SoHo

 GalleryViews / Soho

 Keith Long at the OK Harris Gallery, 383 
 West Broadway to January 17th
 To view a film clip of the exhibition click here.

It�s been about 3 years since we last saw this artist�s work in this gallery and since then not a lot has changed as to the big issues (more about that later). The work is small to large in scale and, as before, conjures a myriad of references from primitive ritual objects to microscopic biomorphic

Keith Long, Untitled, 2003, wood, 16.5 x 27 in

forms enlarged to cartoon images to ancient tools of which their utilitarian use is no longer understood. Long�s sculpture is engaging and well thought out but also imbued with a disarming sense of humor.  As with the sculpture of Thomas Kiesewetter, this all comes at you simultaneously as a complete package.

Part and parcel of the comprehensive effect is the artist�s meticulous attention to craftsmanship combined with these rough-hewn, rather crude

Keith Long, installation view

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Keith Long, installation view

materials. Long carefully arranges and  reconstructs what are obviously found objects and in so doing focuses our attention to the beauty of those materials. The underlying issue proffered is the confrontation of a sophisticated esthetic with a primitive one.  Which is the better? Don�t ask Keith Long because he gives both equal attention.

Keith Long, Cerf Volant 6, 2003, wood, 43 x 165 in

Another important aspect of this work is the attention they give to balance and symmetry. Long addresses this in a couple of ways.  One approach is to arrange the components in a more or less  even symmetry but then to mess it up a bit by letting one element stick out.  A good example of this is found in the Cerf Volant pieces where in #6 that little tail form drops down in the lower right.  In #7 the upper portion is evenly symmetrical but whole lower �tail� of this piece drops off and gently bends to the right. Long engages the same order/chaos question that so many grid painters wrestle with.  But in his work there is a direct relationship to how symmetry works in natural forms; in the unusual ways equilibrium is often thrown off-balance by nature.

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