Issue 224
January/February 2022

‘Destroy all critics’ – Dan Fox on Mike Kelley  

In the January/February issue of friezeDan Fox examines Mike Kelley’s influential writings on the 10th anniversary of the artist’s death. And Amy Sherlock profiles the sculptor Magali Reus, whose solo show at the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas, USA, opens this spring. 

Essay: Dan Fox on Mike Kelley  
‘Being “bad” made Kelley’s writing fun.’ Since Kelley’s death a decade ago, the artist’s gonzo visions have only seemed more prophetic. Lesser known is his gleefully perverse, free-wheeling writing practice, which looks at art history through the wrong end of the telescope. 

Profile: Magali Reus  
‘I am always pushing against the nature of materials.’ In her final assignment as frieze’s deputy editor, Amy Sherlock returns to Reus’s east London studio to witness preparations for a major new exhibition at Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas  

Also featuring    
The chief curator of CAPC Musée, Cédric Fauq, speaks with Julien Creuzet ahead of the artist’s first UK show at Camden Arts Centre. In ‘1,500 words’, So Mayer explores Stefan and Franciszka Themerson’s recently re-discovered experimental anti-fascist film, Europa (1931). And for the dossier, we present an oral history interview with the original members of the Los Angeles-based Chicano art group Asco. 

Columns: Catching Feelings 
On the 25th anniversary of Wong Kar-Wai’s Happy Together (1997), Shiv Kotecha reflects on the legacy of actor Leslie CheungTan Lin reveals his guilty pleasures, including an unexpected love of billiards; Shygirl speaks about writing the perfect love song. Plus, author Neil Bartlett dives into a new compendium of AA Bronson’s recent works, House of Shame (2021), and critic Bruce Hainley speaks with curator Jordan Stein about his affection for an unfinished work by Jay Dafeo.  

Finally, artist Jonathan Griffin responds to a single work by Liz LarnerJennifer Packer answers our questionnaire and the latest iteration of frieze’s Lonely Arts column. 

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From this issue

Neil Bartlett on the lessons Bronson’s art practice teaches in the face of catastrophe

BY Neil Bartlett | 25 FEB 22

Amy Sherlock returns to the artist’s east London studio to witness preparations for a major new exhibition at Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas 

BY Amy Sherlock AND Magali Reus | 21 FEB 22

25 years after its premiere, Wong’s film about being unable to escape the present strikes a new relevance 

BY Shiv Kotecha | 11 FEB 22

The ‘Cleo’ singer on her practice and inspiration

BY Khuroum Ali Bukhari AND Shygirl | 04 FEB 22

On Stefan and Franciszka Themerson’s celebrated experimental anti-fascist film poem, Europa

BY So Mayer | 28 JAN 22

Ahead of his first UK institutional exhibition at Camden Art Centre in London, the artist speaks with curator Cédric Fauq about how returning to Martinique after a decade made him rethink anti-colonial approaches

BY Cédric Fauq AND Julien Creuzet | 14 JAN 22

The writer reflects on how secretly loving pool led him down a path of self-education

BY Tan Lin | 07 JAN 22

Members and affiliates of Asco reflect on the influence of the Los Angeles avant-garde group and the events that inspired its creation

Hainley speaks to Stein about his new book, Rip Tales, a homage to DeFeo and San Francisco

BY Bruce Hainley AND Jordan Stein | 31 DEC 21

On the occasion of Liz Larner’s survey at Sculpture Center in New York, Jonathan Griffin looks closely at black iris (2021)

BY Jonathan Griffin | 30 DEC 21

On the tenth anniversary of Kelley’s death, Dan Fox rereads the artist’s writing and criticism

BY Dan Fox | 15 DEC 21

The artist’s survey exhibition at Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid, explores Spanish cultural and socio-political practices and how collective belonging is intertwined with cultural production

BY Alejandro Alonso Díaz | 18 NOV 21

For her exhibition at Balice Hertling, the artist gives new life and meaning to items found discarded on the streets of Paris

BY Oriane Durand | 15 NOV 21

At Sophie Tappeiner, Vienna, the Berlin-based artist presents a series of painted false idylls

BY Ramona Heinlein | 12 NOV 21

At the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, a massive survey, focusing on the famed artist's legacy, bypasses new readings of his oeuvre

BY Will Fenstermaker | 12 NOV 21

At Hauser & Wirth, New York, a survey of the late artist’s paintings presents a body of work that goes beyond her biography as a woman who survived the Holocaust

BY Peter Brock | 09 NOV 21

At Camden Art Centre, the artist creates a teenage dreamland with mini discs, Mariah Carey and grape soda to evoke inmate adolescent memories    

BY Kevin Brazil | 08 NOV 21

Curated by Larry Ossei-Mensah and Omsk Social Club, the 7th edition of the Biennale highlights the African diaspora and imagines new worlds

BY Chloe Stead | 05 NOV 21

In their first solo exhibition in Mexico City, the artist reflects on the history of computer technology through the lens of Blackness

BY Mebrak Tareke | 05 NOV 21

At Lafayette Anticipations, the famed fashion designer achieves little in translating his much-lauded tactics of defamiliarization into art

BY Jeppe Ugelvig | 03 NOV 21

At Jessica Silverman, the artist presents a group of ceramics and still-life paintings that recall our experiences of being shuttered in our homes during lockdown

BY Natasha Boas | 02 NOV 21

In her inaugural show at Massimo De Carlo London, the artist and recent recipient of the MacArthur ‘Genius’ Fellowship renders today’s world with thoughtful tranquillity

BY Nimco Kulmiye Hussein | 01 NOV 21

At Multimedia Art Museum, Moscow, the late Russian artist’s paintings of faces consider what it means to be human

BY Valerie Mindlin | 28 OCT 21

The artist’s installation at Material Exhibitions, Chicago, is both cynical and deferential towards the art world

BY Alex Jen | 27 OCT 21

The group show ‘Extra Worlding’ tries to revive the political core of utopian thinking

BY Philipp Hindahl | 26 OCT 21

At Sprüth Magers in London, the artist’s robotic snake is a harbinger of destruction and regeneration

BY Tom Morton | 25 OCT 21

At Sir John Soane’s Museum, London, the artist’s depictions of the excesses of consumerism and empire are all-too seductive

BY Cal Revely-Calder | 20 OCT 21

At Track 16, Los Angeles, the artist presents a collection of orientalist-inspired works that poignantly address current issues of race and misogyny in the US

BY Amber Power | 18 OCT 21

A tactile archive exhibition of the artist’s photography at Birmingham’s Grand Union evokes the joyful resilience of LGBTQ+ people in the face of adversity

BY Emily Scarrott | 18 OCT 21

For her first solo exhibition at Berlin’s Guido W. Baudach, the artist finds the concealed connections between Dubai and Berlin, relaying both places’ urban histories

BY Sonja-Maria Borstner | 14 OCT 21

At Sikkema Jenkins, New York, the artist’s latest bon-mot works tackle the anxieties and fears of the pandemic

BY Paul Stephens | 12 OCT 21

The artist’s deft and personal paintings documenting gay Chicano culture in the 1980s and ’90s take centre stage at Ortuzar Projects, New York

BY David Everitt Howe | 08 OCT 21

In a series of sculptures and installation works, the artist unpacks the self-destructive consequences of their faith in the solidarity of cisgender white men

BY Simon Wu | 08 OCT 21

At Alexander Gray Associates, New York, the artist presents a suite of new mixed-media canvases that continue her formal and social investigations into geometric abstraction

BY Ian Bourland | 07 OCT 21

At Schinkel Pavillon, Berlin, the two artists find common ground in sculptures, drawings, paintings and prints that evoke the unknown

BY Mitch Speed | 07 OCT 21

Based on visits to this unique archaeological site, the artist's new series of ceramic sculptures mine the past to remind us of the fragility of the present

BY Ana Vukadin | 07 OCT 21

In Sadie Coles’s sprawling Kingly Street gallery, Helen Marten lays out an exquisite corpse of ordinary affects. It’s impossible to see in totality so we rely on the clues

BY Alice Bucknell | 30 SEP 21

The artist’s solo show at London’s Ginny on Frederick creates a complex confrontation with fragmented, sexualized humanity

BY Sam Moore | 23 SEP 21