joe scanlan


Abstract Labor, or: The Happy Butcher

At a time when artists may work without obligation to medium, why choose the materials of painting? What does it mean for an artist to assume the role of painter today? And just what is at stake for a new generation committed to painting?

This exhibition, Joe Scanlan’s third at the gallery, presents new developments in abstract painting and studio practice as they relate to abstract labor, that is, the comparatively unencumbered task of preparing the materials for a work of art before authorship and anxiety set in.

Scanlan’s new works consider the illustrious role of the stretcher builder as butcher to contemporary painting. To paraphrase Samuel Beckett by way of The Brady Bunch, the person building the stretcher never worries about what to paint. This worry free attitude accounts for the undeniable freshness of Scanlan’s exhibition, and the slow smile it will likely bring on your face.

For Scanlan, painting is a means, not an end—a generative process rooted in the studio yet open and receptive to the world. With a fascination for the medium's many histories—especially the traditions of textile manufacturer and stretcher builder as anonymous craftsman—Scanlan’s new works freely pursue new vocabularies of abstraction and methods of making.

Questions of form and process find a more distributed context than ever before as Scanlan embraces an ever-expanding network of references and influences, including fine woodworking, laundry day, and alcoholism. Drawing into the studio aspects of bluegrass, furniture, literature, performance, meteorology, philosophy, and class, Scanlan filters his wide-ranging interests through the aesthetics of a job well done.

By engaging painting's history, conventions, and critical debates on their own terms, he insists that the role of the painter is open to interpretation and reinvention. Indeed, the simple repetition in the show's objects is meant to signal the term's fluidity, as Scanlan pulls apart, examines and reposes painting’s various meanings in our present moment.

press release gallery, 2013

 

 

Joe Scanlan, Artisanal Complex 2019

Joe Scanlan, Set I (wall), 2019
oil paint, reclaimed wood, archival inkjet on paper, polyvinyl acetate, wood
168 x 112 x 15 cm

Joe Scanlan, Stretchers, 2018
oil paint on various reclaimed woods
variable sizes
Joe Scanlan, Artisanal Complex 2019

Joe Scanlan, Saack van Laack, 2019
repurposed van Laack shirt sleeves, rip-stop nylon, polyester
edition of 25

Joe Scanlan, Artisanal Complex I, 2019
archival inkjet on paper mounted on gessoed linen, vinyl wallpaper
300 x 360 x 5 cm
Joe Scanlan, Artisanal Complex II, 2019
repurposed van Laack shirt sleeves, rip-stop nylon, polyester, vinyl wallpaper, archival inkjet on paper, polyvinyl acetate, wood
168 x 112 x 20 cm
Joe Scanlan, Artisanal Complex 2019
Joe Scanlan, Palermo, 2018
digital font derived from the basic forms in Blinky Palermo’s Blau Scheibe und Stab (1968), archival inkjet on various Epson photo papers with sample pack interleaving, storage box
edition of 26
Joe Scanlan, Palermo, 2018
digital font derived from the basic forms in Blinky Palermo’s Blau Scheibe und Stab (1968), archival inkjet on various Epson photo papers with sample pack interleaving, storage box
edition of 26
Artisanal Complex 2019
Donelle Woolford, The Raw and the Cooked, 2016
exotic inlay wood box containing 1907, a book authored by the fictional artist Donelle Woolford and printed in Marrakesh, interleaved with recipes handwritten by the people who printed the book in Marrakesh
20.5 x 15 x 3.8 cm
edition of 35
 
Joe Scanlan, Cold Turkey, 2013, linen and acrylic fibre on vintage indoor clothesline, 193 x ca. 250 cm
Joe Scanlan, Abstract Labor, or: The Happy Butcher, view galerie de Expeditie, 2013 
Joe Scanlan, Abstract Labor, or: The Happy Butcher, view galerie de Expeditie, 2013 
Joe Scanlan, RA, 2013, wood, oilpaint, 72,5 x 70,5 x 6 cm
Joe Scanlan, Ides, 2013, chintz, rayon, linen, cotton, poplin on vintage indoor clothesline, 220 x ca 493 cm                                                                                  
Joe Scanlan, GV, 2013, wood, gouache, 40,5 x 40 x 5 cm
Joe Scanlan, MC, 2013, dyptych, wood, 45,5 x 45 x 3 cm and 40 x 40 x 1,5 cm
Joe Scanlan, A Battle for Narrative, view Bonnefanten Hedge House Foundation, 2012
Joe Scanlan, Bryter Layter, 2009, plywood, enamel paint, acrylic paint, gouache, steel wire, yellow paper, hot glue, 9 parts, 141 x 206 x 107 cm
Joe Scanlan, Springtime for Kippenberger, 2009, wood, polystyrene, acrylic paint, gouache, steel wire, yellow paper, hot glue
31 parts, 142 x 155 x 96 cm
Joe Scanlan, Change of Season, view galerie de Expeditie, 2009
Joe Scanlan, Rational Exuberance, 2009, wood, extruded aluminum, enamel paint, paper collage on cardboard box, Hans Hofmann picture puzzle, Table: 70.5 x  117 x 99 cm, Puzzle box: 36 x 36 x 4 cm
Joe Scanlan, Change of Season, view galerie de Expeditie, 2009