Hot List
CONTACTStaffCAREER OPPORTUNITIESADVERTISE WITH USPRIVACY POLICYPRIVACY PREFERENCESTERMS OF USELEGAL NOTICE
© 2024 Pride Publishing Inc.
All Rights reserved
All Rights reserved
Scroll To Top
By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Private Policy and Terms of Use.
Disdain? Petulance? Melancholy? Ennui? It's hard to say what emotions, exactly, animate the children and babies that gaze moodily from Nir Hod's paintings. In his studio, a two-room walk up in New York's Meatpacking District, they've been occupying more and more wall space, crowding out Hod's earlier work like usurping cuckoos. Now, even Hod himself has flown the nest for a new apartment 15 blocks or so north, paid for in part by his restless brood, whose enigmatic personalities have struck a chord -- and earned Hod a hotly tipped solo show at New York City's Paul Kasmin Gallery, running through June 18th. Like their progenitor, those babies will soon have new homes.
Where do they come from, these 'baby geniuses' with their world-weary mien and luxuriant coiffures? Some, it turns out, are modeled on the artist himself; others on celebrated geniuses like the designer Yves Saint Laurent, or the classical musician Glenn Gould, whose expressions suggest boredom or grievance with life's limitations. Looking at them, Hod saw a parallel with spoiled rich kids who live in their own realities but are needy and vulnerable nonetheless. 'When I was a child I was always pouting when I wasn't happy,' he recalls. 'It was just to get attention, but it's so interesting and powerful to see it on a child because it conveys such self-awareness.'
There are other influences, too. With their pallid complexions and cigarettes dangling from limp hands, these children could be the progeny of the effete villains of classic Hollywood movies -- or Oscar Wilde. You expect a bon mot to escape their lips at any second. And the smoky backgrounds, the browns and mauves, capture the kitsch quality of child portraiture popular in Israel when Hod was growing up there in the 1970s. He left Israel for New York in 1999, shortly before his 30th birthday, and after having established himself as the resident provocateur of Israeli art with works exploring the tension between romanticism and reality that animates Israeli society. An early, controversial series of paintings of female Israeli soldiers included Hod himself, pony-tailed and glamorous, with a cell phone in one hand -- exaggeratedly campy and irreverent. Like an Israeli Jeff Koons, he blurs the boundaries between art star and rock star, often placing himself in the middle of his narratives. Much of his work is preoccupied with narcissism, beauty, and death -- concerns that were amplified by the photo-realist quality of his technique. He once planned on becoming a rock star with the express purpose of killing himself at the height of his fame, a fantasy he consummated in Broken Hearts, a painting of a young pop star, unconscious or possibly dead, a trace of cocaine around his nostrils. 'My paintings sometimes have something from dreams, not with their beauty and sweetness, but with their sadness and pain,' he says. 'It's something that breaks with the familiar.'
And despite appearances, there's something sad and even romantic about his baby geniuses, no matter how entitled they appear. Beyond the kitsch veneer, Hod has genuine affection for them, without which the paintings would just be cynical parodies. There's a sympathy at work that makes them more interesting, something in their defiance that makes them paradoxically fragile. Or, as Hod, puts it, 'All of them in some way want the love of their mother.'
Nir's Hot List
1. 'I'm planning to go to some far romantic place, calm and warm, a place that will fill my mind, my heart, and my soul with magic.'
2. 'Finally I found one of my favorite movies, Bitter Moon by Roman Polanski. I haven't watched it for nine years and can't wait to reacquaint myself with it.'
3. 'To eat, I like to go to Tatiana in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn. It's ridiculous in such a good way. It's like traveling behind the mirror. '
4. 'I'm reading Richard Branson's Losing My Virginity. The guy is a genius.'
To see the full 2011 Hot List, click here.
From our Sponsors
Most Popular
41 male celebs who did full frontal scenes
September 16 2024 2:02 PM
38 LGBTQ+ celebs you can follow on OnlyFans
July 23 2024 2:33 PM
33 actors who showed bare ass in movies & TV shows
September 17 2024 5:43 PM
These pics prove that Maluma is still our supreme thirst trap king
May 22 2024 6:29 PM
26 LGBTQ+ reality dating shows & where to watch them
July 03 2024 4:21 PM
20 times male celebrities had to come out as straight
September 13 2024 3:47 PM
15 queens who quit or retired from drag after 'RuPaul's Drag Race'
July 09 2024 11:33 AM
52 steamy celebrity Calvin Klein ads we'll always be thirsty for
August 27 2024 1:08 PM
15 gay celebrity couples who make us believe in love
October 03 2024 5:43 PM
A gay adult film star's complete guide to bottoming
September 16 2024 8:50 AM
Latest Stories
Taylor Frey & Kyle Dean Massey drop 'spicy' gay holiday movie
October 04 2024 7:45 PM
Genovia's is back—'The Princess Diaries 3' is official!
October 04 2024 5:34 PM
Menéndez brothers & the real people of 'Monsters': where are they now?
October 04 2024 5:30 PM
Trans kids are supported by parents but bullied at school
October 04 2024 4:15 PM
12 queer celebs showing off their sexy little briefs
October 04 2024 3:16 PM
Lauren Boebert refunds $67k after boxer rejects anti-trans campaign
October 04 2024 2:10 PM
Colton Haynes celebrates 6 years of sobriety in super sweet Insta post
October 04 2024 1:59 PM
'Joker: Folie à Deux' is a wandering mess that doesn't care about its subject—or audience
October 04 2024 1:48 PM
Shocking: Schools put windows in school restrooms
October 04 2024 10:31 AM
Hurricane destroys Asheville LGBTQ+ bar open only 31 days
October 04 2024 9:55 AM
These are all the 'Drag Race' queens who won crowns in 2024 (so far)
October 03 2024 6:21 PM
The 'Monsters' cast talks what the show gets right about the Menéndez story
October 03 2024 6:02 PM
44 stunning pics of Folsom Street Fair 2024 in San Francisco
October 03 2024 5:32 PM
GOP Senate hopeful: Military needs alphas, not LGBTQ+
October 03 2024 4:10 PM
Ryan Murphy says the Menéndez brothers should be 'sending me flowers'
October 03 2024 3:55 PM
Out and About with Sasheer Zamata
October 03 2024 3:08 PM
Is Agatha Harkness gay? A queer guide to 'Agatha All Along'
October 03 2024 2:18 PM