Alex Kanevsky
Everything Twice
Alex Kanevsky
November 21–December 28, 2024
Essay by John Yau
plate 1.
Umbria, 2024
Oil on wood, 24 × 24 in. (61 × 61 cm)
Foreword
One anticipates being beguiled and captivated when seeing a new body of work by Alex Kanevsky. Idiosyncratic imagery from an active, atomized mind creates a kind of fugue state for the viewer in which the norm is suspended, requiring deep and focused concentration as time stretches and a new visual reality takes over within the composition. Alex’s integration of ruptured abstraction with recognizable imagery are brought to perfect order under his hand. What could be a painterly sense of anarchical execution is instead transformed to a kaleidoscopic lushness of pronounced brush strokes and entrancing palette. There is a confidence on the part of the artist as he controls form and color. Alex’s adroitness as an artist is unquestioned and it is always fascinating to see the subtle evolution that occurs with new paintings from his studio.
A fascinating thematic subject which is explored is a few of the paintings centers around the battle of Shahbarghan in the Mughal region of India. Inspired by a seventeenth-century ink and watercolor painting on a gold background in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This single record of a civil war confrontation shows the defeat of Nasr Muhammad by Mughal commanders. Wonderfully stylized, the work captures both the opposing armies on horseback in beautiful splendor facing each other at the moment of attack when each side is uncertain of the outcome and an ethereal, mountainous background behind. Also represented in the exhibition are examples of Alex’s intriguing nudes, lavish interiors, haystacks in the snow, and the portrait of rebel French poet, Arthur Rimbaud standing in the exotic landscape of Ethopia. Thus Alex’s inspirations are far-reaching, combining historic references and prosaic images from his surroundings.
A penetrating, meaningful essay accompanies the exhibition. Our sincere thanks are offered to John Yau for this contribution. We are honored and pleased by his involvement in the project. There is a plethora of relevant labels that can be assembled to describe the alchemy that Alex Kanevsky achieves in his paintings: provocative, skillful, challenging, nimble, eye-catching, alluring, seductive, distinctive, hypnotic, accomplished—to name a few. The intricate musings of his creative mind and the visions that capture his intellectual interest continue to make for an extremely satisfying experience for any viewer.
Hollis C. Taggart
Debra V. Pesci
Everything Twice
John Yau
Alex Kanevsky is a figurative painter who belongs to no school, follows no tendency, and has neither a signature style nor a recurring topic. Other than working on rectangular supports, his resistance to being pigeon-holed offers us a way to reflect upon his treatment of traditional subjects, such as the model, landscape, and still life. By rejecting familiar stylistic devices, such as surrealist dreamscapes, expressionist distortions, and impressionist views, Kanevsky has developed a unique approach to figuration. The result of this approach is a diverse group of paintings, which have been known to baffle even his most loyal viewers. The most common way these viewers have responded to their bafflement is by concocting narratives about the meaning of Kanevsky’s paintings, and the motivations behind them. This has led to many misunderstandings which I will attempt to clear up in this essay.
All Possessions Twice (2024, pl. 2) depicts a prison cell bunk bed—two shelves extending from a wall. On both of the spare, neatly made-up bunks, we see all of the anonymous prisoners’ worldly possessions carefully arranged for inspection. Almost as if we are prison guards, we begin visually sorting through each person’s things, mentally noting what they have, and how each set of items is different. What we make of the fact that a similarly colored carton of toothpaste is found in each collection depends on who we are. Context is all.
Formally, the two shelves, one stacked above the other, function as planes on which we see a still life. The pairing seems to have little to do with traditional still life, or with well-known modernist views of tabletops by Paul Cézanne, Pierre Bonnard, or Henri Matisse, none of whom depicted still lifes within the confines of a prison cell. Kanevsky’s unconventional choice should clue us into the subversive nature of his choices. By picking prisoners’ things as his focus, we lead to ask: is the artist commenting on the history of still life painting?
Once we begin focusing on the banal objects neatly arranged on each bunk bed, we will likely notice that there is a pillow on the top bunk but none on the bottom, and that the surface of one bunk is blue while the other is green. By now, we have accepted Kanevsky’s invitation to look deeper into the painting, to begin to closely examine similarities and differences, and to pay heightened attention to the distinguishing features of banal things, such as the color and size of each individual’s slippers. As we go further to the painting, we might start to ask ourselves, what are we looking for, and where will this looking take us
If “God is in the details,” as the architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was known to have said, what might we get from itemizing the things neatly arranged in All Possessions Twice? One anomaly that stands out is the reproduction on the wall above the lower bunk. It shows a woman in a
plate 2. All Possessions Twice, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
white gown, set against a black ground. Her head and lower body have been cropped. Turning away from us, and posed in three-quarter profile, we see her bare right arm extending from the top of the reproduction to the bottom edge. The image feels both extraneous and necessary to the painting, which infuses it with an irresolvable tension, a visual provocation.
What is the relationship of this faceless, anonymous figure to the two absent prisoners and their possessions? Doesn’t her presence in the painting open it up to speculation about the role she plays? Is she a surrogate for the viewer or for the absent prisoners? What does it mean that she is facing away from the painting and looking into the darkness surrounding her? While these questions help us to look more closely, the answer eludes us. Might not that elusiveness be an ethical one? Might not Kanevsky be probing the limits of seeing rather than settling for what he sees?
One of the hardest things for a figurative painter to depict without resorting to familiar tropes is a scene where nothing significant is going on. In three identically-sized paintings from 2024, all of which are given the same title, Hay Bale with Snow, and consecutively numbered (pls. 3, 12, 13), Kanevsky pivots away from a prison cell to focus on a rotted hay bale lying in a snow-covered field. Thematically speaking, this view shares little with Kanevsky’s still life. The difference between them conveys something of the artist’s astonishing ability to find fresh subjects within well-known genres. Kanevsky understands, as the poet Robert Kelly wrote, “Style is death.” With this understanding, he defines a territory, where seeing the world as specific instances, no two alike, is paramount. Even when he returns to a subject, each view is different, as exemplified by his three distinct views of the rotted hay bale.
As with the prison bunk bed, Kanevsky has found a subject that challenges our assumptions. He doesn’t regard the hay bale as part of a thematic group, as did Claude Monet. Again, we are tempted to construct a narrative, one in which we see the rotted hay bale as a commentary, perhaps on waste and excess. From there, we can connect the hay bale paintings to what the artist focuses on in All Possessions Twice, which on a simple level is incarceration. There is something satisfying about connecting the paintings this way, particularly in light of climate change and the misuse of the prison system. While I grant this socially relevant, over-arching narrative is more than plausible, I don’t think it contains Kanevsky’s work. Instead, I think the work’s inability to contain something so direct and transparent is its real strength.
Kanevsky, who doesn’t believe in either narrative or parody, has little interest in aligning himself with topical correctness or being entertaining or amusing. Although his paintings belong
plate 3. Hay Bale with Snow 3, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
to the genres of still life and landscape, they are not stylistically connected, and the inseparable conditions they make plain is that of isolation and time passing. A prisoner’s daily life is regimented during the time he is isolated from society. The rotted hay bale is left in the field, imprisoned in its uselessness. Of no value, it is isolated from the world because its time of usefulness has passed.
This perception of Kanevsky’s paintings has little to do with social relevance, unless we buy into the idea it is important to be productive and useful at all times. Just as we might think we have found a key to Kanevsky’s paintings, his Las Meninas (2024, pl. 4) refutes this view. Kanevsky depicts white chickens strutting around a hen house with a brown rooster located near the painting’s upper center, presiding over the flock. The floor has been sectioned with low partitions that can easily be stepped over. Though the reason for this is unknown, it does suggest the chickens are separated from each other, perhaps by their own volition.
However, in contradiction to the prison cell, the sole purpose of caged chickens is to be producers, either as egg layers or as meat. Beyond the looser handling of the paint, what distinguishes this painting from the others I have discussed is the addition of three abstract blue lines running horizontally across the painting, two near the bottom edge and one a short distance from the top edge. The lines contract the space inhabited by the chickens. Were they added to break up the vertical posts we see, as well as to further hold the chickens in? The addition of the lines may have been impulsive and inexplicable, an obvious extra, but they feel right, as if they belong exactly where they are.
Thinking about Kanevsky’s paintings, as I have for the past month, spending an afternoon with him in his studio in New Hampshire, and talking with him over Zoom, I realize I have neglected to mention the one thing they have all given me: pleasure. I am reminded of the ending of Wallace Stevens’s poem, “It Must Give Pleasure”:
These are not things transformed. Yet we are shaken by them as if they were. We reason about them with a later reason.
For me, one of the undeniable pleasures is both seeing and reflecting upon Kanevsky’s paintings, their buttery surfaces and resistance to narrative. Perhaps Kanevsky’s elusiveness is most strongly felt in his paintings of nude models, an academic subject if there ever was one. Despite this long and honored history, Kanevsky once again breaks new ground. In The Battle
plate 4. Las Meninas, 2024
Oil on wood, 24 × 24 in. (61 × 61 cm)
plate 5.
The Battle of Shahbarghan I, 2024 Oil on wood, 60 × 42 in. (152.4 × 106.7 cm)
of Shahbarghan I (2024, pl. 5), the largest of his recent paintings, he juxtaposes a nude model against his version of a Persian miniature, which he saw at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Done in ink, opaque watercolor, and gold, the miniature measures 13 5/8 inches by 9 1/8 inches, and is part of a folio. It is hardly a famous battle, and there are no heroes to be seen in the original painting.
While one can make out the turbaned horsemen in the bottom right quadrant of Kanevsky’s painting, he has stretched some of the figures out, as if they were painted on a thin sheet of brown. Their upward thrust directs our attention to the nude model, who is seated and facing toward the left side of the canvas. We see her long black hair cascading over her breasts, but her head has been unevenly cropped by the trees growing behind the white wall in the miniature. Below her left knee, we see parts of four legs, all of which are hers. Her left leg, which is closest to us, appears to be crossed over her right leg. The four legs suggest that the model changed her position during the days the artist was painting her, while he was trying to figure out how to merge both her and the background battle scene together. He seems to have had no plan about this. Her missing head suggests that neither the viewer nor the artist can see her, and, in that sense, know her. This preoccupation with the limitations of seeing is the theme running through the three paintings I have discussed so far.
We are invited to pay attention to the plethora of details in The Battle of Shahbarghan I without losing sight of the painting, to continually refocus while reflecting upon their dialogue with each other. As we give thought to the inexplicable juxtaposition, we must contemplate what role the limits of our seeing plays in our comprehension, but that’s not all. What about the original miniature caught and held Kanevsky’s attention? Why did he make it part of two large paintings? I think these questions are crucial to understanding what motivates the artist, who moves nimbly from one painting to another without settling down into a mode of dependable production.
By picking his subjects from a wide range of sources, including working with a model to using a photograph, Kanevsky keeps himself as open as he can to the world, and his everyday life. Working and living in this way, while never knowing in advance what he might feel compelled to devote his attention to, Kanevsky embodies that longed for state, artistic freedom. Instead of surrendering to the prison of style or becoming a member of a school or movement, he recognizes the restraints his freedom imposes on him by pushing through them. One of the restraints is the viewer’s need for everything to be decipherable. This is where I see Kanevsky’s elusiveness as being ethical. Artistic freedom does not mean the artist agrees to make work
plate 6.
More Self Portrait Than Not, 2024 Oil on wood, 36 × 36 in. (91.4 × 91.4 cm)
from which palpable meaning can be extracted. The artist who enters into this agreement embraces the security and the comfort of conformity. Kanevsky rejects this option in favor of entering the unknown.
What do we see when we look at Kanevsky’s More Self Portrait Than Not (2024, pl. 6), done on a square panel? In the center of what feels like a small, pale blue room with a low, dark blue ceiling, we find two identical figures wearing full-length mink coats; one is in profile and the other, connected to the former, is seen from behind. The figure’s gender is ambiguous. The coat is open and the chest is bare. A dark brown band with a horizontal slit covers the figure’s face, something between a blindfold and dark visor with a misplaced opening. A bed with a red blanket is to the right of the figures while to the left, and behind them, we see the base of an easel rising into patches of indecipherable paint. Above the bed, we see a row of tilting books, but by now we are unsure of what is front of us. This precarity suffuses through the painting on multiple levels, from the blindfold to the enigmatic figures. The position of their hands suggests they are uncertain of what is in front them, adding a note of tentativeness to the situation. Are we meant to read this painting allegorically? Why is it more of a self-portrait than not?
The uncertainty we encounter in this painting mirrors the artist’s recognition that he does not know what awaits him, and that his paintings mark the journey of his unfolding life. And yet, I would not claim his paintings are strictly autobiographical, unless we include the places his imagination has gone and memories that have come to him. The paintings transcend their inspiration, and become a way for the artist to ask how he knows what he knows. He wants to discover the limitations of sight. We do not see the faces of the women in his two The Battle of Shahbarghan paintings (pls. 5, 9). If we cannot see them, can we know them? Can we feel empathy for them? In a media saturated world these questions gain further resonance. Kanevsky possesses a remarkable ability to transform his inescapable precariousness into works of unrivaled visual eloquence, at once direct and enigmatic.
John Yau is a poet and critic. His most recent book, Please Wait by the Coatroom: Reconsidering Race and identity in American Art (2024), won an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation.
plate 7.
Arthur Rimbaud with Banana Tree, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
plate 8.
Messy Desk with a Painting, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
plate 9.
The Battle of Shahbarghan II, 2024 Oil on wood, 36 × 36 in. (91.4 × 91.4 cm)
plate 10. Grapes, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
11.
Another Nomad, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
plate 12. Hay Bale with Snow 1, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
plate 13. Hay Bale with Snow 2, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
plate 14.
Social Distancing, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
plate 15. Corner Negotiation, 2024
Oil on wood, 18 × 18 in. (45.7 × 45.7 cm)
plate 16.
Padshahnama, 2024
Oil on wood, 24 × 24 in. (61 × 61 cm)
Biography
Painter Alex Kanevsky captures movement and time’s constant flow in canvases that resist adherence to a single moment, or even a single reading. Like the unreliable nature of memory and the imprecise atmosphere of poetry, Kanevsky’s multilayered works provide more questions than answers. These paintings combine abstraction and figuration in layered, painterly compositions in which the artist strives to convey his own particular view of the world with clarity.
Kanevsky describes himself as a slow painter who nevertheless works quickly to maintain a fresh approach to the canvas. His process of painting, rubbing out, and painting over was developed over many years and holds the key to the emotional richness of his work. This creates a kind of palimpsest, in which past iterations and experimentations remain visible beneath the topmost layer of paint. Though Kanevsky paints both from life and from photographs, he relishes most the kinetic energy of live models. He often works with the same models for years at a time, developing a strong sense of their individual form and motion. The figure is central to Kanevsky’s work. They inhabit mysterious landscapes, ambiguous architecture, often composed of wide swaths of color that contain echoes of color field painting. In his new body of work, the figure’s presence is at times represented through its absence.
Kanevsky was born in Russia in 1963, where he studied theoretical mathematics at Vilnius University in Lithuania before coming to the United States in the early 1980s. He settled in Philadelphia and began painting classes at the Philadelphia Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) in 1989. After receiving a Pew Fellowship in 1997, Kanevsky was able to devote himself to painting full time, and from 2002 to 2017, he served as an adjunct painting instructor at PAFA. He lives and works in New Hampshire.
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2024 104Galerie, Tokyo, Japan
2023 Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
2022 Hollis Taggart, New York
2020 Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
2019 Hollis Taggart, New York
2018 Galerie Guido Romero Pierini, Paris
Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
2017 Hollis Taggart Galleries, New York
2016 Foster Gallery, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA
2015 Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
Hollis Taggart Galleries, New York
2014 J. Cacciola Gallery, New York
Scarfone/Hartly Gallery at University of Tampa, FL
2013 Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
2012 Barbara Frigerio Contemporary Art, Milan, Italy
J. Cacciola Gallery, New York
Woodmere Museum, Philadelphia
Lux Art Institute, Encinitas, CA
2011 J. Cacciola Gallery, New York
2010 Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
2009 J. Cacciola Gallery, New York
2008 Rosenfeld Gallery, Philadelphia
Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
2007 J. Cacciola Gallery, New York
2006 Gallerie de Bellefeuille, Montreal, Canada
2005 Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
J. Cacciola Gallery, New York
2004 J. Cacciola Gallery, New York
Rosenfeld Gallery, Philadelphia
Somerville Manning Gallery, Greenville, DE
2003 Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
J. Cacciola Galleries, New York
2002 Rosenfeld Gallery, Philadelphia
2001 Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
J. Cacciola Galleries, New York
2000 Philadelphia Art Alliance
Rosenfeld Gallery, Philadelphia
1998 Rosenfeld Gallery, Philadelphia
1997 Merrimack College, Andover, MA
Somerville Manning Gallery, Greenville, DE
1995 Rosenfeld Gallery, Philadelphia
Selected Group Exhibitions
2024 Museu Europeu de Arte Moderno (MEAM), Barcelona
2023 Museu Europeu de Arte Moderno (MEAM), Barcelona
2022 Art Miami, Hollis Taggart, Miami Beach
Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
2021 Barnes Art Center, Hopewell Junction, NY
Museo Europeo de Arte Moderno, Barcelona
2020 Hollis Taggart, New York
Sugarlift, New York
Dallas Art Fair, Hollis Taggart, New York
SFA Projects, New York
2019 Susquehanna Art Museum, Harrisburg, PA
Hollis Taggart, New York
Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
Galerie Gmurzynska, New York
Cerulean Arts, Philadelphia
Avery Galleries, Bryn Mawr, PA
2018 Delaware Contemporary, Wilmington
Stanek Gallery, Philadelphia
Hollis Taggart, New York
Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle Mesa Arts Center, AZ
Galerie Guido Romero Pierni, Paris
Meno Parkas, Kaunas, Lithuania
2017 Oakland University Art Gallery, Rochester, MI
Woodmere Art Museum, Philadelphia
Hollis Taggart, New York
Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
2016 New Museum Los Gatos, CA
University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Guido Romero Pierini Galerie, Paris
2015 Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
Cerulean Gallery, Philadelphia
2013 National Arts Club, New York
Asheville Art Museum, NC
2012 Royal Society of British Artists, London
2011 Barbara Frigerio Gallery, Milan, Italy
J. Cacciola, New York
2010 Fuse Gallery, New York
Stedman Gallery, Rutgers University, NJ
2009 Barrister’s Gallery, New Orleans
Somerville Manning Gallery, Greenville, DE
2008 Hopkinson House Gallery of Contemporary Art, Haddon Township, NJ
Art Museum of Los Gatos, CA
Edwards Art Gallery, Holderness School, Plymouth, NH
Ballinglen Arts Foundation, Ballycastle, Ireland
Edwards Art Gallery, Holderness School, Plymouth, NH
2007 Tower Gallery, Philadelphia
Angles Gallery, Santa Monica, CA
Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco
2006 Brady Art Gallery, George Washington University, Washington, DC
2005 Arcadia University Art Gallery, Glenside, PA
Gallerie de Bellefeuille, Montreal, Canada
2004 Castell Welsberg, Italy
Arcadia University Art Gallery, Glenside, PA
J. Cacciola Gallery, New York
2003 Casa Wassermann, Villabassa, Italy
2001 J. Cacciola Galleries, New York
1999 Montserrat College of Art, Beverly, MA
1998 Art Alliance, Philadelphia Mulligan-Shanoski Gallery, San Francisco
1997 The Philip and Muriel Berman Museum of Art, Ursinus College, Collegeville, PA
1994 Pleiades Gallery, New York
Selected Bibliography
Tim Brinkhof, “As Seen on ‘Synecdoche, New York’: The Tiniest Paintings Ever,” Artnet, June 17, 2024, news.artnet. com/art-world/as-seen-on-synecdoche-new-york-alex -kanevsky-2448406.
“65: Honesty in Art – Alex Kanevsky,” January 18, 2023, in ART2LIFE, art2life.com/2023/01/18/honesty-in-art-alex -kanevsky-ep-65.
Annabel Keenan, “Our Curated Guide to Miami Art Fairs,” Artsy, November 22, 2022, artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial -curated-guide-miami-art-fairs.
Harper’s Magazine, January 2021, harpers.org/archive /2021/01/new-books-january-2021, illustration.
“45: Alex Kanevsky and Hollis Heichemer,” October 30, 2020, in Art Grind Podcast, artgrindpodcast.com/podcast/ ep-45-alex-kanevsky-and-hollis-heichemer.
Tamsin Smith, “All That Is Solid Melts Into Paint: An Essay on the Works of Alex Kanevsky,” Juxtapoz, September 30, 2020, juxtapoz.com/news/painting/all-that-is-solid-melts -into-paint-an-essay-on-the-works-of-alex-kanevsky/.
Alice Puig, “20 Picks From The Dallas Art Fair,”Create Magazine, April 23, 2020, createmagazine.com/read /2020/4/23/20-picks-from-the-dallas-art-fair.
Rochelle Belsito, “Shift: A New Exhibition Featuring the Artwork of Tiffany Calvert and Alex Kanevsky Explores the Passage of Time,” American Art Collector, February 2020.
Oksana Berzinsh, “Hollis Taggart Showcases Alex Kanevsky’s Fluid Brushstroke,” Fine Art Globe, September 24, 2019, fineartglobe.com/artists/hollis-taggard-showcases-alex -kanevskys-fluid-brushstroke/.
Dinner with Dear Friend, illustrated, Harper’s Magazine, March 2019.
Rochelle Belsito, “Ends and Beginnings,” American Art Collector, November 2018.
Bathroom, illustrated, Harper’s Magazine, October 2018.
Kim Power, “The Laws of Motion: In-Studio Interview with Alex Kanevsky,” Art Pulse Magazine, 2017.
The Moth Magazine of Art (Ireland), no. 28, 2017.
Amanda S. Torres Cunha, Caminhos em Poética Visuais Bidimensionais (Brazil: Editora Intersaberes, 2017.)
Lightning Strikes: 18 Poets, 18 Artists (San Francisco: Dolby Chadwick Gallery, 2016).
“Chamem-lhe pintor, não artista,” Diário de Notícias, February 21, 2015.
Marie-Christine Horn, La Piqûre (Switzerland: L’Age D’Homme, 2015).
Peter Selz, Frances Malcolm, and Neil Plotkin, Alex Kanevsky (San Francisco: Dolby Chadwick Gallery, 2015).
“Les 50 Painters les Plus Cités,” Miroir de L’Art 55, 2014.
“People and Their Bodies: Pintura, Alex Kanevsky,” Egoista, Magazine of Art and Literature 51, December 2013.
James Chute, “Alex Kanevsky in Residence at Lux Art Institute,” San Diego Union Tribune, June 9, 2013.
Interior with Meat, cover, illustrated, Harper’s Magazine, May 2013.
Allison Malafronte, “Alex Kanevsky at Dolby Chadwick Gallery,” Fine Art Connoisseur, February 2013.
Jacques Desage, “Alex Kanevsky,” Miroir de L’Art 45, 2013.
BM, “Alex Kanevsky Doppio Sogno,”Artinmostra, December 4, 2012.
Alex Kanevsky: Contemporary Painter Series (China: Tianjin Yangliuqing Fine Arts Press, 2012).
Frédéric Charles Baitinger, “Alex Kanevsky, Le Hasard Manipulé,” Artension, May/June 2011.
Peter Selz, “Alex Kanevsky: Dolby Chadwick Gallery,” Art in America, January 2011.
Ilaria Bignotti, “Corpi Esposti” (Milan: Barbara Frigerio Gallery, 2011).
Kenneth Baker, “Kanevsky at Dolby,” San Francisco Chronicle, October 23, 2010.
Polish Rider, cover, Subaltern Magazine, no. 1, 2010.
Versal 7 (Amsterdam), 2009, cover and picture essay.
Mario Naves, “Alex Kanevsky: Proserpine,” City Arts, New York, May 2009.
Alexandra Bourré, “Alex Kanevsky,” Vernissages, France, January 2009.
“Alex Kanevsky: 13 Paintings,” Guernica, Magazine of Art & Politics, January 2009.
Carina Chocano, “Synecdoche, NY,” Los Angeles Times, September 2008.
Peggy’s House, illustrated, Harper’s Magazine, September 2008.
Kenneth Baker, “Kanevsky in His Stride,” San Francisco Chronicle, May 10, 2008.
Peter Campion, “Painterly Painting: The Next Level” (CA: The Art Museum of Los Gatos, 2008).
Al Gury, Alla Prima Painting: A Contemporary Guide to Traditional Direct Painting (New York: Watson-Guptill, 2008).
David Miklos, La Hermana Falsa (Mexico: Tusquets Editores, 2008), book cover, illustrated.
Valerie Gladstone, “Alex Kanevsky: J.Cacciola Gallery,” ARTnews, September 2007.
Holly Myers, “Considering Affairs of the Heart,” Los Angeles Times, March 9, 2007.
Tyler Benedict, “Figura” (Montreal: Galleries de Bellefeuille, 2005).
Sharon Mizota, “Alex Kanevsky’s Paintings,” San Francisco Weekly, December 28, 2005.
Mario Neves, “Alex Kanevsky,” The New York Observer, May 30, 2005.
Fox Hunt, illustrated, Harper’s Magazine, May 2004.
Victoria Donohoe, “Painter Takes Cues from Camera,” Philadelphia Inquirer, March 28, 2004.
T. S. in Her Bath, illustrated, Harper’s Magazine, November 2003.
New American Paintings 45, May 2003.
Tom Csaszar, “Observation of Time and Lived Moments: Paintings of Alex Kanevsky” (New York: Cacciola Gallery, 2003).
Robert Flynn Johnson, “Love Affair with Paint” (San Francisco: Dolby Chadwick Gallery, 2003).
Edward J. Sozanski, “Raking Light,” Philadelphia Inquirer, May 26, 2000.
New American Paintings 27, May 2000, cover, illustrated.
Catherine Quillman, “Alex Kanevsky,” Philadelphia Inquirer, October 21, 1999.
Victoria Donohoe, “Alex Kanevsky,” Philadelphia Inquirer, October 17, 1999.
Joshua Meyer, “Alex Kanevsky,” Art New England, April 5, 1999.
Gerard Brown, “Fast, Smeared, and Out of Control,” Philadelphia Weekly, April 29, 1998.
John Chambless, “Alex Kanevsky,” Philadelphia Inquirer, Mach 14, 1997.
Judith E. Stein, “Ars Longa, and It Keeps Changing,” Pew Fellowships in the Arts Catalog for Awardees, 1997.
Tom Csaszar, “Alex Kanevsky: Rosenfeld Gallery,” New Art Examiner, May 1995.
Awards
2012 Lux Art Institute, art residency, Encinitas, CA
2008 Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, painting fellowship
2007 Eagle Hill Foundation, Steuben, ME, painting residency
2006 Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, painting fellowship
2004 Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, painting fellowship
2003 Frantz and Virginia Bader Fund, grant for painting Ballinglen Arts Foundation, Ireland, residency fellowship
New American Paintings, Number 45
2002 Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, painting fellowship
2000 New American Paintings, Number 27 cover
1999 New American Paintings, Open Studio Competition
1997 Pew Fellowship in the Arts, painting fellowship
1994 Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT, painting fellowship
1993 Pennsylvania Governor’s Award for Painting
1993 Mary Townsend & William Clarke Mason Memorial Prize in Sculpture
1992 William Emlen Cresson Memorial Travel Scholarship
Mabel Wilson Woodrow Memorial Award
Pearson Memorial Prize for Painting
Special Projects and Collections
2017 Schmidt Dean Gallery, Philadelphia, Out There, curated with Michael Gallagher
2013 Philadelphia Sketch Club, Some Drawings, co-curated with Bill Scott
2012 Woodmere Art Museum, Philadelphia, Annual Exhibition, judge
Woodmere Art Museum, Philadelphia, Selection from the Collection, curator
2011 University of North Carolina, Asheville, NC, Drawing Discourse, judge
2010 Achenbach Collection, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, de Young & Legion of Honor
Woodmere Museum Collection, Philadelphia
2008 Synecdoche, NY, feature film directed by Charlie Kaufman, paintings for the film
2007 Vast Beautiful System (barely holding together), Jenny Jaskey Gallery (Tower), Philadelphia
This catalogue has been published on the occasion of the exhibition “Alex Kanevsky: Everything Twice” organized by Hollis Taggart, New York, and presented from November 21–December 28, 2024.
Artwork © Alex Kanevsky
Essay “Everything Twice” © John Yau
ISBN: 979-8-9902841-5-9
Publication © 2024 Hollis Taggart
All rights reserved.
Reproduction of contents prohibited.
Hollis Taggart
521 West 26th Street 1st & 2nd Floors
New York, NY 10001
Tel 212 628 4000 www.hollistaggart.com
Catalogue production: Kara Spellman
Copyediting: Jessie Sentivan
Design: McCall Associates, New York
Printing: Point B Solutions, Minneapolis
Photography: John W. Hession
Cover and frontispiece: The Battle of Shahbarghan II, 2024, pl. 9
Back cover: Umbria, 2024, pl. 1
