Botond Keresztesi

NPC (No-one Paints Chrysopoeia)

★★★☆☆

On until 26 October 2024

Keresztesi’s ornate paintings are taxing on the imagination. In one, mechanical horses meet crying cyborgs. In another, emotional factory robots wistfully look over a horizon on fire. That could be enough but there is no “too much” in this fantasy meme game. Next, gilded clowns laugh at the weather. Crystal castles crumble in the wind. Oh, and the gallery’s walls are turned into clouds.

Ironic Art Nouveau is Seventeen’s premium brand of opulence. Keresztesi doesn’t hold back when mixing it with early Deviantart forum sci-fi and traces of late Surrealism for good measure. He speaks of alchemy as he does so, albeit more obliquely than the gallery would have him. It is not easy to discern from the canvases alone whether this practice is borne of biological dystopia or a blind breed of techno-optimism. There is not quite enough paint on their surface to split this final difference.


notes and notices are short and curt exhibition reviews. Read more:

Stephen Willats, Time Tumbler at Victoria Miro

Stephen Willats

Time Tumbler

★★★★☆

Willats orders fragments of time, matter, and space into data packets on one side of the flow chart and puts them to use on the other.

Aziza Kadyri, the Uzbekistan pavilion in Venice ★★★★☆

Aziza Kadyri

Don't Miss the Cue

★★★★☆

This dissonance might be intentional. If it isn’t, so much for the better.

Trevor Yeung, Soft Ground, at Gasworks ★★☆☆☆

Trevor Yeung

Soft Ground

★★☆☆☆

It’s stressful enough to fuck in the forest for fear of passers-by or the police; imagine having to also look out for curators.

Kevin Brisco Jr, But I Hear There Are New Suns at Union Pacific ★★☆☆☆

Kevin Brisco Jr

But I Hear There Are New Suns

★★☆☆☆

I didn’t get to see this show. Perhaps for the best.

TJ Wilcox, Hiding in Plain Sight at Sadie Coles HQ ★★☆☆☆

TJ Wilcox

Hiding in Plain Sight

★★☆☆☆

Vanity proceeds in circles.

Thibault Aedy, Dilara Koz at Filet ★★★☆☆

Thibault Aedy, Dilara Koz

Caressed and Polished and Drained and Washed

★★★☆☆

These ideas can’t last beyond the pop-up show’s closing date.

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