The Desk Dispatch
January 21, 2025
I start the new year with a lot of excitement for my writing life, which is about my subjects and the creatives and others who give impetus to them. Writers and artists are foremost among them, but also curators, publishers, and sense of place, wherever it is found. I have also been re-inducted into the fellowship of AICA: The International Association of Art Critics. Yes, I was a member before, for a few short years in the last century. I am over the moon to be back in the company of my respected peers, and I look forward to meeting more of the younger contemporaries as well. As someone who has fulfilled both roles. I am interested to explore the experiences and interests of art writers and curators in these pages as well.
Currently I am finishing up two essays on artists that I started last year: the last in a series of four essays on Nolan Preece, a septuagenarian photographer with divergent interests both creative and personal. His essays populate my “Portrait” section which will feature complex portrayals of an individual beyond what they create for artistic pursuits, but their youthful education and life changes; their driving forces tangential to art, or diverging from it; and the overall arc and direction of their lives as a story and symbol for interpretation. Preece has led a fascinating life, learning his craft under the tutelage of Ansel Adams and his workshop group The Friends of Photography, developing radical new techniques for experimental photo related abstraction while simultaneously developing a grand array of landscape photographs of the area in and around his home in Reno, Nevada; his teaching and curating activities, and his friendships and collaborations amidst the larger artistic community. Another essay in progress regards Leah Oates, whose progressive bodies of photographic work challenge both perception and process. Oates shares with Preece an interest in the land, yet her idea of the medium alters drastically. Hers are analog photographs altered by successively re-exposing the film inside the camera. I won’t speak of future essays until they’re closer to being written, but there are several I am thinking about, including an extended exploration of the works and ideas of Joseph Beuys. I have inherited many books on him, and what better use to put them to than to expand my understanding of his legacy and the specific art forms within it.
The art scene changes all the time, with galleries moving from one neighborhood or borough to another. The fortunes of artists and curators are wrapped up in the changing fortunes, and developing visions, of the venues that host them. I’m reading a very interesting book on this subject, Art Monster: On the Impossibility of New York by Marin Kosut, who teaches The Sociology of Art at SUNY Purchase College. My review is forthcoming. Other reviews include poetry, visual art, literary criticism, and memoir. Sometimes I will also post about books from my collection that have meant a lot to me, under the theme Shelf Life. Profiles on the publishers of new books are also in the works, as are various independent curators of my acquaintance. I’m going to be posting more art reviews, some in my section for memories of exhibitions called Retrospection, and some in a running format about recent days when I saw several exhibitions under a section called The Art Stomp. I will also be talking more about the scene and what I think is new and fresh.
David: Your enthusiasm is contagious. Looking forward to reading your thoughts on art and life. With all that is swirling around us, your outlook is refreshing.