Abstract painters Amy Sillman and Cameron Martin discussed tragicomic abstraction in art.
In the heart of New York City, the exhibition "Baseline" by Cameron Martin at Sikkema Jenkins & Co is captivating audiences with its exploration of perception, abstraction, and the natural world. The exhibition, on view through October 11, invites visitors to experience a unique blend of light, space, and art.
Martin's paintings in this exhibition, set in motion by capturing natural light and spatial experience, conclude with a series of subtle, evocative works that challenge the viewer's perception. Each painting appears as if it just appeared on the canvas, with no visible history or remnants, creating an air of mystery and intrigue.
Martin's work might be seen as a kind of idealism, painting the world that is desired to live in. His collages, on the other hand, have more concrete referents, as the components clearly come from somewhere. However, his current work is an attempt to trouble the category of painting, working against embodiment as prerequisites.
The paintings in Martin's latest show had articulated brushstrokes, but he has been thinking about other kinds of surrogates or stand-ins for gesture. His new paintings differ from earlier works, as he is interested in putting forms together that don't necessarily make sense in the same space. This approach proposes multiple meanings being possible at once, in contrast to binary thinking pervading art and politics.
Martin finds abstraction exciting as it allows for a polyvalency of meaning. His version of abstraction involves thinking about "almost signs," where the signifier and the signified don't quite add up. This results in paintings that have a festive quality, with a distinct relationship to gravity and a proposing of a lack of fixity.
Ulrike Mueller, a mutual friend of Martin, said that sometimes artists don't paint the world they live in, but instead paint the world they want to live in. Martin's work certainly supports this sentiment, as it proposes a world where multiple meanings coexist, where forms that don't make sense are put together, and where the viewer's perception is challenged and expanded.
Martin's paintings might be humorous, as they are like signs stripped of meaning, or pictures stripped of background and foreground, or images stripped of signification. Yet, they also have a stilled quality, or a paradoxical situation of stillness and motion, as seen in his collages, which have a whole different kind of affect, being animated but not funny.
Martin's current work explores the mediated relationship to the natural world and the ideologically loaded environment. Every painting he makes still has the logic of an image playing with graphics and signs and grids. His work might be described as having a smile that is more unsure than it looks, inviting the viewer to ponder, question, and engage with the art on a deeper level.
Don't miss the opportunity to immerse yourself in the captivating world of Cameron Martin's "Baseline" exhibition at Sikkema Jenkins & Co before it closes on October 11.
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