Kathleen Henderson’s Urgent Graphics Capture Human Folly on Track 16 – ARTnews.com

Sketching an oil stick, Kathleen Henderson applies a medium to the paper with a degree of pressure that conveys more than just a chromatic focus. Her streak is thick, turbulent, driven by dread and biting, desperate humour. Henderson has been making her way through nearly 30 years of discontent with this country’s political corruption, military operations, environmental degradation, and social unrest, creating a devastating record of human folly and error. Recently shown at Track 16 in Los Angeles, her new work, nearly 40 sketches made during the charged pandemic year of 2021, features an evolving set of numbers rigidly defined in scenarios of compromise, collusion, or otherwise disclosure, and is among its most difficult and The most stable.

Henderson often refers to ancient myths or popular accounts to critique contemporary abuses of power; In a selection of drawings here, you arrive at the centuries-old French bluebird tale. The original character, a wealthy man with remarkably unattractive facial hair, marries and murders a series of women until the last wife discovers his horrific hideout of bodies and manages to escape. In Henderson’s hands, the bluebird is an all-poisonous, all-purpose, outrageous exploiter. in Candidacy for the school board, it puts clear, chaotic blue triangles on the faces of three running candidates, presents a public service advertisement of sorts by explicitly revealing their ill intentions, and perhaps the kind of regressive, book-banning agenda that is strategically absent from ultra-conservative campaign materials. in another piece, blowing bluebirdthe characters line up submissively to perform sexual favors on the dumb blue monster, who, like many inhabitants of the turbulent universe of Henderson, is presented as an erect, limbless bubble, little more than a penis endowing with mobility and potency.

Across her works, humans appear in traditional bodies, but often assume a set of amorphous forms: cartoonish ghosts, disguised torture victims, camouflaged dressed actors, and Klansmen’s descendants of Philip Guston. The highly insistent black and red Henderson’s streak, with yellow, green and pink stained hues, borders on creatures lacking thorns and ears as well, bodily features that embody conscience and empathy. Regardless of impersonal disguise, the bare true self appears through preparation, action, or expression. Usually, these cruel and dangerous spirits are caught inflicting some kind of damage (on others, the planet, democracy), claiming unearned power, or displaying great pride. Exploring dominance and the self-satisfaction you generate in it cage, Henderson depicts two men in what would serve as a commercial in captivity: one depicting a trap barely large enough and the other smiling in unconcealed delight. in pinky, a large mass of a man with an imposing weapon strapped to his chest in front of the mirror. And inside is annoying yellow lightHenderson bathes an inappropriately smiling person, tied with a rope to a chair, in a cone of glowing gold.

Actual monsters dot all of Henderson’s scenes, but only humans are brutally visible, and their cruelty is completely petty. In the realm of social commentary, Henderson landed somewhere between Aesop and an editorial. It oscillates between ancient sources and contemporary appearances, generalizing the punches and events of vanity and charming aspects of human nature. Among its closest citizens are Jose Guadalupe Posada and James Ensor.

Henderson’s work hinges on her fascination with how we see and present ourselves. She places figures in front of mirrors and squats over puddles and puddles, hungry to validate their reflection. It mocks, albeit grimly, how the human instinct that sustains and attests in an age of mass communication and pernicious individualism has turned into a compulsion to document and broadcast our every move. Cameras and microphones abound in these scenes. Almost every activity has become either a show or a press event. bubble He holds the phenomenon to its darkest extremes, depicting suicide in stages. the victim, a gun in the mouth; Camera operator and arm mic stand standing on a curved platform, blood-colored globe. That’s us, Henderson rages, producing and starring in some sort of block snuff movie, a thrilling real-time record of our own death.

Its shaggy, curvy line matches primitive forms in a group of flesh-colored wax tabletop sculptures (all 2022). Temporarily grafted and pressed together, the figures, less than a foot in height, have prominent noses, gaping mouths, buggy eyes, and akimbo arms. They seem to be escaping from a disturbing fairy tale. Although Henderson’s work is exaggerated and distorted, it reveals the way things work as a means of applying pressure to make them different. I once wrote via awkward drawing of a bird, “What if I could draw a bird / It could change the world? / In a good way it means / In a good way. / I know that’s not that bird. / And I know that.” Declaring her desire, and assuming its impossibility, she pressed her, making the work increasingly painfully important.