CORY REYNOLDS | DATE 3/23/2018

Vija Celmins. A quieter, more beautiful book would be hard to find.

Featured image, of Vija Celmins' New York studio, 2017, is reproduced from the exquisite new Celmins monograph from Matthew Marks Gallery. Bob Nickas writes, "Above the street in a cool, orderly studio there is a sense of being both near and far—far from city noise and the earthbound, near to a stillness, a center of gravity and suspense… The oceans are painterly, with traces of brushwork, but the same cannot be said of the night skies. This difference may account for the distance between the sea and the heavens, between what may be accessed and what can only be imagined, each with its own depths… The ocean and the sky both serve to remind us that the limits of a painting are like the limits of a world. They inevitably make us feel small, even vulnerable at times, though often filled with wonder."