Constructs, Abrasions, Melons and Cucumbers is an exhibition of works by Barbara Kasten and Justin Beal which aims to underline the artists’ contrasting ways of “mis”-leading the audience’s first reading of their work. Though forty-two years apart in age, both artists are interested in challenging the potential of their chosen mediums; Kasten presents complex sculpture as photography; Beal incorporates architectural elements into sculptural works, as well as transforming natural objects into humorous constructs.
Throughout her career Kasten has continually pioneered experiments in photography and exhibits works spanning from 1975 to 2012. In her cyanotypes from 1975 entitled Photogenic Paintings, Kasten folds and crumples screens onto painted paper and exposes them to light, creating an intricate imprint of the textured items. In her Constructs and Studio Constructs series, she photographs assemblages that she has meticulously arranged in her studio, which often includes glass, mirrors, screens, and metal displayed in various stages of lighting. The resulting images resemble Post-Modern Constructivist Art rejecting the documentary nature of photography and creating an illusion of three-dimensional space.
Justin Beal exhibits new work that continues his subtle critique of modernist design and consumer culture. Beal includes chrome sculptures of cast aluminum cucumber and cantaloupes with a nickel finish, suggesting sexual undertones that are often inherent to high end design objects. Beal also exhibits a selection of black wall sculptures made of matte urethane rubber, which are secondary casts of wrapped domestic architectural elements such as poles and shelves. Juxtaposed with Kasten’s Studio Constructs and Photogenic Painting, both works reveals the artists’ varying aims to represent three-dimensionality by way of leaving a sculptural imprint.
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at Bortolami Gallery, New York
until 3 August 2012
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Justin Beal, Untitled (Cucumber and Cantaloupes), 2012
Justin Beal, Untitled (Middle Shelf), 2012
Justin Beal, Untitled (Middle Pole), 2012
Justin Beal, Untitled (Low Shelf), 2012
Barbara Kasten, Construct LB 3, 1982
Barbara Kasten, Construct XI A, 1981
Barbara Kasten, Construct XIII, 1982
Barbara Kasten, Studio Construct: Incidence 1, 2009
Barbara Kasten, Studio Construct: Incidence 3, 2009
Barbara Kasten, Studio Construct 121, 2011
Barbara Kasten, Photogenic Painting Untitled 75/32, 1975
Barbara Kasten, Photogenic Painting Untitled 75/30, 1975
Barbara Kasten, Photogenic Painting Untitled 75/31, 1975
Justin Beal, Untitled (Cucumber and Cantaloupes), 2012
Justin Beal, Untitled (Cucumber and Cantaloupes), 2012
