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Trump installs a toppled statue of Columbus outside the White House, a Paul Klee exhibition in New York opens without its centerpiece, and photos from Morandi’s studio in Bologna.
In these strangest of times, up is down and right is wrong. In DC, President Trump installs a statue of Christopher Columbus outside the White House. It is a replica of a monument to the colonizer that protesters in Baltimore tore down during the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020. In New York, a Paul Klee exhibition at the Jewish Museum opens without its centerpiece, the famous “Angelus Novus” (1920), due to “current conditions” in Israel, where the work is held.
To liven things up, enjoy Joel Meyerowitz’s heartwarming photographs of Giorgio Morandi’s preserved studio in Bologna and read about the Indian modernists who practiced “Global South” solidarity long before it became an academic buzzword. Julia Curl also visits an exhibition in Houston that radically changes her opinion about AI art. Be careful, it can happen to you too.
—Hakim Bishara, editor-in-chief
Joel Meyerowitz on photographing Giorgio Morandi’s studio
“He was putting together a force field of geometric objects,” says Meyerowitz, whose photo book of images of the painter’s famous still lifes is being rereleased this spring. | Greta Rainbow
Elias Sime: FINAL DROP (more info) at 52 Walker Street Gallery by James Cohan
Working with electronic components such as circuit boards, computer keys and telecommunications wires, Elias Sime creates lyrical abstract compositions that shift seamlessly between evocations of landscape, urban topography, the human form and vast fields of radiant color. These works make visible the movement of material goods around the world while simultaneously highlighting the fragility of our networked existence.
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News
- Trump installed a reconstruction of a statue of Christopher Columbus outside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House grounds. The original was among dozens of Columbus monuments toppled in 2020 during nationwide protests against racial violence.
From our critics
The angel of history is trapped in Jerusalem
Paul Klee’s iconic work is missing from an exhibition on fascism at the Jewish Museum in New York due to ‘current circumstances’ in Israel. | Natalie Haddad
Before the ‘global south’, Indian modernists dreamed of solidarity
Historian Atreyee Gupta unravels the threads of catch-all terms like “Global South” to trace the connections between Indian painters and anti-colonial figures like Frantz Fanon. | Nageen Shaikh
Raw Material: The Art and Life of Susan Kleckner
This exhibition at Haverford College’s Cantor Fitzgerald Gallery is the first comprehensive retrospective of the groundbreaking feminist, filmmaker, photographer and performance artist.
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Function
Is there an ethical path for AI art?
There is a destabilizing, dreamlike sense of awe when you encounter something without knowing the answer to your common sense’s most basic question: “Is this real?” | Julia Krul
Susan Shutan on Aruna D’Souza’s “Zarina Brought the World to New York”:
Thanks for the article about Zarina. I was unaware of her important work. The way she incorporated displacement and upheaval seemed to reflect her continued nomadic existence.
From the Archives
Joel Meyerowitz Wild flowers Is a reminder that the world is still thriving
In the expanded new edition, Meyerowitz’s photo book provides incidental details of the main characters. | Esmé Hogveen
