artblog

Thursday, November 06, 2003

Political art, alive and well

 
Post from Mark Shetabi

--in response to robert asman's post--

I'm all for preaching to the converted. It tends to remind people of what they believe in. Look at how right wing radio has galvanized the Republican base.

A short list of powerful and political artworks:

Guernica --Picasso
October 1977 --Richter

Third of May --Goya

Philip at Fraga --Velasquez

Charles V on Horseback --Titian (shown left)

F-111 --Rosenquist

Porkopolis --Sue Coe



99 Cent Store --Gursky (shown left)

Raft of the Medusa --Gericault

Target with Plaster Casts --Johns

Mother with Dead Child --Kollwitz
...
-- Mark Shetabi is a painter and installation artist



permanent link  libby and roberta 9:53 PM
Comments? Let us know. 

Public spaces, private lives

 
Post by Mark Shetabi

Artists of the Baroque didn't leave many letters behind for fear of a paper trail leading to something like a Clear Channel boycott or worse.

I think that the interiority of Baroque painting (Vermeer's "Girl Reading Letter shown) was in part a reaction to the fear of being watched.

The rather tense atmosphere of the Baroque echoes our own times. Many artists today seem very hesitant to express an opinion on events that happen outside their studios.

This is not necessarily a criticism of the artists, as there is still a lot of great work being made.

Rather, it is an observation that the public square seems to be getting smaller and there is an idea that people ought to leave the heavy thinking to the experts.

Artists should stick to paint, doctors should talk tumors and leave war and peace to the political set. Good-looking actors shouldn't discuss deforestation or Third World debt relief on Letterman (shown Jane Fonda in Vietnam).

This is why things like the Michael Moore's Oscar speech or Natalie Maine's comments on the president arouse so much antipathy. Inevitably it will seem crude and clumsy to inject prickly issues like war and pre-emption into art.

On the other hand, a lot of contemporary visual culture borrows heavily from the Baroque and along with the formal tricks, artists seem to have picked up on the undercurrent of control and privacy that the art evokes (shown, Bruce Nauman's "Green Light Corridor"). The Baroque seems more relevant for good reason.

Today we are surrounded by the technology that Enlightenment thinking brought about, but we are once again living in a society dominated by Baroque surveillance and fear. The U.S. pre-emptive doctrine is based on surveillance.

We have grown used to the idea that being observed is a natural payoff to being in public(shown, Ozzie Osborne and family). Our public spaces are designed in part to make surveillance easier. Surveillance seems almost comforting to many.

It certainly imposes order. People tend to behave better when they are watched.

Artists grow up in the same soil as other people, watch the same television and breathe the same air. It's only natural that some will notice these things
and make art out of it.

-- 2002 Pew Fellow in the Arts Mark Shetabi showed this year at White Columns in New York and at Locks Gallery, here in Philadelphia


permanent link  libby and roberta 11:23 AM
Comments? Let us know. 

Separation of art and state

 
Post from Robert Asman

I know it is not correct to speak out about this, but I have to weigh in on the fact that I believe political art debases both art and politics (if art and politics can be debased any further in our culture).

One of the strongest principles still active in our Constitution is the separation of the state and religion.

I believe the best artists of a culture strive to present some element of transparency to a transcendence beyond common life experiences--not unlike what religions strive for (shown right, Andres Serrano's "Piss Christ"). Politics is an earthy, human business which is important that we all partake in as citizens, like paying taxes. To be effective you have to frame and focus your viewpoints by voting or supporting candidates and their organizations.

To do it artistically is to preach to fellow art community members who probably have the same viewpoint. It seems to be an ego exercise, not unlike [the egotism of] a lot of individuals who choose to run for public office.

If political disgust, change, etc. is desired to be communicated, why not organize and do it and target those who should hear your message?

You don't see politicians making art. To have artists making politics just seems naive and narcissistic and I can't recall a piece of political art that has
effectively embraced my consciousness as a successful work of art (shown left, poster from Diego Rivera show "Art and Revolution").

--Rob Asman is a Philadelphia area photographer

permanent link  libby and roberta 11:00 AM
Comments? Let us know. 

Wednesday, November 05, 2003

BoingBoing

 

Here's what I've been surveiling... Boing Boing, A Directory of Wonderful Things, a site I found through Daypop. (Daypop rounds up weblinks and statistics about internet sites and delivers them in usable arrays like "top 40 sites" or "hot topics" in blogdom (guess what, art is not a hot topic).

BoingBoing, an ebullient potpourie of interesting information, some nice pictures and just fun stuff, is run by four writers who seem to be California based (except for one, Mark, who just moved with his family to the South Pacific island, Rarobonga--presumably some alternate kind of Survivor gig) The site's energetic almost to the point of manic. they had a link to some wonderful nighttime photographs taken in Japan on their front page today. If you fell in love with the way Tokyo looks at night in the movie "Lost in Translation" you might want to take a look. (image of Nagoya is one of many I scrolled through...at this scale it doesn't do it justice--they're much bigger on the site.)
permanent link  roberta 10:09 PM
Comments? Let us know. 

Tuesday, November 04, 2003

Surveillance and the "p" words--porn, politics and prurience

 
Post from Brian Wallace

Mark Shetabi's observation (about the prominence of surveillance as a topic) is correct (see Nov. 4, 9:41 a.m. post), but I'd be interested to know why he thinks it's true.

I, naturally, have an opinion: to me, it's a way to address semi-perennial "issues" such as the body, pornography, and politics while seeming (and in some cases being) fresh (and, er, without getting labelled as prurient).

I brought Surveillance Camera Players to Cambridge/Boston last spring as one part of a conference on digital art and public space [ed. note: Digital Art and Public Space: Expanding Definitions of Public Art], and their performance was pretty provocative (shown right, above, SCP's map of surveillance cameras in Times Square area; shown left, image from an SCP performance).

Their tapes are interesting as documentation, but participating in a critical (literally, a finger-pointing) tour of a populated streetscape is very engaging...putting your body into a politically active mode for the delectation of some anonymous viewer...why, it's those issues of the body, pornography, and politics again.

--Brian Wallace is the director of exhibitions at Moore College of Art
permanent link  libby 8:46 PM
Comments? Let us know. 

The unbearable heaviness of George (No, not that George)

 

I understand why you’re supposed to like George Segal’s plaster cast bodies.

I get the humanism.

I get the pull of empathy. As embodiments of loneliness, resignation and the unstoppable pull of gravity and death, these folks demand your attention.

But I’ve always found them difficult. From the plug-ugliness of the plaster to the oh-so-somber-ness of the faces, the works are as subtle as crying children. See one too many, you get annoyed.

Part of the 1960's culture of oogie anti-art, Segal’s plaster casts kept company with other drippy, gloppy (at the time) merry-makers -- Oldenberg, Kienholtz, Johns and Rauchenberg. The art was political and experimental and felt fresh. Forty years later, Segal’s adherence to plaster seems formulaic and played out.

I tried hard to stay the course with the artist’s five-piece, mini-retrospective at Locks Gallery. It’s interesting to learn that the artist cast himself as the standing figure in “The Asian Picnic.” (image is "The Asian Picnic," 1996) But that knowledge didn’t raise the viewing experience. The ugly plaster, the lack of color, the lack of humor (!!!) the heavy handedness of the work is still difficult.


permanent link  roberta 10:23 AM
Comments? Let us know. 

First Friday surveillance

 
Peek in at Vox Populi for the Surveillance Camera Players
(SCP) at the Video Lounge there this First Friday. SCP, a New York City group, performs plays directly in front of video cameras as a protest against the ubiquitous surveillance of our lives.

As I mentioned in my previous post, political art is resurgent--no doubt thanks to the Patriot Act and our duly unelected president. And surveillance is a hot art subject (I have to credit artist Mark Shetabi for this observation). Hmm. Is it? What do you think?

The Vox Pop exhibition includes documentation of public performances of stage and screen classics and media appearances. SCP's videotapes have been exhibited nationally and internationally at venues including the Museum of Contemporary Art (Barcelona), The New Museum (NYC), and the Museum of Contemporary Art (Chicago).
permanent link  libby 9:41 AM
Comments? Let us know. 

Monday, November 03, 2003

Politics and prints

 
Screenprints and stencils are suddenly all the rage in art shows. The Asian Arts Initiative had a political art show back in the spring, right before we went into business; the show included a bunch of stencil art; then Space 1026 had a all-stencil show, most of it political. And coming up Friday at the Painted Bride , "Say Something: The Art of Politics," curated by Philadelphia artist Cavin Jones. The notes mutter something about the Patriot Act and freedom of speech.
If there aren't any screen prints or stencils in that show, there ought to be.

But right now the Art Museum has a show of screenprints--a form of stencil art--from the museum's own collection: Popular, Pop & Post-Pop: Color Screenprints 1930s to Now, that runs to Jan. 25.

The show is in the Berman and Stieglitz galleries, the space across the the museum store run by the print department, and it's an eye opener.

If you've ever done screen prints and you thought they were the perfect medium for t-shirts, you're selling them short. Here are just a handful of the artists who tried their hand at the medium and are included in the show: Roy Lichtenstein (shown, "Untitled [Sandwich and Soda]") Ben Shahn, Takashi Murakami, Kara Walker, Ed Ruscha, Betye Saar, Lucas Samaras, Andy Warhol of course, Jim Houser, Willie Stokes, Randy Bolton, Bridget Riley, Edna Andrade, James Rosenquist, and Robert Gwathmey.

The show's pairings were provocative and exciting.

Ed Ruscha's "Dues" (shown) and "Mews," screen printed using homemade potions of fruit juices and such that faded over time to white-on-white images of the words, hung next to Betye Saar's "Passe Blanc," a bleached-out woman of color, dressed in white on a white ground.

And across from that was Kara Walker's "The Emancipation Approximation," with a pair of flat silhouetted women--apparently also of African descent--trapped in tightly-bodiced dresses with bouffant skirts, one woman above the inverted other.

Takashi Murakami's flat, quadruplicate "Mr. DOB" images of cartoon/anime mice (shown, a Mr. DOB image not in the museum's collection) talked to Kara Walker's superflat areas of pigment, but Mr. DOB was definitely more comical and cultural than political. British pop artist Bridget Riley's black and white concentric rings hung next to an undulating checkerboard from Philadelphian Edna Andrade, and the content was definitely optical effects.

And speaking of quadruplicate, the Andy Warhol images implied multiples even when the multiples were not there. And advertising images like "Tux Pale Dry Ginger Ale" and "Hygrade Ham" served as reminders of silkscreen's commercial uses.

Going further back in time, Sylvia Wald's "Tundra" was a wonder of textures in a medium famous for its flat areas and hard edges, and an abstract landscape to boot. The show included Works Progress Administration era art--political for sure, including Eugene Morley's dark (in content, not color) "Execution," and influential printmaker Harry Sternberg's "Steel (or The Riveter)" (shown).

Although the show may lack the glitz of the Elsa Schiaparelli "Shocking!" show, it is one of those shows that gives back however much time you sink into it and then some.



permanent link  libby 9:12 PM
Comments? Let us know. 

First Friday sandwich

 
Before and after First Friday openings this week are two things I want to recommend.
Thursday, Nov. 6, 11:30 a.m.


Artblog contributor and acclaimed stained glass artist Judith Schaechter will give a slide lecture this Thursday, Nov. 6, at Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Hamilton Auditorium (in the Furness building). Part of PAFA’s Visiting Artist Lecture Series, the talk begins at 11:30 a.m. and is free. If you’ve ever heard Judith talk about her work, you know how wickedly funny she can be -- and how interesting and insightful about her own work. And who couldn’t spend an hour looking slides of those stained glass pieces in a darkened auditorium anyway? (image is Schaechter's "Child Bride") For a warm-up, read Judith's statement at Missioncreep.

Saturday, Nov. 8, 7-11 p.m.

The always interesting Project Room opens an exhibit of new work by Jessica Doyle--large-scale drawings built on walls then trucked to PR. There’ll also be a bench, a garden, an aquarium and a video projection about the artist’s daughter. Doyle, who lives in Philadelphia, has screened her videos in the Brooklyn Underground film Festival and elsewhere in New York. Check out the online art zine femalepersuasion.net for more. (video stills from a Doyle video)

Music is always big at Project Room openings. This Sat, DEEJAYS: Brad Bailey (NY), Erica Bradbury (NY), Shawn Doyle (Phila) & Eric Midgett (Phila) will orchestrate the sounds.
permanent link  roberta 8:04 AM
Comments? Let us know. 

Sunday, November 02, 2003

Art Rabbit

 

Here I will confess my pointy-headedness. I've been a reader/subscriber to the NY Review of Books since college. You don't want to know how long ago that was. One of the things I like about it is the writing about art exhibits and art books. I particularly like John Updike's reviews which seem to show up more and more of late. Not only is he a fresh, non-pointy-headed reviewer (no footnotes, no art-speak) but he's often a nay sayer. Like in the recent piece he wrote on the El Greco show at the Met. Of course he's a highly Protestant guy and the show's a highly Catholic show and he deals with all that in his review. But being a great writer, he also gives you the juicy anecdotes that make the piece grow beyond just a review. (For another, also fresh, take on El Greco, see Libby's post of Oct. 22.)

You can read the mag online. For any Bush-haters and you know who you are I also recommend the Paul Krugman article in this month's issue.

I saw Updike recently at the Free Library. He read from his new book of collected stories and talked about his life. I always wondered how he got interested in writing about art. Turns out he was a gifted child artist always drawing up a storm. He has some formal training as an artist having taken classes when he was younger. But mostly, he's a visual guy and his response to the world is that of a visual artist.
permanent link  roberta 10:44 AM
Comments? Let us know. 

Halloween Inc.

 
Speaking of monsters, every year the list of exhibits and events tied to Halloween seems to get longer. Whether this is a cultural return to childhood or just good niche marketing I can’t figure. This year, my favorite Halloween treat came to me in the mail in the form of a comic book, Boo! Halloween stories by Manning Krull and Jon Morris. The local Krull and Tucson-based Morris put together some bedtime stories right out of Itchy and Scratchy -- bloody and bloody funny. Nicely drawn, for $3 it’s no trick. Available online.
permanent link  roberta 10:21 AM
Comments? Let us know.