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Was hoping to get this photo posted before the gallery closed today but have been on the road. Missed it by 14 minutes. Next week for sure for one ultimate self referential feedback loop post for BLOG, the exhibition. Photo of seminal conceptual artist from Aron Namenwirth's blog.
GIF grid by eyekhan
not ideal in RSS readers
Am currently in Charlottesville, VA, attending an anniversary event for the college radio station WTJU, where I DJ'd for several years and enjoyed a couple of bracing years of administrative responsibility (as program director). 'TJU is much like WFMU in NY*, a free form format with knowledgeable volunteers as jocks. When I was in school it was entirely student run and thus a creatively fertile chaos, but it has since hired a station manager who miraculously is not a micromanager and lets the volunteers continue to shape the content. Charlottesville is beautiful but barely recognizable from my student days for all the growth. It has been touted as a perfect city so of course everyone wants to move there.
*metropolitan area
Reporting from Washington DC. Checked out the newest addition to the Smithsonian's museums on the Mall: the National Museum of the American Indian. Dramatic yellow adobe modernist building with the obligatory giant atrium, nice for the architect's portfolio but hogging much of what could have been exhibit space. Some wonderful collections of objects such as a show of women's apparel with intricate beadwork and concentric rings of elks' teeth (only two of such teeth per elk, so the more rings the mightier the woman's husband's hunting prowess, according to the video). Unfortunately most floors gave prominence to exhibition design over artwork, presenting crowded mazes of computer-generated text-and-photo spreads and interactive video terminals. Actual artifacts, darkly lit against darker backgrounds, tended to be swallowed up in these seas of typography. Other problems: vague and blandly worded themes ("our people," "our universes"), no clear timelines or sense of geography, avoidance of any kind of overall narrative history. Haven't researched the politics of how the museum came together and what kinds of compromises had to be made (either among tribal interests or to sidestep the U.S.'s sordid past of mass native American disenfranchisement), but the murkiness of the design seemed purposeful. Not to overlook the simple problem of "too many cooks" in the layout or the ever-ascendant tendency of designers to think they're artists and overwhelm the actual artwork on display.
Belatedly posted photos here.
Documentation of my work in the "Fresh NY" show at Threshold Art Space, Perth, Scotland. Eleven of the 22 screens are shown. Photos by exhibition curator Anne Barlow. The OptiDisc GIF below is reduced; clicking on image shows the actual size (of the GIF--the screens are much larger).
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Some halfway sensible talk from a foreign policy grown-up, Lt. Gen. William E. Odom (retired); here is publisher YaleGlobal's synopsis:
The US Congress and the White House have been at odds over the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq for months [not nearly enough at odds --tm], but brief historical reflection suggests that the only option left for Washington is to link forces with Iran. Starting in the mid-1950s, the US maintained stability in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf by establishing bilateral relationships with Israel, Iran and Saudi Arabia, and preventing any one country from overwhelming another. Even after the Iranian Revolution in 1979, presidents recognized that restoring ties with Tehran could minimize US military costs. George W. Bush, however, disrupted the delicate balance with the invasion of Iraq [and inclusion of Iran in the so-called Axis of Evil, Odom also notes --tm]. Unless the US can convince Iran to play a cooperative role, the chaos in Iraq will spread to neighboring countries. In this article, William Odom, a former director of the US National Security Agency, contends that a rapprochement with Iran is the key to restoring regional stability as the US withdraws from Iraq. However, the US must follow up on Monday’s meeting with Iran in Baghdad and abandon its current “all sticks” policy for stopping Tehran’s nuclear-weapons program. Iran cannot help but realize that its influence in Iraq faces limits when US troops leave, and Washington must take advantage of many mutual goals to establish a sustainable relationship with Iran and restore stability throughout the Middle East. – YaleGlobalHalfway sensible because it seems nostalgic for the era of the odious Shah and convinced of the wisdom of continuing US stewardship of the Middle East.
Currently making the Internet rounds: Hieronymous Bosch action figures. Never warmed to the blow-up Munch scream for museum gift shops, but these are f*ckin funny. How many childhood hours did certain of us kids spend looking at those paintings? Their re-reification as toys was inevitable but not before this moment, somehow.
Update: These are not really action figures. They are art gift figurines from a company called Talaria. The cheeky, inaccurate description comes from irresponsible bloggers and is being passed around by other online ne'er-do-wells desperate for an eyegrabbing tag line.
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