dArt International Magazine – Summer 2026 edition of the making of art, its exhibition, and what we say about it

August 21, 2026August 21, 2026

Zsolt Ferenczy’s Magical surrealism

by Emese Krunák-Hajagos

When I walked into Zsolt Ferenczy’s large studio in Miskolc (Hungary) I was surrounded by large paintings and drawings that caught my attention with their vivid colours and unique figurative. I fell in love with It’s time (Itt az idő, 2020) at first sight. A very challenging work, with many layers of meaning, that invites endless possible narratives. I think this painting encompasses all of Ferenczy’s painterly symbolism and creative methods.

Let’s start with the animals that appear in his works. The monkey is an important one, recurring in many of his paintings. The one in Dark Material (Sötét anyag, 2020) refers to Frans Jansz Post’s painting View of Olinda (1662). It takes us to the Dutch colonies of Brazil. Post depicts a beautiful landscape with exotic animals. Ferenczy’s starting point is also a landscape but a very different one that is urban and imaginary at the same time. The monkey from Post’s painting is leaning against a red metal dumpster. His body is almost human with a sarcastic smile on its face. Exotic birds fly over palm trees and rich vegetation. The purple material—the ‘dark material’—seems to be solid and porous at the same time. The purple shapes remind us of mountains. But what are they really? Are they man-made or did they come from somewhere else? Are they nuclear and dangerous or just a byproduct of some digging?

The sky is also mystical. The layered pink cloud-shapes seem to move upward. It could easily be the smoke from a nuclear explosion. The colored stripes in front of it might be ‘fences’ trying to separate the two worlds to protect us. There is an idyllic forest in the middle of the composition contrasted by the red dumpster with the dark material and the pink clouds. A weird, foreboding environment.

Zsolt Ferenczy: Dark Material, 2020, acrylic on canvas, 200 x 115 cm — Zsolt Ferenczy: **Dark Material**, 2020, acrylic on canvas, 200 x 115 cm

Figures are central elements in Ferenczy’s paintings. His research for his paintings is very sophisticated. He has wide and varied interests that seemingly don’t relate; deep, updated knowledge in anthropology, history (both natural and human), art history, stories of animal and human mutations, among many other fields. The series called Bestiary (2019–2020) includes a piece containing images of human evolution and mixed races (casta) entitled The Burden of the Past. Iceman (Jégember, 2019–2020) is a reconstruction of the face of a creature we know as a Yeti or Bigfoot. A very tall and large-footed being, who reportedly has been seen in various places on Earth. The portrait is very dramatic, the black ink flows over the surface, the dark eyes, hair and beard suggest the hidden nature of the creature. What makes this series even more interesting is the cardboard base. Cardboard boxes are used in the transport of goods. Ferenczy “considers the box to be an important symbol of global trade.” Then, after they fulfilled their duty, they get discarded. The artist pinpoints the similarities between the fate of those boxed and creatures that are extinct or on the verge of extinction. He reconstructs some of them, like the Tasmanian Wolf, among other mutated animals, like a two headed sheep.

Zsolt Feranczy, Bestiary, Iceman (The Burden of the Past), 2019 – 2020, ink, acrylic, plastic tubes on cardboard, 210 x 120 cm (left) and Tasmanian Wolf, 2019 – 2020, ink, acrylic, plastic tubes on cardboard, 170 x 170 cm (right) — Zsolt Feranczy, **Bestiary, Iceman (The Burden of the Past)**, 2019 – 2020, ink, acrylic, plastic tubes on cardboard, 210 x 120 cm (left) and Tasmanian Wolf, 2019 – 2020, ink, acrylic, plastic tubes on cardboard, 170 x 170 cm (right)

History, especially Hungarian history, is challenging to comment on, especially when it comes to—and it always does— talking about the fight for freedom. In the 19th century the Habsburg Monarchy ruled Hungary. Their high taxation interfered with the developments of Hungarian agriculture, animal breeding and industry. To show their resistance, Hungarians dressed in the traditional outfits of mounted horse-herdsman (csikós), including baggy pants (bő gatya), long coats ofter lined with fur, fur hats (kucsma), peaky hats (csákó), and carried a sword and spoke Hungarian. It was meant to show their resistance. The figures in Horsemen gathering bombs and The Rebel wore those traditional clothes and actively engaged in the rebellion that came to a conclusion in the war of 1848 against the Habsburgs. They are forboding images. We can feel that death is at the gate. The compositions are almost fairy-tale-like. In both paintings, the figures are elongated, giving them some eerie, magical appearance, wearing traditional Hungarian clothes as symbols of their political stand. The landscape is the great Hungarian Plain but we can’t really recognize it as it is modified to tell the story. There is a hyena who feeds on carcases, at the feet of one of the horsemen in The horsemen gathering bombs, snakes are fighting at the top of a flag. The bomb (that didn’t exist at that time) is on the ground. The Rebel is mounted on his horse, holding a sword, ready to fight. There are both peaceful (the resting deer) and worrisome (the agitated swan) animals around him. We face the dangerous pink clouds again and bombs are falling from the sky to destroy this budding rebellion. Pink/red light radiates from the rebel’s head, giving him the status of a hero.

L-R: Zsolt Ferenczy, Horsemen gathering bombs (Bombászó csikósok) and The Rebel (A lázadó), each 2020, oil on canvas, 150 x 100 cm — L-R: Zsolt Ferenczy, **Horsemen gathering bombs** (Bombászó csikósok) and The Rebel (A lázadó), each 2020, oil on canvas, 150 x 100 cm

As I mentioned earlier, I saw It’s time as a conclusion of Ferenczy painterly symbolism. Beside a Tisza-type boat (Tisza is a large river in Hungary) a boy in a peaky hat stands. There are animals around the boats, rabbits jumping playfully, a lizard, a deer looking into the distance, and a seagull flying above. In our world of environmental issues like global warming, forest fires and floods as well as political uncertainties, we never know what’s coming. We don’t know where the issues are coming from, what or who caused them, but disasters are coming for sure. This boy, like a “New Noah” is waiting for it to happen, possibly a flood, but there is no water rising yet. Everyone is waiting and ready. The animals are nearby, the two monkeys, like sailors are waiting. It is the quiet moment before the storm. The sky behind reminds us of the sky in Dark Material. Ferenczy wrote: “The sky always shows a different formation than the sphere below, but there is always something that connects the two. I borrowed the floating shape from astrophysical models that illustrate the motion of the black holes or galaxies. The danger, the sign of times, always appear in the sky …” Indeed, it does. The red shapes might be fires burning with dark smoke, while the blue, like exploding splashes of water that will rise and endanger everything. When it happens, the birdhouse is the only hope, the symbol of home, a way to escape from danger, and a chance for survival.

Zsolt Frenczy: It’s time (Itt az idő), 2020, oil on canvas, 170 x 120 cm
Like a crown, there is a purple atomic shape hovering at the very top of the composition, inviting the future into the upcoming catastrophe. Is it only observing? Or is it there to help or give us some hope? We don’t know. It’s like a poem. You don’t have to understand every motif to relate to the story and enjoy the vision.

August 21, 2026August 21, 2026

Why Keep the Figure? Anna-Maria Škroba at YveYANG

by Kun Sok

I kept returning to the turquoise table in Anna-Maria Škroba’s Nazar. A seated figure occupies the center, but the table holds my attention. Its saturated color and sharply angled edge give it a force the sitter never acquires. The face has been reduced to a gray oval, while the black clothing breaks apart against the open weave of the jute. Though porous in places, the table seems to push forward. The person recedes.

Anna-Maria Škroba, Nazar, 2026, oil and gouache on jute 18 x 13 inches (Images courtesy of the artist and YveYANG Gallery) — Anna-Maria Škroba, **Nazar**, 2026, oil and gouache on jute 18 x 13 inches (Images courtesy of the artist and YveYANG Gallery)

That reversal raises a question that follows Škroba’s solo exhibition, I’m raining before the rain, at YveYANG: Why does she continue to paint the human figure while allowing other elements to overpower it?

Her figures are rarely absent. They sit, recline, walk, or occupy the middle of a field, yet they seldom govern the picture. Tables, roads, expanses of color, and the exposed fabric beneath the paint exert competing pressures. Škroba treats the figure less as a commanding subject than as something vulnerable to its surroundings. The body gives those surroundings something to act upon.

Anna-Maria Škroba, Neither-Nor (Bolshaya), 2025, oil on jute, 90½ x 63 inches — Anna-Maria Škroba, **Neither-Nor (Bolshaya)**, 2025, oil on jute, 90½ x 63 inches

This is especially clear in Neither-Nor (Bolshaya). A seated woman appears within a monumental turquoise field, indicated by thin reddish-gray lines describing her head, torso, and bent legs. The figure is large, but scale does not translate into authority. The surrounding color carries greater visual weight, while the rough weave remains visible across body and ground. The woman never separates cleanly from the surface. She appears held within the field and partially undone by it.

Without the figure, the turquoise expanse might read primarily as a formal event—a field of color interrupted by paint and fabric. The body changes the stakes. It allows the field to feel enveloping, resistant, perhaps indifferent. The figure does not explain the space, but makes its force perceptible.

Škroba’s handling of paint intensifies this relation. On jute, pigment settles into translucent passages, accumulates in thicker patches, or catches unevenly on the raised weave. At times the fabric appears more definite than the image painted over it. A shoulder or knee may gather into recognizable form, while surrounding marks remain closer to abrasion, stain, or drag. The support does not simply carry the image; it interferes with its coherence.

In space, a reclining figure stretches across a muted green field. The body is pale and elongated, but the weave beneath it remains insistently present. The person seems less placed upon the fabric than absorbed into it. Here the figure gives material tension a bodily consequence. The jute’s resistance becomes more than texture because a body is attempting to distinguish itself from it.

Anna-Maria Škroba, High perspective, 2026, oil on canvas, 38⅝ x 33½ inches — Anna-Maria Škroba, **High perspective**, 2026, oil on canvas, 38⅝ x 33½ inches

High perspective approaches the question differently. Painted on canvas, it presents a curving gray road, a green slope, a broad diagonal shadow, and two small figures in the distance. The people are nearly reduced to punctuation marks. The road and shadow organize the picture, directing the eye and establishing scale. Still, the figures turn an arrangement of directional forms into a traversed space. Their smallness makes the landscape feel expansive, while their movement gives the road purpose.

This may be why Škroba keeps returning to the figure. Her paintings need a human presence, though not necessarily a human center. The body provides scale, fragility, and consequence. It allows a table to dominate, a field to engulf, or a road to exceed the person crossing it. The figure remains so that its loss of control can be seen.

The exhibition’s title, I’m raining before the rain, folds weather into the speaker. The self becomes a condition rather than a stable center. Škroba’s figures occupy a comparable position: they register the pressures of color, texture, and scale without mastering any of them.

Anna-Maria Škroba, May, 2026, oil on jute, 16⅞ x 11¾ inches

There are limits to this approach. In May, a pale vertical form occupies a mottled yellow-green surface, but it is difficult to determine whether the shape is a person, an architectural fragment, or an accumulation of lighter paint. The uncertainty produces little friction because too little distinction remains to place under pressure. Exposed weave and blurred form begin to supply a generalized atmosphere rather than a specific pictorial relation.

This is the risk of Škroba’s recognizable vocabulary. Blurred faces, muted fields, fragmented silhouettes, and visible jute are familiar features of contemporary figurative painting. Her strongest works move beyond that familiarity by establishing a precise conflict between the figure and what surrounds it. The weaker ones rely on material roughness to generate mood.

Anna-Maria Škroba, Installation View, “Why Keep the Figure? Anna-Maria Škroba” at YveYANG

Škroba’s figures matter most when they remain necessary without becoming sovereign. They do not dominate the paintings, yet their presence prevents color, fabric, and space from becoming purely formal. A body sits, reclines, or walks through the picture, and the world around it acquires force. The figure stays so that we can watch it lose control.

Anna-Maria Škroba: I’m raining before the rain July 9 – August 21, 2026 at YveYANG, 12 Wooster St., New York, NY 10013

August 18, 2026August 19, 2026

The Silence of the Philosophers

by Steve Rockwell

Steve Rockwell, Mime on Melrose, Abandoned Painting, 1995, acrylic on canvas with wood and masonite frame, 52 x 48 inches. The painted work is a double-frame record of the "abandonment," a work within a work — **Steve Rockwell**, Mime on Melrose, Abandoned Painting, Los Angeles, CA, 1995, acrylic on canvas with wood and masonite frame, 52 x 48 inches. The painted work is a double-frame record of the “abandonment,” a work within a work

It’s a joke readymade. My painting of Marcel Marceau was “abandoned” on Melrose Avenue on April 1, 1994 in Los Angeles. Yes, Mime on Melrose had been a sight gag – a “silent” French actor trapped within a canvas in Hollywood, where no one could hear him scream. Of course, revenge would come in the form of five Oscars in 2011 at the 84th Academy Awards.

Michel Hazanavicius's The Artist (2011), starring Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo (and Uggie). The film deliberately recreates the visual language of late-1920s silent Hollywood — **Michel Hazanavicius’s *The Artist* (2011)**, starring Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo (and Uggie). The film deliberately recreates the visual language of late-1920s silent Hollywood

The Artist became the first silent film, to win best picture since Wings in 1929. The Michel Hazenavicius film pulled off a historic sweep, Jean Dujardin, being the first French actor ever to win the category. So, there! To rub it in, directing, score, and costume took the remaining Oscars.

My own bias for the visual sense developed when the world fell silent as a child. When I lost my hearing due to enlarged adenoids, I compensated by just looking harder. Images of the operation itself, as a five-year-old, are still quite clear: arms being strapped to the chair, an anesthesia mask much like a small lamp shade raised to my face – then coming to, seeing the doctor waving surgical tweezers with some whitish tissue.

The 1882 Gustav-Adolf Schultze photographs are among the best-known portraits of Nietzsche. The series was made in Naumburg in September 1882; one version became associated with the later Thus Spoke Zarathustra image — The **1882 Gustav-Adolf Schultze photographs** are among the best-known portraits of Nietzsche. The series was made in Naumburg in September 1882; one version became associated with the later *Thus Spoke Zarathustra* image

In the field of philosophy, the cone of “silence” seemed to have fallen over one particular thinker. Apparently, Friedrich Nietzsche had been fearful. In a confession to a friend, even the mere mention of this individual’s name publicly, might have resulted in a charge of plagiarism against Nietzsche. Karl Marx took the opposite approach. Together with Engels, they spent a year writing a 500 page attack-book in an effort to silence him. One of the most obsessive, explosive feuds in the history of political theory was the result.

Karl Marx, 1875 photograph by John Jabez Edwin Mayall — **Karl Marx**, 1875 photograph by **John Jabez Edwin Mayall**

Marcel Duchamp had called “Philosopher X” the primary intellectual influence on his entire artistic output. Here he found the catalyst for his break from conventional painting and subsequent invention of the ready-made. “X” argued that State, Religion, Humanity, Morality, and Truth are “spooks,” they being fixed ideas employed to subjugate the individual ego. Applied to the art world, Art, Taste, and Genius are “social spooks,” that required systematic demolition. In practice, a state of personal autonomy might be achieved through absolute indifference to societal expectations.

1952 portrait of Duchamp as the work of Eliot Elisofon, a Life staff photographer. “Dada’s Daddy,” published April 28, 1952. The article was by Winthrop Sargeant — Portrait of Duchamp is the work of **Eliot Elisofon**, a *Life* staff photographer. **“Dada’s Daddy,”** published April 28, 1952. The article was by **Winthrop Sargeant**

Readers of philosophy would recognize the mystery thinker as Max Stirner. At the core, Stirner rejected authority in any form. These illusions, mental ghosts, or “spooks,” having been banished, a “creative nothing” was possible. The ego now free from all ideologies, situated in a state of total intellectual neutrality – a clean slate. Stirner’s 1844, The Ego and Its Own, was the career-defining work that Duchamp discovered while staying in Munich around 1912.

The concept of a societal clean slate has a precedent in the French Revolution, 1793 being “Year One.” With history erased, time reset, the birth of a new world could now be governed strictly by reason. Churches across France were stripped of religious imagery, now dubbed “Temples of Reason.” Opera actress, Sophie Momoro, portrayed the Goddess of Reason in the newly-minted Festival of Reason at the Notre-Dame Cathedral.

There are thinkers, and there are doers. To implement the wiping of the cultural slate, doers are required. The tool, during the Reign of Terror, became the guillotine – a humane, rational instrument of social progress, egalitarian and swift. Another “Year Zero” was attempted in Cambodia. Somewhere between 1.5 and 3 million people died in the Killing Fields during Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime (1975-1979). Coming from a wealthy background, Pol Pot was educated in France, but had been a mediocre student. He had a political awakening that led him to co-found the Marxist Circle and join the French Communist Party.

During the Pol Pot regime, 1976 was the transitional year when the Khmer Rouge officially codified their radical society. Cambodia had now ceased to exist by name, replaced by a totalitarian agrarian slave-state. On January 5 of that year, the Democratic Kampuchea abolished all private property, cancelled the national currency, outlawed all religions, and stripped away basic human rights. Up until 1976 the public had not formally known who was running the country.

Silent Movie, 1976, theatrical poster illustrated by John Alvin — **Mel Brooks, Silent Movie**, 1976, theatrical poster illustrated by John Alvin

In 1976 Silent Movie is released. Mel Brooks played Mel Funn, a once-successful Hollywood director attempting a comeback. He persuaded a failing studio to finance an extraordinary project: a full-length silent movie. To make his imaginary film commercially irresistible, Funn tried to recruit major stars. Brooks therefore turned the film into a parade of contemporary celebrity cameos: Burt Reynolds, Paul Newman, Liza Minnelli, Anne Bancroft, James Caan, and Marcel Marceau. They appeared essentially as themselves.

The principal theatrical poster was illustrated by John Alvin, whose design turns Brooks into a comic silent-film hero, with the huge three-dimensional SILENT MOVIE title and Brooks making the classic “shhh” gesture.

Performance portrait of Marcel Marceau in classic white face, striped shirt and exaggerated gesture — Performance portrait of **Marcel Marceau** in classic white face, striped shirt and exaggerated gesture

The joke is that Silent Movie itself is essentially a silent film: without spoken dialogue, communication relies on physical performance, title cards, music, and sound effects. The single exception is Marcel Marceau uttering the film’s only audible word. – NON!

August 14, 2026August 20, 2026

Abandoned on Point Dume in Malibu

by Steve Rockwell

Eleven miles out of Binghamton, New York, the timing belt on our Volkswagen Passat snapped. Occurring as it did going downhill, the moment was strangely peaceful with the car still moving – engine silent, the clang of the pistons hitting the engine block now subsided. I’m not a car person, so I would have appreciated knowing that the 1990 VW Passat uses an interference engine design. Meaning: a snapped timing belt will cause catastrophic internal engine damage. What were the VW engineers in Emden, Germany thinking!

Rodman Edward Serling, born December 25, 1924, in Syracuse, New York, growing up mainly in Binghamton, New York — **Rodman Edward Serling**, born December 25, 1924, in Syracuse, New York, growing up mainly in Binghamton, New York

Well, the consequence of all this was getting to know the Rod Serling of his hometown a touch deeper. Booking a motel in the Carousel Capital of the World turned into a roulette of Name the Appropriate Twilight Zone Episode. A Serling biography from a nine-year-ago-reading came to life – Rod Serling: The Dreams and Nightmares of Life in the Twilight Zone: A Biography by Joel Engel, a Contemporary Books publication, Chicago, 1989. The book was a summer read on the Granary Lake shoreline at our family “camp” in Blind River in 1990.

The Spring/Summer edition of dArt International magazine, covering the LA International Invitational — The Spring/Summer 1999 edition of dArt International magazine, covering the LA International Invitational

Sandy and I had been returning from the release of the Summer 1999 edition of dArt International magazine at the Limelight Club in New York City. It had been a party and and a show, LL Gallery being the Limelight show venue. The Making Connections exhibition was curated by Leeza Ahmedy and Robert Curcio with works by critics, artists, and galleries featured in dArt, as well as regular LL Gallery exhibitors. Present at the event was legendary publisher of Avalanche magazine, Willoughby Sharp.

Willoughby Sharp, Avalanche #1, Fall 1970, cover photograph of Joseph Beuys by Shunk-Kender and János Kender — **Willoughby Sharp, Avalanche #1**, Fall 1970, cover photograph of Joseph Beuys by **Shunk-Kender and János Kender**

Sharp had championed Earth Art. With the release of his 1968 documentary, Earth, a fresh perception on art had been put forth: it might be something that couldn’t be bought, sold, and hung on the walls. His meeting Liza Béar led to the 1970 publication of Avalanche – not just a magazine about conceptual art, but an alternative exhibition space in print. Sharp was now at the center of the “painting is dead” movement. Avalanche #1 contributors included: Carl Andre, Jan Dibbets, Richard Long, Robert Morris, Joseph Beuys, Michael Heizer, Dennis Oppenheim, and Robert Smithson. The Beuys section was a Portrait by Shunk-Kender, while Sharp contributed Body Works. To the art world, the critical mass of these new artists’ bodies of work turned into a global tidal wave.

Willloughby Sharp & Friend at Limelight Club dArt International release and exhibition. Photo by Steve Rockwell — Willloughby Sharp & Friend at the 1999 Limelight Club dArt International release and exhibition. Photo by Steve Rockwell

In my 1970 group studio on Queen Street West in Toronto, I felt the acute “chill” of painting in its then state of rigor mortis. My effort, in the studio exhibition that year, was to concentrate and compress all experience, the visible included, into simple elements of dot, dash, and line. Framed as time increments and events, their attendant visual imagery might float freely as association. My present writing about these events merely accomplishes the “unpacking” of compressed material. While I had trashed the work from that year, their retrieval was made relatively easy. Like letters of the alphabet, it was no more difficult than reciting A,B,C. Repainting a dot or line just packages the “word” in a new context.

Steve Rockwell, New York Trash on Point Dume, (Malibu Jetsam), 1995, acrylic on canvas with wood and masonite frame, 52 x 48 inches. The painted work is a double-frame record of the "abandonment," a work within a work — **Steve Rockwell**, New York Trash on Point Dume, (Malibu Jetsam), 1995, acrylic on canvas with wood and masonite frame, 52 x 48 inches. The painted work is a double-frame record of the “abandonment,” a work within a work

In 1994, I carried out The Abandoned Paintings project. Seven 24 x 20 inch canvases were left at considered locations in Los Angeles, New York, and the Algarve, Portugal. The Malibu “abandonment” as written into my account, read, “New York street trash became the basis of my next abandoned painting. After Griffith Observatory, the four of us drove to Point Dume in Malibu. It took us a while to get to the beach because a film crew had taken over the parking lot.”

Steve Rockwell, The Abandoned Paintings, 1995, limited handmade book work. Leaving the painting (left), Malibu Discovery (right) — Steve Rockwell, **The Abandoned Paintings**, 1995, limited handmade book work. Leaving the painting (left), Malibu Discovery (right)

“I took the painting out of the trunk and we walked to the rocky edge of the point near the water. The wind was strong. I tried wedging it into the rocks. It kept blowing over. Tracy suggested a spot further from the water. I pressed the painting into the side of the point and took pictures. We started down the beach.”

“A man in his sixties passed us walking to the end of the beach. We followed him with binoculars. He noticed the painting and approached it cautiously. Then he grabbed the top of it and began to read the note on the back. We saw him pack it up and walk toward us. Bob asked him if he found the painting at the end of the beach. He said, yes. ‘What are you going to do with it?’ Bob asked. ‘I’m going to keep it. The artist said I could have it.'”

The Statue of Liberty reveal in the original Planet of the Apes (1968) was filmed at Point Dume/Westward Beach in Malibu, California — The Statue of Liberty reveal in the original *Planet of the Apes* (1968) was filmed at Point Dume/Westward Beach in Malibu, California

The Point Dume, Malibu location has been a choice spot for filmmakers over the years. The Statue of Liberty reveal in the original Planet of the Apes (1968) was filmed there, not in New York. For Planet of the Apes, Rod Serling wrote the first three major drafts of the screenplay, working from Pierre Boulle’s novel. The finished movie substantially altered his conception, but retained his central idea of the ruined Earth and the shocking Statue of Liberty revelation. The film suddenly becomes a parable about humanity destroying itself. When Taylor, the Charlton Heston character realizes that his space flight had returned him to a future earth, he cries out, “Oh my God, I’m back. I’m home!. I’ve been home all the time. You really did it. You maniacs!”

That final frontal image was a matte painting by Emil Kosa Jr., composited with the real cliffs and beach — That final frontal image was a **matte painting by Emil Kosa Jr.**, composited with the real cliffs and beach

Not unlike the pressing of my New York Trash painting into the side of the point, that final frontal image was a matte painting by Emil Kosa Jr., composited with the real cliffs and beach, and super-imposed on the tip of Point Dume. The physical miniature/partial replica was used for the high-angle shots looking down through the crown. The high-angle shot looks down through the Statue’s crown toward the two characters on the beach, Taylor (Charlton Heston) and Nova. A 70-foot scaffold was erected at the cove, with a scale replica of the upper portion of the statue positioned in front of the camera.

Planet of the Apes Behind-the-Scenes Stills from the collection of Mark Talbot Butler — **Planet of the Apes**, Behind-the-Scenes Stills from the collection of Mark Talbot-Butler

Our Malibu tale ends with a white 1993 Ford Bronco XLT owned by Al “A.C.” Cowlings. I had been riveted with the other 95 million viewers who had watched the O.J. Simpson Bronco chase live on television on June 17, 1994. Two and a half months earlier we had left the Point Dume “abandonment” scene, while they were still filming the Frogmen TV pilot. To my “Did you see O.J.?” question, Bob had answered, “Oh, yeah, he was there.” The actual chase Bronco is now preserved at the Alcatraz East Crime Museum in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.

August 11, 2026August 11, 2026

He Spoke to the Birds: Extending the Everyday and Dissipating Resonations

by Taylor Bielecki

He Spoke To The Birds, a group exhibition curated by Fanfan Yuxuan Fan at the AAIE Center for Contemporary Art in Rome, is a journey into intricacies, interactions, and lingering conversations. Featuring Jeremias Rumpl, Diego Azzola, and Huang Zhe, the exhibition brings together practices with such disparate registers that, at first glance, they might seem incompatible. Yet curator Fan has woven them together skilfully, allowing each voice to be heard while the collective voice resonates just as strongly.

Huang Zhe, The Thinking of a Small Cluster of White Plants, 2026 — **Huang Zhe**, The Thinking of a Small Cluster of White Plants, 2026

In Huang Zhe’s The Thinking of a Small Cluster of White Plants (2026), Fan introduces terms such as corroding, remembering, drifting, and dissolving. Words that feel light, airy, and weightless, yet suggest flow, connection, growth, and a steady presence through change. Each starts with an object, an element of nature, or a memory; through these actions, its point of departure shifts, much as the histories surrounding us do.

Installation view of He Spoke To The Birds, Rome. Artists: Diego Azzola, Huang Zhe. Curated by Fanfan Yuxuan Fan. Courtesy of AAIE and FanFlus — Installation view of He Spoke To The Birds, Rome. **Artists: Diego Azzola, Huang Zhe**. Curated by Fanfan Yuxuan Fan. Courtesy of AAIE and FanFlus

Standing in the midst of Rome’s everlasting history, this exhibition adds to its deep and ever-growing presence. Many works extend beyond themselves, allowing forms to grow while their lines still connect. A striking example that made an impact on me is Diego Azzola’s works, whose galvanized pipes emerge from his paintings as physical extensions of the image. In their original function, pipes carry water from one place to another; here, they do the same, linking works to the gallery and neighboring pieces. Rome has long been expanding and intertwining with new history, and its water systems still exist throughout the city, hidden, underground, lying at its edges, leaving a quiet but lasting imprint. Azzola’s pipes function metaphorically as fragments of a system that never entirely stopped functioning. He seems interested in what happens at the edges, where things cease to carry one singular meaning and instead become more complex and layered.

Installation view of He Spoke To The Birds, Rome. Artist: Diego Azzola. Curated by Fanfan Yuxuan Fan. Courtesy of AAIE and FanFlus — Installation view of He Spoke To The Birds, Rome. **Artist: Diego Azzola**. Curated by Fanfan Yuxuan Fan. Courtesy of AAIE and FanFlus

Fanfan Yuxuan Fan utilizes the space exceptionally well. Hung in clusters, the work develops their own conversations, guiding viewers through the gallery’s interestingly shaped architecture. Drawing on the spirit of Arte Povera, Fan enriches the curatorial framework by allowing the objects and materials to find their own voices — pipes, zinc plates, and smoke becoming not merely media, but interlocutors. This exhibition invites closer attention to details, connections, and intricacies. Interviewing Fan was immensely enlightening, offering insight into the process behind it, from engaging with the space to shaping relationships between works.

Installation view of He Spoke To The Birds, Rome. Artist: Zhe Huang. Curated by Fanfan Yuxuan Fan. Courtesy of AAIE and FanFlus. — Installation view of He Spoke To The Birds, Rome. **Artist: Zhe Huang**. Curated by Fanfan Yuxuan Fan. Courtesy of AAIE and FanFlus

TB: What drew you to choose these artists, and how did you work with them to choose the works for this particular space?

FYF: Diego Azzola and Huang Zhe have already built relations with AAlE. During my conversation with the gallery founder, I proposed inviting Jeremias Rumpl, based in Germany, to join. From the outset, I envisioned the project around materiality and the spirit of Arte Povera while remaining grounded in each artist’s practices that treat materials as active participants in the creative process.

TB: What interested AAIE in collaborating with you on the exhibition He Spoke to the Birds, especially in relation to supporting younger curatorial voices and international artists in Rome?

FYF: There was strong alignment from the start. AAlE has never been focused exclusively on or limited to local artists; its programs have always had an international vision and encouraged dialogue across cultural contexts. I was mindful that this exhibition would take place in Rome, a city where Arte Povera was not simply an art-historical reference, but a way of engaging with a history that originated in a living context for rethinking materiality. That shared vision made the collaboration feel natural and meaningful.

TB: How did you consider the exhibition as a space where different forms of time and material presence coexist beyond physical presence? How did you decide on placement and installation heights?

FYF: The AAlE space is very different from a conventional white cube. Its triangular corners and irregular geometry, characteristic of Roman architecture, opened up possibilities that a standard space would not. I grouped Diego’s installations by color and series within one corner, while positioning sculptures of different forms and tones in dialogue with Huang Zhe’s paintings. Throughout, I was thinking about spatial narrative, how to create a sequence that feels coherent while remaining visually engaging and full of unexpected encounters.

TB: Given the deep history of Rome, what kinds of conversations or connections were you hoping might enter the gallery as viewers experience the work?

FYF: Rome made this exhibition possible in a particular way. There is something about a city where history is never abstract, where ancient infrastructure, ruins, and contemporary life coexist, that invites a return to what is most essential. For me, the exhibition also returns to one of the fundamental ideas behind Arte Povera: not a style or historical movement, but an attitude toward the world. He Spoke To The Birds suggests a way of relating to nature and all living things with equality and attentiveness. In today’s uncertain world, I hope it offers a quieter space to reconsider our relationships, with one another, with materials, and with the natural world — to slow down, to listen, and to reconnect with what is most essential.

TB: At what point does the material stop being a surface and become a collaborator? Is the metal seen as an extension of the work? Perhaps acting as a drawn line?

FYF: I think that’s a very apt reading of Diego Azzola’s work. The galvanized pipes are not simply structural elements; they become active collaborators in shaping the composition and the viewer’s movement through space. Extending beyond the pictorial surface, they function like drawn lines that have escaped the canvas and unfolded into three dimensions. They also carry a historical resonance in Rome, deeply embedded in the city’s architectural infrastructure, so when Diego brings them into dialogue with painting, the material responds to the image, the space, and history surrounding it.

Jeremias Rumpl, House book, 2024 — **Jeremias Rumpl,** House book, 2024

TB: The show title evokes a foundational ethos of Arte Povera: a world in which human and non-human exist on the same level. How do you feel this theme fits the works? How does each artist embody this ethos?

FYF: I think each artist embodies this ethos differently, but all approach materials as something with agency. That openness lies at the heart of the spirit of Arte Povera and this exhibition. Jeremias Rumpl relinquishes part of the creative process to acid, weather, and time, allowing the material to shape the final work. Diego Azzola places industrial pipes, painting, and marine forms on equal terms, without hierarchy, dissolving boundaries between the natural, the built, and the imagined. Huang Zhe transforms smoke into a painted presence, allowing memory and atmosphere to emerge through a material that is almost impossible to grasp. None of them impose meaning on their materials; instead, they enter into a dialogue. That willingness to listen, to materials, to time, and to the more-than-human world, is what most deeply connects their practices to Arte Povera and the title He Spoke To The Birds.

TB: Elements within the pieces vary in weight and presence; how did you negotiate those differences while maintaining the coherence of the whole show?

FYF: I didn’t begin by thinking about contrast or balance between materials. Each artist had already developed their own material language: zinc, pipes, and smoke were not choices I imposed, but vocabularies already in motion. What I noticed was that these materials also carried a particular resonance in Rome: a city built on stone, water systems, and accumulated time. The differences in weight and presence emerged naturally from bringing these three practices together. My role was less about negotiation and more about creating the right spatial conditions for each to exist on its own terms, while allowing connections to emerge across the exhibition.

Installation view of He Spoke To The Birds, Rome. Artists: Diego Azzola, Huang Zhe. Curated by Fanfan Yuxuan Fan. Courtesy of AAIE and FanFlus.

About the Writer:
Taylor Bielecki lives in Gowanus, where her studio is, and works at Pratt Institute, where she earned her MFA. She also studied at Penn State, where she earned a BA in English and a BFA in Fine Arts. She finished as a finalist in the Kennedy Center’s VSA National Emerging Young Artist program for 2017, where she earned an award of Excellence. She has shown prints internationally in a print exchange in Australia and exhibitions in Dubai, India, and the Glasgow School of Art. She has also shown paintings internationally in Gallery 24N, PhilaMOCA’s juried exhibitions in Philadelphia, Pa., Perry Lawson Fine Art in Nyack, NY, BWAC in Red Hook, and IW Gallery in Brooklyn. Taylor works for Two Coats of Paint, TUSSLE Magazine, and has joined Art Spiel as a contributing writer. @Taylor.Bielecki