Research Catalog

Title

Tal R : Altstadt girl / [with a story by] Gary Indiana.

Author

R, Tal, 1967-

Publication

New York : Cheim & Read, [2015]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Additional Authors

• Indiana, Gary
• Cheim & Read organizer.

Description

94 pages : color illustrations; 33 cm

Summary

Titled "Altstadt Girl," the paintings refer back to a time when Tal R was a professor at the art academy in Dusseldorf. He lived and taught in the Altstadt ("old town") section of the city, and would often draw strangers in a nearby hotel room in the evenings after class. Translated as "old city girl," the work's title cites not only the location of his own past, but also the sense of history, and art history, that reverberates through his canvases. All interiors, the paintings are reminiscent of the patterned, colorful rooms of Matisse and Bonnard, with the psychological intensity of Balthus and the focused gaze of Alice Neel. Though he does not cite any artist as specific inspiration, his references are diverse, encompassing Fauvism, Expressionism and Symbolism, as well as folk art and children's art. However, though Tal R confronts and appropriates art historical forms, namely the female nude, he grants little hierarchy to the different elements of his compositions. For him, the surrounding space is as important as the person he draws: "the face, the eyes, the pillows, the windows, the tapestry all carry information and meaning." While the outside world can be glimpsed through open windows and doors, the "Altstadt Girl" paintings are focused on the internal. This parallels the intuitive source of Tal R's motivations; as he has said: "my work arises from the private." Simultaneously beautiful and ominous, Tal R's paintings and drawings are characterized by a charged duality, which stems in part from his childhood--his mother's orderly, Scandinavian sensibility contrasted the Czechoslovakian Jewish side of his father--and his self-identification as an outsider. The contradictions of Tal R's heritage guide his work. Ultimately, his work attempts to navigate the many intertwined layers of the psyche. Conveying the complexities and distortions inherent to our cultural and temporal experience, he says, "I once read that the future has a long past."--Cheim & Reid website.

Alternative Title

Altstadt girl

Subject

• R, Tal, 1967- > Exhibitions
• R, Tal, 1967-
• R, Tal 1967-
• Cheim & Read > Catalogs
• Malerei
• Zeichnung

Genre/Form

• Catalogs
• Exhibition catalogs

Note

• Includes essay "New Persian Letters (for Tal R)" by Gary Indiana.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

ISBN

• 9780991468157
• 0991468155

OCLC

• 903226749
• SCSB-10425115

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library