The offer made to the residents of Villa del Sol by Dr. Ibarra is outstanding. The President of el Colegio de Medicos Cirujanos, by giving away 17 cuerdas of precious land for the new community, deserves our respect and admiration. His dedication can be only praised by imitating his goodwill. At fournier:arquitectura csp, we will offer our services gratis to help accomplish his dream of freeing the good people of this makeshift community of the despair that accompanies the uncertainty of being deprived of your home. En horabuena!
The moment passed (in 2 parts) by Peter Halley (1989). Day-glo acrylic and roll-a-tex on canvas
97.8 x 95 in.
Peter Halley was always an enigma for me within these rough times. Everyone was spreading paint like there’s no tomorrow and Peter was putting tape on his canvas!
Haunts
by Gregory Amenoff (American, b.1948) 1980, Oil on Canvas52” x 62”
I wonder if I would have continued painting after 1992, if my paintings would have looked like this. For all I could swear, Greg Amenoff was German! (He is from St. Charles, Illinois, hmm?)
Oral history by Meyer Vaisman. Ink on Canvas (processed inks)Size 90.6 x 109.8 x 7.9 in (1988)
I remember Vaisman’s work as retrograde: ink drawngs, portraits, caricatures - all of this in cameo shaped raw canvas…very strange!!. Meyer Vaisman was born in Caracas, Venezuela (1960), studied at Parsons School of Design and currently lives in Barcelona and New York. He is represented by Sonnabend Gallery.
Growing by Keith Harring, 1988
I worked on Park Avenue South and 22nd in NYC. One day, while going to lunch (near 20th St), I saw a line of “crawling babies” on a construction board fence. I was curious just enough to think about it for the entire lunch hour. That afternoon, at the subway station at 23rd St, I saw a jumping dog drawing, made with chalk on a black poster(the kind used by the NYCTA to cover old ads). Now, I was totally fascinated by the thought that the drawings I had seen that day were done by the same artist. Anyway, two days later, I ripped the poster away. It was after all a drawing by soon-to-be-famous Keith Haring. This was back in 1979. Or was it in 1980? I still have it with me.
Nadie olvida nada, (1982) by Guillermo Kuitca Acrylic on wood 47 1/2” x 60”
This is one of four paintings by Kuitca titled “nadie olvida nada”. Josefina Ayerza speculates that the repeated names are the result of a ritual started by Guillermo on account that his father would tell him when was the work piece, finished. Click on the picture to read Planning stages: Josefina Ayerza on Guillermo Kuitca.
Bad Boy (1981) by Eric Fischl, Oil on Canvas 66” x 96”.
Robert Huhes, Time critic wrote back in 1988: “This is the suburb as “failed Eden,” as noted by three out of three American sociologists and not a few novelists. But Fischl’s project is not to embroider clichés on it. Rather, he finds images that seem to trail a whole narrative history behind them, but obliquely so that you, as viewer, are put at the threshold of a hidden life that may, if you look closer, be yours. Fischl is a true American realist, but he works at a pitch of psychological truth (especially about adolescent sexuality) not known in American narrative art in the thirties.” (Read the entire article on the left column)
Tennyson by David Salle Oil on Canvas w/acrylic & wood & plaster relief 78 x 117.3 x 5.5 in. 1983.
I have decided to devote this blog to 80’s art, particularly the New York scene. I lived in NYC from 1979 to 1983 in the formative years of the dog-eat-dog gallery boom. The Germans also arrived in NY with wet paintings and it was so spectacular!. Saturday evening openings and parties were the norm and I must have attended them all. Starting with David Salle, I start this humble homage to my favorite city during my favorite decade. I have included a brief article on Salle that sums up this enigmatic man.
The Patients and the Doctor (Mixed Media) 1978 by Julian Schnabel. I saw this painting for the first time back in 1979 when I moved to New York. I believe it was part of his first solo show at Mary Boone, but I’m not sure. Anyway, what I remember was talking to Julian the day after Robert Hughes crucified him on Time magazine. I crossed the street and told him I was moving to Barcelona, the next day. I knew of his attraction to Spain, so I told him I was also a painter and that i enjoyed his work. He was dressed with a heavy fur coat and a sad look. This was back in February 1983.
