Jonathan Griffin

Criticism and essays on art and culture

Month: October, 2020

October 29, 2020

Mark Bradford

Mark Bradford, Q1, 2020 © Mark Bradford. Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth Photo: Joshua White / JWPictures

“I’m adjusting to life on Mars,” says the artist Mark Bradford, as he folds his frame into a chair positioned a prudent nine feet from my own, and unpeels his mask from behind his ears. Yes, he says, his glasses fog up, too.

Since mid-March, when California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, issued a statewide “stay at home” order, Mr. Bradford has kept a low profile. Throughout the nationwide unrest that flared after the killing of George Floyd, he remained silent. While Mr. Bradford, 58, is one of the more visible figures in the arts community in Los Angeles, he is not on social media. But with three new paintings on the wall in front of us, he’s finally ready to talk.

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October 28, 2020

We Called Her General Girouard

Video still, Food, 1972, Gordon Matta-Clark, © Estate of Gordon Matta-Clark / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

An ad, printed in the Spring 1972 issue of Avalanche magazine, trumpeted in boldface type ‘FOOD’S FISCAL FAMILY FACTS’. Most of the readers of Avalanche would, it was assumed, be at least part way familiar with FOOD, the restaurant opened in SoHo by artists Gordon Matta-Clark, Carol Goodden, Tina Girouard, Suzanne Harris, and Rachel Lew a few months earlier. It was already a fabulous success, and the Downtown art scene was tight knit in those days and more or less identical to Avalanche’s readership. Also, FOOD was the only decent restaurant in the neighborhood. 

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October 15, 2020

The Breakfast Club

The multigenerational artists’ salon hosted by Derek Boshier inside a fast food restaurant
Photograph: Steven Simko

The invitation, when it comes, is invariably by email and typically consists of the entirety of the note crammed into the subject line, plus a random image.

“Can you make Ricks tomorrow Thursday at 8.30 am…….derek,” read a recent message accompanied by a photograph of a headshot of Julie Andrews adjacent to a paper Union Jack. “Sent from my iPad.”

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