"Beyond/in Western New York".

Sayej, Nadja

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"BEYOND/IN WESTERN NEW YORK"

Albright-Knox Art Gallery et al., Buffalo NY September 14 * October 20, 2007

When we see "I [love] NY" logos emblazoned on T-shirts, coffee mugs, and the like, rarely do we think of bright lights beyond the big city. But this second annual biennial, spearheaded by the Albright-Knox public art gallery, shows that regional work in Upstate and Western New York can shine just as brightly.

Choosing 50 artists from Syracuse, Batavia, Hornell, Niagara Falls, Ithaca, and Toronto, the survey, pegged in 12 galleries across Buffalo, has tripled in size since its first conception in 2005. So what do they have to say not-so-way-out west? That the art fostered in fringe towns would much rather stretch out across Western New York than fight for a cramped piece of drywall in a Chelsea group show. While last time set the stage for readymade sculptures (Carlo Cesta) and minimalist painting (Anitra Hamilton), this year snaps and crackles with digital pop and DIY fershizzle. But that doesn't mean the biennale mimics or mocks big-city white boxes, it just kind of sings along to its own off-beaten track.

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Take Transhuman Dance Recital, No. 1 (2007), a video by Toronto artist Jeremy Bailey, who seems to be moonlighting as altogether media commentator, pop star, and motion designer. Clad in black-rimmed glasses and mod hipster haircut, Bailey's talking head sporting animated pink octopus legs prattles on about his newfound freedom and, to prove a point, starts dancing to New Order's 1986 hit "Bizarre Love Triangle" while a cutesy turquoise triangle ping-pongs around the screen like an old video arcade game. Also on show at Albright-Knox are hundreds of images of typewritten poetry and bug-eyed cartoons by New Berlin-based Simone Mantellassi. Sitting in ratty, though lovingly chosen frames on two intersecting walls, the exhibits from his Otto Series (2006-07) seem to be channeling the ghosts of Margaret Kilgallen and her surviving husband and collaborator Barry McGee, two key players in the 1990s San Francisco graffiti and folk movement.

Over at Squeaky Wheel, Buffalo's media arts center, Yvonne Buchanan from Syracuse presented This Blackness (2007). This animated short composed of dancing black polka dots on a crisp white background brings to mind what a flea might see when hopping along a Dalmatian's back, while local artist Adam Weekley's nine soft-sculpture beehives offered caramel-covered treats to the audience at nearby Hallwalls. With the walls painted bubblegum-Barbie pink, and clouds that transport us to the pages of anime graphic novels, a life-sized teddy bear with no face stands inconsolably before a mirror. Hallwalls, now located in a church owned by local songstress Ani DiFranco, was founded on Buffalo's West Side in late 1974 by a group of young artists, including Cindy Sherman and Robert Longo.

Yet unlike Sherman and Longo, who like so many others jumpstarted their careers in the Big Apple, the artists in "Beyond/In WNY" are doing the very opposite: carving out a scene here at home, hoping to draw collectors and grow from the experience. They may as well promote a new logo for their own region, one that reads "I [love] Western NY"--an appropriate text message for a bold new scene still in the making.