Dave Kim’s BFFF fabulousness
The third annual Philebrity.com reader’s poll nominees include Dave Kim, whose project My BFFF (Best Facebook Friends Forever) is picked for the fabulousness category! Kim’s project made him a slave to the social media site’s suggestions and dictates between April 1 – 30, 2011. He did anything Facebook would tell him to do.

Printeresting gets Warhol/Creative Capital writers’ grant!
Congratulations, Jason Urban, Amze Emmons and R.L. Tillman of Printeresting on winning this coveted grant for excellence in art writing! Printeresting is a blog founded by Urban (former Philly guy now in Texas), Emmons (Philly) and Tillman (Baltimore). Take a look at how many blogs won! In previous years they didn’t know how to deal with blogs–artblog was a finalist in one of those years. Now it seems they’ve adopted the excellent art blogosphere! Check the website for all the winners.

Diplomat the newest gallery around town

An interior shot from Diplomat.

Appropriately named gallery “Diplomat” showcases international artists working in the medium of photography. Each month the gallery exhibits either a solo or group exhibition of artist(s) from one specific country. Their third exhibition To The United Kingdom features photographs by Nik Adam, Luke Norman, Peter Haynes, and Nicoli Haeni. The reception is December 10 at 6:00 PM.

Art in an elevator shaft!
A new makeshift venue, THE SHAFT occupies the space between gallery and hallway. Elevating passengers to a new floor, THE SHAFT presents a series of site-sensitive, participatory artworks created by emerging and mid-career artists. Come check out THE SHAFTING at the Vox building – 319 N. 11th Street – this Friday at 7 PM. (Dedication @7:45) A project of Maiza Hixon, curator at DCCA and Lauren Ruth.

Vincent Romaniello…
The author of the flame-throwing blog artblahg has been definitively found out to be Vincent Romaniello. The sleuths who uncovered this information are dedicated to finding and outing trolls by tracing IP addresses and identifying users. Enough said.

Artist News

Lynette Shelly, "Harley", 2011.

Lynette Shelley has licensed her animal-theme artwork as cross-stitch patterns for GeckoRouge Modern Cross Stitch. Cool.

James Johnson is part of an exhibition with Jean Alexander Frater, Jassie Rios, and Oscar Scantillan at GuestSpot in Baltimore. The show opens on December 9.

A view of Tyler Held's "Space Post".

Tyler Held constructed and lived in his most recent project “Space Post” in the desert of California. We told you about this before.

Erin Murray is in the upcoming show at the Viewing Room in New York’s Nancy Margolis Gallery.

TIGER STRIKES ASTEROID

Tim Belknap at Tiger Strikes Asteroid

moving on is a spare little show. With works by three artists, one local, one in London and one in upstate New York, the exhibit covers a lot of geography — and a lot about the human condition,  in sexy, manic, or bare-bones fashion.

Carolee Schneemann at Tiger Strikes Asteroid

The surprise here is Carolee Schneemann, the powerhouse 60′s-era feminist artist — her presence is highly unexpected in an alternative gallery show.  ”Fuses,” her scratchy film-to-video, (1966) is a melange of moving images of bodies (herself and her boyfriend making love), sometimes so up-close they are completely abstract. The work slips from one image to another with a liquid fluidity, and the mournful piece talks beautifully with both Tim Belknap’s skeleton piece and William Blackhurst’s two videos. All the work in the show is moody, a little forlorn and human-focused.

Belknap’s motorized skeleton somehow conjures the ambiance of a post-life The Dude with his loose-limbed, sandal-footed amble. Alexis Granwell, who was gallery sitting, said that the piece had been and was supposed to step more lively. But to me, the slow, almost-drunken movement more closely suggests the elasticity of time and its unstoppability. The digital read-out reinforces the idea of time and speed as well. Belknap has a solo show at Rebekah Templeton, and Dennis will tell you about that soon.

William Blackhurst at tiger Strikes Asteroid

William Blackhurst’s animations merge video footage of what might be home movies with animation to create a psychedelic and fractured narrative — a take on human interaction that suggests we all have real and unreal characters within. The artist lives in London and the press release says this is his first gallery exhibit.

NAPOLEON

Max Seckel in Commonplacing at Napoleon. Pencil on wall

The tiny gallery looks great with a big group show in it! Commonplacing is the debut curating show by members of Napoleon; the members each selected one of the eleven artists in the show. Pay attention in particular to the wall drawing by Max Seckel, a marvel of control over a difficult surface (stucco). Described by Leslie Friedman — there when Cate and I visited — as a landscape with a Where’s Waldo aspect, the cartoon landscape is dotted with tiny references from the artist’s life. Seckel is a Space 1026 member.

Loo Bain, Fixed Strays, at Napoleon

Perhaps because it is a large hanging object, Loo Bain’s “Fixed Strays” made of yarn, thread and string, has a big presence in the show.  Backlit by the window and swaying in the breeze, it’s the piece you gravitate to first in the show. The colors are totally upbeat, but the hanging animal harkens back to the dark work of Berlinde De Bruyckere (featured in ICA’s Springtide show in 2005) who also suspends animals or animal-like creatures in the air (or on plinths) to suggest commodification. (See also, Maurizio Cattelan’s suspended horse.) I’m not sure that’s what’s on Bain’s mind (commodification) but it’s a reference for sure. Apparently the artist was going to use this structure an an armature for another piece but decided the armature is the finished work.

Edward Marshall Shenk at Napoleon

Edward Marshall Shenk’s mystery pills on a plinth are optical magic (due to an optical illusion). (Remind me somebody where I’ve seen this piece before…)

Dana McElroy at Napoleon

Also a kind of magic, Dana McElroy’s photo of a room with a spooky luminescent window, and a door that appears to be coming up out of the floor. We were told the image is of a miniature environment. Whatever the source, there’s some Magritte-like wizardry in the work.

Joe Boruchow in Commonplacing at Napoleon

And it’s great to see Joe Boruchow’s cut paper works here. The virtuoso pieces are the basis for some of the artist’s recent street posters–you’ve seen them on mail boxes and elsewhere around town. Also in the show Shelby Donnelly, Hannah Rose Dumes Nelson Figueroa, Anna Gray, Ryan Wilson Paulsen and Ryan Parker.

Napoleon has a website now,  designed by Matt Kalasky. The full complement of Napoleon members includes: Matthew Brett, Daryl Bergman, Dustin Campbell, Leslie Friedman, Christopher Hartshorne, Jose Ortiz, Jordan Rockford, H. John Thompson, Tamsen Wojtanowski and Jacob Yeager.

VOX POPULI
Vox members James Johnson and Anita Allyn create dueling environments that are oblique comments on human behavior.

James Johnson, Work, at Vox Populi

Johnson’s work is called Work and to read the press release it’s really about work — the work of the artist and what it means to be an artist. But honestly, when I saw Work I hadn’t read the release and so I didn’t think one thought about artists — I though about people.  And I think Johnson’s piece is applicable to more than just the idea of the artist today, although artists are included of course.

Johnson has been a maker of theatrical environments for a while now. Usually, the stage-set-like rooms are accessible only through peep holes or windows. But this time the artist has abjured the container to display a few tiny scenes on the floor without their housing units to protect and encase them. There’s a tiny window in one wall (in front of an actual window, and this doll-house sized window lets in a jewel-like burst of light. Other lighting elements in the otherwise dark room ratchet up the theatricality.

James Johnson

Like with an installation by Pepon Osorio or Ilya Kabakov, there is a story suggested, although Johnson is more a formalist and less a linear story-teller, and so the rudimentary installations (a table, a carpet, a light) suggest Waiting for Godot more than bodice-ripping page-turners. As you tower over the little environments, it’s hard not to feel your size and clumsiness — and how you are the outsider, the audience. No matter what your narrative here, the rooms are haunted, provoking thoughts about childhood hopes and expectations — with sadness, regret and anger all present.

James Johnson

There’s one life size element — a really great-looking object — a box inset in the wall holding what appears to be a stack of large denomination bills. The glass-enclosed case is lit up like a jewel display in Tiffany’s. Everyone’s holy grail is money, whether you’re an artist or work on Wall St or at MacDonalds.

Anita Allyn, I love postdemocracy

In the bright-lit gallery up front, Anita Allyn’s life-size installation, i heart postdemocracy, with balloons, reflective mylar-coated protest placards, mirrors and a low table, is another stage set. Allyn’s pre- or post-party installation (and the ironic title of her show) suggest the played-out actions of those who feel for/against a cause, policy, war, group, politician, but whose feelings are less articulable than the trappings of the protest. Hardly a call to arms, the work seems more a comment on and perhaps condemnation of civic engagement.

Bonnie Begusch, flying type at Vox Populi

Guest artist Bonnie Begusch’s Motion Pictures — animated bits of moving type flying and flashing and flitting across screens or projected onto walls — reminds me of  Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries‘ moveable type text-video in the Temple Gallery Philagrafika show.  Whereas the Heavy Industries’ piece is a story with music, Begusch’s silent works are abstractions of language — formalist designs using bits and pieces of keyboard type.  Some of the pieces are more captivating than others — the piece projected low on the wall that has actual words — but words that are so blurry and sped up you can’t read them — kept us hostage as we hoped for a sentence, or at least a word or two (not forthcoming while we were there).

Claudia Weber at Vox Populi

And guest artist Claudia Weber’s Something Something Panorama, a multi-panel photographic panorama, while formalist and chilly (it seems to show debris on a table or floor, has a cosmic night of the soul aspect that’s worth staring at for a bit (where’s the bench???!).

MARGINAL UTILITY AND GRIZZLY GRIZZLY

Hadassah Goldvicht's Sabbath door at Marginal Utility, made by David Carrow

We walked up to Marginal Utility and were stopped by the gated and grated entrance to the gallery. The sign said they were closed for the Sabbath.  According to MU’s David Dempewolf and Yuka Yokayama, this Sabbath closure is the wish of the artist Hadassa Goldvicht, a Brooklyn-based Israeli artist whose work is about ritual and voices and whose installation here is called Songs for the Peacemaker.  In the dark gallery space, visible behind the grate is a video projection of a woman speaking, and this image behind the grated door conjures lots of ideas about prison, war, police states, harsh economic conditions even.   The artist was in Italy at the time of the opening but would be back  later in the month to install some additional work.  Dempewolf met the artist at Skowhegan, he said. And another artist named David, David Carrow, created the door specially for the exhibit. David Carrow is a poet in metal and the door, while forbidding, is elegant and beautiful.

Grizzly Grizzly closes at 3pm on Saturday, something I always forget, so I am always there too late. But I enjoyed their new fancy gallery name printed on the wall. They’ve seriously claimed ownership now.  Chip will tell you about the exhibit soon.

Adam Parker Smith, James Johnson and Charlene Peacock at Little Berlin, close to the ATM machine made of cake and green-grey icing.

Adam Parker Smith had a couple of pieces in the Value City show at Little Berlin. One piece was a tricked out microwave on the floor that looked toxic. The ATM piece by Masha Badinter and Jenna Wilchinsky took the cake. It was disgusting and everyone was picking at it.

Masha Bandinter and Jenna Wilchinsky made this ATM cake and encouraged people to partake

Artist Scott Bickmore working on a community art piece at Little Berlin told us he sold the piece to Hyperion Bank, sight unseen. The bank’s signature color is orange. Guess what color the piece is?

Scott Bickmore working at Little Berlin on his all orange community art

The first place we had cupcakes was Grizzly Grizzly in the kitchen created by Jennifer Catron and Paul Outlaw, the Honeymooners.

PAFA Curator Julien Robson at the Honeymooners' suite at Grizzly Grizzly

The best cupcakes of all were the hand-made variety at Bambi at the opening of Erin Riley’s and Matthew Osborn’s shows. Cupcakes and beer are really delicious.

Nike Desis at Vox Populi in her installation

Speaking of good food, the best cheese we had was at Nike Desis’ show at Vox Populi, where Roberta also talked for ten minutes to Sid Sachs as part of the interactivity in her installation. The piece rounded up people who knew about recent Philadelphia art history and you could talk with them via cellphone. At last psychic and sex hotlines have crossed over!!!

Roberta talking with Sid Sachs on one of the art guru hotlines

Brandon Joyce was scheduled as a hotline art guru later in the evening. There were about ten hotline art gurus altogether

The world is a diminished place in “I Don’t Watch the Internet,” Fleisher-Ollman Gallery’s seventh annual emerging artist survey. A non-themed invitational that’s big on miniatures and works that whir and clack, the show rounds up modest-scale sculptures, and drawings and forlorn videos that fit with the current economic climate.

James Johnson, Stop Following Me, image courtesy Fleisher-Ollman Gallery

Viewers are in the land of disenchantment with nine artists who are wizards of sentimentality (or faux sentimentality). This isn’t kitsch, although, like most artists, these individuals seem to have been inspired by Jeff Koons, the master of post-modern irony and ambiguity.

James Johnson, Stop Following Me, 2009. neon sign, foam insulation, cardboard, box, extension cord. 12x48x12" 1/5

Stop Following Me, a neon word piece by James Johnson, is the most overtly postmodern piece in the show. The fabricated neon sign is in its shipping box, lid-open, on the floor. From afar, the box emits a delicious blue light that reels you in, the hook for the passive-aggressive punchline. An edition of five, Stop Following Me is an object conflicted– like a teen who hates you yet needs a trip to the mall, please. If the piece is a comment on the dumbing-down of our whole culture, I buy it.

Cari Freno, Hold (from the Pocahantas State Park series) 2009 HD video loop, ed. 35

Videos by Cari Freno, Hold and Hang, are also highly postmodern. The artist, seen embracing a tree (in Hold) and hanging from a tree (in Hang), seems to accept and poke fun at “tree-hugging” at the same time.

Jay Hardman, Cake Block, 2009. synthetic chocolate cake, frosting, wood, concrete

Even works made from new materials—like Jay Hardman’s wonderful miniature landscapes made of chocolate cake and icing, or James Johnson’s minimalist dollhouse rooms—contribute to the ambiance of a played-out universe, a place we know and are fond of but are emotionally distanced from.

Gabriel Boyce, Green Screen 2009, aluminum tubing, plastic webbing, rivets 70 1/2 x 55 1/2 x 1"

There is cultural commentary everywhere. Gabriel Boyce’s Green Screen, a hand-fashioned “Shoji” screen made of cheap plastic webbing and bent aluminum rods is an unlikely mashup. But as a comment on American tackiness washing over something elegant, Green Screen is right on Target (ahem).

Jordan Griska, Gas Pump, 2009. vintage 1960s gas pump, hydraulics, 53x24x18"

Jordan Griska’s Gas Pump, a real pump reduced to child’s size by a series of origami folds in the metal frame, feels cautionary. The piece (which smells vaguely of gas) is somehow both cute and monstrous.

Ashley John Pigford, 28,770 Megabytes, 2008. computer hard drives, micro controller, electronics, wood, wire. 36x34x6"

Ashley John Pigford’s interactive computer-part gizmos clack and knock wood (literally, with wooden mallets on xylophone keys) when you push a button. The hacked and neutered electronics are reduced to court jesters—vehicles of entertainment. And John Broderick Heron’s table-top construction landscapes teetering on sticks show a world completely out of whack.

Installation shot, with Jay Hardman's Vacancy in foreground and Sarah Laina Koljonen’s Comma Scroll, rear, on wall

In a weird twist, most of the drawings in the show (apart from a series of small works by Boyce) feature small items scaled to supersize proportions. Sarah Laina Koljonen’s Comma Scroll puffs up and elongates several commas to ridiculous proportions, a comical play on the lack of commas in eastern grammar — or, perhaps, the super abundance of commas, in western grammar. Sebastien Leclercq’s monumental faux graph paper drawings (blue pencil on paper) likewise elevate the lowly graphing sheets to gargantuan proportions for risible ends.

A big dose of postmodernism might not be your cup of tea this holiday season, but this show will keep you smiling.

“I Don’t Watch the Internet.” Through Jan. 16. Fleisher-Ollman Gallery, 1616 Walnut St. 215.545.7562.

Liberta takes a meeting with Barack Obama.

In other news, Pew changed its M-O for how artists can apply for fellowships.  Much unhappiness was expressed on facebook and in our comments among some disgruntled artists. But keep your eyes on the prize — the Pew money is still there.  On the other hand, PA Council on the Arts canned its grants to artists program due to PA budget cuts — recession era blues.

A Junto at P’unk Ave about art criticism is still stirring up some energy.  Even artblog got a few theoretical posts (more to come in 2010!).

First Friday at 319A N. 11th St. Music in the hallway, 4th floor

In architecture news, 319A N. 11th St. became the new First Friday destination with nine galleries now and room for more!  Gotta love it.  And Philly continues to get respect outside the city limits. Alternatives FluxSpace and Vox Populi in the red-hot X-Initiatives festival in Chelsea; the PMA gets the Golden Lion for Bruce Nauman at the Venice Biennale; and NY Times writers are all over what’s happening here.

The Libertas

Jayson Musson has fun with Obama, in his show at the Last Drop

Fun with your presidents award — Tie!!!
Jayson Musson for his Obama-has-superpowers show at Last Drop Coffee Shop and Maira Kalman for her I-love-Abe-Lincoln project at Rosenbach Museum.

Supersize award
books so weighty they beg to be put down — Cezanne and Beyond catalog (9 lb.) and Shape of Things to Come (10 lb.)

Inexplicable Omission Award
New Museum for not including Kalup Linzy in Younger than Jesus

Austin Lee portrait of Shaun Baer, from the My Face in Your Space show at Nexus

Risky Business award
–Nick Cassway gets out of his comfort zone and networks to create some excellent projects at Nexus — Nexus Radio, My Face in Your Space (props to Austin Lee and if you missed this show eat your heart out) and Supergirl — still time to catch this good one.
–Runner-up–Michael Kalmbach takes a chance on Willmington and transforms its art scene (post coming soon)

Best show we had no expectations for
ICA’s Dance With Camera

James Johnson, solid gold on the wall at Arcadia U's Works on Paper show

Ahead of the Curve Gold Award
We saw a lot of gold in Miami but we saw James Johnson‘s solid gold art manifesto first (Arcadia Works on Paper show).

Best Double Bill Ever Award
MOMA for Pippilotti Rist and Marlene Dumas

The Not Marijuana Potted Plant Award
Chris Golas‘ chewing of dieffenbacchia leaves in his homey karaoke performance at Exclamation raised new awareness of that plant’s possibilities.

John Gibbons and Isobel Sollenberger, from their solo show at Rebekkah Templeton earlier this year

Pew Wish List
Joe Boruchow (repeat) Chris Davison (repeat), Phil Jackson, Jennie Thwing (repeat), Sarah Stolfa, Martina Johnson-Allen, Bruce Wilhelm, Danielle Bursk, Gabriel Boyce and Preston Link, John Gibbons and Isobel Sollenberger

Dead Tree Media Award
Machete and New Asshole, two print publications on theory launched this year in Philadelphia. They’re occasional publications so they won’t kill that many trees.

Lance Winn and Simone Jones, Knock, Script by Hope Thompson. Made Possible by the Banff Art Center 2007

Fast Forward Award
Video break-throughs knock our socks off. Steve Coss‘ animated portrait paintings in Vox V and Lance Winn and Simone Jones, Script by Hope Thompson robotic projections on three walls and the floor at University of Delaware Gallery keep the viewer in motion to keep up with the scenario. The level of interactivity seemed new and excellent.

Meanwhile

Tim Gierschick, with a piece in his solo show at Tiger Strikes Asteroid

Gallery Openings
Little Berlin reinvents itself as an 8-person collective. Slingluff renames itself and relocates to E. Girard. Breadbox was Esther Klein Gallery and moved up the street. All these opened: Grizzly Grizzly, Marginal Utility, Philadelphia Photo Art Center, AHN/VHS, Tiger Strikes Asteroid, Progressive Sharing, Mt. Airy Contemporary, 919 Gallery, 12 Gates…and this just in, Sweatshop in Port Richmond, Part-Time Studios in Frankford. We know there are more–put your name in the comments if we forgot you.

Gallery Closings
Bye Bye to Pifas

Ashley Flynn, installation at Knapp Gallery

Artists to watch
Ashley Flynn, Amir Lyles, Matt Savitsky

R.I.P.
Tom Chimes, Jeanne-Claude (Mrs. Christo), Andrew Wyeth, Philadelphia art critic R. B. Strauss.  Of course Michael Jackson died, too, a huge hole in the pop culture canopy.

A shout-out to our design and tech team
Kelani Edmondson, Beth Heinly, Howie Ross for design; Nick Paparone and Jamie Dillon for logo and branding.  We love you guys!

Also, a shout-out to artblog reviewers who make us look good
Stefan Zebrowski-Rubin, John Vick, Corey Armpriester, Kelani Edmondson, Judith Stein, Lauren Whearty, Elisa Ludwig, Sue Spaid, Brandon Joyce, Debra Miller, Matthew Rose, Michael Andre, Jacob Hellman, K-Fai Steele, Annette Monnier (who also writes the new blog one review a month), Max Mulhern, Jennifer Zarro

Next year’s a whole new ballgame.  See you then!  xo xo Liberta

Ribas’ choices for the Arcadia Works on Paper exhibit raise issues of sharing, reproducibility and loss of copyright control. They raise disturbing questions about the value of all art at a time when works on paper have never been more highly valued.

James Johnson, 14K Sentences on Conceptual Art, 2009, framed silkscreen print on letter-sized sheet of 14 K gold on acid-free board, 14.75 x 12.5 inches

Ribas first shots across the bow, the first pieces in front of you as you walk into the gallery, are Michael Davis Carter’s gator, a tissue paper piece that appropriates the LaCoste alligator logo, and James Johnson’s 14K Sentences on Conceptual Art, a 14K gold sheet of paper on which is silkscreened an appropriation of Sol Lewitt’s Sentences on Contemporary Art. The reflective quality of the material and the art historical appropriation serve as a conceptual treatise on material value and creative value–Lewitt’s creative capital, Johnson’s creative capital, the means of production that crosses lines between the handmade and machine (computer) made and printed.

Gabriel Boyce and Preston Link, Health Care Bill, 2009 printed paper 11 x 8.5 x 3 inches

In that same front room, Gabriel Boyce and Preston Link offer on a pedestal another conceptual work–Health Care Bill, three inches of Congressional bureaucratese downloaded from the internet and stacked on a pedestal, the work representing value beyond the ability of most of us to calculate. I found it especially amusing that the gallery needed a young woman to stand guard over this particular piece, to make sure no one commandeered a piece of paper from the bill, a piece of paper of questionable value without the context! And

Bruce Campbell, Directional drawing, 2008, graphite on cut paper on board, 43.25 x 65 inches. This is the largest piece in the show.

Bruce Campbell’s Directional Drawing, with words scrawled over a paper incised with a Frank Stella geometric shape–another art-historical appropriation–brings into question 1968 aesthetics and value at the same time that Campbell appropriates and incorporates into his own value system a piece of Stella’s creative capital!

Robert T. Pannell, Revision, 2006, photo etching, 11.25 x 24 inches

Robert T. Pannell and Pernot Hudson pull the rug out from the assumptions of our common culture–oy, those Indians got such a bad deal, speaking of value. Hudson’s print/drawing of a sheriff’s badge, Samburg’s Finest, drips with irony.

Mia Rosenthal, Breakfast cereals of this great nation, 2009, detail, ink and graphite on paper, 32 x 22.5 inches

The counterpoise to all these rather cynical meditations on value is a wall of five drawings that range from contemporary deadpan to doodly to an old-fashioned elegance of line–all of them raising questions of aesthetics. In this group, Mia Rosenthal’s cereal box grid drawing, an obsessive Roz Chast-like reuse and filtering of mass produced advertising, most pointedly continues the conversation about authorship and value (this and Leah Bailis’ Corner were the only works in the show I had seen before, but I was happy to revisit both of them).

Andrea Beizer, Three In bed, 2009, graphite on Arches, 22.5 x 31 inches

The others in that group on the wall with Cereal… suggest that cultural fashion and value are fickle, from Andrea Beizer’s Three in Bed, which passes for a contemporary cartoon, to John Costanza’s What did you do to the Booze Hickey? #2, which passes for a mid-20th-century one. In the mix of shifting tastes–Erika Mayer’s Knapsack Nation and Dino Vasquez Gargas Positivas.

Erika Mayer, Knapsack Nation, 2008-9, etching, 11 x 14.75 inches

Turns out there’s nothing in this show that doesn’t raise these questions about value and aesthetics. But the conversation about value is the more interesting and edgy of the two.

Mark Stockton, Composition 3, 2009, grphite of BFK Rives, 29 x 22.75 inches

As the show moves into the back room, a number of works copy popular culture images, using hand-reproduction methods that reinterpret the original values. I especially loved Fay Stanford’s Indigenous Princess, a highly unlikely image that turns the sentimentality of kitsch into a wild thing. Closer to my point about copying are Kristina Martin’s movie still and Mark Stockton’s Composition 3, the latter a drawn clipboard of media-celeb images. Matt Neff’s prints may valorize or criticize the Wu Tang Clan. He doesn’t give enough away for me to guess, but he’s playing in the same pond of appropriated pop culture.

That art work appropriating manufactured imagery is so widespread surely shows how far behind the courts are in handling the phenomenon of Shepard Fairey’s reuse of an AP photographer’s Obama portrait. The contentiousness about Fairey’s authorship, ironically, raises the value of the hand work, cheaply reproduced and sold over the internet, and the value of the photo, even more cheaply reproduced and sold over the wire services.

Gabriel Martinez, Untitled (Peking Ducks),"Pink" 2009, archival pigment print, 31 x 59 inches

Gabriel Martinez Untitled (Peking Ducks), “Pink” photo raises so many issues of identity, ownership, advertising, beauty, cultural hegemony, gender, duplication, yadda yadda yadda that it leaves me breathless. Martinez took the photo with a Holga camera in a gay pick-up park in Peking. He asked the subject to pose for him with pink Peeps ducks serving as a mask, but the subject, afraid of being recognized, tore out a magazine ad and covered his face with the advertising image of a woman’s face, and covered her unseeing eyes with the Peeps. The clash of cultures  is played out here in numerous ways, especially with the Western photographer and his Western Peeps and the Western influenced Eastern advertising image. Not to mention, on the love front, that peeps will be peeps. Amazing!!!

Quentin Morris, Untitled (Dec. 2008), 2008, December 2008, black gesso and polymer acrylic, 28 inches in diameter, courtesy Larry Becker Contemporary Art

Quentin Morris, who is a perennial presence in the Works on Paper show, expressed disappointment during the opening because his black circle was hung high on the wall like on ominous moon threatening the art cosmos. In a way he’s right. His work’s meaning got highjacked by the curator for his own purposes! But even when hanging at the normal height, the piece serves as an elegant question mark. Is it reproducible? Depends on who you ask. It is a philosophical conundrum for its refusal to behave like an ordinary drawing or declare its value in quantifiable terms.

Hannah Heffner, Baby Bubble, 2009, cut paper and bubble wrap, 14 x 11 inches

Speaking of drawings, Hannah Heffner’s Baby Bubble is also slippery. The baby bump is bubble wrap and any sense of transcendent birth is completely undermined by the deliberate crappiness of the material inserted in the cut (old-fashioned) image, a page from a magazine. When I was in the gallery, I was sure the page was a hand-made reproduction. Now, as I look at the picture, I am not so sure. The action of the man’s hand becomes a giant question with the intervention of the bubblewrap. This was arguably the riskiest piece in the exhibit!

On the surface, the show had a tremendous respect for small work and for drawing and draftsmanship and craftsmanship and art history.  Although gray, black and white and conservative on the surface, underneath, the show is slippery.If it really is ushering the end of originality and the end of handmade in a world of infinite reproduction, all of this writing is about a bunch of wildly overvalued work–except for that sheet of gold. I don’t buy it–yet.

Here’s the complete list of who’s in the show:

Leah Bailis, Andrea Beizer, Gabriel Boyce & Preston Link, Bruce Campbell, John Costanza, Michael Davis Carter, Hannah Heffner, Pernot Hudson, James Johnson, Sebastien Leclercq, Erika Mayer, Gabriel Martinez, Kristina Martino, Quentin Morris, Matt Neff, Robert T. Pannell, Mia Rosenthal, Fay Stanford, Mark Stockton, Judith Taylor, and Dino Vasquez.

The Arcadia Works on Paper 2009 show runs to Dec. 21.

We dashed out to the West Collection at SEI in Oaks last month for a peek at the West Prize Finalists exhibit before the Grand Prize Winner is announced on Feb. 26. The exhibit showcases works by the ten finalists in the international competition– and all of the works in the show have been purchased by the West Collection.  Each finalist had $10,000 of work purchased; the Grand Prize Winner will receive, in addition, $25,000 in cash–no strings attached, no reports to write. Paige and Al West will select the Grand Prize winner.

Dufala Brothers, 2007, Ice Cream Truck Tank, mixed media, 8’ x 6’ x 13’

In what must have been one of the hardest juryings ever, the Wests looked at submissions by 3,600 artists to make their picks. The ten finalists they chose make work that fits with what the West Collection has always specialized in — edgy art by emerging artists, a lot of it about reality/lies (sci fi, technology and cyber touches) and much about notions of gender fluidity and social and class issues.   Here it’s worth noting that they’re on record that the Philly art community is making great stuff and certainly their choices for finalists in this first round reflect that.

Vox Members Shows

Julianna Foster’s From Morning On

Julianna Foster‘s From Morning On continues the artist’s exploration of narrative through serial photography. This group of photographs shows gorgeous misty landscapes, decrepit mystery interiors that are also misty; claustrophobic backyard mists and more. It’s like the misty moors of Wuthering Heights come to the American Northeast farmland. The actor is a woman who performs ambiguous and rather static actions (listening through a wall; blowing dust off a box; staring out a window). And, maybe it’s because he just died, I’m thinking about Andrew Wyeth‘s dreamy, romantic and nostalgic Americana. Of course, Eileen Neff‘s tres post-modern photos of anthropomorphized clouds who dance with trees and have a lovely existence in the woods and inside houses also come to mind. Foster’s work intrigues by remaining ambiguous at its core, but its lyricism and beauty draw you in. This series is open enough to let all minds wander around and claim the territory for their own.  And let’s not forget we’re in Oscar season.  What kind of movie would this be?

Juliana Foster From Morning On

Several of the photos are framed but not under glass and those pieces become more palpably real — like objects — in a way the glass-framed pieces aren’t. It’s the same non-glass framing Zoe Strauss used for her recent show at Silvertstein and the strategy gives the photos immediacy and plays up their sensuality.

James Johnson, Break, view through the glass door.

James Johnson‘s Break is a breakout piece. The artist used to work in small boxes, putting dollhouse-sized photos in spaces accessible through a peephole or other voyeuristic device. Break is a life-size box (a whole room in the gallery) separated from the viewer by a locked, glass-panel door (the artist selected the door, he says, for its resemblance to Maurizio Catalan’s The Wrong Gallery door.)  Outfitted like it’s a small office this big box has a desk, easy chair, books and slippers. At the opening and at other times during the show’s run it will also have the artist, in residence, sitting, reading, writing and cogitating in the space. Johnson says it’s not a performance piece, but when the artist puts his body in the picture I read it that way. The theatrical aspect pushes into rich territory and I am excited to see where the artist goes next. Artist trapped in a box? I can see that going far.

Eva Wylie, A Continuous Shuffle of Earthturf

Eva Wylie‘s A Continuous Shuffle of Earthturf is a continuous shuffle of imagery in the artist’s virtuoso silkscreen-on-wall method.  From afar the piece looks like an asymmetrical array of candy-colored floating toys or balloons. Up close, the images come into focus as a profusion of women’s hair pieces:  long plaits — thick, double-braidings and solitary ropes — mostly upside down.  Something about the shape of the plaits and their relation to the crown of the head gives them a topsy-turvy jellyfish look, which I quite like. I have no idea what the work is about–whether it’s celebratory or wry — but the image, screened right onto the pristine wall, is dazzling.

Eva Wylie, A Continuous Shuffle of Earthturf (detail)

Vox Alumni show

It’s great that the alternative space continues to showcase its alumni members which allows you to catch up with the artists, or in some cases, meet them for the first time.

Merilee Challiss

Merrilee Challiss‘ delicate white on black works on paper with pinking sheer edges and what appear to be embroidery hoop frames are Edward Gorey-delightful. The work nods to arts and crafts and book illustration and is a nice mix of old, new, high and low.

John T. Lange

John T. Lange‘s mini landscape projection via two clattery old film projectors has a hobby shop charm.

Anne Schaefer.  Photo by Libby.

Anne Schaefer‘s little tower of patterned boxes is elegant and seems like it walked in from the AiA Bookstore — meta-architectural blocks for kids to play with.

Video Lounge

In the video lounge, David Tinapple‘s Scatter Square translates a seascape into a series of digital rows and columns of tiles which it then flips around reconfiguring the landscape like one of those old-fashioned tile games that you can now get for your keychain. There’s a solitary soul on the beach and it’s funny to think of the person being shuffled around willy nilly not even knowing what’s happening. But I guess that’s life for you.

Linda Yun’s Incident. Here’s the little video I made and put at flickr as an experiment in video hosting alternatives to YouTube.

Beautiful conceptual art is a rarity.  But in Arcadia’s group show “A Closer Look 7″ Linda Yun‘s “Incident,” made of simple materials – a fan, a light, some mylar strips — is like the pot of gold — and the rainbow, too.
 
“A Closer Look 7,” guest-curated by Temple Gallery Exhibitions Director Sheryl Conkelton, catches up with six artists whose work was previously shown in one of Arcadia’s Biennial Works on Paper shows. Yun (2005), Phillip Adams (2005), James Johnson (2005), Kocot and Hatton (5 times) and Lucy Pullen (2001) are all conceptual artists whose deadpan and aesthetically spare works make for a quiet show.  If you’re looking for juice here –pizzaz, zaniness, fun – bring it with you.  You’ll need it to puzzle out meaning, conjure memories and take your mind off-site to fully experience these works.  Looking alone won’t do.

Usually sensory experiences are things I think of as juicy. And I can sense there’s something sensory going on in the work of all the artists in A Closer Look 7 at Arcadia. But juicy is not the operative word here. There’s a coolness, a conceptual reflection on the nature of things.

The five artists were selected by Sheryl Conkelton, Tyler’s director of exhibitions and special programs. The A Closer Look series of exhibits was created to allow a more in-depth look at the work of some of the artists who had been in previous “Works on Paper” exhibits at Arcadia.

Hands down, my favorite piece in the exhibit is Linda Yun‘s deadpan piece, Incident–a kinetic sculpture of gold mylar streamers powered by an ordinary fan and lit by a utilitarian light fixture. The piece has a circus like exuberance in the fluttering streamers that fly off a ring–reminding me of the ring of fire lions are trained to jump through. But Yun’s description of her piece is telltale: “mylar, fan, sound, reflected light and color.” Also telltale is her title. There is no incident in Incident, and the focus gives gravitas to what might otherwise be incidental–the subtle glints of light reflected onto the wall, the rustling sound of the streamers and the fan. The gap between two levels of sensory experience–the glitz and the glimmer–is the magic of the nature of things.

I was reminded a little of the way Jackie Winsor and Sigmar Polke uses the materiality of an object to capture an experience. I was captivated.

Phillip Adams, Solipsist: Wil, 2008, charcoal on paper mounted to panel, 50 x 32 inches

Phillip Adams, whose charcoal drawings are technical wows of draftsmanship and control, also is after the gap between the presentation and the experience. His triad of large, deadpan portraits, against white backgrounds is about the disorientation between no-space (the fashion- photography-inspired white backgrounds) and faux-space (the reflections of scenes in the mirrored sunglasses of the subjects). The window into someone’s eyes have been replaced by distorted substitute that sends me reeling. I may be reading too much into it, but I take these pieces as criticisms of a certain Elizabeth Peyton-ish coolness and self-absorption. I experience a sort of vertigo of the soul as I peer at the displaced persons and the reflections of displaced places. Like Yun, Adams is making me conscious of my take-for-granted understanding of reality, and in this case the reality is space and place, rather than color and sound.

James Johnson, House, as installed in A Closer Look 7, at Arcadia University, 2008, foam insulation, existing wall, 144 x 144 x 48 inches. The pink interior light is a byproduct of “Promise,” a neon piece inside the house. To the left, behind Johnson’s house, you can see the golden aura from Yun’s Incident. To the right are some of Kocot & Hatton’s Night/Time

A similar gap is also part of James Johnson‘s House and Promise (courtesy New Money), both pieces offering something beyond reach. The house’s pink interior is just a wall interior filled with sheetrock scraps; and Promise (courtesy New Money) is a pink neon sign stating, “I can give you everything you want.” You have to crane your neck and look through a couple of the small, low windows in House to access what Promise says. Like all neon signs, the shiny promises can never live up to the physical flashiness. The sweet blue trim of the windows and door and steps turns out to be cheesy blue insulation foam.

James Johnson, Promise (courtesy New Money), detail, 2008, neon sign, 16 x 91.25 x 3 inches. Full message reads I can give you anything you want.

I’m a little surprised that when I looked at this work, I didn’t get the connection of glitz and aura to Yun’s piece, yet it is connected. It’s almost as if the wall that the house represents blocked what should have been an obvious relationship.

Unlike the longing for some Ozzie-and-Harriet past that has infused Johnson’s work until now, this piece communicates the hidden mess and frustrations of life inside the child-height windows, and also communicates everyone’s desire for more material goods.

Installation shot, with Kocot & Hatton, from the Night/Time series, lined up on the wall. In front is one Hole of the three in Lucy Pullen’s piece Hole, and on the pedestal, Pullen’s Being and Event.

Windows into the mind are what Kocot & Hatton‘s Night/Time is about–a sort of New Age body art, but this time the shots are harmless and photographic, unlike Chris Burden’s bullets.

Kocot and Hatton, 25 November 2007 (4:25) from the series Night/Time, 2007-8, a series of 16 digital prints, each 8 x 10.5 inches framed. In the exhibit courtesy the artists and Larry Becker Contemporary Art, Philadelphia

It’s a series of blurry photographs of LED clock read-outs. The idea is to get at the semi-awake state-of-consciousness of the photographers as they rouse themselves barely enough from sleep to snap the photos. In this piece, process seems to overwhelm the idea, and the experience never becomes the viewers’ but remains the artists’.

Lucy Pullen, Sonorous Carrot, 2008, cast aluminum, 8 x .5 inches diameter

What overwhelms the idea in Holes, work by Canadian artist Lucy Pullen, is the material–sinuous rings of bent ash. I was more interested in her sculpture Sonorous Carrot, a deadly looking carrot of cast aluminum, hung by a string to point at the wall. The title made me think I’d find a sound here. But I could not figure out a way to ring it, pluck it, or whatever. Too bad. I did like the idea of a singing, killer vegetable.

I don’t know why the whole of this show felt less than its parts, even though there was some interesting work here that certainly deserved the closer look. I think I might have better enjoyed some of these pieces in a different context or setting.