Chain link necklaces, long skater tees, and bright mustard Nikes: the long line of hip New Yorkers wrapped around 79th Street last night resembled more of a Kiki's waitlist than an Upper East Side gallery opening. Anchovied inside Acquavella, bodies brushed past each other to find a universe far from the French neoclassical townhouse its facade implies. Tom Sachs's third showing at the three-generation-owned gallery, which officially opens today, continues the artist's reckoning of the astrological and material worlds that we know, using familiar, DIY, and unexpected material to pierce the concept of galactic transit; specifically that a spaceship is not only a method of transportation but also a vessel for metaphysical and spiritual discovery.
Titled after the pieces Sachs hopes to redefine, "Spaceships" features new and recent sculptures and paintings including, Technics 1200MK3D, 2022, an Arshem-eqsue turntable sculpture and Generation Ship, 2019 - 2022, a mop bucket re-seen as a vessel to tranquility. "There are three reasons people do anything—spirituality, sensuality, and stuff," the artist explained in a statement for the exhibition. "Spirituality is asking the big questions...Sensuality is going where no man has gone before...Stuff is the hardware: a spaceship, a cathedral, a tea bowl. That’s what we make. Our priority is sculpture, but it doesn’t mean shit without the ritual and without the spirituality and the reasons behind it. You’ve gotta have all three.”
“Spaceships” is on view at Acquavella from October 7 to November 26, 2022, at 18 E 79th Street, New York, NY 10075.