The Real Things

Reverence, satire and respect for beauty in the work of John Kindness.

John Kindness

Institute of Contemporary Art, 118 S. 36th St., through June 29, 898-7108.

"Art," said John Kindness, "has to be beautiful, to use an old-fashioned word. I think it has to bring you across the room to look at it. And it has to have something else that interests you when you look close, to back that up."

Gazing collectedly through round glasses, the Irish artist was patient with questions posed during the critics' preview of his show at the ICA. He concentrated on clarifying his intent and seriousness of purpose as an artist and seldom disclosed the playfulness evident in his work. I felt sure this was not the first time he'd said, "Most of the work I like is strong in concept, strong in execution and strong in physical presence."

It's a statement worth repeating. Kindness' frescos, painted taxi cab sections and assemblage sculptures absolutely have these qualities. Linear grace, an intriguing complexity of pattern, clear modular compositions and the magic of illusionistic representation entice the eye. Then one is drawn further in by compelling narrative, humor, and quiet but sharp social and political observations. Often, though, it is Kindness' high level of craft which scores first and strongest.

The most complex room in this solo show is devoted to "The Treasures of New York," a group of works made in the early 1990s during a year-long residency at P.S.1. In the center of the floor a large "mosaic" represents Mr. American Express, the centurion logo on the American Express card, executed entirely in soda crackers. For this re-creation of a transitory work, Kindness toasted crackers in a toaster oven. Values range from out-of-the-box buff to quasi-carbonized black.

One edge of the oval medallion has seemingly been nibbled away by a mouse which lies decoratively dead in the border of the design — a characteristic example of this artist's compulsion to frame his work with minutiae embroidered on his central motif, in this case, one of conspicuous, even "heroic" consumption.

The aggression and strength symbolized by the soldier, as well as the aura of indestructibility associated with art which has survived from the Roman period are ironic decorations for a piece of plastic. American Express, the most elite credit card, is emblematic of the capitalist economic system. Kindness embodies the fragile — even provisional — nature of this system in the ephemeral soda cracker. Even more telling is a kind of "Let them eat plastic" satire which reminds us of the many human beings who struggle (like mice) for simple survival while others dine like conquerors on the artificiality of a credit-based economy (perhaps, also, as a result of military — centurion — power).

Contemplating the finished work, its maker did not remark on its meaning but, rather, wondered if carpenter ants, introduced into the museum by Winifred Lutz's recent installation of dead tree trunks, might attack the crackers.

Near the threatened pavement, a trash can is painted with a parody of the ubiquitous blue and white New York City paper cup. The Coliseum on the cup is represented by the Stock Exchange and a discus thrower becomes a Frisbee thrower. Continuing the classical motif, the walls of this room are hung with shield-like sections of yellow taxi cabs: doors and hoods, each painted with American city scenes in the style of Greek vases. Scraping the Surface, for example, depicts a sleek pair of hounds waiting aristocratically as their owner dutifully scoops poop from streets fouled with cigarette butts and hypodermic needles.

When I suggested that these taxi works blend satire with a sincere admiration for their classical models, Kindness replied, "I never was much into Attic Greek vases. I would always waltz through them in museums. When I started looking at them after I began [the paintings], it increased my interest as I was parodying them. It's a send-up and a celebration of the tchotchkes of travel."

Kindness' various ways of working, including the ancient art of fresco painting, seem to be part of a recognizable trend in art-making that respectfully appropriates the craft and style of traditional art history as a subject in itself — usually while simultaneously addressing at least one other subject. It's a kind of pop homage. This blend of reverence and satire can embrace art from any period and culture as long as it's museum-worthy. Teraoka does it with Japanese woodcuts. Fred Wilson does it in actual museums, utilizing their methods of display. Judith Schaechter does it with the demanding skills of stained glass construction.

While "pop homage" interrogates contemporary museum practice (to wallow in fashionable jargon), it repudiates minimalism and conceptualism with a respect for fine crafting and an appreciation of beauty which can "bring you across the room." Even the most cynical and deconstructed artist must at one time or another have experienced and valued simple visual pleasure.

"I love art museums. I love looking at the art of the past," Kindness said. And added, "I think there's very little art of any period that's great art." Implicitly accepting the idea that art can be "great," he is possibly equally interested in the mundane. "There's a lot of junk made all the time, things that we consider kitsch or vulgar. Lichtenstein liberated the aesthetic qualities of these things." Kindness noted other pop artists like Warhol and praised comic book artists like Robert Crumb who, he said, "will be important in years to come, I'm convinced."

Kindness enjoys making art even more than looking at it, but he emphasized that contact with real works of art is crucial. When we study reproductions, he believes we concentrate on iconography and miss important parts of the experience.

Mentioning Bill Gates' digitized projections of art works, he said, "Electronic information replacing a painting is like seeing the trailer for a film. Physical travel is more interesting than the Internet. Our ability to travel and experience original art firsthand is unique to this time. "All it takes is a war or terrorism to close that down," Kindness warned. "We don't know if this accessibility is going to continue.""

This love of material, physical, tangible stuff is particularly noticeable in Kindness' frescoes. The Belfast Frescoes, undoubtedly the artist's most accessible and captivating body of work, are captioned horizontal rectangles detailing his childhood memories. Easily comprehended in a quick survey, each panel acquires depth with longer acquaintance. For example, the picture captioned "Early in the morning in our house there was a cigarette that moved around in the dark, it was my father getting ready to go to work," includes a sequence of homey images — down to a door seen on edge with its tongue-and-groove fitting carefully detailed.

A series of frescoes painted this year in Philadelphia during a short residency at the Fleisher Art Memorial shows isolated images of items for sale in the Ninth Street Market. The irregular slabs of plaster include pictures of chickens (the head of one), a sausage, a cruller, and a bride and groom for a wedding cake. Though they are amusing, these works don't have the edge of the more ambitious pieces from New York, the autobiographical power of the Belfast Frescoes or the affection and frustration of the Waterfall of Souvenirs. These latter sculptures constructed from tacky ceramic tourist mementos of Ireland are shown with an homage to the pig as a staple of the Irish diet. Items in the same gallery comment on the conflict in Northern Ireland. Again Kindness invokes the strategies of the classical world to represent the chaos of the modern one.

One of my favorite works in the show is in a series of photographs. Prawn Bridge is a smallish humpbacked stone bridge which Kindness embellished with a monster prawn in pink tile mosaic. Its tentacles of tubing threaded with pink wave happily in the air, and posts at the ends of the bridge are garnished with big yellow-tiled lemons. Very tasty! But I suppose, to appreciate it fully — not as a hollow iconographic reproduction — I'll have to visit Ireland.