Spotted on Hudson Street today.

This post at Daily Kos is the best summary I've read about how we reached this point of near collapse of our financial systems. Spoiler alert: former Senator Gramm (McCain's chief economic adviser) and formed Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan are bad buys. Here are some interesting statistics, which come from a conversation between business correspondent Bob Moon and host Kai Ryssdal on American Public Media's "Marketplace" in the spring.

BOB MOON: OK, I'm about to unload some numbers on you here, so I'll speak slowly so you can follow this.

The value of the entire U.S. Treasuries market: $4.5 trillion.

The value of the entire mortgage market: $7 trillion.

The size of the U.S. stock market: $22 trillion.

OK, you ready?

The size of the credit default swap market last year: $45 trillion.

KAI RYSSDAL: That's a lot of money, Bob.

Our CD player is on the blink, so we're listening to the American Music Center's Counterstream Radio instead. Awesome mix of contemporary classical, avant-garde, and progressive jazz. Cecil Taylor meets Bang on a Can!

Remember, German Chancellor Angela Merkel is head of the conservative Christian Democratic Party in Germany, not the Greens. Via Deutche Welle:

Speaking in Austria on Saturday, Sept 20, Merkel said her government had tried in vain to win G8 support last year for tighter regulation of hedge funds and financial oversight of capital markets, hinting that she felt vindicated in her stance as a financial disaster unfolded on Wall Street in recent days.

Shane Hope

Yes, it's one of the more baffling shows up in Chelsea right now, in a good way. Ed Halter does a nice job of writing about the project on Rhizome. Here is a post by James about our studio visit last year.

[image via Winkleman Gallery]

Check out Art Fag City's latest masthead artist, Neil Rough. Good stuff.

So we can't have health care for everyone because that would be socialist, but the government just took 80% ownership of AIG? Crazy.

Joy Garnett, Molotov (detail)

Susan Meiselas, Sandinistas at the walls of the Esteli National Guard headquarters, Esteli, Nicaragua, 1979
© Susan Meiselas/Magnum

The second paragraph of Susan Meiselas's bio on her website states:

Meiselas joined Magnum Photos in 1976 and has worked as a freelance photographer since then. She is best known for her coverage of the insurrection in Nicaragua and her documentation of human rights issues in Latin America, which were published widely throughout the world. In 1981, Pantheon published her second monograph, NICARAGUA, JUNE 1978-JULY 1979.

In addition to being the author of the iconic photograph above, she is also known to many of us as the person who sent her lawyer after Joy Garnett accusing her of "pirating" the photo when Joy created the painting titled Molotov seen in detail above.

Given Meiselas's progressive (other than on copyright issues) history, I was surprised when I saw this on the page for her upcoming exhibition at the International Center of Photography:

[Meiselas image is from the ICP site. Joy's image is from her flickr feed.]

We first put up the website, and had a few sites in addition to ArtCal, in August of last year. We've now reached over 40 sites with over 400,000 unique visitors and 1 million page views each month. Here is the official launch press release.

Foxy Production is moving to a larger space on their same block on West 27th Street: the old Clementine space. Their next show (Jimmy Baker) opens there on October 17.

Mary Heilmann
The First Vent, 1972
acrylic with bronze powder on canvas
20" × 32"

I love Elizabeth Peyton and Mary Heilmann as much as anyone, but don't those seem rather un-new-ish choices for big shows at an institution called The New Museum? Perhaps some arrangement could be made to send those to MoMA in place of their upcoming Miró and Van Gogh shows?

Meanwhile, a 20-year survey of the work of Lyle Ashton Harris is only going to appear in Scottsdale, AZ, and Buffalo, NY. Is there really no room at any New York area institution for such an exhibition?

And why does Lyle's website just have a flash slide show and no other information on the artist?

[photo by James Wagner]