Draper style. (Photo by F.Trainer.)
- You too could be the proud owner of a giant Canadian beaver. Inflatable, of course.
- It’s all about performance. At least in NYC’s major museums. Plus: An audio slideshow devoted to the female artists of the genre.
- The Marina Abramovic cam. In related news: I stared at Marina Abramovic and all I got was this lousy T-shirt. And: Audio of Abramovic’s press conference, earlier in the month. (@gregorg.)
- Child performers at the Gugg’s Tino Sehgal show didn’t get paid. Instead, they got a hat, a bag and a museum membership. What, no key chain? Sehgal’s performers also report that American college students are the rudest of all museum-goers.
- Could be interesting: The Tate is inviting producers, poets and hip-hop musicians to react to Chris Ofili’s work.
- Christopher Knight likes Luc Tuymans, he really really likes him.
- Nazi-looted Corot to go to auction.
- A biennial grows in Denver. ‘Cuz what the world really needs is another biennial. (Though I have to confess, I’m digging the North/South America angle on this one.)
- Kathy Grayson, a director at Deitch’s gallery, to take on a bunch of the soon-to-be MoCA director’s artists.
- Alexandra Peers goes to the NY Observer. (@russelltrombone.)
- Art by telephone: authenticating Andy Warhol.
- Please don’t lick the art. Shit, I coulda used this shirt on Saturday night. (Eyeteeth.)
- From the Annals of White People Hijinks: Having chickens in NorCal is now a movement known as “femivorism.” In the rest of the world (and among the poor and in agricultural/rural societies), this important movement is known as “having chickens.”
- The rare black penguin.
- Rednecks and cars.
- Photo Set: New York in the ’60s and ’70s. (Flaming Pablum.)
- RIP photographer Charles Moore. Renowned for dramatic civil rights era photographs such as this. (Thanks for the heads up, Bill.)
- Today’s Graff: Arp in Naples, Italy.
- Jean Nouvel’s latest. Ourossoff describes it as having a “rough-edged sex appeal.”
- I love me some taxidermy. (Coudal.)
Supply and Demand, by Skewville at Factory Fresh. (Image courtesy of Factory Fresh.)
- The Art Industrial Average seems to be showing signs of life — at least when it comes to the old school stuff. Plus: Sotheby’s returns to profitability. (Arts Journal.)
- On the New Museum controversy, “art collector, heir” Adam Lindemann takes to the Observer to announce: Get over it whiners, it’s a rich person’s world — and y’all just live in it. A coupla things: One, Lindemann forgets to inquire how the Joannou show fits in with the New Museum’s mission of ‘new art, new ideas.’ (As far as I can tell the only thing ‘new’ in the show is the paint job on the museum’s walls.) Secondly, he says that as long as “the public gets a great show” then that’s all that matters. Um, except the show isn’t great. It’s kind of a hot mess. Top floor reminds me of standing in line at Universal Islands of Adventure…except I don’t get the joy of riding the Hulk roller coaster when it’s over. (@hragv.)
- ¡Celebrity Curator Smackdown! Jeff Koons versus Shaquille O’Neal. Thank you, Ben Davis.
- Marina Abramovic, the minimalist. Holland Cotter at the NYT reviews the show here.
- In related news: Jerry Saltz makes “genital contact.”
- Harry Benson totally annoyed to see one of his pix “appropriated” by Whitney Biennial artist.
- A profile of Christophe de Menil in W — aka Dash Snow’s grandma.
- Booby-trapped art work. (@KnightLAT.)
- Plus, in NYC: Sculptures that look as if they are about to leap to their death.
- Man Bartlett’s balloon pile.
- Abstract expressionist stamps.
- Create your own Chiquita Banana’s stickers.
- Photo Essay: Curse of the Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta.
- Welcome to Your Parents New York. (Flaming Pablum.)
- Today’s Street Art: Stinkfish in Bogotá.
- RIP Bruce Graham, the architect who designed the Sears Tower in Chicago.
- Sorry Wallpaper, you have it wrong: This is not the world’s first artificial floating island. These have been around for hundreds of years.
- The Big Lebowski morality continuum.
Lethal Injection Gurney, 2008, by Robert Priseman. Part of the exhibit No Human Way to Kill at White Box, in New York, opens Monday, March 15. Book signing and artist talk on Tuesday, March 23rd at 7pm. (Image courtesy of White Box.)
- In Miami: Anna Gaskell at World Class Boxing, opens Saturday at 7pm.
- In Miami: Chained to a Creature of a Different Kingdom, at David Castillo, opens Saturday at 7pm.
- In Miami: Diego Singh, Pathological Liar/Stalker, at Fred Snitzer, opens Saturday at 7pm.
- In NYC: Lost Amazon: Nature’s Discontent, photographs and video by Andrew Garn, at A.M. Richard Fine Art in Williamsburg, opens Friday at 6pm.
- In NYC: Otto Dix at the Neue Galerie, opens today.
- In NYC: Graphic Heroes, Magic Monsters, at the Japan Society Gallery, opens Friday.
- In NYC: Curious George Saves the Day: The Art of Margret and H.A. Rey, and Modern Art, Sacred Space: Motherwell, Ferber and Gottlieb, at the Jewish Museum, opens Sunday.
- In NYC: Deborah Brown, Elisabeth Condon and many others, Ocketopia, at Lesley Heller Workspace, through April 18.
- In NYC: Leola Bermanzohn, Abby Goodman, Kristin Reed and many others, Water’s Edge: 12 Artists from the Brooklyn Army Terminal, at the chasham 461 Gallery in Harlem, opens Friday at 7pm.
- In L.A.: Jack Pierson at Regen Projects, opens Friday.
- In L.A.: Andy Freedberg, The Guardians, and William Steiger, Recent Drawngs, at Kopeikin Gallery, opens Saturday.
- In Gateshead, England: Jenny Holzer at the Baltic, through May 16.
- In Berlin: Emil Holmer, Dead Letters, at Michael Janssen, opens Friday at 7pm.
Bunny Bread. (Photo by Alex Gaidouk.)
- Chile, nine days later. (Coudal.)
- An unofficial ad campaign for the New Museum highlights the institution’s ethical challenges.
- Speaking of which, the NuMu has a forum about art museums, private collectors and the public going down this Saturday…that costs $10 per person to attend.
- “You must ask him to get down. I know better than anyone what that is like, and even I can’t take it!” Marina Abramovic to a New Museum curator, on Pawel Althamer’s sculpture, Schedule of the Crucifix — after a performer’s legs began to turn blue while hanging on a makeshift cross in the galleries. (@ARTnewsmag.)
- Jerry Saltz seems to love anything as long as he’s featured in it. (@TylerGreenDC.)
- Obligatory Whitney Biennial round-up: Christian Viveros-Faune is ambivalent — likening parts of the show to Tylenol PM and others to the bitchslap of a new beginning, Paddy Johnson is a like, and Kriston Capps is of a mixed view. (Modern Art Notes.)
- Tino Sehgal, a kid’s take. (Art Fag City.)
- Yosi Sergeant talks about the out-of-touch NEA.
- Elisabeth Eaves on the gaps in Patti Smith’s memoir.
- This looks super-cool: Felix González-Torres pieces grace billboards in Texas. (Modern Art Notes.)
- Annie Liebovitz’s new creditors. (@russelltrombone.)
- L.A.’s Brody art collection worth big bucks.
- Ansel Adams’ photographs of Japanese internment camps.
- Jörg Colberg describes the art fairs as a place “where your soul is not only crushed, it’s actually slowly and steadily ground into a fine powder.” Yup, sounds about right.
- A visual summary of The Big Lebowski.
- Nice online piece from the Guggenheim for their Contemplating the Void exhibit, which examines the architectural/installation possibilities of the museum’s atrium. Can someone please scrape up some budget to let Arne Quinze build a stilthouse in the rotunda? Also digging the proposals by Andy Goldsworthy, Mass Studies, Martha Rosler and Amanda Levete’s rotunda reflection.
- Today’s Street Art: Jan Vormann’s Lego fixes in New York City. (@russelltrombone.)
- Extinction outpaces evolution.
Above: Me. Pretending to be a badass. (Photo by Zach Stovall; borrowed from Florida Travel + Life.)
Last December, I escaped the art fairs in Miami early to spend several days camping and kayaking in the Ten Thousand Islands on assignment for Florida Travel + Life, where I serve as a semi-regular contributor. It was pretty awe-inspiring . By day, we explored the mangrove isles that make up much of the southwestern Florida coast. At night, we camped on small beaches, carbo-loaded and admired the stars. It was the perfect antidote to the overload of shiny baubles I’d just gorged on at the art fairs. I’m also pretty dang proud I managed to survive the physical demands of the trip (blogging doesn’t do much in the way of developing stamina), but I’m also pretty excited about the story that came out of it. I’ve been spending the last few years making regular Everglades pilgrimages and I’ve developed a real affection for it. It kind of bums me out that the many Miami types who live right on top of it rarely show it much appreciation.
You can find my story on this journey in the April 2010 edition of Florida Travel + Life (available at Barnes & Noble) or you can cheat and read the PDF version here. Though if you could support the mag — which helps support me, I’d be deeply appreciative.
If you’re interested in doing something similar, I would like to heartily recommend the wonderful folks at Everglades Area Tours, who not only organize some mighty fine kayaking excursions (there are day-trips in case you don’t do camping), but are super cool folks to boot. And if for some reason, you spend any time at all in South Florida (be it for art fairs or because you like to get butt facials), consider Michael Grunwald’s The Swamp required reading. No ifs, ands or buts.
Untitled (Opium Den), 2009, by Rosson Crow. Part of the exhibit Bowery Boys, at Deitch Projects, through March 27. (Image courtesy of Deitch Projects.)
- In L.A.: Art Against Empire: Graphic Responses to U.S. Interventions since WWII, at LACE, opens Wednesday.
- In L.A.: Andreas Gursky, at Gagosian, in Beverly Hills, through May 1.
- In S.F.: Inaugural Group Show at Guerrero Gallery, through March 27.
- In Miami: Cory Arcangel: The Sharper Image, at MoCA, in North Miami, opens Thursday.
- In Fort Lauderdale: Edward Steichen: The Condé Nast Years, 1923-1937 at the Museum of Art Fort Lauderdale, through April 11.
- In Philly: Timothy Buckwalter, Imitation of Life, at the Green Line, opens Friday at 6pm.
- In NYC: Landscapes of Quarantine, at the Storefront for Art & Architecture, opens tonight at 7pm.
- In NYC: Stokenphobia, drawings by Gore-B and other works, at Pandemic Gallery in Brooklyn, opens Friday at 7pm.
- In NYC: Duncan Campbell, Make it New John, at Artists Space, opens tonight at 6pm.
- In NYC: The Bible Illuminated: R. Crumb’s Book of Genesis at David Zwirner, through Apil 24.
- In London: Malick Sidibé, Unseen Work, at Lichfield Studios, opens Thursday.
- In London: Subodh Gupta, School, at Hauser & Worth, through March 27.
Joanne McNeil of Tomorrow Museum and I model the latest in fashion-forward footwear at the all-yellow Nicole Klagsbrun booth at Armory Show 2010. Many more pix to follow. (All photos by C-M.)
Evening Cocoon, by Kate Browne, in Cragsmoor, New York. Beginning today, Browne will be building a large cocoon in the Plaza Tlatelolco (sight of the infamous 1968 massacre) in Mexico City. It will be lit on March 21st, the first day of spring. (Image courtesy of Kate Browne.)
- The Holy Land Experience.
- El Museo del Barrio’s Julián Zugazagoitia to head up the Nelson-Atkins in Kansas City. See a video of him talking about the move. (@museumnerd.)
- Art21 interviews Alec Soth.
- Five things you didn’t know about Ansel Adams. Interesting fact: he and Georgia O’Keeffe were friends, but dissed each other’s work. (@russelltrombone.)
- Sea and sky.
- A new book says that conflict over climate change will create a new world order: U.S. and Europe vs. China and Russia. (Cool Green Morning.)
- A special multimedia feature on Jonathan LeVine’s fifth anniversary. Profile here.
- Today’s Graff: Esco in Sao Paulo.
- The Guardian profiles JR.
- The Glass House, Maira Kalman version.
- Rush Limbaugh home décor. He has a way with the baby blue.
- Honest movie titles, Oscars 2010 edition.
The Art Yoga tribute to Marina Abramovic: Yoga in lab coats. Later, we sat around and stared at each other. (Screengrab taken from the live webstream.)
There’s all kinds of goodness going down at #CLASS this weekend and in the coming week, starting today with a panel on the art world’s shade of pale, organized by An Xiao, the motivational stylings of Rod Verplanck, and through the weekend, with working sessions and a contemporary art wake. This will be followed, mid-week, by balloon-popping with Man Bartlett, a feminist tea party with Suzanne Stroeb and Caitlin Rueter, a merciless Q&A with art dealer Magda Sawon of Postmasters, and a lecture, on Friday, by Yevgeniy Fiks, on Communist Modern Artists in the Art Market.
I attended Fiks’ fascinating guerrilla tour of MoMA early this week, in which he led us through a number of the works in the permanent galleries created by communists and sympathizers. (See my Tweets from that event here.) The history nerd in me (I have a thing for Cold War-era politics) was totally loving it. You can see reports on the tour at Bloggy and jameswagner.com. Fiks’ totally wonderful Russian accent just brings it all together.
Find a full schedule of events over at the official website. And I’ll see you in #CLASS.
