Joel Shapiro: New Prints at Gemini

As a follower of Contemporary art, Joel Shapiro happens to be one of my favorite sculptors. I am no where near an expert on his work, but I became familiar with his sculptures through a previous job, where an art collector had one of his large sculptures in her yard. Although Shapiro's sculptures in their basic form are pared down rectangular shapes, the balance and contrast of perceived movement in the work is impressive. The way he creates the sculptures, to me, they look like people in different states of motion. There could be a person balancing on a hi-wire, or someone kicking a soccer ball. I imagine this one to be a person taking a happy and triumphant stroll down the street swinging their arms:


It was to my great pleasure to learn of the edition of nine prints he created with Gemini G.E.L. in Los Angeles. Luckily for us New Yorkers, Gemini G.E.L. at Joni Moisant Weyl has these prints on display in a show titled "Boat, Bird, Mother and Child" in their gallery on 980 Madison Avenue. From the website: "Shapiro's prints explore an elegant intersection between reductive geometric formalism and energetic figuration."

MY EXPERIENCE
I attended the opening of the show, and I must say, the screenprints are much different then I would have guessed. Before I viewed the prints, I would have wagered the prints would look similar to his rectangular sculptures, only this time they would be in 2-D. Instead, he still uses geometrical shapes, but as you can guess from the title of the exhibition, the prints look much more like boats, mothers, birds and children then his sculptures do. Similar to laying in the grass and imagining shapes in clouds, his forms can be viewed subjectively; one's imagination can run wild with what it perceives as the subject of each print. I always enjoy this type of art, as it is unique experience for each viewer.

Here is an example of one of the screenprints:

Boat, Bird, Mother and Child (d) , 2009 ( JS09-5322 )
5 color screenprint
28 1/2" x 36"
Edition of 38

Gemini at Joni Moisant Weyl
980 Madison Avenue, 5th Floor
New York, NY. 10075