Quite another thing, Reinventing Abstraction

Curating a painting show is one thing, curating a painting show to change the historical narrative of art is quite another thing. Reinventing Abstraction, Raphael Rubenstein's exhibition curated for Cheim and Read seeks to revise the view of the 1980's held under sway to neo-expressionism and conceptualism. Rubenstein includes artists who may not have been in favor in the 1980's but were still working to forge a future for abstraction. This is from the press release:

They opened their work to elements that had been largely excluded from abstraction in the previous decade, beginning with a reinvestigation of the conventional rectangular support. They were unafraid to explore gesture, improvisation, relational compositions, allusions to figuration and landscape, as well as art historical and cultural allusions, high and low.

Carroll Dunham
HORIZONTAL BANDS 1982
Mixed media on pine
62 x 48 inches
157.5 x 121.9 centimeters

Jonathan Lasker
DOUBLE PLAY 1987
Oil on linen
76 x 100 inches

Pat Steir
LAST WAVE PAINTING: WAVE BECOMING A WATERFALL 1987-88
Oil on canvas
7 feet x 11 feet 6 inches

Gary Stephan
UNTITLED (#45418) 1985-88
Acrylic on canvas
40 1/4 x 30 1/4 inches