sublimate there own desires, if you don’t like it change the channel… you and only you have the power not to click on this url. And if everyone who feels the same way does the same – well it will just go away – nes pas?