The Curators' Eggs

Paul Kasmin Gallery is pleased to present The Curators’ Eggs, an exhibition opening July 12 and on view through August 18, 2017, which will feature the work of thirteen artists, each selected by one of thirteen guest curators. Spanning painting, sculpture and installation, the exhibition will manifest the ongoing dialogue between artists and cultural influencers in an effort to momentarily articulate the hyper-evolving landscape of contemporary art.

Works by Nick Hornby, Cheryl Pope, Matthew Hansel and Pieter Schoolwerth hone in on the rich lexicon of art history, appropriating diverse visual and contextual economies through their own distinct contemporary means. In a similar vein to Hansel, Mark Thomas Gibson adopts iconic cultural visual languages to realize compositions that are at once recognizable yet surreal. Maximilian Magnus and Lucy Dodd further examine abstraction and underscore the performativity of painting. Rooted in a parallel practice, Jan-Ole Schiemann creates abstract compositions composed of shapes and fragments from various sources, both historical and his own, to delve deeper into the potential and limitations of autonomous painting.

Through a critical lens, Zoe Buckman and Ivy Haldeman realize works that take on issues of patriarchal authority and ideas of femininity. Merging sexual tensions with fairytale-like subjects, Kathy Ruttenberg’s blunt figurative sculptures emerge from traditions of Symbolism pioneered by Louise Bourgeois and Kiki Smith. Incorporating invented symbols with existing motifs, Claudia Peña Salinas and Matvey Levenstein create compelling works that simultaneously excavate the anthropology of their respective heritage and personal biography.