Looking Across Exhibitions: Building Professional Judgment

A Work and a Whole Exhibition Require Different Scales of Judgment

In a gallery solo exhibition, I can return a work to the artist’s wider questions for that particular show. Penone, for example, uses bronze to address a tree’s surface and growth, while Manders uses it to produce the unfinished appearance of clay. In both cases, an understanding of the material develops through repetitions and differences among works. Time and space are more compressed at a fair, where a booth must quickly establish a recognisable identity. I therefore look at two things at once: whether a work holds together at first sight, and whether the booth supplies enough evidence to make a second look more revealing than the first.

Mindy Solomon’s juxtaposition of tapestries and three-dimensional works, and Baker—Hall’s furniture-like arrangement of wall works and small objects, make the booth a concrete unit of comparison. Yet an overall spatial impression can also obscure individual works’ questions. If I leave a booth remembering only that it had a strong atmosphere, without being able to explain how the structure, surface or imagery of a particular work operated, that memory cannot yet support an in-depth judgment. Conversely, a clear display need not rely on theatrical scenery: empty space, hanging height and distances between works can also make details easier to see.

Understanding Fibre and Clay Beyond Material Categories

Sonia Gomes and Sagarika Sundaram in London, together with Silvia Heyden and Terri Friedman at Independent, make me reconsider what the label “fibre art” preserves and what it overlooks. Thread, cloth, weaving and felt do provide a material basis for comparison, but each artist addresses different questions: an object’s history and its seams; forms swelling into space; the rhythm of lines; or how forceful imagery takes shape through fabric. Describing them only as soft, warm or handmade fixes the material in advance within a set of emotional impressions.

Ceramics present a similar problem. Brittany Mojo’s vessel forms, Yuka Nishihisamatsu’s biomorphic ceramics at Eunoia, Keiyona Stumpf’s densely growing organic structures and the works of Yoshikazu Tanaka and Kuniko Kinoto cannot be treated as expressions of the same taste simply because they involve clay. I need to distinguish the structure of a vessel, glaze and firing, the recombination of fragments, and suggestions of animals, plants or geology. These specific differences explain the works I actually saw more effectively than sweeping formulations such as a “return to craft”.

The Rights of Figures Within Figurative Painting

Danielle Mckinney and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye make me notice how recognisability, a figure’s direct return of our gaze, and whether a setting supplies a complete story alter the relationship of looking. Quiet figures in interiors may not be waiting to be interpreted by the viewer; invented figures can have a fully realised presence. By comparison, the bodies, actions and spatial relationships in Dana Schutz and Shaqúelle Whyte draw my attention toward the sense that something is happening while resisting reduction to a single plot.

I therefore hesitate to supply a psychological story for every figure. Describing the position of a hand, the proportions between a person and furniture, or the relationship between a direction of gaze and the edge of an image is usually more persuasive than immediately calling a character lonely, anxious or free. Viewers can propose their own understandings while leaving room for what a work has not explained. This is a balance I hope to maintain in future art writing.

Market Observation Begins with the Quality of Information

NADA and Independent offered different modes of discovery. NADA’s dense booths brought new names and materials together. Independent, with a considerable share of individual presentations and large sculptures marking points along the route, allowed some spaces to approach the form of small exhibitions. These are differences visible in the materials for this set of visits. They cannot directly establish which fair offers better purchases or which artists will perform better in price terms. A considerable research distance remains between short-term visual impressions, exhibitor lists and market value.

If I continue to follow a work from the perspective of art dealing or collecting research, I first need to confirm its official title, year, medium, dimensions and edition status. Next come its exhibition history, provenance and associated documentation. Only if a transaction becomes a consideration can I meaningfully check the actual quoted price, condition, and transport and installation requirements. A gallery’s presentation of an artist at one fair does not automatically establish long-term or exclusive representation. These seemingly basic details directly affect whether I can describe the work accurately and define the scope of my judgment.

This process also reminds me that subtitles, translations and second-hand captions can introduce small but significant errors. A word in an exhibition title, a misplaced gallery name or a painting mistaken for an installation can send analysis in the wrong direction. I want checking a work’s information to be part of looking, rather than an extra task performed after the writing is finished. Trust in art expertise often rests on details that can be explained one by one.

The Exhibition-Viewing Method I Want to Develop

After these exhibitions, I want to keep building three kinds of record: overall observations that identify relationships between works and spaces; close details that support analysis; and sources that allow information to be checked against the original record. When comparing works, I will first establish that I am comparing the same problem before addressing similarities in appearance. For example, I place Gomes beside Heyden to understand how fibre organises time and rhythm, and Penone beside Manders to consider how bronze changes my perception of fragility and duration. Such comparisons extend an exhibition experience further than simply grouping similar colours or shapes.

For me, this report’s value is in forming questions that can be reused and revised. The next time I enter a gallery or fair, I will still allow the works themselves to guide my attention, while asking more precisely what is visibly present, what comes from the exhibition’s own explanation, and what belongs to my interpretation. Distinguishing these levels allows exhibition-going to develop gradually into the capacities needed for research, curating and communicating about art.