i just saw the best installation ever. In my dreams. It was at a shopping mall. I remember passing the Virgin mobile phone section, before I came to the project space they usually reserve for artists. I walk into the space and there's a projection there, so the room is pretty dark, to the right there's a another little space, where a small cabin has been erected. Outside the cabin is a horse, a sculpture, made out of plastic or just papermache, but on the horse is a naked guy. He has long, dark hair and is made out to look native american. I walk around and look at the horse, and the guy, wondering if I should take a photo. After a few seconds, the horse starts to move and the guy on the horse gestures for me to follow him. I do, and the horse shifts through the space, out through the projection room and into a great big hall, where there's an artificial waterfall and a forest scene. The horse starts to fly towards the ceiling, where daylight is coming through. It's lifted of the ground by some strange mechanism. The guy gestures for me to follow, and I'm puzzled as to how. I see a huge wine, and the guy on the horse passes it to me. I grab it and wonder what will happen next. I can't hang onto the vine all by myself. The vine has a mechanical contraption which rotates itself around me, but I'm doing something wrong. The vine is supposed to envelop my body, but it only caught one arm. The guy on the horse is trying to fix the situation and tells me it's going to be ok, just let the vine wrap itself around your other arm.
I do, and the whole vine lifts me up after the horse and pulls me up. The horse and the naked guy disappear through the glass ceiling, and I'm pulled up through a skylight and left on the edge of the roof, on a rafter. What a ride! And I see myself lying on the rafter. I have long, straight, blond hair, and pale, pale skin.
what a nice trip to the mall.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
naked guy on horse
Monday, April 27, 2009
I smell second place!
sorry Allison, but you're not America's Next Top Model.
I want to be friends with you and have share a nosebleed or two, but you are getting a Jenah'fied. Or Lauren'ized. Or something between quirky and a personality.
love you!
Tuesday, April 07, 2009
c'mon over!
I'm curating a show at Landings, opening the first weekend of May. Which is pretty soon, come to think of it. I will have Landings 1 and 2 to my disposal, while Andrea Geyer will occupy Landings 3.
My show is called Case Study: Art and Biography and tackles the work of Cindy Sherman. Cindy Sherman has presented in many different ways, but I've chosen to look at her work in relation to who she was dating at the time. It's pretty rude, but I do believe there's a lot of interesting things about Sherman's work that will be uncovered. Especially with an artist that denies the autobiographical.
Anyway, check out http://www.landings-projectspace.com/ for more details and please come down for the opening. There will also be a launch for Landings Journal issue 1 pretty soon. Fingers crossed.
younger than jesus
The generational at the New Museum is opening tonight, with Ida Ekblad, Ryan Trecartin, Lizzie Fitch, Cory Arcangel, Aids-3D, Tauba Auerbach, Keren Cytter, Ryan Gander, Matt Keegan, Adriana Lara, Emily Roysdon, Josh Smith, Trish Vonna-Michell and plenty of others. Plenty of familiar faces, but quite a few I don't know that well. Or at all.
So, the premise: Youth. No big surprise, seeing as the art world is gearing it's attention to people just out of, or still in, grad school. The three curators have asked 150 informants from all over the world to supply them with fresh, local meat. I put forth three names, one of them made it to the show. The rest will be featured in an artist directory with 498 others. I'm curious to see what the directory will look like. Charley's special Berlin Biennial edition a few years ago could potentially compare to the megacatalog of young artists. The three curators compiled a page about each artist they had considered for the biennial, whether it be a press release or a crappy jpeg.
The triennial will hopefully turn their eye to older than God for the next show. Or something. The show is up until the first week of July. Good luck.
http://www.newmuseum.org/ytj/
Saturday, April 04, 2009
Sunday, March 01, 2009
Where are all the ladies??
Norway. Bastion of equal opportunities? Maybe.
BUT, there are a few things that annoy me at the moment, and I guess the blog will suffice as an outlet.
1. Where are all the female artists at the Astrup Fearnley museum? They are a private museum for contemporary art and are known for their shows of white, male artists. They have followed 'trends' in the art market and taken into account globalization or whatever and exhibited Chinese artists, but their current exhibition, Rotasjoner #1, is almost totally lacking in women artists. Ann Lislegaard and Jennifer Allora are the only women in the exhibition. The total list of artists>>>>>>>>
Allora & Calzadilla, Matthew Barney, Frank Benson, Cao Fei, Paul Chan, Chu Yun, Gardar Eide Einarsson, Olafur Eliasson, Gilbert & George, Douglas Gordon, Shilpa Gupta, Guyton \Walker, Damien Hirst, Anselm Kiefer, Ann Lislegaard, Liu Wei, Bjarne Melgaard, Shintaro Miyake, Adam Putnam og Yang Fudong.
Anyway, that's their profile and they can keep it.
2. Platekompaniet, the Norwegian version of HMV or Virgin, have bi-weekly sales and this time it's "Retrospektiv 1938-2008" and they only manage to find room for Joni Mitchell and Carole King? Ok, so Blondie and the White Stripes are in there too, but agggghh!
Norway.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Thursday, February 05, 2009
Monday, February 02, 2009
the rinse cycle?
cycle 12 of America's Next Top Model is on the doorstep, banging hard on the door, waiting for some poor fool to open up. And that's me. And this is my favorite, without even knowing anything about her. Except that she is an artist and that she has posted tons of photos on photobucket that are witness to her artistry.
AND rich over at fourfour has started writing again! I can't wait to go to .gif heaven!
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Marcia Tucker
one of my favorite professors at Bard was Marcia Tucker. She was honest and taught us quite a few important lessons. Her biography recounts her successes and failures on equal parts. There's something valuable about the failures as well and avoiding the streamlined trajectory of success. One of her mottos as a curator was "a lifetime of bad reviews." Not doing shows just to get a good review, but finding out where prejudices, established notions of what's right or wrong, challenging orthodoxies and doing what tickles your fancy. Act now, think later. That way you will have something to think about.
The biography is important. Not just to remember Marcia, but also to remember her work as a curator. The show she did with James Monte at the Whitney Museum (as the Whitney's first female curator), Anti-Illusion, was installed while Szeemann and Hultén were working on their approach to contemporary art of the late 60s. After being fired from the Whitney (something Marcia was proud of) she started her own museum, the New Museum. It's evolved and changed into the superstructure it is today, but the 32 year old museum has a unique history.
READ THE BOOK.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Poetry must be made by all! Transform the world!
Exhibition curated by Pontus Hultén at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm in 1969. Initiated by Ronald Hunt and assisted by Katha Waldén. The show consisted mostly of photographs and reconstructions, but also a heavy program of films, meetings, concerts and other initiatives that just utilized the museum as a space, not necessarily an exhibition space.
The intersection of life and art, viewed through the lens of radical politics of '68. The exhibition traveled to the Kunstverein in Münich, where the local art academy took part in scheduling activities and debates. The exhibition was closed down by local politicians after too much criticism of the establishment. wha-wha. The show traveled to Vancouver and to RISD, where the show remained in storage until the 80s. The show was part of an anniversary at the Kunstverein and put on display as an important show that changed the political landscape and how art and politics interacted. Anyway. This was a large institution organizing and touring a radically different type of exhibition. Where did that all go?
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
commes des garçons rip off?
no wonder this shirt is 70%. It's horrendous. And a part of the commes des garçons line at H&M. I saw most of the stuff and thought it was pretty plain and simple. Got the wool scarf and cardigan because the wool was thick and nice. Now that the sale is on I got two shirts as well and I think the simple shoes are nice, but not for the full price. SALE>>>>
Anyway, I thought I was pretty familiar with the whole collection until this one popped up. Wow. The stripes are weird and the diagonal line is not doing anything for me. And I only saw one. I thought it might just be H&M trying to be sneaky and copying Rei Kawakubo, but no. It's official.
criminal hair
Lewis Powell tried to assassinate the secretary of state, while his buddy John Wilkes Booth did the deed with Abraham Lincoln. Powell was caught and hanged alongside three fellow conspirators. I saw a photo of Powell while I was working in a library in London round the Millennium. And thought he looked like a nice guy. His friends called him doc, because he took care of animals and nurtured stray animals back to health. A horse kicked him in the head when he was a teenager, but I don't know if that explains why he later would think assassination would be a good idea. A more probable explanation would be the war. He was wounded and captured at the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg.
And how come he looks like he is in a fashion ad?
Wednesday, December 03, 2008
scuse me while I geek out
I do read a lot of comic books. and I mean the comics that have superheroes in them. It started out reading the classics, like Spiderman (Edderkoppen), Batman (Lynvingen), Superman (Supermann), all the men (Prosjekt X [X-men]), but also the spin-offs, like Spiderwoman and She-Hulk. But I also like some of the more experimental stuff from the two big ones. Marvel. And DC.
Grant Morrison, just recently 'killed' Batman over at DC, wrote Doom Patrol from issue #19. It was fun, took some risks, and poked fun at the more generic brand of super-heroes.
Wikipedia will do the trick if you want to know more
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doom_Patrol
But one character stands out as being truly unique.
Danny the street, a transvestite street, with the power of teleportation, boggles my mind. I want to be a street!
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Happy Birthday Shirley!
Barack will serve as the first African-American President of the United States of America. On his way to secure the nomination from the Democratic party, he beat Hillary Clinton, a woman. In 1972 Shirley Chisholm was a presidential candidate for the democratic party. Groundbreaking.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
H&M COMME des GARÇONS
The launch of H&M's new designer collaboration launched this week and I was pretty excited to see the stuff I had been clicking on online in the flesh. And the wool. It was ok. Nothing over the top, nothing too exciting. Kind of dull.
I got the freaking scarf, because who doesn't need a huge wool scarf in November?
I might get the fragrance, but the trench-coat and the jacket were too expensive for H&M, even with added Rei Kawakubo. The wool sweaters were nice, but didn't fit. I tried the large and it was too long and too tight. ok, so maybe I just need to lose weight.
My favorite collection would be the Karl Lagerfeld one. The jeans were amazing, they had cords, a lot of accessories and it was clean, simple, but well fitting. Who's next?
Female Vigilantes
I bought two dvd's at platekompaniet yesterday. Both 59,50 in the sale section. I didn't really think about it, but both movies revolve around women horribly wronged by other men, not relying on the official system of crime+punishment, and taking the knife, pistol, stiletto in their own hands. Jodie Foster and her husband are attacked and left for dead. Her husband dies, but Foster starts a career as a vigilante. Neil Jordan is the director, so I am looking forward to taking a look. In "I spit on your grave" a manhattanite on a relaxing get away is raped. and left for dead. She survives and exacts her horrible revenge. Having being mugged myself, but not a woman, i guess I am drawn to these types of movies.
What if?
Thursday, November 06, 2008
November 2008
NOVEMBER 2008 – ARTIST INITIATED MAGAZINES
08.11 - 23.11
OPEN THURS - SUN 12 - 5
Curated by Karen Christine Tandberg and Elin Maria Olaussen (Torpedo)
ART RITE (US 1972-1978), AVALANCHE (US 1970-1976), CHARLEY (IT 2001-d.d), TELFAR CLEMENTS (US), DONNIE&TRAVIS (US), DOT DOT DOT (US 2000 – d.d), EAU DE COLOGNE (DE 1985-1993), FILE (CAN 1970-1989), GENERAL IDEA (CAN), JONAH GROENEBOER (US), INTERFUNKTIONEN (DE 1968-1975), JAMES HOFF (US), SCOTT HUG (US), K48 (US 1999-d.d), JEFF KONINGSBERG (US), MADE IN USA (US 1999-2001), NICHOLAS MESSING (US), PERMANENT FOOD (US/IT 1995-d.d), FATIMA AL QADIRI (US), REAL LIFE MAGAZINE (US 1979-1994), RE-MAGAZINE (NL 1997-2004), SLAVA MOGUTIN (US), KLAUS SCHULZE (DE), GRANT WORTH (US), ZG (UK/US 1979 - 1988).
We are concerned with the web of fact and fiction that binds and releases mythologies that are the sum experience of artists and non-artists in co-operative existence today. Every image is a self image. Every image is a mirror.
- Editorial FILE Mr.Peanut issue, vol 1, no1 1972
The exhibition November 2008 is based on a careful selection of artist initiated magazines from the 70’s until today. Art magazines play an important part in the distribution of art. The drive to create new arenas for art led to a surge of artist-produced magazines in the 70’s, and the magazine-format paved the ground for experimentation with text, information, distribution and media-realities.
Artist initiated magazines enabled the artists to work outside the galleries, take control over their own production and to reach a larger audience. November 2008 focuses on how the magazine format works as an alternative exhibition space.
The represented magazines in this exhibition have in common a DIY – attitude, where collaboration and the collective is in focus. The artist group General Idea (which consists of AA Bronson, Felix Partz and Jorge Zontal) founded, in 1972, FILE megazine. FILE was not a magazine in it’s normal sense, but one of General Ideas many art – projects. By appropriating the name and the visual profile of the well-known life-style magazine LIFE, General Idea sought a broader distribution. The thought was that the magazine format itself would lead the art out to a larger audience, no matter which content. FILE was made with the kiosk newspaper stands in mind, not the secluded art audience.
At Rekord, FILE will be shown together with original editions of General Idea. Other magazines from the same time, like Art Rite, Avalanche, Interfunktionen, Real Life, ZG and the some-what later Eau de Cologne, all made use of different strategies to present the art-scene they themselves where a part of. Artists like Joseph Beuys, Lawrence Weiner, Barbara Krüger, Cindy Sherman, Ray Johnson and more often appeared in several of them.
K48’s last number Starship Counterforce will be launched in this exhibition together with a presentation of works by selected contributors: Telfar Clements, Jonah Groenboer, Jeff Konigsberg, Nicholas Messing, Slava Mogutin, Klaus Schulze, Donnie & Travis, Fatima al Qadiri and Grant Worth. Other contemporary magazines that are shown include, among others, Dexter Sinisters magazine Dot Dot Dot, RE-magazine, Charley and Permanent Food.
Scott Hug, the man behind K48, shows a constellation of his own polaroids and images taken from the magazines Time and The New Yorker in Too Much, Too Little, Too Late. Polaroids: 2002-2007. James Hoff (US) uses the magazine as a background source for his artistic practice: Sing, Sing consists of drawings taken from a Raymon Pettibon fanzine, and the publication Topten originates from Artforums top ten column.
arrivedurchi
oh, Elina.
I haven't seen the latest episode of antm, but I know you are on your way back to the US. Rich made this for the previous episode and it proves his genius. Please, if you like smart people, gay people or both, you have to read Rich's blog.
http://fourfour.typepad.com/
and while you are at it, look up
http://www.onedatatime.com/dick_liker/2008/04/post.html
It's Rich's friend, Tracie, writing about a night on the town.
If only Elina could lose control like Tracie, she would be on top. Of America's Next Top Model.
