Fontana Mix for October 16, 2007

Matthew Collings
Regular readers know of my enjoyment of Matthew Collings dairy in Modern Painters. Here’s a pretty good interview with him on Artnet (amazing how they interview their own writers as an article – but that’s another story) Here’s a quick snippet.

writer: You made your reputation with TV programs and books on modern and contemporary art, but more recently you’ve turned your attention to Matt’s Old Masters, and now you’ve remade Sir Kenneth Clark’s Civilization. It would seem that you really do hate contemporary art these days.

Matthew Collings: I know a lot about art and want to talk about it. But knowing about it isn’t the same as feeling you have to mindlessly support it and say the accepted things about it to show you’re in a creepy club, or that you can intimidate people who don’t know about it. That’s the theme of all my books and programs. The new series is about how we might understand “civilization” today (that is, if we think we’ve still got it). It goes from the Greeks to now, but it’s all from the perspective of now. The book that comes out of the series is more diaristic and confessional; it’s about my tragic parents and so on, what I thought yesterday, etc., as in Blimey. There’s also some stuff about Clark and the whole idea of TV arts programs. But the true focus of both the book and the TV series is the anxieties and uncertainties of art now, taking “art” as a kind of culture or constant, ongoing discussion, not just a collection of individual objects or shows.

Glenn Branca
A couple of days I alerted readers about a GB performance of Symphony No.13: Hallucination City for 100 electric guitars. Well it seems that PGWP saw this performed in LA about a year os so ago.

Follow this link to the story

Johnnie Winona Ross
One of my favorite artists, JWR (above: Sand Bend Draw, 2005) has a new show in New York this week at Steven Haller Gallery. I’ll review this later in the month. But don’t wait for me, exhibition is from October 18 – November 24.

Lori Nix
Randall Scott Gallery is showing Lori Nix (another favorite / below: The Majestic, 2006) along with Dane Picard right here in Washington DC. Exhibition is from October 27 – December 8. I’m missing this opening, however do expect a review.