~JOSH’S FRIEND STATUS . . .
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.