Posts tagged with ‘NY’

  • An Architect’s Angle

    In News on

    Once the work goes out of my studio, it finds new contexts and meanings
    in viewers’ minds. It’s fascinating to hear what they see.  Last March, I
    enjoyed an architect, Saurabh Vaidya’s blog post that showed the work
    through his rich, investigative mind.  He just posted his second entry on
    the work.  Here are his 1st and the 2nd entry posted back to back:

    Lebenswelt

    I came across works by two very interesting artists last week,
    Nicolas Moulin who envisages ruins of mega monolithic concrete
    blocks in a deserted landscape while the other being Hiroyuki Hamada
    who designs comparatively small, vaguely futurist looking monoliths.






    (Some of the many Hiroyuki’s tablets that could easily come to be a parts of totem pole
    of a dystopian space age civilization, whose technological advancement has come at
    the price of erosion of memory of history and language…where technology is god.

    Images sourced from
    http://acidolatte.blogspot.com/2010/02/hiroyuki-hamada.html?zx=883872d53fad4dd5)

    Hiroyuki’s artifacts that seem to draw semantic nourishment from manga,
    minimalismspace debrisJapanese Zen, Buddhism, God particles,
    Shivalingam, crustaceans, Mars and brush by closely to Nicolas’s Béton
    Brut work that sends roots to Normandy Bunkers, Corbusier, Oplismeno
    skirodema, Berlin Wall, Moai, Rosetta stone, Noah’s Arc etc according
    to me are not thriving on but are just the opposite. They are soil samples
    of the very ground that anchors the tree of Being, from where all these
    references germinate.



    (Images of Nicolas Moulin’s collages sourced from Vulgare one can also find an online
    blog recording by the artist and Amanda Crawley Jackson called
    Beton brut)

    The ability of both these artist to have art works that spread roots
    through history and simultaneously come across as being so basic
    that it forms a part of Lebenswelt, the very ground of universality
    which anchors the roots of metaphysics, to be understood in equal
    ways by every member of the human race is according to me the
    true essence of their work.

    Scale, texture and form, that is all to it, as wise old university
    stalwarts would put it, which according to me has more truth to it
    than the combined cacophony that we seem to have inherited from
    the circus that was post modernism and these two artists working
    independently in different circles and continents seem to echo just
    that. The simplicity of works is refreshing and it just looks very
    very sexy.

    Lebenswelt appeared at Urban Floop on Sundy, March 28, 2010

    Here is his second post:

    Hiroyuki

    During my early days in architecture all of us during a brief phase
    had taken to worshipping Tadao Ando, which secretly we still do in
    some obscure corner of naivety unpolluted by the realisation that
    it cannot be that simple, life is far more complicated, filled with
    contradictions that need to be represented in our spaces, objects,
    skews and corners. Ando had been popular for quite sometime
    then but it was during my first year in Architecture that he built
    Church of the Light a building that worshipped space, made
    concrete an inch more beautiful than what the modernist had left it
    as and we drooled.

    It is this rich simplicity that draws me to Hiroyuki’s work of which I
    have written before
    .  Hiroyuki will be exhibiting three new pieces in
    his next show at Art Sites, a gallery in Riverhead, NY. If you are
    the lucky few around do visit…I personally would like to see the
    scale of these objects…and if they open up like loosely held 3d
    jigsaw puzzles, or do they crack like egg shells, are they hollow
    or filled with a heavy fluid, is there a temperature difference in the
    blacks and whites, browns and greys…I guess I will definitely be
    banned from entering the gallery or his workshop!
    I hope the art work sells and and pray definitely not to clients who
    would use it as bourgeoisie conversational props with their boring
    guests in plush living rooms with matching minimal aesthetics.

    Hiroyuki appeared at Urban Floop on Saturday, August 14, 2010

  • Art for People: NYFA’s A & AE

    In News on

    It’s no surprise that as an artist I believe art is good.  Not just paintings or
    sculptures but anything that can make me see new possibilities, open my eyes
    to new realities and make me feel some sort of awe inspiring flow that’s
    bigger than my usual self.  And simply put, there are amazing things out there
    that make me say “wow, I’m glad to be alive to see that!”.  But actually getting
    out and trying to help artists to make things is a tricky matter; especially
    when it’s done publicly.  When I see people debating about it, I feel helpless.
    I have no words to say if someone claims that we have more urgent issues
    than people having fun listening to music or painting pictures.  And how
    do you decide what’s good for people and what’s not?

    That’s why it’s so refreshing and encouraging to see people just going
    ahead and doing what they believe by clever ideas and practical solutions.
    Last year I had such a moment when I got to know about
    the Artists & Audiences Exchange program of New York Foundation for the Arts.
    It’s a part of their grant program which basically give away money to selected
    applicants.  But they tell the selected applicants that the part of their money
    will be given only if they make up a public program for the people in NY state.

    nyfa_logo

    OK, so when I got the money from NYFA last year, my response was, “Ah,
    what? It’s not a free money?  I don’t get it.  They are not just giving it to me?
    What???.”.  Well, that was just before I realized the cleverness and significance
    of the program.  It’s so great to know that there are smart, capable people
    looking after arts out there.  Thank you NYFA.

    After thinking about the program for a few months I decided to give a talk at a
    local library, Hampton Library, in Bridgehampton, NY.  Its building has just
    gotten an extensive renovation and the director of the library has been very
    positive and welcoming about the idea (my wife used to work there!).  So the
    talk is going to be on Saturday May 15th 3:00PM.  I will be talking about my
    sculpture making process with lots of images.  It’ll be relaxed, informal and
    hopefully fun.  Please let the library know if you are interested in attending.
    I will see you there if you are around!

    n78577900729_2980790_3989686

    Contact information for the Hampton Library in Bridgehampton
    Facebook Page for the Hampton Library in Bridgehampton
    Hiroyuki Hamada is a 2009 Artist Fellowship recipient of the New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA).  This presentation is co-sponsored by Artists & Audience Exchange, a NYFA public program.
  • SCW Show Pictures Added

    In News on

    Images from Salomon Contemporary Warehouse exhibition (East Hampton, NY)
    which ran from Oct. 11 to Nov. 30, 2009, have been added to the site. The set has
    total of 28 images and it comes in two parts. To see them, go to
    the main part of the site and click “PHOTOS”. Hope you enjoy! Here are a few of
    them from the set. You can see bigger pictures at the site.

    #54

    #54

    #54 detail

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    #52 and #59

    #52 and #59

    #52

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