Hammer Curator James Elaine

Hammer Pickers: From left: Russsell Ferguson, Ann Philbin, Claudine Ise, and James Elaine.

We got to meet with Hammer Projects Curator James Elaine yesterday. A few thoughts to post. Jamie (as he introduced himself) came from the drawing center in New York nine years ago. He positioned himself as an artist-curator, a la Matthew Higgs. Next year he'll be taking an extended trip in China, looking at art and artists, like a baseball recruiter for the Hammer. The Wrong Gallery's Ali Subotnick will be taking over as HP curator.

I asked about some of the conflicts that curators face, with art collectors who support the museum and also use the Hammer's penchant for finding the next hot young artist as a way to expand their collection. He did say that the recent growth in the art market has helped more younger artists make a living from their art (a good thing), though with the growth of art fairs and biennials, he hasn't seen a corresponding growth in the amount of great art being produced. (Something I've remarked about in past posts).

I've also commented before that art fairs promote art fair art: that being work that ships well, has immediate impact, and looks good on a temporary wall erected in some convention center. It seems that the Hammer is fairly entrenched in that sub-class of the art world: one of the criteria for the Elaine-curated sculpture survey, "Thing," was that there would be no installation art.

Which brings me to my final comment.

The traditional (non-CalArts) art education, a group of freshmen are scattered about an object and are schooled in pictorial representation. By their fourth year, art students are expected to produce a body of work that is unique in vision and expression. What is difficult (for me) to understand is how one leads gracefully to the other. In the end, we are left with art folk who's only entrance into a work of art is through some aesthetic entry point. Work that reads like politics (or worse, work that you have to read) either gets derided or left out of the mix.

Which brings me back to the Hammer.

Having Jamie talk about (and being reminded of) past Hammer shows made me realize that there is a Hammer aesthetic. The work shown can be wacky or serious in its subject matter, messy or clean in its execution. In the end, if I walked into the Hammer five years ago, I wouldn't know (with a few exceptions) that the United States is at war in two countries, tortured people, and suspended due process. Which makes me think that their survey shows (Thing, International Paper, Eden's Edge, Snapshot) have been avoiding a big chunk of the art world.

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The Art World in the Age of Mechanical Blog Production

Ed Winlkeman reports on museum blogs. I thought it to be an interesting idea in an odd sort of way. While most museums promote their shows by having press openings, buying print ads, and contributing to banner blight, it seems only natural that they should expand their horn-tooting into cyberspace's newest medium, the blog.

I would have to say that most of my blog reading would make me surmise that the blogsphere is a type of primordial ooze compared to the highly evolved (and edited) print media. I don't mean that in a bad way. It's an excellent zone to post half-formed ideas, tidbits or memes of informations, and on the more popular blogs, a way to start conversations. When a museum enters the area, it becomes philosophically recursive, like the snake eating its tail.

Unlike the print world where there's somewhat of a demarcation between advertising and commentary (which could easily be argued against), in the blog world conversationally worded press releases would be pressed to function as commentary on itself.

If museums (and art spaces in general) are interested in harnessing the power of the blog world, it would behoove them to treat bloggers more like the press. This meager site which gets updated once or twice a week, averages about a hundred hits a day. Looking at my site meter, I can find the Google search words reader typed that led them to my page. I can also see how a particular blog posting ranks with those particular words typed in to Google. Here's some examples from the past 24 hours:

Key:
"Words Googled" (My rank) -my comment
posting link

"lamb painting prado" (3)
imoralist.blogspot.com/2007/07/some-notes-on-paintings-at-prado.html

"The Soul Guided by Christ by Francisco Martinez" (2)
imoralist.blogspot.com/2007/08/checking-out-lacmas-arts-in-latin.html

"munster sculpture project los angeles" (2)
imoralist.blogspot.com/2007/09/words-about-sculpture-projects-muenster.html

"ica boston hustler" (1)
imoralist.blogspot.com/2007/08/art-and-chemisty-with-robert-in-boston.html

"venice biennial 2007" (5) -amazing
imoralist.blogspot.com/2007/08/venice-biennale-2007.html

"christ child of huanca" (7)
imoralist.blogspot.com/2007/08/checking-out-lacmas-arts-in-latin.html

"art basel advice" (17) -and they click through to my page even though it was so far down the list
imoralist.blogspot.com/2007/08/art-38-basel-highlights-and-thoughts.html

"Michael Asher caravan" (14) -typed into Google.jp
http://imoralist.blogspot.com/2007/09/art-theif-exhibits-video.html

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Art Theif Exhibits Video?

As previously reported here, Michael Asher's caravan at Muenster's Sculpture Project was reported stolen, then discovered a few days later. An anonymous reader of this blog reports that Scotland-based Vancouver artist Keith MacIsaac is showing a video in the Young Athenians Exhibition as part of the Destroy Athens Biennial. The video shows the caravan being stolen. Perhaps it's a similar caravan, as these things have become collectors items. If anyone has been and seen the video, please leave a comment with your thoughts.

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Started by Christophe Buchel and Finished by MASS MoCA: Judge Rules That Tarps Come Down

Artforum, local press, and the Globe all report on the decision to allow MASS MoCA to take the tarps down. Edward Winkleman quotes the law in question (which the judge decided does NOT pertain to works in progress). Martin Bromirski reports on the courtroom proceedings at Anaba. (Worthwhile reading).

Judge Ponsor, in talking about the collaborative aspects of the aborted installation, made note of the motto emblazoned on the crashed police car in the space... Pride Partnership Professionalism - "lots of irony on that police car... did Mr. Buchel choose that? Did the museum choose that?"

More to be posted tomorrow.

The New York Times reports, "Mr. Büchel referred to his time spent in North Adams working on the exhibition as an “acid bath” and called those he worked with there “jerks.”"

Robert Storr in his affidavit, states, “In my view, under no circumstance should a work of art be shown to the public until the artist has determined that it is finished." Interesting comment from someone who showed Jason Rhoades unfinished Black Pussy installations in Venice.

If nothing else, this will make a great Ph.D. dissertation for someone.

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This Week at CalArts

CalArts faculty Nina Menkes will be screening her film this Tuesday September 11th at 7:00 pm in the Bijou Theater. Free. Here's the blurb:

The award-winning experimental filmmaker and longtime CalArts faculty member screens a 35mm print of her long-awaited new feature.

Hailed at this year's Sundance Film Festival, Phantom Love "strikingly puts a woman's subconscious thoughts and dreams onscreen in ways more radical and beautiful than in her past visually stunning semi-narrative films," according to Variety. Set mostly in Los Angeles-but also with breathtaking passages set in India-the film's fragmented structure combines a dreamlike atmosphere with a hyperreal documentary style. In addition to screening at Sundance, Phantom Love has been presented at REDCAT, the Museum of Modern Art and the Locarno International Film Festival, and selected for the upcoming annual fests in Vienna, Warsaw and Stockholm, among others. For more info, see
http://www.myspace.com/phantomlovemovie

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Transitions

A parting shot of my five weeks in Europe: my scanned ticket to the MMK in Frankfurt,; the lower-left of the image includes the entrance to the Golden Gate Bathhouse. Posting will be less frequent, as I transition back into school. Sam Durant is on sabbatical, but I will have opportunities to work with Shirley Tse and Jessica Bronson, Michael Asher, Benjamin Weismann, Andrea Bowers, and more!

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Words About Sculpture Projects Muenster 07

In retrospect, Skulptur Projekte Münster was my favorite stop on my Grand Tour. There was a viewable amount of art and one could see how different artists approached the assignment of making public work. The art museum showed documentation of past proposals, so one could see Bruce Nauman's proposal from 1977 that wasn't realized until this year. Some of the work will remain long after the art tourists have gone away, and in ten years a new group will join the collection.

Jeremy Deller worked with the an allotment garden group who will be writing journals that will be kept until SP 2017. He also gave out seeds for the Dove Tree, which will take ten years to bloom--a reminder to return to Muenster.

Above is one of the city's confection shops that is selling work by Pae White: marzipan sculptures of Los Angeles' taco trucks and their wares.


Above is a view of Guy Ben-Ner's "I'd give it to you if I could, but I borrowed it." The work is a video powered by the exercise bikes: pedal backwards, and the video moves in reverse, pedal faster and the action speeds up. The video begins with the artist at an museum exhibition with his children. Bored and rambunctious, they reassemble Picasso's Head of a Bull, Duchamp's bicycle wheel attached to a chair, and Jean Tinguely's Cyclograveur into a functioning bicycle (with the help of an air pump from Joseph Beuys' Zerstorte Batterie. There's a wonderful layering effect as you watch the Ben-Ners tour Muenster's past sculptures on their conglomerated art-bike, all while one pedals an exercise bike in-between a bike ride tour of Muenster's Sculpture Project.


Above is Mike Kelley's Petting Zoo, with a salt lick shaped like Lot's Wife. The best part was watching one woman scrape goat shit off her Prada shoes. Mike would smile.


This is Bruce Nauman's Piece, snapped in the pouring rain. There was a soaked-to-the-bone ride back to the bike rental place at the end of the day.


If I would pick a favorite piece it would be Andreas Siekmann's "Trickle Down. Public Space in the Era of its Privatization. " The spheroid pictured above is an amalgam of all those fiberglass cows (and other city icons) given to artists to be decorated and placed about the city. Next to it is the industrial trash compactor used to make the sculpture (below). On the compactor are silhouettes of the different city icons with the year of the program.


Around the circumference of the courtyard are wheat-pasted posters depicting the process where private business interests fund the project,


redevelopment districts are created and secured,


an agenda of surveillance and crime reduction is put in place,


general lolly gagging activities are outlawed,


and those laws are in turn used to suppress public demonstrations and political action.




'Nuff said.

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Ode to Larry Craig

By Jill Sobule, Robin Eaton and Lorene Machado. A follow-up to my previous post. Just wondering if it's still considered schadenfreude when you revel in the misfortune of one of your own? The whole story is just sad.

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Documenta 12,Take 2:

Call it a modified form of synaethesia; it seems as if each city I rolled into produced an endlessly looping song in my head. In Madrid, I would hear the opening plaintive horn of Miles Davis' Sketches of Spain. In Kassel, it was Springtime for Hiter.

Perhaps my mind was making up for a kind of absence. There was an anti-Nazi protest march one day, and being a card-carrying member of the ACLU, I felt some dissonance (in my mind) between the concept of liberty and a march against it. There was also a shop specializing in war memorabilia that was without Nazi memorabilia for sale, and the occasional WWII-era German eagle with the swastika in its talons chiseled off.

In my hotel room I flipped through the cable channels and saw reruns of Hogan's Heroes dubbed into German. It seemed perfectly normal to hear Colonel Klink and Sargent Schultz speaking in a heavily accented German; it seemed to fit better with the show's context. At the same time it brought me back to an earlier trip to Germany, backpacking across Europe in 1979. Outside the Hofbräuhaus I stopped for a bite to eat and encountered a German WWII vet who drunkenly extolled the virtues of the Messerschmidt while calling Americans schafe. I thought that a show like Stacheldraht und Fersengeld might be oddly comforting to an elderly unapologetic Nazi. Even though the Germans are made to look like buffoons, at the end of each episode they remain in power and the allies are still the prisoners. Every week on German TV there's Nazi visibility in a fictional reality where the war was never lost.



At the same time I came to the realization that the old guy was now probably dead. My father, a veteran of World War II, died in the early 90's. The youngest veterans of that war are in their 80's. In another generation they will transform from eyewitnesses to historical footnotes. I realized that Germany is on the cusp of history, the point where lived experience is becoming extinct, only to be replaced by newly created historical fictions. It is in this context where the past becomes a story that ultimately has to lead up to a present tense where the people have some self esteem, and a sense of morality.



It's this odd congruity of history, and a Documenta that (historically) has been both about art and politics. Rather than mention specific works I enjoyed, this take on Kassel's survey of contemporary artistic practice is more about the gestalt of my time at Documenta.



Suspiciously, there seemed to be something for everyone. A little painting and some video, political work and artists wrestling primarily with aesthetic issues, familiar faces from the cannon of contemporary western art and lesser-knowns from the developing world.

My previous post on Documenta was my (trying to be clever) attempt at looking at something so big and trying to make coherent sense of it. I used John Godfrey Saxe's poem based on the Hindu parable of the five blind men and the elephant, as a way to show that no matter what you personally thought of the show (or conclusions you made based on what you read) you would have been right to some degree. Perhaps the Documenta can be seen as a collaborative project of the curators and the 113 artists included in the show; an attempt to produce the world's most ungainly Rorschach inkblot.

If that's the case, one doesn't need a curator per se. If too many recently produced artworks are gathered together in one place, then the curating will ultimately be left of to the viewer. After walking room after room of the Schloss Wilhelmshohe, Neue Galerie, Museum Fridericianum, documenta-Halle, and Aue-Pavilion, it would be impossible to give each of the 500+ works the time needed for proper decoding and/or appreciation. In Venice, one would greet other art-viewers on the street with the phase, "Have you seen anything interesting?" if only out of the fear that there was some incredible, groundbreaking, transcendent installation in a crumbling villa that somehow got overlooked. In Kassel, it was all laid out German-style, with maps, floor plans, and lists of artists. It was as if Ruth Noack and Roger Buergel were taking a page from the playbook of William Mulholland when he opened the gates of the Owens Valley Aqueduct and famously proclaimed, "There it is. Take it."



I became hyper-aware that I would quickly check off familiar works (in my mind) and gloss by stuff by artists who's interests seemed too far afield from my own. Some sort of time editing became necessary--even with three full days to view the work. The "run, skip over, then pause" mode of looking at works of art was in use by many other viewers of the show. One would catch art-worn folk looking through the corrugated plastic walls of the Aue-Pavillion at the crenellated landscape beyond.

If you thought that didactic political work was mediocre and futile at best, then you saw plenty of work to support your position. If the voices of people in the developing world are important to hear, then parts of Documenta would have left you pleased. If you like looking at Persian rugs, there was one in the show for good measure.



Am I being old-fashioned by wanting the curators to present a well-reasoned argument, or at least a point of view? The world is a complicated place. The topics addressed in some of the work are complex issues. Perhaps the art world is very much like an elephant, but I'm not willing to leave it at that. In attempting to make sense of the world, every generation goes about the process of writing it's own history. Looking around Kassel, I felt as if I was a witness to that awkward process. At Documenta, it felt like someone dropped the pen.

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Taking Apis at the Schloß Wilhelmshöhe

On my second day at Documenta 12 I headed up to Schloß Wilhelmshöhe, about halfway between town and the giant statue of Hercules up on the hill.

I read somewhere that Thomas Crapper was the first to but an image of a honeybee as a pee target in his urinals.

So there it was, a little urinal wordplay. If you don't know the genus, you don't get the joke.

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A Few Words on Michael Asher

Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster's miniature Michael Asher caravan.

Back before my current stint at CalArts I attended a presentation by Michael Asher at the Getty Research Institute. It was a weekday afternoon along the 405 and the room at the GRI was packed. I was amazed at the turnout until I realized what a profound effect he's had teaching the infamous Post-Studio Art for nearly 40 years. There are those who've gone on to artistic and academic fame, and on to teach at other institutions, forever changed by Michael's thoughtful, methodical, and critical approach to artistic production and educating art students.

Last week at LACMA I noticed a Joe Goode donated by Michael to LACMA's permanent collection, and a couple of other pieces from his mother, Betty Asher. Recently MOCA announced the opening of a show of works donated by Michael to their collection.

The location flier handed out at Sculpture Projects Muenster HQ.

A couple of weeks ago I received an email from Adam Feldmeth that the caravan used for Michael's work in the current Sculpture Project was temporarily purloined:

"Caravan found: As the police announced this morning, the caravan of Michael
Asher was found. Following a hint by the public, the officers found the
caravan at a street in Telgte. In the night of Saturday, July 21, the
Caravan by Michael Asher has been stolen from its 5th parking position
(Hörster Friedhof / Piusallee). "

It's quite light weight (and conveniently on wheels); when I was in Muenster, I had no trouble picking it up by the trailer hitch, and considering all the college kids about town, it's not surprising that hijinks would ensue.

The caravan in 2007.

Besides the opening of donated work on Sunday, September 9th, The Santa Monica Museum of Art will be housing a site-specific work by Michael Asher in January.

Michael Asher's camper being tailed be a Richard Tuttle semicolon.

It's interesting to see how the work in Muenster, Germany has changed with each iteration. Now the caravan is somewhat of a collectors' item, and for a few of the weeks the camper will be in storage, as the changing architecture of the city has eliminated some of the past parking spaces. There was another work at SP by Andreas Siekmann called "Trickle down: the public space in the era of its privatization" which I'll write about in a future post. Both works had in common that they pointed to the relationship between public art and gentrification, but in very different ways.

The first page of Michael Asher's original proposal.

Muenster's art museum hosted a show called Archive, which displayed maquettes and correspondence by artists from the past 30+ years. I got a chance to see Michael's familiar handwriting on the two-page proposal for the caravan project. They also had on hand another unrealized proposal, as well as photographs from the past events.

Implications of the caravan proposal (page 2).

Near the lake was Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster's A Münster Novel. The work was made up of miniature versions of various works from past years, as seen in the picture at the top. Behind the mini Asher is a mini Buren.

Photo of the caravan in 1977.

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Compartmentalized Sex

Having read quite a bit on the Larry Craig scandal, I felt compelled to type a few words into the fray. In part of my past work involving NGI-MSMs in PSIs (that's non-gay identified men who have sex with men in public sex environments), I became certified as an expert witness called to testify on several 647(a) trials. There are a few basic issues I'd like to address, and I thought I would do it in Q&A format.

Q: How can someone claim not to be gay, and have sex with other men?

A: Do you think anyone likes to deal with the homophobia, gay jokes, potential and realized bashings and threats, and just the general discrimination if they can avoid it? There's probably about 2 to 6% of the population that identifies as gay, mainly because they don't have a choice; that's how their wired. That leaves two ways of dealing with society's BS: move to a gay ghetto, or stay in the closet.

I expect there's another 2 to 6% on the other end of the bell curve that are hopelessly straight. For the vast majority in the middle, their orientation will vary along the continuum, depending on circumstances, potential partners, and the environment. For a bisexual man in a heterosexual world, the easiest route is to choose heterosexuality. You get the job promotions, the smiles instead of glares. It's a no-brainer.

Q: Why do sex scandals involve so many skanky partners or situations?

A: Men--all men--compartmentalize. Women have sex with the gestalt of their partner: the looks, intelligence, demeanor, passion, ability to provide, etc. Men have sex with body parts. Any guy will tell you, I'm a breast man, or I'm an ass man. If those breasts are attached to someone willing to perform oral sex, the fact that they're also attached to someone with a penis is inconsequential.

Q: Did he want to get caught? It seems so if he's having sex in public!

A: Forget the armchair psychology. All sex involves an escalation of signs. If at any time an advance is not reciprocated, the game is off. In a breeder bar, a guy glances at a girl (1). She looks back (2). He smiles (3). She reciprocates (4). He sends her a drink (5). She accepts (6). This repartee goes back and forth--perhaps across several dates and multiple conversations--until they are both naked and humping. If at any time she rolled her eyes or thew the drink in his face, the game would have been over.

The back-and-forth is just the same in a toilet stall; most folks wouldn't be aware that it was happening, unless they were playing the game themselves.

Q: Why do my tax dollars pay for cops pretending to masturbate in porn theaters and toilet stalls where they can arrest unsuspecting cruisers?

A: If you were a cop, would you rather confront a gun-toting crack dealer or sit in an air-conditioned porno theater and arrest cooperative gay men? Since they're are arrested with a lewd conduct charge, the suspect runs the risk of being convicted of a sex crime and thereby would have to register as a sex offender for the rest of their lives. An extreme penalty for "having a wide stance," or "toe tapping" under any circumstance.

In this situation, it's easy for the prosecutor to get the suspect to plead guilty to a lesser charge of "disturbing the peace" and thus maintain a high conviction rate when running for reelection.

Q: Isn't it hypocritical for Larry Craig to have such an anti-gay voting record and be simultaneously engaging in homosexual activity?

A: Imagine for a moment that you're a married man who enjoys the occasional no-strings-attached blow job on the side. Who are your allies? The conservative Idaho voters that have elected you to Congress for the past 25 years, or a bunch of gay rights activists who revel in Schadenfreude when your marriage and career are destroyed?

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Greed Longa, Vita Brevis: Consortium Buys Hirst's Skull

Art Daily reported that a consortium of buyers (including the artist himself) bought Damian Hirst's diamond-encrusted skull, "For the love of God." It seems that the artist is taking a page from the playbook of his mentor Charles Saatchi by sending the work on tour to pump up the work's press (hoping that it will enhance its value). I expect there were some fairly complicated financial arrangements made to support the 100 million dollar claim for the sales price, with an amount closer to the 20 million dollar fabrication price actually being coughed up. With White Cube and Hirst maintaining partial control, and other investors paying for the materials and world tour, everyone involved is hoping that the added notoriety will rub off some added value. I would also expect the reverse to be true of any institution that showed the skull, losing real art world cred in the process.

On a slightly related subject. I have to take exception to the chicken little predictions for the art market by some art bloggers. Contararian that I m, I would have to say that no aspects of the financial world, be it hedge funds, the art market, or the stock or real estate markets are 100% linked. For those who can remember back to Bush's first term, there were several years of a stagnant US stock market, and high unemployment. We now live in a neo-liberal economic age of massive amounts of surplus cash. When the US stock market tanked, surplus cash was shoveled into real estate and art markets, setting record prices. Rich folk aren't likely to pull their money out of art unless there are better places to park their Euros.

A better predictor of a drop in the price of any commodity is surplus availability. This would point to a drop in the primary art market, with its surplus of recent MFA-sters, auxiliary art fairs, and gallery wall space without any corresponding increase in quality.

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