Columns Archives - Page 2 of 11

Drama, Anxiety and Beauty at Art Fair 14C

by Tris McCall November 11, 2022November 11, 2022

On the lacquered floor of the gigantic Jersey City Armory (678 Montgomery St.), scores of participants set up for a crowd of spectators. But despite the overhead scoreboard, wooden bleachers, and anticipation in the air, this is no sporting event. Instead, painters, sculptors, photographers, multi-media dreamers, and creators of unclassifiable what-is-its — most from the […]

Loura van der Meule's "A Spontaneous Garden"

Visual Arts

“The Embankment on My Mind” at NJCU Makes a Powerful Case for Preservation

by Tris McCall November 4, 2022November 5, 2022

The Sixth Street Embankment is hard to miss. What you see when you look at it depends on who you are. To developers, it’s a place to build and make money. To greenspace advocates, it’s a potential answer to Manhattan’s High Line. Birds may see a verdant spot to roost; seedpods might find a fertile […]

Eye Level

“Your Home Is My Home” Shakes Up Dineen Hull Gallery

by Tris McCall October 28, 2022October 27, 2022

One of the greater ironies of art in Jersey City: the three truly incendiary group shows mounted during the pandemic era have all hung in our most moneyed institution. “Implied Scale,” a condemnation of waste and a passionate staredown directed at habitat destruction, “Land of the Free,” a searing examination of the border and the […]

Eye Level

BARC The Dog at Deep Space Has Plenty of Bite

by Tris McCall October 21, 2022October 22, 2022

I. Avatars If you’ve played an online game — and social media is an online game — there’s a good chance you’ve participated in an art project. A modest one, one circumscribed by the game’s parameters, but a common act of creation nevertheless. You’ve made a small digital stand-in for yourself, dressed it up, equipped it, […]

Columns

A Brief Encounter With Xiaoqiang Li at Novado Gallery

by Tris McCall October 14, 2022October 17, 2022

Some abstract works register an immediate impression but don’t hold attention; the pieces in Li’s exhibition don’t demand scrutiny, but they certainly reward it. The longer they’re observed, the more they seem to breathe.

Columns

JCAST22: Eleven Marvelous Things at MANA Contemporary

by Tris McCall October 7, 2022October 17, 2022

For the story of JCAST22 to be fairly told, we must discuss a place that hasn’t always been well integrated into the scene: MANA Contemporary.

Eye Level

JCAST22: A Preview and Guide

by Tris McCall September 30, 2022October 17, 2022

Hurricanes and walking tours don’t tend to work too well together. The thirty-second annual JCAST may well be a wet one. If the remnants of Ian tickle the Garden State, it might be plenty windy, too. Since the Jersey City Art and Studio Tour encompasses all six wards of Jersey City, that matters — there’ll be […]