The blog's been quiet due to multiple art-related projects. Not only did ArtCal relaunch with a new look this week (and a new programming framework for the geeks in the house), Winkleman Gallery is now using ArtCat for its website. This is my favorite part of Ed's post announcing it:

I can attest to how much easier making changes to the website has become with this new tool. One of the complaints I often heard with the old website was that there were not enough images. Well that's because adding images was a huge pain in the ass given the way that site was designed, but with ArtCat, adding images is a breeze, so you can expect to see plenty more moving forward. In fact, I've added some behind the scenes shots of Thomas Lendvai creating his truly astounding new installation (he's been working very hard on it all summer), which opens, you guessed it, next Thursday.

 

We're still working on a few features and tweaking the design, but the new ArtCal, with design by Michael Mandiberg, went live today. Check it out.

 

James and I took a walk in the lovely humid air this afternoon, and spotted this, from the "Riot" series, in our wanderings. The photo is by him. Visit Joy's home page and blog for more about her.

Related: The website for the show we curated last year that included three paintings by Joy.

Larry Bamburg, Untitled Variable, 2007
Ceiling fans, plexiglass, monofiliament, masking tape, wire, fishing line, plastic beads, rubber bands, metal clamps, screw driver, wood, lead, band aid, and cricket

This is one of several great pieces in Stubborn Materials at Peter Blum. It's up for 2 more hours on 29th Street. Go!

Related: A post on a show at Esso Gallery that included his work in 2006

[note to people reading this via the feed: there are 2 videos in this post]

I love 303 Gallery and its program, but given the fact that we've been told not to take photographs in the gallery, I find it funny that founder Lisa Spellman is quoted in The Art Dealers saying,

As a student I had been immediately been touched by the generation of appropriationist art and by the intensity of political discussions centering on the new notions of Postmodernism.

The show in question was Mary Heilman's exhibition in 2005. At the time, there were only work images on the website, and no installation views. How can you write about a Mary Heilman show without talking about how the various works relate to each other in the space?

As we move into the middle of August and Chelsea starts shutting down for the month, there are still some interesting things happening, especially related to performance. There are 2 events tomorrow I recommend:

• 4pm: A walk-thru of the exhibition with private dealer Betsey Geffen, aka Charley Friedman as part of Ceci n'est pas... (This is not...) at Sara Meltzer Gallery
• All day: "An improvisational dance performance by Felicia Ballos and Flora Wiegman. Staged in the midst of demolishing the exhibition format of Part One and constructing the setting for Part Two, the performance takes inspiration from the actions performed by the gallery workers, with each dancer creating her movements in response. " This is part of Carte Blanche at Elizabeth Dee Gallery.

In March I mentioned that I was looking into this, and I wanted to let people know that we now have a website:

Culture Pundits

and the ability to buy or sell ads on ArtCal plus 9 blogs so far. For ArtCal, it's only for the banner ad at the top, or a 125×125 button under the left nav. The ad network software isn't really set up to manage something like the gallery ads on the right at the moment.

I'm sure some of my readers are interested in buying an ad, or signing up as a blogger/publisher. There is a signup link if you wish to serve ads on your site. You also will have the advantage of seeing some of your posts show up on the home page of the newly redesigned ArtCal which launches this month.

Elizabeth Murray in 1998 with one of her New York subway murals, at the 59th Street and Lexington Avenue station in Manhattan. G. Paul Burnett/The New York Times

 

This is my favorite paragraph of her obituary, written by Roberta Smith, in the New York Times:

Born in Chicago in 1940, Ms. Murray had a hardscrabble childhood that included bouts of homelessness caused in part by the ill health of her father. Ms. Murray traced her interest in art to watching a nursery-school teacher cover a sheet of paper with thick red crayon, an experience that she said gave her an indelible sense of the physicality of color. She drew constantly from an early age, inspired mostly by newspaper comic strips, and once sent a sketchbook to Walt Disney asking for a job as his secretary. By the fifth grade she was selling erotic drawings to classmates for a quarter.

installation view

detail

Hydrangea, 2007
found objects, oil on canvas, acrylic and gold leaf on wall
50 × 58 inches

 

Love Machine Prototype, Airborne, 2006
acrylic and paper on canvas
24 × 24 inches

 

Here is more work I spotted and liked last week at the SVA open studios for the Summer Art Residency program.

The artist's website tells us a bit more about the work.

My artwork depicts organic machinery and hand-crafted nature: tree machines, emotion machines, and sea kites, or byproducts such as factory-generated insects and sunlight circuitry. I think about the meaning of hand-made, machine-made, and nature-made, and I create a world in which all three categories can define a single object. In each case, the mechanism almost works properly. I'm interested in the poignancy of this pure, unattainable goal being earnestly (and naively) sought. I paint about fragility and hope.

The most recent painting series is entitled Love Machine Prototypes. Each is a single scenario from an otherworldly marketing experiment in which the Love Machine Prototype is tested. It is mostly learning how to walk.

Until Repetition Becomes Endurance, 2007
Modified acrylic polymer, pigment, gesso, rust and alkyd resin on canvas on mounted wood
approx. 19.5 × 19.5 × 3 inches

 

The Purpose And Function Of Art, 2007
Modified acrylic polymer, pigment, latex house paint, gesso, rust and alkyd resin on canvas on mounted wood panels
approx. 40 × 30 x 24 inches

 

Duration And Constancy, 2007
Modified acrylic polymer, pigment, gesso, rust and alkyd resin on canvas on mounted wood
approx. 24 × 48 × 3.5 inches

 

James and I met Gabriel some time ago, but this is the first time we've seen the work in person. I like the painting/sculpture combination of these black shiny works. Check out his website for more images, and James's remarks and photos.

Note: The bluish shine you see is from the lighting, and is not in the work itself.

Here is James Kalm's video of his visit that night:

David Newton
Found Space, 2005
Found object suspended in steel form, held in place by wires, on top of geometric wooden form
77”H X 22”W X 33”D

 

David Newton is an Assistant Professor of Sculpture at Guilford College, Greensboro, NC. He is also the latest ArtCat artist, having found us via Emily Noelle Lambert. I love this sentence from his statement:

The sculptures sometimes include wheels, which highlights the tragicomic reality that most of us are rolling around, trying to keep it together.

Check out his new site for more information.

It appears to me that this is another Duke Riley "event". See my earlier post for more information and compare these photos. The first is from flickr, the second is from WABC.

Manuela Leal
Kalashnikov Close-Up, 2007
58 × 78 Inches (4 parts)

 

I haven't seen this work in person. I saw it on Manuela Leal's RSS feed for her website. Yes, I still actually follow via RSS every artist on ArtCat. I have emailed with her about this series of work in the past, and learned a few things about where these come from.

These are color pencil and spray paint on inkjet prints. The images come from various war-related foreign videos on YouTube. I watch the videos and take stills from the computer screen with a digital camera. I then print the images, have layers of spray paint and then color pencils on top... I have been interested in war images and in "rebuilding" images of war and bombed, decimated buildings and places for a while now...

On YouTube, these videos are often posted as "responses" to other videos, as "justifications" (i.e.: a documentary on Croatian concentration camps will be posted in response to a serbian nationalistic video, and a video of a foreign mujahideen on the side of Bosnians torturing Serbian soldiers will be posted in response to a video on the massacre of Bosnians in Srebrenica by Serbs...).

I recognize that detached from language (they are often in languages I cannot understand), these images of war (and often propaganda) are posted, watched and commented on by people to whom images still carry immense urgency and power - they need to be seen...

I would like to know if" art" could still envision another reality, if by "altering" images one can offer the possibility - even if fictional - of change...