René Daniëls

Although they were later lumped under the rubric of Neo-Expressionism, a wave of European artists who began to show in New York during the late 1970s and early 1980s were better known on the Continent as the Trans Avant Garde. The term was meant to suggest some sort of reaching past the confines of cutting-edge aesthetics, to reengage previously off-limits categories like representational painting, while maintaining Conceptualist cred. Dutch artist René Daniëls was one such revivalist, who exhibited during this time at Metro Pictures, home to members of the Pictures Generation like Robert Longo and Cindy Sherman. The gallery collects examples of his watercolors and drawings from the period, which strikingly resemble work you're likely to encounter at small Lower East Side venues devoted to young artists.