Monday, January 24, 2011

Theo Altenberg

Theo Altenberg is good.  There is an intriguing drama in his yummy olis-on-cardboard . In these seemingly random splashes and smears of mixed oily color, the viewer finds him- or herself looking for scenery, people, recognizable forms.


Whether this was Altenberg’s intention or not is irrelevant. What matters is that it gives us pause. We look. We see.

The 59-year-old Altenberg was born in Mönchengladbach, Germany, and lives in Berlin

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

something i like

New York artist Tom Fruin’s outdoor sculpture Kolonihavehus in the plaza of the Royal Danish Library in Copenhagen.

Fruin’s sculpture is constructed of a thousand reclaimed pieces of plexiglass ranging in size from 2x2 to 24x36 inches. They originate from many sources, including a closed- down plexi distributorship near Copenhagen, a framing shop, the basement of the Danish State Art Workshops, and the dumpsters outside the Danish Architecture Center - nice work Tom!

Kolonihavehuses were originally small garden sheds that were designed to give cramped and often impoverished city-dwellers a small plot and a refuge from city life.