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Miami International Art Fair II
Monday, January 24, 2011 at 07:23PM All photos in this post by m.diaz @ the MIA Art fair
Christina Pettersson
In grad school I was told I was a better draftsperson than painter and that I should focus my energy on just drawing... regardless... at graduation I received a certificate of distinction at the Hoffberger school of Painting. I'm glad I didn't outline limitations around myself or be swayed by the big names that guided my path, but when I saw this artist, Christina Pettersson's work @ Mia it reminded how powerful an unadulterated graphite drawing can be. Her work comes across as pure as a piece of 18th century literature and iconic and romantic enough to make William Morris smile in his grave. The large scale of the drawings can be better appreciated in the video I found for you. I am also quite impressed with the artists featured by the Spinello gallery who had more than one of the artists I am featuring and reviewing here my blog.
Zora Neale Hurston's Grave, 2009, Graphite on Paper by Christina Pettersson rep. by Spinello Gallery</span>
Eudora Welty's Grave, 2009, Graphite on Paper by Christina Pettersson rep. by Spinello Gallery
Euginio Cuttica
One of the artists I really enjoyed discovering at the Miami International Art Fair was Euginio Cuttica, who I believe was there represented by the Adriana Budich Arte Contemporàneo Gallery. Eugenio Cuttica is a contemporary artist born in Buenos Aires in the mid 50’s. The opening slideshow on his website is a treat enough to discover so I highly recommend clicking on his name anywhere in this post to go to it and peruse yourself.
Luna #19 mixed media on cardboard by Euginio Cuttica
DETAIL Luna #19 mixed media on cardboard by Euginio Cuttica
Luna #17 mixed media on cardboard by Euginio Cuttica
DETAIL Luna #17 mixed media on cardboard by Euginio Cuttica Sang-Sik Hong
Another very intriguing artist was South Korean Artist Sang-Sik Hong who was represented at MIA by the Patrajdas Gallery.
Sang-Sik uses a very pedestrian (everyday) object such as the plastic drinking straw and delivers a fun, yet deliberate and evocative punch of relief imagery!
He makes contemporary, symbolic sculptures & installations. A real special treat is to visit the Patrajdas site by clicking on it here and seeing SangSik Hong's Installation Works which are EXTRAordinary and fantastic feats of genius!
Representations of Power, Sex & Desire executed in a "weak" and basic, yet iconic material.
Mouth - Red (ed. 3/5)Straws by Sang-Sik Hong rep. by Patrajdas Contemporary Art
Obstruct (ed. 1/5)Straws by Sang-Sik Hong rep. by Patrajdas Contemporary Art
DETAIL Obstruct (ed. 1/5)Straws by Sang-Sik Hong rep. by Patrajdas Contemporary Art
DETAIL Obstruct (ed. 1/5)Straws by Sang-Sik Hong rep. by Patrajdas Contemporary Art
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I hope you enjoyed this second installment and trust me there is still so much more to come! So stay tuned! -Ciao Amarettogirl
Reader Comments (11)
Oh I love the straw art!!! Wow!! But my favorite is the Eugenio Cuttaca..thank you for sharing..
this is so amazing. I'm so happy you shared this with all of this. The work with the straws is epic and it really makes you think of the potential in simple things in our lives :)
This is really cool! I love Christina Pattersson's idea of resurrection and how she expresses the meaning of the word from her personal life as well as from literature and history. I also like the fact that her works are linked with writing which makes her work very poetic and more profound. With Euginio Cuttica's work I was surprised how you can just take one image,(A girl standing on top of a chair) and just the change of colors and textures can bring up a variety of feelings emotions.The Artist Sang Sik Hong impressed me the most. I love the concept of using a simple everyday object like straws to create something so big and complex and also the contradiction of using a manufactured material like straws(plastic) to create something natural and organic like the human body. I think that contradiction is what makes this piece of art so powerful.
ohhh man christina is so good. all those drawings are super wild, and then that sculpture with the flowers coming out of the cracks is super good, mostly because of that explanation of the affects of the atomic bomb. I had no idea. Looks like MIA was willlllld. your other post is great, too! (comment consolidation, hep) i really like that one that was using so much red. super nice.
Cristana's work looks like black-and-white photography because it seems so clear and detailed. Cuttica's work is amazing. I really like the colors and the fact that it is painted all over cardboard, wow. The girl even reminds me of my oldest niece standing on a chair to reach the freezer! The S. Korean work is my favorite (and my dad's!) It is hard to believe that the work is created by just straws to make such a creative piece. What Jenny said is very interesting and I must agree with it. It's a little ironic that this image of something so natural like the human face is made up of plastic straws, something totally man made and different.
I agree with what has been said about the originality and impressiveness of the straw artwork, but i have to say i LOVE the pieces you posted by Euginio Cuttica best- my favorite is Luna #17. The amount of colors and patterns and designs shown appears to fuse contemporary with traditional. And Christina Pettersson's work looks romantic, like you said, but at the same time dark and mysterious (which is the best combination, in my opinion.)... like an old black and white photograph. So much talent in this post!
all the art pieces were interesting but I liked the one by Sang-Sik the best just because its so different. I wonder how long it took Sang-Sik to make the sculpture being that its made out of plastic straws. One thing it reminds me of is the "see no evil" monkey from the three see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil monkey sculpture. Another thing that amazes me about this artwork is that the image of the person covering his or her eyes is popping out like its three dimensional instead of just a two dimensional image. This is definitely something I have never seen before.
I have to say hands down the most interesting piece(s) of art posted has to be Sang Sik Hong's straw impressions, it reminds me of the old toy in which you could press objects into and the hundreds of pins all fitted into one frame would take the form of the object(s) pressed into it. Thinking of the toy it also reminds me on how hard it was to try to make the pins form the shape of an object, without actually placing the object itself into it, which leads me to believe that making these works of art was not only imaginative but extremely hard to boot.
Thanks for posting this!
I'd have to say my favorite piece is Luna # 17. I like the contrast between the naturalistic features of the girl and the colors used. Also, the detail is so striking it seems to give the painting moderate relief, like she's jumping out of the canvas.
Also, despite the natural proportions and relief of the Straws piece, it still gives the feel of a stylistic sculpture because of the color of the straws and the way the sculpture radically seems to shift when looked at from a different perspective.
Those pieces are amazing! It doesnt even look like the pieces are made out of straws!
My favorite sculpture was the straw piece by Sang-Sik Hong. It was truly breathtaking what he did with a material so simple, but so complex as a straw; he managed to use the straws in ways that are not common and he did an amazing job. He created a sense of movement that made his pieces flow very well together. I also Loved the drawings by Christina Pettersson. Her work is truly amazing; her tree was very realistic, detailed, and mystical in a way - beautiful.