Cherry Pie (High Quality Georgia Coffee advertisement by David Lynch) (by GODSorGAMES)
Crystal Bridges
A museum of American art is to be opened by Alice Walton, the daughter of Wal-mart’s founder, in Arkansas. I might be making a little road trip to Bentonville sometime soon…
Moon Museum
Scattered readings about Claes Oldenburg and I happened to come across this and this. Awesome.
I’m currently formulating (devising? planning?) a piece for Claes as part of an ongoing (and as yet imagined) series of works that are dedicated to an artist in the subtitle. i.e.: 99 Whispered Monuments (for Claes Oldenburg). The meta-concept is an examination of art as 1) an act of love (creation, followed by dedication and/or giving), and 2) a way to engage in dialogue with individuals or entities I would not otherwise have the means to talk to/publicly admire/argue with/question. We’ll see how it all goes.
And while we’re on the subject of sound archives… have you seen this yet??? AMAZING
History of Electronic Music
If you have ANY interest in electronic music you need to take a look at this. Unbelievable archive, although flawed. Says UbuWeb:
This is from a 62 CD set called “The History of Electroacoustic Music” that was floating around as a torrent, reputedly curated by a Portugese student. It’s sketchy. The torrent vanished and the collection has long been unavailable.
It’s a clearly flawed selection: there’s no women and almost no one working outside of the Western tradition (where are the Japanese? Chinese? etc.). However, as an effort, it’s admirable and contains a ton of great stuff.
Take it with a grain of salt, or perhaps use it as a provocation to curate a more intelligent, inclusive, and comprehensive selection.
-UbuWeb
All the same, there’s some amazing material here. Poke around!
mmmmmmmm.
Terry Riley
Bas Jan Ader
Probably my new second-favorite artist (Joseph Beuys holds a strong slot in first). Ader keeps popping up in my readings, specifically the Chance and Failure installments of the “Documents of Contemporary Art” series. A conceptual and performance artist who documented his work with photographs and short films, Ader’s career was concise and, when looked at from a distance, deliberate. The calculated feel of his overure makes his final work (and cause of death) all the more haunting. In Search of the Miraculous was an attempt to cross the Atlantic in a 13-foot “boat.” That he did not succeed in crossing the Atlantic is not necessarily a suggestion of failure on his part; to imply the success or failure of a work would be to suggest knowledge of intention, goals and desired outcomes of the artist, of which we unfortunately have none. Rather, the ending of Ader’s piece and life - to me, at least - raise questions about what role the spectator plays in determining the end result of a work or career. As we speculate possible motivations behind his final act (stunt, attempted heroism, suicide, ultimate prank, etc.), we make the piece something that it was not meant to be. To a very large degree, artists must be willing to release their work into the world and allow it to be interpreted and recreated in the mind of each individual that encounters it, and that can be a very, very scary thing. Which the raises questions of the responsibility of the artist for how a work is interpreted, and on and on and on. But all that for another time.
Anyhoo, I like Bas Jan Ader, and you might, too.
sound=metal
Her sense of place, and space, memory and presence reminds me, weirdly, of the sculptor Richard Serra at his best. Her art makes you think of your place in the world, and opens you up to your feelings.
-Adrian Searle, art critic, on Susan Philipsz’s sound installation that recently won her the Turner Prize.
Nice commentary on the physicality of sound, the medium’s uncanny ability to be so oppressive and so delicate all at once.
we chased breezes we thought we recognized, rattled leaves that beguiled us with feigned familiarity. metaphors and metaphysics, metal charms dusty beneath metal desk lamps: silver. silver highways, strings, and silver, silver hair. frozen guitars bend before memory.
foundation or, looking forward looking back
He paused uncertainly. ’No, that isn’t right. Ghosts are weak shadows of reality. What lives here is more real than we are. We are like ghosts of its reality. What is it, Juanito? Has my brain gone weak from being two months alone?’
…
‘In the end it doesn’t matter,’ he said abruptly. ’What I feel or think can kill no ghosts nor gods. We must work, Juanito. There’s the house to build over there, and here’s the ranch to put cattle on. We’ll go on working in spite of the ghosts. Come,’ he said hurriedly, ‘we haven’t time to think.’
To A God Unknown, John Steinbeck
