Ben Kiehl at motor city
While I was in miami I had my informant take some pictures of ben kiehl's works at motor city since I knew the show would be one not to miss! I really love the direction of ben's work...we all know that he is one of the best photorealist painters in detroit...and maybe beyond but he is now using his precise execution with more content.
look closely but there is no spray paint here...only graphite! I definitely want to snatch one of these drawings up!
posted by art blogs are fun at 10:09 PM
13 Comments:
enjoyed the "Detroit" take on On Kawara.
Actually it's a pretty stupid "take" on On Kawara.
oh lighten up. How many Basquiats, DeKoonings, etc etc etc do we have around here? This is a young artist trying out lots of things, including working through art history. He's viewing his own idiom via a previous format.
I like Ben's work in general, but I was less impressed with this show. maybe because it wasn't really a cohesive body of work. It seemed like 3 or 4 different directions. The drawings representing spraypaint left me wondering "why?" Why not just use spraypaint? Why draw it out? what's the point? But knowing Ben and his work I can see where he's coming from. His goal is to trick the eye into thinking it's something less than it is from a distance, but when you get up close you notice how much time was put into it. I think for a photorealist, I'm happy he's decided to take a more conceptual approach than to just paint canvas' that look like pictures. I guess I kind of go back and forth with those spray paint drawings. I can see both sides, but a big part of me begs the question "why not just use spray paint?"
I'm more of a fan of his drawings of crumpled paper. But there's only so much you can do with that before it's time to move on.
from what I observed about this show is that the artist is taking chances. Taking chances with his image, taking chances with subject matter, and so on.
why spray paint? why not? what is a cohesive body of work? isnt the brewery a place for experimentation? I would hope that it just doesnt turn into a really tiny "little white box" of an exhibition space, just showing small versions of the samo samo.
samo samo, its art, why should he use spray paint? Why doesn't he just stretch the canvas, why doesn't he try something different, why doesn't he attatch a few more bike spokes to his pieces, or nails, or throw chairs at his paintings, maybe try not reading the bible? maybe its just art, you look at it and then
hmmm...don't remember ever using bike spokes in my work. The bible's a good book, but has nothing to do with the comment I made. personal attacks are better left for myspace. in fact, here's my myspace address:
www.myspace.com/johnazoni
you can dislike me for my art and my faith there. unfortunatley for you, you can't leave anonymous posts on myspace, so on second though I suppose that's not your style.
and then you form opinions
based on truth of fiction.
slanderous fiction
what the hell are you even talking about? "truth of fiction..slanderous fiction?" I can't stand it when people try to be overly artsy in every statement they make on here.
slanderous fiction means that maybe using you as a reference was just my way of
www.7xAzoni.com
Ben's work continues to be unique and advanced for his age as always. His rare technical talent and attention to detail are needed in the art market today. Unlike other technical powerhouses; Ben's daring paintings and drawings are constructed with clarity and originality. Fonts, colors, lines, and photorealist images are created with the goal of attaining some level of perfection. Some people have posted that Ben's experimentations are too randomized or unrelated to one another to be considered a strong body of work. I personally find ben's work to have a very strong connection. He creates illusions of the mundane signs and images of daily life. His recent graphite drawings of spraypainted walls follow the photorealistic illusions of his crumpled paper series. After speaking with ben about his word paintings, I realized how much time he spends recreating the fonts to the level of perfection computers automatically create for us. One might ask, why not spraypaint the wall? Why not print the font? Why should he spend hours upon hours recreating a photo with paint? Because he can. By speaking about art you aesthetically and conceptually deconstruct pieces based on your own knowledge and experiences. Ben's work makes the point that our deconstructions of his work, good or bad, share one thing in common; Ben has an obsession with perfection and a gift of constructing images with clarity.
Ben Kiehl is a hack!
Ha Ha, just kidding, I know Ben from way back, in fact I've known him since freshman year in high school, there is nobody, and I mean nobody who puts more thought into what they are doing, and more detail into any craft then Ben.
Ask him to see the 'baby' he sculpted his junior year of high school.
He was so afraid it might crack in the kiln that he never fired it! Best artist in the mitten
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