2024 in Review: Art Exhibits

Today, I’m musing on the art I’ve seen this year. In the spirit of EOY, I intend to (and hold me to this dear friends!) drop a year-end retrospective of art experienced, books read, movies watched, and television consumed. Let this serve as the first entry of recaps from 2024––an exercise in reflection.

I’ll caveat by saying that I am no art critic. I’m not skilled in articulating why a paint stroke elicits a certain emotional response from me, but I find it nourishing as a writer to experience art in various forms and to think critically about them.

I’ve selected my top four incredible artist exhibitions that I had the privilege to see up-close and in person this year. And (bonus!) I’ve curated 3 art films that I found very intriguing, especially in conversation with each other.

Shneider Léon Hilaire

Magnin A – February 2024

La sirène guérisseuse, Shneider Léon Hilaire

There was something haunting and mystical about Hilaire’s art. By painting in a ghastly white atop darker backgrounds, he evokes a ghostly feeling. A connection between the living and the dead. With his piece Tête sans corps, I’m reminded of the classic tale of the headless horseman, but I’m equally endeared to Hilaire’s unique spin on it. It feels like a fairytale (or ghost story) that I know, but seen from a new angle.

Tête sans corps, Shneider Léon Hilaire

As a writer, I appreciate Hilaire’s ability to create these landscapes that are clearly so chock full of engaging stories, traditions, emotion and drama. And as someone who adores a healthy dose of fantasy, I like how Hilaire portrays elaborate rituals and mythical creatures like mermaids. Above all, I am struck by how memorable his pieces are, even months after I experienced his exhibition in February.

Gabriel de la Mora

Perrotin – March 2024

Mesmerizing. Insane. I’m short of just saying… holy shit about the whole thing. These are butterfly wings. (To be clear, I do wonder how these wings are sourced… is it ethical? What does it even mean to ethically harvest butterfly wings? How many wings am I staring at? I don’t know!)

But the message underneath is a little beautiful. That even in death, you can live on. Perhaps in some greater existence or in another form when united with others. Like an optical illusion, I’d love to gaze endlessly into these colorful patterns and see what answers about the universe seep out.

(Okay, I read the fine print. It says the butterfly wings were ethically sourced… but like… what does that meeeeean?)

Ry Arne

Vernissage – May 2024

As much as I spent time in big name galleries this year, I also experienced the incredible art of some more “early career” artists. And… my god… homegirl was cooking with this one. I spotted Ry Arne’s art at a group exhibition of a bunch of art students and her art just… grabbed me. Both darkly hilarious and cutting with her commentary on pharmaceuticals and healthcare as a whole, these sculptures of monstrous fingers and painted claw nails speak for themselves.

I can feel the tension between medicine (addiction?) and the individual, not to mention the self deprecating humor used to mask it. As I stared at her pieces from every angle (including catching myself in the mirrors of the sculpture bases), I couldn’t help but feel like I was experiencing something I hadn’t seen before––fresh, funny, unique, and coated with biting criticism. I’m really excited to see what Ry Arne does next.

Shannon T. Lewis

Mariane Ibrahim – May 2024

Body fragments and windows into other universes. The abstractness of Lewis’s work doesn’t feel abnormal in the slightest. Even as I look at an outstretched arm that seems to be attached to nothing, it feels right. Just like the shadows of sunlight that illuminate the black-and-white checkered floors, despite being detached from any window. Like the light they shed comes from another world altogether. As a woman with a face hidden by braids poses upon what appears to be a satin fabric, she holds a mirror. Or what could be a portal to another universe with dark sunsets and palm trees. Whatever she holds, I want to dive inside it.

(As an aside, I’m currently reading N.K. Jemisin’s THE CITY WE BECAME and her writing and descriptions of worlds layered upon worlds certainly evoke something akin to Lewis’s work here.)

3 Art Films

As someone who has written and directed a short film, I was drawn to these three art films and the artists’ reliance on visuals and themes––rather than a traditional commercial film structure. They’re strange and bizarre, but moving and eye-opening. And I find them inspiring––much like Hilaire’s work––in their ability to create these incredibly compelling visual worlds, where stories upon stories definitely unfold.

In other words, what these three films have in common is their lack of story (or what I as an American screenwriter would call a “cohesive narrative”). But that doesn’t make them any less compelling. In fact, I think it makes them more interesting and leaves so much room for them to inspire long form filmmaking.

In the Future, They Ate From The Finest Porcelain (Larissa Sansour, 2015)

Sansour unpacks the Palestinian identity and the artifacts she imagines that they will leave behind for archeologists of the future to find. I stumbled upon this piece at the L’Institut du monde arabe this summer and––from the very first line––the story captured me with emotional power and a fascinating perspective. The film takes place in this futuristic dystopia plagued by an ongoing and brutal colonization. As the heroine traverses this Dune-like landscape, she also attempts to better understand the events unfolding around her through some type of therapy session happening in voice over.

Through those discussions, she describes her dreams in which it rains porcelain. She asks us if we think it means anything. But before anyone can respond, she says she doesn’t think it means anything. A heartbreaking representation of how Palestinians might conceptualize the world around them.

Cosmic Generator (Mika Rottenberg, 2017)

@janiceofcourseExcerpt from Mika Rottenberg’s “Cosmic Generator” installation at SCAD #mikarottenberg #cosmicgenerator #overstimulation #hyperstimulation #asmr #art #china

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When visiting Seoul this spring, I was captivated by Rottenberg’s short film, which seems to explore borders and boundaries (at least, that was my takeaway). By moving through stalls at a shopping center in China, we experience rigid lines as one stall transitions to another. The stalls metaphorically explode with bright lights and colorful trinkets, but simultaneously remain contained by their rigid border. And somehow, by entering a secret tunnel, we end up on the other side of the world, walking the California-Mexico border. Business men in suits end up as the meat inside dishes at this Chinese restaurant somewhere in Mexico. They, too, find themselves crawling through that secret tunnel, where they discover larger humans smashing colorful light bulbs to pieces at the end.

I didn’t necessarily come for a plot, but I can only imagine what plots could happen in a world with borders that can only be traversed through colorful patterns and secret tunnels.

Passageways (Carine Asscher, James Turrell, 1995)

This one felt like Jurassic Park. And maybe it’s my love for the 90s sci-fi aesthetic or my adoration for anything that feels reminiscent of Michael Crichton, but I’m compelled by whatever James Turrell is cooking in the Painted Desert. I couldn’t exactly grasp what Turrell was doing flying over the hypnotizing desert landscape in Arizona. Nor did I understand what he builds that triangulates with the sun, which he discusses at length with a local Indigenous leader. But at the same time, I couldn’t really look away.

What are some of your favorite artists, pieces of art, or exhibits? Any I should check out?

Until next time,

Carrington

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Looking for more art-related musings? Catch up on my last musings about art exhibits from earlier this year.