During a recent trip to Kansas City, I visited the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art on the campus of Johnson County Community College. The museum building is new and beautiful and the collection is truly impressive—a must see for anyone interested in contemporary painting.  I was surprised to find such a strong collection at a community college, but even more surprised to find several significant pieces installed not in the museum, but in other buildings around campus.  The modest coffee shop in the student center has a painting by Jonathan Lasker and one by Linda Besemer; the Tomory Dodge painting pictured above (Lost and Found, 2004) is in the student center cafeteria!  If you like your art in quieter and less-trafficked settings, the museum galleries have excellent pieces by Elizabeth Murray, Do-Ho Suh, Kerry James Marshall, Karin Davie, Dana Schutz, Amy Sillman, Kehinde Wiley and Fred Tomaselli, among others.  Kudos to Bruce Hartman, the museum director and driving force (so I’m told) behind all things good at the Nerman.  Don’t miss it if your near Kansas City.

I know that this show was a while ago, but…

Whenever I question if it’s worth struggling over subtle variations in value, chroma and temperature (because currently it seems that nobody cares about such things), I look at David Reed’s paintings and my questioning stops. It’s worth it. The manipulation of temperature in his work is exquisite and his paintings serve as a forceful reminder that we can all benefit—makers and viewers alike—from giving greater and more critical attention to color. The painting above is #572, oil and alkyd on polyester, 105 x 49 inches, 2005-2007. Thank you, David, for the ongoing inspiration.

In lieu of a live view (at least until his next show), I recommend a visit to David’s website and a look at the following links.

David Reed at Max Protetch, November-December, 2007

A video review of the show by James Kalm

Two shows that I wish I’d seen this summer:

Tomma Abts at the New Museum, April 9-June 29, 2008

Christopher Wool at Luhring Augustine, May 9-June 21, 2008

In early June, Mary and I went to see the Québec Triennial at the Musée d’art contemporain de Montreal. Among the best work in the show was a video installation by Manon De Pauw titled Fantasmagorie lumineuse. The apparatus and the visual effects were complex and mannered enough to make it challenging, while the playfulness and experimental spirit of the investigations kept it lively and buoyant. Once I got a handle on what I was looking at, I found myself cheering along with the action: “Please make it green next…Come’on green!…ARGH blue!” or “Ooh, ooh….try the other diagonal now….YES!” There was a lovely new painting on the screen every few seconds and I couldn’t help but feel pangs of jealousy (mixed with delight) at the efficacy, immediacy and basic humanness of it all. Catch it before the trienniel ends in September.

After writing a few posts about artists that I admire, I can’t continue without highlighting my favourite art writer, Matthew Collings. His books (Blimey!; It Hurts; Art Crazy Nation; This is Modern Art) are good reads, but his Diary column in Modern Painters is the bee’s knees. While some of the individual entries are strong as stand-alone pieces, the real value of the Diary lies in Collings’ regular and sustained campaign in support of visual pleasure, formal sophistication and colour literacy (and against sound bite-quality meanings, art historical amnesia and empty emoting). I strongly suggest reading the Diary in 6-12 month batches to get a sense of its collective potency. For a stand-alone piece, I recommend Collings’ essay “How Contemporary Art is Redeemed from Shallowness” (Modern Painters, March 2005).

In my opinion, Collings’ Diary remains the lone consistently valuable feature of today’s Modern Painters, which otherwise has been steadily fading for a few years. Their recent move to New York (from London) seems only to have made the magazine worse. If Collings departs, I’ll stop buying it.

Collings is also a painter and makes collaborative work with his partner Emma Biggs (see image above). Visit their website to see and read more. www.emmabiggsandmatthewcollings.net

If you’re near enough to make it to the show, please visit my recent paintings at the Susanne Hilberry Gallery.

The exhibition runs May 17-June 14.

The show also includes recent work from Gordon Newton and Barry Roth (but because I’m horribly self-absorbed, I only took pictures of my paintings). Barry’s small constructions are deceptively specific and controlled. As a result, they emit what feels to me like a poignant aura of intimacy and tenderness. Gordon’s collages are equally sensitive in terms of their formal make up (especially the use of texture), but several pieces also include identifiable items/fragments (model railroad trains and track, “Bridge to Canada” text), suggesting that Gordon is motivated by additional concerns.

I’ve seen several paintings by Laura Owens and some of them have been compelling; others not so much. This one (Untitled, 2004) is stunning. It’s part of the museum’s collection and they had it hanging when I visited in February. I hope they keep it on view.

Anyone interested in painting should get to Columbus and see this show. I recommend spending some time sitting in one of Heilmann’s chairs in front of your favourite painting. My favourite is Neo Noir (pictured above).

Mary Heilmann at the Wexner Center

At this point, you can only see the show in Paris or Frankfurt, but it might be worth the trip. Mary and I saw the show at Tate Britain in February. Here are some links with more info about the show. The painting above is White Canoe.

Peter Doig at Tate Britain

Peter Doig at Le Musée D’Arte moderne de la Ville de Paris

Peter Doig at the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt