Amer Kobaslija, “The Poetics of Space: New Paintings”

Florida Studio III

Photograph: Courtesy George Adams Gallery

Amer Kobaslija’s visual world teeters between the studio and the public restroom, the subjects of his latest paintings. Depicted from odd angles and vertiginous perspectives, the sutdios seem to list and heave in some panels; in others, the walls appear to fall open. His anonymous bathrooms, also captured from odd angles, are littered with smashed bottles, soggy cardboard and sodden mops—the sort of place where you end up when the room begins to spin.

Such images lend themselves to any number of interpretations. The studios, off-kilter, clotted with rags, brushes and canvases, might be symbols of our affluent, if unmoored society; the toilets, meditations on selfishness and excess. That Kobaslija grew up in Bosnia during the time of ethnic cleansing further suggests that he is reminding us of how easily things can fall apart.

The use of mirrors as well as paintings within paintings to complicate pictorial space reflects conceits used by artists for centuries to show off their craft and its tenuous relationship to reality. The eviscerated carcass hanging in Florida Studio 3, for example, recalls Rembrandt’s Slaughtered Ox. So perhaps Kobaslija is really exploring the illusionistic and imaginistic aspects of his medium.

However, such references quickly become tiresome, especially in the larger pieces in this show. Luckily, the smaller, simpler ones remain compelling.