Reviews
Andrew Bick
Issue 28, December 2008
Galerie von Bartha Garage, Basel
5 September – 18 October
Review by Sherman Sam
Over the years, Andrew Bick's engagement with abstraction has become increasingly complex. A refitted car garage (Galerie von Bartha's newest space) has possibly provided him with the opportunity to put forward his best argument yet. His earlier work was so physical that it could be described as closer to painted sculptural relief than 'regular' painting. These wax-laden objects incorporated the building blocks of nonfigurative painting's language – gesture, geometry, the grid, drawing – and often set them in opposition: painterly versus hardedged, wax paintings and Perspex reliefs, splattery against smooth, painting and drawing, painting versus furniture. It appears as if Bick has been gradually developing an expanded notion of abstraction somewhere between the lines of Gerhard Richter and Jonathan Lasker, achieved by creating what at first glance appears to be a reified object that meditates upon abstraction's grammar and structure.
Having said that, Bick has constantly – consciously or unconsciously – subverted his own seemingly 'ideological' strategy with a more sensitive and thoughtful touch in his approach to material. More Jasper Johns than Wolfgang Laib in his use of wax, Bick appears to favour the medium for its cool nature. In particular the use of encaustic – a medium that naturally provides a luminous warmth different from that of pure oil and more physical than the plasticity of acrylic – is enhanced here by the natural daylight provided by the gallery's factory roof. It is just this particular sensitivity to texture and surface that prevents Bick's paintings from turning into the colder, more programmatic objects of contemporary abstractionists like Jason Martin and Fiona Rae, or Peter Halley and Fabian Marcaccio.
On this occasion Bick has also eschewed a dynamic approach to composition that has previously conveyed a sense of organised chaos; instead this group has a reduced vocabulary, with triangles at its core and compositions that unfold with a more elegiac tempo. Gesture only appears faintly, via scribbled pencil lines. By using oil paint for a base, instead of acrylic, as in the past, and covering some of his panels in linen (yet another signifier of 'refined painting'), coupled with a more restrained palette, Bick has created a group that is mostly elegant and meditative. Ultimately there is here a gentler pace that was not possible or evident in his earlier work, and the overall thrust of this show seems towards creating work that has a certain humming luminosity.
Bick's approach over the years has been to produce a broad range of work to advance his various arguments for an abstraction that is intelligent (though not programmatic), while also being felt. Like his seemingly contradictory visual juxtapositions, this approach requires a good sense of balance. Here he has allowed a more sensitive aspect of his work to take hold, and the result is one that is rich in its sensitivity to the basic building blocks of his visual language: geometry and colour. It is this pared down quality that makes this show stand out.
Galerie von Bartha Garage, Basel
5 September – 18 October
Review by Sherman Sam
Over the years, Andrew Bick's engagement with abstraction has become increasingly complex. A refitted car garage (Galerie von Bartha's newest space) has possibly provided him with the opportunity to put forward his best argument yet. His earlier work was so physical that it could be described as closer to painted sculptural relief than 'regular' painting. These wax-laden objects incorporated the building blocks of nonfigurative painting's language – gesture, geometry, the grid, drawing – and often set them in opposition: painterly versus hardedged, wax paintings and Perspex reliefs, splattery against smooth, painting and drawing, painting versus furniture. It appears as if Bick has been gradually developing an expanded notion of abstraction somewhere between the lines of Gerhard Richter and Jonathan Lasker, achieved by creating what at first glance appears to be a reified object that meditates upon abstraction's grammar and structure.
Having said that, Bick has constantly – consciously or unconsciously – subverted his own seemingly 'ideological' strategy with a more sensitive and thoughtful touch in his approach to material. More Jasper Johns than Wolfgang Laib in his use of wax, Bick appears to favour the medium for its cool nature. In particular the use of encaustic – a medium that naturally provides a luminous warmth different from that of pure oil and more physical than the plasticity of acrylic – is enhanced here by the natural daylight provided by the gallery's factory roof. It is just this particular sensitivity to texture and surface that prevents Bick's paintings from turning into the colder, more programmatic objects of contemporary abstractionists like Jason Martin and Fiona Rae, or Peter Halley and Fabian Marcaccio.
On this occasion Bick has also eschewed a dynamic approach to composition that has previously conveyed a sense of organised chaos; instead this group has a reduced vocabulary, with triangles at its core and compositions that unfold with a more elegiac tempo. Gesture only appears faintly, via scribbled pencil lines. By using oil paint for a base, instead of acrylic, as in the past, and covering some of his panels in linen (yet another signifier of 'refined painting'), coupled with a more restrained palette, Bick has created a group that is mostly elegant and meditative. Ultimately there is here a gentler pace that was not possible or evident in his earlier work, and the overall thrust of this show seems towards creating work that has a certain humming luminosity.
Bick's approach over the years has been to produce a broad range of work to advance his various arguments for an abstraction that is intelligent (though not programmatic), while also being felt. Like his seemingly contradictory visual juxtapositions, this approach requires a good sense of balance. Here he has allowed a more sensitive aspect of his work to take hold, and the result is one that is rich in its sensitivity to the basic building blocks of his visual language: geometry and colour. It is this pared down quality that makes this show stand out.
Tags: andrew bick, basel, galerie von bartha garage, sherman sam
