ART CITIES:N.York-Helen Marden
In 1971 Helen Marden took Brice to Hydra for the first time. It was here that Marden was at his most prolific. In the meantime, Helen has played her own part in the island’s preservation. When Richard Branson tried to build a luxury resort in the Island, she joined the local effort to block construction – to success. The couple bought their first home there in 1973. The light and landscape have greatly influenced Marden’s work.
By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Gagosian Gallery Archive
Helen Marden’s compositions in her solo exhibition “Bitter Light a Year” combine vivid color with gesture in a joyful affirmation of life’s energies. Raw powdered pigments are mixed into resin, which Marden pours with both intensity and control. While the resin hardens, Marden augments the compositions with acrylic paint and more unconventional materials such as seashells, beads, and plastic. The organic qualities of the paintings are enhanced by the use of bright neon hues, translating the grit of postwar abstraction into the techno-exuberance of today. In “Noon Tide” (2020), Marden adds shells and fragments of glass to a biomorphic form rendered in acid pink, generating a dynamic fusion of the organic and the artificial. The appended elements follow looping skeins of paint traced on the surface of the canvas, suggesting a fluid, symbiotic relationship between the two distinct sets of materials. In “Forward” (2020), the same pink is joined by translucent fields of red, yellow, and blue, their overlapping shapes hinting at biological entities while stopping just short of figurative representation. Clustered shells appear at once bound to the composition and independent of it; in “Evening Tid”e (2020), two large scallop shell halves resemble wide-open eyes set in a howling visage of pink, blue, turquoise, and deep red. The exhibition’s poetic title, “Bitter Light a Year”, suggests hard-won wisdom and anticipates collective emergence from a profoundly challenging time for the planet. In works of endearing and unrestrained vitality, Marden offers an optimistic vision of a world in which environmental forces and human culture might be reconciled and reunited. In Marden’s hands, paint, resin, and objects intertwine, revealing her conviction that painting can capture pure, condensed energy.
Photo: Helen Marden, Forward (detail), 2020, Resin, powdered paint, and shells on linen, 50 × 50 inches (127 × 127 cm, © Helen Marden. Photo: Robert McKeever, Courtesy the artist and Gagosian
Info: Gagosian Gallery, 976 Madison Avenue, New York, Duration: 6/4-8/5/2021, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 11:00-14:00 & 15:00-19:00 (by appointment only, book here), https://gagosian.com
