ArtSeen
Nicholas Baker-Maffei
Sideshow Gallery
Couched in the artist’s pleasure, Baker-Maffei’s eight paintings, spanning from 2000 to the present, are testaments to the creator’s mood—whether sexual, intellectual, or technical. There is a delight in each of these works that make them vibrate on the walls like abstract records of some sensual epiphany.
Two large paintings—“Chien Chaud” and “Penetration & Clouds”—encapsulate the issues at work in his process, which he says in his artist statement are guided by desire. They both hang on the same wall and make the other works in the gallery appear rougher in their more centralized sparseness.
In “Chien Chaud,” French for hot dog, the layering of vibrant brushwork with a seam of quirky wiener forms provides the groundwork for experiments with color and composition. The various elements are intriguing in themselves but the work never allows his brush to overpower the design elements that obscure some of the joy evident. The sprayed-on central form is a surprise that does an effective job of softening the form but doesn’t do enough to eliminate the graphic quality.
“Penetration & Clouds” is a more sophisticated layering that perfectly learns from the lessons of 1970s abstraction and updates it to the digital era. It is an amalgam of seemingly hallucinatory forms that are at first obstructed by the overall graphic composition; each underlying element emerges slowly making it a very sophisticated visual. The painting is a mature meditation on disparate elements and only seems to work because of his innovative touch. The way that the forms gently shift across the surface is something that I can also describe as erotic.
When Yoko Ono asked Timothy Leary the qualities he most admired in a man, he replied, “Intelligence, Self-Confidence, Humor.” Baker-Maffei demonstrates all three.
Contributor
Hrag VartanianHrag Vartanian is a writer, critic, and designer. He lives in Brooklyn, NY.
RECOMMENDED ARTICLES
A Hunger Artist
By Betsy KaufmanMAY 2019 | Critics Page
On my first date with an artist who would eventually become my husband, I said, “Look at me, look at me, look at me!” I am also an artist and I wanted him to know, from the beginning, that I not only live for my work, but that I need an audience to view that work. Eventually my husband gave me “A Hunger Artist” by Franz Kafka.
Hands On: Working with Artist-Endowed Foundations and Trusts
By Patterson SimsDEC 18-JAN 19 | Critics Page
Working with artist-initiated entities charged with stewarding a creative legacy, both artist-endowed foundations (charitable tax-exempt organizations) and artists’ trusts (private, non-exempt entities), has been the core of my professional life since 2009 and a deeply gratifying culmination of nearly fifty years of work in the visual arts.
Artist-Endowed Foundations: Mapping the Field
By Christine J. VincentDEC 18-JAN 19 | Critics Page
Artist-endowed foundations (“AEFs”) are increasing in number due to the convergence of three factors—demographic trends in the artist population, the continuing rise in the global art market, and artists’ desires to provide for their creative works and philanthropic interests in the long-term.
Artist's Choice: Amy Sillman—The Shape of Shape
By Cynthia CruzFEB 2020 | ArtSeen
As Sillman explained in Artforum, much of what interested her “didn’t seem to rate in art history, to fit the correct teleology. Art historian friends who saw my list were like, ‘Who are all these people?’ I was like, ‘Are you kidding?
