Mona Hatoum’s solo exhibition, currently on view at Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art, is made entirely of newly gifted works from philanthropist and political activist Barbara Lee. The Barbara Lee Family Foundation is focused on advancing female representation in politics. Lee is a major supporter of Hilary Clinton, in addition to being a collector who has shifted her focus exclusively to female artists. At the[…..]
Until now, the ICA Boston’s Foster Prize has been relatively traditional. It begins with the museum’s announcement of a short list of artists who participate in its biennial. From there, an independent panel of judges selects one winner, who walks away with a cash prize. This year’s Foster Prize is different. The ICA’s Associate Director of Performing Arts, John Andress, and Senior Curator, Jenelle Porter,[…..]
The entry point to Ragnar Kjartansson’s The Visitors (2012)—if you’re lucky enough to see the beginning of the looping one-hour, nine-channel video—is like awakening each day in a house full of people who were up all night while you slept. Slightly disorienting, the sound, light, and being start streaming into the gallery as each of the screens lights up. The camera is impartial: The shots[…..]
Amy Sillman? All I can say is pentimenti. The artist’s working process provides so many transitory parts that the brain has to protect itself by combining them into a whole. The work comes to a rest, but hiding under the surface are two interpretive horizons: The complete painting and the individual paint strokes. The whole work is inseparable from each stroke, and yet the individual[…..]
I am as free as nature first made man, Ere the base laws of servitude began, When wild in woods the noble savage ran. – John Dryden, The Conquest of Granada, 1672 At this point, everyone knows that street artists leave completely unexpected artworks that don’t last long but that are often more absorbing than the works we usually get to see in museums. Because[…..]
Hidden within the hard facts are things too complicated and involved to be considered with too much precision. Economists and scientists choose what to measure when running their reports with good reason: if they eliminate the extraneous data than the utility of their predictive models increase. This process hides what Gabriel Kuri calls “soft information in hard facts.” His sculptures are attempts to reclaim that[…..]
This spring, the Manifest.AR collective is presenting new and established augmented reality (AR) artworks at the ICA during the 2011 Boston Cyberarts festival. Approximately 16 artists will present their incorporeal digital art in and around the ICA. Some will be site-specific works that respond to the architecture of the museum and some will aim to juxtapose their work against the existing physical exhibitions in the[…..]
