Swoon

by Swoon (artist)

When the 27-year-old Brooklyn street artist Swoon had her first one-person gallery exhibition at New York's Deitch Projects in 2005, the area surrounding the gallery was so overrun with fans and friends that neither cars nor pedestrians could pass through. Reviews in all of the major New York papers, and even national news sources like Newsday , raved--crediting her intricate paper cut-outs and hand-pulled block prints of realistically-rendered street people (often friends and family doing ordinary things) with depicting no less than "the poetry of urban life." Her figures, according to Newsday , are rendered with "breathtaking precision [and] radiate humanity and compassion." Most people know of Swoon through her wheat-pasted cut-outs, which have appeared throughout New York for the better part of the last decade. Usually seen in a state of decay, they are powerful time-based public artworks that only get more potent as they age. For the past two years, Swoon has been traveling the world, creating exhibitions and workshops. Published to accompany the artist's highly anticipated fall 2008 exhibition at Deitch's Long Island City project space, this first monograph documents exhibitions from 2005 to 2007, as well as collaborations created in Russia, Ukraine and throughout the United States.

Genres: Art, Nonfiction

64 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2008

Reviews

[Kora Kaos · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't even remember, how I stumbled over Swoon, might have been a graffiti in Berlin or Instagram, probably both.. But I'm so glad, I did! And I'm glad I found this book, it kind of enhances the picture I have, it's intriguing to read about the art installations and the boat flotillas.. Such a magical world!

[Jennifer Bacall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Swoon proudly lives life in her own fashion as the leader of a hippie counterculture which includes Freak Folk Music (Coco Rosie, Devandra Banhart, Dark Dark Dark), Black Label Bicycle Club (a fearless and tattooed group from Minnesota known for two-tiered bikes), Freeganism (vegan eaters who eat what they can found that has been discarded in dumpsters or on the street), and an American carnival tradition. But ultimately, Swoon is an artist. She marries her beliefs with the way that she lives. She does most projects in collaboration with dozens of other people. She feels that there is nothing more important than communities working together for a common goal and she utilizes all members for their unique skills.

She is very connected to stories and dreams. The name Swoon came from a dream that a boyfriend of artist Caledonia Curry had. He dreamt that she was successful sharing her work on the streets and she called herself "Swoon". Dreams are one of her main influences on her work and she values them and views them as being as valid as her waking thoughts. "Form follows fiction" is one of her mottos and she confronts the reality of life by juxtaposing fantasy with reality while finding wonder in the overlapping chaos of crowded city spaces and mixed cultures.

The three types of work that figure predominately in this book are her wheat-pasted elaborately cut street art posters, her gallery installations and her strange floating wonderlands. She began on the street, gradually accepted that exhibits were her next natural step and finally fulfilled her ultimate dream projects of creating floating villages.

This book is a gorgeous Abrams publication with high quality picture reproductions printed on matte high bond paper stimulating the sense of feel. It blends anecdotal remembrances from friends, gallery owners and others inspired by or engaged in Swoon's work. It covers Swoons work from 2002 through 2009 so it does not cover her more recent work in New Orleans (on the street or her stunning installation Thalassa at the New Orleans Museum of Art), but it is a thorough and fascinating introduction to a woman that is changing art in America and will be considered a living legend.

[Grady · Rating 4 out of 5]

Making Permanent the Impermanent Art of SWOON

SWOON is the nom de plume of Caledonia "Callie" Dance Curry, a out in the open 'street artist' from New York City who has made her mark on the art world by creating life-size wheatpaste prints and paper cutouts of family and friends going about the very ordinary aspect of daily life, superimposed on her own bizarre yet realistic renderings of bridges, fire escapes, sidewalks. Her works are not created to last: they weather rain and snow and wind and graffiti and the changes that these elements create sometimes enhance the original work. She has created altars, decorated ships, public theater - her influence is ubiquitous in New York and in gallery and building settings and in Berlin and other parts of the world, much to the favor she finds in the hands of Jeffrey Deitch.

This monograph is generous in the number of images created by Swoon and given the fact that her art is by nature temporary, the book saves much of her work for posterity. There are essays accompanying the works - describing her Swimming Cities and Toyshop projects - and while these essays are not always particularly well written they do add flavor that enhances the imagery. The curator of this book is MOCA director Jeffrey Deitch, an important art figure who is currently facing the cloud of censorship for his act of covering a mural placed outside the Los Angeles MOCA facility. This controversy makes reading about Swoon and Deitch's promotion of her while in Deitch Projects in Brooklyn all the more timely!

Grady Harp

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is basically a catalogue raisonné of Swoon's work, including her awesome Swimming Cities projects, and the Black Floor show from a few years ago (some of my friends are in the pictures! Weeeee!). My only complaint is that there are very few photos of her wheatpastes that take into account the entire landscape...the rest of the building, for example. I think her work should be seen up close, but also as it relates to the scenery as a whole.