Nice to see THIS article about Angie Fraliegh and Michael McKean up at Inman now, but Chron writer Douglas Britt seems to suck balls when it comes to allusion.
"The amateur porn vibe carries over into all the paintings, even though none of them is explicit."
Demonstrating that it doesn't matter what a writer is writing about (he'll bring up whatever he likes) Britt launches into a triple toe loop trying to get McKean's sculptures and Robert Ryman in the same sentence.
His last word on the Robert Ryman work at the Menil is cute: "The meditative environment that tiny room created made me wonder what a Ryman Chapel would be like, until I realized I was already standing in one." Aww...
Well I think that the Ryman work sucks. Curator Sirmans cut a perfectly fine gallery in half and put three incongruous paintings together. The two white paintings and one grid work are a perfectly plausible excuse for the average museum-goer to say "What the fuck? Who cares?" and I'm inclined to agree with him.
The darkened gap above the temporary wall sucks attention away from what little there is to focus on in the room. The doctor's office lobby-like space promotes visitors to enter, circle and leave without a moment's rest, and Ryman is not an artist where you want to challenge viewers' attention spans on a race to zero. Without a lick of context or magic (come on lets spice up the lighting!) you may as well be looking at it in a book- save for the occasional brushstroke an avid visitor can detect. Feel free to examine the wall for more exciting tidbits!
"The Builder and Science bears some resemblance to a Robert Rauschenberg assemblage (if you're shallow), but both times I saw this show, the artist I couldn't stop thinking of (because I was thinking of him already) was minimalist pioneer Robert Ryman because of McKean's intriguing use of white paint in all three sculptures."
His last word on the Robert Ryman work at the Menil is cute: "The meditative environment that tiny room created made me wonder what a Ryman Chapel would be like, until I realized I was already standing in one." Aww...
Robert Ryman in more interesting times, Ledger, 1982
Well I think that the Ryman work sucks. Curator Sirmans cut a perfectly fine gallery in half and put three incongruous paintings together. The two white paintings and one grid work are a perfectly plausible excuse for the average museum-goer to say "What the fuck? Who cares?" and I'm inclined to agree with him.
The darkened gap above the temporary wall sucks attention away from what little there is to focus on in the room. The doctor's office lobby-like space promotes visitors to enter, circle and leave without a moment's rest, and Ryman is not an artist where you want to challenge viewers' attention spans on a race to zero. Without a lick of context or magic (come on lets spice up the lighting!) you may as well be looking at it in a book- save for the occasional brushstroke an avid visitor can detect. Feel free to examine the wall for more exciting tidbits!
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