Thursday, August 31, 2006

Late, but short summertime reading

As I was clicking around the ubuweb, I came upon this great page of links to many of the seminal minimalist texts. These are not manifesto's per se, but they do give a great understanding of approach and process. So as far as minimal/conceptual texts go, these are easy to digest as well as easy to read. By the way, who write manifesto's anymore other than the unabomber?

I also found a great Ed Ruscha text well worth the time to read.

Mel Bochner - Excerpts From Speculation (1967-1970)
Joseph Kosuth - Art After Philosophy (1969)
Sol Lewitt - Sentences on Conceptual Art (1968)
Robert Morris - Statements (1970)
Ed Ruscha - Edward Ruscha Discusses His Perplexing Publications (1965)

Summer art video thursdays



Today I was thinking about my favorite band name - I like "The New Originals" I like other names too but that one sounded witty and it made me think a little bit about the images I'm linking to today. Of note, Laurie Anderson's "Clone" I first saw on "Alive From Off Center" a ill fated PBS broadcast about the new video art (probably around 1984). William S. Burroughs "Thanksgiving Prayer" is perfect in every way. The Jack Kerouac clip is from the Steve Allen show back in the fifties, Robert Frank's "Pull My Daisy" is a beat generation classic, and the Haring clips are sure to remind you that it's summer and it's time for some fun before the world gets too serious again.

Laurie Anderson - Sharkey's Day
Laurie Anderson - Clone
Laurie Anderson - O Superman

William S Burroughs - Thanksgiving Prayer
William S Burroughs - Commissioner of Sewers

Jack Kerouac - Steve Allen Show
Jack Kerouac (read by Johnny Depp) - Mexico City Blues

Robert Frank - Pull My Daisy

Madonna (1984) - Keith Haring Show - Dress You Up
Keith Haring and Jeremy Scott - Untitled
Keith Haring - Milano Friends

Monday, August 28, 2006

Thursday, September 7 openings as of right now (NYC)

Clearly the art world is about to repopulate the Chelsea area this September. Thursday is probably going to be the most crowded evening this fall. The short list below is from the always informative and helpful Douglas Kelley Show list.

Marc Brandenburg, TILT at Andre Schlechtriem Temporary, 524 West 19th Street, 6-8

Everest Hall "Axis Mundi", +Project Room: Karen Dow at Bellwether, 134 Tenth Avenue, 6-8

Chris Morris, My America at Hasted Hunt, 529 West 20th Street, 3rd fl., 6-8

Rivane Neuenschwander, Other stories and stories of others, + SATELLITES: w/ Ryan Gander, i-cabin, Ian Kiaer, Simon Popper and Sue Tompkins, curated by Erin Manns and Francesco Manacorda at Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, 521 West 21st Street, 6-8

Esko Mannikko, Cocktails at Yancey Richardson Gallery, 535 West 22nd Street, 3rd fl., 6-8

Jean Miotte, Spirit of Defiance at Chelsea Art Museum, 556 West 22nd Street, 6-8

Matt Jones, Death By Misadventure at Buia Gallery, 541 West 23rd Street, 6-8

First exhibition of Isca Greenfield-Sanders paintings in New York in more than four years at Goff + Rosenthal, 537B West 23rd Street, 6-8

Amy Myers: The Particle Zoo at Mike Weiss Gallery, 520 West 24th Street, 6-8pm

castaneda/reiman at DCKT Contemporary, 552 West 24th Street, 6-8

Nancy Burson, "The Hand of God", an exhibition of recent photographs by the eminent artist in ClampArt's new and significantly larger space at 521-531 West 25th Street, grd fl., 6-8

Wallpaper LAB collaborates with contemporary artists to produce limited edition wallpaper, w/ Douglas Gordon, Gary Simmons, Phoebe Washburn and more at Lennon, Weinberg, Inc., 514 West 25th Street, 6-8

Amy Morken, Backwards Diving at Claire Oliver, 513 West 26th Street, 6-8

Alison Elizabeth Taylor at James Cohan Gallery, 533 West 26th Street, 6-8

Ghosts & Machines, Michael Bell-Smith, La Vaughn Belle, Jason Hackenwerth, Alejandra Villasmil Closing Reception at Rush Arts Gallery, 526 West 26th Street, Suite 311, 6-8pm

Alice Konitz at Hudson Franklin, 508 West 26th Street #318, 6-8

Adam McEwen at Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery, 526 West 26th Street, Room 213, 6-8

Stefano Arienti at Lehmann Maupin, 540 West 26th Street, 6-8

Frank Rodick, Arena at Andrea Meislin Gallery, 526 West 26th Street, Suite 214, 6-8

Walter Niedermayr at Robert Miller Gallery, 524 West 26th Street, 6-8

Maki Tamura, The Enlightenment at Lucas Schoormans, 508 West 26th Street #11B, 6-8

Poets & Visionaries:, Selections from the UbuWeb Collection at Oliver Kamm 5BE Gallery, 621 W 27th Street, 6-8

Wendy White at Sixtyseven, 547 West 27th Street, 6-8

Fran Siegel at Margaret Thatcher Projects, 511 West 25th Street, Suite 404, 6-8

Ester Partegŕs, Saturated Fat at Foxy Production, 547 West 27th Street, FL 6, 6-8

Jade Townsend, and the days fly by on their own, a Site-Specific Installation at Priska Juschka Fine Art, 547 West 27th Street, 2nd fl., 6-8

Jesse Bercowetz & Matt Bua, Things Got Legs at Derek Eller Gallery, 615 West 27th Street, 6-8

Julian Montague's solo show - over 40 photographs from his ongoing series of works that document and classify stray shopping at Black & White Gallery, 636 West 28th Street, Ground fl., 6-8

Su-Mei Tse at Peter Blum Chelsea, 526 West 29th Street, 6-8

Walead Beshty at Wallspace, 619 West 27th Street, 6-8

"Abuse of Power: Abu Ghraib", drawings by Susan Crile, a body of work inspired by prison scandal at Hunter College Art Galleries, 695 Park Avenue, 6-8

Mark Podwal, Kabbalisitics at Forum Gallery, 745 Fifth Avenue, 6-8

Noted: Collecting Contemporary



Collecting Contemporary is a new title from Taschen on guess what - collecting art. I was curious to read these interviews to get a perspective of the many layers that go towards accepting or rejecting artwoks/artists especially because of the people interviewed in this project. Rarely do I read interviews with collectors that are longer than a paragraph or two at best - in this case 11 collectors are interviewed over 60 pages. I'll drop names in a few moments, but the basic structure of the book is this:

The art world is broken down into seven basic areas (lets call these "verticals")
The Artists
The Dealers
The Critic
Consultants
Collectors
Auction Houses
Museum Professionals

After introducing these verticals we have a few interviews with seriously prominent people in their spaces. of these areas "The Artist" is the one area not involved in this book - this makes a ton of sense to me because it's really about collecting the product of that verticals work.

For me the real meat of the book is in the Dealer and Collector interviews. This is also where most of the focus of the book is. I'll admit the interviews are all from the high end of collecting - but lets face it I'm thrilled to hear what dealers like Marc Glimcher and Marianne Boesky and collectors like Peter Brant and Charles Saatchi have to say. (A side note: Mr. Saatchi is known for buying heavily in a single artist and then after a few years - dumping almost the entire collection of that artist - many people know that he sold most of Damian Hirsts work back to the artist - but I was not aware of the massive change in availability in Sandro Chia's market after this happened. Mr. Saatchi denies this was his fault - while many dealers point toward him for the Chia devaluations).

As an artist, I find this book to be valuable because it has started to allow my further understanding of the collector a bit more as well as the dealer and his/her relationship in the business process of art. Overall an interesting read depending on your interest in the business mechanisms of the art world.

Bonus: A six page excerpt from the latest Taschen catalog

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Ubuweb Film & Video Relaunch

UbuWeb has announced a relaunch of its film and video section.
Greatly expanded with liner notes and links, They now host over 300 avant-garde films and videos. New additions include works by artists such as Vito Acconci, Alexander Calder, Merce Cunningham, Bruce Nauman, David Wojnarowicz, Richard Serra, Paul McCarthy and many more.

www.ubu.com/film

Ubuweb is such a great site - I really can't reccomend it enough.

Art Deal of the week



Chris Johanson
Untitled (Insectarian), 2005
10 color lithograph, 22 x 28 inches, Edition of 39.
Signed and dated by artist.

Printed on 100% cotton fine art paper by Analogue Press.
Published by Outpost.

$600

All proceeds benefit
Outpost for Contemporary Art.

Follow this link

Summer art video thursdays

A number of folks might know that I love me the art rock. So I guess this will come out in the video process. Today is a bunch of Eno and Sonic Youth.

Pleae note: the video thing will probably terminate in mid-september possibly sooner as summer is wrapping up and the world starts thinking a bit more about art.

Brian Eno - Ambient 1 (Music for Airports)
Brian Eno - on Voices
Brian Eno - Paintings and Sculptures
Brian Eno - Tribute to Can

Sonic Youth - Bull in the heather
Sonic Youth - Tunic
Sonic Youth - Kool Thing

Friday, August 18, 2006

Helvetica (a new film)



"It must be hard to be a cashier in a book store - oh to be surrounded by the history of your true loves..." - Jim Carroll

Is the Carroll quote appropriate? I think so because in the design world, Helvetica is practically a religion. I mean if you could get a group of people meeting sundays around noon with for a pot luck supper - it would be a religion. However right now,
Helvetica is a feature-length independent film about typography, graphic design and global visual culture.

I did not know this film was even being made - I have a huge love for Helvetica the typeface in fact I use it at my daytime job all the time. The Director of "Helvetica" is Gary Hustwit who produced I Am Trying To Break Your Heart, the award-winning film about the band Wilco and Moog, the documentary about electronic music pioneer Robert Moog. Helvetica is Hustwit's directorial debut.

The film was shot in high-definition on location in the United States, England, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, France and Belgium. It is currently in post-production and is slated to begin screening at film festivals worldwide starting in early 2007. Featured in Helvetica are some big names in the design world, including Erik Spiekermann, Matthew Carter, Massimo Vignelli, Wim Crouwel, Hermann Zapf, Stefan Sagmeister, Michael Bierut, Jonathan Hoefler, Tobias Frere-Jones, Experimental Jetset, Michael C. Place, Norm, APFEL, Pierre Miedinger, Bruno Steinert, Otmar Hoefer, Rick Poynor, Lars Muller, among others.

For more information www.helveticafilm.com

The Eames Film Festival



Comes to Design Within Reach, Bethesda, September 12, 7 - 9 pm
Ray and Charles Eames extend far beyond furniture. By using a groundbreaking multidisciplinary approach to design long before practically anyone, the Eameses created dozens of short films. Design Within Reach, in conjunction with the Eames Foundation and Herman Miller will be screening seven films, discussion and snacks will follow.

Thursday, August 17, 2006

Summer art video thursdays



It's summertime and the videos are getting lighter and lighter - please do check out the Klaus Nomi stuff and if you can rent "The Nomi Song" from your video place of choice - it's well worth your 90 minutes. I love Craig Baldwins movie "Tribulation 99". The whole movie is about 75 minutes long, it connects a multitude of conspiracy theories using found footage - its great and worth finding if you can.

Craig Baldwin & Guerrilla News Network - Craig Baldwin & Guerrilla News Network
Craig Baldwin - Tribulation 99 - trailer

Richard Kern and Sonic Youth - Death Valley `69

Klaus Nomi - Falling In Love Again
Klaus Nomi - The Cold Song
Klaus Nomi - Lightning Strikes

JOHN CAGE - SPEECH

Phillip Glass (kinda) - Einstein On The Beach (in legos)

Steve Reich - Eight Lines

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Spencer Tunick to create largest ever nude installation in Mexico City

When we last checked in with Spencer Tunick policemen in Britain were selling security tapes of his last large photo shoot - these days we find him in Mexico with his largest installation to date. Mireya Escalante, a Mexico City-based art consultant who is representing Mr Tunick, expects the participants to top 9,000.

Ms Escalante says it has been difficult to secure institutional cooperation and financial backing for the project. Public nudity is not an easy subject in Catholic Mexico (even though demonstrators for peasants’ rights have recently been disrobing en masse downtown), and politicians, arts organisations and sponsors have shied away from the potential controversy.

The rest of this story, with all the ridiculous religious problems to be expected with public nudity can be found at The Art Newspaper.

Monday, August 14, 2006

As seen in the Washington Post yesterday



I'm not usually one to bitch too much about the art coverage in the local press. Most people know it's far below what passes for coverage in other cities of our size and smaller. This could be because really what our little town produces is politics and policy - we are unfortunately viewed as a small player in art. If people have serious interest, they can easily afford to go to new york for the day and purchase what they want.

That said the museum beat here is sometimes lacking and it is a shame because the shows that come here are great. So it disappoints me to read the very first line of the Post yesterday:

"John Baldessari, one of the most influential artists in Los Angeles..."

I'm going to assume that most readers of this blog know who JB is. So I'm not going to mention that he is one of the leading artists as it pertains to conceptual art, Artists Books, photography, (or post-photography - my term) and intellectual discourse in the world of art. (sorry I just did).

Many of you know that the Hirschhorn was recently rehung by JB - the Museum gave him open and full access to the entire collection and he went for it. I realize the choice of JB is interesting, but the bigger idea behind it (if there is one) is going to become clearer after this hanging goes down - or when you finish reading this missive. Did JB make some interesting choices and pairings with the collection - of course he did. At worst he is an agent provocateur, at best he is connecting thoughts that might be considered non-historical (in other words more about artist influencing artist indirectly). The truth, frankly is going to fall somewhere in the middle. This will lead to questions about where are all the great pieces that are not up, etc., etc.

I would expect to see a massive rehang in the fall of 2007 of the entire collection spotlighting the masterpieces and hidden gems in this collection and it being done with great fanfare. This will follow on the heals of the big rehangs this summer; the Whitney and the Tate. This could very well be a great chance to reintroduce the Hirshhorn to the public.

Thursday, August 10, 2006

Art deal of the week




Christian Marclay
Slipmats
New York and Toronto, USA and Canada: Printed Matter, Inc. and Art Metropole. 2005

Slipmats is a multiple made by Christian Marclay as a Fundraising Edition for Printed Matter (NYC) and Art Metropole (Canada). Each pair of slipmats is dye-printed with a photogram of the artist's right and left hands and housed in a clear vinyl sleeve.

Unsigned and Unnumbered

$95.00 Follow this link

summer art video thursdays



Well, here we are knee deep in summer - I thought we might go for some more mainstream and fun videos today. - enjoy.

William Wegman New Order - Blue Monday '88
William Wegman Alphabet Soup
William Wegman Early Videos

Joseph Beuys I Like America

Robert Smithson Spiral Jetty(excerpts)1970

Brian Eno & David Byrne America is Waiting
David Byrne Self Interview

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Hirst in Legal Battle Over "Spoof" Website

Damien Hirst has launched a legal battle to stop a struggling young British artist using his name on a "spoof" website, reports The Independent's Guy Adams. Hirst has employed the law firm Manches LLP to act against Simon Phillips, a self-styled "Internet artist" who owns the domain name www.damien-hirst.co.uk. Hirst's legal team has submitted a dossier of evidence to the UK Internet regulator Nominet, arguing that Phillips has breached his trademark and intellectual property rights. The disputed domain name previously contained a potted history of Hirst's career, but now carries an image of a sailor dressed in red latex, with the slogan: "My arse is nothing to do with Damien Hirst." (from Artforum.com)

Monday, August 07, 2006

Arthur Lee - R.I.P.

Arthur Lee, frontman of '60s psychedelic legends Love, has died at the age of 61. The singer had been suffering from acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Lee's manager, Mark Linn, confirmed that the singer had succumbed to the disease on Thursday afternoon (August 3). The statement read: "Arthur Lee died peacefully at Methodist Hospital in Memphis, a little after four in the afternoon Aug. 3, 2006 with his wife Diane by his side.

Thursday, August 03, 2006

Summer art video thursdays

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Warning: Low Tech Camera Geeking



Those of you who know a little about the photography that I do, know that almost everything I show is shot with a "Holga" - a super-cheap medium format camera produced in China. The Holga is famous for it's crappy construction, of which everything is made of plastic except maybe a spring, otherwise is all plastic - including the lens. Oh yeah it's best if I tape the camera shut so light stays out as well.

Lately I have found out that there is a Polaroid back for the Holga (quick note: A back is a fancy name for a film holder) I thought why not try to marry up two kinds of oddball approaches and see what happens (clearly others have done this before me). So I did a bit of web searching and found a site with them in stock, plunked down the cash (or whatever the equivalent of plunking down cash over the internet is) and waited for the UPS man to show up. I received a new piece of plastic and metal that is about 400 times better engineered than the camera - so I was interested.



I've shot a box of film this weekend and have a few images that I think are interesting - certainly these all need some refinement - and probably need to be re-shot. I think the effect is real dreamlike in that the images are soft and while I have an idea that I think will be a great match only time will tell. I've uploaded a few of the test photos today so you can get an idea of what I mean.

The only real issue with the Polaroid back is that it completely covers the camera's viewfinder, which means you have to estimate your shot - not a huge problem since the approach is so exact to start with (HA!). The other drawback is that the camera with back is quite bulky not heavy - but bulky. Insanely bulky.

I do love the name of Polaroid-Holgas though - Holgaroids.

I bought mine at www.unsaleable.com

One quick note - I'm shooting these full size to the Polaroid paper which accounts for a pretty heavy vignette (those dark corners)