Wael Shawky’s gorgeous cinematography, sets, and marionettes fuse a child-like play with the horrors and complications of war and history.

Webster’s definition of ideology is: “A system of ideas and ideals, especially one that forms the basis of economic or political theory and policy.” Artist Nicola Dale’s sculptures, performances, and installations are interpretations of this definition of ideology—one of many subjects that Dale explores in her work. Dale often works on one subject or idea for an extended period, in distinctive bodies that incorporate various[…..]

Photographs have many potential uses. They can serve as objective documents of history, standing in for memory, ideas, and sensory representations, but they also have the capacity to manifest images of fictional narratives that are markedly creative. Nando Alvarez-Perez’s photographs, often produced in a series, mirror the many capacities of the photograph, capturing an array of past and future meanings, motifs, styles, and contexts. At[…..]

In The Disappeared, artists Tatiana Grigorenko and Zoë Heyn-Jones rewrite history through still and moving images. In the current exhibition at Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography, Grigorenko and Heyn-Jones negotiate their relationships with their ancestors and origins through altered photographs and Super 8 film. With disarming honesty, they interrogate the ways in which their private memories and personal realities overlap and diverge. This fissure between[…..]

Opening today at the SVA Chelsea Gallery, It’s a Poor Sort of Memory That Only Works Backwards is a solo exhibition of four films by Johan Grimonprez. To accompany the beginning of this exhibition, today we bring you an interview with the artist from 2011, when he memorably said, “… every kiss is a political act.” This article was originally published on March 23, 2011. Johan[…..]

Richard Stone creates paintings, sculptures, and installations that form constellations of meaning. While the works are all distinct—for example, a series of bronze figurines half-covered in smooth, bulbous wax, or a carved white marble flag that ripples in an unseen wind—when exhibited together, they form a cohesive yet mysterious network. Stone is chiefly concerned with art and cultural history. He explores the past through the[…..]

Geoffry Smalley’s work is rooted in early-19th-century American painting, deriving specific scenes and techniques from historical canvases and the Hudson River School. In 1836, painter Thomas Cole completed his five-part series The Course of Empire. The series documents Cole’s vision for the birth, life, and death of western civilization, from the pastoral to the desolate. Cole had a calculated optimism for life and renewal, but[…..]