iMinnesota Street Project · Dogpatch
Blaise Rosenthal: A Far Country
Blaise Rosenthal's large multi-canvas Monoliths and small Overpaintings, abstractions shaped by Northern California landscape, at Municipal Bonds.
The Mainland is more than nine feet wide: canvases butted together into a stepped block, a dark field split by one clean diagonal from an earth-brown wedge. Up close the surface is ruled with fine horizontal lines in charcoal, earth pigments and acrylic.
This is Rosenthal's second solo show at Municipal Bonds, and it hangs two series against each other. The Monoliths, like The Mainland and the new Terre Verte, join two or three canvases into one work. The Overpaintings are small, some 10 by 8 inches, and the artist says they come from "random acts of joy and desperation." You turn from a wall of grey geometry to a hand-sized canvas crusted with blue, yellow and white. Many were layered over years, the only layering in San Francisco that has nothing to do with Karl the Fog.
The gallery says the Overpaintings are rarely exhibited, which is the reason to go now. Admission is free, Tuesday to Saturday, 12 to 5pm, at 1275 Minnesota St, until 31 October.
Look for
The Mainland (2018)
Look for the biggest work listed, 75 by 110 inches: a dark charcoal field cut by one diagonal from a brown wedge, its right canvas stepped lower than the left.
Terre Verte (2026)
A new 60-by-90-inch Monolith where a dark, flat-topped trapezoid rises between two brown edges, the shape of a mountain with its peak sliced off.
La Petite Montagne (for Cézanne) (2026)
Just 14 by 18 inches: two small canvases hung at different heights, each with a dark slanting shape over tightly ruled grey lines.
Overpainting, 2012
The oldest work here, 10 by 8 inches, with thick white smears over raw canvas broken by streaks of cobalt blue and yellow.
Overpainting (for Dave), 2018
A 12-by-9-inch canvas crusted with layers of grey, lilac and turquoise, flecked with white drips.
Good for
- Cheap Culture
- Locals Who've Seen It All
Skip if
You want pictures of things: every work here is abstract, with landscape only as an undertone.
Also at Minnesota Street Project
On now nearby
Nearby
Image credits
7
- Blaise Rosenthal: A Far CountryCourtesy of Minnesota Street Project
- Martin Venezky: Process WorkLetterform Archive
- Type for All! Ten Years of Type WestLetterform Archive
- Caguiat Delacruz: The TrampCCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts
- Minnesota Street ProjectPigeonChickenFish / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Letterform ArchiveClyde Charles Brown / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary ArtsMariwlqs / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0