Artzines and artblogs

[imomus]

At a loose end after a day of unreliable tour guiding yesterday I headed down to SoHo and looked at The Garden Party, the current show at Deitch's Wooster Street gallery, proposed as an "erotic garden" in the tradition of Giorgione and Manet. It's a spectacular and impressive show, in the Deitch tradition of lavish installation and sexy but well-chosen art. In a kind of answer to my lament of last week, Where have all the New York Japanese gone?, the "erotic garden" was full of them (not to mention lots of tasty paintings and installations by Cecily Brown, Momoyo Toremitsu and others). I ran into my old friend Hiroshi Sunairi, who was showing round a party of Tokyo gallerists over for the Armory Show, some of whom I'd already met at art events in Japan. They were the staff of Kodama Gallery, which started in Osaka but now has a Tokyo branch (you can see Kodama Gallery's Armory stall in the top right photo in Wednesday's entry) and Kazuyuki Takezaki, who's opened his private apartment in Ebisu as Gallery Takefloor.



Hiroshi also introduced me to two Japanese girls who run an art magazine called Educated Community. They immediately recognized the tartan padded jacket I was wearing as a dotera, usually worn by old ladies sitting at a kotatsu table, and clucked about how kawaii my oba-chan style was. Art magazines became the evening's theme: we all re-convened up at Boesky Gallery in Chelsea (Takashi Murakami's gallery), where there was an opening for a Chinese artist called Yi Chen (big-eyed creature-paintings based on magazine collages, didn't look very "Chinese"). Here we were joined by staff from ArtKrush, FlavorPill and Art Asia Pacific magazines. Art Asia Pacific's staff had already kindly given me copies of their magazine at the Armory Show.

The current ArtKrush has an interview with Philippe Vergne in which the Whitney curator has this to say about my performance in the Biennial: "Momus is our unreliable tour guide who tells us that there is no truth. I think an exhibition should be about freedom of interpretation and organic, individual expertise. You grab what you can, you see what you wish, and you leave the room with your own conclusions. This is what the work is about. It is always up to you, and that's what's difficult — embracing the responsibility to make a decision for yourself and not look up to a structure of authority." So there, you have your instruction not to look up to authority on good authority!



Other artzines and artblogs worth mentioning (apart from the obvious Artnet) are Aaron Rose's ANP Quarterly (not available online). You can read an interview with Rose in the charmingly-named Fecal Face, a bay-area arts scene blog. Teenage Unicorn is a nice resource for snapshots of openings (good for fashion tips).

We ended up at the apartment of Diego Cortez, curator, downtown music-scene impressario (he co-founded the Mudd Club) and good friend of Arto Lindsay (who's currently in Brazil).

Comments

[henryperri.livejournal.com]

I had a good chuckle or two reading the ArtKrush interview with Philippe Vergne.

"Culture is like a gene pool: the more diverse, the better."

Notice how, even while using the "umbrella of inclusion," the curators unsurprisingly failed to include the conservative American viewpoint into their show.

"Art is ultimately about subversion..."

Yes, an artist making an anti-war statement is pretty subversive. Like putting ketchup on a hotdog.

It's fine to base a modern/abstract art show around the liberal political viewpoint. Very few of those sorts of artists are conservative anyway. And it makes sense. A lack of respect or interest in traditional art often translates into a lack of respect or interest in other sorts of tradition. And when you ignore history, it's very easy to think that you've stumbled upon all the answers. If only the world would just listen to what I have to say!

Let's not fool ourselves into thinking the message behind the show is so critical and original. The media flogged the abu gharib and hurricane katrina stories horse beyond recognition. I'm no fan of Bush, either, but let's get real.

[butterflyrobert.livejournal.com]

the curators unsurprisingly failed to include the conservative American viewpoint into their show.

The American conservative viewpoint is notoriously anti-art.

Their pitch would go something like this:

"Hey, we openly hate you and want you shut down simply because we believe art is immoral as well as a waste of 'human resources', time and money. ...By the way, will you show anything that pushes our political agenda? For the sake of 'fair balance', of course. No? You hypocrites!"

[charleshatcher.livejournal.com]

The American conservative viewpoint is notoriously anti-art.

Isn't that the point? Or don't artists have a sense of humour anymore?

[nomorepolitics.livejournal.com]

a waste of 'human resources'

ha ha

It's interesting that they can say such a thing while they have such a high unemployment rate.

First, give everyone jobs, and then you can complain about wasting "human resources."

[butterflyrobert.livejournal.com]

Their view on unemployment is: "Dignity? Youse bums need to get yerselves jobs! Move your lazy asses. No jobs? All lies!"

[mcfnord.livejournal.com]

As of March 20, 2006, the confirmed death toll from Katrina stood at 1,604, with more than 1,500 unaccounted for. How should such an event be presented in "the media"? Of course, it was a natural disaster, not, say, an unprovoked war, so it's not like the President is responsible for the event. Just the response. The bumbling, racist response.

My friend is a conservative and an artist. Mostly we talk about art, not politics. But sometimes he stretches reality like putty as you've done here. What SHOULD be on "the media" if not the largest natural disaster in the country's history? Patriotic jingles and soldier recruiting infomercials? Yeah, I know where conservativism wants to go. I'd rather attend another hippy art show.