artblog

Friday, June 27, 2003

The sound of art

 


I was at the Art museum the other day with my 14-year old, Stella, who’s big on shopping so we hit the gift shop.

The find of the hour was the series of cds, “Art in Concert” -- musical mixes grouped around big name artists, packaged with a little biographical information and a few images. Art and music history 101 for $16.95 each.

At the cd listening station I sampled from a half-dozen cds. In a funny way, the music matches the art -- upbeat for Renoir and the Impressionists, skittery for Van Gogh, etc. But the whole thing was vaguely annoying -- in a Ken Burns way. Thumbnail packaging -- a fast food art bite with a sound bite chaser. I guess I’m not the audience for the product.

But it started me thinking about artists who use music in their art and artists who make mixes and artists who compose their own music and make it part of the work. Now there’s a satisfying blending of art and music -- a product I can buy.

Philadelphia has a great bunch of musician-artists. Jim Houser, Jim Hinz, Aaron Igler and Clint Takeda, to name a few--all composers and musicians whose music weaves its way into the art they make -- either as background or in the case of Hinz, (new Pew fellow) foreground.

There are video artists like Pete Rose and Matthew Suib (and out-of-towner Christian Marclay, see post of 5/29/03) whose works are an art-music synthesis of another kind.

And, of course, the Space 1026er-djs, Ben Woodward and Andrew Jeffrey Wright, who work professionally around town and knock off paintings and drawings on a regular basis and design cd covers, too. Check out the Space 1026 store, MarketEast to see more.

Then there are painters who paint about their favorite music. Thom Lessner paints portraits of heavy metal groups and designs posters for the Paul Green School of Rock and Roll. And Scott Cassidy paints pictures of his favorite cds.

Recently, I got sent a couple of cds designed by the designer of the wavy-world aesthetic, Karim Rashid. (The guy’s a serious dj. He even designed a dj station). The music’s techno-electronic-bleeding heart-liberal -- post-911 lyrics about love thy neighbor, etc. I’m not up on that genre so what do I know, but it seemed authentic.

Here’s the real question. Where are all the girls here? Is the art-music connection totally a guy thing? Apart from Clare Rojas who has a band, and Patti Smith (who's going to show some art at the ICA next fall) I can’t think of any girl art-musicians. Is testosterone a required ingredient in this sphere?


permanent link  roberta 8:39 AM
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Wednesday, June 25, 2003

Muskrat love and bickering

 
I wasn’t planning to see James Parlin’s “Noah’s Ark” show at Schmidt Dean Gallery--the images
on my postcard didn’t look too inviting. Fortunately, I was in the neighborhood and popped in anyway.

I laughed out loud when I saw Parlin’s six animal couples in person. The polychromed bronze critters disagree, appall one another and studiously ignore one another, acting out the trials and tribulations of romance and partnership atop pieces of furniture painted white--domestic discord meets love and art on a pedestal.

Besides their anthropomorphic charms, the bronzes are beautifully made and colored.

As in the postcard, this image of "Noah's Ark/Porcupines" doesn’t even begin to capture the visual beauty and the emotional interplay as the male backs off from the female showing off her bottom.
permanent link  libby 1:00 PM
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Soul satisfying

 


Russian emigre artist Vitaly Komar (of Komar and Melamid) was in town last month for a Slought Foundation panel coinciding with an exhibit of contemporary Russian video art. (You may remember K&M's Asian elephant art project which came to town at the same time as the Republican National Convention in 2000. Image here is of "America's Most Wanted," a painting based on survey research data into the general public's taste for color and imagery.)

Komar showed slides from the team’s projects and one that especially tickled me was the “Sell Your Soul” project, a 1979 foray into capitalism that followed the duo’s arrival on America’s shores in 1978.

Using Madison avenue tactics, K&M posted their sales pitch on billboards and posters in New York and in ads in major art magazines. The price was negotiable and many sold their souls to the duo. (Andy Warhol sold his for $1.)

Later, the individual souls were resold at an art auction in Russia -- for a lot more money. Somebody made a profit.

I was reminded of this trans-national trafficking in souls when I got an email recently from Fernando Velazquez, a young, Uruguaian artist living in Sao Paolo, Brazil.

Velazquez, too, is a soul collector. The young painter, photographer and media artist is not into buying and selling, though. His web project, “The Soul Collectors” is an on-going project in which people email images of themselves to his site and he puts them up in a grid of mugshots. Everybody from baby to grandma to Keanu Reeves is represented. Velazquez said in an email that he doesn’t know when he’ll be finished with the project. Understandable. It’s hard to know how many souls are enough.

Velazquez's site (bone up on your Spanish) is inquisitive as well as acquisitive -- in a spiritual kind of way. In addition to collecting your soul/image, the artist would like your help amending the 10 commandments. Now there's an opportunity.
permanent link  roberta 8:35 AM
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Night falls on la casita

 
Kids were playing in la casita last night at around 9 p.m. when I stopped by. A boy was riding a bike in and out of the house and two others were chasing each other around. Behind the house, a basketball game was underway. Burns Security Guard, Tony Okokuro, hired to watch over the space at night said the kids generally were peaceful and that when they weren't he shooed them off and sent them home.

Standing flood lights illuminate the courtyard and wash over the little house. The artificial brightness subdues the piece and steals its thunder a little. It seems more of a presence in the daylight.

Casita's interior lighting system (spot lights in the ground shining up) is subtle. The house is shadowy and dark from the outside. Inside, it has a candle-lit appeal -- warm light, a little fuzzy around the edges.


More dramatic are the photographs in the windows of Congreso's office building, like the one here in the 4th floor, visible from as far away as Lehigh Avenue.



permanent link  roberta 6:58 AM
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