Gallery-Going

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The New York Sun

Allan McCollum’s “Perpetual Photos” (1982-90) appear to be little more than grainy, unfocused abstractions, the sort of enigmatic blobs used to prove the existence of dubious phenomena like UFOs or the Loch Ness Monster. But while these suggestive shapes look like they were discovered serendipitously, Mr. McCollum’s method is deliberate and specific. Fascinated by the out-of-focus framed images that appear in the background of television stills, he photographed the screen, isolated the framed images, and blew them up.


Much more than a grouping of hazy organic forms, “Perpetual Photos” is actually a complex exploration on the nature of the art object. Mr. McCollum’s work reveals that an image’s frame, rather than the image itself, often leads to its classification as a work of art. Removing a photograph from the wall on which it hangs and from its frame should be the equivalent of stripping it down to its naked, art essence. As such, “Perpetual Photos” exposes the framed images in the backgrounds of television screens as empty vessels.


But paradoxically, Mr. McCollum’s work also increases the prestige value of these unfocused images. By blowing the photos up, reframing, and hanging them on the gallery wall, he has transformed forgettable background decorations into contemporary art objects worthy of a Chelsea gallery.


The 20 Perpetual Photos are all silver gelatin prints but are printed in two colors: sepia-toned, which suggests an underwater or stormy setting, and the more familiar black and white. There are 10 photographs of each tone, and Mr. McCollum has arranged them in an alternating pattern, like men and women at a tasteful dinner party, to create a rhythm of color that draws attention to the artificiality of the gallery display.


If the “Perpetual Photos” are images released from their frames, “The Recognizable Image Drawings” (2003) (from the Kansas and Missouri Topographical Model Donation Project) are frames filled in. Mr. McCollum has used the shapes of the two states’ 220 counties – 105 in Kansas, 115 in Missouri – to create a series of graphite drawings on white paper. Many of the counties are rectangular and the images have the iconic feel of Malevich black-on-white paintings; other counties, particularly those that border the Mississippi River, resemble the jagged, irregular shapes of the two states. Though less visually spectacular then the “Perpetual Photos,” “The Recognizable Image Drawings” represent a similar attempt to re-contextualize familiar images and explore the meaning of frames and borders.


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Those who have lived in New York long enough will remember that before the far west side of Chelsea was an art gallery row, it was where you went to have your car fixed. Lehmann Maupin Gallery recalls this grease-stained past with “Some Exhaust,” a gimmicky group show organized around the theme of the garage.


Upon entering the gallery, one is confronted by a constructed garage facade with brick walls and a closed, metal slated, sliding door. Housed within the gallery’s Rem Koolhaas / OMA-designed uber-contemporary space, this model hardly recaptures the blue-collar feel of a working repair shop. But Lehmann Maupin seems less interested in verisimilitude than a motif that can be teased and played with.


“Some Exhaust” is an uneven collection of works, all created for the exhibition, by approximately twenty artists. Some pieces are challenging and surprising, some merit little more than a quick glance and shrug of the shoulders. But as levity is the predominant mood, the show is a pleasant walk-though.


Matthew Lusk, who organized the exhibition, has contributed various works, including “Barricade” (2004), a pile of black tires with white rims, a few of which have been pierced by open jackknifes or contain flowers floating in water in the inner grooves. The Relay Project’s “As Is” (2004) a stereo with cassettes and records stacked on a flimsy folding table, reminds us how antiquated 1980s technology looks today. Lara Kohl’s “Once Upon a Time Yesterday” (2004) is a freezer that houses an impressive twelve-towered ice palace.


A few works, in particular Caroline Allison’s 2004 film “Copycat” (and the accompanying photography portfolio), darken the show’s mood. Ms. Allison’s work reminds us of a well-publicized 1987 teen suicide pact in Bergenfield, N.J. Inside a brick garage, not at all dissimilar to the one constructed within Lehmann Maupin Gallery, four teens parked their car but left the motor running, poisoning themselves with carbon monoxide exhaust.


The New York Sun

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