Monthly Archive for May, 2009

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Calendar. 05.19.09.

By c-monster on May 19, 2009 in C-Monster, Calendar, Galleries, Installation, Miami and Mixed Media. Closed

Chusma, 2008 by Luis Gispert. (Image courtesy of Fredric Snitzer.)

In Miami: Luis Gispert at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Goldman Warehouse, in Wynwood, through June 27.
In NYC: Commune, a group show curated by Dominique Nahas, at Black and White in Chelsea, opens Thursday.
In NYC: Francis Bacon: A Centenary Retrospective at the Met, opens tomorrow.
In NYC: Mike Cohen: True Color at Hasted Hunt, opens Thursday.
In NYC: Richard Avedon at the ICP, through Sept. 6.
In NYC: Brian Dettmer, Nikki S. Lee, Jim Dingilian and many others in Deviate, at Schroeder Romero, opens Friday.
In L.A.: Scott McFarland at Regen Projects, opens Saturday.
In San Pedro, Calif.: Boxing & Ballet, new works by Jocelyn Foye at Project Room 3G, opens Saturday.
In London: Gerhard Richter at the National Portrait Gallery, through May 30.
In Paris: Beatriz Milhazes at the Fondation Cartier, through June 21.

Tags: chusma, fredric snitzer gallery, luis gispert.

The Digest. 05.18.09.

By c-monster on May 18, 2009 in C-Monster and Photography. Closed

From Joe Polifrone’s A Still Life series. (Image courtesy of Joe Polifrone.)

Techie gang signs. (Gracias, Royce!)
Museums in movies. (@brooklynmuseum)
Photos from the Frank Lloyd Wright show at the Guggenheim. Justin Davidson of New York Mag reviews the show here.
Plus: The Saltz-master on Francis Bacon.
LACMA’s new big-ass Roberto Matta. Which reminds me: How many more Cisneros-fluffing shows am I gonna have to endure at MoMA before they finally get around to giving Matta the retrospective he so sorely deserves?
Studio 360 covers the changing landscape of arts criticism and journalism.
The Getty Research Institute is on Flickr.
Christopher Knight gives Michelle Obama the smackdown for going to the Met. I, for one, would pay money to watch FLOTUS admire the banana peel at the New Museum.
Photos of the Jessica Stockholder installation in Madison Square Park.
Twittering Alice in Wonderland.
Hilarious: After 400 years, Oxford University has banned stepladders from its library for “health and safety” reasons. Problem: Now no one can reach the books.
The best baguettes in Paris. (Hustler of Culture.)
Today’s Street Art: Judith Supine in NYC.
The Washington Post looks at the National Trust’s most endangered list. (Arts Journal.)
The architecture of evil lairs.
Princess Zaha’s latest footwear.
A round-up of designs for the temporary pavilions at the Shanghai 2010 World Expo, including my favorite, the Dark Lord Foster’s labial sand dune.
Underwater volcanoes and killer shrimps.
Your moment of awkward family photos. My favorite. A close second. (Thank you, Gary!)

Tags: a still life, joe polifrone.

Art That Loves You Back: Ernesto Neto at the Park Avenue Armory.

By c-monster on May 15, 2009 in Art for stoners, C-Monster, Installation, Mixed Media and New York. 3 Comments

Drippy nutsacks as far the eye can see. (Photo by C-M.)

We love art. We hold it in high esteem. We write about it. We talk about it. We fix it when it’s broken. But what does art ever do for us? (Besides provide us with something to look at while sipping bad chardonnay.) Well, in the case of Ernesto Neto’s piece at the Park Avenue Armory, in NYC, it loves us back. His sprawling installation — think: mom’s pantyhose gone fantastically amoebic — contains various chambers that embrace you in the most womb-tastic ways.

A small, red-tinted tent (on the right), is filled with a squishy soft floor and lavender pillows. Perfect for midday naps. A testicular-looking chamber towards the back features a giant Barney-purple pillow that engulfs you in a spongy bear hug. And a Chuck E. Cheese-style ball pit, filled plastic spheres, suspends you above the ground, while providing needed acupressure. (It’s incredibly restful, provided you’re willing to fight off the three-year-olds.) Connecting all of these sensual delights are monstrous intestines lined with dangling organs that are scented by a line-up of aromatherapy-worthy spices like ginger and clove.

What’s it all mean? Who gives a crap? All I know is I haven’t felt this good since I chilled out on those labial pillows at the Pipolotti Rist exhibit at MoMA earlier this year.

The show is up until June 14. Do not miss.

Continue reading ‘Art That Loves You Back: Ernesto Neto at the Park Avenue Armory.’

Tags: anthropodino, ernesto neto, park avenue armory.

The Digest. 05.15.09.

By c-monster on May 15, 2009 in C-Monster, Sculpture and The Digest. Closed

Shipwreck ’09, a 70-foot long sculpture made of found driftwood at the Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge in N.C. by R.L. Croft and Michael Anthony. Click here to get a sense of scale. (Images courtesy of R.L. Croft.)

Fascinating. You are what you eat. (ackackack.)
Brandeis’s Rose Art Museum to shut down public exhibitions after this Sunday. Update: For now, apparently, this will be for the summer. No word yet on what will happen in the fall.
The Gugg turns 50.
Some lovely views of the Art Institute of Chicago’s new Modern Wing. More here and here. Plus: El Ourossof’s review. Nicky likes it! And, La Smith looks at the art.
The Kimbell Art Museum in Ft. Worth picks up a demonic-looking early Michelangelo painting, the only Michelangelo painting to enter the permanent collection of a U.S. museum. (Hrag Vartanian.)
Phillips de Pury sales “underwhelming.” More here. Plus: Greg.org analyzes the auctions. Basically, a bunch of dealers selling work back and forth to each other. (Bloggy.)
Can the new NEA director make the organization relevant?
Cranky pants: “Anyone wanting to snap an exhibit ought to be forced to look at it first for at least a minute — or be fined.”
Art about buildings.
David Hockney, on his inkjet drawings: “A brush, like a computer, is merely a tool.”
Art21 is on Hulu.
The day in space-age headgear.
How California is like every place else.
A round-up of vintage Indian pulp. (Coudal.)
Who buys urban-art? According to the Guardian: the boy-man, the corporate banker, the canny restaurateur, bitter speculators and ex-subversives. (World’s Best Ever.)
Today’s Street Art: Faile in Brooklyn.
Landscape deflation.
Princess Zaha’s wine pavilion in Rioja, Spain.
Santiago Calatrava’s Atlanta symphony ain’t gonna happen. (Arts Journal.)
Your moment of cat workout. (Hustler of Culture.)

Tags: Michael Anthony, R.L. Croft, Shipwreck '09.

Calendar. 05.14.09.

By c-monster on May 14, 2009 in C-Monster, Calendar, Museums and Uncategorized. Closed

Old and new: In foreground, the new Modern Wing at the Art Institute of Chicago. (Photo by rossrenjilian.)

In Chicago: The brand spankin’ new Modern Wing, designed by Renzo Piano, opens at the Art Institute, on Saturday.
In L.A.: Barkley L. Hendricks: Birth of the Cool, new paintings, at the Santa Monica Museum of Art, opens Friday.
In NYC: Souther Salazar at Jonathan Levine, opens Saturday.
In NYC: An artist talk with photographers Lisa Ross and Nan Goldin at Daneyal Mahmood, today starting at 6:30 p.m. Read Jeff Weinstein’s piece about Ross’s exhibit, which chronicles the Sufi memorials of the remote Taklamakan Desert of Xianjing, in Western China.
In NYC: LaToya Ruby Frazier/Sebrina Fassbender at Higher Pictures on the Upper East Side, opens tonight.
In NYC: Housing Works is having an arts and design book sale this weekend.
In NYC: Eve Sussman & Rufus Corporation, Photos for ‘White on White’ at Edward Winkleman, opens Friday.
In NYC: True: Twelve Years of photography by Mike Schreiber at 139 W. 14th Street, opens Saturday.
In NYC: Social Virus, a group show at NurtureArt, opens today.
In NYC: Possibilities, a group show with Eric Doeringer, Danny Coeyman, Kate Fuavell and Daniel Turner at chashama Harlem, through May 30. (AFC.)
In NYC: Helen Levitt, a memorial tribute, at Laurence Miller Gallery, through June 26.
In NYC: Crash and Daze at Ad Hoc Art, opens Friday.
In Somerville, Mass.: Four Flights at Chorus Gallery, opens Friday.
In Washington, D.C.: Comic Art Indigène at the National Museum of the American Indian, through May 31.
In London: Louise Nevelson at the Louise Blouin Foundation, through June 14.
In Hong Kong: José Parlá at Ooi Botos Gallery, opens today.
In Beijing: China: Through the Lens of John Thomson 1868-1872 at the Beijing World Art Museum in the Haidan District, through May 18.

Tags: art institute of chicago, modern wing.

Photo of the Day: Artist Unemployed.

By c-monster on May 13, 2009 in C-Monster, New York and Sublime ridiculosity. Closed

Guy in a rabbit suit, pacing in front of Gagosian Gallery. (Photo by C-M.)

Tags: gagosian gallery, guy in a rabbit suit.

What I’m Reading.

By c-monster on May 13, 2009 in Books, C-Monster, Museums, New York and What I'm Reading. 1 Comment

Rogues’ Gallery: The Secret History of the Moguls and the Money That Made the Metropolitan Museum by Michael Gross.

This dishy page-turner chronicles more than a century’s worth of rich-people scoop and intrigue at the Met (including an entertaining account of how the venerable institution was built upon the private collection of a fake general with a warehouse full of pillaged Cypriot artifacts). I’m still reading the sucker, which checks in at 486 pages, but thus far one of my favorite quotes comes from a museum annual report that details what went down the first day the museum opened its doors to the unclean masses on Sunday in 1889:

Many visitors took the liberty of handling every object within reach; some went to the length of marring, scratching, and breaking articles unprotected by glass; a few proved to be pickpockets, and other brought with them peculiar habits, which were repulsive and unclean.

Tags: metropolitan museum of art, michael gross, rogues' gallery, The Met.

The Digest. 05.13.09.

By c-monster on May 13, 2009 in Architecture, C-Monster, Graffiti, New York and The Digest. Closed

Brooklyn rooftops. Best viewed large.

Just Landed, a video by Jer Thorp. (NotCot.)
Obama names nominee for NEA: New York theatre producer Rocco Landesman, the guy behind Angels in America and The Producers.
Welcome to reality: Art school students like totally bummed about job prospects. (@artnetdotcom.)
Art market now being described as ‘recalibrated.’ I describe it as being in the shitter.
In honor of LACMA’s Pompeii show: The Pomplaylist. Related: The L.A.T. asks museum-goers whether the $25 ticket is too much to pay for the show.
An auction raises money for L.A.’s troubled MOCA. But that doesn’t mean the budget cuts and layoffs are over.
The Tate Modern is looking for identical twins.
Marcel Duchamp explains how to make a readymade: Take a Rembrandt. Iron on it. (Eyeteeth.)
The Arbitrary Grant.
Photo Essay: Installing Ernesto Neto at the Park Avenue Armory.
Edo-era pregnant dolls.
Pixels out of control in this trippy animated short. (NotCot.)
Overcoming tourism.
Luuuuucha Libre! Coming soon to a town near you…if you live in California. Photo essay here. (World’s Best Ever.)
Is Bansky now into self-portraiture? The Internerdz are atwitter. (@artnetdotcom.)
Which U.S. state has the boldest architecture? Ohio, says Fast Company. (Buildings and Food.)
Ada Louise Huxtable looks at public architecture in NYC. Apparently, it is much improved from the bottom-line crap that usual gets built. Now, if only these forward-thinking design principles could be applied to Ground Zero. (Arts Journal.)
Jonathan Glancey reports on Prince Charles’s respectful speech at the Royal Institute of British Architects: Not all that interesting, it turns out. If you miss the days when HRH got crazy about modernist carbuncles, however, Looking Around helpfully links to Chuck’s 1984 speech.
Starchitecture on fire! A blaze consumes part of Zaha Hadid’s yet-to-be opened Guangzhou opera house. The extent of the damage is unknown. (Arts Journal.)
Your moment of the Simpsons getting architectural.

Tags: brooklyn roof, Graffiti.

C-Mon Giveaway Extravaganza: San Francisco Street Art.

By c-monster on May 12, 2009 in Books, C-Monster, Giveaway, Graffiti and San Francisco. 28 Comments

San Francisco Street Art. (Photo by C-M.)

Photographer Steve Rotman has just released a photo book devoted to all things S.F. (He’s also the author of Bay Area Graffiti.) Among the artists featured in San Francisco Street Art are perennial favorites such as Miss Van, D*Face, Doze Green, Swoon, Neckface, Ron English and Shepard Fairey — as well as some funny pieces by Thesis, Hug and Dome.

Leave a comment below to enter to win this palm-sized hardback. If you’re looking to buy, you can find it here.

Tags: san francisco street art, steve rotman.

Calendar. 05.12.09.

By c-monster on May 12, 2009 in Architecture, C-Monster and Calendar. Closed

Fallingwater, by Frank Lloyd Wright. See my photos of Wright’s Florida Southern College campus here. (Photo by C-M.)

In NYC: Frank Lloyd Wright: From Within Outward at the Guggenheim, opens Friday. Plus: On Thursday, the museum launches a two-day symposium on architecture called Now What Architecture.
In NYC: Ernesto Neto at the Park Avenue Armory, opens Thursday.
In NYC: The New York Photo Festival, in Dumbo, starts tomorrow
In NYC: Robert Longo: Surrendering the Absolutes at Metro Pictures, through May 30.
In Minneapolis: Designing Obama, a panel at the Walker Art Center, this evening at 7:00 p.m.
In Seattle: Desmadre: Fresh Latino Perspectives in America at Vermillion, opens Thursday.
In L.A.: Jean Lowe at Rosamund Felsen Gallery in Santa Monica, through May 16.
In L.A.: My Certain Fate, a group show featuring Martin Bromirski, Manuel Dominguez Jr. and Katy Stone, curated by Timothy Buckwalter, at Pharmaka in downtown, opens Thursday.
In L.A.: Sebastião Salgado gives a talk at the Hammer Museum, tonight at 7 p.m.
In NYC: Nunca at Galerie Le Fleuve, opens Thursday.

Tags: fallingwater, frank lloyd wright.