Arts & Entertainment
Tuesday,
January 11,2005
From Imagination to
Reality: The Art of Science Fiction | Through Fri., Jan. 28
Between
Interconnectedness | Through Sun., Jan. 16
Art and science are old companions, yet they
rarely meet today, as science has become extremely complex and art increasingly
self-absorbed. We normally think of art as the more inspiring practice, but two
shows currently running explore the role of science as muse.
"From Imagination to Reality: The
Art of Science Fiction"—curated by Vincent Di
Fate, a leading sci-fi illustrator and author—is on display at the New York
Academy of Sciences. A small but impressive collection of paintings, the show
considers aliens, androids, man-eating monsters, altered states, other worlds
and dire predictions for this world.
Straight out of a sci-fi B-movie, the
Academy is the perfect home for a "mad scientist." Located in a
beautifully preserved, 1919 neo-Renaissance mansion, it still has its original,
dark, Elizabethan-era woodwork, large creaky doors and tiled floor. Originally
created as book covers, the finely painted illustrations of colorful bug-eyed
monsters, irate cyborgs and stylish spaceships are on
display in the main hallway and waiting room. Divided thematically, sci-fi film
props punctuate the images, such as an alien rocket, the head of the Creature
from the Black Lagoon, and—gracing the 16th-century Florentine mantel—the
severed hand of X.
Highly skilled, these sci-fi artists are
unconcerned with contemporary art theory. And the ethical conundrums that do
concern them border on the futuristic, like John Schoenherr's
picture of an alienated astronaut, Michael Whelan's robot at the moment of
self-awareness and Donato Giancola's
depiction of species-to-species communication.
What's missing in the sci-fi art exhibit
can be found in profusion at Smack Mellon's exhibition "Between
Interconnectedness," curated by Suzanne Kim.
Illustrating art theory, the seven artists use engineering and science's
pictorial qualities to dress up their ideas, rather than explore ethics or
future horizons.
Angie Drakopoulos applied the terminology
and imagery of physics and biology to create a video, a deck of cards and a
series of resin paintings. Her paintings apply the natural abstraction of cells
and stars to create intriguing necklaces of dots and diagrams suspended in
layers of milky resin.
Shown upstairs at this
foundry-turned-spice warehouse-turned gallery,
David McQueen created kinetic landscapes.
One portrays a desert with a slowly rising and setting sun (lamp); the other
features snow falling on a cabin. The snow is made by spidery wire fingers
striking suspended chalk cubes. Inside the tiny cabin, a camera feeds a live
picture of the snowy scene to a back room, where yet another snow machine dusts
the floor.
Though several of the works are visually
serene and others mechanically entertaining, the rhetoric is
overbearing, the artistic outcome meek, and the science a playful device.
New York Academy of Sciences, 2 E. 63rd
St. (5th Ave.), 212-838-0230; 9-5, free.Smack Mellon,
56 Water St. (Main St.), Dumbo, 718-834-8761; 12-6,
free.
—Julia Morton