Art
Edited by Erin Kuschner
timeout.com/austin/art @erinito
Art
What lies beneath
Diptych #1, installation view
The Contemporary Austin invites you to take a (very) close look at the work of celebrated abstractionist Garth Weiser. By Joel Meares
CURATOR LOUIS GRACHOS is effusive when talking about New York painter Garth Weiser, the subject of a career survey exhibition at the Contemporary Austin’s Jones Center. Grachos compares Weiser to Jackson Pollack and Bauhaus artist László Moholy-Nagy, and there’s excitement in his voice as he describes the way the young abstractionist combines layers of paint with occasional incisions in the canvas to create fabriclike textures that demand closer inspection. “Every once in a while, you see a painter who comes out and really moves the needle,” says Grachos. “Weiser is such an artist.” “Garth Weiser: Paintings, 2008–2017,” which opened in April and runs through the summer, tracks the 37-year-old artist’s evolution through the last decade. Viewers can follow chronologically, across two floors, the Arizona native’s work from the flat, hard- edged Moholy-Nagy–like geometric pieces of the late 2000s to the increasingly complex pieces produced in more recent years. Weiser says that even as the formal nature
of his work has changed, “the underlying theme of conflict and usability is carried through.” He points to the earliest work in the
Time Out Austin May 11–August 16, 2017
show, 2008’s I wouldn’t have worn mascara if I knew I was going to be taking a trip down memory lane—in which clashing line patterns surround a black hexagon—drawing formal connections between it and his newest work, Diptych #1 (2017), which was specially commissioned by the Contemporary Austin. Each composition takes a different approach to layering, and playing with viewers’ expectations. “[The first work’s] underpainting (in
this case, tempera paint) physically affects the paint applied on top of it,” he says. “The tempera is an unstable base that the white acrylic can’t adhere to; in effect, the
underpainting bleeds through the final layer.” In the later diptych, the underpainting is similarly revealed but this time through “pits and gashes.” Weiser says both processes work to bring “a sense of controlled spontaneity as well as conflict between the spectrums of techniques used.” The painter’s large-scale works make
the survey a perfect exhibition to showcase the Jones Center’s renovations, which were completed last December and added almost 3,000 square feet of space. In the new building, viewers have room to stand back and take in a Weiser work at a distance and experience the hard-to-focus white noise of the pieces—“I think drone or static (as in TV static) is defiantly in the works,” says Weiser—as well as to get up close and discover those layers. “You’ll see shapes and colors emerge,” says Grachos. “The more you give the painting, the more it gives back to you.” “The viewer can be met with what appears
“The more you give the painting, the more it gives back to you.” —Grachos
Tahitian Moon 50
to be static,” says Weiser, “but if looked at closely, an underlying topography or random composition emerges. … When the two intersect, you get an unstable painting that flickers between hard-edge restraint and Expressionistic instinct. This is what I am after.” à “Garth Weiser: Paintings, 2008–2017” is at the Contemporary Austin’s Jones Center through Aug 27 (
thecontemporaryaustin.org). Free–$5.
PHOTOGRAPHS (FROM TOP): BRIAN FITZSIMMONS, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND CASEY KAPLAN, NEW YORK; CARY WHITTIER, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND CASEY KAPLAN, NEW YORK, © GARTH WEISER
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