John Waters said recently on Studio 360 that he only buys art that annoys him. It shouldn’t surprise his audiences to hear that the outrageous creator of “Pink Flamingos” and “Female Trouble” doesn’t want to be surrounded by comfortable work.
I only got the account of his NPR interview secondhand, but I think I understand what he means – or at least I can work with it. I don’t buy pretty art myself, and I don’t buy art which I pretend to understand or with which I’m totally comfortable.
This is all by way of an introduction to the current installation at Foxy Production. I don’t mean to say that David Noonan’s show actually annoys me, but I admit that even after seeing all kinds of individual pieces on previous occasions I remain more than a bit baffled by what he’s doing. At the same time I’m fascinated. What you’ll see on West 27th Street is gorgeous work, but I know there’s stuff in there of which I am only dimly aware.
Wait, I think I’m talking about all of the gallery’s work as much as I’m talking about the paintings in the current exhibition. It’s not just the charm of the two principals which brings me back for every show; it’s the heady feeling of not only being exposed to something quite new each time but also of encountering something which may never reveal itself entirely – even if it comes home with you. In a very real way, it always does.
Seriously one of the most interesting shows in Chelsea this month.
[images (paintings produced by diluted bleach applied to black saturated canvas) from Foxy Production]
Category: Culture
fucknewyork
Ahhh. The Underground Railroad has the dope on the wonderful little video I posted one month ago. This is from the director, Matt Lenski:
We’re both native New Yorkers – I was born in Manhattan and lived on Eldridge and Houston when I was little – and of course we were all outraged that Republicans were coming here to use the 911 incident and twist it in their favor. They’re coming to our home town and we felt like we did when we were sixteen years old and some bully was steppin to you on your block, talking shit. These Republicans are the ultimate punks. I’m a director and Sam Marks is a writer and a playwright so we said let’s come up with something.
[thanks to bloggy]
The Drawing Center
I don’t think there’s one clinker in the group included in the new show at The Drawing Center (and actually I wouldn’t mention it if I thought there was). Although some of the work is immediately seductive, some of it may have to wait a bit for the kind of recognition it’s certainly going to find. I’m thinking right now of the powerful, disturbing drawings of Zoë Charlton.
You know it’s a good group show when you find yourself wondering about the actual process of assembling a group of (in this case 14) artists you’ve seen little or nothing of before. I mean, how does it happen? And where have they been up to now?
In any event, the pictures included below offer barely a hint of the deptha nd breadth of the show, and they definitely don’t describe all of my pleasure in what I found at tonight’s opening. As usual, they are images which happened to come out the best in a few of my modest attempts to record things which attracted or provoked me. I certainly don’t always get what I want.
Sometimes it’s just the ambient light which won’t cooperate, but the work itself can be the obstacle. I really liked the gorgeous assemblies of Jonathan Herder which I had first seen at Pierrogi 2000, but it’s impossible to show them with a hand-held subminiature camera. Any reproduction of Nancy Jackson‘s extravagantly-imagined worlds probably shouldn’t be attempted, and Jennie White’s exquisite, pierced white paper samplers almost defy the eye even if you’re standing in front of them.
Tucker Nichols untitled (2004) installation detail
Ricardo Lanzarini untitled books (2003-2004) installation detail
Alejandro Diaz detail from “works from ongoing series of cardboard signs” (2003-2004) marker on cardboard, dimensions variable
Phoebe Washburn, Simone Shubuck
LFL was also crowded Friday night, for two openings, work by Simone Shubuck and Phoebe Washburn, but in this case an overflow crowd only intensified the impact of Washburn’s enormous and quite magical installation in the front of the gallery’s newly-enlarged space.
Two years ago LFL’s smaller, original location on 26th Street was the site of Washburn’s overwhelming (literally) first appearance with the gallery. Or was it rather that her installation was the site of the gallery for a few weeks?
Simone Shubuck, vitrine installation view
I’ll definitely be coming back for a better look at Shubuck’s gorgeous drawings in the inside room. There, because of the size and energy of the very interesting crowd, there wasn’t even space to snap a picture, but there are some images of her work on the gallery’s site. She and all of us are far better served by the room itself, so you should go if you can, and you’ll probably want more than a quick look.
Two wonderful shows.
[image of Shubuck’s work from LFL Gallery]
Chelsea SUV
They’re still bringing SUVs into the Chelsea streets lined with art galleries, but Friday night outside the Pipilotti Rist opening at Luhring Augustine we found that some of them are less monstrous than others.
Size definitely matters when it comes to parking on a busy street.
[because of the crowd inside that night we decided to go back another day to see the installation]
old music made very new
New Music.
The sounds would have been new to almost everyone on the planet, even, perhaps, to most of the population of Japan, where the music originated – more than two millenia ago. Zankel Hall was the venue last night for a concert, “Reigaku and Gagaku: A Living Tradition,” of traditional and modern music composed for ancient Japanese instruments. The ensemble was Reigakusha.
The entire program was spectacular, but in a very restrained, austere mode.
The visual beauties (faces, instruments, costumes, set, movement) were also compelling, and might actually have been enough of an attraction by themselves.
The performers were mostly quite young and there were more women than men. Two of the four composers represented were also very young, and two were women (amazingly, only a small portion of the evening’s program was devoted to traditional pieces). If this musical tradition is timeless it’s also become very, very new for reasons only partly dependent upon its exoticism.
Unfortunately this concert will not be repeated in New York (they were at the Kennedy Center in D.C. tonight and they’ll be at UC Berkeley September 12), but I’ll be back in line the day this company (or any similarly-inspired) announces a return engagement. Next time I’ll try to give everone I know a heads-up.
Meanwhile, there are CDs (see their site linked above, or check Amazon for sound samples).
[image from Reigakusha, via the Institute of East Asian Studies]
Nuha al-Radi
Nuha al-Radi, detail of a work in a 2002 exhibition in Amman
Writing in “Baghdad Diaries,” about the first gulf war and its aftermath, the Iraqi artist and writer, Nuha al-Radi lamented:
The birds have taken the worst beating of all. They have sensitive souls, which cannot take all this hideous noise and vibration. All the caged lovebirds have died from the shock of the blasts, while birds in the wild fly upside down and do crazy somersaults. Hundreds, if not thousands, have died in the orchard. Lonely survivors fly about in a distracted fashion.
Ms. Radi died last week in Beirut. The birds, Iraq and the entire world will miss the wry wit of this great soul.
She seems to have belonged to no one party or culture, but rather to all humanity. The NYTimes obituary describes her as “not overtly political.” Certainly no friend of Saddam Hussein’s regime, at the same time she saw no great virtue in the destruction wrought by his nemesis:
She was somewhat less than enchanted with Iraq’s latest overseers for failing to provide basic security and services, however, describing the new tenants of the presidential compound in an interview with The Times last year in her typically caustically droll manner:
“America is in its ivory tower palace,” she said, “We are used to having coups and revolutions. But usually people who stage them take over the country
afterward.”
[image from 4 Walls]
the Hearst Tower Project
completing the Hearst Building
It’s probably the most interesting building now going up in New York. That may not be much of a recommendation these days, but seriously, Sir Norman Foster’s solution for completing a 75 year-old skyscraper is well worth a detour even as it’s still going up.
I’ve been lucky to be able to visit 7th Avenue and 56-57th Street and watch this column grow all summer.
If you look at the familiar tower of the Empire State Building it rises in a similar fashion, set back from a base the width of a city block, even if in its case the same elegant style is continued throughout its height.
The Hearst Building was never completed after rising only six stories. Today it may finally making up for its deprived youth. Be sure to check out its interesting history on the link above.
“Watch What We Say”
little red convertible, dusk, Williamsburg Bridge
Barry and I had the delightful experience of being whisked to Williamsburg for an opening at Schroeder Romero Gallery on Wednesday evening in our friends’ bright red open car, but the unfamiliar luxury of the carriage subtracted nothing from our experience of the political or aesthetic power of the show curated by Marc Lepson. The title of the exhibition, referencing the notorious post 9/11 warning delivered by former Bush press secretary Ari Fleisher, is “Watch What We Say.”
Many of these provocative and very beautiful works are documented on the gallery’s own site or that of Joy Garnet (who has two pieces in the show) but I managed to capture a couple of detail or installation shots which may still be useful to the curious.
William Pope L. Bill is Upset 1955-2004 (2004) mixed media 12″ x 11″
Christopher Knowles Alert Paintings (2003) acrylic on canvas; five parts 4′ x 10′ installed [installation view]
Joy Garnett Smoke (2003) oil on canvas 54″ x 60″
Carrie Moyer Psychogeographic Landscape v.2 (2004) acrylic on canvas 84″ x 72″ [detail]
Dread Scott Beloved (2003) silkscreenon paper 22″ x 17″
I’m Gonna Kill the President”
One scene in the play we saw last night accounted for what I’ll say was the scariest evening I’ve ever spent in a theatre. While I think it’s generally billed as comedy (well maybe political satire) don’t underestimate its seriousness. Yes it’s hysterically funny and the players are really impressive, but there’s much, much more in store for the brave souls who make it to a venue revealed (eventually) only to those who reserve tickets. Performances run through next Saturday.
I don’t come across too many playwrights working with the kind of political material I find inside my own head. Barry writes, “I love a play where “moderate” is an insult.”
Many, many thanks to the anonymous crew responsible.