Monkey Business: Featuring works by Corey
Hengen, Bridget Griffith Evans, and Gene Evans
Luckystar Studio
5407 W. Vliet Street, Milwaukee. 414-257-4640
www.luckystarstudio.com
Through February 16th
"Well, art is art, isn't it? Still, on the other hand, water is water!
And east is east and west is west and if you take cranberries
and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like
prunes than rhubarb does. Now, uh... now you tell me what you
know." -Groucho Marx
January 8, 2008 - The current show at Luckystar, Monkey
Business, is prefaced by this Groucho Marx quote that spells
out, yet disrupts, the obvious. This nonchalant presentation is
the backdrop for works by gallery proprietors and mainstays
Bridget Griffith Evans and Gene Evans along with works by
Corey Hengen. The installation in the gallery space is spacious
and open, giving plenty of room to meander from one group of
pieces to the next. The wall text is extraordinarily practical yet
subversive, scrawled on the walls in chalk like informative
graffiti.
The portrait photographs by Cory Hengen meld direct with
oblique approaches to the photographer/subject relationship.
His figures dominate the frame, the background is simplified
and uncluttered. Despite this magnifying presentation, he does
not produce imposing figures. Hengen is careful in his angles,
with an off-kilter vantage point here, an uplifting diagonal
there. His subjects look friendly and well-humored, but in a
moment of staged or spontaneous candor, look away from the
camera, their attention elsewhere. The exception is his portrait
of gallerist Kent Mueller, who takes the photographer’s gaze
head-on. With Mueller and his trained set of eyes, there’s a
feeling of being viewed, rather than the viewer doing the
viewing. Perhaps it goes with the peculiar development of
talents related to one’s profession; whereas the surgeon who
holds a butter knife wields it with more skill than the ordinary
hand, the art dealer’s eyes have a sustaining impact that goes
beyond the mere act of looking in a specific direction.
Other works in the gallery are from the Griffith Evans/Evans
catalogue, including humorously barbed drawings by Gene
Evans. But one of the best things about the gallery’s current
location and visiting during daytime hours, especially on pale
overcast days, is the even, airy natural light on the paintings,
especially those by Bridget Griffith Evans, where her subtle
maneuvers of brushwork and layering of colors are well-
revealed.
- Kat Murrell
Kat Murrell is co-publisher of Susceptible to Images
Hengen, Bridget Griffith Evans, and Gene Evans
Luckystar Studio
5407 W. Vliet Street, Milwaukee. 414-257-4640
www.luckystarstudio.com
Through February 16th
"Well, art is art, isn't it? Still, on the other hand, water is water!
And east is east and west is west and if you take cranberries
and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like
prunes than rhubarb does. Now, uh... now you tell me what you
know." -Groucho Marx
January 8, 2008 - The current show at Luckystar, Monkey
Business, is prefaced by this Groucho Marx quote that spells
out, yet disrupts, the obvious. This nonchalant presentation is
the backdrop for works by gallery proprietors and mainstays
Bridget Griffith Evans and Gene Evans along with works by
Corey Hengen. The installation in the gallery space is spacious
and open, giving plenty of room to meander from one group of
pieces to the next. The wall text is extraordinarily practical yet
subversive, scrawled on the walls in chalk like informative
graffiti.
The portrait photographs by Cory Hengen meld direct with
oblique approaches to the photographer/subject relationship.
His figures dominate the frame, the background is simplified
and uncluttered. Despite this magnifying presentation, he does
not produce imposing figures. Hengen is careful in his angles,
with an off-kilter vantage point here, an uplifting diagonal
there. His subjects look friendly and well-humored, but in a
moment of staged or spontaneous candor, look away from the
camera, their attention elsewhere. The exception is his portrait
of gallerist Kent Mueller, who takes the photographer’s gaze
head-on. With Mueller and his trained set of eyes, there’s a
feeling of being viewed, rather than the viewer doing the
viewing. Perhaps it goes with the peculiar development of
talents related to one’s profession; whereas the surgeon who
holds a butter knife wields it with more skill than the ordinary
hand, the art dealer’s eyes have a sustaining impact that goes
beyond the mere act of looking in a specific direction.
Other works in the gallery are from the Griffith Evans/Evans
catalogue, including humorously barbed drawings by Gene
Evans. But one of the best things about the gallery’s current
location and visiting during daytime hours, especially on pale
overcast days, is the even, airy natural light on the paintings,
especially those by Bridget Griffith Evans, where her subtle
maneuvers of brushwork and layering of colors are well-
revealed.
- Kat Murrell
Kat Murrell is co-publisher of Susceptible to Images
Full Moon Edition No. 4 1.22.08
| Copyright 2007 Art History Chicks LLC |
| Above: installation view with painting by Bridget Griffith Evans (foreground) and Gene Evans (background). Below: Installation of photographs by Cory Hengen. Photographs by Kat Murrell. |
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