The show’s title “Dangling Between The Real Thing And The Sign In The Window” is derived from a 1973 address by the composer Morton Feldman and is reflective of the newly minted curators’ perception of a tension on display in today’s art world between substance and superficiality. The curators’ choices demonstrate that works of conceptual rigor and substance can be personal and lavishly beautiful with no diminishment of integrity.
]]>But while Chelsea had its fair share of political art, it was indefatigable gallery visitors who hit openings in Brooklyn on Friday who got to see an especially strong work that explicitly evoked the political climate. Susan C. Dessel’s installation, Our Backyard, A Cautionary Tale, in the sculpture garden at Dam, Stuhltrager, featured a series of white plastic body bags lined up on a patch of grass. To get from the back door of the gallery to the outdoor bar, visitors had to either navigate a narrow path or step over the body bags to reach the far side of the outdoor space. As the opening got crowded, it provided perhaps the most apt metaphor for why we may see more "political" art this fall—under contemporary circumstances, it’s simply unavoidable.
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