Above: Andrew Sendor, “Installation view from right: Alejandro Celestino, Artist Unknown, 2013, human being and mixed media, dimensions variable, Soliloquy, Ana Libitina, 2012, video projection, 107 minutes.” Courtesy of the artist and Caren Golden Fine Art.
Andrew Sendor’s current New York exhibition, Based on a True Story, combines a new series of figurative paintings with his first series of drawings. These works continue to feature characters that appear to have stepped out of Victorian portraiture – and in a way they have, as he finds inspiration from his large collection of old photographs. But aside from his Victorian models, Andrew’s newest work takes on an entirely new subject paired with a distinctive change in the materiality of the work. Individual figures, dressed in old-fashioned styles, stand upon bases that might traditionally be used for sculpture. The titles read like museum plaques, and refer to the future, suggesting a new direction for historical exhibitions in which the bodies themselves are put on display (a little different than the scientific Bodies exhibition).
In the painting Installation view from right: Alejandro Celestino, Artist Unknown, 2013, human being and mixed media, dimensions variable, Soliloquy, Ana Libitina, 2012, video projection, 107 minutes (Yes, that is the title of one painting!), multiple references to the history of figure painting coincide amidst the somber interior of a darkened museum space. A small, solemn boy atop a pedestal is painted in a stark balance of light and dark, which might be taken from a Victorian miniature or a painting by John Singer Sargent. Behind him the sepia “video projection” contrasts the Photorealism of Gerhard Richter against the “window” opposite which opens onto a Magritte-like clouded sky. The gloom of the interior is replete with references to death and the afterlife – the chalky face of the preserved body of a child from another time, still holding what must be a prayer book; the statuette of Virgin and Child; the children in the “video” standing at the edge of the grave; and the artist of the video who is referenced in the title, Libitina, also known in Roman mythology as the goddess of death – all this is juxtaposed with the brilliant light of the cheerful sky, alive outside the mausoleum-like museum.
While each painting easily stands alone, Andrew considers them, in some ways, to be one work, a sort of thesis. Death and the afterlife feature as one of the predominant themes. He faces the fact of human mortality and considers society’s way of dealing with the human body which remains after death. In what he considers a hypothetical situation, rather than a fantasy or fiction, he proposes the possibility of preservation and exhibition of the body – rather than traditional practices such as burial or cremation. In a less literal way, he considers what happens after death, and contemplates new ways of conceiving an afterlife. Andrew also sees this as a reflection on our inability to let go of the past – for the museum is often a sort of nostalgic memorial to what is gone. There is of course an inherent tragic element, which comes from the fact that these are figures of dead children, caught in their youth, at the point in their life when death seems improbable.
The history of figure painting remains a constant point of reference in this exhibition, but the allusions are not purely stylistic. The reference to Magritte symbolizes Andrew’s interest in posing philosophical questions through his paintings as Magritte did. He is clearly contemplating the history of art, but during our discussion, he expressed to me his desire to make work which can communicate to those who may not know anything about art. He wants to convey ideas which can connect to humanity on a much larger level, and actually respond to our contemporary psyche. As he explained “I have always been interested in combining the personal and the universal.”
The drawings were produced after the paintings – a sort of inversion of the usual process in which the drawing acts as a jumping-off point for the painting. When drawing, Andrew tried to imagine what he would make if he was actually living in 1904. He sees them as artifacts, or relics from the past. Drawn on old, yellowing paper they are informal sketches of events such as childhood outings, and they seem to generate that very feeling of nostalgia and loss, which is dissected in the paintings.
Andrew regards these latest works as predominantly conceptual, and the painting functions as a carrier for his ideas. Yet, on the other hand, these are skilled paintings, filled with delicate mixtures of texture, perspective, tonality and lush bits of color that jump out of the dark spaces. His concepts come alive because of his ability to infuse his work with subtle and conflicting moods and emotions.
Andrew Sendor, Based on a True Story
Caren Golden Fine Art, 539 West 23 Street, New York, NY 10011
April 9 – May 16, 2009
