Paul Chan at the Carpenter Center, ‘Keeping Time’ at the PRC, Julia Hechtman at Artists Foundation, Inaugural Exhibition at Walker Contemporary
By EVAN J. GARZA | October 29, 2008
Paul Chan, 5TH Light |
“Paul Chan: Three Easy Pieces” at Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts at Harvard University, 24 Quincy St, Cambridge | November 6–January 4 | 617.495.3251
“Keeping Time: Cycle and Duration in Contemporary Photography” at Photographic Resource Center at Boston University, 832 Comm Ave, Boston | November 7–January 25 | 617.975.0600
“Julia Hechtman: Landshifter” at Artists Foundation, 516 East Second St, South Boston | November 8–December 20 | 617.464.3559
Inaugural Show at Walker Contemporary, 450 Harrison Ave, Boston November 7–December 20 | 617.290.0548 |
If you’ve visited the Institute of Contemporary Art at any point in the last few years — in either of its physical incarnations — there’s a good chance you’ve seen Paul Chan’s work. (His might be the only floor-projected video installation you can recall.) It’s the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts at Harvard University, however, that’s writing the next chapter for Chan in Boston. Opening next Thursday, November 6, “THREE EASY PIECES” will feature the fifth work in his seven-part cycle of digital-video installations projected onto the ground, plus a single-channel video piece filmed in Iraq and an animated digital video projected onto something called a “sparkle vellum” screen. (Sparkle motion, anyone?) Using characters set in a universe that is part paradise, part apocalypse, Chan’s digital-video pieces (as well as his documentary-style work) function as entertainment and as a critique of the ramifications of war and of our post-9/11 global culture.Making light of less destructive properties, “KEEPING TIME: CYCLE AND DURATION IN CONTEMPORARY PHOTOGRAPHY” offers work by a handful of artists who explore time as both experience and construct. Opening November 7 at the Photographic Resource Center at Boston University, the show explores the effects of long photographic exposures and varying methods of timed light capture as well as the influence of the human factor (when to shoot and for how long) and celestial cues (sunrise, sunset, star patterns in the evening sky) on photographic decisions.
Julia Hechtman isn’t as inclined to leave so much to chance. In “LANDSHIFTER,” which will go up in the video room at the Artists Foundation on November 8, we find Hechtman (founder and co-director of the Proof Gallery) controlling nearly everything. Set in a serene forest nook, the single-channel video installation features several seconds of pure uninterrupted nothingness briefly interrupted by periodic images of the artist popping up in the distance and foreground. Each candid appearance is carefully placed within the peaceful surroundings — and with just enough presence to disturb that peace.
Also content to do her own thing is Stephanie Walker, who’s opening her own gallery, WALKER CONTEMPORARY, with an inaugural group show on November 7. The director of Boston’s Chase Gallery from 2003 to 2007, Walker moved to Los Angeles for a year with her husband, where she was a private dealer. Her gallery roster is a collection of emerging and mid-career artists she met on the West Coast; her new space is the one that Gallery Kayafas leaves behind as it moves upstairs.
On the Web
Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts at Harvard University: www.ves.fas.harvard.edu
Photographic Resource Center at Boston University: www.prcboston.org
Artists Foundation: www.artistsfoundation.org
Walker Contemporary: www.walkercontemporary.com
Related:
Staycation, Primitive soul, Photos: Boston's Combat Zone, Burlesque (NSFW), More 
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With some contemporary-art spaces holding off on summer programming, June's First Friday celebration at the Harrison Avenue galleries may be the strongest one until the fall season, when both the traffic and the collectors return.
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Anne Siems's paintings are time machines teleporting you back to the early days of our American republic. In her show at Walker Contemporary, the German-born, Seattle-based artist channels the endearing awkwardness of artists like John Brewster Jr., who roamed NE at the start of the 19th century painting portraits.
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Images from Boston's Combat Zone at Howard Yezerski Gallery and the "Henry Horenstein: Show" at Walker.
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The Peabody Essex Museum in Salem has another show of historically relevant new art up its sleeve, this time focusing on Asia's other giant: India.
- A walk on the wild side
Everyone looks so weary in Howard Yezerski Gallery's gritty documentary photos of Boston's dear departed Combat Zone from 1969 to 1978. The year's still young, but this glimpse into our past from Roswell Angier, Jerry Berndt, and John Goodman may be one of the best shows of 2010.
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Topics:
Museum And Gallery
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