James Welling and Bernd & Hilla Becher

★★★☆☆

On until 19 April 2025

Not taking the Becher’s name in vain was once the sole Düsseldorf school commandment. Welling trained elsewhere and, besides, his claim on typology is also a decades-long story. Yet this two-venue paring of the three photographers’ deadpan architectural meditations is a dead giveaway of Welling as a mere imitator.

Perhaps. The Bechers recorded industrial phenomena with such restraint that their lens critique was evident in even a single snapshot. Welling’s veneration of brutalist concrete – his lens turns to Washington’s infamous HUD building now outlawed under Trump’s classical architecture edict – borders on a fetish by contrast. But if one no longer needs to look at Bernd and Hilla’s grain silos, Welling’s quasi-opportunistic fixation leads to fresher discoveries.


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

Michaël Borremans, The Monkey at David Zwirner ★★★★★

Michaël Borremans

The Monkey

The Monkey

★★★★★

Borremans toys with his subjects, his audience, and with art history.

Matthew Barney, SECONDARY at Sadie Coles HQ ★★★☆☆

Matthew Barney

SECONDARY: light lens parallax

SECONDARY: light lens parallax

★★★☆☆

Secondary turns the gallery into an American Football stadium. But all the seats in the house are the cheap seats and the game lacks a cheerleader.

Jordan Derrien, Painted on a Wall of the Inn at Marlotte at Des Bains ★★☆☆☆

Jordan Derrien

Painted on a Wall of the Inn at Marlotte

Painted on a Wall of the Inn at Marlotte

★★☆☆☆

Derrien has his audience discussing the nature of paint drying out loud.

Stuart Middleton, The Human Model at Carlos/Ishikawa ★★☆☆☆

Stuart Middleton

The Human Model

The Human Model

★★☆☆☆

An interest in material is core to this practice but Middleton mistrusts his instincts.

Christopher Wool at Gagosian ★★★☆☆

Christopher Wool

★★★☆☆

No room for the eye, no way to follow the line.

Machine Painting at Modern Art ★★★★☆

Machine Painting

Machine Painting

★★★★☆

Ask DALL-E to paint an abstraction and it’ll confidently produce a museum-worthy clone

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