It's crazy how often I hear people say they miss New York in the 1970s and wish they lived here back then. I'm one of the lucky ones, but let me tell you, navigating the filthy cesspool of crime, corruption, and debauchery wasn't always fun. Still, the threat of daily danger created its own buzz and fascination. Add to this cheap rents, a glut of nightclubs and dive bars, and a population of young artists moving to downtown Manhattan, and you have the basic ingredients for a crackling cauldron of underground activity. It's all set. With little planning or intervention, artists of all kinds crept into vacant lots, abandoned buildings, creaky lofts and decaying piers to stage exhibitions and live performances that became legendary for their ephemerality. It was exciting until money came along and solved the problem.
Now Christopher Wool has awakened some of his old DIY spirit. See “Stopping Execution”.a survey of a recent body of work that he and Belgian independent curator Anne Ponteny have legally installed in a magnificent unreconstructed space on the 19th floor of an office building in the financial district.
nothing for sale
Here, in the commercial capital of the world, a decidedly non-commercial exhibition of around 75 paintings, photographs, drawings, prints, posters and books will be held. This exhibition receives no support from galleries, organizations, foundations, or collectors. Also, there is nothing available for purchase. All belong to wool. It's not that he has a sudden urge to indulge in institutional criticism, but rather how the surrounding context influences the artwork he usually displays in his sanitized white-cube galleries and museums. I just wanted to know. As he says, “The modernist ideal in art is to exclude context.” (This project has its own website It is free and open to the public until July 31st. )
Ironically, the show was made possible by a lack of commercial real estate tenants following the coronavirus lockdown, a situation that mirrors the open-air urban environment of the 70s. Wool's intervention further resonated by evoking a time when few people lived in the World Trade Center's new twin towers and the only people living nearby were artists.
It took Wool and Ponteny two years to guide them through the U-shaped 19,000-square-foot space. “The idea was to leave it a little rough,” Ponteny says. He has collaborated with Wool on various projects over the decades, starting with Wool's first photographic exhibition. The 2022 show at Xavier Hufkens in Brussels was the impetus. See “Stopping Execution”.. “This allows for something more intimate than a gallery or institution,” she says. “We weren't thinking about any consequences. We just said, 'Just give it a try.'”
Both artists and curators hope that people will come to see the exhibition and relax with a cup of coffee at a table or sofa. I'm sure they will. His 19th floor of this half-vacant building offers stunning city and river views on all sides. It's also in such disrepair that it suggests archaeological excavations have taken place, and each step past the remains of the mosaic tile floor reveals its former life.
The monumental mosaic of paintings that Wool created for his home in Marfa, Texas, is just one attention-grabbing element of a consistently astonishing visual story. See “Stopping Execution”.. The title is a play on one of his classic type paintings of Wool from the 80s. None of them are here. The origin of his explosive mosaics is crosstown transportation, an even larger one commissioned for the new Hudson Yards office building. Other works on display have emerged from the artist's studios in New York and Marfa over the past five years.
It all starts with materials Wool finds in the Marfa desert or upcycles from previous work, borrowing patterns he silkscreens onto enamel and adding layers he employs throughout his career. This is the strategy I've been using. Suspended from the ceiling throughout the space are seemingly delicate, moving sculptures made of intertwined barbed wire. The sculpture on the pedestal was cast from copper tube. A photo series of rhythmic installations shows individual wire sculptures and the desert landscape that inspired the wool. Paper works are displayed on the pillars and corners. This is the practice of an artist's vision, free from all constraints. The effect liberates the viewer from the bland, ultra-expensive and closely monitored Ikea aesthetic that currently dominates the city.
Repurposing dilapidated buildings with art is not uncommon, but these efforts are largely sponsored by self-branding commercial organizations and organizations. It's pretty rare to find an artist who carries all the weight without anyone interceding, and it's exciting whether you've tasted the do-or-die forbidden fruit of the 1970s or not.
• Christopher Wool: See Stop Run. 101 Greenwich Street, 19th Floor, March 14th – July 31st