NEW YORK – The Bronx meets Australia at “Durability,” Cope2 and Ben Frost’s new exhibit now on view through April 20 at the Krause Gallery at 149 Orchard St., with eye-popping bubble tags, abstract pieces and colorful commercial parodies.

Cope2 provides the tags, with his name written in a classic bubble style, my favorite of which are red outlined in black, their imposing curviness now found more frequently on gallery walls than on the trains of yesterday where Cope2 aka Fernando Carlo began tagging in 1978. Sometimes his lettering is simple and direct, and sometimes more intricate, blending into its environment, whether a subway train, ad or gallery wall. More recently Cope2 has been experimenting with a more collage-like, abstract style, with a Lichtenstein-esque layer of tiny black dots overlaying spray paint, ink, enamel and paint.

Ben Frost is originally from Australia, but his slyly funny commercial parodies, poke fun at universal themes of advertising and culture. This includes a strung-out Goofy drawn on boxes of Valium (hey, it must be tiring being a Disney character), and reminded me of the commercial parody T-shirts my high school raver friends were fond of, the logos of companies like Fed-Ex and Tide transformed into references to music and drugs and the themes and Peace Love Unity and Respect (aka PLUR). The Ritalin box features two seemingly innocent children, with a small smear of red spray paint suggesting some kind of menace in their future.

The show is overall a good introduction to both, a bite-size sampler pack of their work that will hopefully encourage visitors to metaphorically buy the full-size bottle. Fortunately for art lovers however, a simple free Google search will do the trick.

ADDITIONAL IMAGES OF NOTE