Press Release
Images
Press

The Landing is pleased to present On a New Coast, the first Los Angeles solo show by New York-based artist Brenda Goodman. On a New Coast is comprised primarily of abstract paintings on wood with incised surfaces. Goodman begins each painting by using a linoleum cutter and a tremel drill to groove its surface with irregular, freeform lines, which create geometric sections, which are then painted. Some sections are built up with thick oil paint; in others, paint is applied in a thin wash. In some areas, pastels or muted grays form a calm ground; in others, prismatic color erupts in patchwork sections of palpable vibrancy. In some places, paint is applied in regular, straight strokes; elsewhere, it curls up in energetic loops or swirls, or appears in grids. It’s the interplay between different areas of color, texture and tone in these works that builds paintings that feel compelling, energized and dynamic, and that, though abstract, have a palpable emotional presence. The variety of techniques used to build these works results in a viewing process that is activated and invigorated: the eye is always moving, always alert, and always engaged.

Throughout this body of paintings, sections of charged, bright color and sections of subdued color are presented in tandem. In “The Sun Does Shine,” for example, the majority of the picture plane is painted in muted colors: gray, black, brown, tan and slate. The rectangular shapes on the right side of the painting feel reminiscent of downtown buildings, while the brown-tinged gray ground that hovers at the top speaks of the dinginess of city air. But on the left, out of a stone-like protrusion, a section of vibrant, prismatic color emerges upwards, with its shock of levity. Sunshine, it seems, is always possible; even amidst the heaviness of an urban palette, this flush of vibrant life is able to step forth. It’s the cohabitation of the two tones in one work that builds the painting’s feeling of active narrative.

In the painting “Double Talk,” again, contrast of tones builds dynamism and emotion. One central form spreads across both halves of the painting, which is made up of two separate panels. The right panel is primarily colored in gray, white, black and tan, a subdued palette—but as the central form spreads into the left panel, it blossoms into geometric sections of vibrant color. The prismatic area on the left panel seems in constant conversation with the subdued world on the right—and this presentation of two versions of things—in a way, two outlooks—is what builds the work’s dynamic, compelling energy.

The active texture in these works always brings the viewer’s attention back to the painting’s surfaces, where grooves stretch across the picture plane that feel reminiscent of the natural fissures that spread across lake beds. The organic shape of each line and the irregular depth of each groove remind the viewer constantly that a human hand built each work, with intricate, careful attention. The lingering presence of this human hand adds emotional immediacy and a sense that the artist has made herself available and apparent in these works: vulnerable, though not overtly depicted. And yet: always felt.

Goodman was born in Michigan; in the 1960s, she was a member of the Cass Corridor Movement in Detroit. In a recent review of Goodman’s work for Hyperallergic, art critic John Yao wrote, “Between 1994 and 2011, Goodman painted a series of self-portraits that constitute one of the most powerful and disturbing achievements of portraiture in modern art.” Several of these figurative portraits—each with a deep interest in the body, in the experience of inhabiting flesh itself—will be on view as part of On a New Coast. In her figurative self-portraits, many of which are nudes, the artist’s vulnerability, honesty and felt presence are central to each work. In Goodman’s recent geometric abstracts, human presence and emotional availability are felt—and communicated—through technique rather than depiction.

These abstracts are not preplanned. Says Goodman, “It becomes a totally intuitive journey where one shape of color informs another shape and another shape until it all comes together in a cohesive painting. I don’t always know what they are about or what they mean, but what I do know is that they feel RIGHT. They are not done until they feel absolutely right to me. When that happens, they have what is most necessary–heart, humanness, and a nonspecific narrative in which the viewer can find their own meaning.”

These new abstract works on wood—most of which were painted in 2019—will be on view in the Landing’s large central gallery. Simultaneously, a handful of older works by Goodman will be on view in two smaller rooms—including a sculpture from 1976, two mixed media constructions from 1978, two paintings from 1987 and a painting from 1989, and several self portraits—which will lend a kind of retrospective depth to the show.

The presence of these early works will help to make clear the great breadth of Goodman’s techniques and practices.

While Goodman moves fluidly between figuration and abstraction, between heavier and lighter tones, there are constants throughout this body of work, like an emphasis on texture, vulnerability and emotional charge. Always there is the apparent mark of the artist’s own hand: organic, careful and rigorous. Whether figurative or abstract, these are works of great humanity: works in which the human is always apparent, always available, and always compelling.

Brenda Goodman was born in Detroit, Michigan in 1943. She attended the College of Creative Studies, where she earned her BFA; the college also awarded her an honorary Doctorate of Arts in 2017. She is a new member of the National Academy of Design.

After moving to New York City in 1976, Goodman’s work was included in the 1979 Whitney Biennial. Since the 1970s, she’s had forty solo exhibitions. In 2015, a fifty-year retrospective of Goodman’s work was presented at the Center for Creative Studies and at Paul Kotula Projects. That same year, her work was included in the American Academy for the Arts and Letters annual invitational, where she received the Award in Art.

Goodman’s work is included in the public collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; the Santa Barbara Museum of Art; the Detroit Institute of Arts; and the Agnes Gund Collection. She has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York Foundation for the Arts.

Goodman’s work has been included in over two hundred group shows in galleries and museums throughout the United States, including shows at Edward Thorp Gallery, Nielsen Gallery, Jeff Bailey Gallery, and David&Schweitzer Contemporary. Her work has been reviewed in New York Times, Art in America, The New Yorker, the Los Angeles Times, Huffington Post, the Brooklyn Rail and Hyperallergic, among many other publications.