Issue 239
November/December 2023

The ensemble of Ali Cherri’s work grapples with the issues of the artist’s place in a world in crisis. Wilson Tarbox

In the November/December issue of frieze, Wilson Tarbox profiles Ali Cherri, whose first solo show in Italy is open at GAMeC Bergamo in October, and Ben Davis, Stephanie Dinkins, Mike Pepi, Noam Segal and Christopher Kulendran Thomas contribute to a discussion on the impact of AI technologies on artistic production.

Profile: Ali Cherri

‘Close examination of Cherri’s practice reveals it to be deeply invested in questions of human dignity and welfare.’ Wilson Tarbox visits the winner of the Silver Lion at last year’s Venice Biennale and considers the role of an artist in a time of political crisis.

Roundtable: The Face of The Deep

‘We want to offload our problems onto this technology, but it always comes back to the humans behind it and how we start those negotiations.’ As generative AI and large language models such as ChatGPT storm our creative industries, five artists and writers delve into a philosophical and political debate on the viability of machine artistry.

Also featuring  

Simon Wu examines the year in Asian American media, asking if such a denomination can still exist; and Wassan Al-Khudhairi speaks to Hajra Waheed, ahead of the artist’s solo show at Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis. In ‘1,500 words’, Robyn Brentano revisits Robert Wilson’s opera The Life and Times of Joseph Stalin (1973) on its 50th anniversary.

 

Columns: Re-evaluations 

Brian Dillon ponders Catherine Millet in the #MeToo era; Paul Chan names Jeff Koons America’s most religious artist; Shiv Kotecha lauds Bernardo Bertolucci’s film The Dreamers (2003); and Orit Gat defines post-internet art as a product of digital culture’s seismic shift. Plus, Fernanda Brenner on the influence of Karim Aïnouz’s film Madame Satã (2002) on a generation of Brazilian artists.

Finally, Matthew McLean on a single work by Lutz Bacher. Plus, a new series of artist ‘to-do’ lists, and we bring you the latest iteration of our Lonely Arts column.

From this issue

Twenty years after the film’s release, does it still turn you on?

BY Shiv Kotecha |

How do we read The Sexual Life of Catherine M in the age of #MeToo and autofiction?

BY Brian Dillon |

The artist speaks about how poetry and song can bridge social movements, connecting people in the face of adversity

BY Hajra Waheed AND Wassan Al-Khudhairi |

Fifty years after the debut of Wilson’s Life and Times of Joseph Stalin, a friend and collaborator remembers her time with the director

BY Robyn Brentano |

How the artist's dedication to perfection and relentless work reflects the religious undertones of the American work ethic

BY Paul Chan |

A personal essay on the importance of friendship and the ascendancy of Asian American stories in the mainstream

BY Simon Wu |

The artist’s sculptural installations and films sit at the heart of a debate about Eurocentrism in the arts

BY Wilson Tarbox |

Karim Aïnouz’s debut feature film presaged contemporary discussions on gender performativity, racial violence and identity politics

BY Fernanda Brenner |

On the occasion of the artist’s retrospective at Raven Row, London, Matthew McLean revisits Untitled (Diana)

BY Matthew McLean |

Tracing the movement’s emergence and its current role in shaping digital culture

BY Orit Gat |

Five curators, artists and writers discuss the impact of AI models like ChatGPT on artistic production

At the National Gallery of Art, Vilnius, the artists challenge dominant interpretations of wetlands as a hostile and undeveloped space

BY Valentina Sansone |

At WIELS in Brussels, the artists present a multimedia dystopia of disenchanted desires and endless searching

BY Stanton Taylor |

At Layr, Vienna, a group exhibition reminds viewers of the culture-crossing and nonconformist possibilities of artworks

BY Mitchell Anderson |

At W-galería, the artist collaborates with Guaraní weavers in a decolonial project of self-representation 

BY Rosario Güiraldes |

​At Sprüth Magers, the artist visually renders our hackneyed vocabularies around anxiety and care

BY Pablo Larios |

At Sargent’s Daughters, New York, empathetic oil paintings suggest healing through revisitation

BY Bryan Martin |

Ireland’s biennial of contemporary art delicately weaves weighty issues into Limerick’s surroundings

BY Nadia Egan |

At Rinde am Rhein, Düsseldorf, the artist’s new series riff on conceptualism but reflect the alienation of our times

BY Stanton Taylor |

While ‘Choreographies of the Impossible’ stumbles curatorially, this edition nevertheless feels vital and exciting

BY Marko Gluhaich |

At P21, Seoul, a group show of intimate mixed media works draws on Byung-Chul Han’s revolutionary The Agony of Eros (2017)

BY Wong Binghao |

At neugerriemschneider, Berlin, an exhibition dedicated to the late dance composer’s notation system reveal the complexities of her ideas

BY Emily May |

At The National Gallery of Denmark, the artist’s retrospective interrogates the space between coloniser and colonized

BY Alice Godwin |

At the artist’s studio via Chateau Shatto, Los Angeles, the artist’s facsimiles of pavement interrogate the similarities between civic labour and artistic production

BY Claudia Ross |

At MOCA GA, the artist's sculptures adapt Kente cloth as a framework for pan-Africanism

BY Leia Genis |

At White Cube Mason's Yard, the artist’s latest film is a Kafkaesque vision that may leave you pining for the exit

BY Tom Morton |

The artist's murals at Galerie Chantal Crousel, Paris, repurpose elements of cloud vistas and early Renaissance frescoes

BY Andrew Hodgson |

At Night Gallery, Los Angeles, claustrophobic paintings of horse races meditate on risk, desire and control

BY Clare Gemima |

From the peat of the Scottish hill-tops, the artist embraces a material language of ritualism and transformation

BY Tom Jeffreys |

Inspired by Mesoamerican culture and Mexican modernism, the artist’s materially lush sculptures and drawings aspire to a time beyond geopolitical violence

BY Armando Pulido |

At Sant’Andrea De Scaphis, Rome, the artist instils an apparently bucolic setting with a sinister undertone

BY Ana Vukadin |

A group show at Pilar Corrias, London, unites work dealing with the natural world and humanity’s impact on it

BY Emily Steer |

At The Arts Center at Governors Island, New York, the artist presents installations that induce an embodied reflection on immigration and national identity

BY Jasmine Liu |

At Muzeum Susch, ‘Art Is Not Rest’ celebrates a singular artist who refused to be categorized

BY Agata Pyzik |

Raw figurative paintings at Aspen Art Museum show how the artist's relocation to New York in 2020 infused new life into his work

BY Evan Moffitt |

At Jack Shainman Gallery’s The School, New York, a pioneer of 1960s avant-garde film is remembered for his more contemporary works

BY Terence Trouillot |

At Helena Anrather, New York, the artist’s sculptures, photographs and video work document the surviving architecture of a less gentrified Lower Manhattan

BY Will Fenstermaker |

At The Modern Institute, Glasgow, an exhibition filled with religious symbolism feels curiously shallow

BY Helen Charman |