Judy Pfaff
There are two ways to approach a gallery opening. The first way is the obvious way - taking in everything you know about the artist, gallery, outside opinion, and pricing. The latter way is divorcing everything one knows and going in clean slate - not letting anything including the gallery take influence. In this case I like to picture the art in all contexts like in a NY gallery, in the interior designers studio, in a public space...and so on. I have found this way holds up in "art court" because then you can really look at the art for what it is and not what is being said about it.
All of that said, I believe that Judy Pfaff's work specific to Lemberg gallery was decorative and fit into a designer's showroom. I know that her portfolio includes beautiful installation work, but I just felt that this show was lacking depth and content. I liked the surprising layers of the delicate prints and drawings. The most successful works used a variety of materials and paper cut outs to achieve this depth but I found the framing most distracting to the art. The frames mimicked the art and stood out too much. Again, I know that this isn't completely representive of her work but it really left me feeling empty as I quickly exited Lemberg. I am still interested in what Judy has to say when she lectures at CCS this week.
All of that said, I believe that Judy Pfaff's work specific to Lemberg gallery was decorative and fit into a designer's showroom. I know that her portfolio includes beautiful installation work, but I just felt that this show was lacking depth and content. I liked the surprising layers of the delicate prints and drawings. The most successful works used a variety of materials and paper cut outs to achieve this depth but I found the framing most distracting to the art. The frames mimicked the art and stood out too much. Again, I know that this isn't completely representive of her work but it really left me feeling empty as I quickly exited Lemberg. I am still interested in what Judy has to say when she lectures at CCS this week.
posted by art blogs are fun at 12:12 AM
4 Comments:
didn't waste any time posting this one. damn you're good.
Didn't Pfaff win one of those MacArthur genius awards with a half a million dollar prizes to do whatever she wants with?
Pfaff's an internationally renowned artist (a Detroit artist, yet) showing in Detroit, real enough to come back and speak and be excited about it. (She's grounded, down-to-earth, fabulous.) The work is gorgeous, complex, beautiful. When did beautiful get to be a bad word?
Well the work deserves being called beautiful. If the work was especially pretty their may be some cause for concern. What does detart mean by "made it" anyway?... Has the art made it? If so where to? Maybe I should attempt to make it? But first I need to find out where Judy Pfaff is so I can get some directions on how to get there.
Ann, I get where you are coming from. You are obviously hungry to dig deeper into all this art stuff. Trying to peer behind the art. I think this round of work from Miss Pfaff (the work itself spans quite a few years right?) could be chalked up as rent payers, or checks waiting to be cashed, but they are a bit more than that too. Transitional works are just as important (or unimportant) as the "big ones". It is a slippery slope to put our subjective brain to work on every minute detail of an artist's work. But then again that is the fun of thinking about art isn't it.
Finally (as if I have said anything up to this point) I think we can all applaude anyone who comes to an exhibition with a blank slate on which to write their opinions. It is diffucult to do and usually earns the highest rewards from the viewer and the work. Especially with well know artists it is not easy to let your eyes see what is in front of you, because there is so much "literature" already engraved on our subjective brains. J
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