Joyce Pensato at Friedrich Petzel

Batman, 2012, Enamel on Linen

New York: Joyce Pensato, ‘Batman Returns’, at Friedrich Petzel Gallery.  From the gallery write-up:

“Alongside Pensato’s Batman motif will be paintings and drawings incorporating her familiar cartoon imagery of clowns, Homer Simpson, Groucho Marx, Mickey Mouse, and a character the artist refers to as “The Juicer.” Furthermore, she will present assemblages of toys, ephemera, and stuffed animals throughout the gallery and will show as well approximately fifteen to twenty photographs of striking tableaux of the aforementioned elements taken by the artist at various times of day and night in her former studio. Through these old and new mediums, Pensato continues her baleful transmutation of American cartoon culture - employing her fast, assured, and gestural hand to shed light on the arguable darkness lurking within our familiar Pop iconography. What lay beneath Batman’s mask was, perhaps only for a moment, Bruce Wayne”

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Pensato’s work made me think of Jean-Philippe Harvey, a Montreal based painter.  Both artists make gestural images that hover between representation and abstraction, and both draw on pop cultural motifs with sinister results.

Jean-Philippe Harvey, Smilin’ Death, acrylic on canvas, 2009