While everyone was falling over themselves to get to the Banksy show to behold the power of a live elephant and a lot of paint, I took in a couple of smaller shows downtown. Both, by coincidence, were contemplated the art of design and the design of art.
At Dangerous Curve, the featured show was “No point takes up space” by Sky Burchard. The show was really a show in two parts, one an exhibition of faux furniture made from Styrofoam cutouts and basic three-dimensional prints to give the illusion of depth, the other contained small sculptural objects reminiscent of architectural/environmental models. The two separate sections were both fun and contemplative, giving thought to questions of design, scale, the objects being represented, and the life of the materials that are used to create them. However, the artist was still gluing pieces to the works as the show opened, leaving me to wonder how much care the artist had put into the pieces and thus how much I should put in them as well.
The other show that I caught was at the Desoto Gallery of works by Kelly Reemtseen. This was a collection of prints and cutouts, again the emphasis being the art of design with images of chairs, motorcycles, etc… While the craftsmanship was high, I was left feeling a little like the works had just exploded from an ipod or Target ad. The more simplistic abstract work was a little fresher, but at the same time just seemed a perkier version of 70’s abstraction. Which, I suppose, isn’t a horrible thing to be.
Both shows left me with the feeling that style is more important than substance and both contained work that I would buy because it matched a room in my house, but I wouldn’t change a room in the house to match it.
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