“We would do well to view these homes less as enclosures than as portals.” –Lucy Ives
In the April issue of frieze, Lucy Ives takes a close look at artists who made their homes into all-encompassing works of art; Steven Zultanski finds poetry in the perversity of cult video artist Steve Reinke; and Tan Lin remembers the Chinese candies that framed his childhood in Ohio, with original photography by Roe Ethridge.
Ecstatic Forms and Ways of Living
“These…interiors…are neither solely for aesthetic contemplation nor for autonomous living…[They] give place to ecstatic forms of daily life that cannot be reduced to work or leisure.” From Jean-Jacques Lequeu’s eccentric architectural designs and Marquis de Sade’s 120 Days of Sodom (1785) to John Boskovich’s fabled “Psycho Salon” and Niki de Saint Phalle’s Tarot Garden (1978–98), Lucy Ives examines how maximalist approaches to décor were used to challenge conventional ways of living.
Satanic Verses: Steve Reinke
“Irony is Steve Reinke’s favoured method of evading perspicuity, because it thrives on contradictions.” On the eve of Steve Reinke’s first institutional solo show, which opened at the mumok in Vienna, Steven Zultanski delves into the twisted psychology of the artist’s influential lo-fi films, which conjure the kind of uneasy comedy where you can’t tell if someone is joking or not.
Also featuring:
Robert Glück revisits the dream journals left by his late partner, the painter Ed Aulerich-Sugai, in a previously unpublished excerpt from his forthcoming memoir, About Ed; Juliet Jacques talks to McKenzie Wark, author of the forthcoming Reverse Cowgirl (Semiotexte, 2020), about new approaches to writing about trans identity; and artist and composer Tarek Atoui answers our questionnaire.
Columns & reviews:
Rosanna McLaughlin has lunch with Zoé Whitley, who was recently appointed director of London’s Chisenhale Gallery; pioneering performance artist Vaginal Davis speaks to Jessica Loudis about moving to Berlin, worshipping feet and romancing Jodie Foster over milk and cookies; Amy Sherlock visits Aaron Angell’s east London ceramic studio, where he is training young people to make garden pots; Dodie Bellamy pens her experiences of finding solace in the unreal world of YouTube make-up artist Jeffree Star; Anna Lena von Helldorff wanders Munich with author Heike Geissler; Pablo Larios visits the Guatemalan home of Vivian Suter and Elisabeth Wild; and Glenn Adamson pens a picture piece on the many and varied wares of the Pontiac arts and crafts store, Ceramics by Bob & Hazel.
Plus, 26 reviews from around the world, including Tschabalala Self at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, and Anna Bella Geiger at the Museu de Arte de São Paulo.
Subscribe now and explore the issue on frieze.com.