Art Is Free

Twin Twin at Pierogi

2011-09-06T10:26:00.003-04:00

Twin Twin curated by Matt Freedman
A September 11th Memorial Group Exhibition
Pierogi Gallery in Williamsburg, Brooklyn (177 North 9th Street)

On exhibit from September 9 to 16
Reception: September 9, 7-9 pm

Dreams, Machines, Light and Space

2011-04-29T10:16:00.003-04:00

Sean Morello's work will be featured in:

Dreams, Machines, Light and Space
Curated by Jonathan Shorr, GAGA Arts Center, Garnerville, New York

Opens April 30th, 2011 as part of the GAGA Arts Festival, Saturday April 30th - Sunday May 1st.

Self-Conscious Striving

2010-10-18T22:03:00.008-04:00

Even when the old masters painted humbler or comical subjects, even when they painted terribly, they were animated in theory, as no craftsman was, by the self-conscious striving for high art, the ambition to rival and surpass what they understood to be the paintings of the ancients.

James Gardener in his article New Light on the Old Masters, The Magazine Antiques, March 2010, page 76.

Group Exhibition: Social Circuitry

2010-04-28T21:54:00.008-04:00

Social Circuitry
An International Group Exhibition of Painting, Photography, & Sculpture
Curated by Jonathan Shorr

GAGA Arts Center
Garnerville Arts and Industrial Center
55 West Railroad Avenue (Directions)
Garnerville, NY 10923
845-947-7108

Opens May 1, 2010 as part of the GAGA Arts Festival.
GAGA Arts Festival
Saturday May 1st - Sunday May 2nd
11am - 6pm

Ordered and Controlled

2009-11-28T13:16:00.001-05:00

Abstract paint areas are real areas--lofty, alive, emotionally ordered and intellectually controlled. ... Maybe you think things are o.k. and that you're "doing all right." But someday the monotonous and ugly spaces you live and work in will be organized (by your children) as intelligently and as beautifully as the spaces have been in some paintings. A painting of quality is a challenge to disorder and insensitivity everywhere.

Ad Reinhardt, "How to Look at Space," Editorial cartoon, PM, April 28, 1946.

The Hardest Thing in the World

2009-09-02T08:00:00.000-04:00

An honest picture has to be aware of itself, and the hardest thing in the world is to make an honest picture.

Spencer Finch quoted in Meghan Dailey’s article on the artist in Art+Auction, Sept. 2009, page 52.

The Knife Edge of Nonsense

2009-08-18T08:00:00.000-04:00

...We are constantly worried that we are being played for fools [by abstract works of art]. What makes the anxiety even worse is the fact that this is an art that, by its very nature, willfully and knowingly flirts with absurdity and emptiness, dancing on the knife edge of nonsense and beckoning us to come along.

Kirk Varnedoe, Pictures of Nothing, 2006, page 42.

Barnett Newman

2009-01-09T13:00:00.000-05:00

An artist paints so that he will have something to look at; at times he must write so that he will also have something to read.

Barnett Newman, “Why I Paint,” in the journal The Tiger's Eye, 1947.

New Paintings

2008-10-02T08:00:00.005-04:00

New 2008 paintings and drawings were added today.

Click here to see them.

New Photographs

2008-08-08T08:00:00.000-04:00

New 2008 photographs were added today.

Click here to see them.

Otherwise it's fashion

2008-07-18T20:00:00.000-04:00

To have something that lasts - that says something - that means you've really gotten hold of the essence of things. The only thing that can last is really the essence. Otherwise it’s transitory, it’s fashion.
...
[Architecture] has to be something that somehow relates to life itself, of that particular time and place.

I.M. Pei as recorded in the documentary film First Person Singular.

Participation in the actual events of the day

2008-04-01T20:00:00.000-04:00

The collector of contemporary art actually participates in the discourse of the day, adding through acquisition his or her particular inflection to this tumultuous conversation. Hence, the collecting of contemporary art... confers a voice upon the collector with regard to the formation of the larger culture and allows for real participation in the actual events of the day.

- Critic and curator Robert Pincus-Witten as quoted in Artforum, April 2008, p. 296.

Near Lancaster, PA

2008-02-24T08:00:00.002-05:00

A willing individual

2007-11-11T08:00:00.000-05:00

Art is, and should be, the act of an individual willing to say something new, something not quite familiar.

- Maya Lin as recorded in the documentary film A Strong Clear Vision.

One Night Only

2007-10-09T20:32:00.000-04:00

Playing For Keeps

2007-05-01T08:00:00.001-04:00

At its best, art school is the more or less productive meeting of as many supple and unpredictable minds as can be arranged. It's the partially organized but largely ad-libbed exchange and differentiation of interests among a group of semi-strangers, all of whom are playing for keeps.

- Robert Storr as quoted in Art in America, May 2007.

Retail

2007-04-27T08:00:00.000-04:00

A retail masterpiece photographed in Atlantic City, NJ.

CUAC Show Closes

2006-03-15T19:00:00.001-05:00

I am grateful to everyone who contributed to the exhibition at the Central Utah Art Center. I feel honored to have been welcomed so warmly by the Ephraim art community.

This is some of the media coverage of the show:

What Art Is: Sean Morello at the CUAC by Geoff Wichert, 15 Bytes, ArtistsOfUtah.org.

CUAC probes 'What art is' by Jill Cox, Sanpete Messenger.

CUAC features Sean Morello by Carolyn Fernandez, The Snowdrift Feb 16, 2006, page 6.

What is art?, Daily Herald, Feb 09, 2006.

Show at CUAC

2006-01-25T11:41:00.000-05:00

SEAN MORELLO

10 FEBRUARY - 15 MARCH 2006
OPENING RECEPTION AND ART TALK
FRIDAY, 10 FEBRUARY, 6-9 PM

CENTRAL UTAH ARTS CENTER
86 North Main Street, Ephraim, Utah
www.cuartcenter.org

Open Studio

2006-01-08T18:56:00.000-05:00

Please come to see some new work by five New York City based artists:

Brett Carron
Juozas Cernius
Sean Morello
Ryan Mrozowski
Mike Womack

One night only:

Tuesday, January 10th, from 7 - 10 pm.
At the studio near the World Trade Center.

142 Fulton Street, 3rd floor (just east of Broadway).

Upcoming Events

2005-12-01T07:30:00.000-05:00

10 January 2006
Open Studio featuring the work of five NYC-based artists at Fulton Street studio near the World Trade Center site.
One night only

10 February - 18 March 2006
Exhibition at Central Utah Arts Center, Ephraim Utah.
10 February, 6-9pm, Opening and presentation by the artist.

Press: NY Arts

2005-09-30T14:04:00.001-04:00

To read the full text of Shane McAdams review of Foundations at Gallery Boreas, as published in NY Arts Magazine, click here.

Announcement: What Art Is

2005-09-05T08:00:00.000-04:00

Upcoming Exhibition

2005-07-13T07:30:00.000-04:00

Foundations at Gallery Boreas.

21 July - 15 August 2005
Reception Thursday 21 July 6-9pm.

Works by: Peter Barrett, Paul Daniel, Yasmin Etemadi, Peter Finnemore, Sean Morello, Zhu Wen Qing, David Shull, and Mike Womack.

From the press release (Gallery Boreas):
"The artists in this show... replace fear and misunderstanding with open-ended investigations.
...
The sculptures and paintings of recent Pratt MFA graduates Sean Morello and Mike Womack discuss the formal language of art and expression. Art itself as a foundation is discussed in their work as contemporary art exists in a situation of indeterminate change and lingering traditions."

Review: Karin Davie’s Perfect Heritage

2005-06-24T07:00:00.008-04:00

Karin Davie’s show of recent work is a lively collection of canvases brimming with painterly bravado. Davie’s energetic gestural abstractions make an ambitious contribution to the historical project of painting. Though the images are palpably contemporary, and employ an undeniably unique mode of picture-making, Davie’s work evokes painting from the very dawn of the endeavor.

Viewing the work, I was reminded of a visit I made years ago to the Botticelli Room of the Uffizi. Alongside behemoths such as the Birth of Venus, Primavera, and that famous Centaur, hangs Ghirlandaio’s 1484 Madonna Enthroned with Angels and Saints. According to the standard pattern, the painting depicts a group of figures worshiping the young Jesus seated on the lap of the Virgin, with kneeling patrons in the foreground.

The painting is a masterpiece. About six feet square, every inch is bejeweled in stunning detail, the figures, drapery, flora, and every other minute feature are portrayed with a graceful intensity. The thousand parts form a whole, creating an image of completeness through complexity. Standing in front of the painting, the profound impression is that this is somehow a perfect work of art. Its perfection is neither the sort that excludes other possibilities nor the dubious sort that purports to embody a culmination of history. It is perfect in the sense that it lays out in clear terms what its intentions are and by what means they will be accomplished, and then proceeds with unflinching rigor to the end.

One of the finest works in Davie’s exhibit is the large Between My Eye and Heart No. 18 (2005). Long, unbroken brushstrokes of rich purple, fleshy peach, pink, and lush green squirm and pulse over a deep field of grey-blue. The relationship of this painting to the renaissance goes far beyond the superficial chromatic similarity it bears to the work of that period - though it deserves mention that her use of color is masterful. Rather, the work’s best qualities are traceable to the artist’s command of illusionary depth, her delicate balance of material indulgence and pious control, and her pursuit of the most sublime beauty in its natural habitat, just on the edge of ugliness. Davie’s is perfect painting, her parameters are clear, and she accomplishes her objectives with unimpeachable skill and remarkable poetry in a way that Ghirlandaio would applaud. Achieving all this by means of her own bold, idiosyncratic brushwork enriches the history of painting. It is a pleasure to see such work while the paint is still drying.

Karin Davie was at the Mary Boone Gallery in Chelsea, 30 April - 25 June 2005.

[This review was originally published in June 2005 on BrooklynArtists.org]