Peter Halley: Maintain Speed

by Susan Kandel, Rudi Fuchs

Painter, writer, teacher, and Peter Halley has been a widely influential figure in the international art world since his bold canvases were first shown in the early 1980s. Emerging from the East Village Neo-Geo scene, Halley soon became known for his aggressively colored Day-Glo paintings of square "cells" and rectilinear "conduits," titled with references ranging from the erudite to the pop.
While his paintings may initially recall the abstractions of Newman, Mondrian, and Albers, Halley's work breaks with the modernist agenda by insisting on a figurative referent, and, as curator and critic Dan Cameron has noted, Halley "effectively restate[s] the terms of abstraction in our time." For Halley, geometry is a profoundly social fact and his paintings are diagrams of the experience of space and time in contemporary society, depictions of loneliness and of connection.

Genres: Art

228 pages, Hardcover

First published April 1, 2000

About the author

Susan Kandel is the author of the critically acclaimed, L.A. Times-bestselling Cece Caruso mysteries, the most recent of which, DIAL H FOR HITCHCOCK (Harper, 2009) was named one of the five best mysteries of the year by NPR. Her upcoming book, DREAM A LITTLE DEATH, is the first in the Dreama Black series, and will be published by William Morrow's Witness Impulse in 2017.

Susan lives in West Hollywood, CA with her husband, Peter Lunenfeld, and her equally handsome dog, Cooper.

Reviews

[Terence · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty interesting book, great reproductions and a ridiculous design. Seriously out of control.