I will be direct: Unusual denominator: Nina Katchadourian at the Morgana collaboration between artist Nina Katchadourian, the Morgan Library & Museum and Morgan curator Joel Smith, is one of the most unusual and captivating exhibitions I have come across in years.
Katchadourian began by asking several of the curators to choose an object from Morgan’s extensive collection that they hold dear; some of these works are in the exhibition. Then she and Smith set about selecting disparate works of art and artifacts, some very old, some recent, and everything in between. Interspersed, and often discreetly installed, are Katchadourian’s own works, as well as treasured objects from his family.
Everything relates to themes that have long been important to her: travel, maps, language, books, bodies, history (including personal and family) and the relationship between man and nature. Her sensibility – keenly intelligent, moving, playful, without limit of alertness – permeates everything. Not only the ideational but also abundant visual matches help to make the show so delightful and appealing.
An engraving by Dutch artist Jan van de Velde shows a witch spreading a bewitching white powder through the air to demons (“The Witch”, 1626). In the Katchadourian pic “Prince Charming” (2012), from his ongoing Allocation of seats series, two smiling airplane pilots look at each other in an airport. A similar white powder bewitches the two men, who seem eager for a torrid encounter.
The centerpiece of the exhibition is a collection of 24 lush Katchadourian photographs, commissioned by the Morgan, from his ongoing look who‘Talk series. She selected mostly lesser-known books by well-known authors from Morgan’s Carter Burden Collection of American Literature and arranged them in piles with their titles forming messages. Let’s start: Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Edward Albee). The Hilarious Response: Don (Zane Gray), Joey (Henry Miller), Charlie (Ben Hecht), Elmer (William Faulkner), Ferdinand (Munro Leaf and Robert Lawson) and Tiny Alice (Edward Albee); except for little Alice, all are men. It’s a sly but powerful critique of men terrified of powerful women.
The show easily crosses eras, categories, mediums, genres. On one wall, in an assortment of body-themed works, is an enchanting chalk drawing by Antoine Watteau of a young woman, her billowing dress half slipping over her shoulder, her face turned to the side as she gazes outward and upward (“Assise Jeune femme,” c.1716). Nearby are side-by-side photographs in a 1926 book with the alarming title Ein anatomischer Totentanz (An Anatomical Dance of Death) of a male javelin thrower and a skeleton apparently ready to throw a javelin, by Albert Hasselwander with Fritz Skell. This is quite a change from the Watteau.
Total surprise in an exhibition full of them, a handwritten and illustrated book on the human body, with an enchanting title The human body: the incredible machine (1975-1976), directed by Katchadourian when he was seven years old. One page features his drawing of a smiling “human skeleton”; below is the emphasis “Magnificent!” in bright red tinged with blue. Finding this childhood book in an institution renowned for books, many of which are rare and famous, is wonderful.
Among the approximately 130 items on display are the shredded remains of the champagne bottle that christened JP Morgan’s yacht, as well as various heirlooms from Katchadourian’s family. His Finnish grandfather meticulously repaired and restored an unremarkable plastic lid. This minimalist object is strange and attractive, although the grandfather never considered it art. Nearby is Katchadourian’s striking and colorful photograph “Renovated Mushroom (Tip-Top Tire Rubber Patch Kit)” (1998); instead of fixing a tire, she modified a fungus. Renovation and transformation in the family.
At first, the exhibit may seem overwhelming – basically a panoramic cabinet of curiosities, minus the cabinet. But after some time and exploration, the ultra-creative logic becomes apparent, with things organized into thematic groups. Plants? Golding Bird’s fern photogram of 1839, the first published photo and an anonymous c. Photo from the 1860s of a jungle scene in India. Nearby is an English woman’s scrapbook, containing real seaweed and a poem, and Katchadourian’s highly artificial green plant made of wire covered with paper, poster paint and product wrappers (“Plant # 32”, 2021), from her rightly titled fake plant series. Animals? A striking, anonymous 1960s photograph of a shaggy black dog on its hind legs at a window, Robert Benecke’s gruesome 1873 photo of bison heads, and a Mesopotamian alabaster seal over 3,000 years old showing cattle at a barn. Informative graphics? JP Morgan’s pocket diary of 1853 listing various Liverpool steamers, third mate LR Hale’s logbook of a long whaling voyage from 1857 to 1860, Saul’s Chart of Campaign Sounds Steinberg and Katchadourian’s “Beatle Log” (1981), a notebook chronicling each time she heard a Beatles song.
Most, perhaps all, non-art objects have probably never been the subject of an art exhibition. A surprising star is an assortment of small leather stamping tools in a handsome wooden case that Katchadourian spotted at the Department of Conservation. Used to adorn leather-bound books, they resemble a mysterious pictorial language.
Directly opposite is an embroidery sampler of young Lucy Katchadourian, who was orphaned during the Armenian Genocide (1915-1916), went to a refugee camp in Lebanon, and later joined the Katchadourian family, becoming the “bonus” of the artist, third grandmother. ” The beautiful multicolored sampler also suggests a pictorial language; it also seems spiritual, with its intricate – perhaps even cosmic – patterns. The fact that Lucy composed it out of immense trauma, suffering and death makes it all the more special, a captivating diasporic work by a young survivor.
Katchadourian can be riotous, and this exposition is often refreshingly humorous. The champagne bottleneck is next to a yacht model from JP Morgan, Jr. – I guess yacht-owning oligarchs go way back. Above, each in a different language, are 31 copies of the book Survive the wild sealong important to the artist (“Every Version of Survive the wild sea in all languages and all editions”, 2021). Bottle, yacht and books evoke an impending disaster: a yacht is christened, it sets sail, then yuck!
The exhibition is also often deeply moving. For 12 years, Katchadourian’s Finnish grandmother, Runa “Nunni” Lindfors, took pictures of her daughter, Stina (Nina’s mother), on her birthday wearing her first nightgown. The pretty accordion-folded book shows Stina growing in size, the nightgown shrinking. Note the Swedish title of “The Story of Why Stina’s First Nightgown Got Too Small” (1939-1952): “Berättelsen om varför Stinas första natipaitu blev för liten”. Katchadourian’s maternal family is from the Swedish-speaking minority in Finland.
Behind him on the wall is Katchadourian’s “Lake Michigan” (1996), in which paper-cut maps of the lake gradually enlarge. The two serial works echo each other, linking the two women. These connections underscore the creativity of what is indeed a remarkable spectacle.
Unusual denominator: Nina Katchadourian at the Morgan continues at the Morgan Library & Museum (225 Madison Avenue, Murray Hill, Manhattan) through May 28. The exhibition was curated by Joel Smith, curator of photography at Morgan and head of the photography department.
