Beyond ‘Retaining Wall’: Gaze At The ‘Paintings’ And Other Evocative Works By Theaster Gates At Gray Warehouse

Installed diagonally across the expansive gallery at Chicago’s Gray Warehouse, Theaster Gates’ Retaining Wall fully captures the gaze from myriad angles. Experiencing its colossal presence and exploring its every “thing” — the countless items from the inventory acquired from the owner — invites a narrative about the death and creative rebirth of the family-owned hardware store and a once-bustling South Chicago neighborhood thriving with commerce, community, and socialization. The focal point and most prominent of four works displayed in the latest site-specific installation of How to Sell Hardware is astounding, yet the eye is immediately swept away on a social and historical journey throughout the room.

As I first entered the gallery, I was quickly drawn to the shimmering, colorful “paintings” on the enormous rear wall. Each of five large-scale “paintings,” including a shiny red and yellow Triangle (2021), a glimmering blue half moon Bowl (2021), a simple green Leaf (2021), a white Circle (2021), and red and white Rectangle (2021) stands on its own. Together, they make up Hardware Store Painting (2021), crafted from steel pegboard, pegs, and hardware store inventory. As you walk closer, each piece of inventory becomes a “thing” that commands a very different view than those contained in the 25 prodigious gabions featured in Retaining Wall. The simplicity of each painting is subverted by proximity when every “thing” is exposed. Surely, Hardware Store Painting would challenge and dazzle museum-goers at any major institution with the space and light to replicate this stunning display.

EXPLORE ‘RETAINING WALL’ AND CLOSING EVENTS AT GRAY WAREHOUSE: READ MORE

The genesis for the exhibition was born from an out-of-print book titled How to Sell Hardware (1913) by Roy F. Soule, which instructed hardware store owners how to effectively organize and display wares to attract customers. Gates’ exhibition by the same name is antithetical to the capitalist agenda. The book, in a clear plastic dust jacket, is displayed in a vitrine to the left of an accordion conveyor. History of Conveyance (2021), which was on view alongside a wall to the left as you enter the gallery, compels us to think about the efficiency of business management through production, shipment, and storage stages. We’re immediately transported back in time, imagining how gravity, rather than electricity, would convey a “thing.”

On the interior right wall of the gallery space, a simple installation emphasizes the complexity and breadth of Retaining Wall. Foot Scrubber (2021) is an oversized depiction of a mechanical shoe polisher, only made of rotary abrasives and metal that would scuff leather. Lighting displays illuminate the smallest work, reminding us of the importance of leaving space between the myriad “things” contained within the gabions of Retaining Wall, which allow light to emanate.

“There will be moments when we have to decide, ‘where does the light go?’ And how much investment I would have to ensure that the lights come on inside the gabions. What do the lights do relative to other gabions? … It has a light source, three or four, and it has composition,” said Gates.

For a detailed survey of how Gates has developed an enhanced artistic practice that includes space development, object making, performance, and critical engagement with various public spaces and audiences, read and view Theaster Gates by Lisa Lee. Indulge in rich photographs and Gates’ own writings, in this comprehensive, accessible Phaidon tome. Learn about Gates’ training as an urban planner and a sculptor, and how studying clay has informed and elevated his awareness of the poetics of production and systems of organizing.

Stunning images in the book include stills from 2 Ballads for Huguenot House (2012), which investigates the relationship between social enterprise, contemporary art practices, and architectural and cultural redevelopment. Gates hired and trained a team of unskilled laborers to help him dismantle the interior of a Chicago building slated for demolition. The salvaged materials were repurposed to restore the Huguenot House, a historic hotel, in Kassel, Germany. The project evolved into the foundation for a solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago.

2 Ballads for Huguenot House project featured ongoing musical performances by the Black Monks of Mississippi. Music plays a vital role in Gates’ work, most recently with his longtime friend DJ Madrid Perry collaborating for the closing of the Gray Warehouse exhibition.