May 30, 2012

Objects and Ideas


"Objects hold ideas like amber traps insects.  A sofa or a chair is an artifact of the time in which it was created, its lines and planes are what's left behind in the world when the storm of an ideology has passed by.  But if we don't remember the ideas that led to the final form of the chair or the sofa, if we don't recognize the kind of insect trapped in the amber, the artifact loses all its meaning and becomes shape and line and form only.  It becomes the narcissistic manipulation of outside things, becomes like a woman valued for her face who learns to ignore her heart."  

      -Natalia Ilyin, from an essay entitled The No-Draw Rule in her book Chasing the Perfect


May 24, 2012

Color Correct


Randy Ross has a meticulous eye.  Side by side, at least one of these William Eggleston reproductions is obviously not what the artist intended. But, to notice one and dig out the other for comparison reveals a deeper level of visual awareness.  The one on the left is from William Eggleston's Guide published by MoMA in 1976 and accompanied his exhibition there, the first fine art photography exhibition in color taken on by the institution. So, as Randy notes, they were very sensitive to reproduction quality as they challenged the establishment's opinion of photography and definition of art.  The one on the right is from The Hasselblad Award catalog from 1998, a prestigious award to be sure.  So, why so blue? In Randy's opinion the quality of art and photography reproductions in print has been sliding down hill for quite some time.  He says that, "4-color separation has become such an automated process with scanner operators only concerned with color levels and dot gains for their specific presses that the art of color correcting and proofing seems to have fallen by the wayside."  With exceptions of course, and for flawless reproduction he cites House Hunting by Todd Hido, published by Nazraeli Press.

The color difference in these two images is so extreme, that at a quick glance they don't even seem to originate from the same photograph.  The cyan is so wrongly manipulated in the image on the right that the figure becomes lost in the ground.  Whereas the integrity of the color of the older reproduction on the left is what holds the figure/ground relationship in balance and presents a stronger illusion of depth.
 

May 23, 2012

Shreveport Modern










That's an Allison Turrell on the right!




Oh my goodness, what a lovely weekend in Shreveport with charming and interesting folks! Our gracious hosts, Molly McCombs and Randy Ross, really know how to make a girl feel like she's on vacation.  Lots of lounging time around the pool, but also smart, architectural tours of a town I would never have guessed to be so mid-century modern.  And, not to mention, stacks of art and design books at our fingertips for late night perusing over a cocktail.  Molly and Randy are mad book hunters and savvy book collectors.  Check out the splendor of all their hard work and research at Modernism 101.   

Highland Blooms







Oh my goodness, a Shreveport garden tour!

May 21, 2012

Finally, Tinkertown!


Every time I find myself in northern New Mexico, my friend Jennylee tells me I must go to her favorite museum, Tinkertown.  And, this time, I'm happy to say, I finally had the opportunity to experience this folk art roadside attraction, off the beaten path in the mountains between Santa Fe and Albuquerque, and it was everything I hoped it would be.  Jennylee's uncle, Ross Ward, was the mastermind behind this rambling and obsessive endeavor.  He died in 2002, and his wife Carla continues to share his legacy with thousands of visitors a year.

Ward was a self-taught artist and a show painter for carnivals.  He tinkered and collected and carved small kinetic figures in his free time, and then built Tinkertown to be a home for all of his creations so that he could share it with others.  This dusty old west town, with its dash of Coney Island and its whiff of the county fair, is truly touching for the belief in one man's imagination enough to just follow it along.      









May 16, 2012

Time-Lapse @ Site Santa Fe



Currency

Since 2007, Temple has been completing one drawing a day for her series entitled Currency.  In an attempt to understand world events and politics, she studies one article a day in depth, draws a portrait of the primary world leader associated with the event, and writes a short caption underneath the drawing.  The drawings are hung like a calendar by month, and the drawings in this show were up to date as of the day before!  History in the making.  


Sunday Paintings

Kim has been making paintings of the sky from wherever he happens to be every Sunday since 2001.  Scrawled on top of the paint is a short, diaristic entry of his moods, feelings and activities on that particular day.  Many of the paintings/entries touch on family life, outings with friends, an obsession with his children's education, social anxiety and a commitment to meditation.  The presence of vulnerability in these paintings is what kept me moving through a year of Sundays with the artist.   

Pulse Index

With a quick scan of your index finger, the viewer/participant instantly becomes a part of this video collage by Lozano-Hemmer.  The most recent scan is the largest and bumps off the oldest and smallest fingerprint at the other end of the room.  Each frame is pulsating with life, while it lasts.




A film from 1902, each frame hand-painted by the artist, and set to the music of the French band, AIR!  A gaggle of scientists, giant mushroom forests, hoppy aliens, sexy ladies dangling from planets, dream-time adventure... What else could we possibly want?  


May 8, 2012

Unstretched




More time, more work, more play.

Full Moon Fever


Yes, it was old school week around here.  I haven't been to an arena show in years.  Never been to the super drum.  And now, here I am, twice in one week.  Arena shows are what I grew up on.  It's what you do when you grow up in a small farming town in Iowa, and the closest metropolis (if one could call it that) is Omaha.  And, it's the late 80s.  So, as you might imagine, I saw my fair share of big hair and cock rock.  However, a constant beacon of sweet badness beamed through all of that hairspray and cocaine, and that bright light was Tom Petty.  And the Heartbreakers, of course.  And, I still love them.

Saturday night's show was like a campfire sing-along, and I was surprised I still knew all of the words to the classics.  Thanks to endless hours driving around on country roads, and thanks to my high school boyfriend, no doubt, who was a huge Petty fan.  Those lyrics will probably continue to bounce around in my head for days...  

You're so bad, Tom Petty.  In a world gone mad, you're so bad.


May 7, 2012

Joan Jonas @ Fusebox!



I was only able to squeeze in one performance at Fusebox Festival this year, and lucky for me, it was Joan Jonas' The Shape, the Scent, the Feel of Things.  In this performance she tells a story of anxiety, culture and ritual, layered with the perspectives of the patient, the analyst, the intellectual, and the artist.  It is a reflection on her study of and fascination with Aby Warburg (1866-1929), the German art historian, and their common experience of witnessing Hopi ceremonies as visitors to the American Southwest. 

The performance both opens and closes with what I believe is a quote from Warburg's writings.  But, I didn't write it down in the moment because I wanted to soak it all in, so I'm unsure of the exact wording.  But, this is pretty close:  "Even the weakest member has the duty/possibility(?) to strengthen the will to/for(?) cosmic order."  For me, this is the key that unlocks the mystery of the work. 

Soaking it all in was the only way to go, because there was so much happening simultaneously.  A backdrop of video played while the performers moved through and around the space: sometimes dancing, sometimes drawing, sometimes in monologue, sometimes performing a ritual, sometimes pulling a taxidermied coyote on wheels, and often all at once.  And, it was lovingly layered with Jason Moran's piano, composed especially for this piece.

Jonas' work is both difficult, in that there is no way to accurately convey what was really going on, short of saying you had to see it, and completely natural, in that it makes so much sense!  I stayed on after the performance for a conversation between Jonas and Lynne Cooke, the curator who originally commissioned the piece for Dia:Beacon.  And, in her closing statement Jonas said that "work has the power to heal."  Amen.  


Joey on an Orange Field, for Joan

Comfortably Numb


Well, those were the days!  These days, not so comfortably numb.  More like, uncomfortably aware.  Not that I'm complaining.  It was time to face the music.  So, Roger Waters and I, and thousands of other fans of Pink Floyd's The Wall, faced it together on Thursday night. And, it was well worth the anxiety trip.


Far, far away...


We don't need no education!
Who are these lucky little ones?


Outside the Wall.
Who is gonna clean up this mess?


The almost full moon, truly outside!