Jennifer Bartlett at the Locks Gallery

"In New York [in the sixties], I felt a distance between myself and others. I didn’t understand a lot of what was going on, what people said or how people felt about art. I feel that to this day. I don’t feel threatened by it anymore. I don’t understand, sometimes, what other people are seeing, or what they’re after, but back then it seemed necessary to pretend that I understood. Sol LeWitt’s 'Paragraphs on Conceptual Art' had been published, one of the great mid-century poems. And on a good day I could follow 15 of his 32 rules."

-Jennifer Bartlett

from an interview with Elizabeth Murray for BOMB magazine (2005)

Have you ever played Minesweeper? It's a trite computer game that I first experienced in the mid-nineties on what now seems like an an operating system artifact, Windows 95. When the game begins, there's a grid full of undifferentiated grey blocks that one has to blindly click. You may unknowingly strike a mine on the first turn and BOOM! Instant explosion. Or you'll discover a number that alerts you as to the possibility of a local mine through hints of pattern. Identify the "rhythm" of the suggestive numbers correctly and you just might win.

The haze of Jennifer Bartlett's recent work Song initially acted as a wall that I had to "blindly see" through in order to discern anything. As my eyes bounced like they were in a pin-ball machine amidst the thousands of dots, I began to recognize patterns that led to "explosions." Unlike in Minesweeper, however, these bursts were the rewards.

Song, 2007
enamel over silkscreen grid on baked enamel steel plates
6 ft. 3 in. x 97 ft. 4 1/2 in. overall
(Installation views courtesy of www.locksgallery.com)

As I stepped in three-quarter time (1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3) through Song, some shapes elevated from the enamel squares and arrested me in ways that transcended traditional Op-Art through progressive spatial manipulation. What the hell does that mean? It means that Bartlett's shapes evolve, expand, retract, dissipate, aggregate, and constantly refresh themselves through a series of mini-evolutions. Yes, they move (due to their multiplicity and sequentiality).

Bartlett narrowed her palette to wheat (pale tan) and black to give pixely form the mic and I'm ferociously dialing to cast my vote. Arthur Danto, in a written response (published in The Nation in 1986) to Bartlett's Rhapsody (her career-making work from the 70's), mentioned that Bartlett attempts to paint everything through reduction i.e. she finds universals in elemental forms not unlike Thales, the first Greek philosopher on record, who attempted to find the common denominator in all materiality. His answer was water. Since water could transition from solid to liquid to vapor, it seemed the most likely candidate for our universal essence. In this room-spanning work, Bartlett's solution, like many masters such as Seurat and Close, is dots. A fitting conclusion because dots can represent molecules, cells, (maybe even monads?) and more importantly, bits (a measurement for quantities of information).

Bartlett's pieces compliment each other like layers of a matryoshka doll (those Russian dolls that when opened, reveal more dolls) and all the fragments harmonize like a devoted choir. It's safe to say that Bartlett's Song is a hit.

Outside of Song, Bartlett's work at the Locks gallery (in a show that is now closed--so this review is rather gratuitous) goes awry due to pure colors that should be locked up for battery (they defeat form and block any compositional nuances) and/or imagery that reminds me of elementary art projects:

Untitled (Ocean & Mountain), 1975
enamel over silkscreen grid on baked enamel steel plates
12 x 25 inches

Thanks for reading!

The Doll Thing, excerpts from my thesis

Hey y'all-

Gerard asked me to post excerpts from a chapter from my thesis to share with those of you who care to read it, along with some photos of my recent works...in truth, I was undecided about what excerpts to include so most of the chapter is here in its entirety, although I will not be offended if you choose not to read all the way through.

Enjoy.
Melissa




The Doll Thing


At a time when everyone was still intent on giving us a quick and reassuring answer, the doll was the first to inflict on us that tremendous silence (larger than life) which was later to come to us repeatedly out of space, whenever we approached the frontiers of our existence at any point.
Rainier Maria Rilke, Some Reflections on Dolls, 1914

Reading Rilke’s Some Reflections on Dolls encapsulated the thoughts I’ve had in my mind for some time regarding my own work. At first these creatures mimicked the animals that I live with; it tickled me to see the live animals interact with the imperfectly created ones, the border between the real and the imagined coalescing was an exciting discovery. The natural progression went from animals to surrogate humans, yet, while I was busy lamenting the disconnect in relationships between humans I had neglected to address the very interesting connection between man and doll. Rilke’s reminder of how children play-acted relationships with their dolls, their surrogate humans, brought to mind an image of an adult play-acting with dolls to address the issues they are confronted with but either refuse or are afraid to enact with human counterparts. My creatures materialize into agents of retreat when the reality of human life is too dangerous or when the simple act of confronting the truth is unbearable.

These dolls, or creatures, are not the same as childhood dolls in the sense that I carry them around with me like a makeshift friend wherever I go, they are not “lived unwearyingly with energies not their own”, nor are they “dragged into the heavy folds of illnesses, present in dreams, [or] involved in the fatalities of nights of fever” (Rilke 120). Yet, I create them like Geppetto created Pinocchio in place of a boy-child of his own. What is the impulse behind these fantastical creatures’ creation? In some ways I believe their formation has resulted from mounting frustration about cultural forces that are beyond my control. Much like Hans Bellmer created his first eroticized doll in response to world events that were threatening his everyday life, I feel as if my primary impulse to make these creatures is my irritation with a world that is increasingly consumer driven, shallow, and complacent (Lichtenstein 1). The Bush administration’s policies have left me feeling repressed and paranoid about speaking out about acts that are truly fascist. Perhaps it is naïve to lame the blame on the administration’s doorstep, but with technology advanced to the point where we can literally be in communication with anyone, anywhere, George Orwell’s prophetic warnings seem apt. (We already know that our government is listening to our phone conversations.) When you are unhappy with the establishment and the status quo you are left with two choices: you can either rise up against it, or if you feel powerless and overwhelmed you can retreat into yourself. For the time being, I have retreated into the void of silence and these creatures have emerged as mute witnesses to my conscientious objection.



That some of these creatures have strong relations to others and interact and exist in their own quiet space is one of their characteristics. That I search for an environment for them in the real world of humans is another aspect of their existence akin to childhood dolls that have been loved. I keep thinking of them as an alternate to humans – perfectly empty vessels without original sin, yet imperfect in their formation, as if they have been punished without doing anything.

One of the primary impulses for making them is an overall disgust I have with the human race. I feel a greater affinity with animals and certainly with individuals, but am at odds with the interests of so-called mass society. Making an alternate, yet imperfect family is comforting somehow; it offers no solution at how to deal with reality other than to provide an escape from it. Exiled voluntarily from the world of humans, at least mentally, these creatures are an attempt to amend for our garish, barbaric ways. My level of success is uncertain, which only confirms my belief that humans fail to do anything correctly. These creatures were born from a need to understand human tragedy and pathos, but they themselves are warm, funny, and disturbing. Perhaps that is the reflection of human interaction for me.

Yet, this seems to be an oversimplification of them as well. It is not as if I am a child who needs an imaginary, silent friend to feel safe with, but when exploring childhood fears, traumas, and insecurities carried forth into adulthood these creatures become intruders from youth, the monsters of maturity taunting me to grow up and join them. These are the nightmares of childhood made manifest – the things I didn’t understand and yet haunted me still; demons made a little less frightening and a bit more manageable, but still powerful. To put them in real human environments is to assert their existence in a world that is not metaphysical, but is present and organic.

To make dolls as an adult poses a question different from the one asked of children about why they possess dolls and live out lives for them. Perhaps an adult who makes dolls does so out of a desire for a child of their own, so they may love something outside of themselves. Kate Linker, in examining the differences in the role-playing phenomena of both children and adults, states, “children project alternative identities onto surfaces, imaginatively painting a man’s face on the moon to warm the eerie coldness of the night sky…Adults extend such empathetic projection onto objects in consumption” (Linker 36). It is also interesting to note that in consumption, adults are gaining dominance by possession of a material product, whereas with dolls, children gain dominance through assertion of character, because otherwise, “had [they] surrendered [themselves] to it, there would have then have been no one there at all” (Rilke 121).




Perhaps making dolls, as an adult, is an alternative to the traditional love affair most people have with their possession, their house, car, etc. There is an act of nurturing involved in the creation of a doll – the act of dressing it and of bringing it into locations that could be interpreted as an adult playing out the role of the parent to see if it suits them. It reminds me of the Home Economics project they make teenagers do in high school where they are forced to carry around a fragile egg for several weeks so that they begin to understand the magnanimity of having a child. Because an adult is more emotionally developed than a child it seems odd to see them carrying on with a doll in a manner similar to one. Children are trying out roles when they play with their dolls also, but do not have the life experience to make this interaction seem weird or inappropriate.

I think there is something a little sad about someone who prefers the silence of the creatures they make to real human interaction, but maybe that’s not really the case. Maybe the few real relationships the maker has is enough and the dolls fill in the gap, becoming almost spiritual in their silence. Maybe they take up the space of God or meditation in the consuming act of designing them, dreaming them, of stuffing their limbs and sewing them up. The joy of seeing them complete is so fulfilling that they add to the whole rather than subtract from it. As their creator I am very fond of them, but I also easily forget them or love them a little less as time wears on, much as I imagine God did after he created man. These creatures, in their way, are God’s unwanted children, playthings that have been discarded after a brief, intense loving.

The task of representing humans in their entire complex and frustrating forms is a difficult one. How do we make something that can be offered up as a token of what we are capable and incapable of simultaneously? Are not dolls surrogate creatures that have our likeness but are unfamiliar? I suppose it is not entirely possible to incorporate every aspect of humanness in one particular object, but rather to approach humanity through many, and hope that through their existence with each other, they create a whole, imperfect being that reminds us of ourselves.

These creatures are out of place; they seem to have no true home, no real environment, which enhances this feeling of displacement. I think it would be very beautiful and poignant in a way to only have them exist physically in a room that is more fantastic than real and have them only exist in the real world through photography, so that they are perpetually held in this kind of imagination purgatory, not really living except as dreams that sometimes creep out into the light of human existence.

by Melissa Nannen



Bibliography

Howard, Jan. Laurie Simmons: The Music of Regret. Baltimore, MD: The Baltimore
Museum of Art, 1997.

Lichtenstein, Therese. Behind Closed Doors: The Art of Hans Bellmer. Berkeley, CA:
The University of California Press, 2001.

Linker, Kate. Laurie Simmons: Walking, Talking, Lying. New York: Aperture
Foundation, 2005.

Rilke, Rainier Maria. Rodin and Other Prose Pieces. London: Quartet Books, 1986.

Welcome Jamin's Baby

News from Jamin London Tinsel - Angelina Marquette Tinsel was born on Thursday, May 15, after 60 hour of labor (geez, that's longer than the thesis show was up!) Mother and baby are doing well, and as you can see from the photo, are beautiful.

Congratulations, Jamin.

ARTS FUNDING IN THE NEW GOVERNMENT

So, a Chair or Shoes?

Art critic James Panero said the following (in an article titled, "Criticism After Art" from the New Criterion, Dec. 2005):

A world of difference separates those who criticize art from those who seek to know about how art criticism is done, because art criticism is done by doing it. To ask after the details beyond the most practical ones is already a step in the wrong direction. Art critics who make the "criticism of art criticism" their business do not stay in the business of art criticism for long.

As most thinking creatures do, I turned inward after the dawn of my age of reasoning (12). From the outside, I might as well have been an invalid and my ventures into art-making and art theory didn't do anything to alter that state. As an amateur artist and theorist, I just fed into the cycle of make-think, think-make and stockpiled jargon which I thought was necessary to my understanding of art like "simulcra" and "rhizome." Very impressive, huh?

Occasionally, if it was convenient, I would observe actual art in other places. If the art was bad, I was happy because I was superior. If the art was good, I was jealous.

It wasn't until I started writing about other artists' work on a regular basis from a relatively disinterested perspective that my mind was opened to the world of art criticism. "Oh! So art does exist outside of books and computers!" I thought. Then I found James Panero's articles in the New Criterion. As a critic, he's too conservative for my taste but his style was a revelation because he relocated the discussion of art from academia to gallery-hopping:

In New York, the good gallery critic is set apart from the bad by how efficiently he steers a course from Chelsea to Fifty-seventh Street to the Upper East Side with a stopover in Williamsburg. How he finds shows to write about. How he calculates (as in my case) a way to feature exhibitions, with a three- or four- or five-week run time, that will still be open once the magazine comes out.

In Panero's reviews, there's none of the intellectual jargon found in most published writings about art. Not that "artspeak" or theoretical terminology are inherently bad or useless--the truth is far from that-- they just aren't everything. There's a way out of discussions about "the postmodern sublime" and that is to live by the anonymous art critic's statement, "I see art...and I write about it!" (Panero's quote)

Since I've put down the books and laced my shoes, a whole world of art has opened up to me. I can't wait for First Fridays and opportunities to experience art directly, talk specifically about that art and issues relevant to it, converse with gallery owners and artists about their ideologies, and bump into hundreds of lively, talkative people.

The art world exists outside the studio, beyond books, away from the keyboard, and in local galleries.

"He who experiences [artistic] impressions strongly and drives directly at the discrimination and analysis of them, has no need to trouble himself with the abstract question what beauty is in itself, or what its exact relation to truth or experience--metaphysical questions, as unprofitable as metaphysical questions elsewhere." -Walter Pater from Studies in the History of the Renaissance (1873).

Awards

MFA Ceramics, Painting, & Sculpture Faculty, Returning & Entering Students:

Each Spring MFA faculty recognize 3 thesis students who have attained a high level of accomplishment in their studio work and have achieved the highest GPAs for their overall academic achievement.

I am pleased to announce the Spring 2008 MFA CPS Awards to thesis students:

Nate Pancratz Painting Henkels Award

Sara Fine-Wilson Ceramics MFA Faculty Award

JoAnne Schiavonne Sculpture MFA Faculty Award

In addition to recognizing these students for their fine work, I am particularly thrilled to announce that JoAnne Schiavone is among the 15 MFA students being awarded a $15000 grant by the Joan Mitchell Foundation! Joanne is the first student from our program to receive this prestigious award in recognition of the quality and inventiveness of her work.

Please join me in congratulating JoAnne, Sara, and Nate until we are together in June and can deliver a resounding round of applause at Saturday's lunch in the Hunt Room.

Carol

Theophile Gautier

(Image used with the courtesy of
http://www.poesies.net/images/theophilegautier.jpg)

Theophile (pronounced Toe-feel) Gautier (1811-1872) was a French romantic novelist, poet, play write, and literary historian who was co-responsible for the "art for art's sake" movement (Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism p. 750). He resented the notion that art should be a political instrument for either the conservatives or the liberals and thought that's its uselessness was its strongest element. I posted this blog because contrary to most theoretical writings, Gautier's is actually fun to read.

Gautier, in response to the conservative notion that all art should promote virtuous activity wrote the following (printed in his Preface to Mademoiselle De Maupin):

"She [Virtue personified] is a very agreeable grandmother--but a grandmother she is...It seems to me natural, especially when you're twenty to prefer some immoral little thing who is very sprightly, flirtatious and obliging, with her hair somewhat ruffled, her skirt on the short side, her feet and eyes provocative, her cheeks slightly flushed, a laugh on her lips and her heart on her sleeve."

Some more outrageous quotes:

"What is the use of music? What is the use of painting? Who would be mad enough to prefer Mozart to M. Carrel, and Michelangelo to the inventor of white mustard?"

"No, imbeciles, no, idiotic and goitrous creatures that you are, a book does not make jellied soup, a novel is not a pair of seamless boots; a sonnet, a syringe with a continuous spurt; a drama is not a railway...By the bowels of all the Popes, past, present and future, no, and two hundred thousand times no!"

"Let people say after this that novels don't contribute to civilization. I shan't talk about tobacconists, grocers, and sellers of fried potatoes; they have a very great interest in this branch of literature, since the paper it's printed on is generally of superior quality to that of the newspapers." ("Better quality paper made better wrapping for their commodities"--Editor's note).

"I have no wish to disparage the illustrious profession of the cobbler, which I honour as much as the profession of constitutional monarch, but I humbly admit that I should rather have my shoe unsewn than my line ill-rhymed, and that I'd rather do without shoes than do without poetry. As I hardly ever go out, and walk more skillfully on my head than I do on my feet."

"Nothing is really beautiful unless it is useless; everything useful is ugly for it expresses a need, and the needs of man are ignoble and disgusting, like his poor weak nature. The most useful place in a house is the lavatory."

"I should most joyfully renounce my rights as a Frenchman and as a citizen to see an authentic picture by Raphael, or a beautiful woman naked..."

Sometimes he sounds dangerously like your charismatic best friend offering you pot at 13 but it's okay to be a Lotus-eater once in awhile.

Another Criticism Heads-Up

More stuff has rolled across our radar for those preparing for Criticism Seminar this summer.

I hope you’ll take a moment to visit NPR’s Archive page for a link to the April 30, 2008, broadcast of Talk of the Nation which dealt with movie critics and how much traditional journalistic criticism has been replaced by criticism on the Internet (I know, I know, it’s film…but the class – thank heaven – is criticism not art criticism).

The conversation (which you can, and I hope will, download) touches on a number of questions we’ll examine this summer. Among them,

What’s the role of localism in criticism? (Or to put it another way, why don’t art reviews get syndicated so you can read the review of the Murakami show from the LA papers or the Olafur Eliasson show from the San Francisco papers instead of taking up space in the New York papers?)

What are the criteria for preparing a critic for her career? Can everyone be a critic?

What’s the relationship between a critic and his readers? Specifically, what’s the relationship between the (disinterested) critical conversation of art and the economics of talking about it?

Is criticism in the business of taking things too seriously, preventing enjoyment, and sublimating pleasure (however it may be defined) to intellectualism?

In the next few days, I'll be sending out info on books and things I want you to read in preparation for class. Hope you're well.

Your Hardworking Faculty...

Congrats to Jennie Shanker, who started a new photoblog documenting her community work with the Mural Arts Program, Tyler School of Art and the Hartranft Elementary School. You can check out what going on by clicking here.

Gaudy Details

The auras of Ivan Stojakovic's pieces (this concept in the artistic context is taken from Walter Benjamin) in his show "Build Up" at the Bridgette Mayer Gallery radiate virulence of the most pleasing kind (depending on your perspective). Stojakovic squeezes "toxic paint" (his words) from its tube, leaving its consumerish purity intact, directly onto the canvas populating cityscapes with fat rows and squished spots. The following pictures can only intrigue and tease you because they don't come close to reproducing (in another word, dissipating) the authority of the original work.

Before the Storm, 2008
Oil, Alkyd and Spray Paint on raw Canvas, 60 x 43"

Before the Storm -Detail

Whenever I usually catch bright colors through a gallery window I prefer to send a stunt double in to withstand the attack but in this case, Stojakovic uses a nifty technique in which he interjects a warm neutral in between effulgent colors to mildly and effectively offset the impact and balance the compositions. Another surprising facet is that, despite the artwork's initial punch, there's actually more to see and understand in the particulars: Maze-like textures rest on harsh silvers made from means that are hard to pin down ("alkyd?" It's apparently a polyester coating), company icons are mixed with buildings that seem familiar but remain deceptive (Is that San Francisco or Chicago?), and the ominous clouds hang so clear and yet so hidden.

The press release says, "His current process of creating work stems from an internalization of dramatic events and turning points from around the world, such as: climate change, terrorism and breakthroughs in genetic science." These issues may be important to the artist and political elements are seemingly essential (if one goes by most gallery statements) to making artwork seem relevant today but Stojakovic's work is damn pretty and that's all I (want to?) see. Those three aspects (climate change, terrorism, and genetic science), as far as I'm concerned, are lost in transmission. The deliberate garishness of the paintings gives one an opportunity to argue that this intention conveys a societal critique (Stojakovic hinted towards this reading) but that's as far as I'll budge. A general societal critique is far from a problem-specific argument (and I recognize that descriptive words like "balanced composition" and "garishness" are contradictory but I would argue that this contrariness is fitting).

In Stojakovic's oeuvre, these new works represent a shift that is more positive than negative towards a streamlined vocabulary. Previously, our Serbian artist dabbled in Kandinskian space and Kiefer-thick abstraction with light references to recognizable forms. Now, cityscapes dominate, forcing Stojakovic to handle pre-established complex details which add depth to his platform and outcome, with a flavor that is still Expressionist through and through. Read: SEE THIS SHOW (and I dare you to tell me I'm wrong about the political aspect).

Other galleries to check out in Philly this month: The Clay Studio has a deep but overwhelming exhibit titled "Small Favors III" that includes tiny works of over 120 artists.

Zack Hamilton Wounded
Ceramic, Platinum

The encasing of these works seduces the viewer into a retinal dissection of the eye-level "specimens." The only way to make sense of a show like this, especially when there's that good ol' First Friday crowd wrestling (stop stepping on my eye!), is to play favorites based on instant impressions. I looked at the above work more than any other, at first, simply because it was so odd. There's more than enough here to interest any aesthetic, so, you are sure to be satisfied by something (if you intuitively establish a hierarchy and then put blinders on).

Continuing the Honey I Shrunk the Artwork theme from the Clay Studio: Gregory Halili's watercolors, at the Artists' House Gallery, are delightfully miniscule (delicate and focused) with wide mattes that fit like clown shoes (strictly in terms of proportion...otherwise they're normal). I openly admit that my enjoyment of this work comes from the novelty of the miniature and the unbalanced presentation and not from the content. If you don't mind seeing bananas in a basket then maybe you'll appreciate the work too.

Gregory Halili Banana Basket
1.5" x 2" watercolor

Thanks for reading!
Matthew Parrish

Walking

"I think that I cannot preserve my health and spirits, unless I spend four hours a day at least--and it is commonly more than that--sauntering through the woods and over the hills and fields, absolutely free from all worldly engagements."

- Henry David Thoreau, from Walking (June 1862)

"When you're walking you notice things otherwise unseen--like mice in the fields--and you have to experience every step."

-Werner Herzog, from his discussion at UPenn (2007)

I have a confession to make--recently I've become addicted to walking. This habit was born from a gimmick I devised to get myself to exercise more: I decided that whenever I spoke on my cell phone I would go for a walk. I actually didn't realize how much time I spent on the phone until I realized how much I found myself walking.

It wasn't long after that that I became acutely aware of how anchored I felt by my stomach after meals. My newly named "digestive walks" cured this heaviness. Soon, after I accomplished anything--a reading, a writing, and/or an artwork--I thought, "I need to go for a walk to relax and clear my mind."

Sometimes, I got to jogging and felt this strange thing I'd only heard of before: "runner's high." A concept like this was alien to a person who had dreaded every stride of football practice in his adolescence. But here I was, racing along and feeling more connected to my human essence than through almost any other activity (we'll leave the champion of this hierarchy to the imagination). I thought, "Feral rabbits beware! I may be out for your blood so my tribe will have food tonight." Okay...so maybe I'm not Survivor Man just yet but I feel a little less wired and more inspired.

I've already had my share of run-ins with the police because of my new addiction. Recently I was actually pulled over for walking! A police officer stopped me and inquired about my name, my residence etc. and said that someone had ran out of the local diner the other night without paying and that my appearance fit the description! I thought I'd walked out of my house and into a Law and Order episode.

Pretty soon you may see me on Intervention (a TV show in which families intervene to save loved ones from drugs) with my sister saying, "Matt, walking isn't just hurting you it's hurting everyone you love. You need to come back to us! The neighbors don't like you pacing the streets at night."

Maybe I'll be like Chris McCandless or Forrest Gump and just keep going one day! See you all at Uarts later...or will I? (dramatic music please).

Pentimenti Preview/Early Review

Image taken from:

http://localephemera.blogspot.com/2007/07/real-bling-was-on-street.html

The new show at the Pentimenti Gallery doesn't officially open until next Friday but I've taken a peak and here's what I saw: David Ambrose's daedal works are less than engaging from a distance, but look a little closer and you'll find a porous, wavy web of colors. Ambrose pierces relatively thick paper in precise or wandering lines to create a braille-like texture (one of the works is titled "Braillescape" or something similar) before releasing watercolors upon the bumpy terrain, creating a nice balance between "control and chance." Art historically, the work immediately brings to mind Lucio Fontana's holey canvases:

Lucio Fontana Concetto Spaziale, La Fine di Dio

Oil on canvas, 1964. The Rachofsky Collection.
Image used with the courtesy of http://www.panachemag.com/Spring_07/TheBuzz/TheCollector/The_Collector.asp

Fontana's work, however, has more of a modernist "shock of the new" feel about it whereas Ambrose acknowledges and encourages a connection with the inherently "feminine and anonymous" history of knitting and lace-work rather than the "heroic and autographic" tendencies of painting and building (paraphrasing his own words). This aspect of his work makes it more inviting and warm than ambitious and exclusive (I'm aware that this argument can be made to support the mediocre over the great but that is not the case here--Ambrose's art is both average in appearance and superior in process and philosophy). Ambrose's work successfully commingles the trendy non-monumental world, the Yayoi Kusama school of repetition, and the increasingly prevalent "fine artist" fascination with craftwork.

On a Side Note: The works at Pentimenti are more painterly and less like classical patterns than the image above which is taken from a previous show.

Also showing at the Pentimenti Gallery is Matthew Kucynski's work:

Green Receptionist, Mixed Media, 36" x 36"

Used with the courtesy of http://www.poolartfair.com/pool_miami_05/exhibitors.html

Kucynski's particular blend of blatant sexuality and surrealistic strangeness isn't particularly intriguing and the "pop-up book" theme seems gimmicky. Most relief-styled, protruding, or distinctly shaped paintings have this problem because the three-dimensional accentuation exhibits a lack of faith in painting. However, his Technicolor Wizard of Oz tonality is charming and the obvious fun he had while envisioning these id-driven characterizations comes through the work.

Finally, head out to the Sam Quinn gallery (around 4500 Spruce...past UPenn) to see SUMFA alumnus Melinda Steffy's show if you haven't already.

Thanks for reading!
Matthew Parrish

First Friday at Vox Populi

Picture used with the courtesy of the Vox Populi Gallery

http://www.voxpopuligallery.org/

Magnetic Movie, by artists who call themselves "Semiconductor," is a squeaky, spastic, scientific digital animation (projected on a screen in a secluded dark room) of what magnetic fields and particle movements hypothetically look like (a video still can be seen in the picture above at the bottom right). The work could be viewed as "just" a glorified diagram of the potentiality of physics but it's an enthralling one. Part of what makes the video so enjoyable is that the graphic animations are contained in real environments. One watches neon magnetic fields expand and particles buzz, pop, and fire through what seems to be experimental laboratories. A highlight is when the "real space" seems to get caught in a matter 'quake, blurring the lines between the graphically altered and the actual.

I'm not one who usually likes to bring up the question "What category does it fit into?" but in this case, I can't deny the inquiry. Is it science or is it art (or both)? This dilemma reminds me of Eadweard Muybridge's stop-motion photographs from the late 1800's (which I learned about from Digital Currents: Art in the Electronic Age by Margot Lovejoy). Muybridge's photos are considered scientific but not science because it was revealed that he "freely edited" his photographic sequences for the sake of continuity.

Eadweard Muybridge The Horse In Motion. 1878
Used with the courtesy of http://www.math.yorku.ca/SCS/Gallery/images/muybridge_galloping_horse.jpg

Whereas the results from Jules-Étienne Marey's "phot-graphic gun" are considered hard science because they are precisely captured multiples without any post-production alterations. So, the distinction between what is and what is not science, according to this example, is a matter of whether or not the photographer's hand distorted the results. In the case of Magnetic Movie, the animations are based off of science but the results are creative interpretations. The artists took the blueprints for what particle movement and magnetic fields could look or sound like and pushed them into artistic territory.

There are two other video works at Vox but neither have the jolt of Magnetic Movie (not that I necessarily judged them comparitively, for they were all of different genres and it would be unfair...I'm just noting what I liked and didn't like). Nadia Hironaka and Matthew Suib's Black Hole is, simply put, disappointing (top right in the picture above). The room that Black Hole is in is more impressive than that of Magnetic Movie because it's larger and darker. The film seems to engulf the viewer which made the video, in part, live up to its name. However, the content is confused and the progression is suspect (images enter and reappear without registering).

I appreciate the chiaroscuro and some of the light play (they mesh with my video art aesthetic) but there was an attempt at a narrative that fails. I left thinking, "What was that?" After I exited the room, I found a gallery statement that discussed isolation (a favorite topic of mine), political metaphors, film noir, and cinematic conventions (so, there was an attempt at conveying meaning-- it wasn't meant to be a display of the destruction of information) but I didn't get any of that from the work (two people I watched the video with remarked on the division between the art and the statement as well).

Lauren Kelly's Big Gurl is shown on a tv screen hung on the wall in normal lighting (bottom left in the above picture). It's a stop-motion video with Barbie-like dolls that is difficult to sit through due to its inherent awkwardness but that is not the reason it's unsuccessful. It fails because its too "messagey." I don't discourage feminist messages, the truth is quite the contrary, but all the characters in this narrative are simply representations of sexist issues instead of being complex characters that we could connect with. All the men are over-the-top sleezeballs or morons trying to pick up attractive women. I'll admit that I didn't make it through the entire piece but I watched three "skits" and all three fall under this description (you could watch it for one minute and "get it"). In other words, take away the "I'm going to beat you over the head with my message" element and we're left with cleverly arranged backgrounds.

This blog is getting too long so, I'll wrap it up (I focused on video art because it's my medium but there are other works as well...Carl Baratta's paintings are fun--the middle right image in the top photo). In the end, Magnetic Movie is deeply affecting and certainly worth the trip.

Thanks for reading!

Maybe it was an April Fool's joke...?

Maybe, but maybe not. Fans of the hive mind (you know who you are...) will be delighted to read Mark A. Wilson's article at insidehighered.com, imaginatively titled Professors Should Embrace Wikipedia.

As a teacher who supports student research projects, I have some thoughts on it, but I would rather just get it out there for y'all to think about. Have fun.

More on critcism - at the movies

There was another little tidbit on the place of criticism in contemporary life in the New York Times on April 1 (Now on the endangered species list: Movie critics in print by David Carr).

Carr makes many interesting observations in the piece, but the one I most interested in about how journalistic criticism (as opposed to mob-criticism on the web) benefits products that the market is prone to overlook. Carr usefully reminds us that the cream doesn't always rise; it's often prevented from doing so by the enormous marketing of blockbusters that fills our collective field of vision. Journalistic criticism can direct attention to overlooked works with an authority that new media criticism has yet to obtain.

The article introduces other interesting topics to thrash out this summer in seminar, too. If, as it is commonly claimed, everyone's opinion of a work of art is of equal value (the "everyone's a critic" maxim), how should media outlets select regular critics for their publications? More to follow, but I wanted to put this out there for y'all.

In Defense of The Internet

Many people lament the historically recent technological shift in our culture. "They" say that it has imprisoned people in a reflection of reality (disconnecting them from the actual) and dehumanized them. Instead of interacting with people proper, so the rhetoric goes, people are now engaging with a screen that only encapsulates a whiff or an echo of humanity.

Of course, some of this is true. The internet and its outdated predecessor the television can be seen as compact psychological cages. To me, however, it seems that people who hold this view forget the painful, madness-inducing isolation paramount in this world. They must be city-folk who have a healthy social atmosphere for intellectual, social, and pleasurable endeavors.

For most of the population, of America at least (the only country I can speak for), who are suffocating in traps that parallel the technological ones like slave-driving bosses, miserable and self-indulgent neighborhoods, and ignorant relatives, the internet can be a utopian window for cross-state relations. Instead of one being stuck in a sleepy, dull area, one can converse about favorite artists, authors, musicians, etc. through forums which house engaging discussions. One can experience bright and life-affirming personalities through comedic videos on Youtube. One can elevate one's mental faculties by browsing the latest political commentaries on Rollingstone.com or CNN.com (and local papers or libraries are no substitute...the former are often concerned with dog shows and the latter, highly selective). One can learn about anything at the drop of a hat. (What do I want to learn about today? The baboon spiders a.k.a. tarantulas of South Africa? Done).

Of course there's a lot of bogus information out there but one just has to be smart about sources. When in the history of the world wasn't there a lot of bogus information out there? Woody Allen said, "Everything our parents told us was good is bad. Sun, milk, red meat, college." How many parents force their children to eat everything on their plate? This enforcement leads to enlarged stomachs and tendencies that encourage obesity. Where did they get this "method" from? It wasn't the internet. Everything my father's mother told me, God rest her soul, was B.S. and she never owned a TV or a computer! She believed in fake illnesses like "Liver Groan" (you catch this from jumping in the pool too much--and don't think she was just using this as a method for instilling fear...she actually believed in her diagnosis because her mother told her about it).

I'm more terrified of isolated information handed down from generation to generation than an information free-for-all that, when surfed right, can be enlightening. This new transferral of information may be wreaking havoc on the nervous minds of scholars but screw 'em. Don't get me wrong. I have a lot of respect for good professors (several of them have enriched my experience of the world and made me a better and smarter person) but many of them seem to be more concerned with tooting their own horn, puffing themselves up, and social positioning. Maybe the internet's insistence (I realize this is grammatically wrong) on collectivity (not that the literary world wasn't already heading this way) will force them to concede a little ego.

If Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead in today's world, someone would have posted a video from his cell phone on Youtube.com showing the behind the curtain switch of the dead body with an impostor. It was easy to deceive people who had no other source of information but word of mouth.

Anyway, people who regret the technologically-centered incarnation of reality that we live in for the reason that it is socially isolating and an information bedlam don't really understand that such a state is the nature of the world and that this version helps people who would otherwise be completely cut off stay in the game.

Time to think about criticism again....

Hope everyone is enjoying a productive semester - mine has been utterly chaotic and I apologize that I'm playing catch up to so many people's work. But I saw this and thought I should share it, as the subject - how criticism is responding to a changing world - is a major part of this sumjmer's conversation in my seminar.

Ann Powers had a little piece in the LA Times (Music industry rules are shifting under feet of artists, fans and critics) about the new Raconteurs album and how it will be released to the public without any advance release to critics. The article is short and readable, and notable because Powers is thinking through a good many of the constituencies affected by the shifting landscape of art/critic/audience relations. I'd encourage everyone to read it, and post comment (but, sorry, I can't give any advice about the Raconteurs album yet).

Best,
gerard

Red Light Cameras

An MSNBC article titled, "Red Light Cameras Work Too Good for Their Own Good" enlightened me about the real motivation behind enforcing traffic violations.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23710970

In Dallas, TX, they had installed "red light cameras" to capture images of drivers in the act of violating traffic laws. There are cameras like these all over the country. I'm familar with them because my sister was ticketed in NYC and she received a picture of her car before and as she ran a red light at 2 am. I mocked her stupidity ("Thought you were gonna get away with it, huh?") while being in awe of the technology.

In Texas and Illinois, however, they have decided that the cameras work TOO WELL and have limited or ceased using them. "Why?" one might ask. Because their revenue for ticketable offenses has decreased too much. But wait--I thought devices like these were implemented to lower the amount of violations and consequently make the roads safer. Nope. It turns out these nifty cameras were put in place solely to catch more criminals (and generate profit) not to stop them. Since "violators" were aware of the cameras, they were more conscious of their driving, less tickets were handed out, and the government got less money.

It's one thing to take extra cash from careless drivers but another to depend upon them as a regular profit. I didn't realize minor crime was an economic crux. The police claim that without the ticket revenue they can't afford to operate the cameras that were installed to generate ticket revenue. HA! A great expediture that turned out to be.

The next time you get pulled over tell the cop, "I pay taxes."

"French Students Shy of Real World" -BBC

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7293992.stm

This article (click the link above) discusses how the educated youth of France are choosing too many "soft majors" and not working enough. What do you think? Is America the same way? Are too many of us choosing impractical career paths and then wondering where our money is? And if so, what should we be studying instead?

I think about this a lot. Susan Sontag said something like "Anyone who doesn't work with their hands is a parasite." What she means is anyone who isn't doing hard labor is living off of others hard labor. The latter group includes artists, critics, theorists, etc. Are our paths justified?

Art is a natural part of humanity and its enrichment of life is, to me, self-evident. If we all adapted a utilitarian perspective, what kind of life would we be constructing?

Who or what "decides" who should be a laborer and who gets a spot in the ivory tower? Money? Influence? Academia? Skill?

Who the #$&% Is Jackson Pollock?

Picture used with the courtesy of http://www.impawards.com/2006/posters/who_the_bleep_is_jackson_pollock.jpg

A brief synopsis of the film Who the #$&% is Jackson Pollock? (released in November 2006, directed by Harry Moses):

While scanning a local thrift shop, former truck driver Teri Horton came upon a rather large, abstract painting and decided to buy it for her sick friend. The original price was seven dollars but she haggled it down to five and put it in her truck. When she presented it to her friend, they both agreed that it was ugly and joked about throwing darts at it. A local art professor came upon the work and said that it may have been painted by famous artist Jackson Pollock. Teri's response was, "Who the #$&% is Jackson Pollock?"

After she consulted a few people, she became convinced that the work is actually an authentic Jackson Pollock. However, the art world thinks otherwise. Experts like Thomas Hoving, an executive at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, are convinced that the work is of no significance and was not made by Pollock. The film documents Teri's struggle to prove the legitimacy of the work against the consensus of the experts.

This film is a Marxist crossbreed in which the art world, the bourgeoisie, and former truck driver Terri Horton and her friends, the proletariat, collide. This reading is encapsulated by the "opposing" ways of celebration: The experts and the in crowd of the art world fashionably attend gallery openings where they drink fine wine, eat various cheeses, listen to classical music, wear expensive jewelry, and mingle with supermodels (Moses unfairly limits his shots almost entirely to this type) while Teri Horton's sweatshirt and jeans group hovers around a bar at a familiar dive laughing, drinking beer, listening to the local Mellencamp, and saying F-U to the absent snobs.

Beyond the upperclass/lowerclass distinction, this film is an inquisitive documentary (is there any other good kind?) that is relatively objective. Moses seems to be honestly after answers and truly conflicted when science and the art world disagree. I won't give too much more away but the film is worth the watch even though it is sometimes tedious (in the second half, the twists are mild), rambling (one can only listen to Horton for so long) or absurd (Horton comes up with a maddening story for how the painting was made).

B-