Bill Henson & Jeff Whetstone, neither that great?

Last week we went and saw 2 shows: Jeff Whetstone's Post-Pleistocene at Julie Saul Gallery and Bill Henson at Robert Miller gallery. Quiet frankly I wasn't too impressed with either.

Whetstone's idea of going into the caves with a large format camera and photographing the graffiti came off as a much better idea than execution. I think this print below was the only one where I really felt like the graffiti added to the work.



The prints were beautiful but was the subject interesting enough? Personally I was hoping that all the spray paint, carvings, and other markings left by the human touch would tell more of an immediate story, and while I know that isn't Whetstone's fault, as interesting as the caves look, the graffiti is the main subject. Would the show have been more interesting if it was just documenting caves that weren't covered in spray paint? Would it be in the gallery?

Whetstone actually has some other projects on his website which are worth checking out regardless of what you thought of this show.



And what about Bill Henson?



Well, he's selling prints for $25,000 - $29,000 and apparently has gotten into some controversy for what some think is sexualizing underage kids. I will leave out all personal opinion of this show because I feel like it requires more thought to talk about.

What do you think class? Please leave your responses as comments.