12 March 2007 (~10:00 p.m.)
The most exciting thing of the day is Jorge Drexler. He barely registered on my usually soundtrack-sensitive aural horizon even with an Oscar under his belt for Motorcycle Diaries. (Is it because I see so many fewer movies; and never watch television? (Drexler has also composed the theme for the telenovela Corazon partido.) He’s had a lot of public radio exposure lately – Weekend Edition, The BBC World, and now Nick Harcourt’s Morning Becomes Eclectic here on the Santa Monica NPR affiliate KCRW – all of it richly deserved. Why I lost track of him, post-Oscars 2005 (or 2004?) I have no idea. (I’m sure it couldn’t have helped that Antonio Banderas and Carlos Santana actually sang the song on the awards show. Antonio Banderas! That’s the AMPAS for you – just hopeless.) But he’s built his career very independently. (His first record was his own production top to bottom. He had an entirely separate career from music until little more than a decade or so ago. Would you believe he’s a doc? Can you imagine having him as your ear, nose & throat specialist? Even better than a psychiatrist I had who looked like a blond Tony Perkins in his prime.) Due to any number of exigencies I am forced to forego his concert at Disney Hall and immediately swing by a Virgin store for his current CD, 12 Segundos d’Oscuridad, which sounds like the immediate aftermath of the 15 minutes of Warhol-mandated fame to which we may all eventually be condemned (or perhaps its antidote – or both). It’s 12 original tracks and one cover of an already classic Radiohead song, "High & Dry." (Am I the only person who remembers a Rolling Stones song of the same title – from (coincidence?) Aftermath?) Thoughtful, rather studied-inchoate (isn’t that the Radiohead way?) – though terrific – song; but certainly no more impressive – indeed, easily eclipsed by most of these songs. With one or two exceptions, the textures and rhythms are very simple. But the poetry of the lyrics – and Drexler’s incredibly sweet tenor voice – the straightforward sincerity of his delivery – make them soar. Take the cover as exemplar by way of exception: you hear the song fresh, as if for the first time. It’s as if the images were freshly engraved with each roll of the simple 4-note guitar figure he fingers under the melody. (I don’t think the piano parts get more complicated than a few triad chords.) The imagery of the first couple of songs has a striking resonance (consider my last few posts; cf., Irwin, etc.) made all the more poignant by the musical articulation. “Pie de trás de pie / Ira tras el pulso de claridad / La noche cerrada, apenas se abria, / Se volvía a cerrar.” (the title track). Or – “El velo semitransparente del desasosiego ("The semi-transparent veil of uneasiness")/ Un día se vino a instalar entre el mundo y mis ojos … / Yo estaba empeñado en nover lo que ve, pero a veces. / La vida es más compleja de lo que parece …” “El Otro Engranaje” (“The Other Gear”) is sheer danceable pop on its smooth surface, but what wit and insight. Or consider the incredibly beautiful songs, “Soledad, aqui estan mis credenciales,” or “Sanar” (“To Heal”) which close the disk with passion and eloquence. Drexler’s certainly the most original – and maybe the best – voice out of South America since Caetano Veloso – to whose post-bossa, post-tropicalismo pop styles he may owe more than a little as both singer and songwriter. The music isn’t quite on Veloso’s sophisticated plateau – but it doesn’t have to be. It’s an appropriate vehicle for Drexler’s melancholy (“transoceanica melancólicos”) poetry.
What a preamble to chatting about the Graves recital -- before moving from aural to visual. (Maybe Bizet's Seguedilla from Carmen -- one of the encores -- is appropriate after the fact. I have to say the de Falla Seguidilla Murciana was far more scintillating, to say nothing of an aria by Cilea from Adriana Lecouvreur.) I can't go into all this just now, though. I have to shut my eyes for a moment (to Drexler's serenade) I'll just say that Graves' 'star turns' took a back seat to the story-teller's art in her Royce Hall recital. She's a consummate theatrical artist, of course; but her special gift (aside from an amazing voice) is as a story-teller in song. She's really a story conductor. In her hands (and that rich multi-register voice), the song-story becomes a kind of orchestral production. She has an extraordinary ability to draw her audience (as if the chorus) into the narrative thread of a song -- as if making us participants, or at least direct witnesses, in the process. (I have to remind myself to talk about the Schubert (no -- it was fine, really) -- including "Death and the Maiden.") "Gira inexorable el otro engranaje, / La noria invisible de las transgresiones." I hear someone calling me.
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Through a glass darkly ...
8 March 2007 ~12 midnight
“Nights are long since you went away …,” my Uncle Tom once lullabyed to me in his fabulous Chicago apartment way back in the Pleistocene era. And for some reason, the line and sentiment come back to me as I mull over the evening and, uh, one of ‘my buddies’ (I’ll call this one, ‘opera buddy’); and the question I ask about almost everyone (and maybe everyTHING) – how well do we actually know anyone? How much is entirely beyond our grasp, beyond our reach – vaulted and entirely inaccessible? I sometimes feel like Alice Toklas (yeah, in more ways than one) in the trajectory my life seems to take – one long sequence of dinners (or drinks) with geniuses, the great and near-great (and, it must be conceded, more than a few non-entities). It’s as if, absent a sit-down, on-the-record interview, that’s about as well as I’m going to know any of them.
I feel incredibly fortunate that some of them are my pals; but there are moments when what I learn about them calls into question almost everything else I’ve assumed I knew about them; when the river between us seems more like an ocean. (The ‘object in your [mental] mirror may in fact be more ‘distant’ than it appears.) I’m feeling guilty about essentially playing hooky on the Robert Irwin ‘conversation’ with LACMA Director Michael Govan (though reports on the previous ‘conversation with Jeff Koons’ did nothing to whet my enthusiasm for this one). Chatting with opera buddy, as we speed down Wilshire Boulevard in the opposite direction from LACMA (I mention Irwin’s spiral serpentine garden at The Getty, and wonder if a “confrontation”-style event might be more interesting, say, for example, a little set-to between Irwin and his Getty foil, architect Richard Meier. Hey – they’re both about light and space, no?), I ask her what she thinks about Irwin. She shrugs her shoulders as she places him in the overall contemporary art scheme. “Yeah.. Uh -- don’t care. You think he’s important?” “I’ll take that to mean you didn’t catch his MOCA retrospective.” I have to laugh – it’s not as if I’m not just as dismissive occasionally. ‘Oh yeah – he’s doing this, that, . . . and this – NEXT!’ Or complaining (as I was only soooo recently) about ‘too much’ painting – in actuality meaning too much of the same kinds of painting – but how quick I am to dismiss what doesn’t immediately fall into (or, alternatively, way outside) certain criteria. But it’s one thing to say something like this about some submerging schmo in a gallery and another entirely about someone like Irwin.
The subject turns to New York, from where we’ve both just recently returned, and what we were up to respectively there. I mention a few things that grabbed my attention at the fairs and the records that were set at the Christie’s auction I attended. She talks a bit about what she’s writing – extrapolating into the defining parameters of art itself. It shocks me a bit that she is somewhat adamant about drawing a firm line between film and “fine” art. “Films [and I do mean feature films by this] can’t be art?” I ask. “Movies are entertainment,” she pronounces definitively. I start to pursue this a bit, starting with a couple of films she knows quite well and throwing in another couple of examples, but quickly drop the matter. Absurd to waste my breath on a moot point – something that’s already been arbitrated by the culture of an entire century. I’m hoping she’s not planning to pursue this bogus extension of the otherwise interesting points of her essay. She asks me if I noticed work at the fairs by a painter who’s garnering quite a bit of attention in the art press in the last couple of months – whose work we’ve both admired (indeed mutually discovered – at least for ourselves) a couple of years or so ago – and whose market has risen accordingly. She now wishes she had purchased one of the paintings we admired then. (I had – though not the sort of thing one might expect from this particular artist.) “Were you seriously considering buying one?” I asked, thinking it not entirely outside the realm of possibility. “Maybe you should have.” “Would YOU have spent that kind of money?” she asks me. “If I had it, I might.” She suddenly seemed incredulous. “You’d throw that kind of money at a painting?” (She knows how little I make.) “I’m not talking about ME. And it’s not like I’m going to do something financially self-destructive. But for YOU – it might be a reasonable thing. And you really liked it.” “No,” she says, almost scowling. “I just wish I’d bought it now. As an investment.” “Just as an INVESTMENT? That sounds pretty crass.”
“You think it’s crass to buy art only as an investment?” “ONLY as an investment? Yes. Of COURSE, it’s an INVESTMENT – but the decision can’t be about money alone.” “That’s just stupid. Of course it can be for money.” “And why would you be selling it [the hypothetical admired painting] now anyway? Her market hasn’t gone up that much.” It occurs to me now how many artists she’s passed by whose markets have gone up “that much” in recent years. The same thought occurs to her – and she mentions it. (Defensively?) But the more important thing she’s left out here is an essential factor in the investment process – whether financial or artistic: the risk to be considered – intellectual or financial, and in the art world – both. The notion of making money from the re-sale of art, in itself, isn’t crass at all. But the level of return, not so differently from any other financial investment, will always bear some relationship to the level of risk. And there is always the possibility that the market will not behave ‘rationally.’ (Or that it will.) Even in the rarefied world of old masters, there is rarely anything like a ‘SURE THING.’
Not to be sanctimonious about it, though, there’s something almost offensive to me about the notion of simply ‘flipping’ a piece for a short-term, dead-end capital gain. As closely as I follow the markets – as I follow money trails all over the goddamned place – art is not something I think about in primarily economic or utilitarian terms. To deal with it strictly in such terms seems degrading to me. Coming from an artist – as this does, it’s nothing less than astonishing. I’m appalled -- and a little nonplussed. And it occurs to me that Irwin applies here just as he does in the parks and wide-open plazas and exhibition and quasi-theatrical spaces where his work is seen to advantage. Here, in this confined space, with the light rhythmically traversing the car interior and strobing across her (always amazing) silhouette, I suddenly see opera buddy in a different and disquieting light. Later, outside Royce Hall (which is where we’re headed), she crosses the quadrangle, presumably (I think for a moment) to take in the Powell Library (something else we’ve both admired), then turns to me with impatience, as if to say, ‘are we going already?’ Uh, okay, I think – and it’s as if I’m walking through several half-lit scrims or mirrored walls to see a person I only now realize I hardly know.
[MORE – about the art market, Irwin’s notions of light and space – and the “not-Irwin” event – Denyce Graves’ recital at Royce Hall]
“Nights are long since you went away …,” my Uncle Tom once lullabyed to me in his fabulous Chicago apartment way back in the Pleistocene era. And for some reason, the line and sentiment come back to me as I mull over the evening and, uh, one of ‘my buddies’ (I’ll call this one, ‘opera buddy’); and the question I ask about almost everyone (and maybe everyTHING) – how well do we actually know anyone? How much is entirely beyond our grasp, beyond our reach – vaulted and entirely inaccessible? I sometimes feel like Alice Toklas (yeah, in more ways than one) in the trajectory my life seems to take – one long sequence of dinners (or drinks) with geniuses, the great and near-great (and, it must be conceded, more than a few non-entities). It’s as if, absent a sit-down, on-the-record interview, that’s about as well as I’m going to know any of them.
I feel incredibly fortunate that some of them are my pals; but there are moments when what I learn about them calls into question almost everything else I’ve assumed I knew about them; when the river between us seems more like an ocean. (The ‘object in your [mental] mirror may in fact be more ‘distant’ than it appears.) I’m feeling guilty about essentially playing hooky on the Robert Irwin ‘conversation’ with LACMA Director Michael Govan (though reports on the previous ‘conversation with Jeff Koons’ did nothing to whet my enthusiasm for this one). Chatting with opera buddy, as we speed down Wilshire Boulevard in the opposite direction from LACMA (I mention Irwin’s spiral serpentine garden at The Getty, and wonder if a “confrontation”-style event might be more interesting, say, for example, a little set-to between Irwin and his Getty foil, architect Richard Meier. Hey – they’re both about light and space, no?), I ask her what she thinks about Irwin. She shrugs her shoulders as she places him in the overall contemporary art scheme. “Yeah.. Uh -- don’t care. You think he’s important?” “I’ll take that to mean you didn’t catch his MOCA retrospective.” I have to laugh – it’s not as if I’m not just as dismissive occasionally. ‘Oh yeah – he’s doing this, that, . . . and this – NEXT!’ Or complaining (as I was only soooo recently) about ‘too much’ painting – in actuality meaning too much of the same kinds of painting – but how quick I am to dismiss what doesn’t immediately fall into (or, alternatively, way outside) certain criteria. But it’s one thing to say something like this about some submerging schmo in a gallery and another entirely about someone like Irwin.
The subject turns to New York, from where we’ve both just recently returned, and what we were up to respectively there. I mention a few things that grabbed my attention at the fairs and the records that were set at the Christie’s auction I attended. She talks a bit about what she’s writing – extrapolating into the defining parameters of art itself. It shocks me a bit that she is somewhat adamant about drawing a firm line between film and “fine” art. “Films [and I do mean feature films by this] can’t be art?” I ask. “Movies are entertainment,” she pronounces definitively. I start to pursue this a bit, starting with a couple of films she knows quite well and throwing in another couple of examples, but quickly drop the matter. Absurd to waste my breath on a moot point – something that’s already been arbitrated by the culture of an entire century. I’m hoping she’s not planning to pursue this bogus extension of the otherwise interesting points of her essay. She asks me if I noticed work at the fairs by a painter who’s garnering quite a bit of attention in the art press in the last couple of months – whose work we’ve both admired (indeed mutually discovered – at least for ourselves) a couple of years or so ago – and whose market has risen accordingly. She now wishes she had purchased one of the paintings we admired then. (I had – though not the sort of thing one might expect from this particular artist.) “Were you seriously considering buying one?” I asked, thinking it not entirely outside the realm of possibility. “Maybe you should have.” “Would YOU have spent that kind of money?” she asks me. “If I had it, I might.” She suddenly seemed incredulous. “You’d throw that kind of money at a painting?” (She knows how little I make.) “I’m not talking about ME. And it’s not like I’m going to do something financially self-destructive. But for YOU – it might be a reasonable thing. And you really liked it.” “No,” she says, almost scowling. “I just wish I’d bought it now. As an investment.” “Just as an INVESTMENT? That sounds pretty crass.”
“You think it’s crass to buy art only as an investment?” “ONLY as an investment? Yes. Of COURSE, it’s an INVESTMENT – but the decision can’t be about money alone.” “That’s just stupid. Of course it can be for money.” “And why would you be selling it [the hypothetical admired painting] now anyway? Her market hasn’t gone up that much.” It occurs to me now how many artists she’s passed by whose markets have gone up “that much” in recent years. The same thought occurs to her – and she mentions it. (Defensively?) But the more important thing she’s left out here is an essential factor in the investment process – whether financial or artistic: the risk to be considered – intellectual or financial, and in the art world – both. The notion of making money from the re-sale of art, in itself, isn’t crass at all. But the level of return, not so differently from any other financial investment, will always bear some relationship to the level of risk. And there is always the possibility that the market will not behave ‘rationally.’ (Or that it will.) Even in the rarefied world of old masters, there is rarely anything like a ‘SURE THING.’
Not to be sanctimonious about it, though, there’s something almost offensive to me about the notion of simply ‘flipping’ a piece for a short-term, dead-end capital gain. As closely as I follow the markets – as I follow money trails all over the goddamned place – art is not something I think about in primarily economic or utilitarian terms. To deal with it strictly in such terms seems degrading to me. Coming from an artist – as this does, it’s nothing less than astonishing. I’m appalled -- and a little nonplussed. And it occurs to me that Irwin applies here just as he does in the parks and wide-open plazas and exhibition and quasi-theatrical spaces where his work is seen to advantage. Here, in this confined space, with the light rhythmically traversing the car interior and strobing across her (always amazing) silhouette, I suddenly see opera buddy in a different and disquieting light. Later, outside Royce Hall (which is where we’re headed), she crosses the quadrangle, presumably (I think for a moment) to take in the Powell Library (something else we’ve both admired), then turns to me with impatience, as if to say, ‘are we going already?’ Uh, okay, I think – and it’s as if I’m walking through several half-lit scrims or mirrored walls to see a person I only now realize I hardly know.
[MORE – about the art market, Irwin’s notions of light and space – and the “not-Irwin” event – Denyce Graves’ recital at Royce Hall]
Wednesday, March 7, 2007
Down to Skin and Bones
5 March 2007 (early a.m.)
I had to revisit the Skin + Bones show at MOCA before it closed despite the fact that I didn’t think it really made a convincing presentation of its thesis. Frankly, I’m not too sure about the thesis itself. On its face, it struck me as being simply an amplification of the influential Susan Sidlauskas MIT show, “Intimate Architecture,” which Brooke Hodge more or less directly acknowledges in the catalogue for the show. Sidlauskas contributed an essay to the catalogue (which I haven’t had a chance to read); though, as I wandered through the show again, it occurred to me that the show would simply give her more material to expand upon her own original thesis. It occurred to me that the impulse for such a show came from the fashion designers and retailers themselves, much more than the architects and architectural firms included in the show: in other words, the fashion houses’ desire to showcase, to exhibit their goods in a way that would be both consistent with the house’s overall design statement (to the extent that’s even possible), while simultaneously reinforcing brand identity for the houses – what the always-changing couture lines are the loss-leading/frontline advertising for. There are a few exceptions: e.g., Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Herzog & De Meuron, OMA/Rem Koolhaas, and a few other firms who have extended their design initiatives beyond the scope of free-standing structures and into art and promotional installations, conceptual projects, and temporary spaces and design motives. (The Foreign Office designs bore interesting parallels, I thought, to Isabel Toledo’s design m.o. – but you didn’t really see it here.) Otherwise, the more interesting pairings/parallels of fashion and architecture were borne out in retail spaces: e.g., Toyo Ito’s sublime design for Tod’s big Omotesando store in Tokyo, Herzog & De Meuron’s Prada Epicenter in Tokyo (to say nothing of the Koolhaas flagships in SoHo and Beverly Hills). Hodge makes a somewhat tendentious case for London’s Future Systems design for Selfridge’s – which of course is an absolutely fantastic design, not without a few analogues to the business it’s housing and promoting, at least conceptually. But there you are: it’s a RETAIL space, darling.
There was a lot of other interesting architecture that you don’t see or hear a lot of (e.g., Greg Lynn) – but I didn’t think it made the analogical leap here. But who bloody CARES? There was just so much FANTASTIC STUFF EVERYWHERE. And then – as I’ve said many times before, it’s the discoveries and rediscoveries that count. It was great to see the Toledos – or here, essentially Isabel Toledo – who’s a design genius on the order of Vionnet (I would KILL to have that caterpillar dress – or any of half a dozen other things), and seriously under-represented/reproduced in the fashion press. And you can forget about analogies – YOU DON’T NEED ANY – Ralph Rucci’s designs for his Chado line are museum-class straight off the runway. (I mean that as a compliment – not museum-dead or archaic – they breathe, respire, inspire. They LIVE as the masterpieces they are – no different from the Balenciagas that inspired him – no different from the Velasquez Meninas that inspired Balenciaga.) It’s a rare thing and everyone should get to see it even if they can’t all afford to wear it.
MORE TO COME -- also about last night's PAINTING.
I had to revisit the Skin + Bones show at MOCA before it closed despite the fact that I didn’t think it really made a convincing presentation of its thesis. Frankly, I’m not too sure about the thesis itself. On its face, it struck me as being simply an amplification of the influential Susan Sidlauskas MIT show, “Intimate Architecture,” which Brooke Hodge more or less directly acknowledges in the catalogue for the show. Sidlauskas contributed an essay to the catalogue (which I haven’t had a chance to read); though, as I wandered through the show again, it occurred to me that the show would simply give her more material to expand upon her own original thesis. It occurred to me that the impulse for such a show came from the fashion designers and retailers themselves, much more than the architects and architectural firms included in the show: in other words, the fashion houses’ desire to showcase, to exhibit their goods in a way that would be both consistent with the house’s overall design statement (to the extent that’s even possible), while simultaneously reinforcing brand identity for the houses – what the always-changing couture lines are the loss-leading/frontline advertising for. There are a few exceptions: e.g., Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Herzog & De Meuron, OMA/Rem Koolhaas, and a few other firms who have extended their design initiatives beyond the scope of free-standing structures and into art and promotional installations, conceptual projects, and temporary spaces and design motives. (The Foreign Office designs bore interesting parallels, I thought, to Isabel Toledo’s design m.o. – but you didn’t really see it here.) Otherwise, the more interesting pairings/parallels of fashion and architecture were borne out in retail spaces: e.g., Toyo Ito’s sublime design for Tod’s big Omotesando store in Tokyo, Herzog & De Meuron’s Prada Epicenter in Tokyo (to say nothing of the Koolhaas flagships in SoHo and Beverly Hills). Hodge makes a somewhat tendentious case for London’s Future Systems design for Selfridge’s – which of course is an absolutely fantastic design, not without a few analogues to the business it’s housing and promoting, at least conceptually. But there you are: it’s a RETAIL space, darling.
There was a lot of other interesting architecture that you don’t see or hear a lot of (e.g., Greg Lynn) – but I didn’t think it made the analogical leap here. But who bloody CARES? There was just so much FANTASTIC STUFF EVERYWHERE. And then – as I’ve said many times before, it’s the discoveries and rediscoveries that count. It was great to see the Toledos – or here, essentially Isabel Toledo – who’s a design genius on the order of Vionnet (I would KILL to have that caterpillar dress – or any of half a dozen other things), and seriously under-represented/reproduced in the fashion press. And you can forget about analogies – YOU DON’T NEED ANY – Ralph Rucci’s designs for his Chado line are museum-class straight off the runway. (I mean that as a compliment – not museum-dead or archaic – they breathe, respire, inspire. They LIVE as the masterpieces they are – no different from the Balenciagas that inspired him – no different from the Velasquez Meninas that inspired Balenciaga.) It’s a rare thing and everyone should get to see it even if they can’t all afford to wear it.
MORE TO COME -- also about last night's PAINTING.
Sunday, March 4, 2007
Clouds, painting, and Plymouth Rock: a weather report
3 March – 4 March 2007, ~midnight
I can’t remember who said it recently – it might have been Roberta Smith – but you wonder why there’s as much painting around as there it today. I sometimes walk into galleries amazed by the sheer quantities of pigment laid out on any number of surfaces from canvas to every kind of panel and support, natural and synthetic, available in the metropolitan region. (And given the level of demand and fundamental costs involved, I wonder how my painter pals can afford them. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised at how expensive even paintings by grad students are.)
I know very little about Samantha Fields; but between my guilt over not giving enough time and attention to the L.A. gallerists scattered through the various fairs (or concentrated at the L.A. in NY fair at the Altman Building) and the interest shown by Fearless Leader (i.e., my editor, Tulsa Kinney), I’m not about to miss this show. Besides, it’s always a pleasure seeing Kim Light (who looks as chic as ever – and rested! How?? I’m just beginning recovery mode.) I can’t fault the acuity of Tulsa’s eye. (I sure the hell can’t here anyway.) They’re all handsomely done – perfectly handsome. Fields calls her show, “The Land” – but it’s all about the sky, or perhaps more specifically, the weather, meteorological phenomena. The paintings are clearly meant to evoke those standardized depictions of cloud formations and other meteorological phenomena; also tourist snapshots of faraway skies; also kitsch photographic imagery of Western and Great Plains land- and skyscapes. I kept thinking to myself, “Beautiful, beautiful…. they’ll look great on postage stamps.” (They reminded me a little of some cloudscapes by April Gornik I saw in New York over the hols at the end of 2005. But Gornik’s work had a little more – what? – presence? drama? I dunno … guess I just haven’t found the right cloudscape yet.)
(I run into Antoinette de Stigter – from Amsterdam’s Art Affairs – fresh from her success with the Mary Younakof installation at Scope – again, which is delightful. Mary was supposed to show up – but I had to move on.)
There wasn’t enough room to breathe much less look at the art at Taylor de Cordoba – I was drawn to a painting (yes, painting again) toward the back of the gallery, but maybe it’s just me and a certain ‘darkness at suburban noon’ thing I’m drawn to – the nightmares I must live over and over again). I’ll have to go back to have a look (yes I just might, I think again – just to think about it darkens my mood). Ditto the stuff at Walter Maciel – big figurative paintings with quasi-industrial subjects. (There’s no information on the artists out and available at either gallery. I guess they assume you’ll access their websites.)
From the Lightbox, it’s down to the Blumbox and Poehouse for Sam Durant. Well. I LIKED the Sam Durant they showed in New York. A girl can hope, can’t she? Actually, the show’s a bloody hoot. I never made it to the National History Museum for my nephew (maybe I can take him I the Fall) as I’d wanted to, so Samila brings the (wax) Museum right back home. ‘Eat your heart out, Jim Shaw – I’ve got the Plymouth bloody Rock.’ Dated 1620 and all. (Rufus should get a head start on his history dates.) He should know about how those fierce (but smart) RED-RED-skinned American Indians put down their tomahawks to help those clueless (that’s religion for you) Pilgrims; how those Pilgrim silver buckle shoes were absolutely useless off the Paris – I mean Plymouth – streets. Loved the loincloths, too. Someone had to do SOMETHING with Grandmère’s stone martens. Or whatever. Hey Samantha – got LAND for you down here. It’s called DIRT. (Well it’s all about real estate these days.)
I know. I should be grateful. No painting. Text. Beautiful text. Signage … uh, maybe not so beautiful. Text – bliss. Information. (Yeah, I know, I’m having a breakdown. It happens. Let me get a drink.)
(PS -- yeah, I'm back in Los Angeles; let me post a NYC recap in a few -- hours, days, lightyears -- hey I'll get to it.)
I can’t remember who said it recently – it might have been Roberta Smith – but you wonder why there’s as much painting around as there it today. I sometimes walk into galleries amazed by the sheer quantities of pigment laid out on any number of surfaces from canvas to every kind of panel and support, natural and synthetic, available in the metropolitan region. (And given the level of demand and fundamental costs involved, I wonder how my painter pals can afford them. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised at how expensive even paintings by grad students are.)
I know very little about Samantha Fields; but between my guilt over not giving enough time and attention to the L.A. gallerists scattered through the various fairs (or concentrated at the L.A. in NY fair at the Altman Building) and the interest shown by Fearless Leader (i.e., my editor, Tulsa Kinney), I’m not about to miss this show. Besides, it’s always a pleasure seeing Kim Light (who looks as chic as ever – and rested! How?? I’m just beginning recovery mode.) I can’t fault the acuity of Tulsa’s eye. (I sure the hell can’t here anyway.) They’re all handsomely done – perfectly handsome. Fields calls her show, “The Land” – but it’s all about the sky, or perhaps more specifically, the weather, meteorological phenomena. The paintings are clearly meant to evoke those standardized depictions of cloud formations and other meteorological phenomena; also tourist snapshots of faraway skies; also kitsch photographic imagery of Western and Great Plains land- and skyscapes. I kept thinking to myself, “Beautiful, beautiful…. they’ll look great on postage stamps.” (They reminded me a little of some cloudscapes by April Gornik I saw in New York over the hols at the end of 2005. But Gornik’s work had a little more – what? – presence? drama? I dunno … guess I just haven’t found the right cloudscape yet.)
(I run into Antoinette de Stigter – from Amsterdam’s Art Affairs – fresh from her success with the Mary Younakof installation at Scope – again, which is delightful. Mary was supposed to show up – but I had to move on.)
There wasn’t enough room to breathe much less look at the art at Taylor de Cordoba – I was drawn to a painting (yes, painting again) toward the back of the gallery, but maybe it’s just me and a certain ‘darkness at suburban noon’ thing I’m drawn to – the nightmares I must live over and over again). I’ll have to go back to have a look (yes I just might, I think again – just to think about it darkens my mood). Ditto the stuff at Walter Maciel – big figurative paintings with quasi-industrial subjects. (There’s no information on the artists out and available at either gallery. I guess they assume you’ll access their websites.)
From the Lightbox, it’s down to the Blumbox and Poehouse for Sam Durant. Well. I LIKED the Sam Durant they showed in New York. A girl can hope, can’t she? Actually, the show’s a bloody hoot. I never made it to the National History Museum for my nephew (maybe I can take him I the Fall) as I’d wanted to, so Samila brings the (wax) Museum right back home. ‘Eat your heart out, Jim Shaw – I’ve got the Plymouth bloody Rock.’ Dated 1620 and all. (Rufus should get a head start on his history dates.) He should know about how those fierce (but smart) RED-RED-skinned American Indians put down their tomahawks to help those clueless (that’s religion for you) Pilgrims; how those Pilgrim silver buckle shoes were absolutely useless off the Paris – I mean Plymouth – streets. Loved the loincloths, too. Someone had to do SOMETHING with Grandmère’s stone martens. Or whatever. Hey Samantha – got LAND for you down here. It’s called DIRT. (Well it’s all about real estate these days.)
I know. I should be grateful. No painting. Text. Beautiful text. Signage … uh, maybe not so beautiful. Text – bliss. Information. (Yeah, I know, I’m having a breakdown. It happens. Let me get a drink.)
(PS -- yeah, I'm back in Los Angeles; let me post a NYC recap in a few -- hours, days, lightyears -- hey I'll get to it.)
Saturday, March 3, 2007
Born to Be Late -- to the bittersweet end
26 February 2007 (~10:30-11 p.m.--continued)
Miraculously, a cab materializes. The driver is great. “Can you get me to Rockefeller Center in five minutes.” “Sure.” And after a sequence of turns – “Is bad street…. Is bad street….. Is bad street.” (I’ll say they are) – negotiating our way across what seems like a barricade of traffic across Broadway, he manages to more or less do this. Not quite Christie’s – but I know where to find it – through the NBC Building, a building I know in my DNA – down the long corridor and past the elevator banks and out the south entrance on 50th, et me voici. No one needs to tell me the auction has already begun – no one lingers on the ground floor or in the corridors where some of the auction offerings are hanging. The C-prints are just a bright blur as I dash up the staircase. The entrance to the auction room is crowded with spectators and I can barely get through to the press reps. I can’t see him, but Christopher Burge’s distinctively civilized arbitrator’s voice and manner are perfectly audible over the crowd. I’m wondering if this is all I’ll see, although people seem to be randomly wending in and out of the doorway, when Christie’s unflappable and fabulous PR representative (have I EVER said that about a PR person?), Bendetta Roux appears, and with absolute assurance and grace places a program in my hand and steers me to a place with a perfect view of the room. The French journalist whom I can’t help jostling past loaded down as I am with all my gear is none too thrilled to see me and shoots me a “must you REALLY?” look; and although my inclination would ordinarily be to shoot back a verbalized “YES, I REALLY MUST,” Roux’s and Burge’s dulcet and diplomatic manners have a soothing and civilizing effect on my stressed-out temper. I half-smile and whisper apologies and she seems placated. In the meantime, a fellow in an orange corduroy suit offers to share his notated program with me. Color coordinated with the Mike Kelley painting hanging front and center in front of the room. I could kick myself. There have already been a couple of impressive (and not so) sales, including the Steven Parrino (whose work I LOVE – maybe one of the few enthusiasms I have in common with dealer/collector Huber. And I thought I was the only one!) – which went for more than triple its high estimate. It kills me that I just missed this auction. Sherri Levine, Cady Noland and Fischli & Weiss also pick up tripled or near tripled prices on their pre-auction estimates. The Ruff I notice went only at its low estimate – not bad of course – but it sort of confirms what seemed evident from the fairs where his work was a drug on the market – cropping up everywhere (from Park Avenue & 67th to Pier 94 anyway). After an unusual Judd goes in the middle of its range, an On Kawara calendar suite (selected panels from various of her quasi-conceptual canvas/box “Today Series”) is hammered down at an impressive $1.7 million. The high estimate is actually over $2 million – there are 10 panels in the lot – but the sale sets an auction record for Kawara. The market falls for others: Two Carl Andres come up next, one the very impressively installed “Bar” (1981) I just walked past on my way in here, and neither of them fetches even their low estimate. One of the Franz Wests also fails to meet low estimate. (What would Carlee Fernandez think?). Finally the orange (but still classic) Mike Kelley comes up, an extraordinary work. I’m guessing it will go for anywhere between $10,000 and $60,000 over its estimate and boy am I wrong. It just barely meets its low estimate; and suddenly I wonder why those Mike Kelley drawings were still at Patrick Painter Friday afternoon at the Pier. Next up is a Jim Shaw ‘backdrop’ painting– but it’s not just any Jim Shaw and it’s not just any backdrop. The backdrop is the American West, and perhaps Western civilization itself – with the point of departure being, in addition to the Donner party itself, the Judy Chicago magnum opus, The Dinner Party.
I have no use for a lot of Jim Shaw’s work, whatever the scale. I can admit to having been entertained from time to time; but so much of it seems utterly dismissible to me. That said, The Donner Party is an AMAZING work – and perhaps one of the best things Shaw has ever done. It deserves to be seen much more widely – at least as much as Chicago’s Dinner Party. No no no – a LOT MORE than The Dinner Party. Oh – did I mention – I HATE THE DINNER PARTY?? The bidding is spirited and I’m trying to figure out what institutions are in the room (I saw Paul Schimmel at the Pier, of course; but I don’t see him in the room – or anyone else from MOCA). MOCA (not the Hammer) is really the place for it and I’m hoping they have someone on the phone. Burge gavels it down at $550,000 -- $50K under its high estimate – but a world auction record for Shaw. The excitement abates a bit when a lot of 20 of his drawings fails (as it should) to sell at even $50K UNDER its low estimate.
And so it goes. I recognize very few of the bidders; and I’m thinking most of the institutional bidders were on the phones. Max Falkenstein (of Gladstone) walks out right after the last Prince is auctioned which makes me wonder if he was just there to make sure they went at the right price point. (Former L.A. councilman Joel Wachs walks out shortly after the Rhoades is auctioned and I wonder about that, too.) The star of the evening, Paul McCarthy’s 1992 “Bear and Rabbit On A Rock” (and given a star-treatment installation right beneath John Amleder’s glittering mirror balls) goes for a record-setting $1.3 million. Mike Kelley’s famous “Test Room” of 1999 (which Huber personally – and rather bravely – commissioned) fetches almost $1 million. The Kader Attia pigeon installation goes for a respectable $75,000. (WHO bought it???) But I think I’m happiest with the healthy sales of a couple of what are now recognizably classic Albert Oehlens, “Grazie” (1982) and “Born to Be Late” (2001) which seem a kind of benediction on my zig-zag path here tonight – and perhaps my New York fair assignment overall. I’m chronically late; and between technical and logistical problems, I’ve been consistently posting late this trip.
After the auction, Christie’s Amy Cappellazzo (Co-Chair of the Post-War & Contemporary department) and Huber come out to take a few questions. They both seem elated by the auction results and they should be. How many buyers are there for room-sized installations of balloons, pigeons or mysterious quasi-geometric assemblages and or bricolages? The beautiful installation of the auction lots – really almost a museum quality show – is a coup unto itself and – after the Chinati Foundation Judd auction of last year – the Haunch of Venison move seems almost seamlessly logical. Cappellazzo seems to have real enthusiasm for the work and she clearly knows the market. Huber’s next move is anyone’s guess; he’s a seriously competitive character. From Basel, he’s moving on to start an international art fair in Shanghai; and judging from the explosion of Chinese production, it may be the next Basel Miami.
I’m almost sorry to miss the rest of the week’s auctions – to say nothing of all the museum and gallery shows I would have loved to take in. (My only remaining tasks here are to take my hosts’ dogs (I call them canine nieces) on a long walk and to find a new toy or souvenir for my nephew.) But it’s back to L.A. tomorrow – and another raft of openings for the following week-end – to say nothing of my feline daughters, Stella and (Kim) Stanley – who will turn ten next month. I’m too often late for them, too; and, like me, they have no patience for waiting.
Ezrha Jean Black, New York
Miraculously, a cab materializes. The driver is great. “Can you get me to Rockefeller Center in five minutes.” “Sure.” And after a sequence of turns – “Is bad street…. Is bad street….. Is bad street.” (I’ll say they are) – negotiating our way across what seems like a barricade of traffic across Broadway, he manages to more or less do this. Not quite Christie’s – but I know where to find it – through the NBC Building, a building I know in my DNA – down the long corridor and past the elevator banks and out the south entrance on 50th, et me voici. No one needs to tell me the auction has already begun – no one lingers on the ground floor or in the corridors where some of the auction offerings are hanging. The C-prints are just a bright blur as I dash up the staircase. The entrance to the auction room is crowded with spectators and I can barely get through to the press reps. I can’t see him, but Christopher Burge’s distinctively civilized arbitrator’s voice and manner are perfectly audible over the crowd. I’m wondering if this is all I’ll see, although people seem to be randomly wending in and out of the doorway, when Christie’s unflappable and fabulous PR representative (have I EVER said that about a PR person?), Bendetta Roux appears, and with absolute assurance and grace places a program in my hand and steers me to a place with a perfect view of the room. The French journalist whom I can’t help jostling past loaded down as I am with all my gear is none too thrilled to see me and shoots me a “must you REALLY?” look; and although my inclination would ordinarily be to shoot back a verbalized “YES, I REALLY MUST,” Roux’s and Burge’s dulcet and diplomatic manners have a soothing and civilizing effect on my stressed-out temper. I half-smile and whisper apologies and she seems placated. In the meantime, a fellow in an orange corduroy suit offers to share his notated program with me. Color coordinated with the Mike Kelley painting hanging front and center in front of the room. I could kick myself. There have already been a couple of impressive (and not so) sales, including the Steven Parrino (whose work I LOVE – maybe one of the few enthusiasms I have in common with dealer/collector Huber. And I thought I was the only one!) – which went for more than triple its high estimate. It kills me that I just missed this auction. Sherri Levine, Cady Noland and Fischli & Weiss also pick up tripled or near tripled prices on their pre-auction estimates. The Ruff I notice went only at its low estimate – not bad of course – but it sort of confirms what seemed evident from the fairs where his work was a drug on the market – cropping up everywhere (from Park Avenue & 67th to Pier 94 anyway). After an unusual Judd goes in the middle of its range, an On Kawara calendar suite (selected panels from various of her quasi-conceptual canvas/box “Today Series”) is hammered down at an impressive $1.7 million. The high estimate is actually over $2 million – there are 10 panels in the lot – but the sale sets an auction record for Kawara. The market falls for others: Two Carl Andres come up next, one the very impressively installed “Bar” (1981) I just walked past on my way in here, and neither of them fetches even their low estimate. One of the Franz Wests also fails to meet low estimate. (What would Carlee Fernandez think?). Finally the orange (but still classic) Mike Kelley comes up, an extraordinary work. I’m guessing it will go for anywhere between $10,000 and $60,000 over its estimate and boy am I wrong. It just barely meets its low estimate; and suddenly I wonder why those Mike Kelley drawings were still at Patrick Painter Friday afternoon at the Pier. Next up is a Jim Shaw ‘backdrop’ painting– but it’s not just any Jim Shaw and it’s not just any backdrop. The backdrop is the American West, and perhaps Western civilization itself – with the point of departure being, in addition to the Donner party itself, the Judy Chicago magnum opus, The Dinner Party.
I have no use for a lot of Jim Shaw’s work, whatever the scale. I can admit to having been entertained from time to time; but so much of it seems utterly dismissible to me. That said, The Donner Party is an AMAZING work – and perhaps one of the best things Shaw has ever done. It deserves to be seen much more widely – at least as much as Chicago’s Dinner Party. No no no – a LOT MORE than The Dinner Party. Oh – did I mention – I HATE THE DINNER PARTY?? The bidding is spirited and I’m trying to figure out what institutions are in the room (I saw Paul Schimmel at the Pier, of course; but I don’t see him in the room – or anyone else from MOCA). MOCA (not the Hammer) is really the place for it and I’m hoping they have someone on the phone. Burge gavels it down at $550,000 -- $50K under its high estimate – but a world auction record for Shaw. The excitement abates a bit when a lot of 20 of his drawings fails (as it should) to sell at even $50K UNDER its low estimate.
And so it goes. I recognize very few of the bidders; and I’m thinking most of the institutional bidders were on the phones. Max Falkenstein (of Gladstone) walks out right after the last Prince is auctioned which makes me wonder if he was just there to make sure they went at the right price point. (Former L.A. councilman Joel Wachs walks out shortly after the Rhoades is auctioned and I wonder about that, too.) The star of the evening, Paul McCarthy’s 1992 “Bear and Rabbit On A Rock” (and given a star-treatment installation right beneath John Amleder’s glittering mirror balls) goes for a record-setting $1.3 million. Mike Kelley’s famous “Test Room” of 1999 (which Huber personally – and rather bravely – commissioned) fetches almost $1 million. The Kader Attia pigeon installation goes for a respectable $75,000. (WHO bought it???) But I think I’m happiest with the healthy sales of a couple of what are now recognizably classic Albert Oehlens, “Grazie” (1982) and “Born to Be Late” (2001) which seem a kind of benediction on my zig-zag path here tonight – and perhaps my New York fair assignment overall. I’m chronically late; and between technical and logistical problems, I’ve been consistently posting late this trip.
After the auction, Christie’s Amy Cappellazzo (Co-Chair of the Post-War & Contemporary department) and Huber come out to take a few questions. They both seem elated by the auction results and they should be. How many buyers are there for room-sized installations of balloons, pigeons or mysterious quasi-geometric assemblages and or bricolages? The beautiful installation of the auction lots – really almost a museum quality show – is a coup unto itself and – after the Chinati Foundation Judd auction of last year – the Haunch of Venison move seems almost seamlessly logical. Cappellazzo seems to have real enthusiasm for the work and she clearly knows the market. Huber’s next move is anyone’s guess; he’s a seriously competitive character. From Basel, he’s moving on to start an international art fair in Shanghai; and judging from the explosion of Chinese production, it may be the next Basel Miami.
I’m almost sorry to miss the rest of the week’s auctions – to say nothing of all the museum and gallery shows I would have loved to take in. (My only remaining tasks here are to take my hosts’ dogs (I call them canine nieces) on a long walk and to find a new toy or souvenir for my nephew.) But it’s back to L.A. tomorrow – and another raft of openings for the following week-end – to say nothing of my feline daughters, Stella and (Kim) Stanley – who will turn ten next month. I’m too often late for them, too; and, like me, they have no patience for waiting.
Ezrha Jean Black, New York
Friday, March 2, 2007
Born to Be Late (III)
Part III
26 February 2007 (~10:30 p.m.)
Taboon (at 10th and 52nd – see somebody was actually telling the truth!) feels more like a wine bar than a whiskey bar – but fortunately they serve both. More specifically, they serve Middle Eastern food; and over a plate of truly excellent foccacia bread and hummus, we re-hash the last frenzied minutes of the Armory Show’s closing day. I want to know what the collector has bought; but he’s very cagey about disclosing anything. (Why? Building a secret collection? Has he found an emerging artist whose market he wants to corner or at least control? Most of the artists seen on Pier 94’s precincts are, in one way or another, at least as ‘established’ as they are emerging; and if they haven’t been ‘around’ much before this past week-end, they are now – so the word is out.) I’m guessing that the artist or at least the gallery is French. They’re intrigued by the fact I’m from L.A. (although one guy’s buddy keeps insisting my accent marks me as native to Connecticut – an absurd and painful reminder that I won’t be making it up to Yale to see the newly renovated Louis Kahn galleries); and we chat a bit about a few of the L.A. spaces – China Art Objects (who I think also showed some Mindy Shapero – or was it Anna Helwing), David Kordansky, Angles, Blum & Poe. The chronic logistical nightmare of L.A.’s urban/suburban sprawl is borne out by the fact that this trip has marked my first visit to a Kordansky space. (But it definitely won’t be my last. I can’t wait to see what they show next.) The L.A. chat seems to intersect with what everyone picks out as emerging trends: composite actuality – expressed in both abstract and figurative/representational contexts, a greater coherence among sculptural objects – a transition from a slightly raw bricolage kind of process or presentation to a more seamlessly hybridized object (which also brings up a certain schizziness (or at least ambivalence) about the aesthetic issues relative to these kinds of decisions), narrative, resurgent (though inchoate) feminism; also violence. And I’m reminded again of the Blum & Poe space (17 scary Hoebers and 1 Durant named Sam). It was hard not to be struck by at least one of the ‘storyboard’ type panels in that space – and we all seem to have our favorites. I pick the “Take A Walk Motherfucker” panel – with its deft relation between the Kim Novak/Madeleine French twist (from Hitchcock’s Vertigo) and an astral galaxy or supernova. The collector picks the “arousal/negation”/”elements of conflict “ panels – which we both agree is both hard to look at and hard to pull away from (which of course is the point of the thing: the last panel – “There’s no end. It’s always me!” – sums it up.) The Vertigo reference leads inevitably to movie chat – Children of Men, Pan’s Labyrinth, Little Miss Sunshine, Academy Award talk; and it’s somewhat disconcerting to learn that the man sitting next to me is David Denby. For some reason he doesn’t look anything like I thought he would – but maybe it’s the whiskey and wine. I couldn’t decide which red I wanted – the merlot or the cabernet, both of which were excellent (and reasonably priced), so of course I had both. I’m deep into a bowl of mussels and the cabernet when I learn that this David Denby is actually the car dealer across from the Pier. (That was his Lincoln that got us here?) I’m tempted to see what kind of a deal I can get on a replacement for my aging Volvo back in Los Angeles – or in my ideal, motorized Manhattan life, perhaps a Jaguar (he recommends the XJ); but all the L.A. chat suddenly alerts me to the “L.A.” event of the evening – the Kelleys, McCarthys and Shaws that are about to go on the block at Rockefeller Center. I look at my cell phone. It’s 7:00 p.m. NOW and I STILL haven’t called Kathleen back. As I go from freeway obliviousness to panic in 60 seconds, I pay the check, pull my coat on and head for the door. I need a Doris Day cab again and the odds are against me.
MORE TO COME (Christie's -- Kelley, McCarthy, etc.)
26 February 2007 (~10:30 p.m.)
Taboon (at 10th and 52nd – see somebody was actually telling the truth!) feels more like a wine bar than a whiskey bar – but fortunately they serve both. More specifically, they serve Middle Eastern food; and over a plate of truly excellent foccacia bread and hummus, we re-hash the last frenzied minutes of the Armory Show’s closing day. I want to know what the collector has bought; but he’s very cagey about disclosing anything. (Why? Building a secret collection? Has he found an emerging artist whose market he wants to corner or at least control? Most of the artists seen on Pier 94’s precincts are, in one way or another, at least as ‘established’ as they are emerging; and if they haven’t been ‘around’ much before this past week-end, they are now – so the word is out.) I’m guessing that the artist or at least the gallery is French. They’re intrigued by the fact I’m from L.A. (although one guy’s buddy keeps insisting my accent marks me as native to Connecticut – an absurd and painful reminder that I won’t be making it up to Yale to see the newly renovated Louis Kahn galleries); and we chat a bit about a few of the L.A. spaces – China Art Objects (who I think also showed some Mindy Shapero – or was it Anna Helwing), David Kordansky, Angles, Blum & Poe. The chronic logistical nightmare of L.A.’s urban/suburban sprawl is borne out by the fact that this trip has marked my first visit to a Kordansky space. (But it definitely won’t be my last. I can’t wait to see what they show next.) The L.A. chat seems to intersect with what everyone picks out as emerging trends: composite actuality – expressed in both abstract and figurative/representational contexts, a greater coherence among sculptural objects – a transition from a slightly raw bricolage kind of process or presentation to a more seamlessly hybridized object (which also brings up a certain schizziness (or at least ambivalence) about the aesthetic issues relative to these kinds of decisions), narrative, resurgent (though inchoate) feminism; also violence. And I’m reminded again of the Blum & Poe space (17 scary Hoebers and 1 Durant named Sam). It was hard not to be struck by at least one of the ‘storyboard’ type panels in that space – and we all seem to have our favorites. I pick the “Take A Walk Motherfucker” panel – with its deft relation between the Kim Novak/Madeleine French twist (from Hitchcock’s Vertigo) and an astral galaxy or supernova. The collector picks the “arousal/negation”/”elements of conflict “ panels – which we both agree is both hard to look at and hard to pull away from (which of course is the point of the thing: the last panel – “There’s no end. It’s always me!” – sums it up.) The Vertigo reference leads inevitably to movie chat – Children of Men, Pan’s Labyrinth, Little Miss Sunshine, Academy Award talk; and it’s somewhat disconcerting to learn that the man sitting next to me is David Denby. For some reason he doesn’t look anything like I thought he would – but maybe it’s the whiskey and wine. I couldn’t decide which red I wanted – the merlot or the cabernet, both of which were excellent (and reasonably priced), so of course I had both. I’m deep into a bowl of mussels and the cabernet when I learn that this David Denby is actually the car dealer across from the Pier. (That was his Lincoln that got us here?) I’m tempted to see what kind of a deal I can get on a replacement for my aging Volvo back in Los Angeles – or in my ideal, motorized Manhattan life, perhaps a Jaguar (he recommends the XJ); but all the L.A. chat suddenly alerts me to the “L.A.” event of the evening – the Kelleys, McCarthys and Shaws that are about to go on the block at Rockefeller Center. I look at my cell phone. It’s 7:00 p.m. NOW and I STILL haven’t called Kathleen back. As I go from freeway obliviousness to panic in 60 seconds, I pay the check, pull my coat on and head for the door. I need a Doris Day cab again and the odds are against me.
MORE TO COME (Christie's -- Kelley, McCarthy, etc.)
Thursday, March 1, 2007
More -- And Always Too Late
26 February 2007 (later)
Okay – it’s not (only) nascent schizophrenia (pitfall of a Gemini). The Sarmento was a Baldesssari-inflected quartet of film noirs femmes fatales. And now that I think of it, the “Ellen” sums up my attitude of the moment – here in this clutch of marauding dealers and collectors – “You know too much, gone too far, and I’m so tired…..” But I’m holding a pen, not a gun and in any case would never fire one into a crowd. So unpredictable sometimes where we end up and why – I guess that applies to artists, too. Aurel Schreiber (Paris) is showing an Anthony Goicolea – though it’s not a particularly interesting example. It’s great to see Mindy Shapero’s almost always interesting work cropping up everywhere – e.g., The Breeder out of Athens. Dave Muller, too – very interesting pieces everywhere, including here at The Approach, who also show a great Rezi van Lankveld painting. For some reason I’m not blown away by the Germaine Kruip kinetic conststruction. Should I be? Some of the best and most adventurous work seems to always come out of London. Herald St. shows a brilliant Tony Swain gouache on newsprint that – speaking of Baldessari and other masters – is a small masterpiece. I have a Grail moment – I live for moments like these – broken by the hilarity of Scott King’s “How I Sank American Vogue” (call it the 3 second re-write of The Devil Wears Prada – except this is actually good). Ash Lange tells me Swain will represent Scotland at the Venice Biennale and I think -- somebody knows what they’re doing.
Two superb Bridget Rileys catch my eye at Timothy Taylor – and it blows my mind that they’re not sold. The Sean Scully paintings continue to move briskly. What gives? It’s no accident that Christie’s is buying Haunch of Venison, I think (more about their goods later) – as Carol Vogel reported in the Times. And maybe I should scope out this auction. I haven’t been to a New York auction in quite a while – though I haven’t phoned in a press request and wonder if I can even be admitted. Right now all decision-making is out of my hands. The yellow tape barriers are going up and everyone is being hustled to the exits. I have no idea where I’m going, but I’ll settle for the next whiskey bar – at least for a moment. I never get into cars with strangers, but these are strangers bearing art and “it’s only a few blocks.”
Okay – it’s not (only) nascent schizophrenia (pitfall of a Gemini). The Sarmento was a Baldesssari-inflected quartet of film noirs femmes fatales. And now that I think of it, the “Ellen” sums up my attitude of the moment – here in this clutch of marauding dealers and collectors – “You know too much, gone too far, and I’m so tired…..” But I’m holding a pen, not a gun and in any case would never fire one into a crowd. So unpredictable sometimes where we end up and why – I guess that applies to artists, too. Aurel Schreiber (Paris) is showing an Anthony Goicolea – though it’s not a particularly interesting example. It’s great to see Mindy Shapero’s almost always interesting work cropping up everywhere – e.g., The Breeder out of Athens. Dave Muller, too – very interesting pieces everywhere, including here at The Approach, who also show a great Rezi van Lankveld painting. For some reason I’m not blown away by the Germaine Kruip kinetic conststruction. Should I be? Some of the best and most adventurous work seems to always come out of London. Herald St. shows a brilliant Tony Swain gouache on newsprint that – speaking of Baldessari and other masters – is a small masterpiece. I have a Grail moment – I live for moments like these – broken by the hilarity of Scott King’s “How I Sank American Vogue” (call it the 3 second re-write of The Devil Wears Prada – except this is actually good). Ash Lange tells me Swain will represent Scotland at the Venice Biennale and I think -- somebody knows what they’re doing.
Two superb Bridget Rileys catch my eye at Timothy Taylor – and it blows my mind that they’re not sold. The Sean Scully paintings continue to move briskly. What gives? It’s no accident that Christie’s is buying Haunch of Venison, I think (more about their goods later) – as Carol Vogel reported in the Times. And maybe I should scope out this auction. I haven’t been to a New York auction in quite a while – though I haven’t phoned in a press request and wonder if I can even be admitted. Right now all decision-making is out of my hands. The yellow tape barriers are going up and everyone is being hustled to the exits. I have no idea where I’m going, but I’ll settle for the next whiskey bar – at least for a moment. I never get into cars with strangers, but these are strangers bearing art and “it’s only a few blocks.”
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