Folkert de Jong.

Conner, Jill

FOLKERT DE JONG by Jill Conner James Cohan Gallery, New York NY October 20 * November 24, 2007

Folkert de Jong's "Les Saltimbanques," the Dutch artist's first solo show in New York, consists of four sculptural installations that take as their theme commedia dell'arte, here focused on the many ironies that underlie what he terms the "big moral contradictions" of the current geo-political juggernaut. Usually this sort of nostalgic agitprop tends to fall flat in the company of most contemporary neophytes, mistaking in-your-face generalization for improvisational, local satire (the hallmark of Italian Comedy). But de Jong's elaborately painted, freestanding dioramas cast from Styrofoam and polyurethane succeed where many a counterpart do not, rudely unpacking the "acrobatic" mechanisms of the global media spectacle via a medium of toxic, de-sublimated shadow play.

Situated to the left of James Cohan's entrance, Les Saltimbanques (all work 2007) comprises a tableau mourant of five unfortunates who, in mute travesty of Picasso's The Saltimbanques, seem even more isolated or derelict than those found in the 1905 original, looking for all the world like a Green Peace sting operation gone wrong. No longer so much a harlequinade exercise in the artist-as-vagabond, de Jong's luridly colored gens du voyage have either fallen foul of the system or taken a last stand, symbolized by the now basketless little girl standing on the barrel once hoisted on an older youth's shoulder, her arms thrown hieratically into the air. Moreover, the figurine colors often give the impression of having been haphazardly applied, tending to bleed and run together like smeared mascara or oil pollution. And despite the recurring presence of this Delph-blue oil barrel throughout "Les Saltimbanques," what it signifies is no less insightful than Picasso's earthier tumbler's barrel, but here tracing real-life ups and downs of the petroleum industry.

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This cosmic farce continues into the next room where two sculptural groupings form Human Pyramid, made up of a small jester standing on a barrel gesturing toward six castellers precariously pyramided on three further barrels, each wearing something like a cross between a Japanese and Roman theatrical mask. Partly a product of the need to work quickly when casting from wet foam, these applied facial expressions conjure typical multi-corporate indifference to the social aftermath of escalating oil prices. In the back of the gallery is Circle of Trust, which shows another family of acrobats in smears and tatters gathered casually around two barrels, leaving it entirely unclear whether they are merry recipients of an oil-based global economy or its hapless victims. While "Les Saltimbanques" conveys a new twist on the established European tradition of using pantomime to express human folly, however, de Jong's concurrent, monumental Mount Maslow at the Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art brings it full circle. Intended as a long-term installation (opening October 21), this 18-foot-high Styrofoam mountain snow-scape with two bearded climbers staring at the words "Hamburger Hill" carved into the glacier above them refers not only to the famous 1987 anti-Vietnam War movie, but also to the artist's long-term interest in philosopher Abraham Maslow's 1943 theory of a "pyramid of needs," raising the thought that instead of always seeking more through whatever means necessary, humans might begin to seek a more elevating if equitable fuel.