Chris and a second UK artist, Liz Harrison, both did installation works in my gallery, while the remaining artists, Mickey Dell, Paul Malone, and Nicola Rae, exhibited their works at the Maison de l'Art Actuel. The site-specific work Chris placed in the gallery, Red Wine, was made up of 500 8 mm x 1500 mm glass tubes, 30 litres of red Gallo wine, rubber stoppers, filled to the brim, and the patience to line them all up, side by side, against the gallery wall and storefront window. The gallery, a former cafe bar, fit perfectly with Chris' work in both concept and idea. Here is what he has to say about the piece:

Red wine has an enormous history, it is the embodiment of time. It has an inherent depth of process; of making; of maturing. It is metaphysical and scientific. There is immense poetry in the concept of wine, its associations, its symbolism. It has a magical presence in its colour and transmission of light.

KAI1: Alright man – tell me about doing some graffiti.

SOKE: What types of graffiti are you talking about?

K: Whatever types of graffiti you like to do man.

S: As long as its graffiti I like to do everything. I prefer doing filler bombs with black and white, preferably Kilz tips as high as I can reach on freeways and abandoned buildings. I also like to use the canvas of nice vehicles leaving the club, such as Hummers i.e. Escalades, any kind of Audi, even if it’s a nice Mitsubishi. I like to adorn them with my name in numerous places.

Every bag purchased will come with a 8" x 10" color photo of the installation, artist bio, and press clippings. (see image below) Please direct all inquiries and questions to artasauthority@artasauthority.com All purchases will be securely packed and fully insured for shipping. Shipping: $15 in the U.S. Outside the U.S. - please inquire for rate. Please specify the size, and the number of the bag - in brackets [ ]
Don't wait, get the one you want now!



Installation Art Produce Gallery - March 2008




10" x 12.5" $75.00 each



size/number: 10" x 12.5" - [1] $75.00


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Si vous cherchez fébrilement le moment propice pour vous précipiter découvrir la
dernière expo de la saison, nous vous suggérons l'une des plusieurs collaborations qui sont prévues:

Le 17 mai à 18h30, lors du vernissage : intervention du cuisinier créateur Pierre Moussaoui
le 6 juin à 20h : soirée performances avec Sylvie Alexandre (performance voix/labyrinthe vocal), Benoît Casas (artiste, poète, performeur, éditeur), et Patrick Martin (musicien botaniste).

Exposition: 26 avril 2008 au 21 juin 2008 / april 26 - june 21, 2008
vernissage / opening: le samedi 17 mai de 17h à 20h / the 17th of May from 5 to 8 pm

le petit lieu poileboine
8-10 rue de l'église de Vaucelles
14000 Caen
tel. 011332 31 83 20 35

I wanted to post Ed's piece for its humorous and satirical take on the "Innocence is Questionable" exhibit at the CCA, but also because it conveniently fell inline with my own sentiments - and I mean exactly. Besides, if you don't show up for the party that was planned and given in your honor - uh, that would be the artists in the exhibit - you never hear what good was said about you. It is unfortunate for them but great for Ed, and wonderful for us. Thanks Ed, stop by anytime. kf

HE name of this exhibit is, “Innocence is Questionable,” about which, the brochure says, “Ultimately, what each of these artists question is whether or not the folly of the world is the responsibility of man?”

It’s a synopsis which makes me wonder, how does a great artist illustrate the subjects he or she finds “questionable”?

I look at these paintings and I see the man-made uglies of this urban life made beautiful: The mall escalator, the casino, the toilet in the desert, even the depiction of Best Buy, so bounteous, and blue, and expansive that it becomes a planet unto itself; making me instantly understand that I need another flat screen TV – you know – for the bathroom.

Housing being too expensive in San Diego, I set out to realize my lifelong dream of homeownership by approaching the problem as an art project.

Behold the power of the white cube, temple of the contemplative arts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96TyAQ7KnVQ

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.

Exhibit ends Friday, April 25th - HURRY!

(sculpture pictured above) El Anatsui - "Earth Growing Roots"
Collection of Nancy and Dave Gill
Courtesy Jack Shainman Gallery, New York


Well, miracles can happen it seems, and having El Anatsui's work on exhibit here in San Diego is, it appears, one of those times. I saw a larger show of his work in the Fowler Museum at UCLA last year, and have been a devoted fan ever since. El Anatsui is originally from Ghana and is currently Professor of Sculpture at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria.

"Earth Growing Roots" was organized by Tina Yapelli, director of the University Art Gallery at San Diego State. This show, much smaller in scale than its counterpart in UCLA, only contains seven works, modest in size, with the exception of an untitled work measuring 123 x 195 inches. Yapelli writes, in a small exhibit brochure (for those of you unfamiliar with El Anatsui's pieces), "Using copper wire, El Anatsui joins together foil bottleneck wrappers and metal bottle caps - refuse from empty liquor containers - to create colorful, fabric-like wall sculptures that juxtapose the social, political and cultural history of Africa with the stylistic and conceptual idioms of Western art practice... They (also) refer to the traditional woven kente cloth and stamped adinkra symbols of Ghana, the reductive imagery of geometric abstract painting, the pressing ecological issues of consumerism and waste, and the historical and ongoing impacts of the global marketplace."

I'm not so sure, that one or any, artwork, can possibly make so many claims, but even so, these smaller pieces appear to be more formally "self-conscious" and structurized, moving from the traditional motif to the more stylized, literal, and graphic. For example, a work like "Bleeding Takari," riddled with square holes of red metal, pours out brightly colored hemoglobin ribbons, down to the metal fabrics edge and beyond, as they appear to cling and drip onto the polished gallery floors.

Still, this exhibit is stunning in it's presentation and will likely leave you asking for more. It should not be missed; hurry though, it's only on view until May 7th.

Occasionally Paula, who lives in New York, would ask me if I could find out (via computer - my cousin doesn't do computers) if Julie Heffernan was showing in the NY area. To make a long story shorter, Paula became obsessed with Julie's art, and I had gone onto other things. Fast forward 2 1/2 years. I was checking the Night and Day section of our paper recently to see if a local gallery I was interested in was listed among the chosen few. It was not. However, on that very page, my eyes caught an artist's name that I would normally associate with showing only in LA or NYC. It was none other than Julie Heffernan! AND... she was showing at the LUX Art Institute in Encinitas - a place I had heard about but never been, yet!



Julie Heffernan - Self Portrait with Men in Hats,
oil on canvas, 2007 Courtesy PPOW Gallery


OMG!! Do I dare call my cousin Paula and tell her WHO is showing here?? Would she have a heart attack? Unfortunately, she and her family are struggling financially, and a flight out here to see the show would only add more $$ to their 6-figure debt. But I did tell Paula, and, as upset as she was, wanted me to "claw" all Heffernan literature, postcards, ("oh and if there is a catalog of the show, please please please?!" ) when I go to LUX. Not wasting any time, I phoned LUX for directions (I sort of knew the general vicinity) and was a bit surprised when they told me it was behind a Kindercare - HA! I could see the wee ones skipping uphill behind their facility to get some culture at LUX!

If you read LUX's mission statement below, you see the words - "make art more accessible - see the artistic process firsthand - internationally recognized artists." I like that! So, I decided to go on a Friday afternoon to see this artistic process firsthand by the artist my cousin would KILL to see again, let alone to watch her paint (please email me your donations to transport my cousin out here).

I was captivated by LUX, the building looks like something out of the pages of dwell magazine. I COULD live in it - EASILY - for those of you not familiar with dwell, the building is very minimally modernistic. It was designed by Renzo Zecchetto (oh how I love those Italians, they KNOW how to design). Nestled into a hillside, it is one of only a few "green" buildings in SD county. WOW!! As I approached the gallery and resident artist "studio," I noticed a beautifully draped section of the gallery. Some of the sheer white curtain was pulled back so you could view the artist creating a new work. And lo and behold, there was Julie Heffernan, with a few brushes in her hand, busily sketching onto a large canvas. I could smell the oil paint so strongly, an odor I never get to smell (I paint with innocent acrylics). The radio was stationed on talk radio, a folding chair, a table full of paint tubes, the usual studio accoutrements!

"Turgid"
Main Entry: tur·gid
Function: adjective
Etymology: Latin turgidus, from turgēre to be swollen
Date: 1620
1: being in a state of distension : swollen, tumid [turgid limbs]; especially : exhibiting turgor
2: excessively embellished in style or language : bombastic, pompous [turgid prose]
--Merriam-Webster

"Noyer le poisson" (lit. "to drown the fish")
French slang
1: to cloud or dilute, blend. hide truth [fish tale]



Egyptian; Lisht North - Gold, beryl - ca. 1981–1640 B.C., The Metropolitan Museum of Art
"Ancient Egyptians called fish amulets like this nekhau and gave them to young girls to wear as a charm against drowning."


FACT #1: I've been hesitant to tresspass upon an exhibit, that, I am simultaneously involved in as public spectator (art critic, if you will) and unpaid participant, insomuch as my participation is not related to the show's organization, but its support.

FACT #2: I haven't picked up a copy of TIME magazine in over 10 years. I stopped reading TIME - I never read the whole magazine anyway, just the art reviews - when Robert Hughes left his outpost as the magazine's art critic. Born in Australia, Hughes, among other professional and literary activities inbetween, moved to New York in 1970 to become TIME magazine's leading and most influential critic of the arts. He is an obvious hero of mine, a major influence, and a consistent inspiration to this day. I still recall, screening The Shock of the New on VHS, in the University's (UCD) lecture hall during a class entitled, Art Since 1945.

FACT #3: Ignorance is bliss, and so, I have not read anything by TIME magazine's (new?) critic Richard Lacayo, until now. I'm going to start though, if his recent article, The Decline and Fall of Western Civilization, and the quote referenced above, are any indication of the commentary I'll be viewing.

City officials suspect that 40 percent of Los Angeles' 11,000 billboards were installed illegally, and that the city Building and Safety department has not been enforcing the billboard laws.

In 2002 the LA City Council voted to require city inspectors to inventory all existing billboards. One month later the billboard companies filed a federal court injunction which stopped the inventory effort.

A 2006 legal settlement with the city allowed the billboard companies to begin converting a portion of their billboards to electronic LED displays. In return the companies agreed to provide the city with a list of all their billboards, both legal and illegal.

Two weeks ago the City Council learned that rather than providing the list, the companies instead delivered several boxes of documents and an unreadable electronic file purporting to contain the list.

CBS and Clear Channel, two of the largest billboard companies, are now suing the city to prevent it from releasing any list of billboards to the public, on the grounds that such a list constitutes a "trade secret."

City activists have demanded that the list be made public so they can protest the billboards that illegally deface the city.

Link

SD Art PRIZE: Recognition of Excellence in the Visual Art

Performance Slam multi-genre Invitational, April 20 from 5 to 7 pm in support of the exhibition, Innocence is Questionable

Featuring 2006/2007 SD Art Prize Artists:
Raul Guerrero and emerging artist Yvonne Venegas
Jean Lowe and emerging Artist Iana Quesnell
Ernest Silva and emerging Artist May-ling Martinez

Performers:
Art criticism - Kevin Freitas, Art as Authority
Dance - Sara Plaisted, Urban Tribal Dance
Instrumental - Zuriel Waters
Poetry - Jaysen Waller
Performance art - Ted Washington, Pruitt Igoe
Satire - Ed Decker
Theater - Marilyn Klisser and Aura Thielen, Emerge Art Center
Stage Manager - Mercedes Casey

You can also see some of Tom's drawings here in San Diego, currently on view in the COPY exhibit, downtown, at Simayspace Gallery through April 25th.

Read an excerpt of the Terre Haute article below.


Onlookers being drawn to new mural as artists begin work on ‘story’
New artwork expected to be complete by early May

By Deb Kelly
The Tribune-Star

TERRE HAUTE — The picture beginning to emerge on the north wall of the Booker T. Washington Park Community Center already has begun to attract some attention from curious onlookers, according to the artist.

Tom Torluemke, a painter ... continue reading