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Monday, December 3, 2007

Association: Part Four

posted by on December 3 at 4:21 PM

This image by James Casebere, "Asylum"...

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...inspired the dark and ghostly mood of Burial's dub.

Burial:

"...i made music with [Casebere's] pictures next to me. i go into solitary empty spaces and dream of a kind of emptiness that he has in his photos. in my dreams my music would be echoing in those rooms."

burial.jpg To adequately express the way I feel about Burial's dub, I must borrow the words of The Everly Brothers: "I die each time I hear the sound."

They Tell Me I'm in Charge of Modern Art Notes This Week

posted by on December 3 at 3:19 PM

Here's my first (quick) post there, which will explain why I haven't been around for a week.

bild.jpgAnd in the name of double-blogging, I'll be on Slog this week for all you UnMiamis, too. To start off, let me recommend something I meant to write about before I left for New York: Joan Jonas's classic Vertical Roll, hiding in plain sight in the breezeway at the Frye here in Seattle. I was reminded of it when I saw it in another entryway: MoMA's.

Look, you can just about miss it at the Frye: The breezeway is small and unheated, so you just go right through it to the door. But this is where Robin Held has squeezed regular video displays into the programming at the Frye (kind of like the regular-ish videos in the Henry's elevator).

Held has titled her under-the-radar breezeway video series—based on task-based performances for the camera—It is not a question of knowing whether this interests you but rather of whether you yourself could become more interesting under new conditions of cultural creation.

The title is taken from the manifesto of the avant-garde movement that essentially represents the last gasp of manifesto-based avant-garde movements, the Situationist International, based in Paris in the 1960s and led by Guy Debord, who wrote those words. Remake thyself at will.

Association: Part Three

posted by on December 3 at 1:37 PM

This enchanting image was produced by Lorna Simpson:
CorridorPhone2.jpg

This ghostly image was produced by James Casebere:
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Association: Part Two

posted by on December 3 at 11:39 AM

The first American project by the London-based architect David Adjaye is this studio in Fort Greene, Brooklyn:

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The handsome couple below commissioned and own the four-story studio:
2001261002199242047_rs-1.jpg James Casebere and Lorna Simpson are famous photographers.

Association: Part One

posted by on December 3 at 9:49 AM

Let's begin our day-long journey of linked images here:
815_normal.jpg This remarkable building, Whitechapel Idea Store, is in London and has its origin in the mind of this gentleman:
adjaye070723_1_560-1.jpg...David Adjaye.


Friday, November 30, 2007

Shoes on the Wall

posted by on November 30 at 9:26 AM

This morning, what a lovely sight! A row of ladies' shoes.
-3.jpg None has a match. Each is missing its partner. Because all are single, all have no use or exchange value. These useless shoes will never walk again.


Thursday, November 29, 2007

Hot Tip

posted by on November 29 at 5:15 PM

Michael Pollan's In Defense of Food (out the first of January) has finally made it to the library catalog. Place your holds now, or forever wait in line.

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Rainbow!

posted by on November 29 at 4:35 PM

Congratulations to Stranger Genius shortlister (and 2006 Guggenheim fellow) Dayna Hanson, who is the newest recipient of Northwest Film Forum's Start-to-Finish grant.

As with previous projects, Hanson will create Rainbow through an improvisational process with a tight group of collaborators. Maggie Brown (We Go Way Back) and Dave Proscia (Hanson’s bandmates in Today!) co-star with Linas Phillips (Walking to Werner). Music by Today! (which also features Paul Matthew Moore, who composed the score for Zoo) drives the moody, minimalist tale of four interconnected characters struggling toward hope against the grim, seedy background of a Seattle winter. Development is scheduled to begin in late Spring 2008.

NWFF is also tightening up the funding structure for the grant:

With the new structure, the organization provides $100,000 cash and $150,000 in in-kind services to produce the film, and supports the project at every phase of production. With past features, Start-to-Finish films had elastic budgets, funds were raised throughout production, and films took considerably longer to make. With this new approach, funds will be raised in advance, and artists will be commissioned to complete work on a tighter timeline.

It Hurts to Look at This

posted by on November 29 at 10:54 AM

I wrote about My So-Called Life in this week's DVD column:

Angela and Rickie

I was just starting my first year of high school when ABC aired My So-Called Life—set during a turbulent sophomore year at Pittsburgh's fictional Liberty High—so I was probably, like, morally obligated to revere it. What's surprising, watching the series again 13 years later, is that it was worth the adoration.

I watched all 19 episodes and all the commentary tracks for this measly 400-word review, so naturally there are some things I didn't have room to mention. First: It's annoying when it's clear that the people doing commentary tracks know less about the series than you do. Can't the producers of the DVD set force their prima donnas to at least watch the episode in question before sitting down in front of the mics? No, Scott Winant, So-Called Angels was not the first episode to introduce metaphysical elements, though it was the first to do so with any degree of success: The Halloween episode has Angela falling in love with some dead boy. And speaking of shitty episodes, why did Claire Danes and creator Winnie Holzman get assigned to the schematic Self-Esteem? (That track is pretty cute, though.)

To further elaborate on my points about the character of the eyeliner-wearing, girls' bathroom-hanging, half-black, half-Latino Catholic Rickie Vasquez: The way this show treated teen sexuality--whether promiscuous, abstinent, straight, or otherwise (Rickie gets called bisexual and ambiguous before he finally tells Delia he's gay in the last episode)--is really remarkable. I get so annoyed when the media studies types interviewed in Further Off the Straight and Narrow (shown at this year's Lesbian & Gay Film Festival) fall all over themselves praising Joss Whedon for the Willow character on Buffy the Vampire Slayer without mentioning MSCL (ok, I know, it was referenced in the earlier video Off the Straight and Narrow). Whedon is a fan of My So-Called Life (he has a tribute in this box set), and the Willow character is so... feminine... and tame. My So-Called Life didn't have any same-sex makeout sessions, true, but Rickie is a much more complicated and provocative character.

Rickie's storyline in the episode The Life of Brian (directed by Todd Holland) is especially touching and subtle. His cathartic dance scene at the end of the show is right up there with my gold standard for dance in the movies: Denis Lavant in Beau Travail. It almost made me go back and watch Holland's most recent movie again to see if I missed anything. Almost.

One last thing: My So-Called Life producers Marshall Herskowitz and Ed Zwick have launched this new internet-based show quarterlife, which appears to have been designed to appeal to exactly the demographic who would've been fans of MSCL back in 1994. It also seems like it was even timed for the release of this box set. NBC is picking up the show for a midseason replacement, but don't be fooled--that's just the writer's strike talking. There are some decent moments in the second episode, but the show is basically precious and stupid. Avoid.

"Seattle Takes and Gives Nothing Back—Except Child Rape!"

posted by on November 29 at 9:12 AM

Letter of the day, and maybe the month. Sic throughout.

Sir: I recently made the "long drive" in to Seattle from my home north of your damn vile city, having heard that there is "oh so much to do" in Seattle and it is a FAMILY FRIENDLY environement! Unfortunately I found out otherwise and dammit I'm sick of this garbage in that evil town that I paid for and this one is the "last straw"! I took my wife and our two boys who are SIX AND FOUR, Mr. Schmader mere children! to the Olympic Sculpture Park down on the boardwalk area on the advice of some local pervert who no doubt knew the ambush that was lurking for me and probably "got his jollies" realizing the cesspool he was sending us to. Immediately before we had even had a chance to put on our windbreakers there it was a giant fountain RIGHT WHERE EVERYBODY COULD SEE IT! I stopped there with my youngest Adam while the other two OF MY FAMILY! were still getting some things out of the car. At least two of my family members were spared the vile vulgar, and disgusting PEDOPHILE DISPLAY that came next in this TAXPAYER FUNDED vulgarity museum!!!!!!

As soon as the waters stopped there is was, a NAKED man with his arms outstretched and BECKONING a little boy about a four year olds age which was no doubt why one of your "little friends" told us to go there because he wanted to plant some ideas that being naked with strange men was somehow NORMAL! So don't tell me gay marriage hasn't wrecked UTTERLY the moral fabric of King County and the whole damn country!

A celebration of a pedo-lesting scum about to violate the sacred trust between man and boy and family and you wonder why this country is heading for civil war? You know you FAGGOTS and I usally would never use that type of language but let the "chips fall where they may" after this assault on MY family, run wild in Seattle, why the hell do you think DECENT people all live elsewhere?????

There has been vulgar and vile shenanigans before but YOU KNOW what your up to on this one and I will you now THAT STATUE IS COMING DOWN ONE WAY OR ANOTHER AND YOU CAN "BET YOUR BOTTOM DOLLAR" ON THAT ONE YOU CREEPS! I have already talked to my Reverand and TWO other Pastors in the area explained the situation and await their advice. Let the Lord's Will Be Done! In all my born days NEVER have I seen something as sick as OPENLY SUPPORTING CHILD RAPE and then sticking it in everybodys faces! And then to think that MY taxes paid for it like its not enough all the "welfare" I pay out to your AIDS clinics and all the other "BS" that Seattle takes and gives NOTHING back! Except child rape!

You publish all the "fun stories" 9 out a 10 of which insult Christianity Christians or even the "Big Guy" hisself. So if YOU are the "clearing house" for all the gay propaganda then YOU are the one I am writing to, Mister! This is the "last straw"! And you can better believe a protest is coming and if it comes to down to "brass tacks" then this is one time maybe we'll grow some spines and do what needs to be done AND THE SECULAR LAW OF MAMMON BE DAMMED!!!!!!!

Respectfully Yours, Daniel Robert Creighton

For what it's worth, that naked-man statue isn't a "stranger" to the naked-boy statue--the sculpture's called "Father & Son."

But he's right, Seattle is nothing but a child-rape pep rally posing as a city...


Wednesday, November 28, 2007

This Isn't Exactly News...

posted by on November 28 at 12:22 PM

... but I can't help be surprised all over again. Four of the top twenty paperback bestsellers this week are new or forthcoming movies, and one (The Road) is probably getting a boost from the same. The number one fiction paperback in the nation right now is a 1988 novel in translation by Gabriel García Márquez.

Love in the Time of Cholera

Maybe it's worth a godawful adaptation if it gets people to read the original? I confess, I--or rather, the paper, if a certain vacationing someone ever gets around to submitting the receipt--purchased a copy recently in preparation for that review. I hadn't read it previously, and I'm thrilled I did.

By the way, it's totally worth reading Atonement before you see the movie (out in Seattle next Friday) . In some ways, I think I like the movie more than the book (no irritating Woolfian tics that are revealed not to be the author's own irritating Woolfian tics), but having read the book makes the movie better.

Atonement


Friday, November 23, 2007

Northwest Artists Take Over Miami's Video Lounge

posted by on November 23 at 9:30 AM

Seattle Art Museum modern/contemporary curator Michael Darling has flashed his well-concealed muscle again.

When Art Basel Miami Beach (coming up December 5-9) invited him to curate the fair's Video Lounge--a video-art center set up in a building adjacent to the convention center hosting the massive fair--he agreed.

Video Lounge curators typically sift through material submitted by the various galleries in the fair, try to suss out some general themes, and then put together a program for the video lounge.

Darling threw out that model.

He decided this would be a Pacific Northwest show. And it is.

The 19 artists in the 90-minute loop that will play all day during the fair include Anne Mathern, Jack Daws, Mary Simpson, Hadley + Maxwell, Rodney Graham, Vanessa Renwick, and Euan McDonald. (Some of the artists don't live in the Northwest anymore, but all have connections to this region.)

In addition, Darling put together three evening programs, by theme. One is "Return of the Wild West," with work by Damian Moppett, Simpson and Fionn Meade, Matt McCormick, and Renwick. Another is devoted to Miranda July. And a third, called "Storytelling," features Gary Hill, Judy Radul, Renwick, and Harrell Fletcher.

The show is a quick-chute escape from one corner of the country to its opposite, both geographically and culturally.

What sort of work is in the show?

"There's definitely a nature theme: people filming in forests and addressing the beauty of this location, but also in an ironic way and poking holes in that, so it's not just rhapsodic," Darling said in a phone conversation. "There's definitely a rock-and-roll and music-related interest that bubbles up in different ways. As a counterpoint to the natural beauty thing, there's also a sense of simmering violence, maybe, that comes out in pieces from Vancouver and also here."

Darling says he hadn't planned on bringing the loop to show in Seattle, but I desperately hope he'll be able to. When was the last time anyone did a video survey of the Northwest?

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A still from Rodney Graham's A Little Thought (2000)


Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Where Everything Is Peripheral

posted by on November 21 at 10:22 AM

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Seattle artists Thom Heileson and Wyndel Hunt have teamed up at SOIL to create an environment in which buildings—and sounds—stretch to the point of disappearance.

The piece is titled Free Dissociation, and it combines sound by Hunt with Heileson's imagery, especially of construction sites around the city.

By the time Heileson's photographs make it to the screen, their surroundings have been washed out. The hollow, half-built buildings themselves are almost unintelligible as they float by, on the wave of Hunt's heavy drone composition.

With projections on three sides, there's the sense of constantly missing something that's being projected right in front of you.

The first section of the installation is different. The images are more abstracted, the sounds are sharper, and the whole thing is synced up so they flash together, sort of like the high-art version of a trailer for a summer blockbuster. It's the watery "film" that follows that's worth waiting for.

FreeDissociation-install-1.jpg

SOIL is open noon-5 Thursdays to Sundays, and the show, also including an interactive laser installation by Iole Alessandrini, is up through November 30.

End of the Glut: December 5, 2008

posted by on November 21 at 9:52 AM

Special to everyone going to Art Basel Miami Beach this December: you're fine. (Naturally, I'm missing this year's fair.)

Next year (the year I'm likely to go back), forget about it.

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By William Powhida, of course.

(Forgive the crass sales label -- or maybe it's just right.)

Bellevue Arts Museum Financial Officer Finally Charged

posted by on November 21 at 9:12 AM

...with 38 counts of theft for allegedly embezzling $300,000 from the museum.


Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Something Happening

posted by on November 20 at 2:07 PM

There's an event tonight at Lawrimore Project that involves a fashion show, a clothing store, a movie premiere by a couple of unheard-of Seattle-by-way-of-Iowa artists, and some things called "Zones," which I believe involve drinks and conversation.

Here's the film trailer.

I do not know exactly what is going to happen.

It starts at 7, costs 5 bucks, the film plays at 9, and the party continues until midnight.

The Shame

posted by on November 20 at 12:24 PM

My dream letter has come true!

Mr. Mudede,

Halfway through your article titled Miseducation I was prepared to forgive you for being mistaken or ignorant. Now that I'm through, however, all I can express is disgust at what you seem to understand and endorse. Though if your ideas are any reflection on The Stranger's general readership, at least they will not propagate but simply fester in minds already rotting... which is a small consolation.

There are a lot of things wrong with your article, but the founding idea from which all the rest spring is your animosity toward the individual person. I find it hard to believe that someone could actually endorse anti-individualism, which is why I say you only seem to understand what you're writing about. What does anyone have left in the end if not himself? What do you, personally, have left? What does anyone have a right to if not himself? What is so damned horrifying about entertainment for kids which endorses doing things you like, even if other people don't like them too? I don't feel bad for those 200 kids, I feel bad for your kid, who is bound to grow up feeling guilty for doing what he wants because he thinks another guy's wants are more important.

Shame on you for endorsing Karl Marx, shame on you endorsing a large-scale theft of private property that doesn't belong to you, and shame on you for endorsing anti-individualism, as though there is anything better in the world than living for one's self.

James Newport

Let me repeat:

The individual that High School Musical worships is the most nihilistic human being history has ever produced. Because this type of person has no content or history and because s/he absorbs everything s/he encounters into the nothingness of consumer comforts, this person is a perfect onion, a vegetable of pure layers. This thing that dances and sings and expresses its emptiness without thought or worry, this thing that is so stupid that it doesn't even know how to be bored—this thing is killing our planet.

Monday, November 19, 2007

Will the Plunder of University Museums Come to the Northwest?

posted by on November 19 at 3:43 PM

Today's Inside Higher Education has a piece about the University of Oregon's controversial decision this summer to make the university museum answer to the university fundraising department. The logic? Unclear.

But in light of several attempts lately by universities to sell off artworks to pay for financial deficits in non-art departments, the U of O's decision has professors in an uproar.

More broadly, the shift in structure underscores a question that’s been raised as a number of college leaders have raided their art museums to raise funds in recent years: To what degree is a college art museum considered central to an academic mission, and to what extent is it seen primarily as a financial asset?

The U of O's University Senate has submitted a request to the provost that the provost's office resume control of the museum once a permanent executive director is hired. (An interim director is at the reins now.) Let's hope that happens.

What's Going on at Langston Hughes?

posted by on November 19 at 12:37 PM

From our inbox this morning (abridged):

I am a small business owner of Café Vega on 19th and Yesler in Seattle’s Central Area. I have lived in Seattle for 16 years and am proud to live in and help build economic development in the neighborhood.

As an African American man and a parent of two young children of color, I know the importance of cultural institutions that reinforce positive images of our communities. One of the most pivotal institutions for my family for creating this type of space has been the Langston Hughes Performing Art Center.

Over the past few years, I have proudly watched the programs at Langston grow and felt comfort that, just two blocks from my café, something wonderful was happening. We’ve seen plays, dance, film, and music that cannot be found anywhere in this town. The synergy of being located near a vibrant performing arts center strengthens my hope and faith in our rapidly gentrifying neighborhood.

In the past few days I learned that Artistic Director Jacqueline Moscou -- the woman who has spearheaded Langston’s transition from a recreation center into a major civic arts organization -- has been unceremoniously removed from her position. Moscou, a well-known actor, director, and community leader, led the institution and development of the groundbreaking arts programming that has emerged in recent years.

The marquee at Langston now reads “ Dinah Was Cancelled - for more information call (206) 684-7241.” The number you call is not Langston Hughes. What’s going on at Langston? Has this organization abandoned its commitment to the arts? There was no announcement and no statement to the community regarding the future of Langston’s arts programs.

I attended a meeting of the center’s advisory council meeting last night expecting to hear some discussion related to this matter. There was none. The advisory council did, however take my name and ask me to sell tickets to their annual fundraiser. No mention was even made of her position, although the council is still touting her as a “renowned artistic director” in the fundraising materials they were handing out last night. With no artistic director and no vision for Langston’s future as an arts organization what would I be raising funds for?

Please ask Langston Hughes to explain why they dismissed their artistic director and help tell the community what has happened at their arts organization.

Thank you,

Andre Helmstetter
Owner, Café Vega
Central Area resident

Well, The Dinah Washington story was cancelled because the leading actress injured herself during the run, no controversy there. (And the phone number is to Seattle Park and Recreation, which runs Langston Hughes.)

But as for Ms. Moscou? The receptionist at Langston Hughes said nobody there was available to talk, but that Ms. Moscou is "on administrative leave" and "that's all I know."

I imagine we'll know soon enough—I called Mr. Helmstetter's cafe, where a harried-sounding woman said Helmstetter was on vacation, but that she'd already fielded a few calls from reporters.

Dominic Holden, Are You High?

posted by on November 19 at 10:31 AM

Dominic Holden, you're completely wrong when you say:

The best thing about the Olympic Sculpture Park is Wake—graceful and industrial. The worst thing about the Olympic Sculpture Park is the concrete warehouse right behind Wake—a “historical site.”

The concrete warehouse is terrific. It is perfect. It is the only thing within 30 blocks that speaks the same damn language as the sculpture.

And you are rooting for some glassy high-rise architecture as a backdrop for the sculpture?

Pot should be outlawed.

The Real Money Issue

posted by on November 19 at 10:21 AM

While Modern Art Notes worried over LA MOCA's announcement/decision to place a Louis Vuitton boutique in the center of Takashi Murakami's retrospective at the museum, and LAT critic Christopher Knight, known for getting tough on institutions, praised the cleverness of the store in art-historical terms, Jori Finkel of the New York Times was thinking bigger.

She was wondering why the exhibition itself (at a nonprofit museum) was funded by three powerful private dealers who sell Murakami's art out in the real world—for real prices, not the chump change of handbags.

And why one of the dealers, Blum & Poe, chartered a jet so that a particular artwork made it into the show.

The story Finkel wrote is evenhanded, but there are damning moments, and one comes about halfway through the piece.

The worst case, most interviewed agreed, would be for a museum to accept money from a gallery to stage a show of new or available work that the gallery could essentially sell straight off the museum walls. ... (O)nly a handful of the 90-plus works in the Murakami exhibition are for sale, most prominently the “Oval Buddha” sculpture, offered by Blum & Poe.

Oval Buddha is the newest work in the show, the 19-foot platinum and aluminum sculpture that Blum & Poe chartered a jet for. Add to this that the commercial gallery is also underwriting the exhibition, and the situation starts to stink.

But as Finkel explains, the museums she includes in her story—most prominently (but certainly not only) the Guggenheim (with its Richard Prince retrospective) and LA MOCA—solicited the ethically shaky support of these private dealers.

It's a fascinating read about the state of the world of art today.

Does the compromised context change the way we see Murakami's commercially minded art? If Knight had known the full story about the show's funding when he wrote his review, would it have altered passages like this one, or simply underscored them?:

The show is unambiguously titled "© Murakami." The copyright symbol reads as a defiant, paradoxical assertion that the artist -- not the private collector or public museum -- retains perpetual ownership of the art-idea. That's something we need to hear, especially as the mindless hand-wringing over today's art market escalates faster than most stock portfolios.

In capitalist society, art objects are a species of money, not a consumable commodity (as they're often mistakenly purported to be). Art is a medium of exchange, but artists establish its enduring value -- not some hedge-fund gazillionaire with a shopping list.

The claim gets reasserted in the show's newest work, recently completed and never before exhibited (although anticipated in a small figure drawn at the bottom of the mural-size Gero Tan painting). A Buddha-like self-portrait of Murakami is seated atop a lotus, riding on the back of a mythical beast, like Elizabeth "Cleopatra" Taylor entering Rome astride a colossal Sphinx.

Formed in aluminum and more than 18 feet tall, the silvery sculpture is covered in platinum leaf. It's the world's biggest bowling trophy -- an Oscar®™ the artist awards to himself.

Oh, and one other thing I'll say because MAN didn't: Why didn't the LAT get this story?


Friday, November 16, 2007

"New & Improved Stereotypes"

posted by on November 16 at 9:45 AM

Nativeamericans.jpg

Here are many, created by Jeremy Kalgreen (whose graphic design stuff is also delightful.)

(Thanks for the heads-up, MetaFilter.)

Inside Heavy Lines

posted by on November 16 at 9:30 AM

shimo_Minidoka_on_my_Mind_sm.jpg

In this portrait by Roger Shimomura, a young boy—a stand-in for himself—finds himself painting the tar-papered barracks of a Japanese internment camp, as well as the Idaho landscape in the distance. Shimomura was in a camp from age 2 to 4, but this isn't based on a memory. It's a projection of his adult self backwards, a foreshadowing that this camp will always edge his way onto his canvases.

Shimomura's show at Kucera through December 22 takes up the entire first floor of the gallery. I've always been a little undecided on his work, feeling that his heavy black cartoon outlines contain the heavy emotional content of the work in a way that's slightly uncomfortable. All that rage refusing to roar. It's using pop backwards, not to flatten affect but to heighten it in relief. Looked at another way, I suppose the lines seem about right for imprisonment.

When I visited the gallery yesterday, I was won over to their range. Kucera pointed out in particular a nice detail: that the shadowy portraits—the ones where the black oozes out of its outlines and into the subjects themselves—take on nuclear overtones.

This one's called Bad Dream:

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This one is Shadow of the Enemy:

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In this one, Shimomura goes right for it and asks, Would you have done it to Ichiro?

shimo_notJA_72-1.jpg


Thursday, November 15, 2007

Another Photographer Detained

posted by on November 15 at 4:57 PM

Here's another in the rash of tales since Sept. 11 about all sorts of photographers being questioned and detained for taking perfectly legal pictures.

KING-5 reports today that the Snohomish police cuffed an associate professor of fine art at UW, Shirley Scheier, for taking pictures of power lines.

Now the ACLU is suing the department.

Here's a good primer on what you can and can't shoot when you're out there—and with few exceptions, the cops and the security guards crying "security" are wrong.

Keep shooting.

(Thanks for the tip, Betsey.)

Zoe Strauss

posted by on November 15 at 12:05 PM

This morning, United Artists Artists announced its picks for 2007--artists who'll receive $50,000 each--and Philadelphian Zoe Strauss is on the list.

By coincidence I was glued to Strauss's web site yesterday, looking through dozens of her photographs, which form a portrait of her neighborhood in Philly. The influence of Robert Frank is unmistakable, especially this side of Frank (SAM recently had this up but the museum changed photography exhibitions two days ago):

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Here are a few of Strauss's images:

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gallery_1.5.jpg

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Strauss will be the next artist-in-residence at Open Satellite, the new contemporary art space in Bellevue fascinatingly funded by a developer. The space is designed to bring artists from around the country to the Seattle area to work—and to work on the Seattle area.

LA-based Olga Koumoundouros inaugurated the program in September, with an installation inspired by a couple of little brown abandoned houses nestled, still strewn with household goods, in the middle of downtown, beneath the construction cranes and rising skyscrapers of developing Bellevue.

Strauss will focus not on downtown Bellevue, but on Factoria:

In the Seattle metropolitan area, Strauss continues her visual study of broken promises engendered by failed social and economic programs. Specifically, she looks to the Factoria neighborhood of Bellevue, citing the district’s ambitious intentions–suggested by its name–to become an industrial manufacturing hub. These plans never materialized, and the area’s name endures as a reminder of unfulfilled aspirations. Open Satellite presents Strauss’s new Seattle-area photographs, as projections and large-format prints, alongside a selection of her earlier work.

The exhibition opens December 1, with a party and a slide show from 6 to 9 pm.

Also on the list of USA visual arts winners are Uta Barth, Allan Sekula, Ann Hamilton, Edgar Arcenaux, Charles Gaines, and Paul Chan.

The only Seattleite to win a grant is Maggie Orth, in the craft and traditional arts category. Her electronic textiles have been on display at McLeod Residence.


Wednesday, November 14, 2007

The Hospital Ceiling

posted by on November 14 at 9:37 AM

In my review of Jim O'Donnell's beguiling A Spectral Glimpse show up now at Platform Gallery (great slide show here), I mentioned Chicago-based artist Adam Ekberg only briefly.

His two photographs in the show depict the rainbowy flare of the sun on the camera's lens as it points toward the sky from the floor of a forest. They're large and gorgeous, and in their hippy-dippy awestruck way they nod to a video by Ekberg I've only heard about and never seen, of a light show on the top of a mountain in the dark. Here's a still:

ekberg.jpg

This, in turn, reminds me of this (an illuminated tree photograph by Charles LaBelle):

Illuminated-Trees2.jpg

(It also reminds me of an illuminated tree series by Rob Fischer, an example of which I can't put my finger on online.)

But what I really wanted to share is Ekberg's series of hospital ceiling photographs, which are not in the show (but are on his web site). He didn't compose them; he took them by flopping himself down on the beds and shooting whichever way he fell.

hospitalceiling.jpg

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As much as these images are all thick with death and dying, their abstraction pulls away the melodrama and leaves only the image, the last thing you might see.

Portland Art Museum's Winners

posted by on November 14 at 7:57 AM

More on this later, but here are the basic facts: For its first round of Contemporary Northwest Art Awards, Portland Art Museum has selected Dan Attoe, Cat Clifford, Jeffry Mitchell, Whiting Tennis, and Marie Watt.

My first impression is: Go Seattle. Three of the five are from here. And: Where are all those amazing Portland artists we keep hearing about in every news outlet in the country?

Details:

Recent and new work by these five artists will be featured in the Museum’s inaugural Contemporary Northwest Art Awards special exhibition, June 14 through September 14, 2008, which will be accompanied by a full-color catalogue and Museum programming. Each award recipient will receive an honorarium. During the exhibition’s opening celebration, one artist will awarded the Arlene Schnitzer Award for Northwest Art, a $10,000 cash prize named in honor of philanthropist and longtime Museum patron Arlene Schnitzer.

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

This Is Not A Smile

posted by on November 13 at 3:23 PM

From a piece on the endlessly grinning artist Yue Minjun in today's NYT:

Karen Smith, a Beijing expert on Chinese art, suggests that Mr. Yue’s grin is a mask for real feelings of helplessness.

“In China there’s a long history of the smile,” Mr. Yue said. “There is the Maitreya Buddha who can tell the future and whose facial expression is a laugh. Normally there’s an inscription saying that you should be optimistic and laugh in the face of reality.”

“There were also paintings during the Cultural Revolution period, those Soviet-style posters showing happy people laughing,” he continued. “But what’s interesting is that normally what you see in those posters is the opposite of reality.”

Mr. Yue said his smile was in a way a parody of those posters. But, since it’s a self-portrait, it’s also necessarily a parody of himself, he added.

“I’m not laughing at anybody else, because once you laugh at others, you’ll run into trouble, and can create obstacles,” he said.

"Obstacles" were especially dangerous in China in 1989, when Yue developed his style in the aftermath of the student uprising at Tiananmen Square.

Several of these famous smiles are found in a single piece at Seattle Asian Art Museum in the exhibition Shu: Reinventing Books in Contemporary Chinese Art through December 2:

YueMinjun.JPG
Yue Minjun's Garbage Dump (2005-2006)

Another artist in the exhibition, Xu Bing, will give a talk called Between Vision and Language at SAAM Thursday night at 7. The talk is free with museum admission.

Visual Art Intern Needed

posted by on November 13 at 2:53 PM

Here's the text of the classified ad.

Wanted: Stranger Visual Art Intern

Three months of Shangri-La with my wry and well-outfitted viz-art intern, Jamey Braden, are about to come to an end.

The good news for any incoming intern is that she'll train you, and she is worth knowing. The job involves putting together the art calendar every week, and occasionally Slogging about what you see out there, art-wise. It's probably an 8-hour weekly commitment that lasts about three months, and you should be able to come into the Capitol Hill office to work.

My ideal candidate is someone who wants to be an art critic eventually—and while the internship is unpaid, most of my interns write at least one published review, if not more, by the end of their time—but minimally, I have to have somebody who knows the basics about contemporary art and the local scene (who'll notice if a big gallery is missing from the listings, for instance).

What else? Attention to detail, naturally. Sense of humor, I beg you. No flakes. Send me a note and a resume if you're interested: jgraves@thestranger.com. And tell me, if you could transport yourself to any art show in the world right this second, which one would it be, and why.

Here's a depiction of the work:

Man%20with%20a%20Hoe%20Jean%20Francois%20Millet.jpg


Monday, November 12, 2007

Shakespeare's Best Cunt Joke

posted by on November 12 at 1:48 PM

For Annie...

In Twelth Night the servant Malvolio examines a love letter written, so he's been told, by his lady. He examines the handwriting and exclaims...

By my life, this is my lady's hand these be her very C's, her U's and her T's and thus makes she her great P's. It is, in contempt of question, her hand.

In performance, of course, "and her T's" comes out "N her T's," thus spelling out CUNT--and it is with her cunt that Malvolio's lady makes her great P's.

Ah, the classics.


Saturday, November 10, 2007

Norman Mailer Dead at 84

posted by on November 10 at 6:18 AM

mailer.jpg

Here's Charles McGrath's obit from The New York Times.


Thursday, November 8, 2007

Can It Be True? A Free Historic Building to an Arts Organization?

posted by on November 8 at 3:51 PM

Free aside from repairs, of course. But seriously: is this the kind of deal anyone will be interested in?

I'm on a deadline and headed for an airplane at the same time, otherwise I'd look into this more deeply, but this is the word that I and a bunch of other reporters just received from Scott Lawrimore, owner of Lawrimore Project downtown, which is next to the building in question:

It has come to my attention that the City of Seattle has released its hold on a permit to acquire the GIGANTIC, historical and long-fallow Immigration Building next to my gallery here in the International District.

This building was offered by the Government Service Administration and its Regional Manager to the City of Seattle for $1 if they would dedicate it for an arts or cultural purpose.

The City of Seattle ignored this offer.

The City of Seattle instead tried to get it for a developer to turn into mixed-use office space as part of their larger plan to turn my entire block into condos, retail and office space (for which it is not yet zoned).

The Government Service Administration and its Regional Manager now have a very small window of time where they can hear from ANY, I repeat ANY arts organization that can utilize this building for the greater cultural community's benefit and make a "Public Benefit Transfer" of the property--essentially 'give' the building to an organization that will shepherd it for a cultural purpose. Whether it's Artist Trust or the Gage Academy or Cornish or The Henry or U.W. or SAM or The Frye or On the Boards or A.C.T. or... THIS IS THE TIME FOR THEM TO LET THEIR INTEREST BE KNOWN!!!

If this interest is not made know within the next week, the G.S.A. will be forced to put the building up for public sale and the noble, altruistic intent of the GSA's Regional Manager will fall by the wayside as it inevitably falls into the hands of a developer.

This is an amazing opportunity that should not go ignored.

Beyond this being an "arts" story, there is a larger issue with what the City of Seattle has set forth as its priorities.

ANYTHING you can do to get this story out there or spread the word to organizations that might benefit from this knowledge would be great.

Wonderlands

posted by on November 8 at 2:09 PM

From near the center of Lolita:

"I moved toward my glimmering darling, stopping or retreating every time I thought she stirred or was about to stir. A breeze from wonderland had begun to affect my thoughts..."
That wonderland (with its fantastic breezes) can be found in the background of these images.


Image one, behind the house:
bild1088522871681.jpg

Image two, above her head:
l_963d11d2c32c4a1f46a43d51afc25152.jpg

Image three, a wonderland of trees.
20070417b_1_bg.jpg

What we see in the background of all three are "mists of tenderness enfold[ing] mountains of longing."

Re: Café au Laid

posted by on November 8 at 9:41 AM

“It is about time to use an Ethiopian flavour for beautiful Ethiopian girls,” said Dereje Alemu, 19, a university student.
Now that we are aware of these airy words, amorous words that arrive like an aromatic whiff from the wonderland of the African mind, we must not meet the end of today without seeing at least one sample of the many "beautiful Ethiopian girls" that are presently in this world of our making and taking. Picture%207.jpg The name of this exquisite human being is Liya Kebede.

Wednesday, November 7, 2007

Against Pink

posted by on November 7 at 3:30 PM

By Germaine Greer.

(Thanks, ArtsJournal.)

For Anyone Who Wants To Know What It Would Be Like To Be In A Room With Robert Irwin

posted by on November 7 at 3:12 PM

I linked Monday to the review of Irwin's new show in San Diego by PORT's Arcy Douglass, who emailed me this description:

You might enjoy this and I did not know where to include in the review so it was dropped. During the media preview, Irwin is giving a short lecture on the background of his work. He goes on to say that the questions are always more important than the answers and a few minutes later asks for questions by the audience.

Even though there only 40 people in the room, if someone asked a question, Irwin would leave the pedestal to be closer to the audience and make direct eye contact with the person who asked the question the whole time. Keep in mind that if you ask Mr. Irwin a question that you will proabably get a 10 minute answer. Proximity and what he would call being "tuned in" is as important in a conversation as it is in his work.

IRWIN.jpg

In/Visible Is Up, and It Asks: How Well Do You Know This Woman?

posted by on November 7 at 3:05 PM

mimimug.jpg

Because she is your art museum director.


Monday, November 5, 2007

While We're on San Diego

posted by on November 5 at 5:30 PM

Earlier today, I linked to a nice long piece on Robert Irwin's show at MCASD, which ends with a consideration of art's role while the city burns.

I also got an email from Seattle artist John Feodorov: Native American performance artist James Luna's home burned to the ground during the fires. To help:

If you would like to help please send your contributions to Circuit Network at 2940 16th Street, San Francisco, CA 94103. You can make your checks payable to James Luna or if you would like to have your donation be tax deductible, make the check payable to Circuit Network.

Circuit Network is James Luna's management organization, a non-profit arts service organization. 100% of all donations will go directly to James and Johanna to help them rebuild their home.

Best in Thought

posted by on November 5 at 4:38 PM

The new music of Burial has inspired me to make this quick list of key (key for me) philosophical essays.
HDBCD002.jpg

Walter Benjamin: "Theses on the Philosophy of History"
klee_engel_higher-res.jpgThere is no better or more complete concept of history.


Mike Davis: "Dead Cities"
g_08.jpgThis work is urban theory at its terminal point.

Roland Barthes: "Sade"
Picture%201.jpg Everything you wanted to know about sex.


Louis Althusser: "Ideology and the State"
spaceneedle.jpg Theory as a missile that seeks and destroys what it seeks.

Staurt Hall: "The After Life of Frantz Fanon: Why Fanon? Why Now? Why Black Skin, White Masks?"
fanon.jpg Really, what else does a black man want?


For Charles

posted by on November 5 at 11:50 AM

An entire blog based on pairing buildings with songs.

(Thank you, Guardian, my captain.)