Studio Visit With Mike and Doug Starn.

I just posted some hyper enthusiastic text and a slew of pics over on my Creative Time blog about CT's studio visit with Mike and Doug on Wednesday night. Put on your Plotzing Hats, kids.

Don't Call It A Comeback.

Call it a solved problem. You might have noticed that I haven't linked to any posts at my Creative Time blog in the last month or so. That's because there haven't been any. Don't worry. I didn't get into a fight with Yael or anything. We just had some technical difficulties, and now they've been fixed. So let's get on with it, shall we. Eight new posts are now up with more to come. Eat them up, yum.

Just.

Michael Somoroff's Illumination opens at Bravin Lee Thursday night. I'm interested in seeing it, but more than anything I'm looking forward to hearing it. Robert Rich, who I've been listening to for 20 years, has done the soundtrack and will be performing live at the opening. Rich mines the tuning fields of Just Intonation. Yeah. I know. It sounds like math, but it doesn't sound like math. Not in Rich's hands, at least. It's the closest your ear will ever get to the ground. A perfect foundation for light.

UPDATE! How many ways can I say, "Yes."? Don't EVEN think of missing this show.

Death Toll.

Installation artist/interventionist, Karla Roberts, fighting the good fight. For real.

Flags For Everything.

I'm pleased to report that Andrew Sullivan just posted a photo I took from the window at work. He cropped the most interesting part out though: the Chinese flag. He was probably concerned it would be the last bit of evidence that the Republican establishment needed to prove his total Commiehood.

God only knows what the NYSE was promoting this time. (I'm guessing it was something . . . oh, I don't know . . . Chinese.) I have to say that this is a lot more subtle than having, like, a beach party in front of the Exchange. You think I'm kidding? I have pictures.

Update: As I was saying . . . 9am, early March in a tent on Broad.

A Bell Is A Cup Until It Is Struck.

When I went to see the group show at Kinz, Tillou, and Feigen on Saturday it started to rain. And I do mean, RAIN. So, I ended up checking out the group show of recent VCU graduates at the Kim Foster Gallery on the first floor. This is where I found my favorite piece of the day, Angela White's sculpture/sound work.


Two turntables, fishing line, stones and broken cups and such. Visually mesmerizing and aurally arresting, I could have stayed all afternoon to drink it in. A movement sensor set the piece in motion. Although the most dominant sound was that of the cups, it was augmented with the more subtle sounds of the smaller pieces that had been moved by secondary methods of contact.


It was difficult not to think of Steve Roden's wondrous Winter Couplet. Obviously, the outcome here isn't as composed but the uncertainty and unrepeatable nature of the work holds its own gravity. Literally. Gravity and time pull their own weight to make this cup a bell, to make this bell a cup. Now would be a good time to thank the rain.

Pork Lump.

This is not a commentary on Pace Wildenstein. I love all of their galleries. The art's great, and the people who work there are very accommodating, even when they know that you're not even close to being able to buy anything. I had to post this picture though. Somebody had some fun with the text on the mechanical lift. It's totally going to be my new band name. Can't you hear the chants in the stadium? "Pork Lump! Pork Lump! Pork Lump!" Yeah. I know. Me too.

For Those About To Rock.

Sarah Peter's Being American opens at Winkleman tonight. It's like Nikki Sudden wrote a concept album about how Robbie Robertson learned to play guitar listening to old blues records but didn't realize that they used a slide to get that sound. Except, well, Peters doesn't sing. Her drawings do though, so this should be good.

Well. That Didn't Work At All.

After two short months I've decided to discontinue the Heart-Shaped Box feature. It's somehow harshin' my mellow. Turns out that even an ounce of formality kills the organic buzz of this blog for me. Not to worry. My favorite galleries will probably continue to garner a disproportionate amount of coverage. That's the way it works here. I move through this the way I always have, and the blog follows me.

No Rust.

I work with painter Steve Flanagan, and a couple weeks ago we went up to say goodbye to the apartment and studio he's lived in for nearly 20 years. The whiskey was good, but it was also fun to see some of Flanagan's older work that he was getting ready to transport. I'm most familiar with his renderings of rust, decay, and dead machines, so it was cool to see some of his old abstracts.



Looking back at the photos I took made me realize that there's something very Hangar 18, Area 51 about these paintings. It's not that they actually make me think of captured aliens and UFOs. It's that they're infused with an insecurity and paranoia that wavers between dread and light. The fear of not knowing the other, or possibly the fear that we do.

Fuck Art. Let's Lunch.

Glad to see Tina Brown has a publicist. Lord knows, she needs one. It's just a little disappointing to see that it's Michael Kimmelman playing her butt monkey this time around.

Atlantic Crossing.

First of all, you get points if you just got that Rod Stewart reference. Or maybe I lose points for it.

I didn't make it to much of the Atlantic Avenue Art Walk this weekend. In fact, I didn't even know that it was happening until, on my way to the subway Saturday, I passed Cannonball Press's excellent installation of prints between Henry and Court. Cannonball Press are the same folks who brought us last year's lively Prints Gone Wild Fair. I'm realizing that they kind of rule.

Losing Your Edge?

You can get it back, starting in the 500,000s. Acually, if this ad makes you experience anything other than waves of nauseous hate, then no amount of money will buy it for you. Twenty Bayard, for the radically clueless asshole in you.

Addendum: Seriously. This shit is really wrong . . . the fake Hasid, the negative exposure of the African-American, the one-eyed jack, and the sepia-toned promise of a vivacious hottie. Ugh. Repulsion abounds.

Good Fucking Friday.

I was thrilled to see two shows I grooved to recently getting excellent reviews in the Times today. They rock out on both Kathe Burkhart at Alexander Gray Associates and Zoe Strauss at Silverstein. Congratulations to, like, EVERYBODY. Oddly enough, Roberta Smith's mention of a "punch in the face" in her review of Strauss's show reminded me of why I liked the Kathe Burkhart show so much . . . It holds a fist in one hand and a scotch in the other. What's NOT to like about that. You know Liz would be down with it.

Tool.

It seems that since fascist fear monger/art hater Rudy Guiliani decided to run for Daddy-in-Chief he's been on everybody's minds, even art historians. Witness the New Yorker article about Ball State's Mary Carter's recent visit to The Met. She recognizes the Ofiliphobe in the face of Crivelli's "St Dominic." Personally, I don't see it. Which is OK. More than anything it seems that the Ben McGrath-penned bit is just a vehicle to make a bunch of Rudy jokes. Nothing wrong with that. The best moment is left to a kid who wanders by and comments, "That's the Devil right there." Well, maybe not the Devil, but certainly his tool.

Skullduggery.

And speaking of death . . . Sorry, but I can't look at this without thinking of the icon from Logan's Run. Hirst's jewel is so blinking red.

Story Corps Rules.

For real.