BRAUNSTEIN/QUAY - HOSFELT - TRIANGLE - BAER RIDGWAY

ALPHONSE BERBER - HESPE - PATRICIA SWEETOW

RENA BRANSTEN - MARX & ZAVATTERO - TOGONON

09.11.10 - PART I

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Braunstein/Quay Gallery : Some New Pictures in the Presence of their Predecessors - Paul Pratchenko.

Comment by AB: Let's call it visionary surrealism. Care to take a walk in the woods? Paul Pratchenko knows all the best places. Check it out.

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Hosfelt Gallery : Anoka Faruqee - The Longest Day of the Year; Marietta Hoferer - Drawings.

Comment by AB: Swirl yourself away in the vortices of Anoka Faruqee's pattern paintings. As for art sourced from atypical origins, Marietta Hoferer has something to say about that with her tight graphite grids and intricately tiled iotas of strapping tape.

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Alphonse Berber Gallery : Perfect - Allie Pohl.

Comment by AB: Allie Pohl describes her art as "feminist satire packaged in a post-modern wrapper." I describe it as crotch art.

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Hespe Gallery : Mimi Jensen - Recent Still Life Paintings.

Comment by AB: Mimi Jensen sets it on a tabletop and paints it up right.

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Patricia Sweetow Gallery : Michael Hall - Reclamation; Whitney Lynn - Doug.

Comment by AB: Michael Hall paints up defunct World War II military bunkers located along the coast of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, and in so doing, reminds us that Hell is just around the corner. In the anteroom, Whitney Lynn essays on Doug, a rabbit rescued by San Francisco Animal Control, and in so doing, reminds us that salvation is just around the corner.

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Rena Bransten Gallery : Vik Muniz - New Works.

Comment by AB: Vik Muniz creates masterful small-format textured paper collages of classic Japanese woodblock prints from the Edo period and then blows 'em up big into limited edition photographs. For those of you keeping score at home, the original collages are donated to charity. Superb outcome on all fronts and certainly worth a visit.

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Marx & Zavattero : Compound Eyes on the World - Andrew Schoultz.

Comment by AB: Andrew Schoultz ratchets up the detail, concentrates the energy, and conscripts the all-seeing eye to penetrate your innermost psyche. My faves? Well, all of 'em really, but especially a series of revitalized 19th century steel engravings. This one's a yes!

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Togonon Gallery : Instructions For Peace.

Artists: Steve Balbak, Josh Eggleton and Xuchi Naungayen-Eggleton, Anita Glesta, Allen Guilmette, Deann Borshay Liem, Fang-yu Lin, Roberto Rivera, Yul-san Liem.

Comment by AB: New media and mixed-media art exhibition held in conjunction with Zero 1 Biennial in San Jose. I'm particularly partial to Allen Guilmette's chaotic participatory scrap wood palace installation, Peace Pod (2010). Surprisingly solidly constructed.

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Baer Ridgway Exhibitions : Chris Duncan - Eye Against I; Sonido Pirata - Julio César Morales - Sonido Pirata (in the bookstore space).

Comment by AB: Ambitious installation and selection of stand alone works by Chris Duncan in a variety of mediums fill both floors of Baer Ridgway Exhibitions. Add to that a series of live events, taking place during the course of the show, to total a rather thought-provoking investigation into various ways of seeing. Certainly worth a perusal. In related news... catching me way off guard, a respected official of one of the Bay Area's more venerable nonprofit arts organizations notes the "upskirt" nature of Duncan's mirrored floors... and she's right.

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Addendum:

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