Parkett No. 79 Jon Kessler, Marilyn Minter and Albert Oehlen

by Glenn O'Brien, Jon Kessler (Artist), Marilyn Minter (Artist)

Volume 79 of the influential international art journal Parkett features Jon Kessler, Marilyn Minter and Albert Oehlen. In the tinkered gadgetry of Kessler's retro sci-fi installations, we peek through surveillance cameras to see our own image among his analog programs crammed with detritus of all kinds. Kessler's vista of (d)evolved cyberstuff is in a manic state of accumulation, as this data-diving artist masters the ecology of pure information. Within Marilyn Minter's fetishistic, flawless pictures, we find a painter obsessed with the clear articulation of magnified sweat beads and pore-smeared glitter. In each successive lip-smacking painting, Minter sets out to perfect beauty's disguise, affirming both her pleasure in fashion imagery, and an appreciation of its vulgar mishaps--say, a drag queen's eyelashes clumped together with too much mascara. According to essayist John Kelsey, Albert Oehlen's collage-paintings "seem almost bored of their own shock-value." And yet this artist, one of the most significant German painters of the past 20 years, can make boredom look like a rigorous, if not delirious experiment. Also Spencer Finch, Gelitin and Mark Wallinger, as well as essayists Paul Bonaventura, Mark Godfrey, Glenn O'Brien, Katy Siegel, Andrea Scott and Pamela Lee, to name a few.

300 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 2007

About the author

Glenn O'Brien was an American writer who focused largely on the subjects of art, music and fashion. He was featured for many years as "The Style Guy" in GQ magazine, and published a book with that title.

Reviews

[Owen M]

If your interested in Albert Oehlen, their are a number of good plates of his work.