Review: Daniel Knorr at Kayne Griffin Corcoran

Daniel Knorr’s L.A. solo debut at Kayne Griffin Corcoran features an array of brightly colored wall pieces that resemble polished quartz, shards of hard candy, or perhaps the crystallized remains of a spilled Slurpee.

Mostly ovoid in shape, with delicately irregular edges, they are mirror-smooth on the surface but semi-transparent, revealing craggy fissures and cracks in their depths. They feel both natural and artificial, which makes sense since they are cast from L.A.’s potholes, organic blemishes in a synthetic landscape.

The show is fittingly titled “Depression Elevations,” not only for the way in which it literally turns negative space into an object but also because it elevates the lowly pothole, bane of many an Angeleno’s commute, to the status of art in the elegant vein of Minimalism and Finish Fetish.

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In celebrating the pothole, the Berlin artist draws our attention to the urban expansion, over-crowding and whims of nature that define our city’s crumbling infrastructure. He has also filled a few potholes in the process, if only symbolically.

A companion piece involved another civic service: picking up garbage from the side of the road. The collected treasures — beer cans, toys, scraps of paper — were then pressed between the pages of an edition of blank books, creating their own layered depressions. As with the potholes, Knorr has given these overlooked things a chance to make their mark.

Kayne Griffin Corcoran, 1201 S. La Brea Ave., (310) 586-6886, through Sept. 14. Closed Sundays and Mondays. www.kaynegriffincorcoran.com

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