X2plusY2plusZ2isR2

untitled pictures, 2011 (ongoing)

2011-12-14T00:58:00.012-05:00

thessaloniki anthro

2011-08-10T14:39:00.013-05:00

july.

2011-07-31T11:45:00.004-05:00

new work july.

right dope

2011-05-11T16:39:00.000-05:00

aktuell

2011-04-19T11:55:00.014-05:00

͌͌☡

2011-04-07T08:43:00.006-05:00

〽

2011-02-16T20:42:00.005-05:00

at Mr. Murphy's

2011-01-19T10:45:00.014-05:00

shapes, plans

irish

matt entertaining women

the poor, unwanted LP

felt seat

leftovers

2010-12-07T03:41:00.003-05:00

walking the corgis at Frieze

2010-10-21T05:56:00.027-05:00

Some selections from this year's Frieze, which was much more
disorienting than last year.

Kerstin Bratsch

Amikam Toren, Black Hole, 1996-2007

Kai Althoff

Christo

Subodh Gupta

Des Hughes at the Modern Art London booth

Scott Myles

Julius Koller

Tim Eitel

Ariel Schlesinger

a piece shooting out clay pigeons by Piero Golia

Simon Fujiwara

Roger Ackling
(the lines are burned in to the wood using sunlight)

and an outdoor sculpture that neatly epitomised the day

the need to strengthen the weaker argument

2010-09-24T21:56:00.011-05:00

1, McCracken play 2, "I'm on the fucking Verrazano Bridge" 3, studio time
4, foot study 5, kobe and mask 6, Rochelle Feinstein lecture (final slide)

tested on animals

2010-09-18T01:51:00.005-05:00

collaboration with anonymous children
2:1, fronts and backs

White Box

2010-09-14T20:17:00.006-05:00

bltn post; installation shots from Off the Map at White Box gallery, April 2010

untitled photos, 2009

2009-12-25T20:19:00.028-05:00

Per Kirkeby at Tate Modern

2009-07-15T05:49:00.003-05:00

Going to come back to this artist at a later point in time since
I'm working on translating from the French an early collection of
writings by him entitled Manuel (Manual) which accompanied an
exhibition at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (planning
on posting excerpts from the translation on this blog), but for
now it's good to see he's still producing new work; this show opens
tomorrow in London:

http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/perkirkeby/default.shtm

David Wilkinson

2009-05-20T18:27:00.007-05:00

David is a sculptor/sausage maker here in Budapest.

Sausage skins. He fills these with plaster.

Some studio views....

redefining "ROTFL"

2009-05-20T17:37:00.001-05:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQ5boOTyz_4

new music

2009-05-16T19:46:00.003-05:00

I've put up some music on a fresh myspace page
www.myspace.com/klicova

ka-chaaa!

the new Towner art center in Eastbourne (uk)

2009-04-30T10:49:00.013-05:00

Towner art center, debut exhibition. These images are from the
first floor gallery. Don't have any of the artist's names (sorry),
though the title of the show is "Lost Horizons".
above: hand driers like the ones typically found in wc's. Speakers
mounted above each one turn on when the drier is activated,
playing recorded conversations apparently taken from
interviews with people on the streets of London. One of
these the interview turned into freestyle rapping ( a good
way to answer questions).

work for a living turns into work or a living

plexi display holding plaster casts of socks,
many of them child-size

guardian review

Kenji Fujita

2009-04-29T22:08:00.010-05:00

Saw this show at Samson Projects when I was last in Boston,
now that I'm here again for a few weeks was reminded of it.

"The title, Debris of Life and Mind, was taken from a Wallace Stevens poem.
I wanted the conversation between painting and sculpture to take a different turn.
I had done this earlier by examining the convention of wall-based work and turning
the assumptions that we have about the wall into a question: if something is going
to exist on the wall, how does this happen? I wanted to reflect more on the work’s
physical placement in an architectural setting and how that placement in space
determines meaning. I also wanted to play with things that have a certain weight
and that cause pressure. The original idea was to make these works freestanding,
but I soon realized that the bases would overwhelm the pieces. This led me to take
one side of the base, a two-foot square piece of plywood, and use it to prop the piece
against the wall. A plywood support and a compressed sphere coated with plaster
cloth combine to meet the back of the piece against the wall, creating support that
is both functional and sculptural. It’s still a conversation about painting and
sculpture, but the conversation is now taking place in an architectural space."
(from SP website)

It's always pretty amazing to think about how much territory is still open for
exploration, just taking, for instance, how the floor meets the wall, -even after
Tuttle's, McCracken's, Serra's and innumberable others' forays into the question.

the relapse of 1991

2009-02-05T08:25:00.009-05:00

"If there's a problem, yo I'll solve it, check out the hook while my dj revolves(not resolves) it."

1991...just a few years MTV has been out and dances and dance parties are the thing to do. An obsession of self expression, a next generation of working class kids who could learn nothing of self expression from their uniformed nurse mothers and their mechanics' suit fathers were going for it, our eyes were not tired from images, we had the subtlety of our communist enemies in relation to culture, but we broke their backs and so they continue with their fire red lipstick and pegged pants as we move through the subtle gray period, the natural eye shadows and Morandi.

But perhaps this relapse you predict will be so...but never back to my favorite neon sweatshirt worn inside out, this can only be for the kitsch, the rich...only the rich will risk or afford(in time, energy and funds) the french cut thai pants. We will have utility with hype:see $300.00 Uggs for example..."

(written by cheryl robinson)

walking,

2009-01-30T18:56:00.004-05:00

going with the prospect of good tomatoes and beets and finding the best earth
which accepts plants, the meanwhile talking of summer, renting cottages if it's
not too dear ("we shall scrimp and save") & getting muddy without care
in the plateau of thought by a lake designed for that purpose by someone.
horses, so de stil and prancing that they are creamed, and the tails of little striped
birds fluttering as if in perpetual love of the last few hours of daylight in

a reappearing forest

rem koolhaas onward & sideways

2009-01-20T15:50:00.008-05:00

paving the way for buildings to be "about diagonality"...(that's a new one)
the staggered floor heights revealing the secret of the structure is the best part, I think.

related: great FT article about the New New York.

grass collage!

2009-01-14T16:05:00.008-05:00

some serious manicuring going on!!!!!!

long is the arm, short is life

2009-01-11T06:35:00.005-05:00

"The word 'technology' comes from the Greek techne, often
translated as 'art', but closer in meaning to 'skill'. The first
translation is particularly misleading because techne included
both what we call 'art' and what we call 'technology', which,
since the modern emergence of the aesthetic and the 'fine arts',
have become so separated as almost to be opposite. Techne was
was originally related to words having to do with building, like
the buliding of walls. The Latin ars, from which our 'art' more
immediately descends, is related to 'arm', perhaps associating
skill especially with the making of weapons ('firearms', 'armour')
and tools, but also with the shoulder (armus), the arm of the body,
and more specifically, the skillful or 'dextrous' arm (and hand),
activity as it were using the stronger right hand, or perhaps most
generally activity increasing the power to act effectively. When it
began its historical life, then, 'art' had meanings rather like that
preserved in the kinship of the word 'craft' and the German Kraft,
'power' (even though 'crafts are for us now 'minor arts', another
casualty of the historical emergence of 'fine arts'). In antiquity,
the terms now translated by the word 'art' referred to useful adult
human pursuits running the full range from perfumery and
beekeeping to geometry and astronomy. The arts were regarded
as teachable and cumulative, skills to which some practitioners
made new contributions as the generations passed. Teachability
implied codification and principles, and those arts with theoretical
principles came to be regarded as higher than those without them,
so that, to keep our examples, geometry was higher than beekeeping,
even though it was necessary to be taught to be a beekeeper, and even
though it was possible to be a good beekeeper or a poor one..."

(From Real Spaces, by David Summers, a massive volume of
world art history. Found this passage after seeing the Elgin marbles
again last week, after not having seen them in a while... "if you can
hold a chisel, come to Athens!")

revisiting budapest (pt.1)

2009-01-01T21:15:00.016-05:00

these wall-drawing pictures are coming out of art storage,
about 7 months after the fact...this piece was at its best at
the moment of the top photo (rounding the corner it got
a little too cerebral)

hard to shoot because of the morph

other work from the same show (this one was based on
Marshall Islands navigation charts)

and an imploding drawing

You can read all about the show in Hungarian on the gallery's own blog here,
and there's an enlightening review of the show here, which pointed out that
the saxophone music was too short compared to the curator's opening statement.

revisiting budapest (pt.2)

2009-01-01T20:49:00.009-05:00

scenery, real and imagined.

fireworks through anti-perch wire

2009-01-01T17:22:00.003-05:00

updates

2008-12-26T19:24:00.002-05:00

"She took the crowd along."

to here

&

bees dance!

to here
and here
and possibly here

untitled pictures, 2008

2008-12-24T21:26:00.027-05:00

Events around New Brunswick

2008-12-05T13:35:00.006-05:00

abstraction house

of course this throwing the shoes up onto the wire thing is pretty common,
but I always think, what's it supposed to signify?

TBC....

terry winters-related

2008-11-29T14:04:00.012-05:00

Terry Winters has a show up:
Knotted Graphs
Matthew Marks Gallery Nov 6 - Jan 24, 2009

What about the color in these paintings?
Seemed like an interesting flashback to the thin line between light and mud
in the Robert Bordo show at last month...

since I didn't take any pictures, here are some related tissue sample
drawings meticulously noted by an anonymous 20th century
medical student (probably Italian).

nov.20_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _21st

2008-11-21T22:37:00.008-05:00

bill straightener (to be installed in laundromat) with compound shape/ compound shape with Relator as Scale Indicator

"covers and citations"

2008-11-09T18:29:00.002-05:00

a pretty good survey of them here

Hana Hegerova- (the Czech Edith Piaf) - the first of a series of attempted translations

2008-11-08T23:14:00.005-05:00

You Have Where To Go (Pack It Up)

So enough now of your magic- ubiquitous
like dog's wine*.
My juices he would keep sucking, my sun
keep taking-

So that charm of yours,
please pack it up.

What competence, yours, and what a dear host you are-
and I've had enough- so pack it up. So bye, sweetheart.
You have where to go, -
you'll even make of it a career, so pack it up.

You know how to live well, in dreams, desire and feeling.
A few pretty things, then love is but habit,
like buttoning a shirt, and it's a wonder...
But how did you tap into it? What a man!
So go with god, I'm closing up shop, and your Old Spice...
I'll air out.

You know it so well, yes-
your pretty head raised with pride,
what was before isn't, no, but you have to return the key.
Be healthy about it, save yourself now-
with me you're just wasting your time;
I have your school at least - so thanks.

And bye, sweetheart- you have somewhere to go-
and surely, you'll even make a career out of it...

* a type of vine

originally written by Petr Hupka
live version link here

home

2008-11-08T23:10:00.002-05:00

guerilla november bring indoors garden

moonbow

2008-10-14T13:37:00.006-05:00

Language/ Shadows

2008-08-21T13:39:00.011-05:00

One of my favorite pieces in the Ludwig Collection in Budapest.
artist: Peter Türk
Check out the extensive and lofty description of process...this may
have been translated from the original Hungarian by a computer, -
shedding much light upon Hungarian syntax.

2008-07-26T15:37:00.005-05:00

Nothing much to say about this stack of bricks seen outside
Mister Minit in Budapest, other than that they were quite beautiful in the dusk...

Tamas Szabo's studio

2008-07-08T10:58:00.013-05:00

"sometimes you just need to let the phone keep on ringing..."

this is a guitar body in its infancy

(the circular things are improvised clamps made
from steel rods sharpened at both ends)

...speakers for different ranges...

...EVIL receiver!

chair awaiting reupholstering

note the filmic representation of catching fish...

another really nice fish painting near the music and sleep area

2008-07-03T17:21:00.007-05:00

I meant to project this photoscramble on a wall in Budapest
but never got to it so I'm posting it here instead.

Técsői Banda

2008-06-28T07:05:00.003-05:00

"The Técső Band – playing the traditional Russian music of the Máramarosians – is one of the best-known bands of the crown town, which lies on the upper part of the river Tisza. The accordionist Jóska Csernavec and his brothers are the descendants of a reputed gypsy dynasty, but the band’s violinists are not family members. Somehow playing violin was not inherited within the family. All of them learnt the musical style from their ancestors. Their diverse repertoire – because of the strong interethnic influence – features local Romanian, Gypsy, Jewish, Russian and Hungarian songs. I made my first recordings with them at the beginning of the 70’s. At that time, the legendary father Jura Csernavec “Manyo” played the violin.

Unfortunately, his virtuoso performance survived only on a single cassette in bad quality. The band often performs on weddings, on funerals, on Christmas and on the fest of “Misána” (sheep clipping). Their instrument kit includes violin, neckwear cimbalom, bajan (that is an accordion with buttons) and drum equipped with cymbal. The drummer uses a plastic sheet called plonka. He operates this by pressing it between his lower denture and his gum, playing tunes or sometimes playing only to enhance the rhythm of the dance.

Present recordings were made on two occasions with two different primates. On the first part of the album, we can hear wedding music on the second part dance music. During the editorial work, my ambition was to have the band record the most interesting pieces in our studio. I was hoping that many others would love the music of the “unknown land” as much as I love them."

- Ferenc Kiss

birds

2008-06-23T05:03:00.006-05:00

they made their nest from wet newspapers

Pater Nostra (The Perpetual Elevator)

2008-06-03T11:03:00.003-05:00

stills from a video project at the BKV building in Budapest, using
their antique open-construction elevators, which are quite thrilling to ride.
full video coming soon to the youtube channel.

(click to see better resolution)

Events around Budapest

2008-05-27T04:25:00.013-05:00

from the top:
1.makeshift sundial
2.specialists are called in to resuscitate an automobile
3.Hungarian door-propping device
4.code for "this parking spot is reserved"
5.green corner
6.handle display
7.handlebar display
8. ?????

Neo-gothic...scaffolding

2008-05-12T11:22:00.003-05:00

House of Parliament, Budapest

Tent Rotterdam

2008-04-29T08:59:00.011-05:00

you'll need to click on most of these to be able to read the text clearly,
which is well worth it (don't miss the trumpeting gnomes!)
many of these are pamphlets or publications
from Gerard Bellaart's Cold Turkey Press archives from the early 70's.

www.tentrotterdam.nl

Wall-drawing, Travis Day residence

2008-03-27T02:13:00.008-05:00

My friend Travis let me do this wall-drawing at his house over the past few weeks
while he was away. It's on a wall next to the main stairs entering the apartment,
so I tried to keep in mind the changing perspective of the passerby, - and similarly
what happens to flat images when they are drawn into a corner. Some of the
squares left blank are where he previously had pictures hanging.

Peter van Agtmael

2008-03-22T04:53:00.002-05:00

Not sure how I got on the Daylight Magazine mailing list,
but once in a while these leads are worth following:
up on the site this month is a visually stunning podcast by
the photographer Peter van Agtmael, describing
his experiences in Iraq. "The only truth I found" he
narrates, "is that fear corrupts everything". I have to
say- before seeing this work, I couldn't imagine what kind
of existence soldiers over there must lead, - but these
pictures are so pointed, and not without the ephemera,
the humor, and the rawness that must accompany daily
toil, that they bring the usual perspective on the
war to an entirely new level.

www.petervanagtmael.com

"9 times in 800 years"

2008-03-21T23:31:00.003-05:00

http://activerain.com/blogsview/433200/A-rare-coincidence-that

http://www.interfaithcalendar.org/Uniqueevents.htm

AND there was a full moon. Woo woo.

ensemble

2008-03-20T00:12:00.005-05:00

links here
and here

studio light clock

2008-03-16T02:31:00.004-05:00

the period of daylight savings time powering drawings above
to water-powered version below

Vasia Markides at Space Other

2008-03-14T20:34:00.001-05:00

An excellent portrait of a politically and culturally anomalous
city, this short film has some of the most beautifully uninhibited
camera work/visual passages I've seen in ages...well worth a see.

"Hidden in the Sand" chronicles the story of Famagusta, a city in the Turkish-occupied part of Cyprus that was evacuated during the 1974 invasion. Since then, a large portion of Famagusta has been encircled by barbed wire and kept under strict surveillance by the Turkish military, which uses the territory as a bargaining chip in negotiations with the Cyprus government. Over the last 34 years, Famagusta has become a deteriorating ghost city; its former inhabitants watch their houses decay from outside the barricades, waiting for the day when they can return. The film examines the tragic and absurd nature of this “hostage town,” while simultaneously exploring issues of loss, ethnic identity, and the ugly effects of nationalism and propaganda in the Greek- and Turkish-Cypriot communities.

(from artist's site: www.vasiamarkides.com)

Somewhere Felt
March 6- 22
Space Other
63 Wareham St.
Boston, Ma

Philip Jones at Mercury

2008-03-12T19:35:00.003-05:00

The venerable Philip Jones is showing at Mercury Gallery this month...
opening tomorrow night 5-7 pm.

Philip Jones - Photographs
Mercury Gallery
8 Newbury St.
Boston

selected commentary on Amy Winehouse (from youtube)

2008-03-08T21:50:00.003-05:00

"that is zhe real one to die. the BEST SONG,I EVER HEAERD....
amy, you are stronger than me . MY QUEEN"

"I can't believe she's not American!
What an astonishingly talented singer/songwriter genius Amy is,
long may she rain in our hearts"

"America needs to change in their music scene..you are STUCK,
and have been stuck for about 15 years in RnB.
The brits have moved on already! (this song is an example)
You Americans are so afraid of change"

-"What do you mean the brits have moved on. Just about
everything from the British music scence has been influenced by American music. LeonaRulez (11 months ago) I mean they need a change. we have moved on, The Scissor sisters know this, they are american but they rejected them because they are too different, the UK accept change a whole lot better than you do. kyasst (11 months ago) I agree 150 percent. David beckham, RnB, all of it. Influenced by american RnB and urban culture. British people have no soul. Theres no flava in england. DONT get it twisted miss leona rulez... vexed999 (11 months ago) "I agree 150 percent. David beckham, RnB, all of it. Influenced by american RnB and urban culture. British people have no soul. Theres no flava in england. DONT get it twisted miss leona rulez..."

You sir, have NO knowledge of music, what so ever. LeonaRulez (11 months ago) I'm female..and of course i have knowledge..I think you dont understand my point. I cnt be bothered to explain it again..since when was I discussng soul? kyasst (11 months ago) Haha. i work in the music business. what do u do?...u MUST be british. haha. blaxican93454 (11 months ago) ok...this is to kyasst. The United Kingdom is slightly smaller than the state of Oregon! Out of that TINY place we get some of the best,most influential, most diverse music in the world. True, Black America invents it(jazz- blues- hip hop) and then the UK refines and expands it. Its been this way since the 1st British invasion. And it still is. You just don't know cause clear channel controls everything you hear on the radio now. its truly sad. Cutchswife (11 months ago) lol This is RNB! Just 50's stylee. This is proper Rnb! hey im sorry i kno im carazay but what is this song about?? i cant understand what the lyrics mean read the sentence at the end of the track... he broke her hart and she died...
she baruid her heart

Oh and anyone who says she's UGLY, wow NEWSFLASH. In other news Hadrian builds wall.

short movement lift of the long

2008-03-07T21:42:00.005-05:00

A little capture of train cables, a direct lift of Ann Adachi's
Lines piece. Hungarian countryside to old steel wheel beat.

religion/abstact art

2008-03-04T19:35:00.002-05:00

show details

2 Mar (3 days ago)

"Religion is all about the image. It isn't the case that religions use images to great effect; it's more exact to say that they're all about the image. The original and continuing power of religions is their appeal to the same inexplicable part of the human psyche that responds to images. That's why a six-armed female god of death, creation as the break-up of an eggshell, the tree of life or a crucified saviour became so successful in launching and sustaining religions. They are primal and indelible images, and their caretakers - the scholars, the priests, the missionaries - did not invent them to summarise, encapsulate or popularise their tenets, but the tenets developed in response to the images. Religions are simply cultural processes of trying to figure out what certain images that capture us and hold us with inexplicable power actually mean, and how they operate. From druids to the Maya Kiche the same founding images are found not because of cultural interaction, but because they're images that cannot be rid of; and so they are cherished.

Abstract painters are the true priests of the godless, secularised era that began in the West barely a hundred years ago. Their preselection criterion is the same as the priests': the inexplicable draw and power of an image. The process of exploration and continuation, opening up and re-hiding of the meaning of the image (the esoteric-exoteric cycle, the sacred re-enactment through original but self-aware creation) is also identical in religion and abstract painting. Abstract painters interact with their audience the same way that priests do: appearing occasionally to preach, mingle and drink wine, they generally stay aloof and scatter a steady stream of cryptic messages that can be read in a thousand ways, yet gets as close to expressing the ineffable in the image as human language allows."

(written by Mark)

Air in House II

2008-03-04T14:25:00.003-05:00

Inverted view of Air in House, after light rain. In case you missed the article about
the wonder of Hungarian courtyards, here it is again....

"In the country's stormy history courtyards have also served as centers of rebellion. After the invention of the vacuum cleaner and the Communist system, grievances (if not rugs) continued to be aired. In fact, Professor Teplan speculates that this architectural device was abandoned during the Communist era precisely to discourage the subversive commerce of ideas.

''The courtyard was an arena of social conflicts,'' he told me. ''The old houses look inside. The new blocks, the housing developments on the outskirts of Budapest, don't look inside - to avoid space where people can gather.''

announcement

2008-02-13T02:24:00.003-05:00

we're aiming for a modern-day adaptation of:

Thing and Building

2008-02-12T00:11:00.006-05:00

super tuesday

2008-02-05T22:47:00.005-05:00

prediction:

America at the Obama rally the night before:

luscious orange and the fack-builder

2008-02-05T02:21:00.000-05:00

a short advertisement about art in general (I think),
and applying to an MFA program in particular.
This is according to the Swedes.

Troy Hagenbart

2008-02-03T11:56:00.000-05:00

If there's anyone that can can get a painter (re-)excited about
painting, it's Troy Hagenbart. This fist solo of his in Boston
includes work that explores the idea of staging- up, down, and
center...these near-stick figures appear in incomplete landscapes,
asking the question: "how much information is needed to
convey something?"

this etching is a view of the backside of Boston's own Museum
of Fine Arts, complete with graffiti..."BONNETS' it says belows
the columns (hard to see but it's there)

in this larger work, figures seem to be waving at
each other from across dimensions: one in the
space of the fiction, one in the reality...

the story continues on the edges...

Troy Hagenbart @
MPG Gallery
450 Harrison Ave.
Boston

through March. 1

google-drawing

2008-01-31T21:25:00.000-05:00

W W wwwwwwW W
w w WWWWWWW ww
w WWW WWW wwwww
w WWWWWW wwwww
wwww wwwwwwwww wwww
ww WWWWWW WW W wWW
wwwww wwwwww wwwwww
wwwWWWW W wwwwwww

"and please do not, even as a joke, try this at home"

Ondrej Brody

2008-01-17T23:04:00.000-05:00

I don't know much about this person, but he is the only Czech artist-
in residence at De Ateliers in Amsterdam for the 07-08 season.
Video-performance, nods to many other artists and ultimately
nods back to himself...ie this work of his called Artstar.
The main issue here, to take it seriously, is the fear and transparency
of the artist- which Brody emphasizes by his being ridiculed by
the jury- which is itself ridiculed (the hyphenated Japanese name of the
lady art historian trying to quit smoking, the performer from Ostrava
who is offended, the ensuing acrimony...) This is where I think,
"I wish everyone spoke Czech": a few bad translations kill the
nuances, but overall it's pretty hilarious- although the laugh ends in a
head-shaking kind of sadness. And I dare say, a quintessentially
Eastern European species of fatalism.

Also noteworthy are these equally saddening dog-carpets that
comprise the "news" tab of his website. Between Duchamp and
Hirst, and entailing a similar amount of reflection.

Al Held sighting

2008-01-13T00:29:00.000-05:00

Even though I find a lot of his work somehow unapproachable on a
human level, encountering this Al Held mosaic was a pretty stunning
event...it kind of challenged my notion of complexity within the world
of mosaics. There could very well be about a million little tiles that
make up this piece. (51st- 53rd st. subway, NY)

Turns out there's a database for all NYC subway art, with 211 artists
represented...bringing to mind the Tokyo subway, where travelers
can collect commemorative stamps at some stations (just bring
a notebook, and stamp it with the custom-carved woodblock stamp
located at the end of the platform).

Perhaps this idea of take-it-home-with-you art could migrate
to US subways? It's got to be free, of course (like all the rest of it here...).

announcement

2008-01-07T19:27:00.000-05:00

My father is having a show that opens this week.

Milan Klic @
Reeves Contemporary
535 W 24th Street
2ND Floor
New York, NY 10011

Jan. 10- Feb. 9
opening reception Jan. 10 6-8pm

www.reevescontemporary.com

2 00 8

2008-01-04T12:04:00.001-05:00

...................................................................

world - piece - resting - in

2007-12-27T15:22:00.001-05:00

untitled pictures, 2007

2007-12-25T18:33:00.001-05:00

(click to enlarge)

D o' D

2007-12-14T03:18:00.001-05:00

Drawing of the day. Future icicle travel.

Snowden dusk

2007-12-13T21:26:00.001-05:00

Shiva Linga paintings coming to Boston

2007-12-05T00:22:00.001-05:00

A few months back, Feature Inc had a show of these magnificent
tantric paintings- which I didn't chance to attend, but did once come
across an exhibition catalogue in Paris detailing work of similar
origins- a little volume which pretty much changed my life. It turns
out that Feature's show was a smaller version of this Paris show,
the show is a traveling one and will be coming to Boston, to a
yet-undisclosed location.

An excerpt from the exhibition text, by Franck André Jamme:

"Even if Indian aesthetes have always collected them, as beautiful
as they appear to them, the sole purpose of these paintings is actually
meditation, hence their entire vocabulary. They are also used for
visualization. For example, you get up in the morning. Then, almost
immediately: face-to-face with the thing, for several minutes. Until
it has filled your mind, right to the top, until it has slowly eliminated
everything else. Then you come back to the world, attend to your
daily affairs. With the difference that, when you want to, you can
instantly recall the image in your mind, and what’s more, you
can re-create the entire world of this image, namely the image
itself enriched by its constellation, in short all that it first precisely
signified augmented by what it has produced, given rise to,
released in us, as crystalline and operative as in the morning."

Something to look forward to...will keep this post updated.

*thanks Shelley for the tip!

D o' D

2007-12-02T03:24:00.001-05:00

Drawing of the day. Transliteration.

Jack Strange to Land Rainbow

2007-12-02T02:35:00.000-05:00

At the Tanya Bonakdar Gallery a few weeks ago, this tiny piece by
Jack Strange caught my eye...and though almost the whole show was
composed of really good work, Strange's piece was memorable
in that latent, ha-Ha way when I realized that his "Spinning
Beach Ball of Death" is actually a lift from the little icon that
comes up when an action is waiting to be executed (on a mac).
Which is only really funny when you consider the work in
the light of All Painting, Ever.

ANYWAY, on the highway coming back from the MIA show,
with all the trucks going by and at the same time thinking about
big art installations, big things in general, and then from that
to rainbows,
it occurred to me that on a nice, long stretch of highway, it's
theoretically possible to create a massive moving chain of these
18-wheeler trucks, - maybe even one several miles long.
And, let's say they were painted the in full color spectrum, from
end to end (e.g. the first twenty trucks would articulate a subtle shift
from red into orange, and so on) so that the experience of viewing
the piece (from the side of the road) could last several minutes
(if the trucks passed by slowly)...and could MAYBE even change
the entire way that light is perceived as the piece goes by.

Like, grounding a rainbow.

M.I.A.

2007-11-29T12:56:00.001-05:00

Worcester Palladium and M.I.A. was short and sweet, 11 + 3 song set,
the last song of which she put herself on the crowd, - of course, no
worries. I don't know, but there's something about the blinding
flash-flash combined with the ritualistic dancing (definitely not an
American dance- but a willing to work with the American dance)
hardened by the killer instinct and softened by the lycra, that
makes the girl's combinations of music and self really worth
paying attention to.

We met a photographer from the Globe outside, waiting
for his reporter- they're running a feature on Friday,
supposedly.... link TBA, and further thoughts regarding
the MIA Trojan Horse theory.

update: so here's that link...

And while yeah, the "sonic murk" was true (her work comes
off much truer with headphones on, as there's subtlety that
the Palladium venue is perhaps not NASA'd up for), I don't know
what she would think of the Globe (the photographer clearly
wasn't down -"I only have to stay for the first three songs ")
and the show wasn't even sold out, unlike both NYC shows....
once again falling back on its puritanical roots, New England
rubuffs the advances of the anarchists.

Tar Sweater at Smith & 9th

2007-11-18T22:06:00.001-05:00

It looks like the MTA finally realized that even elevated railways
need a little snug, what with the winter coming...

Zurich Plant Installation

2007-11-04T21:04:00.000-05:00

Walking through Zurich airport, I happened upon this fascinating
display of airport decor...

If you look upwards, the plant extends through several floors above.
What's so quintessentially Swiss about it, though, is that someone
thought to tailor a habitat specifically for a plant- this in a passageway
of the airport. Almost random, but definitely serendipitous, and the
construction of the container substantiates that feeling: it seems
just right, both for the plant and for viewing purposes.

Even the label is artful. Plant life taking the place of art!

There is a man who comes with his nice rolling thing and
clears away the leaves that have been shed by the plant.
Maybe this even happens several times a day.

Everything in Switzerland is so kempt!

Eva Farago, in memoriam

2007-11-04T18:10:00.001-05:00

1950-2007

All Souls' Night

2007-10-31T19:05:00.000-05:00

"It wer a col nite but we wer warm in that doss bag.
Lissening to the dogs howling afterwds and the wind
wuthering and wearying and nattering in the oak leaves.
Looking at the moon all col and wite and oansome.
Lorna said to me, 'You know Riddley theres some thing
in us it dont have no name.'
I said, 'What thing is that?'
She said, 'Its some kynd of thing it aint us but yet its in us. Its
looking out thru our eye hoals. May be you dont take no noatis
of it only some times. Say you get woak up suddn in the middl
of the nite. 1 minim youre a sleap and the nex your on your feet
with a spear in your han. Wel it wernt you put that spear in your
han it were that other thing whats looking out thru your eye hoals.
It aint you nor it dont even know your name. Its in us lorn and loan
and sheltering ow it can.'
I said, 'If its in every 1 of us theres moren 1 of it theres got
to be a manying theres got to be a millying and mor.'
Lorna said, 'Wel there is a millying and mor.'
I said, 'Wel if theres such a manying of it whys it lorn then whys
it loan?'
She said, 'Becaws the manying and the millying its all 1 thing it
dont have nothing to gether with. You look at lykens on a stoan
its all them tiny manyings of it and may be each part of it myt
think its sepert only we can see its all 1 thing. Thats how it is with
what we are its all 1 girt big thing and divvyt up amongst the many.
Its all 1 girt thing bigger nor the worl and lorn and loan and
oansome. Tremmering it is and feart. It puts us like we put on
our cloes. Some times we dont fit. Some times it cant fynd the
arm hoals and it tears us a part. I dont think I took all that
much noatis of it when I ben yung. Now Im old I noatis it mor.
It dont realy like to put me on no mor. Every morning I can feal
how its tiret of me and readying to throw me a way. Iwl tel you
some thing Riddley and keap this in memberment. What ever it
is we dont come naturel to it.'
I said, 'Lorna I dont know what you mean.'
She said, 'We aint a naturel part of it. We dint begin when it begun
we dint begin where it begun. It ben here befor us nor I don't know
what we are to it. May be weare jus only sickness and a feaver to
it or boils on the arse of it I dont know. Now lissen what Im
goin to tel you Riddley. It thinks us but it dont think like us.
It dont think the way we think. Plus like I said befor its afeart.'
I said, 'Whats it afeart of?'
She said, 'Its afeart of being bearth.'
I said, 'How can that be? You said its ben here befor us. If it
ben here all this time it musve been bearth some time.'
She said, 'No it aint been bearth it never does get beartht it
all ways in the woom of things its all ways on the road.'
I said, 'All this what you jus ben tellin be that a tell for me?'
She larft then she said, 'Riddley there aint nothing what aint
a tel for you. The wind in the nite the dus on the road even the
leases stoan you kick a long in front of you. Even the shadder
of that leases stoan roaling or stanning stil its all telling.'
Wel I cant say for cern no mor if I had any of them things
in my mynd befor she tol me but ever since it seams like
they all ways ben there. Seams like I ben all ways
thinking on that thing in us what thinks us but it dont think
like us. Our woal life is a idear we dint think of nor we dont
know what it is. What a way to live. "

from Riddley Walker, by Russell Hoban , p. 5-7

2007-10-08T19:25:00.001-05:00

off to Budapest.

"Virtual Popcorn Popper"

2007-09-29T21:16:00.000-05:00

Ok, link scrambletime:

-Nosnibor has a new blog here, well worth checking out.

-Jay di Feo has an excellent show (only the second best after Chris
Wilmarth's, at the Nielsen's) to be reviewed in minutae soon.
(Go shaped paper as passage between drawing and sculpture!)

-I had a 4-day show (which also took 4 days to prepare) at Studio Soto
last week, and am now thinking about this as a possibility for all art
shows in the future- as a way of aspiring towards the temporality of music.

Philippe Lejeune graciously created this page from a video interview of
the show.

-Studio Soto might be on its last legs; with a lease renewal pending, but
by no means certain, Soto will need to find some sort of substantial support
in order to continue. PLEASE GO TO SOTO SHOWS! and donate!

-Roberta Smith weighs in at the Anaba/Chris Buchel debate...but oh...oh!
Let's move on.

-To the 2008 calendar: there is, rumor has it, a revolutionary way of
paper-organization for next year.
To be published soon.
Start saving your 25 dollars now.

that's the beaut of a floor at Soto.

Bee Update

2007-09-07T12:19:00.000-05:00

Back from Europe and listening to the news with voracity, yesterday heard a show about the real cause of CCD in North American bee populations. As it turns out, our cellphone-radiation speculations
were wrong: it's viral.

(the whole story here)

The fascination with the morality of the story, has turned into
fascination with the science of how this diagnosis was actually
obtained: researchers actually sequenced the genetic material
in bees, to find a possible agent of cause. Following this thread,
check out the video on the (new and expanded) X-prize page....
With bees it was probably much simpler than with humans, but
the ultimate question is...do we want a disease-free world?

Air in House

2007-09-05T22:17:00.001-05:00

Yeah.

Barn Month

2007-07-11T20:25:00.000-05:00

Some images from my recent residency at the Edward Albee
Foundation- (what a gorgeous ceiling to have over one's self!)
Of course all the beam/construction themes got into the work,
where they are most welcome...

Some dusk-waiting in these photos. Dusk seems to take a lot longer
(is noticed more acutely?) in the country. All in all, an idyllic month.
Many, many props to Mr. Albee for establishing the place...

www.albeefoundation.org

More images coming soon on the website.

Letter from Brooklyn

2007-05-25T07:12:00.000-05:00

yeah i saw the article in yesterday's times. and it was cool. but this is something else.

hey i think i told you when i was 23, and working at kinkos on 12th and university, and ostensibly here to play the drums, i was already into walking around haphazardly on the streets after work to see if i could sniff out what was happening, and that is how, i think i told you, wandering around, i found this cafe that there used to be back then, this cool little cafe on saint marks place on the south side between A and first. it had two bays of kinda wide-ish windows with a door in the middle. it was shabby-chic simple east-village style and there was an anomalous heavy sheet of brushed iron on the left wall that said "Sin-é" in cut out letters.

so when i went in there were these two irish longhairs sitting at one of the like 8 tables in the place, looking like they owned the place, which i later found out that they did. and there was this pretty, sad-looking tough girl with frizzy blond hair working the coffee machine, really mellow. it was still light outside so i got myself a cappuccino and a beer and sat down, and i tried to look available for conversation, which didn't work, but eventually the longhairs paused and looked at me and gave me an in, and i asked what was going on that night and this gaunt guy with long stringy grey hair around these supersharp eyes looked at me for a second and said "Ah, it's good music tonight. jeff buckley. y'heard of em?" and i said definitely not. and this younger dude who kind of had robert plant hair, who was similarly quiet and precise, said this jeff guy was tim buckley's son, and that didn't ring a bell either.

but i hung around alternating coffee with beer until it got dark, and
eventually there were maybe 20 or so people, mostly the kind of office women who think they know what's up, sitting in there drinking either cappuccino or beer or wine, that's all the cafe had. and then finally a thin guy in a white wife beater walked in, sat down at a table where there already were some people, and talked to them while he took out his telecaster guitar and tuned it real casually, leaning back and talking, and everybody else in the place was talking too, it was not like a starstruck thing cause he was unknown, but people were definitely more psyched since he was there. after his conversation he stood up and plugged the guitar right into the p.a. system, there was no amp in the place, and started doing a little fingerpicking, like he was just fucking around. but he kept it going and then after a few minutes, he stepped up to the mic, sort of looking like he was now seriously in the zone, and started singing, and it was real nice and delicate. for the next like 10 songs everybody shut up real tight and all you could hear was the occasional steam exhaust from the coffee machine, and breathing and little talking and stuff between songs. the songs were long and he stretched them out with really relaxed and pretty fingerpicking on the guitar. more people arrived little by little, but not too many. i didn't move from my seat.

so at the end of the night, the place was pretty hopping, and i gave the irish dudes and the blonde girl the salute-bow of respect, and i decided right then and there i would definitely come back almost every week for many months, and I did and it was each time kind of a different revelation. i've seen all the jeff buckley music videos but they seem to have all been made more self-consciously- and i especially don't recognize the experience cause the music changed with the backing band, and all these videos were made after I moved back to virginia.

but finally today this video appears on an english newspaper's site, and it's the only one i've seen that shows what he sounded and looked like standing upin that really small cafe. I think it's maybe not even a lipsync, i think it's a straight up filmed performance of the song. he really did sound just like that, i think he maybe had a chorus pedal or something between his guitar and the p.a. board, but nothing else, it was just eq'd.

turns out the coffee girl was from hungary - this was 1992 and she was really on kind of an adventure with no plan B - and eventually i asked her out because i saw her like 3 times a week and she was unstandably pretty and mysterious. her name was marianna. she told me not to mess with her, she said i seemed nice but she thought she would probably break my heart, i hadn't experienced the things she had.

yeah.

http://music.guardian.co.uk/video/page/0,,2079313,00.html

written by Andrew Nimmo

Put-up of the day

2007-05-23T00:31:00.000-05:00

Art-Walk roundup

2007-05-23T00:14:00.000-05:00

Thanks to all who made it out in the rain
for our open studios. September's (real)
open studios will be massive.

{we hope to have our in-studio sauna built by then}

Anyone who wishes to be added to our mail list
should email either Cheryl (cheryl.time@gmail.com)
or myself (klicova@gmail.com).

Art-Walk

2007-05-15T18:07:00.000-05:00

We're participating in the SOWA art walk this weekend. Unofficially.
Directions and more info here...

"Man would have only four years of life left..."

2007-05-13T00:17:00.000-05:00

...without song and without honey:

On npr the other day, they were talking about the sudden and rampant disappearance of bees in North America... one theory, not entirely implausible, is that the navigation systems of the bees is blocked or disrupted by radiation emitted from cellphones- which prevents them from being able to find their way back to their nests, resulting in what's called Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). Ow.

THEN,

Tom Ashbrook hosted a woman who discussed a similar thinning-out occurring in the songbird population:

"We are losing our migratory birds. ... Over the last 40 years, many
species have lost 30 to 40 percent of their numbers...a lot of migrants
are coming back earlier because in general springs are coming earlier.
Birds are tracking climate change and they are noticing"

The solution: to toss the phone, and build bird-habitats in the backyard?
Well, there's more at stake here...

For millennia, bees have been symbols of perfect polity. Pliny,
Aristotle, Cicero, Plutarch- they have all pondered upon the
virtues of the little buzzers... but that's wild bees. The disappearing
bees mentioned here are domestic. When man domesticates, he corrupts. He intends to be symbiotic, but cannot help but abuse. Bees have had enough, are leaving, going back to their own perfect, natural polities.

If man threw away his cellphones and went back to nature,
he'd corrupt nature all over again, in another way... we won't
settle for stasis, but will always seek progress. Being human is a
blessing and a curse, but for nature, the existence of humans is
definitely a curse. Humans doesn't need nature if they have
technology (which can make food out of non-nature), and other
people (to define themselves against); nature doesn't define
itself against humans, and doesn't take anything from
mankind, only loses to it...

The irony is that even man- who anthropomorphises
nature (as in the ancient symbols of birds, whales, bees)-
still corrupts nature.

The story of disappearing species is a metastory, a story that unites and transcends an already established tradition of stories, which use anthropomorphisation to express fundamental truths about man vs. nature. The new metastory restates and supercedes the same: humans are incompatible with nature, even and especially when they are doing their best to be compatible. As every man dies alone,
so does the species. There is no home to go back to, there is only us. As we stand.
Alone, together.

Hippies and druids and greens and others are right in their
actions, wrong in their thoughts; there is no balance between
man and nature that can be recaptured or recreated. Man has
been an anomaly, a sore thumb sticking out, ever since he
appeared in nature. Those who glory in being an anomaly say
the same thing, but in reverse terms: Nature is here for the
sake of man, for man is special. Man is the paragon of Creation,
Creation was created for man's sake. In either case,
the anomaly theme unites the greens and the priests.
So may as well stop pretending otherwise.

Hence the prophecy is wrong: when bees disappear,
and birds stop singing, it shows we're doing great.

And they're not.

I o' D

2007-04-22T11:13:00.000-05:00

Intaglio of the Day

1 of a series coming from drawing a blank as to what an image might
be (upon preparing a set of plates), and then seeing a fingerprint
embedded in the asphaltum ground on the plate...its magnification.

fwd: save the wails/ a petition

2007-04-22T10:35:00.000-05:00

Hi, it's Tim from Pandora,

I'm writing today to ask for your help. The survival of Pandora and all of Internet radio is in jeopardy because of a recent decision by the Copyright Royalty Board in Washington, DC to almost triple the licensing fees for Internet radio sites like Pandora. The new royalty rates are irrationally high, more than four times what satellite radio pays, and broadcast radio doesn't pay these at all. Left unchanged, these new royalties will kill every Internet radio site, including Pandora.

In response to these new and unfair fees, we have formed the SaveNetRadio Coalition, a group that includes listeners, artists, labels and webcasters. I hope that you will consider joining us.

Please sign our petition urging your Congressional representative to act to save Internet radio: http://capwiz.com/saveinternetradio/issues/alert/?alertid=9631541

Please feel free to forward this link/email to your friends - the more petitioners we can get, the better.

Understand that we are fully supportive of paying royalties to the artists whose music we play, and have done so since our inception. As a former touring musician myself, I'm no stranger to the challenges facing working musicians. The issue we have with the recent ruling is that it puts the cost of streaming far out of the range of ANY webcaster's business potential.

I hope you'll take just a few minutes to sign our petition - it WILL make a difference. As a young industry, we do not have the lobbying power of the RIAA. You, our listeners, are by far our biggest and most influential allies.

As always, and now more than ever, thank you for your support.

-Tim Westergren
(Pandora founder)

GMF

2007-04-21T21:56:00.000-05:00

Just a belated congrats to Flash's
entry into the Hall of Fame. A lifetime
of "never touching the grooves, but rather
always the side of the record"...

White Lines for the ears (realplayer req.)

some revised Americana writing from 360 days ago and a picture of the sky after 4 days of rain

2007-04-19T15:53:00.000-05:00

Washington, Allston, Eatonia- greenest of the greengrass then
shymy dew caught on barely blossoms now, the different academics,
differently walking than talking and on to Camino Real- the ROYAL
PATH by the new england where they buy gold cause more than
paper does it weigh
the only new garage doors on the block,
we had a guy come paint them that green of Fenway hinges
left black, looks sharp now we rent them out a sixteen year old
towing a hummer first job, mother still in apron, wipes her
hands from dough
the balcony over
the enclosed alley they just throw things there-
food scraps, papers, whatever- the younger brother
recounts these stories and can barely supress laughter,
the older one wishes he hadn't (friends) the sound of Portuguese,
not
turning around to see the source it's all very much like a sketch
for a pristine tank someone long ago drew up, a museum tank, never
to be used, little dashes
where light falls, fit to be the treasury engraver,
and everything dissipates with the same cadence as the engine below
falls into neutral

from one point,
John Hancock was to be seen from the best, elegantest angle
our arc of triumph at the end of the avenue, a deliberately
exaggerated vertical signature being eaten by fresh mist.

easter, but more like april fool's

2007-04-10T02:18:00.000-05:00

NB: NOT photoshop, but rather fine cakemaking skills

welcome, april

2007-04-02T14:03:00.000-05:00

Interview with Andy Zimmermann

2007-03-26T09:48:00.000-05:00

Upon entering Andy Zimmermann's recent video installation at the
FPAC Gallery, an uncanny sense of time and space warping seems
to come over the viewer. Onto several plexiglass screens composed
to form a jagged wall plays a projection. The images- interiors,
landscapes, architectural fragments- all contain parts which move
slowly between being in and out of focus, playing with varying depths
of field. The factuality of the wall is at times forgotten, replaced by the
clarity of the projection, which articulates a tangible space- but in the
next moment, the rug is pulled out from under the viewer, leaving
only a vague atmosphere of light. Experientially, the piece is sublimely
engaging- sometimes leaving the viewer baffled, but in a wholesome fashion.

Curious about the ideas that went into this work, I interviewed
Andy about his recent show...

MK: The work of yours I've seen prior to this show was at your
thesis exhibition at MassArt. There, you had constructed what
seemed to be a mini-city, which you used as a canvas
for a projection; essentially, an object in a state of permanent
change. In the recent show, however, you seem to be more involved
with an idea of passage- the movement of the viewer seems to be of high
importance to the completing the experience of the work. Can you talk
about how the idea to build the installation evolved for you?

AZ: In my thesis exhibit I was also concerned with how the viewer
moved through the piece. I'm very interested in having projected images
occurring in three dimensions, and the best way for someone to
experience this is by moving around, and into, the piece. You are
right, however, that in Seven Songs, the piece at the FPAC Gallery, I
was dealing with a specific path which the viewer would follow. The
piece is designed to be seen first from outside the gallery, as you
are looking in through the large window and doorway from the
Channel Cafe. Then you walk alongside the piece as you come
through the door and move into the interior space.
The idea evolved as I myself spent time in the cafe. I couldn't
help noticing that people invariably spent a lot more time there,
waiting for a table, waiting to be served, eating, chatting, hanging
out, than they did looking at the art inside the gallery. I just
wanted to make my piece so that people could watch it while they were
eating lunch! I'm very interested in making video poems that have
some duration, have a little plot development, but most videos
installations are limited by the relatively short amount of time that
most viewers are willing to give such pieces when they are walking
through a gallery.
The three-dimensional aspect of the piece, the layers of frosted
plexiglass panels, the cloudy, out-of-focus effect created by
overlapping layers, the different sizes of the panels, all developed
out of the idea of structuring the space so that viewers experienced
the piece first from outside the gallery, and then saw it unfold as
they walked into it. This then guided the content of the songs
themselves, having to do with uncertainty, and illusion; of things
looking different from different angles; of the images ultimately
dissolving and disappearing as you come close to them and walk past
them.

MK : That makes sense...a propos the interactivity of the
transient audience (the audience that views the work from the cafe),
it actually sounds like an attempt break down
the so-called "fourth wall". For instance, the
fact that you have decided to project the "songs" in a random
sequence brings about a different sort of expectation on the casual
looker's part; a lesser one than, say, having the narrative of the
projection be sequential and cumulative. At the same time, my
impression was that the randomization carries with it the effect
of the images entering the viewer's awareness on a more
subconscious level. Was this intentional?

AZ: You're right about the idea of the 'fourth wall'.
There were a couple of reasons behind the idea of making
the songs play in random order. One was to get around the
viewers' expectation that they could know when they had seen
the whole program; that they might then no longer need to
watch anymore. I wanted them to gradually become aware that
there might still be parts they had not yet seen. I liked the idea
that the piece would keep re-making itself; that even if the
individual parts had been seen, they were going to continue to
occur in new and different combinations, and therefore have a
slightly different meaning each time.
I thought about not only what the piece would be like for the person
who spent a lunch hour there, but also the people who worked there
every day. I wanted the piece to be enjoyable for them, and not oppressive.
Secondly, the piece is in some ways a political critique. It deals with
uncertainty, blurring of vision, things that disappear when you get close
to them. Just because it is called Number Five does not mean it comes
after Number Four. There is not one Number Three, there are two of
them, and three Number Fives. Just because you see it in print
doesn't mean it's true.

MK: That's a very clever way of dealing with the issue of narrative;
the idea that the piece keeps remaking itself harks back to the notion
of the artwork as a being in itself . Backtracking a bit, can you talk
about your history as an artist, and how you came to the themes which
you are dealing with currently? Have you always been a video artist,
or is this something you arrived at via other media?

AZ: I started as a painter; studied it in college. Went through a
long sequence of gradually using more and more relief elements on the
canvas, then shaped canvas, then making painted wall-sculptures.
These still had the aspect of an image painted onto a three-
dimensional surface. When these got heavy to the point of pulling the
bolts out of the wall, I started doing floor sculptures out of welded
steel, then outdoor sculptures. This was my focus for several years.
I came back to the idea of having images on the surfaces of the
sculpture when I started using digital photos printed out on buswrap
adhered to the flat surfaces of welded aluminum sculpture. Somehow,
the complexity of the illusion of depth in a picture layered onto the
actual depth of a three-dimensional structure has always fascinated me.
In 2001, I entered the MFA program at MassArt. There I pretty
quickly got the hang of using digital projectors and editing video
and sound. I brought it right back to my original impulse to make the
images happen not just on a plane, but three-dimensionally. I think
the theme that I've been exploring is the relationship between the
stationary material world, which doesn't change much from one day to
the next, represented by the sculpture, and the fleeting, flickering
sequences of our living moments, represented by the video
projections. In my working process, too, I find it satisfying to
spend time carefully planning and building the framework onto which I
will be projecting, and then allowing the video and sound work to be
more improvisational and spontaneous.

MK: That sounds like a very organic trajectory. It reminds me of
something Robert Morris wrote:

"The trouble with painting is not its inescapable illusionism per se.
But this inherent illusionism brings with it a non-actual elusiveness
or indeterminate allusiveness. The mode has become antique.
Specifically, what is antique about it is the divisiveness of
experience which marks on a flat surface elicit.
There are obvious cultural and historical reasons as to why this
happens. For a long while the duality of thing and allusion sustained
itself under the force of profuse organizational innovations within the
work itself. But it has worn thin and its premises cease to convince.
Duality of experience is not direct enough. That which has ambiguity
built into it is not acceptable to an empirical and pragmatic outlook.
That the mode itself (rather than the lagging quality) is in default,
seems to be shown by the fact that some of the best painting today
does not bother to emphasize actuality or literalness though the
shaping of the support."

And this was written in 1967! I guess I'm just trying to point out
that there is a tendency- almost an inevitability- within those who
have worked in the two-dimensional, to branch out, become curious
about the potency of more tangible media. Based on what you've
described as your history, it seems your work mirrors this condition,
and it's remarkable to see where you have arrived- coming from a
painting background.

Lastly: (and this one's a bit virtual)
Describe your idea of what the ultimate installation would be.
I mean, one you would create. Realizable, or not...

AZ: An interesting question! I find myself thinking in something like
religious terms. On entering the ultimate installation, the viewer
would be re-born, would suddenly have a deeper, more intense
perception of reality; "…was blind, but now can see!"
It’s a funny puzzle that, to get the sensation of experiencing the
whole of reality more deeply, one has to experience specifics and
details. It is by learning more details that we know we are seeing
more than we saw before. So, that leads me back from the
ultimate installation to the regular installation, one which has
specifics and details which are new to the viewer, and leads to a new
way of apprehending those specific ideas. That, in turn, makes the
viewer realize that it is possible to be, and to actually become,
more conscious than s/he was before that moment. That, ultimately, is
all I hope to accomplish.

more work by Andy Zimmermann can be seen at www.andyzimmermann.com

D o' D

2007-03-21T21:38:00.000-05:00

Diet entropy!

D o' D

2007-03-19T08:10:00.000-05:00

Drawing of the Day

On entropy.

Calling the Coda

2007-03-16T11:36:00.000-05:00