Abstraction the unifying principle of a new international show

A new international show, entitled ‘The Jewel Thief’ explores novel ways to experience abstract art. Employing divergent display forms, the exhibit focuses attention on intersection of art with both the functional and decorative elements of architecture. It offers a wide range of work, including painting, textiles, wallpaper, video, photography, and sculpture. 



A set of absorbing abstract works by 60 artists of different generations (Nicholas Krushenick, Joan Mitchell, Joan Snyder, Francesca DiMattio, to name a few) is on view at the Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and at Skidmore College Art Gallery in upstate New York. They are presented through the lens of different opposing albeit fluid categories, existing in our day lives, such as intimate and spectacular, and private and public.

The show explores how art negotiates the distance between some of these constantly shifting categories and how space tends to affect this negotiation. Doing away with the notion that abstract is devoid of content, it maintains that pleasure and beauty in works are invariably full of meaning.

The exhibit draws parallels between attitudes and questions within individual works. Defining boundaries and edges decides how we are able to follow the limit of any given object and experience. Such definitions require a kind of invention (a shared abstraction), which alters what’s within realms of possibility for us to do, think, and be. As an ensemble it makes up for a vibrant viewing, covering a wide swath, and setting up some useful confusions.

Among the other important artists, who feature in the show, are Anni Albers, Gary Batty, Alex Brown, Richmond Burton, Patrick Chamberlain, Stephen Dean, Anne Delaporte, Francesca DiMattio, Cheryl Donegan, Rico Gatson, Joanne Greenbaum, Christopher Harvey, Jessica Jackson Hutchins, Lisa Lapinski, Barry Le Va, Sherrie Levine, Chris Martin, Andrew Massulo, Jane Masters, Carrie Moyer, Victoria Palermo, Lawrence Weiner, and Richard Woods. ‘The Jewel Thief’ is co-curated by Ian Berry, Susan Rabinowitz Malloy, and Jessica Stockholder.