Art as Authority

The COPY exhibit currently on view at the Simayspace Gallery downtown got some copy, today, in the form of a nice article and review of the show, by San Diego Union Tribune's art critic, Robert Pincus. The long hours of planning, ideas and physical work that went into the organization of this exhibition, paid off. I'm grateful.

This show of course, couldn't have been possible without the help, good faith and excellent work provided by the artists who participated. I take this opportunity to thank all those who helped in the planning and execution of this event (and if you think this is sounding like an acceptance speech for an Academy Award, you would be right - I'm elated.)

Thanks to the artists: Richard Gleaves, KAI1, Joey Burns, Tom Torluemke, Herve Crespel and Bret Barrett; gratitude for Doug Simay at Simayspace Gallery and the Art Academy of San Diego for the invitation and letting me be the "first;" Mark over at BodyMarks Tattoo on El Cajon Blvd. for playing a major role in the performance; Patricia Frischer for being a sounding board to last minute ideas; Elliott Linwood for curatorial advice at a crucial moment; and finally, Robert Pincus from the San Diego Union Tribune.


Freitas follows the rabbit down the hole
Curator strives for an 'Alice in Wonderland' feel to exhibit at Simayspace

By Robert L. Pincus
ART CRITIC
March 30, 2008

Kevin Freitas has placed a big desk in the current exhibition he's curated for Simayspace downtown. It even has his nameplate on it, with his title (art critic) in French ... more

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Artists: Joey Burns, Hervé Crespel, Kevin Freitas, Richard Gleaves, KAI1, Tom Torluemke
Show title: COPY
Show dates: March 7, 2008 –April 25, 2008
Reception: Friday, March 7 6-9pm
Gallery hours: Monday-Friday 9am – 6pm & Saturday 9am – 1pm
Contact: Kevin Freitas (619.337.4891) or Doug Simay (619.231.3900)
Simayspace @ the Academy
The Art Academy of San Diego
840 G Street
San Diego, CA 92101

COPY features installation work and collages by San Diego artists Richard Gleaves and Joey Burns, drawings by French artist Hervé Crespel and by Indiana/Chicago artist Tom Torluemke, and a mural by Arizona graffitist KAI1. It also includes an opening-night performance by Kevin Freitas, San Diego arts writer and founder of the art blog www.artasauthority.com.

With roots back to the 14th century, the word copy has acquired many meanings and usages. The one most commonly used by artists and laymen alike is: “an imitation, transcript, or reproduction of an original work.” Yet this does not capture the unique ability of the copyist to diverge from the original, unintentionally or otherwise. This ability embodies the beauty and intrigue, the power that the copy holds over the original. It also embodies the beauty of the word itself, which can denote so many things: political, religious, social, artistic, sexual, mass-produced, and even terroristic.

In keeping with this theme the art and performance featured in COPY will be subjected to various acts and forms of copying, blurring the boundaries between copy and original, critic and artist, text and image. Whatever truths result will reside strictly in the eye of the beholder.


www.artacademyofsandiego.com

www.simayspace.com/index.html

www.artasauthority.com

Spun by Art as Authority at 08:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

BEFORE

AFTER

Last chance to see Julien Colombier's "90 Grammes" exhibit at Art Produce Gallery in North Park. Show ends Sunday, April 6. Please stop by, and afterwards, have a coffee in the newly opened Caffe Carpe Diem right next door. You won't regret it.

Julien Colombier
"90 Grammes"
Art Produce Gallery
3139 University Avenue
San Diego, CA 92104
tel. 619.584.4448 - for gallery hours

www.artproducegallery.com

www.artasauthority.com

www.myspace.com/mrjulien_c

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Monday March 31st
KOOR "BACK TO THE ROOTS" (NYC)
From 7:00 -10:00pm. all ages

Chuck "KOOR aka KOOL KOOR" Hargrove started writing graffiti in the south Bronx in 1976. After participating in virtually every important exhibition on Graffiti Art in New York City his dynamic artwork took him on a journey exhibiting in galleries and museums around the world. You can find KOOR in famous collections such as The Metropolitan Museum, Chicago Renaissance Society, The Butler Museum, Wihelm Hack Museum in Germany, The Groninger Museum in the Netherlands and an impressive list of others. Today gallery 151 is pleased to welcome KOOR back for his first solo exhibition in NYC since over two decades. Titled "Back to the Roots" KOOR is reflecting on the symbolism and architecture in his artwork, taking us on a journey into the past then straight into the future. Exhibition runs from 1 through 14 April

Gallery 151
151 Wooster St., 2nd Floor (off Houston Street)
New York, N.Y. 10012
Please call Gallery for exhibit hours at 212-375-0151
1 train to Houston Street, C and E to Spring Street, R and W to Prince Street.

About KOOR's ART

KOOR creates artwork that makes us feel that life as we know it is not real at all, there lies several other levels of reality that we choose not to see. Each reality tragically effecting another. We feel this because we can see that other side in his artwork. Tension of his every day struggle to exist in this world becomes clear in the reality of his artwork. Architectural structures bend and twist like strands of nerves in human anatomy, Like the mind fighting to calculate a difficult equation. The use of robotic forms reminds us that there is still a link to a our reality. Like in the works of Mobeus we discover deep transforming perspectives in KOOR's drawings relaying to us that even these new worlds are not yet fully defined. It is here that we find the key to the power of KOOR's work. The rules are being made along the way. However definite they may be, even the artist has to play by them. The longer we look the more it all comes together. We are discovering frame by frame the projections of the meaning of life as it radiates on the surfaces of another reality. A reality where we want to return to, or one where we very well may belong.

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The Wonderhaus and Voice 171 (formally Voice 1156)

To hear Monica Hoover tell it, she needs your help and now!

It's unlikely that there is someone left in San Diego who doesn't know who Monica is - artist, lifestyle photographer, "creative activist" and co-founder of Voice 1156. I've known Monica for about a year now after reviewing one of her solo shows at the Rubber Rose Gallery on Ray St. That show, like everything else Monica does was/is perfection. She is un-relenting in her pursuit of bringing artists together, showcasing their works and bringing the public into the fold through exposure, dialogue and education. She is tireless and dedicated to the Arts in general and to the larger artistic community here in San Diego. This is where she wants to be, this is where she wants to stay and she's asking you for your help to achieve that goal.

Monica is in the process of re-locating and re-establishing Voice 1156 in its future location within the Wonderhaus or former Wonder Bread factory, built in 1924 and located in the Ballpark District of downtown San Diego. She has this to say,

"The opposition we are up against is the city, and the laws and regulations the city represents and enforces. I am confident we will get what we need, but it will speed things up a great deal if we show the California and San Diego community supports VOICE as well. We need to show the city that a venue like VOICE is wanted and needed in San Diego."

For those of you who are not familiar with Voice and what they do, here is a brief Mission Statement:

VOICE is a mixed use art and culture facility. Offering art shows changing monthly paralleled with a music venue featuring live music performances. The space will also include a small retail store that sells art related merchandise and a café that will dual as a full kitchen to be utilized for catering special events. The motto of VOICE is “Practice Creative Activism”. Gauging from our experience at our previous facility VOICE 1156, our current goal is to take our grass roots origins to a more mature, professional level by creating financially stability to support our establishment. Additionally we are in the process of setting up a non-profit “YOUTH VOICE” - that focuses on sharing art education to youth through tours, lectures and workshops. VOICE’s intent is to be the leader in the urban, young and progressive arts movement in the emerging downtown San Diego scene. It's not that the lack of people in San Diego – creative individuals and creative patrons, it's the lack of proper facilities. Voice’s intention is to be a part of the contributing leaders whom want to change our San Diego’s scene and reputation.

Monica asks, "It would be AMAZING - if you could print out the 'Signatures for VOICE' sheet - have people sign it - and mail mail it back to me. Monica Hoover P.O. BOX 1017 Jamul, CA 91935"

Won't you please help Monica and all of us who are committed to a vibrant and dynamic arts community in San Diego? Become a Creative Activist and take responsibility for the future of the Arts, you'll be glad that you did. Further information and the "Signatures for VOICE sheet" can be be found below.

VOICE Press Kit (please email me at artasauthority@artasauthority.com and I will send the .pdf document to you.)

Signatures for VOICE sheet

Wonderhaus

Monica Hoover

Thank you.

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Politicians should read science fiction, not westerns and detective stories.
-- Arthur C. Clarke

Image of Arthur C. Clarke by Charles Adams, Science &
Society Picture Library, London


There's definitely a part of my adolescence ending with the passing of Arthur C. Clarke today, a mere 90 years of age, such a great loss. I read "Childhood's End" by Clarke in high school, Soquel High (Santa Cruz), English 1B, a class obliged upon those of us who did not fair well enough on the english proficiency exam to be part of English 1A nor in the company of grand literature and scholars. I found myself in a class with other "literary dropouts" that had no desks and only beanbag chairs, a worn out couch and a whole wall of bookshelves heaving with nothing but Science Fiction on them. I thank the stars to this day, and often enough to realize that on that one percise moment in flunking english, I had the opportunity of a lifetime and a whole universe of discovery before me yearning to be read, written by Gods the likes of Clarke, Heinlen, Bradbury, Asimov, Herbert, Vonnegut and many many more for wanderlust mortals like myself. Thank you.

You will be missed.

Spun by Art as Authority at 07:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

(image: senatorpeter6)

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Julien Colombier at Art Produce Gallery


Can't say I didn't warn you but I did, and now we have a perfect case (several) of what a lot of us have been preaching these past several months - consistency, integrity, vision and how to put on a good show. March has turned out to be an excellent and exciting month in North Park, particularly on that hallowed art ground we call Ray St. I believe one should lead by example, especially when it comes to exhibiting in the art world. Lead they have and remarkably well, both Spacecraft and 4 Walls have exhibits ranging in style and temperament with rock solid performances. At Spacecraft Matt Wedel is showing some large scale glazed ceramic sculptures of quirky and delightfully charming Polar Bears embracing or dancing, and colorful singular slices of flowering plants clinging to angular stacked boulders. The photographer Bill Dane and the mixed-media artist Kimberly Tomney round out a beautiful and compelling show of works at 4 Walls. Bill Dane, for those of you like myself who are learning about him for the first time, is a longtime Bay Area photographer who has received critical acclaim during his long career and who has also received grants from the Guggenheim Foundation and National Endowment for the Arts each twice. Impressive for work rich in metaphor that combines straight non-manipulated photos of juxtaposed layers of "common" everyday life - bus stops, billboards, window panes, advertising etc. - mixed in with the folk who inhabit that environment, reflected and shadowed oftentimes by the artist's own shadow in a domino effect of us as viewer/voyeur, the artist, and then the subject (photographed). They are stunningly simple and beautiful.

Kimberly's amalgam aluminum and pen & ink drawings on paper of suburban swimming pools have that definite Southern Californian feel to them, reminiscent of Edward Ruscha's black & white photos of the same subject in "Nine Swimming Pools and a Broken Glass" and they even retain the same dead-pan humor and irony of his images. What sets Kimberly's drawings apart is the elegance, simplicity of line and form, and the almost religious atmosphere she creates and worships upon such a banal luxury.

4 Walls Gallery

Spacecraft Gallery


Finally, French artist Julien Colombier from Paris has orchestrated a spectacular installation of painted paper bags at the Art Produce Gallery. Derrik Chinn, online editor of the Nightlife & Visitors info at SignOnSanDiego.com, has written a nice little article about Julien's exhibit complete with several photos and a series of questions & answers for the artist. You can read an excerpt from the article below:


POP BOMB: Julien Colombier at ART Produce

Graffiti sprayed all over the sides of city trains, buses and walls. Entire sides of skyrises draped with advertisements. Digital billboards towering over the interstate. Urban decor has exploded with such an intensity that megalopolises such as Sao Paulo, Brazil (population: 10,886,518), are beginning to ban all forms of public advertisements. Imagine ... continue.

If this isn't enough to get you into Spring with a light heart and a head full of images, I can't help you then...

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COPY


The present age … prefers the sign to the thing signified, the copy to the original, fancy to reality, the appearance to the essence … for in these days illusion only is sacred, truth profane.
-- Ludwig Feuerbach

Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works. You do more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it. Then you do something else. The trick is the doing something else.
-- Tom Peters

No.thing Works
-- Gordon Matta-Clark

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Artists: Joey Burns, Hervé Crespel, Kevin Freitas, Richard Gleaves, KAI1, Tom Torluemke
Show title: COPY
Show dates: March 7, 2008 –April 25, 2008
Reception: Friday, March 7 6-9pm
Gallery hours: Monday-Friday 9am – 6pm & Saturday 9am – 1pm
Contact: Kevin Freitas (619.337.4891) or Doug Simay (619.231.3900)
Simayspace @ the Academy
The Art Academy of San Diego
840 G Street
San Diego, CA 92101

COPY features installation work and collages by San Diego artists Richard Gleaves and Joey Burns, drawings by French artist Hervé Crespel and by Indiana/Chicago artist Tom Torluemke, and a mural by Arizona graffitist KAI1. It also includes an opening-night performance by Kevin Freitas, San Diego arts writer and founder of the art blog www.artasauthority.com.

With roots back to the 14th century, the word copy has acquired many meanings and usages. The one most commonly used by artists and laymen alike is: “an imitation, transcript, or reproduction of an original work.” Yet this does not capture the unique ability of the copyist to diverge from the original, unintentionally or otherwise. This ability embodies the beauty and intrigue, the power that the copy holds over the original. It also embodies the beauty of the word itself, which can denote so many things: political, religious, social, artistic, sexual, mass-produced, and even terroristic.

In keeping with this theme the art and performance featured in COPY will be subjected to various acts and forms of copying, blurring the boundaries between copy and original, critic and artist, text and image. Whatever truths result will reside strictly in the eye of the beholder.


www.artacademyofsandiego.com

www.simayspace.com/index.html

www.artasauthority.com

Spun by Art as Authority at 07:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

An American in Paris? - but of course! A Frenchman in San Diego? - splendide!





Paris artist Julien Colombier stands in front of a graffiti mural by Arizona writer KAI1, freshly painted behind the Art Produce Gallery where Julien is having his first solo exhibit in the US. Both artists, KAI1 and Julien, blew into San Diego to participate in their respective expositions with great fanfare and success.

Julien's show entitled "90 Grammes" will be on view through April 6, 2008 at the Art Produce Gallery, 3139 University Avenue, San Diego, CA 92104. Please call 619.584.4448 for more information and gallery hours. Or check out the review of the show at SignOnSanDiego.com here for a taste of what awaits you.

KAI1 is participating in "COPY" which is also on view at the Simayspace Gallery located within the Art Academy of San Diego, and features local San Diego artists Joey Burns and Richard Gleaves along with Kevin Freitas, Herve Crespel, Bret Barrett and Tom Torluemke. The Academy is located at 840 G Street downtown San Diego. Call 619.231.3900 for more information and opening hours. Check 'em both out, you'll be glad you did!

90 Grammes - the weight of kraft paper ....

COPY


The present age … prefers the sign to the thing signified, the copy to the original, fancy to reality, the appearance to the essence … for in these days illusion only is sacred, truth profane.
-- Ludwig Feuerbach

Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works. You do more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it. Then you do something else. The trick is the doing something else.
-- Tom Peters

No.thing Works
-- Gordon Matta-Clark





FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Artists: Joey Burns, Hervé Crespel, Kevin Freitas, Richard Gleaves, KAI1, Tom Torluemke
Show title: COPY
Show dates: March 7, 2008 –April 25, 2008
Reception: Friday, March 7 6-9pm
Gallery hours: Monday-Friday 9am – 6pm & Saturday 9am – 1pm
Contact: Kevin Freitas (619.337.4891) or Doug Simay (619.231.3900)
Simayspace @ the Academy
The Art Academy of San Diego
840 G Street
San Diego, CA 92101

COPY features installation work and collages by San Diego artists Richard Gleaves and Joey Burns, drawings by French artist Hervé Crespel and by Indiana/Chicago artist Tom Torluemke, and a mural by Arizona graffitist KAI1. It also includes an opening-night performance by Kevin Freitas, San Diego arts writer and founder of the art blog www.artasauthority.com.

With roots back to the 14th century, the word copy has acquired many meanings and usages. The one most commonly used by artists and laymen alike is: “an imitation, transcript, or reproduction of an original work.” Yet this does not capture the unique ability of the copyist to diverge from the original, unintentionally or otherwise. This ability embodies the beauty and intrigue, the power that the copy holds over the original. It also embodies the beauty of the word itself, which can denote so many things: political, religious, social, artistic, sexual, mass-produced, and even terroristic.

In keeping with this theme the art and performance featured in COPY will be subjected to various acts and forms of copying, blurring the boundaries between copy and original, critic and artist, text and image. Whatever truths result will reside strictly in the eye of the beholder.


www.artacademyofsandiego.com

www.simayspace.com/index.html

www.artasauthority.com

Spun by Art as Authority at 09:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

90 Grammes - the weight of kraft paper ....

In progress

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