dArt Magazine’s Playing Card Feature

by Steve Rockwell

dArt magazine is pleased to introduce TWINNING, the application of a game structure to its Playing Card feature. When presented with cards bearing images from dArt back issues cropped to playing card size, a participant is asked to pair up any two from cards presented. While the choice on the surface may be no more profound than “liking the combination,” something deeper may have been at the root of the picks. Even if this is not the case, the resultant pairing of images affords the chance to answer questions that the art itself may be posing. This had certainly been true for writer Bruce Bauman, who in his The Empty Deep article about Gehard Richter said of the exhibition that it “forced me to reevaluate why I write about art.”

Cropped details of Gerhard Richter’s 1982 oil on canvas, Two Candles (Zwei Kerzen), and on the right Deiter Mammel’s Saddy. Collage produced 2021 by Steve Rockwell on dArt International paper over pine frame, 8.5″ x 10″
Karin Mamma Anderson (left) and Philip Taaffe were “twinned” by dArt contributor Gae Savannah. The Anderson image was cropped from the Emese Krunák-Hajagos article When Darkness Falls in the Fall 2016 edition of dArt. The Philip Taaffe image came from the same dArt edition and was part of an article by Christopher Hart Chambers, Abstract But Not.
The above eight playing cards-sized images were cropped from dArt back issues. From left to right: Karin Mamma Anderson, Deiter Mammel, Alberto Giacometti, Kurt Schwitters, Philip Taaffe, Joe Goode, bunny and carrots from a Katharine Carter and Associates ad, and Gerhard Richter.

This TWINNING of images was inspired by a recent visit to the home of collector and former dArt associate, Roy Bernardi, when presented with eight of my playing card works mounted on dArt International paper. Two had stood out as ones that he preferred: Richter’s Two Candles and Saddy, an acrylic on canvas painting by Deiter Mammel, cropped from the dArt advertisement of his 2016 HOT exhibition at Christopher Cutts Gallery in Toronto.

Every copy of the coming edition of dArt International magazine will be unique. The projected signed limited edition will feature dArt‘s “Playing Cards,” hand cut from back issues and tipped into a reproduced image of a dArt International paper mat.

Images from past dArt magazines trimmed to playing card size.
Images from past dArt magazines trimmed to playing card size.
A printed image of the work of Julian Schnabel cut to playing card dimensions by Steve Rockwell from an article on the artist that appeared in the Fall 2010 edition of dArt (#27).

Apollonia Vanova’s Sleepover Gallery in Toronto

by Emese Krunák-Hajagos

Artist Lumír Hladík on left and Darren Gallery’s owner Apollonia Vanova. Photo, Yianni Tongh

EKH: Darren Gallery is reopening after, as you’ve said, a long and painful renovation with a new concept: Sleepover Art Gallery. Where did this idea come from?

AV: The sleepover gallery concept came about from a variety of factors.  It’s difficult to sell art, as it’s not a life necessity and not a surprise when galleries close down after a few years. Continue reading “Apollonia Vanova’s Sleepover Gallery in Toronto”

Points of Engagement

by D. Dominick Lombardi

Irene Rousseau (American, born 1941), Visual Symphony: Stretching the, Space, 2019, Oil on canvas, pen and ink, 36 x 36 x 1 1/2 in., Courtesy of the artist, ©2020 Irene Rousseau

The success of an exhibition, or any work of art for that matter, is its ability to engage the viewer. Engagement can be a bit more difficult to achieve when you eliminate any sort of representation, as with the current exhibition at the Hofstra Museum of Art, Uncharted: American Abstraction in the Information Age. Continue reading “Points of Engagement”