Marc Handelman

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Marc Handelman Exhibited at The Saatchi Gallery

Marc Handelman
Our Banner in the Sky

2005

oil on canvas

226 x 365 cm
Our Banner in the Sky is based on an iconic 1861 Civil War propaganda painting of the same title by Hudson River School artist Frederick Church, in which streaks of red and white cloud fill an early dawn sky behind a dead tree to form an almost abstract double-image of the American flag. Widely circulated in the form of a mass-produced print, it was intended to rally Union supporters, indicating a victory prefigured in the heavens. Handelman ramps up the illusionistic, visionary power of the original painting by greatly increasing its size, while at the same time cropping it to strip away its surrounding landscape. Furthermore, the flag itself has been inverted, a defiant gesture on the part of the artist to express his own ambiguity of feelings regarding national identity, ideology and morality in the contemporary political climate.
Marc Handelman
Plan for Victory

2005

oil on canvas

227.3 x 193cm
Adopting the languages and motifs of iconic images, Handelman’s paintings crop, manipulate and invert their sources to formulate abstracted and fragmented fields that resound with the uncanny. Through this re-ordering, Handelman forges parallels between media, kitsch and spirituality. Inspired by American Luminists such as Frederic Edwin Church and Fitz Hugh Lane, Handelman’s canvases incorporate light as a dramatic tool, simultaneously conjuring associations of grandeur, heraldry and divinity, while underscoring their representation as artificial constructions.
Marc Handelman
Nurnberg, 1937

2006

oil on canvas

335.3 x 335.3cm

Marc Handelman analyses and repackages the power of visual images. His work questions the relationship between aesthetics and ethics, making references to the glory of nineteenth-century American landscape painting, political propaganda, Nazi architecture, photo-journalism, advertising, and the USA’s most beloved home decor artist Thomas Kinkade. Choosing his sources for their contemporary and historical associations with politics, religion and social ideals, Handelman pastiches the alluring visual strategies of dogma and propaganda. Expropriating these dynamic genres from their associated ideologies, Handelman’s canvases reverberate with hollow splendour, creating a critical meta-aesthetic reflective of a new global outlook.






Other artists in
USA TODAY

Ellen Altfest    Kristin Baker    Huma Bhabha    Mark Bradford    Matthew Brannon    Carter    Mathew Cerletty    Dan Colen    Adam Cvijanovic    Gerald Davis    Jules de Balincourt    Inka Essenhigh    Brian Fahlstrom    Jason Fox    Barnaby Furnas    Luis Gispert    Mark Grotjahn    Marc Handelman    Daniel Hesidence    Elliot Hundley    Matthew Day Jackson    Terence Koh    Douglas Kolk    Florian Maier-Aichen    Ryan McGinness    Rodney McMillian    Josephine Meckseper    Jin Meyerson    Aleksandra Mir    Matthew Monahan    Wangechi Mutu    Jon Pylypchuk    Christoph Schmidberger    Lara Schnitger    Dana Schutz    Josh Smith    Dash Snow    Erick Swenson    Ryan Trecartin    Banks Violette    Kelley Walker    Dan Walsh

Marc Handelman's Biography

Marc Handelman
Born 1975, Santa Clara CA
Lives and Works in Brooklyn, NY


SOLO EXHIBITIONS


2011
Geological Sketches at Home and Abroad, Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York, NY

2009
Marc Handelman, David Schutter, Sikkema Jenkins & Co. New York, NY

2008
TOMORROW’S FORECAST: STRIKINGLY CLEAR. Marc Selwyn Fine Art,
Los Angeles, CA

2007
Empire of the Eye, Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York, NY

2005
Scenes From the New Miasma, Marc Selwyn Fine Art, Los Angeles, CA

2004
Warm White Blizzard, Lombard-Freid Fine Arts, New York

2000
Security, Lenore Gray Gallery, Providence, RI


GROUP EXHIBITIONS


2011
Creating the New Century: Contemporary Art from the Dicke Collection, The
Dayton Art Institute, Dayton, OH

2010
Book Ends, James Fuentes LLC, New York, NY
Carry-On, Gallerie West, Den Haag, Holland
Parts & Labor, Soloway, Brooklyn, NY
Precarity and the Butter Tower, CTRL Gallery, Houston, TX
Summer Group Exhibition, Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York, NY

2009
Kings County Biennial, curators: James Fuentes and Kidd Yellin, Kidd Yellin
Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Abstract America, The Saatchi Gallery, London, UK
Splinter of the Minds Eye, Philip Slein Gallery, St. Louis, MO
On From Here, Guild & Greyshkull, New York, NY
Do They Love Their Children Too?, Milliken Gallery, Armory Show, NY, & Miliken
Gallery, Stockholm Sweden.

2008
That Was Then . . .This Is Now, PS1 MOMA, Long Island City, NY
Audacity in Art, Colelctor’s Choice III, Selected works from central Florida
collections, Orlando Museum of Art, Orlando, Fl
Harlem Postcards, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY
Opportunity as Community, Artists Select Artists: Part II, Dieu Donne, New York, NY
8 1/2 X 11 / A4, James Fuentes LLC, New York, NY
Legerdemain, Sue Scott Gallery, New York, NY

2007
Emergency, PS1 MOMA, Long Island City, NY,
Unfathom, Max Protetch, New York, NY
Summer Group Exhibition, Sikkema Jenkins & Co. New York, NY
Neo-integrity, Derek Eller Gallery, New York, NY
Warhol and…,Kantor/Feuer, Los Angeles, CA.
Practical F/X, Mary Boone, New York, NY
New Acquisitions, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO
Brief Encounters, Caren Golden Fine Art, New York, NY
An Orchid in the Land of Technology, OHT, Boston, MA

2006
USA TODAY, Royal Academy of Arts, London, UK
This Ain’t no Fooling Around (Art During War Time), Rubicon Gallery, Dublin,
Ireland, Letterkiney Art Center, Letterkiney, Ireland.
Turn the Beat Around, Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York, NY
New Trajectories I, Recent Painting, Drawing and Multimedia Work from the Ovitz
Collection Los Angeles, Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery, Reed College,
Portland OR.

2005
The General’s Jamboree, Guild & Greshkul, New York, NY
New Acquisitions, Orlando Museum of Art, Orlando, FL
Fast Forward: Passion for the New, House of Campari, Venice, CA
ATOMICA, Lombard-Freid Fine Arts and Esso Gallery, New York, NY
This Hard, Gem-Like Flame, Angstrom Gallery, Dallas, TX
Exploding Plastic Inevitable: 40 Fun Galleries, Bergdorf Goodman, New York, NY

2004
Ciao Manhattan, Perugi Arte Contemporanea, Padova, Italy,
Emo Eco, Kavi Gupta Gallery, Chicago, IL
Back to Paint, C&M Arts, New York, NY
The Sublime is Still (Now), Elizabeth Dee Gallery, New York, NY
Surface Tension, Lombard-Freid Fine Arts, New York, NY

2003
Pantone, Massimo Audiello, New York, NY
The Changing Same, Artists in Harlem, Triple Candie, New York, NY
The 2003 Wight Biennial, Wight Gallery, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA
Lordship and Bondage, Leroy Neiman Gallery, Columbia University, New York, NY
The Burnt Orange Heresy, Space 101, Brooklyn, NY
Columbia University MFA Thesis Exhibition, Curated by: Lia Gangitano, The
Studebaker Building, New York, NY

2002
Procession (An exhibition in three locations), Curated by: Eva Respini, Columbia
University, New York, NY
Painting as Paradox, Curated by: Lauri Firstenberg, Artists Space, New York, NY
Escape, Egizio’s Project, New York, NY
Visual Arts MFA First Year Exhibition, Curated by: Eunje Joo, Wallach Gallery, New York, NY
Marc Handelman: Project Room, Rare, New York, NY

2001
Texas National 2001, Stephan Austin State University, Narcoganges, TX
Group Show, Gallery Agniel, Providence, RI
2000 The 2000 Group, Lenore Gray Gallery, Providence, RI
Marc Handelman, Anthony Bevilacqua, Four Corners Art Center, Tiverton, RI
Smorgasbord, Transient Space, Boston, MA
Marc Handelman, Lynn Curtis, Helen Cantrell, Full Circle Gallery, Providence, RI

1999
Monotype and Beyond, Attleboro Museum, Attleboro, MA
1999 Savlanut, Hillel Gallery, Brown University, Providence, RI
New Faces/ New Work, Artists Invitational, P.A.C., Providence, RI