The China Institute: Art in a Time of Chaos

At China Institute's new headquarters downtown: Art in a Time of Chaos, Masterworks from Six Dynasties China, 3rd - 6th Centuries. China Institute Link
What a gorgeous show! Above, Celadon Earthenware, Three Kingdoms Period (272)

Funerary Pedestal

Rubbing of the Ming Tanxi Epitaph (Southern Dynasties tomb dated 474)
Detail, for full image, scroll down

Left panel of reproduced scroll for Orchid Pavilion poetry readings, during which officials gathered,

Drinks were passed and if passed the drink, one had to compose a poem...or drink.

Rubbing for the Eulogy of Burial of a Crane, detail (for full image scroll down)

Rooster

Rubbing of mold-impressed brick Hu xiao Shan Qiu, from Eastern Jin Tomb, Fourth Year of Yonghe (347)

The technique developed over the next 100 years,...

Museum Director Willow Weilan Hai discussing the printing technique in front of a misaligned print of the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove (details at end of post)

Images of Tao Yuanming, who wrote,
"Gathering chrysanthemums
'Neath the eastern paling of bamboo -
In langourousness I gaze
at the southern heights in the distance."
(Trans. Ben Wang)

Tao was considered the pioneer of Chinese recluse poetry, particularly Field and Garden poetry (tianyuanshi). I am excited to find out this is a category! David Hinton, esteemed translator, likens the genre to a suburban sort of Shanshui (mountain/water) than its own category. Wikipedia Link

Buddha standing on a lotus petal, surrounded by bodhisattvas.  Nanjing, inscribed 8/23 first year of Datong, made by Chao in offering

Rubbing of the Ming Tanxi Epitaph (full view, detail above)
474, standard script

Rubbing of the Eulogy for the Burial of a Crane, 420-589
The crane was a pet of a devoted monk. The stone on which the script was carved was for a long time submerged in the Yangtze River. 

From the Admonitions Scroll: a how to on behavior for ladies.

Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove, a vision of Chinese utopia. Brick rubbings in a style attributed to Gu Kaizhi.

Warriors

Order, then disarray - inspiring either way.

Misaligned, impressed-brick mural depicting the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove, found in a couple's tomb. From Southern Dynasty period (420-589)

Saturday Sprint through Chelsea: Moses, Staver, Benglis, Schulnik, Waber

Ed Moses, Painting as Process at Albertz Benda
Gallery Link

Moses, American, b. 1926, resides in LA and is influenced by Buddhist thought. These back room paintings deviate from his work featuring grids. They are lyrical, imaginary landscapes made from squeegeed surfaces and serendipitous confluences of odd or unlike materials.

Kucha, 1991, 75 x 60.

The world is here...

Moving through the exhibition back to front. Moses' grids, 1970s.
The interplay between loss of control and control is evident.

A detail or two of Gimbalus, 1989, 78 x 66 inches, in the gallery's front room.

Gimbalus in full. 1989, 78 x 66 inches. 

Downstairs, works on paper.

With ink brush,

and charcoal

Ed Moses: Painting as Process through October 15th. A beautiful show. 

Kyle Staver at Kent Fine Art.  Is this my favorite painting? I can't decide between so many of them in this painterly, sumptuous show.
Gallery Link

Staver composes large, broad shapes with pleasing internal scale. Seen close the paintings' payoff is just as good, as here with warm-hearted, witty, attentive details such as these wonderful toes

...and captivating scale changes, swoops of movement captured between hands or light on form.

Narcissus falling in love...love this painting. If I had to vote today this is my favorite.

But then there are the angels... I love this one, too...these round, friendly forms and their backlighting

The internal light is a consistent characteristic in this work as is scale, humor, pathos and beautiful, knowing color

Sketches for compositions. For those who know the show, here is the camel painting before the camels entered the painting.

A set of maquettes by Kyle Staver. Beautiful show.

Lynda Benglis at Cheim and Reid.
Gallery Link

This work looks like it was a blast to make - hand made paper, glitter, wire frames

A lightness and openness related to the pour, yet also to other forms

Lynda Benglis

Quick one: Iva Gueorgieva at Ameringer McEnery Yohe.
Gallery Link
The combination between painting and sculputre is a beautiful direction in her work. 

Another quick one: Peter Cain at Matthew Marks. Great to see these paintings again.
Gallery Link

Third quick one: Jonas Wood, Portraits, at Anton Kern.
Gallery Link

I know he has a workshop, etc. but I really love these paintings, their logic, their touch.

Alison Schulnik's unicorn series in Hoof II at Zieher Smith. Dazzling, weird, pastel cake decoration dreamlands.
Gallery Link

A small bouquet in a unicorn coffee cup

A gorgeous big painting with details below

What a knockout set of paintings!

Quick one four: Sharon Louden painting, one of two in her show of mostly works on paper at Morgan Lehman, which creates "windows" of color upon various toned grounds.
Gallery Link

Ending the day with Louisa Waber's new works at the Painting Center.
Gallery Link 

Waber, a veteran painter and New Yorker, whose father wrote my favorite book ever, Lyle the Crocodile, has been working with collage, pencil, and stains for some years, emptying the canvas.

Her work has a light touch, but with plenty of layering.

There is a loose grid that breaks down as a painting evolves.

The collage of one material on top of the same material. The space that emerges from a yellow line.

Louisa Waber.