June 11, 2022 • View in browser

This week, the Metropolitan Museum of Art opens an exhibition of employee artworks, Texans use art to express their grief and anger at the Uvalde shooting, favorites from the Tribeca Film Festival, Ukrainian folk art becomes a tool of resistance, and many more stories and reviews.

Enjoy your weekend, use art to make your life and the lives of others around you better, and don't let go of hope!

— Hakim Bishara, interim editor-in-chief 

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Caterina Angela Pierozzi, "The Annunciation Miniature" (1677), tempera and gold leaf on vellum, 5 3/4 x 7 5/8 inches (photo Olivia McEwan/Hyperallergic)

A Thrilling Discovery of the Only Known Work by Female Renaissance Artist Caterina Angela Pierozzi 
Olivia McEwan highlights this ultimate lost artwork, or “sleeper,” on view in Forbidden Fruit: Female Still Life at Colnaghi gallery in London.

Art history is a living thing, and events such as this are key milestones in its progression... Having the Pierozzi publicly visible, rather than retreating into the obscurity of private ownership, allows art history to grow.

NEWS THIS WEEK

Textile art in Art Work: Artists Working at The Met (photo by Elaine Velie/Hyperallergic)

• Featuring over 450 museum workers, The Met opens an exhibition of employee artworks to the public for the first time.

• From murals to a front-yard installation featuring rows of backpacks, Texans memorialize the victims of the Uvalde shooting through art.

• A 1,700-year-old graffitied stone was uncovered at Roman Vindolanda, featuring a carved penis and the words "Secundinus, the shitter."

• Retired British geologist Jim Fitton gets a 15-year sentence after Baghdad airport authorities find pottery shards from an Iraqi site in his luggage.

• Artist Paula Rego, whose figurative art focalized both the power and suffering of women, dies at 87.

LATEST REVIEWS

Robert Rauschenberg, "Untitled (Early Egyptian)" (1973) (© Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, courtesy the foundation and Gladstone Gallery. Photography by Ron Amstutz)

Seeing Robert Rauschenberg for the First Time, All Over Again
Catherine Yang on Robert Rauschenberg: Venetians and Early Egyptians, 1972-1974 at Gladstone Gallery.

His trust in materials is beautifully demonstrated in this two-part show, with works reminiscent of his early combines in that they carefully collide seemingly disparate objects to create new meanings. Coming out of this show, I had the unique experience of feeling like I was seeing Rauschenberg for the first time all over again.

Hanne Darboven’s Attempt to Unbind Narrative From Time
Renée Reizman on Hanne Darboven: Six Books on 1968 at Sprüth Magers.

Making Art in the Shadow of Grief
Kealey Boyd on Erica Green: Once They Were Redat the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art.

BOUNDARY BREAKERS

Nancy Buchanan, “Hair Art, Dirty Art” (1974), photograph (courtesy the artist and Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles)

The Women Artists Who Found Inspiration in Friendship
Anya Ventura on how we are in time and space: Nancy Buchanan, Marcia Hafif, and Barbara T. Smith at the Armory Center for the Art.

What the exhibition calls “empathic overlaps” are in fact the ways in which artists shared ideas, materials, spaces, and bodies as communal resources in the creation of a new avant-garde art. Between the three artists are multiple and intersecting connections, as they shared studio and exhibition spaces, babysat each other’s children, and took part in one another’s work.

Lorraine O’Grady Still Won’t Play It Safe
Ela Bittencourt on Lorraine O’Grady: Body Is the Ground of My Experience at Alexander Gray Associates.

A Studio Visit With Jillian Conrad
John Yau takes a closer look at the processes and aesthetics of sculptor Jillian Conrad.

BEER WITH A PAINTER

John Lees, “Man Sitting in an Armchair” (1971/2013-2014), oil on panel, 12 1/2 x 10 inches (courtesy the artist and Betty Cuningham Gallery)

Beer with a Painter: John Lees
Jennifer Samet sits down with the artist to discuss the inspirations behind his practice.

Amid an art world fixated on work that’s fresh, current, unlabored, and image based, Lees makes art that is craggy, built-up, thread-bare, and mysterious.  

FILM & DOCUMENTARY

From To the End (2022), dir. Rachel Lears (all images courtesy Tribeca Film Festival)

What Documentaries to Catch at This Year’s Tribeca Film Festival
Dan Schindel spotlights some notable titles at this year's festival.

There are biographies of musicians ranging from Sinéad O’Connor to Lil Baby, sports figures like Colin Kaepernick and Derek Jeter, and activists and politicians including Al Sharpton, Rosa Parks, and Rudy Giuliani (in the form of a musical, of all things).

Beyond such immediately and easily pitchable titles, there are a few others one should not overlook at Tribeca.

David Cronenberg Creates a World Where “Surgery is the New Sex”
Sophie Monks Kaufman reviews the sexy body horror Crimes of the Future.

A Frightening Doc About the NYC Subway  
Dan Schindel looks at how End of the Line captures five years of failed efforts to fix the city’s disastrous train infrastructure.

ALSO ON HYPERALLERGIC

Maria Prymachencko, “A Dove Has Spread Her Wings and Asks for Peace” (1982) (image courtesy Justice Murals)

How Ukrainian Folk Art Became a Tool of Resistance Against Russia  
Katya Zableski expands on how the international community is using Ukrainian folk art to show solidarity with the Ukrainian people.

Ukrainian people are responding to the war in similar ways they have responded to oppression, war, and famine throughout Ukrainian history: They are using folk art, music, traditions, and practices to bring together communities, resist the war, and foster hope.

Will Artists Ever Be Forgiven Their Student Loans?
Scotti Hill addresses how Biden’s plan to improve the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program may fall short for most working artists.

Required Reading
This week, where did chickens come from? Is being “fashionably late” obsolete? And other important questions.