Fear(s) of the Dark

This film is a Blockbuster exclusive. If there's one near you, make sure to rent it.

The disparity between great art and bad art is ridiculous. In the world of bad art, an amazing film like Fear(s) of the Dark doesn't seem possible. In the world of good art, Paul Blart: Mall Cop doesn't seem possible. One of them is bluffing.

What about art criticism?

I thought y'all might be interested in the April 23 Junto hosted by P'unk Ave, whose website promises "a discursive discussion, beer". In addition to the beer and discursiveness, you can hear from Sid Sachs, Roberta Fallon and Libby Rosof, Katie Murken, and Andrew Suggs about art criticism. Yeah, art criticism!

Hope to see you there ~gerard

holy moly

As much as possible given the time and space allotted. from Galerie Leonard & Bina Ellen on Vimeo.

OK - I seriously do not know what to think about this...as someone who has worked behind the scenes in museums, (in the collective I work with in DC - DCAC's Sparkplug more than a 1/3 of us have 'done time' in museums as I know 1-2 of you in SUMFA do now). This is a painter-centric type of rant - which is a little funny coming from me - but here it goes...

I have seen 'the stacks' and know the beautiful collisions that can happen on those racks where items are put together solely based on available space-like a little Daumier painting ending up next to a big Bonnard, where proximity creates affinity. Dollars to donuts that's the kind of thing you'd have to travel through space and time to actually see hung up in a museum - unlikely matches happen, but rarely.

It also struck me that this show looks a lot like the proverbial mid-century SOHO painters loft (Alice Neel's is infamously described in my circle of education) where finished paintings line every available space not needed for walking or working. This kind of chaos is often where us 'art professionals' work - why not drive that point home to the pedestrian public?

Well frankly, because when I see it on 'tv' I realize how freaking insane it looks - how does clearness of message arise out of this horror vacui?

Well brother - it just does. Contemplate that.

Make Sense

Before the Internet, when texts were confined to publications or notebooks, they were solid (or at least encased). They had a place, a center, and their meaning was partly derived from their participation in objecthood. They had to be copied, printed, and passed around from hand to hand. One could trace their history and track their movement.

These days, however, texts are like water. They spill and run through the infinity of cyberspace, being absorbed into everything or evaporating before you know it. As a writer, I’m almost afraid—better yet--embarrassed, to pour. Without cups to catch and hold them, texts just slip through our hands into the abyss.

Better to be a visual artist then! The problem discussed above is of no concern to the painter or the sculptor (we’ll suspend consideration of the photographer) since we deal in objects. A word is a word whether it’s in a book or on the Internet. But a painting on the computer screen is not a painting. It’s a picture of a painting and it doesn’t come close to recreating the experience of an actual painting. One can only judge the size of a painting relative to his or her height and one can only examine the thickness of the paint by viewing it from all sides. To see a large painting in person is to enter it; to see one on the Internet is only to catch a whiff.

At a time when the Internet is swallowing all—newspapers, books, the mail—it can’t touch art objects. Going to a gallery cannot be replaced by browsing the web. If someone makes a drawing, there’s still a delay between its construction and its public presentation unlike blogs, which can be “published” immediately upon completion by anyone, anywhere. The gallery system continues to function as the publication industry did before the Internet. It decides who’s in and who’s out, acting as a necessary filter to retain the value of the goods.

Make an object and be proud! That object holds a significance that exists in no other place. By locating meaning, you are making sense in a world that desperately needs some.