With the recent opening of three new fall exhibitions at the ICA LA- B. Wurtz: This Has No Name, Nina Chanel Abney: Royal Flush, and Adrian Piper’s What It’s Like, What It Is #3- comes a host of new perspectives and dialogues that each of these artists has to offer. Presenting oeuvres with visually captivating imagery and that deal with complex ideas, their work sets the stage for new and exciting approaches to artistic production that blends art history with common experience. Although vastly different in approach and in concept, the work of B. Wurtz, Nina Chanel Abney, and Adrian Piper is linked in their inventive explorations of both art and social history, and how such histories can be exhibited and re-thought in the present for contemporary audiences.

A New York-based sculptor for whom the most ubiquitous of items are fertile artistic material, B. Wurtz is an artist that looks to the everyday for inspiration. Generating whimsical, yet routinely familiar sculptural constructions, Wurtz’s practice speaks to the fictional dichotomy between art and life and encourages viewers to envision even the most common materials as viable works of art. Often incorporating familiar objects from daily life, he uses both wit and structural transparency as complementary strategies for art making.

Drawing from ideologies surrounding the concept of the “readymade” (common objects exhibited as works of art) in art making, Wurtz uses universal objects to make assertions regarding life as contemporary beings- something that traditionally is an inherent contradiction to the readymade’s historical function of being distinct from any specific associations or representations. Wurtz playfully addresses this history in many ways, for instance, employing items such as dusters, lampshades, food containers, clothing, produce netting, and aluminum pans to insert elements of personal and collective narrative that point to topics of consumption, domesticity, leisure, and similar aspects of lived experiences. These constructions serve as visual documents of daily life, bringing tangible experience into the space of the gallery, allowing beauty and esteem to be found in prosaic material.

Furthermore, Wurtz not only incorporates objects associated with universality into his pieces, but also utilizes items that directly point to his own existence as well, thus establishing a kind of indexicality within his structures that leaves an imprint of his physical presence and specific individuality. In works such as Untitled (t-shirt #4) (1991) and Untitled (Know Thyself) (1992), he creates pseudo self-portraits and concurrently presents an alternate approach to traditional methods of portraiture that focus on a specific likeness. In using remnants from his own life in lieu of his tangible body, Wurtz establishes a sense of intimacy in these works, allowing viewers into his personal life and space beyond what they may see on a daily basis.

What is so pertinent about Wurtz’s practice is his ability to manipulate and transform the tools of everyday utility. It is through his hand that a simple metal container becomes a grandiose architectural structure and an aluminum pan becomes an elegant meditation of notions of domesticity and consumerism. Serving as a contrast to artists who historically employ consumerist objects, Wurtz’s use of found objects and items pertaining to industrialization and mass production are not a cultural critique, but rather, a celebration of even the most seemingly insignificant components of everyday life, and how we navigate the world in various settings on the most minute and grand of scales.

Similar to B. Wurtz’s inherent refiguring of art history and interest in the nuances of everyday life, Nina Chanel Abney presents her own take on art history via expressions of contemporary social commentary. Rather than sculptural objects, Abney’s practice looks to elements of painting, collage, and watercolor, specifically, the historical tradition of genre painting, which is defined as painting that presents depictions of ordinary people from real life engaged in routine activity. An exhibition complimentary to an additional display of Abney’s work at the California African American Museum, the ICA’s presentation of Royal Flush places an emphasis on Abney’s most recent works and formal development through time.

In her pieces, Abney uses bold color, line, and imagery to generate various social commentaries and critiques. Reading as visually hand-crafted stories, her panels, rife with color and figuration, use text, image, and symbolism to highlight instances of social inequity beyond mere scenarios from everyday life. The addresses that Abney formulates in her work deals with a wide variety of topics pertaining to popular culture and events within the information age, ranging from references to politics, social media output, and various social encounters. One of her most recent works, the monumental painting, Catfish (2017), is a piece that not only highlights Abney’s increased sense of abstraction and stylization, but her use of art history as a reference point for her works. Composed of four vertical panels, Catfish focuses on the idea of the historical portrayal of the female nude, bringing it into a contemporary setting. Depicting various female figures, both black and white, posed in provocative positions with their faces looking out onto to the audience, she rejects the concept of the male gaze, turning perspective outward toward the viewer. Filled with a plethora of shapes and symbols, Abney also incorporates familiar imagery, such as dollar signs, text, and phallic motifs to further feature the inherent racism and sexism of these traditions, and how they continue to persist in today’s society.

Abney’s story-based paintings that exhibit both individual perspective and documentation also harken back beyond genre painting to the tenants of ancient relief panels and the long-held tradition of storytelling through art. In works such as Beauty in the Beast (2009), Abney creates a scene in which the imagery portrayed captures a conceived reality while simultaneously playing up elements of narrative. Here, she depicts two white, masked figures, one holding a baby and the other a small pig. Pointing to the increasing popularity of interracial adoption, specifically referring to predominate white individuals adopting African American children, Abney illustrates the problems surrounding such an act, formulating a dialogue beginning with an inherent questioning of the motivations and sincerity surrounding these seemingly generous gestures, and how they can alternatively negatively affect these children and further add to their societal periphery. The title itself references the fictional fairytale, “Beauty and the Beast,” but places a key twist on its title, replacing the word ‘and’ with ‘in,’ highlighting conceived social constructs surrounding race and beauty, and how certain people are elevated over others.

In addition to subversions of traditional art history via critiques of contemporary social observation, Abney also references historical uses of religious iconography via hybrid painting and collage constructions. In the piece, First and Last (2012), she presents a chaotic landscape in which various figures are portrayed in a “judgement” scene- a classical depiction of the coming of Christ and the final judgement of God. Her formal use of a diptych structure looks back to religious altarpieces and their role in artistic tradition, often used within both secular and sacred contexts as a social and religious guideline. Playing with Judeo-Christian ideology and the ideas of damnation and salvation, she critically addresses notions of religion, and how it is and has been used as a tool of manipulation in society. Incorporating symbols associated with Christianity and the LGBTQ+ community (rainbows, pink triangles, crosses, etc.), Abney gives her own thoughts on aspects of judgment and faith, pushing towards acceptance and inclusivity within the sphere of religion.

Presented in conjunction with the Hammer Museum’s exhibition, Adrian Piper: Concepts and Intuitions, 1965-2016, Adrian Piper’s immersive installation, What It’s Like, What It Is #3 (1991), also makes significant reference to the troupes of art history for the purpose of generating commentary that is both pertinent and meaningful within the scope of our lives as contemporary beings. Aligning with Abney’s address of social inequity, Piper’s conceptually-based work addresses issues of racial stereotyping and delves into psychological explorations of interracial relations, illuminating how we individually and collectively perceive others and how these perceptions are often rooted in particular biases. Using the visual austerity of Minimalism- an artistic period defined by its use of large and industrialized, yet visually simple, forms, Piper’s austere, constructed space becomes an arena in which visitors may sit and contemplate their surroundings. Constituted by rows of stark white bleachers, harsh overhead lighting, and a large constructed tower sitting at the center, viewers are confronted with a repetitive image of an African American male, continuously reiterating various stereotypes about black people.

Playing off of on Minimalism’s characteristic of establishing a physical relationship to the presence of viewers in a gallery space, Piper alternatively offers an isolated arena where visitors are able to reflect on their own perceptions and biases, with the aim of acting as a kind of liaison through which people may discover their own truth. As Piper states in her 1991 writing on behalf of the exhibition, Dislocations, at the Museum of Modern Art, “I find it discouraging when someone says of my work, ‘The message is obvious, she’s against racism.’ I think that expresses an unwillingness to pursue the implications of the issues and strategies I explore in the work—it’s like shutting down at square one. I try for ultimate clarity, with multiple reverberations and multiple implications at the same time. I try for simplicity, not oversimplification. I don’t want to make any prescriptions about what people should do. I just want to penetrate the layers of illusion and self-deception as far as possible and do it cleanly without losing any of the mind-bending complexity of the issues.” This sentiment outlines perfectly what Piper’s installation is set up to do: not to merely dictate what people should think, or how their perspectives should be shaped, but to offer both a physical space and corresponding theoretical dialogue that may allow for individuals to become aware of their own tendencies, with the hope of leading to some kind of clarity within this context.

Although disparate in form, concept, and approach, what links the work of these three artists together is their desire to not only question what has come before, but to find new and consequential ways of addressing pre-existing artistic traditions that relate to what we experience in the present. It is through an establishment of progressive modes of production that B. Wurtz, Nina Chanel Abney, and Adrian Piper provide imperative perspectives on the nuances of contemporary life, and in turn, generate important discussions regarding art history and how it may factor into current and future approaches to art making.