TED RIEDERER: HELLAS: Goff+Rosenthal

Back in America and thanks to my pal , artist Jayson Keeling I've found a great new American artist to process. Ted Riederer staged a show at the Goff+Rosenthal Gallery in Berlin earlier this year that sparked up a lot of buzz. Titled "Hellas" the show combined two installations. The first feautured a suit of body armor molded from vinyl punk rock records posed in opposition to a pile of skulls molded from records off the 1986 Billlboard Top 200 Chart. The second installation was projected video of Riederer's band "The Ressurectionists" smashing their instruments at a performance. That video was the background to a forground staging of a destroyed drum kit reconstructed in the confines of the gallery. I love the mix of pop colors, comic book antics, music culture and stability of execution on the part of the artist. Its easy to lump Riederer into that group of artists like Adam Helm, Kendell Geers and Banks Violette but I think the accessibility as well as the control of the ideas presented here makes him very unique and quite stand alone.

Work by Geers

Yvonne Lambert in Paris has a crackling solo show right this minute for self-described South African 'aesthetic terrorist" Kendell Geers. Since Geers have been showing in high profile venues since 1994, it stands to reason that his is an audacious body of work. He tackles the very pungent themes of fear, danger, sex and the desensitization to violence that say, the Team Gallery kids love to fondle. But TI loves the graphic authority that Geers brings to his idea of transgression. If anything of his floats your way at Miami Basel, its a must nab. Or you could wait until his solo show continues onto The Baltic Center For Contemporary Art in England (it closes at Lambert on Dec 8th) where the Baltic's book shop will boast Geers's new monograph "Irrespektiv",

Current Work By Geers: