Charles Ray at Matthew Marks Gallery

Charles Ray, Shoe Tie, solid stainless steel, 2012.
Charles Ray, Shoe Tie, solid stainless steel, 2012.

Charles Ray’s sculptural self-portrait is stunningly perfect – his body has the unflawed, fluid shine of poured mercury – and relentlessly banal – he sports an everyman physique and needs to tie a shoelace.  This first impression holds true to the man vs machine process he used to create the sculpture: a digital drawing is recreated as a clay sculpture which becomes the model for a computer controlled machine that sculpts the sculpture from a solid piece of steel. (At Matthew Marks Gallery on 22nd Street through Jan 12.)