painting rundown

A visit to chelsea forest was made to see the relics spoken of on another blog. you know the one. I found it necessary to view these items after discussions and only jpeg viewing. Here is what I have uncovered - from real eyeball viewing:

Nathalie Frank: I appreciate the ambition of these paintings and her desire to paint in an 'old-school' fancy oilpainting way. I appreciate the decorative floral elements, the color, and there were parts in the paintings that were elegant, beautiful, very satisfying to behold. The paint handling and subject matter mingled in a delicate, vivid way in many instances within larger works - parts were really good. The jpeg that was posted on that blog was probably the best painting there - the one next to it was ok too. But, overall I found the work ungainly - the figurative/symbolic/narrative whatever was just awkward and trying to tell me something but it was convoluted. I was suspicious of what i felt to be forced content. Naked ladies and flowers = ? desire? oh, come on. i don't buy it. My biggest criticism walking out of the show was that her painting chops need to be improved, the virtuosity needs to go up a bunch to get these to fly (as well as a better handle of what the figure's place in the larger works are). or the content and the way they are now painted needs to be resolved. there is a disconnect right now. I feel like she wants to paint like Currin or Yuskavage but doesn't know how to do it yet.

Nicola Tyson: LOVED IT. These paintings felt so right and so wrong. They were almost pyschologically damaging. I wanted to put on a straightjacket right then and there. Really really right on the mark. Completely mystified. I have never been a fan of her work before. Funny.

Les Rogers: Also loved it, strangely!? I liked the move from one painting to the next and the picasso-esque abstraction and then the photo-real. I liked the paint on these, the materials were good. They were strong paintings I thought. The scale was good - the formal stuff all totally working. I like the more fucked with abstract/portraits better than the straight-ons. Maybe it's an easy strategy, painting from photos sent by some girl. blow em up - crop. she's cute. yup. but still i felt something with these. i was surprised i liked them as much as i did.

Erika Somogyi: Oh jeese where to start. These drawings/paintings on paper are really cool. but they suffer from the illustration-precious bermuda triangle. The project feels a little over-done - in that there is so much work like this out there. but to be fair to ES I think she is doing it great within the context of this type of thing. the piece with the pool and swans where the palette shifts was really excellent - my favorite. Her day-glo colored is fairly inventive and unique and totally works wit these and I feel that they color stuff is where she can really be indivudual. But the whole little framed paper colored perfection psychedelic drawings. i dunno. God i am such a poop.

What else... ? oh went to see Karen Heagle's paintings too. The standouts for me were the boxing guy and the other "Adam" character - the male figure that is right there when you walk in - standing on the beach? i think??. And i can't help but love the turkey. She has a clunky hand, in a good way, that can turn on a dime and nail a little passage of paint so wonderfully. I respond to the direct quality of the line and color in there most of all.