Robert Bordo
crackup (crackdown)
15 Nov – 20 Dec 2019
39 Walker

1/8

Robert Bordo, crackup (crackdown), Installation view, Bortolami, New York, NY, 2019

Each of Robert Bordo’s new crackup paintings depict a rupture, but the subject and object of this rupture and what it comes to represent is up for interpretation. The crack in the picture plane—calamity made manifest—becomes a metaphor for a litany of issues; the current political climate, the state of the world: a zeitgeist of outrage and concern. His impulse to shatter the screen, disrupt the status quo, break through, is urgent and necessary. Certainly, the gesture has its precedents, but Bordo uses an incised line—subtly, borrowed from drawing—to impact the painting surface. It is a technique that literalizes: it draws out the metaphor.

Works

Installation view of displayed artwork titled crackup #1 (oil field)

crackup #1 (oil field), 2019

Installation view of displayed artwork titled crackup #11 (crackup/crackdown)

crackup #11 (crackup/crackdown), 2019

Installation view of displayed artwork titled crackup #13 (witch)

crackup #13 (witch), 2019

Installation view of displayed artwork titled crackup #15 (monster mash)

crackup #15 (monster mash), 2019

Installation view of displayed artwork titled bird/window #4

bird/window #4, 2019

Installation view of displayed artwork titled crackup #10 (frost)

crackup #10 (frost), 2019

Installation view of displayed artwork titled crackup #12 (Frida)

crackup #12 (Frida), 2019

Installation view of displayed artwork titled crackup #14

crackup #14, 2019

Installation view of displayed artwork titled crackup #8 (beast)

crackup #8 (beast), 2019

Press

Andrea Scott Goings on About Town The New Yorker Dec 2019Nicholas John Jones 6 December Nordic Art Review – Kunstkritikk Dec 2019