Kiki Smith: Lilith, 1994. Siliconbronze and glass. Most art critics and art journalists avoid art issues. The products are described, sometimes adequately, sometimes not. Meanings are avoided, possibly because in most cases there are none. This might have been understandable in a time like the '80s, when art issues almost sank the ship, but nowadays, when the only issue is whether or not the art fairs will kill off Chelsea, we could use a few issues again. "Kiki Smith: A Gathering, 1980--2005," … [Read more...]
MARDEN ONE AND MARDEN TWO
Brice Marden Return I 1964-1965Oil on canvas50 1/4 x 68 1/4" (127.6 x 173.4 cm) The Museum of Modern Art, Fractional and promised gift of Kathy and Richard S. Fuld, Jr.? 2006 Brice Marden/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York FULL CAPTIONS REQUIRED BY THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART Pulling Down the Shade The word is out. Brice Marden is the one. I am not sure that his elegant retrospective at MoMA -- now we know what those sixth-floor rooms were for -- proves conclusively that he has saved abstract … [Read more...]
THE TEXAS CURE (ART AND LIFE, PART II)
John Perreault: View from Hilton Hotel Window, Houston, Texas, 2006 Against Nostalgia At the American Craft Council's "Leadership Conference" in Houston, the issues were the same, the people friendly. On a side trip, my travel buddy was cured of his nostalgia for San Antonio. We were attending the ACC Conference for different reasons. My friend was on a panel; I was on a mission. Perhaps I could find a few more writing or curatorial gigs. Hey, just when you thought it was safe to go to a craft … [Read more...]
WRIGHT WAS WRONG
Things You Wish You Had Never Found Out Is a masterpiece still a masterpiece once you have discovered that the architect of record was notoriously, dangerously lacking in engineering skills? That the architect wore elevator shoes? That he was a hypocrite about homosexuality? Frank Lloyd Wright was antigay when it came to what he called that "Pansy Patch of the Museum of Foreign Art," as exemplified by Philip Johnson and Henry-Russell Hitchcock at … [Read more...]
DAVID DANIELS
Stalking Chelsea Last week I jumped right in, taking the crosstown bus to Chelsea. I was armed with my concealed must-see list, which is the only way to go. Why haven't I kept all of these the way art criticKim Levindid, as proven by her show at Ronald Feldman a while back? People will collect anything. Aside from a major collection of American modern dinnerware and some outsider art, I collect face jugs, lightning rods, and gear-shift knobs; I am accumulating those little plastic bag-closers … [Read more...]
ART AND LIFE, PART I (SLAVERY)
My Opera Accident To explain the Artopia hiatus, I should first tell you about my Opera Accident. I was trying out my new iPod on St. Marks Place on my way to Kim's Video, listening to the scary Polish contralto Ewa Podles having a go at an aria from Handel's Renaldo ("Tale stupor m' occupa../Such stupefaction possesses my senses") when I hit a sidewalk crack and went sailing. To land on my thumb. Thumb dislocated, tendon snapped. At the E.R., the kind doctor said: Writer and artist? We'll … [Read more...]
On vacation until after Labor
On vacation until after Labor Day... … [Read more...]
PITTSBURGH PILGRIMAGE
Andy Warhol Bridge, Pittsburgh, Penna. The Allegheny Allegory or the Rule of Three Three things brought me to Pittsburgh, the city of three rivers. I missed the opening of the Andy Warhol Museum in 1994. My previous visit, as a juror for the Three Rivers Arts Festival, was long before that, and now I was also seduced by the possibility of seeing in person the contents of one of the Warhol Time Capsules. As an NEA panelist in the deep-dark past, I voted for Mattress Factory funding, but I never … [Read more...]
DOUGLAS GORDON AND DADA
Marcel Dunchamp: Bicycle Wheel, 1913,(replica). Biting The Mother Who Feeds You Juxtaposing unlikely artworks or exhibitions is one way to tease out meanings. I call it the hermeneutics of the unjustified comparison, the depth analysis of opposites, the free flight or free fall of critical discourse. Although a word in different context may mean something else, by pretending it has the same meaning wherever it turns up offers the possibility of turning contexts upside down, inside out. Puns and … [Read more...]
H�LIO OITICICA …AND BICKERTON AND
H�LIO OITICICA ...AND BICKERTON AND CLARK, TOO Ashley Bickerton:Green Reflecting Heads #1(2006) In Search of the Exotic What is exotic? The Other - demon of post-modernism - was the Double that haunted Romanticism. But, excuse me, the Other lives next door. I have really no idea of what's going on in the brain of that birthday celebration family, making such a sit-com racket. When I buy a quart of 2% it is not the harried young man from Mumbai behind the counter who is the Other but the woman … [Read more...]