Matthew Barney’s The Occidental Guest is on view at the Gladstone Gallery in Chelsea in conjunction with the film Drawing Restraint 9. The film is the first to feature Barney with his partner, the musician Björk, who also scored the film.
Five or six years ago, the news that Matthew Barney and Björk were a couple struck the art world as the incarnation of a peculiar form of creativity; it seemed as if the two couldn’t have been better matched. Both artists have continually transformed themselves - Barney in his cool, conceptual sculptures and performances and Björk in her lush and experimental music - and both have cult followings.
The exhibition I saw today is like a visit to Barney’s mind, albeit with restricted access. I haven’t seen the film yet, but I’ve read enough to appreciate the references to a whaling vessel in the sculptures (or “models”) on display. But it was the feathery drawings that I found most amazing. They intimately relate his ideas about physical limitation and chart a course that lends logic to his imagery.
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