Three of Kriesberg’s innovative mobile paintings from the 1950s will be on view from September 15 to November 21, 2020 at Anita Shapolsky Gallery in the group exhibition Off the Wall (see press release).
In 1945, Kriesberg got a job with the Artkraft Strauss Sign Corporation and created artwork that animated large Broadway "spectaculars," which were iconic illuminated signs, replete with special effects and movable parts. Kriesberg’s interest in animation and sequential imagery led to an experimental drive to display his own paintings in ways that distanced them from traditional viewing methods. In the 1950s, Kriesberg began to construct multiple panel paintings that are double sided and affixed to moveable armatures. Each panel has the ability to be manually turned to reveal multiple compositions, thereby expanding the viewer’s pictorial perspective and extending the painting off the wall in a manner akin to sculpture in the round. For example, Maternal Fugue (1959), one of the paintings in the upcoming Anita Shapolsky Gallery exhibition, features sixty-four possible viewing arrangements. The painting is a reversible quadriptych (see image above for both sides) with abstract-figurative imagery that relates to narratives of spiritual and physical origin.
During the late 1950s and early 60s, Kriesberg developed a motif of painterly compositions that resemble some of the earliest known works of art which historians often refer to as ‘Venus’ figures. Kriesberg called his stylized humanoid forms ‘Maternal Images,’ implying that these figures celebrate love, nurture, and the cycle of life.
Another series of changeable paintings are the ‘Lovers’ panels, which Kriesberg worked on simultaneously with his ‘Maternal Images.’ The ‘Lovers’ paintings allude to the acts of romance, although there is no clear anatomical distinction between the figures in most of the paintings. Kriesberg uses a variety of shapes and colors to develop the representational affordances of lovers embracing. Overall, the ‘Lovers’ paintings blur gender and transform each figure into a united entity. The ability to change the panels around enables some wildly imaginative contortions.
Displayed in addition to the freestanding moveable works (Maternal Fugue, Yellow & Blue Lovers and Blue, Green, Red), is a 1969 triptych titled Urban Triptych (shown above).
Anita Shapolsky Gallery is located at 152 East 65th Street, New York, NY 10065