Art Talk
Yunhee Min and Dan Levenson
Hunter Drohojowska-Philp says that the two different shows, paintings of flowing color or of neutral geometry, are complementary.
By Hunter Drohojowska-Philp • • 3m ListenTwo shows at Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects address the ways contemporary artists continue to take on the arc of modernism.
Yunhee Min, "Movements (serpentine 3)", 2015
Acrylic on canvas; 40.50" H x 90.50" W (102.87 cm H x 229.87 cm W) framed
Courtesy of the artist and Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects
Photo by Jeff McLane
Yunhee Min's delightful new paintings appear the essence of simplicity. Veils of translucent acrylic paint in thin washes of pale rainbow colors are applied with a squeegee to a canvas. It seems clear where each stroke began and concluded. The titles suggest the gesture. Movements (serpentine 3), (2015) features the upward thrusting stripes of yellow, lavender, red, blue, aqua and green.
Yunhee Min, "Movements (turns and rounds1)", 2015
Acrylic on linen; 72" H x 60" W (182.88 cm H x 152.4 cm W)
Courtesy of the artist and Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects
Photo by Jeff McLane
She is one of a number of younger artists whose work draws from Color Field painting, the 1960's movement of artists such as Morris Louis or Helen Frankenthaler who reacted to the heavy brushwork of the Abstract Expressionists by pouring thinned paint onto unprimed canvases that then appeared to be stained.
Yunhee Min, "Movements (eccentric 2)", 2015
Acrylic on linen; 84" H x 62" W (213.36 cm H x 157.48 cm W)
Courtesy of the artist and Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects
Photo by Jeff McLane
Min's use of color is determinedly seductive, scintillating on fields of expansive white canvas and despite the nod to her formalist predecessors, looks very much of the present.
Dan Levenson, "Bruno Hüni", 2015
Oil on linen; 66.25" H x 47" W x 1.50" D (168.28 cm H x 119.38 cm W x 3.81 cm D)
Courtesy of the artist and Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects
Photo by Robert Wedemeyer
A nice complement to Min's vibrancy is the work of Dan Levenson, SKZ Painting Storage. One gallery features paintings of black and cream bands with distressed surfaces that lend an appearance of age. In the back gallery, the artist constructed the semblance of a storage area for the State Art Academy, Zurich (SKZ), a fictional Swiss art school, with a desk, storage lockers for the student's work, a great number of geometric compositions in the same black and cream paint, also cracked and chipped with age, all meant to be the result of specific class assignments on how to solve graphic design problems. Each is purportedly signed by its creator.
Dan Levenson, "SKZ Paintings Storage," installation view
Courtesy of the artist and Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects
Photo by Robert Wedemeyer
According to the artist's fictional narrative, this is what was left behind after the art school closed in 1989. However, every item on view was actually made by Levenson. The installation calls into question accepted views of the hallowed art school, the relevance of formalist technique and the confines of educational ideals. Both shows are on view to October 10.