In ‘Zane + Ostendarp,’ at Drive-By Projects, canines and canvases collaborate
By Cate McQuaid Globe Correspondent,Updated December 26, 2023, 3:28 p.m.
WATERTOWN — Joe Zane’s realistic sculptures of dogs gaze at Carl Ostendarp’s paintings scrawled with cynical and cautionary messages, in “Zane + Ostendarp” at Drive-By Projects. The show embodies the tension between a dog’s loving heart and a human’s churning mind. That is part of the installation’s charm.
But “Zane + Ostendarp” is more nuanced. Both artists delight in calling out the art world’s self-importance. In 2017, “Zane/Ostendarp” at Carroll and Sons had Zane’s chicken sculptures viewing Ostendarp’s paintings of question marks. Zane’s conceptual multimedia works deflate the mythic artist’s ego. Ostendarp punctures notions of the grandeur of painting itself.
Even so, his paintings are love letters to his medium. These ones are tenderly made, stroked and dabbed in a mushroomy palette, despite messages such as “”It Don’t Matter” and “It’s Hard.” In “Watch it,” which Zane pairs with a bronze poop bag, apparently stray blots are in fact diligently crafted. The text itself seems to vibrate with tiny bristles. All three are gorgeous paintings in colors echoing the muck of a floor mopped with dirty water. High technique meets grumpy mood.
Zane’s avid pups are more than meet the eye, too, made with true-to-life postures and expressions, right down to a lolling tongue or nails that could damage the hardwood floor. It turns out they’re named after art critics. “Rosalind,” the panting poodle, is Rosalind Krauss. Breeds representing Hal Foster and Jerry Saltz are harder to identify — “Hal” might be a mutt, and “Jerry,” a spaniel. If Zane had made a “Clement,” for Modernist critic Clement Greenberg — who could make or break an artist at the height of Abstract Expressionism — it might have been a snooty Dachshund.
As a critic, well, I felt a little ruffled. My “watch it!” mind went into overdrive: “Are they suggesting art critics are dogs? Or that critics are as ignorant of the true labor and meaning behind a painting as a pooch is?” I wondered. “At least they’re not chickens.”
I was thinking too much. “Zane + Ostendarp” is a big goof, intended to pull the rug out from art-world types and tropes, and it happened to me. We humans get attached to our positions and ideas — and that can make art static. Contemporary art dismantles our precious attachments. So does comedy. This show is both.
ZANE + OSTENDARP
At Drive-By Projects, 81 Spring St., Watertown, through Jan. 8.
617-835-8255 https://drive-byprojects.com/
