April 2009 Archive

Quick pic: Swine Flu/Alamo mashup by Joe Boruchow

This just in from Joe Boruchow, cut paper posterizer and Nite Lights front man — a swine flu poster that remembers the Alamo.  Remember to wash your hands, I say.    

Kalup Linzy’s fabulosity at the Studio Museum

Nobody deals with social issues of gender, race and politics quite as well as Kalup Linzy. The video and performance artist is having his first solo museum show at the Studio Museum and it’s a marvel. The prolific Linzy, who was born in Florida but lives in Brooklyn, has about 3-hours worth of videos looping in a room at the museum.  There’s some seating (although not nearly enough given the length of the program).

Weekly Update 2 — Robert Morris bends gender in his videos

This week’s Queer Issue of the Weekly has my story about gay activist student, Robert Morris.  Below is the copy with some pictures. For Robert Morris gender is a natural subject for an art project. Morris, a local gay rights activist and senior fine arts student at St. Joseph’s University, has been obsessed with questions about his own orientation since he was 16. The videos he made for his recent senior show—stories of personal empowerment loosely based on his life—reflect his passion.

Weekly Update–Richard Amsel’s Hollywood at Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery

The Weekly has a Queer issue this week and I’ve got two pieces in it.  Here’s the first, about Richard Amsel, this year’s featured Equality Forum artist.  The show’s at Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery. Whether you’ve seen the film or not, you probably know Raiders of the Lost Ark by its sexy pulp-fiction-style poster art. What you won’t know is who created the movie’s brand—its vision of the fedora-wearing Indiana Jones cracking a whip above his head and smirking.

PMA pays tribute–Thomas Chimes

The Philadelphia Museum of Art has borne a fair amount of criticism for ignoring the local in favor of, well, the non-local, thereby stepping back from any sense of mission of supporting excellence within Philadelphia. That sort of local modesty seems to be part and parcel of the culture of Philadelphia.

Artistic Essentialism? InkNotInk; Chinese Contemporary Art at Drexel

I joined a group of InLiquid.com members and friends of Drexel University this morning for a tour of InkNotInk, a large and fascinating exhibition filling four spaces in Drexel’s Bossone Center and Nesbitt Buildings (on view through May 9, 2009).

Younger than Jesus — the Book and who’s who in Philadelphia

So we just got the “Artist Directory” for the New Museum’s youthie triennial Younger than Jesus. There are 50 artists from 25 countries in the show drawn from the 500 artists in this directory — a compendium of everyone they considered. Natch we had to search for our Philly posse. We already knew about Jesse Greenberg being in the catalog because he emailed us. But we knew there would be other Philly connections — and by Ben Franklin, there are!!

ART LUBE

 “Liquid Modernity” by the Russian artist Andrei Molodkin opened in the spectacular new Orel Art gallery in London last week. Redolent of a wedding ceremony we witnessed a juxtaposition of two different closed circuit energy states corsetted in tubes configured to reproduce two Russian prison cells. Light was wearing her neon chiffon which produced a wonderful  chaud froid effect. The groom’s proboscis was sucking from a 10 gallon drum of  authentic fine Russian crude to top himself off.  A special page-less edition of “Das Kapital” with hollow Vampire typeface half filled with oil served as the Holy book. The walls were ... More » »

Art of the people, by the people, for the people–Zoe Strauss under I-95

The biggest  art event this weekend is Sunday, May 3:  Zoe Strauss will exhibit a huge number of photographs–231 of them– under I-95, in South Philadelphia.

What we want to see First Friday and Saturday too

Fabric Workshop and Museum The Fab is springing up this spring with a fabulous show: new work by Tristin Lowe, Virgil Marti, Peter Rose and Ryan Trecartin. Trecartin is showing the new film he debuted at the New Museum’s Younger Than Jesus show that everyone is gushing over. Lowe is debuting a new white felt piece, Mocha Dick, take that Starbucks! All Philadelphia artists with national and international reputations. Opening reception Friday, May 1, 6-8 PM show runs through summer, 2009 Little Berlin