Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Jon Pylypchuk at Jack Hanley (SF)

Alert: This exhibition closes on 2/24/07.

Several creatures fashioned by Winnepeg artist Jon Pylypchuk are now hanging out at Jack Hanley Gallery in San Francisco. Once glance tells you they’ve had a bad history. Perhaps they started out as stuffed toys made by inept hands in a family strapped for cash. Then they grew up, fell into trouble, developed bad habits, and rattled around the crummy parts of town. They seem beat-up, uncouth, unsavory, unwashed—and funny.

In one tableau of abjection, a beer-drinking little guy (above) watches a beer-drinking big guy take a piss on the floor (below).

Pylypchuk also goes to extremes in his paintings, several of which are on view. They depict malformed little creatures collaged onto landscapes that look like toxic waste dumps. The title of each work comes from a creature’s comment, which you can read in the painting. One of them says “Alright send me the heater motherfucker.”

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