Pablo Rasgado

Lost Line: Contemporary Art from the Collection

Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles (December 2012)

Unframed’s Jenny Miyasaki sat down with Franklin Sirmans, Terri and Michael Smooke Curator and Department Head of Contemporary Art, to discuss recent acquisitions made by the department and by the new acquisitions group, Contemporary Friends.

Among these recent acquisitions are paintings that test our perceptions of what exactly “painting” is and can be. Works by Theaster Gates, Sergej Jensen, Jennie C. Jones, and Pablo Rasgado all question the diversity of materials and the historical and symbolic power of different materials in the creation of the traditional framing device for making visual art—paintings. Gates employs found fire hose to make tapestries such as that in Civil Tapestry (Dirty Blue), 2012, referencing civil rights movements and textile paintings. Jensen sews together found fabrics to “paint without paint.” Jones’s long interest in American music, specifically the confluence of modernism and jazz, inspires her minimalist paintings made out of acoustic absorber and diffuser panels. Rasgado uses, or reuses, temporary walls removed from their original functionality and given new life with designs carved and cut by palette knives as the surface and support of his paintings.

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