jeremy tessmer | curator & designer

Matthew Collings and I are soul mates. I’m not saying that I want to hold his hand and take long walks on the beach, but when the editorial writer of Modern Painters and veteran British art critic writes about contemporary art, I find myself nodding as I read.

This month’s Modern Painters asks about some irony-trapeze artist,

Is it serious? Is it puerile attention-seeking? Or is that, but with other dimensions, other depths? Which bit is the deep part?

His special brand of criticism is high-minded and serious, but it is also colloquial and ready-to-wear. He is earnest, but he can also affect that wonderfully arch tone that seems the exclusive province of well-educated Brits. This glitchy vacillation between art world elitist and street-wise Londoner hits just the right note for reviews of international contemporary art. Seriously, check him out.