Caitlin Masley at her studio in DUMBO. (Image: Carissa Pelleteri)

Looking at Baltimore’s busted-out vacancies last weekend, with their broken, boarded-up windows and exhausted dereliction, I couldn’t help but think of a phrase the artist Caitlin Masley used when we spoke in January: “monuments to failure.” It’s an interesting description, because monuments tend to valorize failure’s opposite: success and the heroic triumphs of civilization. Beyond recognizing fallen soldiers and epic battles, monuments reserve their monumentality for the great and the good. Yet so much of life is neither great nor good, and if reality is to be preserved in statuary, isn’t it equally worth capturing the sad defeats of life? And if we were to pursue that idea, would we need to go much farther than the half-built developments littering so much of America today? Aren’t their shells evidence of stock market failure and an inability to curb our greed for more land, more profit?

Those are the kinds of questions Masley’s artworks prompt. Her sculptures, drawings, installations, and photography speak to the hoped-for futures humans conjure and then leave behind, whether in their imaginations or here in the material world. There is, for instance, “TWOTOWERSVER2,” a manipulated photo of an imaginary landscape in postwar reconstruction, and “Copperland,” a series of abstract drawings overlaid in copper leafing. In the works, dense clusters of human habitation are seen from a bird’s-eye view, with some sections darkened as if erased, the whole of it suggesting a desert landscape—El Paso at night maybe, or, more likely, bombed villages in the Middle East. Continue Reading More »

Elephant by Chris Barreto, 2010 (7:30pm auctioned at $35)

Untitled (Water Towers) by Harry Gold, 2010 (7:30pm average bid $150 each)

It’s Thursday. And people are swarming to gallery openings everywhere here in Manhattan.  There seems to be an early summer fiesta happening in the art world this weekend. Normally I would’ve done my Chelsea to Lower East Side gallery hopping routine, but tonight I skipped both entirely and went into Dumbo, Brooklyn instead. It’s the 1st Thursday of June, which kicks off the Dumbo Gallery Walk event of the month.  It’s a little haven for the young and emerging, but nonetheless there is a small auction scene happening underground at Rabbit Hole Gallery. I really enjoyed the works, which was installed in non-traditional ways, and mostly in small scale (see above), with an all encompassing silent auction going on. Which means the bidder marks his or her bid on a hanging piece of note-paper taped alongside the artwork. It’s fun and engaging; brilliant! This also gives average folks a chance to collect original works of art.

Two other shows worth noting are the Syracuse University MFA exhibition housed in DAC (Dumbo Arts Center, above) and Cinema 16 hosted by Smack Mellon.

The streets in Dumbo tonight were a mixture of amiable visitors from out of town, local artists, art school graduates, professionals, yuppies, and of course the indie crowd. Not that I want to categorize, but just to give you an idea of the scene, which wasn’t rowdy and hyper as in Chelsea openings, but laid-back and mellow.  By closing time and as darkness fell most people either meandered into nearby bars and restaurants or went to sit by the water.

Dumbo Gallery Walk will be happening every first Thursday of the month throughout the Summer. So get out there and experience the Brooklyn alternative arts culture!