from Holocaust survivor . . . to comic book pioneer.
‘LILY RENEE, Escape Artist’ – by TRINA ROBBINS, illustrated by ANNE TIMMONS and MO HO.
LILY RENEE WILHEIM and TRINA ROBBINS discuss their new book – at a book signing – free & open to the public.
happening – tomorrow THURS NOV 3, 2011 . . . from 7-9 PM
MoCCA – MUSEUM of COMIC and CARTOON ART – 594 BROADWAY, suite 401 – btwn HOUSTON & PRINCE – SOHO, NYC.
‘LILY RENEE, Escape Artist’ – “is the inspirational story about the remarkable life of LILY RENEE WILHEIM and her tenacious escape from Nazi occupation to become one of the leading female comic book artists of the post-war era.
“The two remarkable guests, LILY RENEE, a sprightly and fascinating octogenarian, and TRINA ROBBINS, comic book historian and pioneer in her own right (‘Wonder Woman’ writer, 60s underground comix groundbreaker, etc.) provide an insightful and entertaining look at the contribution of women in the comic book industry of the last 70 years – a quintessential American story.’ – MoCCA
LILY RENEE PHILLIPS, today (she’s 85) – PHOTO BY: JO ANN TOY for NEWSWEEK c/o THE DAILY BEAST
there is a SUPER excellent essay about the life, times and opinions !! – of LILY RENEE up on the web, c/o THE DAILY BEAST . . . the informative and smart article, accompanied by the (above) photo of the newly celebrated comic book artist was written by ADRIANE QUINLAN, and is titled, ‘A Real-Life Comic Book Superhero’ – and was originally published in NEWSWEEK MAGAZINE, with the Daily Beast re-post date-stamped: JULY 30, 2010.
yes, MOST DEF, read: ‘A Real-Life Comic Book Superhero’ by ADRIANE QUINLAN/NEWSWEEK
here’s Adriane Quinlan’s up and running from the get-go . . . start-off sentence:
“LILY RENEE PHILLIPS’S first job in comics was erasing the errors made by the male illustrators who sat around her. It was 1943 in the cramped, smoky offices of Fiction House, the epicenter of comics publishing at the height of the golden age of comics . . . The illustrators around her drew in graphite, then inked them over. It was her job to erase too-thick arms, stray bullets – and the lewd notes they wrote her in the margins . . ” (!!)
and from somewhere half-way down in this fascinating story, yes – it’s very true, it is fascintating – MoCCA !! – you can find this:
“Her illustrations seemed to come from a different world”, (‘Sad Sack’ – anybody ?!!), “and indeed they did . . .
you can see in her work flashes of KLIMT, SCHIELE, DIX, and other high-art painters she studied as a wealthy young girl in pre-war Austria . . . ”
of course the BIG QUESTION, after reading this Newsweek essay, is:
so, why isn’t our young heroine wearing an outrageous princess-style “snow-white coat” with a big Leica camera, swinging about her neck – when she boards that ominous Kindertransport ? instead of looking like a Nancy Drew, or better yet, a young Archie Comics Betty or Veronica – in a conservative plaid pleated skirt and pink missy jacket, on the book’s cover ?
if you make the Q & A, ask the question, and let me know . . .
damn. I might try to make it – just to get the bottomline – on that !!
~LILY RENEE, Escape artist . . . |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | November 2nd, 2011, 9:41am
FILE UNDER: LESS IS MORE + MORE IS MORE !!
URS FISCHER + CASSANDRA MACLEOD
OPENING RECEPTION: OCT 22, 2011
the show runs OCT 22 – NOV 12, 2011
GAVIN BROWN’S enterprise – 620 GREENWICH ST – NYC
URS FISCHER arriving with his daughter Lotti . . .
CASSANDRA MACLEOD, URS FISCHER and their young daughter, Lotti . . .
the family unit.
the essentialnuclear family unit. as in Facebook scaled right back down to the smallest unit.
Less is more.
to understand one family – is to get the beauty of the whole human ‘life’ chain . . .
the press release/artist statement – holds the key.
it reads like a (human) code book – a poem written by someone who wants to keep a little distance, a little dignity – while he is really baring it all. telling you . . . something very private and something really important and intimate and meaningful about his own life, his young family . . . and how it shapes – his creative force.
CASSANDRA MACLEOD . . .
the press release/artist statement opens like this:
“Beneath our feet is an inverted pyramid of excavated earth. It is the cup. The martini glass that will hold our DNA.”
if you saw the hole Urs dug here, you know exactly what he is saying . . . and if you can follow poetry, a roomful of many tables, some stacked one upon the other, a jumble of tables . . . i.e. MORE is MORE – becomes an homage to the poetry . . . that a young family, just starting out – shares.
it’s about infinity, depth, the unknown and the sole mother earth – that is our ground. that we learn to walk upon, and upon whom our lives play out – as we endlessly and infinitely – reproduce the human species. and try to evolve into a future . . . as we function in our survival mode. that is the path we walk. that is the floor of our homes, the gallery.
“Hovering over that mythic cup is a horizontal plane of our invention.”
Urs doesn’t mess around.
JULIAN SCHNABEL.
his face – shows up on one of the tables . . .
“Together with the chair, the table is a first sculpture.”
yeah, Urs has distilled basic human existence to – the functionality of the table . . .
RIRKRIT TIRAVANIJA.
JOE BRADLEY.
collector PETER BRANT.
STEFANIE SEYMOUR.
art world power brokers, writer LINDA YABLONSKI and dealer JEANNE GREENBERG ROHATYN.
so you enter into this labyrinth of utilitarian hard-edged, as opposed to organic, round, over-sized or baroque – tables.
which is: less is more . . . sculpture-wise.
and you have to start to contemplate. space. multiplicity. the maze. the contrasts of shape, and scale . . . color. imagery.
MORE is truly MORE – at this point.
the spatial design of the whole, the creative many vs. the absolute utility of the one . . . it all comes back down to – just a table and a couple of chairs.
the hard edges of the tables and their conservative utility – are broken up into infinite possibility – by the multiplicity of acrylic silkscreened images – under a glossy coat of brushless surface lamination.
more IS more.
the metal legs – especially on the stacked tables – become a dynamic of their own.
would one want one ? or many stacked in an assortment, to be used as needed. or left as a sculpture. I don’t know.
I guess that would depend on if you were a less is more, or more is more – type person.
it was fun to come around a corner, and be stopped by the image.
“Together with the chair, the table is a first sculpture. Not a tool or a weapon, but an object autonomously itself while simultaneously integrated into our lived experience. Just like your dog, your table has evolved and entwined with us. It has run alongside, becoming indistinguishable and invisible.”
not.
“The table is part of the family, it is the stage on which we act.”
“The small personal universe over which we talk, eat, plan our future, pay our bills and raise our children.”
“We sit at the table and look past each other to see the pictures on the walls around us. We look down at plates of food below us on the table, look into each others eyes and we raise a glass.”
totally love the faux picnic table ‘planks’ . . . on this one.
“You get up from the table to close the window to the cold and wind.”
“Just then a sparrow flies swiftly in the room, circles around us at the table for a moment, and just as suddenly flies out through the window on the other side.”
a multiplicity of painted steel table mounts. more is more.
here and there – the equivalent of the “sparrow”.
“When we create this new flat space, the earth is lifted up to float 30 inches above the globe.”
the tables are tagged – with the artist’s signature underneath . . .
“We defy physical reality, make a mockery of gravity and discover ourselves and our imagination.”
“A psychic space that was midwife in the birth . . .”
“of our first terrors and the comforts we seek in each other.’
even a – Jackson Pollock table. (!!)
“This imaginary plane is the site of an original collective unconscious – spread out flat before us as we gathered around it.”
a drawing by the youngest artist in the family . . .
“We are sweet landfill, our own dusty molecules borrowed from the earth.”
painting by Cassandra, edge of table by Urs . . .
“but these objects here now are the feral forms of our unconscious. They are our aliens, unmoored from our endless cycle and lifting off into other dimensions.”
Cassandra’s painting . . .
“They are holograms, only resembling 3 dimensions, their imagery like pools of water at night . . .
reflecting back on ourselves.”
painting by Cassandra MacLeod . . .
“they are our beautiful excess and accumulation.”
“They sit in anticipation of our love . . .
and hunger . . . ”
. . . our nourishment and conversation.”
“Breakfast, lunch and dinner.”
ALL QUOTES – FROM THE GALLERY PRESS RELEASE/ARTIST STATEMENT
PHOTOS: NANCY SMITH
~URS FISCHER + CASSANDRA MACLEOD |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | October 27th, 2011, 12:48pm
the homepage for influential designer STEFAN SAGMEISTER’S New York City office – is a real time webcam scan from above. the decal stickers on the floor, CONTACT, PRESS, STORE etc – are working links to further info. this format took effect sometime around December 14, 2010.
I guess I should go back and screen grab it – during the day with the employees at work – !! but there is something wicked and stealthy about checking in – at night !!
before the webcam set-up – it was a really cool, but very different, abstract – full screen multicolored vertical stripe pattern.
see: Welcome/ Sagmeister Inc
UNDER: ‘ANSWERS’ . . . .
. . . a very succinct and typically Sagmeisterian-crafted, brief but totally illuminating paragraph addressing the new: small is big issue.
though in the art world we’ve always said, at least since the 70s: less is more.
but now, the question seems to be more relevant than ever. because of the largeness of the web.
STEFAN SAGMEISTER at the opening of his curious and really unique-thinking, way ahead-of-the-curve one-person show at DEITCH PROJECTS, NYC.
Jan 31, 2008.
PHOTO: NANCY SMITH
see a few more pix: STEFAN SAGMEISTER/OPENING -THINGS I HAVE LEARNED IN MY LIFE SO FAR.
in particular check out that poster.
the title of the show: brilliant. and in typical Sagmeister speak: ‘Things I have Learned In My Life So Far.’
on a shiny metallic gun-metal gray paper – impeccable type font, of course. white.
and a way way beautiful & content-resonating image.
I have plenty more pix from the show on the archives, but alas if you’ve been paying attention – that ALNY (archive) is down . . . down and crashed. aah, the power & the glory, and the potential for wipe-out . . . of the web.
the man-made computer-based web.
just like a spider’s web . . . all at once strong, and far strung-out. functional beyond belief, a natural wonder. but ultimately flimsy and fragile, and just like a spider web. one fell swoop – and it’s down. (non-sagmeisterian speak – it’s hard to do, don’t knock it)
this was a landmark show. it was a show that crossed over big time from graphic design into ‘fine’ art. Sagmeister even put up a huge, wall-sized, traditional quilt pattern – composed entirely of yellow bananas. real ones, that started to decompose and turn black over the course of the show. kinetic graphics – get your head around, that.
so, yeah, ok. Jeffrey put on some good shows. !
~STEFAN SAGMEISTER/WE WORK IN PUBLIC |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | October 26th, 2011, 8:22pm
‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – ROUGH CUT SCREENING, WHITE BOX – OCT 21, 2011 – PART 2
a young(er) ALFREDO MARTINEZ ran the shooting gallery art installation at ‘QUIET’.
it was the most popular exhibit there. mostly because it was interactive. you, meaning anybody – could come shoot big guns, under professional conditions . . . I mean even, or esp in New York City – how many ordinary city folk, incl hipsters get to . . . really play with guns.
everybody jumped at the chance. and I mean everybody, but esp (stylish) girls.
Alfredo’s self-enclosed plexiglas bullet-proof enclosure was super too. very futuristic. Alfredo designed it himself.
it cost him well over $60,000 to build. year 2000 dollars. not including the salaries for the licensed professional film prop weapons specialists, who were there 24/7 – as required by city ordinance.
(there’s some funny back & forth in the film about that, as well. the film production laws in this almost tinsel town.)
video artist FEEDBUCK conferring with Josh – in the early stages of the installation.
insider’s will catch – a really funny sequence in this edit, about the so-called budget.
FEEDBUCK, the Pseudo resident video artist – is shown chuckling . . . over that.
he says something like: “Josh had made a budget for the party, I think he spent the entire budget – the very first day” !!
meaning after that, it was just one big free fall. money-wise too. outta-control.
I remember Josh’s most frequent question throughout the entire 2 weeks: “anybody see my credit card ?
I can’t remember who I last gave it to.” famous last words.
what is it about guns ? that make them such a babe magnet ?
the chicks just lined up . . . to play with those big guns.
girlz and gunz.
more girlz with gunz. it was the never-ending story.
even Josh, of course . . . got into the gun game. nothing like being around big guns, to make you look – just like a FED !!
you can just start to make out Alfredo’s futuristic $60,000 ‘shooting’ gallery – behind him.
note: Year 2000 $$
this is what it looked like, inside. just one small section – lottsa guns. and big ones.
plus, note that FOX TV logo – yep, we made a big splash – on the local media. the Millennium, how could we not. we were the biggest, and baddest thing happening – in the entire Big Apple – at the turn of this century.
think on – that.
the Interrogation Room.
on the left, the interrogator, and he did a great job of terrorizing everybody: that was ASHKAN SAHIHI.
he was so for real. he could go work for KHADAFY – if Khadafy hadn’t just been taken down by a Yankee fan.
it didn’t help that the interrogation room was right next to the shooting gallery. even though it was soundproof – in the middle of being interrogated / terrorized – every now and then, a big gun would blast out. and the poor jerk under scrutiny – would jump. I mean, who really knew what Josh was capable of ?
yep, they did indeedy catch a big gun blast – ‘jumper’. . . in the rough cut. it’s in the next frame.
R.I.P.
JUDGECAL. aka CAL. he ran the video game consoles next to the Interrogation Room. he also ran the local Vampire branch. for real. he threw the best flat-out party, of the entire 2 weeks, the very nite before New Year’s Eve – it was absolutely and fabulously wild, ritualistic . . . and everybody had fangs. when he passed away a year or two ago, under suspicious circumstances, his friends spread his ashes on the famous Pseudo door – at the SE corner of Broadway and Houston.
R.I.P.
MARK ENGER. he’s the dude who silk screened the red or blue concentric ‘target’ circles on the uniforms of the chosen few. kind of like the anti-army hierarchy.
yeah, I had many ‘targets’ silk screened on mine.
Mark Enger is the guy who got the huge ‘Drunken Cowboy’ cameo – in the finished documentary.
Mark had big ‘targets’ for the back of the shirts, and smaller scale ones – for the sleeves and fronts.
JOSH often walked around, and M.C.d as his alter ego: LUVVY . . . the clown ? the bad clown ? how about the last man standing ?
it was an escape from the C.E.O. label, but also it was an easier and more effective way to encourage (way) bad behavior.
just compare Luvvy to Josh the Fed, a few frames above, and Josh the internet C.E.O. (previous post) below. get it ?
Luvvy’s shinning moment was when he got to judge the live sex act competition. between a straight couple,
a lesbian couple and a gay couple. the straight couple won, but the lesbo bed crew elicited one of the biggest laugh-out-loud moments in the rough cut. When the official competition monitor, a tough lady moderator type, who was helping out Luvvy, went to sit on their bed to chat them up, she immediately jumps back up, exclaiming: “it’s wet !!”
that was Luvvy in a nutshell.
we get to see ALEX ARCADIA, whinning about Josh, having trampled the “purity” of his installation. even though as an individual artist – he scored the biggest budget . . .
for his over-the-top sci fi temple . . . more fascist than Buddhist, truth be told, it was a temple to . . . what else ? Alex Arcadia, himself – with a capital A. it even had live goldfish, the big ones, carp as they are known at that point, swimming in the when finished water-filled moat !!
even though Josh paid and paid handsomely for the honor of allowing Arcadia to build a temple in honor of himself. Arcadia is seen in the film, grumbling, and burning, apparently to no avail, sage to re-purify his temple, after Josh had trampled on its “sanctity” – by using it as a ‘new age’ speech podium . . . trust me, it was an almost Star Trek moment.
p.s. the reported budget on the Arcadia temple installation was $80,000. those were the fab golden dot.com days.
the best Star Trek moment – of the party.
QUIET – be careful what you wish for. it’s closer than you think.
photographer ASHKAN SAHIHI, currently based in London and New York – who played – the notorious and chilling – ‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ interrogator, is alive and well . . . and showed up – at the Oct 21, 2011 WHITE BOX screening.
on the right: the notorious performance artist – PATRICK BUCKLEW – aka – MANGINA !!
also alive and well, he also made the WHITE BOX rough cut screening this past weekend, with his companion, Sprout.
like I said: QUIET, be careful what you wish for . . .
PHOTOS: NANCY SMITH
~the Interrogation Room, GUNZ & GIRLZ |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | October 24th, 2011, 3:27pm
FILE UNDER: CENSORED . . .
‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – ROUGH CUT SCREENING, WHITE BOX – OCT 21, 2011 – PART I
MANGINA . . . in his ‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – pod.
year 2000 – the Millennium, NYC – PHOTO COPYRIGHT: DONNA FERRATO
Josh said he tried to post this photo – on his Facebook page – to promote & mark the recent Oct 21, 2011 screening of a rare rough cut of – ‘QUIET: WE LIVE In PUBLIC’ – the mother of all parties . . . but the Facebook censor bots – kept taking it down – every time he put it up.
he said – he thinks this image – is pretty much where it’s all at, now . . .
the fact that it gets censored by Facebook is a big irony for the guy behind the earliest dot.com funded ‘social experiment’ – his ‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – which pretty much envisioned the web matrix and ‘social’ – ‘hive’ networking – in the first place.
and what’s your most important stat anyways – single ?
I guess if you can blink – you can think: that pretty much says it all: 10 years – in a nutshell.
the first decade of the web – from bio baby and wild human factory – to preppy shutdown & status up-dates.
if you wanna say boner – better make that booner.
(see the ‘community’ commentary – on the recent Yuke band YouTube – post below).
Yuck !! bummer. loss of freedom. Yuck, just another four letter word . . . but it don’t get you banned.
all hail: the urban dictionary.
ANTHONY HADEN-GUEST showed up for the WHITE BOX screening – and immediately took up one of ALFREDO MARTINEZ’S homemade Saturday night specials – !!
MARY POPPINS ? not !!
JOSH HARRIS and ALFREDO MARTINEZ, just before the screening . . .
JOSH HARRIS – ok, he ain’t Steve Jobs – but he is still the most famous web visionary, guru and entrepreneur – not to forget artist and patron of the arts – you never heard of. a true original thinker . . he makes everybody else in this town – look flat. and that’s saying a lot.
and even worse – it’s true.
put it this way: Steve Jobs – envisioned spread sheets – as in: business – for his early personal computing devices. Josh heard spread sheets and envisioned: spread legs. business reports vs. social networking. get it ?
the guy who developed the hardware, thought: business. Josh intuitively got the bigger picture of the future. the ‘web’ interconnected hive matrix part. it’s also called, again: what’s your most important status. single ?
we used to call it, human nature. and its still the primal drive. spread sheets – as in you know: beds !!
translate: organic reproduction.
sex, bodily fluids and rock n roll – human biology 101 – baby. it’s the only thing that humans can do now – that computers can’t.
just ask: SIRI – the new voice recognition & (don’t knock it) thinking ‘personal assistant’ – on the new iPhone 4. if you want action . . . she can call you up an ‘escort’ service – but she can’t do ya !!
though apparently she’s programmed to have quite a sense of humor. ha.
. . so, it turned out be a shorter version of the original rough cut – that we had played – at the DANIEL SILVERSTEIN GALLERY, SUMMER 2001. it’s original working title was: THE BUBBLE.
‘THE BUBBLE’, Rough Cut 02/02/2001 – Director: ONDI TIMONER
but for whatever got left on the cutting floor, this raw in-the-moment 2nd rough edit . . . did C-A-T-C-H the hi-octane energy and explosive free-for-all of the multi-artist installation and 2 week million dollar+ millennium party – that had 99 resident artists and in-house crew members working together – and everyone, everyone followed by the omnipresent mounted cameras, and live camera crews. and most of this footage was streamed live right back at ya !! on multi-channel screens. the Pseudo-funded party was also open to the public 24/7. it was wild. it was chaotic. it was crowded. it was dangerous and flat-out cutting edge. free flowing open bars. vampire parties. day turned into night, and night. what the hell was that. for 2 glorious weeks – nobody knew if it was – day or night. but everybody got it. it was the present. and it was the future.
and indeed it was.
it was the whole spectrum of HUMAN nature . . . but put out by artists, real underground radical-thinking cutting-edge artists – not Orange County housewives.
it was like Josh turned a 4 story grimy downtown warehouse into a ‘living’ breathing real-time time capsule – a Noah’s Ark for the millennium . . . a space ship ready to ditch earth, and land somewhere – new, free and better. maybe even start over. reproduction of the species – would be vital. hey, dudes: it was the millennium. it was downtown. it was New York City.
I’m thinking New York City circa Oct 2011. OWS/OCCUPY WALL STREET – maybe they should re-call JEFF GOMPERTZ back from Thailand – and get him to erect some pod hotels in Zuccotti Park. asap. and some public toilets, and a big hot group shower, too.
oh, the FEDS really gonna shut me down, now.
surveillance was a big big issue at ‘Quiet’ – behind the parties and the art – lay some very heavy duty control rooms. oh yeah . . .
the “Bubble” – also caught . . . how young, we all were . . . 10 short years ago.
when Josh was the “artist and the money guy” !!
it was the cusp of the dot.com days. money was no problemo. . . and we ruled.
it was his baby. his “social experiment”. he was the puppet master.
JEFF GOMPERTZ, now stationed in Thailand – put up the pod hotel. it housed 99 sleep-in residents . . .
a European-accented surveillance expert, NILS BONDES – did all the pod wiring, 24/7 cameras and live streaming monitors . . in each and every pod. and everywhere else. everywhere. . . . we live in public.
a hard-hatted LEO FERNEKES – was one of the site’s top surveillance engineers – and he also oversaw all the digital back room stuff . . .
they shot that wired pod hotel up – in less than 2 weeks. OWS: take note.
and, yeah there was even . . . a bonafide NYC/Lower East Side artist kid along for the time capsule ride. the future, get it ?
check out the pod’s live streaming monitor on the left. you had a choice of like 6 channels, or even a mulit-channel split screen. Leo, and his crew determined the real-time live feed streams of the moment. that was the input.
then you had the output. the omnipresent camera, right under the monitor – checking you out. and sending your signals back to central control. every pod was equipped like this.
Facebook – you be so lame.
a lot of people made the scene. and fueled the dynamic. this is COURTNEY TAYLOR of the Dandy Warhols.
I guess he was friends with Ondi – because of ‘Dig!’. one intense dude.
even mega-art dealer and would-be museum curator JEFFREY DEITCH strolled by. and hardly left, bye the way, though he didn’t get down and dirty in a pod. though he is seen raving and raving about it – and Josh – in the rough cut.
Jeffrey. not one to rumple his bespoke suit.
and yeah Jeffrey dropped the ball. afterwards, he just acted like this great scene had never existed, never encouraged any of its artists. not one. never referenced it again. I guess mainly because it was NOT his idea.
and he went on to become – what he wanted. which is, he wanted to be: the art world version 0.2 of Josh Harris. he co-opted Josh. minus the cool. and that’s alI I’m gonna say about that.. it’s a touchy topic . . . but ain’t it the truth.
LEO KOENIG. pretty much the same game plan. take the goods, and run.
Josh wanted a good-looking young well-connected art dealer to be the face of the party. so as to emphasize the artist installations and the big artist-fed contributions, so Alfredo brought in Leo. Josh liked the pedigree – most of us were street artists right down to the tips of our worn-out boots. the minute Leo landed, all of our names, those of the founding artists – disappeared from the press releases.
after that, all you got was LEO KOENIG talking about ERIK PARKER. ain’t that the truth.
Erik Parker is even caught in this edit, and what does he say: “I’m here, but I’m really only interested in doing my own thing.”
enuff said. connect the sorry ass dots – for yourself.
on the left. the young filmmaker ONDI TIMONER. Josh hired her on the spot to film the party scene – solely based her rock n’roll ‘DIG!’ footage. what was she ? all of 28 or something. something like that. but 7 years later she went on to assemble the Sundance winning documentary – ‘WE LIVE In PUBLIC’ – based mostly on the hours and stories of the ‘QUIET’ raw footage . . . and a damn good, look back . . a real sharp narrative and visual break-down re: the web and the evolution of social networking, and the story of the man behind it all: JOSH HARRIS.
at some point all the resident artists and in-house production crew had to adopt uniforms, red/orange work pants, grey work shirts – so we could be distinguished from the guest masses – so we could move around freely. yes, damn straight, it was absolutely that crowded.
and also, just to raise the ‘performance’ bar, just that little bit – higher. wearing identical crew uniforms was an interesting mind-set all of its own.
and, yes – there was a ‘toxic’ room right next to the pods !!
the brainchild of AIDAS BAREKIS and AARON BREWER – Josh loved it.
Josh. it was kind of the the best worst-kept secret of the whole damn place.
housed right next to the sleeping quarters. of the pod hotel.
looking back – it kinda spoke to the downside of the web. who ARE you talking to . . in reality ?
who do you trust and why do you trust them. esp if you never really meet them. why do you friend them. spill all your secrets to . . and then cry when you get hacked, spammed and conned by. stalked and bullied. busted by . . . and tagged. malware.
the web version of hitchhiking.
the losers, on the far end of the social status pole, or just those crew members who really needed to sleep, as opposed to party, got the short stick – they were placed in the pods – next to the toxic room.
no fire escape either.
hey, a dot.com millionaire turned artist – can have a little fun, can’t he ?
all those bodies needed to get clean – biology 101. the group shower had plenty of hot water.
and of course, it was transparent. with plenty of cameras trained on the action.
humans – need a good hosing, daily.
yeah, it was pretty surreal.
and they had to eat.
OWEN BUSH designed and ran the ‘Bubble’ dining room. housed in the building next door.. . it was possibly the most beautiful room in the entire place.
it provided sit-down meals prepared by an in-house 3 star chef – for 99 guests . . . twice a day for 2 weeks.
it also provided a camaraderie. a break in the day’s activity. as well as more often than not, entertainment. there were plenty of live (outrageous, of course) performances across that long table top. imagine: King Arthur’s round table – in an x-rated 21st C. downtown performance piece.
‘food’ art – before the art fair crowd even knew, there was – such a thing.
as well, there were the omni-present real-time live streaming monitors, of all the action going down, back in the pod, the exhibits, the party central. you could be watching the transparent shower action, or some pod ‘activity’ – as you chowed down dessert. nothing fazed anybody.
there’s a nice clip of video performance artist MISSY GALORE doing a wild performance, orange juice anybody ?
on the dining room table – in this rough cut.
the fun thing about this rough cut – is: even though it’s brief – it has a lot of juice.
no pun intended. it’s the mother – of the mother of all parties.
many brilliant or funny moments got caught – that later on ended up on the killing floor – cut from the final doc. either because they were too wild and over-the-top brutal for mass distribution, or they just got lost in the drive for the larger picture, and a more thematic goal.
PART 2 – THE INTERROGATION ROOM, GUNZ & GIRLZ – COMING UP, NEXT . . .
PHOTOS: NANCY SMITH – UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED.
~JOSH’S FRIEND STATUS . . . |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | October 23rd, 2011, 10:47am
URS FISCHER – CASSANDRA MacLEOD
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OCTOBER 22 – NOVEMBER 12, 2011
OPENING RECEPTION: SAT, OCT 22, 2011 / 6-8 PM
GAVIN BROWN’S enterprise – 620 GREENWICH ST at LEROY – WEST VILLAGE
wonder what URS has up his sleeve – this time . . . .
FLASHBACK TO: WINTER 2005 !!
URS FISCHER – at his GBE winter 2005 installation: ‘Fig, Nut and Pear’ . . . he stands in front of his mega painting, ‘A Novel and Its Novelist’.
PHOTO: NANCY SMITH, Feb 18, 2005
the exhibit . . . also featured his wondrous and crusty, real bread – Breadhouse. and its dissolution over time.
as well as some small birds, at one point. or rather, initially.
(they kind of went wild – once set free of their cramped pet store cages, committing a kind of in-flight hari-kari against the gallery walls and large street side windows. yeah. luck of the Irish – I just happened to be there the very day – Urs released about a dozen of them – from their tiny pet shop boxes.)
PHOTO: NANCY SMITH, Feb 18, 2005
~URS FISCHER + CASSANDRA MacLEOD … opening SAT |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | October 20th, 2011, 5:33pm
AT WHITE BOX – 329 BROOME ST at CHRYSTIE – FRIDAY OCT 21, 2011 – 8 PM / FREE & OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
in the name of safety and security this installation is no longer possible in New York City . . .
Dear New York City,
on Friday October 21, 2011 we are screening a rough cut of ‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – the greatest party in the history of New York City (tied with Truman Capote’s Black and White Ball) . . .
~ it was great because we did it at the Millennium in New York City.
~ it was great because we were free from the constraints of money.
~ it was great because we were free from the constraints of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the New York State Division of Military and Naval Affairs, and the New York City Police Department who now trade our freedom in the name of safety and security.
~ it was great because a group of fine artists worked individually and in concert to create a present and a future.
~ it was great because now, 11 years later, it raises the bar for all artists everywhere.
Please join us.
Thank you,
Josh Harris
Jeff Gompertz
Alfredo Martinez
Nancy Smith
Jon Buckley
Missy Galore
Owen Bush
et al.
MANGINA AS BUBBLEMAN . . . at ‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ / PHOTO COPYRIGHT: DONNA FERRATO
THIS ONE-TIME ONLY . . . POP-UP SCREENING of the original uncensored footage – at WHITE BOX GALLERY
and, yes, it is x-RATED !!
this one of the early first rough drafts (02-02-01) . . .which pre-ceded the eventual, 7 years in the making – ONDI TIMONER – HELMED – SUNDANCE AWARD WINNING – FULL LENGTH DOCUMENTARY, the internationally acclaimed . . . ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ (2009).
THIS IS THE INITIAL EDIT of the ORIGINAL RAW FOOTAGE – PUT TOGETHER in the HEAT of the IMMEDIATE AFTER-GLOW !!
I GUESS YOU COULD CALL IT – THE REAL DEAL – BEFORE IT WAS PACKAGED FOR A WIDER PUBLIC !!
AIN’T THAT – THE TRUTH !!
THE ONLY OTHER TIME – IT HAS EVER BEEN SCREENED PUBLICLY was in the SUMMER of 2001 – at the (now defunct) DANIEL SILVERSTEIN GALLERY – when it was on 21st St – in Chelsea.
this is what CHARLIE FINCH of artnet had to say about that:
see: VIDEO KILLED THE INTERNET STAR by CHARLIE FINCH
see: MY OWN PRIVATE BIENNIAL by CHARLIE FINCH
this is what artlovers had to say:
see: CHARLIE’S CHOICE
this is what renown cutting edge curator ALANA HEISS, the founder of P.S. 1 had to say. she’s the one who tagged ‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ as – “an art installation on par with Truman Capote’s Black and White Ball” !!
see: ALANA HEISS . . . on ‘QUIET’
PLUS: ALFREDO MARTINEZ WILL EXHIBIT – A SCULPTURAL INSTALLATION
PLUS: WINE + BYOB: I have 24 bottles . . . Josh
SO, COME PAR-TAY. LIKE IT WAS NYC – YEAR 2000 !!
WATCH: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC (2009) – NOW !! & FREE on HULU !!
JOSH HARRIS – MAKES THE COVER OF THE MOMA/MUSEUM OF MODERN ART EVENTS CALENDAR – JULY 2010.
JOSH is caught in the public, make that VERY public – as in group shower, make that transparent group shower, make that, and under 24/7 live streaming surveillance . . . at ‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – the 2 week long NYC million dollar Millennium party and multi-artist art installation that he funded – with his dot.com dough – and which became the basis for Ondi Timoner’s – Sundance Grand Jury Prize winning Documentary of 2009 – the Josh Harris bio – ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’. or as Ondi put it: “the story of the most famous web entrepreneur you never heard of.”
After winning at Sundance, the film beat out the much lauded ‘September Issue’ about Anna Wintour and Vogue Magazine, bye the way – and made Ondi Timoner the only director – ever – to win 2 Sundance awards, (she also won for her earlier rock documentary ‘Dig!’) . . . . ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ went on to have its New York City premiere at MOMA – and was included in several of their cutting edge film festivals.
~HEADS UP NYC – ROUGH CUT of ‘QUIET: WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ . . . SCREENING THIS FRIDAY !! |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | October 19th, 2011, 3:46pm
DEDICATED TO: OCCUPY WALL STREET – or OCCU-PIE, as the locals like to call it. whatever you are . . . you’re a NYC phenom . . . and the #1 tourist destination in the city. ha.
“WAKE UP & SMELL THE COFFEE”.
THE DEAD LAPTOP SERIES and other artifacts of the recent present’ – by MICHAEL DINGES
the show runs: OCT 15 – NOV 22, 2011
“NO MAC – GOES TO WASTE”
TEKSERVE – APPLE SPECIALIST – 119 W 23rd St at 6th AVE – NYC
MICHAEL DINGES at the TEKSERVE reception for his in-store exhibit – this past SATURDAY OCT 15, 2011.
MICHAEL DINGES currently resides in OAK PARK, ILLINOIS . . . He spent 20 years as an advertising and editorial illustrator before turning full time to his own artwork. He received his MFA degree from the University of Chicago in 2005. . . his BFA from Art Center College of Design in 1982.
He is the recipient of an Artists Fellowship Award from the Illinois Arts Council, and was awarded a residency at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center Arts/Industry Program. He has exhibited in both solo and group shows throughout the Midwest, as well as New York, Miami, and Vancouver, B.C.
TEKSERVE is proud to present his first solo show in New York City.
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Data Miner’, Dead Laptop Series, 2008. Engraved Plastic and Acrylic Paint.
Mr. Dinges engraves on the surface of the defunct laptop with a dremel tool and then rubs black acrylic paint into the resultant etching – to highlight it.
all of the artworks, interestingly – are accompanied by brief notes, penned by the artist. the note for this one says:
“Brownian Motion” is a physics term used to describe a particle engaged in a constant, erratic motion.
“Data Mining” is the non-trivial extraction of previously unknown, and potentially useful, information from data.
what I love most – is the super graphic design around – the apple logo !!
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Prana, Not Prana’. Dead Laptop Series, 2008. Engraved Plastic and Acrylic Paint.
so, “IS THE STATE . . . A-OK ?”
good question.
detail, MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Prana, Not Prana.’
again the logo and the drawing around it, as well as the rest of the design, come on, of course !! – is fascinating. this looks to be the ‘Evil Eye’ often found locally – imbedded into the filigree of a hand charm. love the Earth, Water, Fire, Wind fingers.
from the artist note:
Prana is the Sanskrit word for “breath.” It represents the concept of a circulating “vital life force” that is a central tenet in Eastern spirituality.
Can “virtual” relationships meditated through technology sustain us ? How “real” are these connections.
MICHAEL DINGES, engraved defunct laptop – most the laptops also have script around the front edges, as well.
this one says: MINE ALL MINE . . . . !!
there are other works displayed a little further into the store, just above – and in front of the TEKSERVE PRO AV ROOM.
the drawings, which are unique graphite works on large paper – are above the AV ROOM.
this one is a drawing of a vintage vacuum tube, an apt piece for TEKSERVE – as the store is known for its vintage computer, camera, and audio artifacts displayed throughout.
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Sell your time, not your soul’, 2011. graphite on paper.
detail, MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Sell your time, not your soul.’ – vintage vacuum tube.
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Brewing’, 2005. Engraved Coffeemaker and Acrylic Paint.
in front of the AV PRO ROOM – are displays of other “artifacts of the recent present” that Mr. Dinges has engraved into, including a (rotating) antiwar PVC bucket and a metal sundial (“It’s Later Than You Think” (!!) – but my particular fave – is the coffeemaker. though it’s a close call. the PVC bucket spouts – righteous.
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Brewing’ . . . “COOL”.
ya gotta love the red on/off ‘dot’ switch – on the otherwise all white appliance.
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Brewing’ . . . “BE KIND”. (!!)
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Brewing’.
in fact: “BE KIND . . BE MORE POLITE” . . .
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Brewing’.
“SIMPLIFY”.
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Brewing’ ….. classic appliance design, or what ? esp check-out that electric power cord . . in-base.
from the artist note:
How is it that a coffeemaker costs only $10 ?
This piece asks questions about fair trade, labor practices, and to what degree government will go to maintain predatory capitalism. Our lifestyles are sustained by the availability of cheap goods. Are the everyday objects that populate our lives enabling a dysfunctional relationship with the rest of the world ?
“WAKE UP and SMELL THE COFFEE” . . .
ok. one last look – Lucky 13 !!
MICAEL DINGES, ‘As Luck Would Have It’, Dead Laptop Series, 2008. Engraved Plastic and Acrylic Paint.
from the artist note:
The surrounding text about luck and chance is inspired by Aristotle and I use it in this context to highlight the role of the internet in engendering a climate of agency and opportunity. Luck is an ephemeral and fickle condition and is increased or decreased in proportion to chance. Chance that is dependent on technology can also become an ephemeral and fickle condition.
oh, yeah – tell me about it.
most def: go check out this modern day thinking man’s ‘scrimshaw’ – the show is up for the next 6 weeks.
PHOTOS: NANCY SMITH
~DEAD LAP TOPS at TEKSERVE … by MICHAEL DINGES/PIX from the opening. . . |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | October 18th, 2011, 8:10pm
MICHAEL DINGES – ‘We are the Saviours of My Life’, the newest in his dremel-tool inscribed . . . DEAD LAPTOP SERIES . . . which will debut along with several other of his engraved ‘dead’ laptops and detailed drawings at a TEKSERVE in-store month-long exhibit opening tomorrow – Saturday, Oct 15, 2011.
ART@TEKSERVE IS PLEASED TO PRESENT the first NYC exhibit of:
‘THE DEAD LAPTOP SERIES & other artifacts of the recent present’ – by MICHAEL DINGES
OPENING RECEPTION – SAT OCT 15, 2011 / noon to 2 PM
the show runs thru NOV 22, 2011
with AN ARTIST’S TALK on: MON, OCT 17 at 6:30 PM
TEKSERVE – APPLE SPECIALIST – 119 West 23rd St at 6th AVE – NYC
“MICHAEL DINGES investigates everything from the second law of thermodynamics to consumer waste in his unique adaptions of scrimshaw. His canvas of choice tends towards objects and materials that we have metaphorically or actually, consigned to the waste heap. The marks he makes on these objects force us to reconsider what we used them for in the first place and whether they’re now devoid of value. Do they disappear just because we threw them away ?” – KEITH RECKER, Hand/Eye Magazine
MICHAEL DINGES, ‘Sampler’, Engraved and Painted Mac Laptop, 2007
in his artist talk on Monday, Oct 17 (6:30 PM) – MICHAEL DINGES, a Chicago-based artist – will discuss the influence of anonymous 18th and 19th century whaling boat, think Moby Dick, sailor hand-etched scrimshaw on whalebone teeth and bone, as well as colonial schoolgirl samplers on his art. an interesting thought: grizzled sailors and young school girls – can you think of any more diverse or opposing spectrum of our early history – whose skilled and highly detailed ‘artifacts’ at first consigned them to the ‘anonymous’ bin of art history, then onto the folk art collections, and now through works like Michael Dinges’ – into the canons of the refined world of contemporary art. what a trip.
and what a trip for these discarded, no longer working tools – of our time !!
as the artist states: “the keyboard represents the alphabet” – and then off we go from schoolgirl ABC samplers “with their embroidered exemplars of virtuous behavior” to the often bawdy sailor-made teeth and bone scribbles, to the present-day with “a compendium of 21st century privacy and environmental concerns and warnings” . . . engaging and informing these dense hand wrought illustrations. . . inscribed into the opaque plastic surface of dead laptops – the “ultimate tool”, well, of this decade anyway (!!) – “which has become our portal to the world functioning simultaneously as our mail drop, music box, photo album and information center.” (TEKSERVE)
“High tech objects can become genuinely obsolete but they leave perhaps a hidden legacy of experience, which is intriguing to me.” ~ MICHAEL DINGES
inscribed on his ‘Sampler’ dead laptop, above – a poignant and direct ode to schoolgirl embroidery:
“I was your treasure chest with buried secrets in my breast . . . now I’m dead and laid to rest.”
JAMES BARRON of the NEW YORK TIMES started the NYC dialog on the implications – in his advance take on the exhibit:
‘The Laptops Don’t Work, But the Messages Get Through’, posted online in his CITY ROOM post, Oct 10, 2011.
. . . which also includes a really nice slide show of about 5 more of the Michael Dinges embellished laptop ‘message boards’ . . which is way too dry a description, maybe better make that – Ouija boards – and cries of environmental warning – straight from the mouths of the recently discarded past.
and yes, he does have a defunct laptop titled: ‘Ouija Board’ !!
see: “The Laptops Don’t Work…” by JAMES BARRON, NEW YORK TIMES . . .
interestingly a TEKSERVE press release also tells us that CLIVE THOMPSON has written: “Dinges’ work . . . evokes the history of warriors etching their tools to imbue them with mythic dimensions.”
yes, I’ve seen it. Samurai and Arabic warriors among others often commissioned highly regarded artists to inscribe beautifully scripted and fierce fighting words into their sharp master craftsman produced blades; swords, daggers, and knives – to imbue them with . . . power and individuality.
I’m thinking maybe Michael Dinges should set up shop decorating and inscribing NEW laptops – to better prepare our new age corporate warriors and citizen soldiers, not to forget schoolgirls – for battle !!
see: more work by MICHAEL DINGES at his website
MICHAEL DINGES is represented by the PACKER/SCHOPF GALLERY, Chicago, Il.
~DEAD LAPTOPS at TEKSERVE . . . by MICHAEL DINGES |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | October 14th, 2011, 8:11am
