so much to catch up on (i.e. lengthy post)

i have been so behind in blogging of late. and there is so so so so so so much i have wanted to share with you all, but have let lame time get away from me.

so let me return to berlin if you will indulge me. because i went to around 40 private contemporary art galleries while there, and needless to say i was stunned overwhelmed submerged inundated engulfed and flooded with beauty and ideas. in short i fell in love.

and here are just 3 reasons why:

1. ik-joong kang. i saw his exhibit "mountain & wind" and was overly inspired by the way he was able to resurrect traditional korean forms (the imperfectly-crafted ceramic jar and the simple rolling mountain-hill) into contemporary masterpieces. they pieces were so calming. that is the best word i can think of - the gallery was accessible through a secluded alleyway between old east german apartment blocks all squished together - but this fabulous alleyway extended the entire length of these buildings, with cafes, offices, apartments, and even a small grassy area off of it. i loved the space, and walking into this gallery and seeing kang's work fill the white rectangular room was so comfortable. my favorite piece of his (which i cannot find an image of online - in fact most of the online works are not representative of what i saw in berlin... sad face) was a series of 3 panels, each composed of a hundred or so small 2 inch by 2 inch blocks of wood, all of different heights/depths, and each painted with the simple shape of a mountain. none of the squares corresponded to the one next to them - they didn't create a coherent "landscape" necessarily, but rested in this gorgeous abstraction, an abstraction that was so comprehensible in its use of the classic korean-mountain form. it was so simple and stunning and i wanted it in my home.

2. ilias papailiakis. i love video/performance/installation art. i really do. but after 30 galleries with such repetitive pseudo-political reactionary pieces it was so relieving to see good painting once more... i saw this greek artist's work on one of my last days in berlin, and i was simply so pleased by the curation of this small, narrow gallery space on the 4th floor of this dingy kreuzberg building... ever since yves klein's "le vide", there has been a legitimate uber-consciousness of the "white box" that is the gallery space. i felt confronted by this conundrum in going from gallery to gallery in which the white space seemed insurmountable for many curators - they simply didn't know what to do with it, in many cases it overwhelmed the art which was supposed to be the object of attention. in the case of papiliakis, whose work rested in the gallery "upstairs berlin", the artist's small square canvases were so perfectly placed in the void that i was enraptured immediately upon being admitted into the exhibition. his paintings are quite baroque, really - he even directly copies fragments of the paintings of velazquez, zurbaran, van dyck et al... but this is the entire point: this often-bizarre fragmentation of famously recognizable artworks makes them so relevant... there is so much about papailiakis that is about return - return to heavy chiaroscuro, to the baroque, to painting itself! all in the midst of the postmodern obsession with video, instaneity, shock-and-awe... it was this that i appreciated. nothing felt stuffy in papailiakis' art, nothing felt unoriginal or tired - it was all new, invigorating, emotionally sublime, and absolutely beautiful.

3. (speaking once more of the power of exhibition space, and the power of painting...) dirk stewen. the gallery c/o alte gerhardsen which housed stewen's work was just unabashedly fabulous: beneath a metrorail bridge in a hollowed out, domed white space flanked by large windows which opened directly to the river with ice sheets floating by. i was in love the moment i opened the massive gray metal factory door into this re-invented brick locale. stewen's work displayed a complete and utter understanding of medium and material. he worked with watercolor, and manipulated the gorgeous ways watercolors blend and move into one another in simple spherical shapes, all painted on antique paper from french exhibition catalogs. he ripped off the plates, leaving just one glued-down edge to remind you of what this paper actually was, or is - and with the small french text at the bottom labelling the now-missing plate (e.g. "jeune femme en rose [55 x 33 cm]"), he places a simple and fabulous circular exploration of watercolors' potential. i love artists that understand the physicality of their medium, even the paper itself.

so sorry i couldn't find good online resources for the last 2 artists, but i suppose you must take my word on it :) i could write more, so so much more about berlin. so many more stunning gallery experiences that i left the city absolutely over-brimming. i feel such an over-stimulation as of late, i don't even know what to do with myself. i hope i was able ot convey some of the ideas i was exposed to in germany, and i hope to write some more soon about things i've experienced since moving to new york as well.

love you all dearly for this community we are trying to create of aristic exchange :) it means so much to me to be able to simply write and share with everyone :)