Cool Hunting

Mark Andreas: Reactive Sculpture Series
After exhibiting up and down the eastern seaboard, Brooklyn-based sculptor Mark Andreas has crossed the East River to make his Manhattan debut. Andreas' Reactive Sculpture Series includes the hulking 400-pound Seed Spreader (pictured), an intimidating machine equipped with three-foot spinning blades. It brilliantly expresses the fear associated with the industrialization of mass food production that, in the words of the artist, “conceptually speaks to...

Gordon Chandler
Sculpting industrial cast-offs into iconic Kimono shapes, there's a great basic tension in Gordon Chandler's work that comes from the tactile differences between his materials and subjects. The contrasts are the natural outcome of his Duchampian use of found materials. "I have a very practical bent," he says, "I use things of very little value and elevate them. I study the objects that we...

Ron Mueck: Brooklyn Museum
You might have already heard, but it's worth a reminder that time is running out to see Ron Mueck's solo exhibition of eleven extraordinary works at the Brooklyn Museum through 4 February 2007. Known for his empathetic renderings, the sculptures are startingly lifelike—so much so that it was easier to look at the sculptures that had their eyes closed, because only then could you...

Andrew Sutherland
Brooklyn-based artist Andrew Sutherland works as a composer of mundane materials and uneventful spaces. Using corrugated cardboard, vinyl and medium density fiberboard, he recalls iconographic minimalists Sol LeWitt and Tony Smith. Colorful, layered work in ethylene vinyl acetate like 2005’s ‘Scrap Bin,’ leans towards late-career Frank Stella, but the work itself has taken Paxil to relieve its anxiety. Instead of working large, he operates...

Scott Campbell
Brooklyn-based tattooist Scott Campbell has taken the art form to another level—not just by being one of the most sought-after tattoo artists in NY (if not the world) but for using a laser cutter to etch his intricate old-world designs into everything from laptops and books to leather chairs, tables and paintings. In this field trip to Scott's Brooklyn tattoo parlor and studio, he shows...

Joseph Conforti
Joseph Conforti is a master of repetition. A raku ceramicist based in New York City, he creates hypnotic wall sculptures comprised of individual panels, each of which contains hundreds of ceramic pieces. Raku, for those unversed in ceramic speak, is a traditional form of Japanese pottery dating back to the 16th Century. It involves low temperature kiln firing, followed by a combustible immersion that...