#peterplagens

Recent paintings by Peter Plagens are on view at Nancy Hoffman in NYC through March 10. Peter Plagens, Treasures o’ the Street, 2017, mixed media on canvas. #peterplagens #nancyhoffmangallery #origami #hardedge #abstraction #nyc #gallery @nancyhoffmangallery (at Nancy Hoffman Gallery)

Plagens’ recent paintings feature an origami-esque central motif circumscribed by loping, calligraphic lines around the periphery. Peter Plagens, Quinella, 2017, mixed media on canvas. #peterplagens #nancyhoffmangallery #origami #hardedge #abstraction #nyc #gallery @nancyhoffmangallery (at Nancy Hoffman Gallery)

Read today's The Wall Street Journal review by #PeterPlagens of our ongoing Gabriel de la Mora exhibition below! On view through next Friday, September 2. From Marcel Duchamp’s readymade “Bottle Rack” (1914) to the Japanese artist Chiharu Shiota’s accumulation of suitcases stacked against the wall entitled “Searching for the Destination” (2012), we see that a certain species of artist operates under the principle that around us lie countless unacknowledged works of art. All that’s necessary to bring them to our attention, they believe, is to lift them out of their original contexts and place them in a gallery environment. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ With Gabriel de la Mora (b. 1968), an architect who switched to art and earned a master of fine arts degree in photography and video in 2003, some nice picture-framing and—in the case of this exhibition—a masterly installation are also required. Mr. De la Mora, who finds his material in Mexico City thrift shops, has gathered 55 pairs of stereo speaker screens and mounted them, framed. ~~~~~~~~~~~ In a minimalist way, there’s something for everybody in this show: for curator types, a capital-S seriousness of grid configuration of the hanging; for retro fans of the 1970s, lots of beige fabric with gold thread; and for cultural archaeologists, the ghosts of the speakers themselves imprinted on the cloth. Mr. De la Mora has a talent for combining visual elegance with the intimations of social meaning increasingly required of art. Here, the balance works. -Peter Plagens #GabrieldelaMora #review @wsj (at The Drawing Center)