As part of the UMKC visiting artist lecture series, today we met Todd Keyser, Assistant Director at the Gross McCleaf Gallery in Downtown Philadelphia, and had the great pleasure of viewing images of his work and work he curates for galleries and shows.
Admittedly Keyser's work is intellectual and dense... but it's deliciously so. He's not just asking a lot from his viewer, he's demanding it. But that doesn't stand in the way of appreciating the work, all abstract and post post post modern as it is, with geometric devices AND romantic references AND potent color.
In a fine art college setting, the brainy presentation I attended today would receive its share of jaded nods of endorsement and hoity-toity sidelong glances, but the university crowd was unabashedly flabbergasted. There were expressions of wonderful unrefined puzzlement at Keyser's premise that "artwork without criticality lacks perspective and seriousness and is" (gasp!)..."self indulgence with artifice and pictorial devices"!
Following the presentation our classroom discussion was a full measure of realistic reaction to a pure, fine artist's thoughts and offerings. There was disbelief that the artist even knew what words were coming out of his mouth, even though every word and every thought made learned sense. There was praise and confusion. There was earnest debate and questioning. There was reaction.
Ahhhh, sublime success.
