It’s a jungle is the name of the the installation dominating Henry Taylor‘s show at Blum & Poe. It is a jungle, but it’s also a graveyard and a playground, a densely layered labyrinth of refuse and memories cobbled together in the most pleasing manner. Bleak black bottles of bleach, mops and spears envelop artifacts from cherished memories of African-American culture. The spectre of racism looms near, establishing a mood as melancholy as it is magnetic– but Taylor refrains from placing obvious value judgements on his juxtapositions and references, instead opting to create an emotional data set from which viewers may extract what they choose.

Huge, gorgeous paintings fill the rest of the gallery with family and friends, heroes and archetypes rendered in vivid colors and passionate brush strokes. Taylor hails from downtown L.A. and he seems to takes pleasure in capturing the beating heart of his community. For instance, from an interview with Artinfo:

The stunned-looking woman seated in a chair in a 2010 canvas, for example, is a crack addict Taylor met on the street and paid to pose late one night. Asked whether he worries about letting strangers into his loft, which also functions as his studio, Taylor, 52, shrugs. “I wanted to work. You gotta get what you gotta get. So far so good. One girl stole my CD player.”

A feeling of intense intimacy creeps up on you in the midst of Taylor’s work. Little by little, he pulls you into his world and you’ll find yourself reluctant to leave. Check out some photos I took at the gallery after the jump, and head on over to Culver City to see it in person before the show closes this Saturday!

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On a recent trip to Chinatown, some invisible force drew me into the POVevolving gallery, where I was confronted by an 18′-long foam skeleton. The piece, Dead Man, dominates the space, floating just a few inches above the floor. It reminds me of those wooden mannequins that pervade art classes across the globe, except huge and suspended in an indefinitely cadaverous pose. Dead Man is the centerpiece of New York artist Clark Goolsby‘s show STRANGE/LOVE, comprised of paintings and sculptures rendered in pleasing shapes and a fluorescent color palette that I’ll never not adore. Pictures after the jump.

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If I ever tumble down a rabbit hole into some abstract alternate reality, I hope it looks something like the world of Jack Felgate‘s paintings. It’s warmly whimsical here, but not simply saccharine– the threat of danger keeps things exciting. A cryptic lexicon of mystical pastel signifiers float freely within a cavernous featureless realm that seems to imply limitless possibility. Rumbling with a foreboding monochromatic undertone of dread, Felgate’s inviting surfaces threaten to give way at any moment to the inherent darkness of infinity. Adventure awaits!

via Ryan De La Hoz.

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There’s an atomic afterglow emanating from the paintings of Iva Gueorguieva. They brim with so much kinetic energy, I’d totally understand if you felt a little intimidated by their labyrinthine compositions. But that’s a good thing: Gueorguieva’s work is like a challenge– a taunt inciting you to dig deep below the layers of her shapes and forms. Like an epic mural, your eyes can land almost anywhere on the canvas and find something interesting. Read them backwards and forwards, left and right, and you’ll only uncover more mysterious sub-plots of intense emotion swimming amidst an overarching abstract narrative.

The latest issue of New American Paintings includes a fantastic feature on Iva, penned by the awesome Evan J. Garza. The magazine wanted to delve deeper into Iva’s work and examine her process in action, so we teamed up to make the video above. Iva was gracious enough to allow me into her L.A. studio, where she shared the importance of sound, time and space in her work. Examining those enormous paintings and collages up close, I felt like I might fall in.

Edition #91 of New American Paintings (with a cover by Erik Mark Sandberg) is on newsstands now! Check out more images of Iva Gueorguieva’s work after the jump.

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Hey, wanna decide which of 12 rad painters goes home with a $500 BLICK gift certificate and $1,000 in cold hard cash? Of course you do. When’s the next time you’ll have that kind of power at the click of a finger?

In the nearly two decade history of New American Paintings, a tightly controlled panel of expert jurors have determined the fate of thousands of artists in the pages of their magazines. Winning these competitions has catapulted the careers of many now-adored artists into the national spotlight. Now, for the first time, NAP is inviting all of us to join the jury and vote for our favorite of 12 artists featured in NAP this year. Head on over to the Reader’s Choice Poll and cast your ballot!

Unless you’re having a seizure right now, you’re looking at a GIF of a sculpture by Matt Furie. Furie’s first sculpture since art school was heralded by a barrage of flashing lights at Show Cave’s Corn on the Macabre III. The Halloween show also featured the talents of fellow Future Colors of America collaborators Aiyana Udesen and Albert Reyes, spooky new works by Leslie Winchester and Ariana Papademetropoulos, and a projector plugged into Furie’s Return of the Quack. Pictures below!

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Have you ever gotten really sick to the point where you just feel like one giant lump of malfunctioning flesh and fluids? I’ll bet Corey Corcoran has. His aesthetic awareness of guts and all of those mysterious little things that make your body work leads you to wonder if he was raised by the descendents of Henry Gray or perhaps a pair of radiologists who always brought their work home. He knows how to turn vital organs into a new kind of face. We can read desires in them, we can wonder how their day went.

It feels appropriate that the majority of Corcoran’s cross-sectioned corporeal forms are in distress in some way. Leaking into a pool, sprawled across the ground, holding their heads in their hands: we see these bodies’ innards spilling into the open as a sign that all is not right in the world. It makes sense though. Organs, like a lot of technologies, almost seem to work towards their own effacement. If they’re operating smoothly you never even have to think about them, you just do what you need to do. It’s only when something in the system fucks up that you’re suddenly reminded: oh yeah, life isn’t just a thing that happens of its own accord, it’s the effect of an extremely long and complicated process of reproduction, generation, renewal, waste, and decay.

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Neck Face devised a hellish haunted house at OHWOW gallery last night to kick off his solo show, Into Darkness. Watch the madness unfold below, and then check out some classic gory imagery and dorky jokes from everyone’s favorite demonic rapscallion.

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Ed. Note: I’m pleased as peaches to present the following feature on artist Jason Villegas and his magnificent multi-dimensional artwork. Below you’ll find an insightful interview by Dan Rosplock, alongside exclusive portraits shot by Landon Metz. Don’t miss our unprecedented giveaway of Jason’s original art piece!! – Graham

Like energy and matter, meaning cannot be destroyed, only redistributed. The symbols in Jason Villegas’s artworks are the children of complacent capitalist icons born into an unpredictable environment. As such, they retain something of the glamorous impact of their forebears, yet their uncertain future has forced them to become more versatile. These are cyborgs, war machines, strange hybrids and channelers of mystical energy suited for survival in any scenario. Villegas is one of those rare creative personalities who seems to be able to reform any cultural construct or market force no matter how concrete or abstract into something more resilient, useful, and, above all, beautiful. He recently took some time to talk to us about such diverse topics as globalism, mainstream Bear aesthetics, and how he came to be a master seamster.

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From the mind of Michael Dotson, more excellent cyberdelic paintings– many of which are currently on exhibit at the Nudashank gallery in Baltimore for Dotson’s solo show, Curves. It’s uncanny how jarringly futuristic and nostalgically computerized these paintings look, in spite of the conventional tape-and-paint process behind them. After the jump, watch Dotson’s helpful Kraftwerk-scored time lapse video explaining how these splendiferous geometric landscapes come to fruition.

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