Uploaded July 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Moments in motion ⏳✨ at MOCA Grand Ave.
Josh Kline, born in Philadelphia and now based in New York, explores themes of work, class, and technology in his influential body of art. Using a range of mediums including digitization, biometric scanning, and 3D printing, he critiques contemporary issues like climate change and automation. Kline’s work often turns these technologies and practices on themselves, examining their societal impacts.
The short film “Adaptation” (2019–22) imagines a future Manhattan transformed by climate change and follows a team of relief workers at the end of their shift. Described by the artist as a “science fiction of ordinary life,” the film focuses on what tomorrow could be like for the working people who will clean up the inevitable mess resulting from the political and economic decisions of previous generations. The fictional workers of “Adaptation” survive by doing the kind of essential but poorly compensated, physically taxing jobs that society takes for granted.
Using primarily analogue special effects—scale models, miniatures, and matte shots—and 16mm color film instead of high-definition digital video, Kline creates an expressionistic science fiction that suggests a nostalgia for the present from the perspective of a future transformed by global warming. Although it was filmed in 2019, the work was completed during the pandemic, and its poetic voiceover and melancholy soundtrack, both added in 2020, quietly evoke the lockdown and quarantine in New York.
Alice Neel, aged 73 at the time of this painting, spent her lifetime creating expressionistic portraits of friends, lovers, family members, and artists from her New York social circle.
In this portrait, artist Robbie Tillotson casually sits cross-legged, staring at the viewer with hands raised, fingers splayed, and lips slightly parted as though in mid-sentence or mid-thought. Tillotson’s heavy-lidded eyes look out intently beneath a dark, curly coif and above an ambiguously shadowed upper lip. The dramatic dipping cowl neck of his red top, along with the dynamism of his flared pants and puckered lips, are androgynous, keyed as neither distinctly feminine nor masculine. Neel casts Tillotson as a fluid figure, poised between words, gestures, and genders.
On view now at MOCA Grand Ave. FREE with advanced reservation. See moca.org for more info.
#JoshKline
#Reverberations
#AliceNeel
—
Video courtesy of Wilson Cetina Group.
Image: Josh Kline, Adaptation (still) (2019-22). 16mm film (color, sound), 10:45 min. Courtesy of the artist; 47 Canal, New York; and Lisson Gallery, © Josh Kline.
Image: Alice Neel, Robbie Tillotson, 1973. Oil on canvas. MOCA Collection. Gift of Hartley and Richard Neel © The Estate of Alice Neel
Moments in motion ⏳✨ at MOCA Grand Ave.
Josh Kline, born in Philadelphia and now based in New York, explores themes of work, class, and technology in his influential body of art. Using a range of mediums including digitization, biometric scanning, and 3D printing, he critiques contemporary issues like climate change and automation. Kline’s work often turns these technologies and practices on themselves, examining their societal impacts.
The short film “Adaptation” (2019–22) imagines a future Manhattan transformed by climate change and follows a team of relief workers at the end of their shift. Described by the artist as a “science fiction of ordinary life,” the film focuses on what tomorrow could be like for the working people who will clean up the inevitable mess resulting from the political and economic decisions of previous generations. The fictional workers of “Adaptation” survive by doing the kind of essential but poorly compensated, physically taxing jobs that society takes for granted.
Using primarily analogue special effects—scale models, miniatures, and matte shots—and 16mm color film instead of high-definition digital video, Kline creates an expressionistic science fiction that suggests a nostalgia for the present from the perspective of a future transformed by global warming. Although it was filmed in 2019, the work was completed during the pandemic, and its poetic voiceover and melancholy soundtrack, both added in 2020, quietly evoke the lockdown and quarantine in New York.
Alice Neel, aged 73 at the time of this painting, spent her lifetime creating expressionistic portraits of friends, lovers, family members, and artists from her New York social circle.
In this portrait, artist Robbie Tillotson casually sits cross-legged, staring at the viewer with hands raised, fingers splayed, and lips slightly parted as though in mid-sentence or mid-thought. Tillotson’s heavy-lidded eyes look out intently beneath a dark, curly coif and above an ambiguously shadowed upper lip. The dramatic dipping cowl neck of his red top, along with the dynamism of his flared pants and puckered lips, are androgynous, keyed as neither distinctly feminine nor masculine. Neel casts Tillotson as a fluid figure, poised between words, gestures, and genders.
On view now at MOCA Grand Ave. FREE with advanced reservation. See moca.org for more info.
#JoshKline
#Reverberations
#AliceNeel
—
Video courtesy of Wilson Cetina Group.
Image: Josh Kline, Adaptation (still) (2019-22). 16mm film (color, sound), 10:45 min. Courtesy of the artist; 47 Canal, New York; and Lisson Gallery, © Josh Kline.
Image: Alice Neel, Robbie Tillotson, 1973. Oil on canvas. MOCA Collection. Gift of Hartley and Richard Neel © The Estate of Alice Neel
