By Merle Exit
Queens Museum introduced several new exhibits on the main floor when it opened its doors Sunday.
“Nine” is a two-room gallery showcasing the works of artists who took part in the museum’s studio program in 2015 and 2017 — the exhibit will run though Aug. 27, 2017.
The main piece by one of the nine, Bryan Zanisnik, is the Presidential Library of Philip Roth, consisting of hundreds of copies of books by the literary fiction writer inserted into a fractured wall made of drywall and plaster. There was a dispute back in 2012 that involved a lawsuit filed by Roth about the piece. Playing off the new interest in his work, Zanisnik did a performance piece where he sat in an enclosed Plexiglas booth silently reading Roth’s “The Great American Novel,” while money and baseball cards flew around him, propelled by a fan.
Other former artists in residents featured in “Nine” include Andrew Beccone, Chris Bogia, Karolina Sobeacka, Alina Tenser, Ruby Onyinyechi Amanze, Gloria Maximo, Denniston Mikalson, and Tuo Wang.
In another exhibit, artist Anna K.E. took over most of the 45-foot-tall, 140-foot-wide wall at the rear of the museum’s vast, sunny atrium at the Unisphere entrance for the huge digital prints on vinyl that make up Profound Approach and Easy Outcome. The two main works place the artist herself in the frame alongside elements of great works from the Metropolitan Museum of art. In one, K.E. inserts herself into the painting Girl at the Window by Balthus, standing behind the titular girl and mimicking her pose. She does the same with Otto Dix’s The Businessman Max Roesberg.
Completing the showpiece are two abstract arrow-like shapes, one in white, the other in triangular-colored tiles that lead the museumgoer to venture from the entrance and look upon the exhibit. A group of small wooden sculptures sits at the bottom of the wall, each with monitors that play videos. This exhibition runs through Feb. 18, 2018.
Artist Ronny Quevedo filled the sunken portion of the museum’s cavernous atrium with his sports-themed exhibit No Hay Medio Tiempo/There is No Halftime. The title comes from Quevedo’s childhood playing soccer. A native of Ecuador, he grew up playing soccer at Flushing Meadow Park along with his late father, who was both a player and referee. His father would say, “No hay medio tiempo,” meaning that halftime is only “the end of the first half and the start of the second.”
The exhibit, which runs through Aug. 13, features vinyl lines and white marking covering the “field,” which mix “wide-ranging references from sports field diagrams to Andean heraldic codes,” said Quevedo. Above the exhibit fly four colorful flags representing the Inca Empire, and at the center is a large, handcrafted concrete-and-chalk soccer ball.
