Artists Unite Issue

Howard Dean had this to say in a DNC email. It bears attention:

An important fact has to be remembered as we recall the victims of last year’s devastating storms:

Almost half of all children in New Orleans lived in poverty — before Hurricane Katrina.

The callous and inept federal response to Hurricane Katrina revealed that, when faced with a crisis that experts had actually predicted, the Republican administration was utterly unprepared and unresponsive.

Meanwhile, the shameful foot-dragging since the storm on reconstruction and help to families shows the same lack of interest in solving real problems and saving lives. So far, the administration has gotten around to spending barely half of what Congress authorized.

The Republican administration’s failures before and after the storms are linked by a common approach to the solemn responsibilities of government. Simply put: they aren’t interested.

This Republican leadership’s philosophy means that our government simply will not meet the needs of our people.

Not because it’s impossible — but because they don’t believe it should.

More, plus some things you can do at http://www.democrats.org/katrinaanniversary

An article in today’s NY Times posed an ethical dilemma that kept intruding on my thoughts all day. It involved a Jewish, Czechoslovakian woman who was able survive Auschwitz (and save her mother) because Josef Mengele happened to discover she had artistic talent, and ordered her to draw portraits of imprisoned Gypsies, (since photography didn’t convey their skin tones to his satisfaction). It is not clear exactly who possessed the pieces after the war, but eventually seven of Dina Babitt’s portraits ended up in the collection of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum in Poland.

The dilemma is that Dina Babbitt, now 83, has been fighting for three decades to get those portraits back in her possession, and the museum has steadfastly refused. The Deputy Director of the museum stated, “We do not regard these as personal artistic creations but as documentary work done under direct orders from Dr. Mengele and carried out by the artist to ensure her survival.”

Okay, well, she was ordered to draw Mengele’s “medical” procedures too, but she isn’t asking for those drawings back.

The Times notes:

“Mrs. Babbitt’s case is unusual among the property disputes to emerge from the Holocaust because it involves artwork created under the duress of Nazis, not property confiscated by the Nazis.

“You have the natural dilemma between something that is clearly significant historical documentation of events and the claim of someone, which can’t be dismissed outright, that this was her creative work,” said Rabbi Andrew Baker of the American Jewish Committee, a lobbyist group, and a member of the International Auschwitz Council, which advises the museum. “I don’t know of a case quite like it.””

Ms. Babbitt would like her family to have the works, and eventually for them to be in a museum in the United States. Her closing statement in the article is wrenching: “Every single thing, including our underwear, was taken away from us,” Mrs. Babbitt said. “Everything we owned, ever. My dog, our furniture, our clothes. And now, finally, something is found that I created, that belongs to me. And they refuse to give it to me. This is why I feel the same helplessness as I did then.”

However much one might wish that her preference was to have those pieces preserved in the Holocaust museum, it is also difficult to completely understand or wholeheartedly support the museum’s position. Whomever had the pieces and sold them to the museum certainly didn’t get them from Babbitt, and likely just grabbed them in the confusion of the liberation. What’s the provenance here? Does causing a survivor so much pain in any way compromise the museum’s lofty mission? The museum’s stance is rational, but is it ethical? Is there any way to find a resolution without setting some unwanted precedent?

My instinct is that the museum should give Babbitt the pieces and replace them with reproductions explaining where the originals are and why. I doubt a flood of claims on the rest of the museum’s collection would ensue. This whole situation seems so sad and unnecessary.

I hate to announce this and reduce my chances of getting in, so I’m being cryptic:

www.filmforum.org/films/warhol.html

At the end of my visit to MoMA last week, I noticed this plaque on the wall next to two staffers at a desk in front of the members coat room. Upon reading the sign, I noticed the two clocks above the womens’ heads. Leave it to Gonzalez-Torres to say, ‘I love you’ without it seeming maudlin or trite.
The clocks were off by about 5 seconds.

We’re extremely pleased to present our first short story feature, a piece titled “Lemon Cake” by Jacqueline Keren. It takes place in Washington Heights and Inwood.

Jacqueline Keren lived in Washington Heights for 15 years on Ellwood and Sickles Streets and Cabrini Boulevard. Her short fiction has appeared in the Alaska Quarterly Review, Confrontation, and other journals. She was awarded Redivider’s Editor’s Choice Award in 2002 for her story Lemon Cake.

(Please note: the following material is © copyright Jacqueline Keren and may not be used in any way without permission from author.)

Lemon Cake

He dreamed he was preparing a banquet, laying out food on a long table. The hall he worked in was bright and airy. Columns poured down from the ceiling, thick and white and solid. In the center of the table he placed the lemon cake. Although it looked ordinary, a pale yellow cake with white icing, he knew that cutting it would require skill and precision. He took the knife with both hands and tickled the frosting with it, awakening a feeling of excitement he remembered from before the time when fear had overwhelmed him. In his dream, there was no plate, no impediment to cutting the cake from below, as if it was suspended above the table, although the stand it sat on was there for all to see. He brought the knife up through the bottom of the cake. The knife came out clean, and he turned it, flickering blue. Trembling, he brought the knife through again from the bottom and placed the perfect slice on the waiting white saucer. This he left above the row of dessert forks and walked away into the room.

They had liked the apartment because the sun streamed through the windows in the morning, waking them up. The first six months there they had risen together. Now, his wife slept later, rising only after Ray had vacated the shower, when the alarm went off and ordered her up. Standing in the middle of the room, bathed in the soft sunlight on a chilly Monday morning, he watched Amanda sleeping. He could see the evenness of her breathing in the rise and fall of the blanket. She had aged very little in the nine years they had been married; in her face, she was a more sharply defined version of herself, as if someone had taken a chisel and dug the lines thinner and deeper. He rubbed his eyes, clearing the sand, then searched through the dresser drawer for a clean pair of underwear. His wife’s collection of old buttons gathered dust on the runner, shaking when he slammed shut the sticky drawer. Amanda lay still, just her hair visible, a mop upon the pillow, her shoulders. Nothing he did would wake her. He wondered how she slept so soundly when every sound made him start, her every movement in the apartment. In this way, he thought, they had always been different, and he shut himself into the bathroom.

Although Indian Summer had come, bringing with it a clammy heat, it was cool when Ray stepped outside. He walked down the noisy stretch of Fort Washington Avenue, where the cars streamed into Manhattan on the George Washington Bridge. An hour or two earlier, he thought, there would have been quiet, a light still softened by the lingering night. He passed a man standing in front of the hospital selling shaved ice with syrup and bags of peeled oranges. Ray missed the summer. Everything grew then, flowers sprouting between the stalks of corn on the mall on Broadway. Planted amidst the vegetation, he imagined the benches he would make, blond wood in straight slats, the arms curved more fancifully. With a workshop, he thought, he could have built them. Though their apartment was spacious, there was not enough room for the sawdust and the fumes from the polyurethane. Even the soot that came in from the street, turning the windowsills black in the summer, made the space seem tighter, as if it brought them too close, boxed in against each other. He did not remember it being that way when his wife had painted, but it must have been so, for his eyes had watered when she prepared the canvases she would cover with oils and acrylics.

He turned off the avenue, passing through a wrought iron gate and into a complex of Beaux Art buildings, huge columns and porticos facing an interior square. The buildings stared down at each other, as if silently communing—the Hispanic Society, the Academy of Arts and Letters, the bilingual Boricua College. Tucked into the corner was the American Numismatic Society, where he worked. He walked across the plaza, past the sculpture garden, and entered its dim interior. His eyes traveled up along the wood paneled walls and into the depths of the vaulted ceiling. It was as if the city, his neighborhood, even his apartment had disappeared and he had entered another time. The society was a restful place, and he always felt at peace there. He never grew tired of his work, studying the coins. There was always something new to see, a detail he had overlooked—all the bits and pieces he needed to bring a dead world back to life.

continue reading this story

via the New York Times (thanks to NewsGrist for pointing to this). “An Arab Artist Says All the World Really Isn’t a Stage” By Michael Slackman, Published: August 19, 2006.

According to Syrian actor Duraid Lahham, who is famous in Syria and has routinely used sarcasm in movies, plays and on TV to criticize political leaders, art entertains and that’s about it. Mr. Lahham said, that he thought he might help change the world with his movies. Not anymore. Now, he says over and over, art is useless as a tool for political change.

A reality check from a 72-year old veteran of fighting the good fight.

boy the blogosphere will be buzzing! (why does so much art blogging come out of DC???) I just spotted an announcement for the 1st annual DC contemporary art fair, artDC, April 27-30. In case you were wondering, DC?, the web site has a section called, ‘Why DC?’

Of course, those of us who have tasted the capital’s artistic delights know well: a concentrated, smart, passionate arts community plus the desire to up the “cultural tourism” appeal of the city.

As biennials and art fairs continue to sprout, is there a limit? I hope not!

There are two inspiring article for creators of art spaces in September’s Art News. (Art News runs stories online later than the print issue, so you’ll have to check for this article on your own).

The first is about “pathologically optimistic” Jill Medvedow, director of Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art. The piece briefly traces the history of the museum from an orphaned sibling of MoMA in 1939, through 10 locations, to Medvedow’s arrival in 1998. Medvedow has begun creating a permanent collection and helmed a project to create a state-of-the art musuem facility on the waterfront in Boston. The building, designed by Diller Scofido + Renfro will be spectacular and full of amenities. You can see photos in progress and slide show at the ICA site. (A sidenote is that Julian Opie’s Suzanne Walking and Julian Walking, whose siblings graced New York’s City Hall are now strolling near the new ICA.)

Also in the issue is a report of Holly Block’s move to the Bronx Museum after 18 years as director of Art in General in SoHo. Block was chosen for the post in part for her committment to involving the community; she expects to draw on locals for exhibitions (she was curator of the museums satellite galleries for three years in the late 80’s and has an eye on the artists now moving to the Mott Haven neighborhood). Block has a love of Cuban art and is author of Art Cuba: The New Generation. A current exhibition showcases Brazillian culture. A quote from Block gives a hint of what to expect:

“I’m very much interested in how the city is changing and its architectural landscape, and how that is going to be reflected in the Bronx, and how that fits into that world.”

artHARLEM presents 2nd Annual
Harlem Open Artist Studio Tour
Saturday, September 9, 2006
Sunday, September 10, 2006
www.artHARLEM.org
The 2nd Annual Harlem Open Artist Studio Tour (HOAST) is a tour of visual
artists’ studios and galleries. OVER 100 artists will be exhibiting work in their
studios, homes and galleries around Harlem, and well over 1,000 guests are
expected to attend the event each day.
VOLUNTEERS ARE NEEDED!
HOAST is a volunteer-driven organization that depends on the participation of
people who are dedicated to the Arts and whose interests include promoting
New York City and its Art Community.
Volunteers are needed in four areas:
Artists’ Assistants:Work with the artists to mount and dismantle artwork for the event.
Assigned locations will be predominately artists’ studios and galleries. (Art students and artists,
this is the volunteer spot for you.)
Gallery Liaisons: Gallery Liaisons will be assigned to be a part of the Gallery Crew. There are a
number of galleries that will house the works of artists who are not showing in their private
studio or home. (If you’re an artist or an art lover, or enjoy organizing, this job will suit you fine.)
Tour Guides: Do you have a cheerful personality and like people? The Tour Guides will be on
the scene at the transportation points and on the route of the tour. (Artist information, bus
schedules and general information will be provided to you.)
Transportation Coordinators:Work with the transportation team to coordinate the pick up
and delivery of guests to the various galleries and artists’ venues. (Some knowledge of the
Harlem community a plus but not mandatory.)
Some assignments will require a brief training session on the day of the event.
To volunteer, send an e-mail with
your full name, your primary e-mail address
and your primary telephone number to
hinymshaw@aol.com

When cynicism seems to be the flavor of the day in art, it’s so refreshing to encounter something more complex on the palate. Food metaphors aside, the thing that caught my attention today did, like food, tie into the idea of a human need for comfort, nourishment, safety, and community. “Dwelling”, by artist Marie Watt, is an 8-foot tower of more than 1000 blankets, and it’s part of an exhibition called “No Reservations: Native American History and Culture in Contemporary Art,” opening at the Aldrich Museum in Connecticut

“…meant to challenge stereotypes about American Indian art and showcase living artists who reinterpret Indian influences in “curious and unexpected ways,” said Richard Klein, the museum’s exhibitions director.

“From the start Ms. Watt had a communal project in mind for the exhibition. She spread the word in the community that she was looking for donated blankets that would be stacked flat to create a tower. She encouraged donors to share the stories behind their hand-me-downs, and she had these stories written on tags that hang on the blankets.”

One local retiree picked up a leaflet soliciting blanket donations, and decided to contribute one he’d been holding onto for years–the blanket he carried with him at age 15, when the Nazis evacuated the concentration camp where he was imprisoned, sending all remaining prisoners on a “death march” north, just ahead of the Allies.

The retiree, Peter Kubicek, has done many things since regaining his freedom, and one of them is to collect contemporary art. Of late, before donating it to Ms. Watt’s project, his blanket had been kept in his car to protect art and special items in transit.

Ms. Watt offered some further insight into the use of blankets in her work:

“Many Indians exchange blankets to mark important events, she said, citing the Pendleton her parents gave her when she graduated from college. “It’s one of the most special gifts you can ever be honored with,” she said.

Over time, she said, the blankets come to be associated with sharp memories.

“These are humble objects we almost take for granted, but they have extraordinary histories,” Ms. Watt said.

She has promised that all the new blankets donated for her installation will be distributed at the end of the project to social service agencies in Connecticut, ensuring that the artwork will have an afterlife.”

Now if that doesn’t make you feel warm all over, nothing will!

[excerpts taken from today's article in the New York Times. Image detail of photo by Andrew Henderson for the NY Times]

a review of Francine Prose’s advice for would be writers, by Emily Barton (via the New York Times).

by Peter Ferko and Wendy Newton

In the current program at Walter Reade Theater at Lincoln Center, Russian sci-fi and fantasy visionaries are ‘beamed up’ to a new audience. The series, From the Tsars to the Stars: A Journey Through Russian Fantastik Film pays tribute to the genres of “imagination” and includes classics like Tarkovsky’s “Solaris” and more recent discoveries, some in new prints. The series is curated by Alla Verlotsky of Seagull films, who continually brings the cream of Russian films to Walter Reade’s schedule, with Robert Skotak and Dennis Bartok.

A great example of the caliber of this series is “Ruslan and Ludmila” from 1972, produced by the children’s division of Mosfilm. The final movie from director Alexander Ptushko is a sophisticated fairy tale based on Pushkin’s Poem “Ruslan and Ludmila” (also the basis for an opera by Glinka). In fact the dialog is the poem. The movie transcends our notion of what a fairy tale on film can be: incredibly good casting, acting, set design, and poetic dialog. A study in how it is not necessary to ‘dumb down’ movies for children, this movie is instead a vehicle for teaching children Pushkin.

A visual artist will delight at this work; it includes giants who are part of the terrain they occupy, crystalline gardens, fountains that spill up instead of down, and an evil sorceror dwarf with a 30-foot beard. The movie gives a great introduction to various archtypes from the Russian psyche: vengeful witches, clever young princesses, brave warriors, gluttons, and a fabulous love of the countryside and country folk all figure here.

There is extensive background on the series at the Film Society of Lincoln Center’s website and a free roundtable took place August 12th. Ruslan and Ludmila screens again August 17 and August 20. The series runs through the 24th. Don’t miss out!

image: The Amphibian Man, G.Kazansky and V. Chebotarev, 1962

Don’t miss Artist Unite Issue Articles , Opportunities, and Events.

For those who are thinking that they’re too busy to go look at a toilet or bicycle wheel, massage that schedule to give yourself a chance to see MoMA’s DADA show before it closes on September 11. I like the DADA spirit, but I wasn’t expecting to enjoy this show, figuring that sometimes you just have to be there to enjoy artists being absurd. There is a lot of Duchamp, of course, and seeing readymades is less than thrilling, but the show is filled with gems and nice amounts of work from various artists. For example, there is a wall of sublime Kurt Schwitters collages and a handful of interesting Man Ray airbrush paintings and a mobile as well as his photo work. The exhibit also features numerous brilliant film pieces (this work seems the basis for half of the  B-movie techniques and half of Monty Python to boot), sculptures and machines, and even a sound piece: Raoul Hausmann reciting hilarious random lettertype poetry.

The labeling gives some sense of the interplay among artists. The exhibit is layed out on a geographical matrix, which seems silly as DADA was explicitly multinational and most of the artists turn up in sections for several countries as they moved about. But the texts and layout provide a good description of the period and its reach, for example the distinction made between the tone in the various countries as they emerged from WWI and how it influenced subject matter.
Much has been said of this exhibit by now, of course. I’ll just add that I’m glad I went by. If you don’t heed my advice and go, you can still see some of Man Ray’s photograms (Rayograms) and even make your own fauxtograph, complements of MoMA.

After this morning’s post about the Times article on UBS Gallery’s Walker Evans show, I made it over to check out the hubub myself. It’s no wonder Mr. Kimmelman focused on questions of posthumous printing and the use of digital output and enlargements: the show brochure devotes three pages to those questions. The justifications that the gallery provides are reasonable (Evans was not interested in “fine art” prints; he approved 6 by 8 foot enlargements of some of his photos for his 1971 MoMA show–although Kimmelman says approved those sizes for “props”; he was content to use the halftone process in book printing to distribute his work; he shot 8×10 negs so was interested in details that can be better shown in enlargements; he only printed contact prints due to cost issues, etc.).

My feeling in looking at the large prints was that it was much ado about nothing–and the most egregious crime at the same time. No biggie because the images look good and probably Evans would have said, ‘Fine.’ And the show is very informative and beautiful. But I also felt like this was a typical contemporary “me culture” kind of act: “I want it bigger, better, and I’m a sophisticated connoisseur who gets what I want.” This feeling was heightened by the presence of a dozen 8 x 10 prints signed by Evans (the Ives Sillman collection from 1971) in vitrines alongside the framed new prints. I wondered why those 8 x 10 images wouldn’t have made an adequate exhibition, as the primary aim stated in the brochure was to introduce Evans to a wider public. The curators have thought of everything; they say another aim of the exhibit is to compare printing technologies. Well, that sounds like something better suited to ICP or to an exhibit at Epson, USA. Anyway, as you would guess, the digital prints look great, as photo magazines have been telling us lately. It’s an old issue already.

But what caught my eye in looking at the signed Evans prints in contrast to the new prints was just that: contrast. In fact, Evans appeared to favor darker prints overall and more contrast. Was it a matter of limited range in the media as the curators suggest? But why brighter images, then? Why not let them go dark but with more shadow detail, for instance? I could only guess that these images felt more “balanced” and more “right” to our modern image-savvy sensibilities. So we “improve” on Evans.

I’ll allow the curators to have the last word; a word that is reminiscent of another debate surrounding analog vs. digital technologies:

“The music is the same; certain subtle notes are now heard more clearly.”

The New York Times Michael Kimmelman reviews the new–um, Walker Evans, …I mean, John Hill and Sven Martson show, “Walker Evans: Carbon and Silver” at the UBS Art Gallery. Mr. Kimmelman’s theme is not the work, which is iconic (and though Susan Sontag may have pointed out that for all it’s seeming naked integrity it was the result of lots of staging, editing, and tricks of the trade, Evans is pretty universally loved). Rather the fascinating point of the article is, “Is this Walker Evans’ work?

The negatives of Evans Farm Security Administration photos are at the Library of Congress and in the public domain. John Hill and Sven Martson, both of whom knew and worked with Evans, used the latest digital technology to draw detail and color depth from the images that is, evidently dramatically different from Evans prints [editors note: see the subsequent post for more about the subtle differences from older prints]. While Mr. Kimmelman points out that Evans was not very keen on darkroom work (which I guess implies not fussy) he certainly gave a de facto approval to the prints as they were originally made. Some of the photos are also of different size than the originals (bigger of course).

Kimmelman poses the philosophical question, is photography more like painting, where copies are inferior, or like music, which is open to interpretation? Well, in a postmodern world, anything is open to interpretation, but then call it your own art. This is more along the lines of the cleaning of the Sistene chapel ceiling (which apparently evoked comments that the ceiling was now too gaudy) except that the Evans prints were never more detailed and big then shrunk and made less clear.

I discussed working digitally vs. film with two photographer friends recently; our conclusion was that the process of making the work, the art vs. the artifact was different for the two media. Perhaps this show highlights something in the gray area between the art and artifact as well; however, without Walker Evans in the process, can we take for granted his consent?

image: by Peter Ferko, after Walker Evans using digital manipulation and extreme size reduction to bring out what I think is most important in the photo (done by placing my tongue in my cheek while using Photoshop)

I recently received a note about a 30-minute long event this Sunday in Washington Heights’ Fort Tryon Park. ComplineNYC is a group that uses the Medieval art of Gregorian chant for the purpose of…well for the purpose it was originally created for: meditation. The site in the park was picked for its acoustics rather than visuals; it’s the reverberant tunnel on a pedestrian walkway. The group’s web site warrants a look, and I’m going to try to go catch some of the sonic vibrations.

Survey breathtaking views of the Hudson River Valley while listening to Gregorian Chants from the monastic tradition of Compline. From the pedestrian tunnel near the promenade, these ancient sounds will drift toward the setting sun. Come participate in a medieval tradition in Fort Tryon Park, host to the Met’s own medieval art collection.

A group will depart from just inside the gateway of Margaret Corbin Circle (the entrance closest to the 190th St A-train station) at 6:45 PM on Sunday, August 27, and walk toward the tunnel for the thirty-minute gathering. Visit our website for more information http://www.complinenyc.org.

Compline presented by ComplineNYC
7:00 PM
Sunday, August 27, 2006
Fort Tryon Park, Washington Heights
http://www.complinenyc.org

For those who remember our post about graphically depicting a web site, it will seem eerily familiar to see Thinkmap’s Visual Thesaurus. Using this alternative to Roget’s will be tempted away from their writing task as they watch stems and branches grow from words that weren’t quite right for the task into words related along various relationships of type, meaning, submeaning, and wait what was I doing here before I got mesmerized by the unfolding flowers?

Why paint today, when ever-new forms of interactive technologies compete for our attention?

what happened to the crawl?