Dennis Hopper 1936-2010

Land Art Road Trip

I've always wanted to do a cross country trip that involved exploring the wide range of land art across our country. Then a couple weeks back my friend, artist Megan Vossler, emailed saying see was embarking on such a trip with her friend Rhamy. They have a website recording this adventure called land land land ART ART ART! The duo are currently in Marfa. Be sure and check it out.


Destinations:

Arches National Park

Badlands National Park

Bonneville Salt Flats

Bryce Canyon National Park

Center for Land Use Interpretation

Donald Judd: Chinati Foundation

Michael Heiser: Double Negative

Nancy Holt: Sun Tunnels

Robert Smithson: Spiral Jetty

Walter de Maria: Lightning Field

White Sands National Monument

Zion National Park

About the project:

We are two California-to-Minnesota transplants (one an artist and teacher, the other a medical resident), chronicling a road trip we will take in May 2010 through the southwestern United States. Our purpose is to record our experience of the changing landscape, through drawings, photos, video, writing and sound. We’ll also be visiting as many of the major American land art sites as we can, to see how they’re holding up 30-plus years after their completion.

This trip has been partially funded by a generous travel and study grant from the Jerome Foundation in St Paul, MN.

image: Spiral Jetty, Robert Smithson

summing up the MTA

A great public intervention, well done.


via Luna Park/Hrag

@

Apparently MoMA has acquired the @ symbol for its permanent collection.

from their blog:

Contemporary art, architecture, and design can take on unexpected manifestations, from digital codes to Internet addresses and sets of instructions that can be transmitted only by the artist. The process by which such unconventional works are selected and acquired for our collection can take surprising turns as well, as can the mode in which they're eventually appreciated by our audiences. While installations have for decades provided museums with interesting challenges involving acquisition, storage, reproducibility, authorship, maintenance, manufacture, context--even questions about the essence of a work of art in itself--MoMA curators have recently ventured further; a good example is the recent acquisition by the Department of Media and Performance Art of Tino Sehgal's performance Kiss.

The acquisition of @ takes one more step. It relies on the assumption that physical possession of an object as a requirement for an acquisition is no longer necessary, and therefore it sets curators free to tag the world and acknowledge things that "cannot be had"--because they are too big (buildings, Boeing 747's, satellites), or because they are in the air and belong to everybody and to no one, like the @--as art objects befitting MoMA's collection. The same criteria of quality, relevance, and overall excellence shared by all objects in MoMA's collection also apply to these entities.

For more on the story and history of the symbol. Read here.

via:CORE 77

bunkART

I was a massive fan of Wacky Packages and Weird Wheels as a kid. If you're like me, you should be pleased to learn that Tom Bunk has a blog with tons of great stuff - bunkART. enjoy.

iheart

for our mindless holiday



via: thisisnthappiness

heading to New Orleans

The above Turner is heading to New Orleans from the Indianapolis Museum of Art as tribute for the Saints Super Bowl victory tonight. Tyler Green take a bow.

from the IMA:

The Fifth Plague of Egypt

Artist Turner, Joseph Mallord William
nationality British
birth-death April 23, 1775-December 19, 1851
Creation date 1800
Materials oil on canvas
Dimensions 48 x 72 in.
Location Charles O. McGaughey Gallery
Credit line Gift in memory of Evan F. Lilly
Accession number 55.24

Gallery Label

This dark, tempestuous painting marks the rise of Turner as a full-fledged Romantic painter. Relying on vast scale, dynamic movement, and dramatic subject, his composition appeals primarily to the emotions to communicate its message. Turner's motive for painting this canvas, which he exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1800, may have been a desire to impress British critics and viewers with his ability to handle serious themes. However, it does appear that the young painter mistitled his picture, as this canvas actually depicts the seventh plague of Egypt, when Moses stretched his arms toward heaven, and thunder, hail and fire rained on the pharaoh and his people.

Indianapolis Museum of Art: Highlights of the Collection (2005)

Gandhiwarmer

This past Saturday I had the pleasure of attending the Gandhiwarmer event at Union Square which was a memorial to honor the great peacemaker on the anniversary of his death. There was sitar music, rose petals, and hats and scarves for those in need. The event was conceived by an old peer from art school, Tippy Tippens. Personally this proved one of the better interactions with public sculpture I've seen of late. Despite the frigid temps their was much warmth in the air. For more pics and details head over to the official site.




image: Tippy Tippens

blue jay way

image: Simon Bliss

10 minutes de silence pour John Lennon

29 years ago


film: Raymond Depardon

Significant Objects

I'm betting that the plastic bottle may be the greatest signifier of our lost age. I hope I'm wrong but the ubiquity of the form says it will be major player for future archaeologists as they formulate their past.

Joshua Glenn and Rob Walker created the Significant Objects project earlier this year to prove the theory that a writer could invest an otherwise worthless object with value by making up a story about it. The objects are sold on Ebay and the proceeds go to the writer. Some have chosen to give the earnings to a favorite charity or cause. Reading the provenance of these odd artifacts of our consumer history is quite entertaining and gives a solid example of how alternative histories can easily make their place.

Prior Significant Object contributors include Maud Newton, Colson Whitehead, Aimee Bender, Jennifer Michael Hecht, William Gibson, Laura Lippman, Lizzie Skurnick, Nicholson Baker, Stephen Elliott, Todd Levin, Ben Greenman, Terese Svoboda, Shelley Jackson, Rosecrans Baldwin, Katharine Weber, and Matthew Battles.

hat tip: Maud Newton
image: Pink Horse
[The auction for this Significant Object, with story by Kate Bernheimer,
has ended. Original price: $1. Final price: $104.50.]

Letters of Note

I'm very excited to have been introduced to Letters of Note. Letters of Note is a blog based archive of correspondence - an attempt to gather and sort fascinating letters, postcards, telegrams, faxes, and memos. A fantastic idea and contribution to us all - well done Shaun Usher! The site accepts contributions so if you are a holder of letters you have an audience now. In looking through the site (which is updated several times a day) I'm moved by the scope and historical reach of the content. Truly fascinating stuff.

The above is a rejection letter from MOMA's Alfred Barr to an unknown but not entirely off the radar Andy Warhol.

Transcript
THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART NEW YORK
19 THE MUSEUM COLLECTIONS 11 WEST 53rd STREET
TELEPHONE: CIRCLE 5-8900 CABLES:
MODERN ART, NEW YORK

October 18, 1956


Dear Mr. Warhol:

Last week our Committee on the Museum Collections held its first meeting of the fall season and had a chance to study your drawing entitled Shoe which you so generously offered as a gift to the Museum.

I regret that I must report to you that the Committee decided, after careful consideration, that they ought not to accept it for our Collection.

Let me explain that because of our severely limited gallery and storage space we must turn down many gifts offered, since we feel it is not fair to accept as a gift a work which may be shown only infrequently.

Nevertheless, the Committee has asked me to pass on to you their thanks for your generous expression of interest in our Collection.

Sincerely, (Signed) Alfred H. Barr, Jr. Director of Museum Collections

Mr. Andy Warhol
242 Lexington Avenue
New York, New York

AHB:bj

P.S. The drawing may be picked up from the museum at your convenience.

The High Line opens

At long last, the High Line is now open to the public. Very exciting.



Image: Joel Sternfield

mapping U.S. migration flows

I'm guessing migration trends in the U.S. are heating up with the reshuffling of the economic order here at home. With foreclosures, immigration, major industry shifts and declines where are people thinking they can make a go of it?

Check out these these fascinating maps from Pew Social Trends which employ a clever and simple use of animation and stylized graphics.

Pew Social Trends:

"Who Moves? Who Stays Put? Where's Home?" [pewsocialtrends.org] is a set of geographical data visualizations that display patterns of domestic migration, that is movement of people among the nation's regions and states. They show gains and losses only from people who move from one state to another. The maps use estimates from the American Community Survey for 2005-2007, and from the American census from the 1980, 1990 and 2000 census.

via: information aesthetics

the most loathsome

So yes, I'm posting another list for our dearly departed 2008. Sometimes a list comes along that is so scathing, brilliant, and timely you have to look to it for guidance and perspective. I present Buffalo's the Beast - 50 Most Loathsome Americans. This is a brutishly cynical masterpiece about our collective narcissism and dysfunction. In other words it's mean - you'll love it. THE TOP 50

43. You

Charges: You think it’s your patriotic duty to spend money you don’t have on crap you don’t need. You think Hillary lost because of sexism, when it’s actually because she’s just a bad liar. You think Iraq is better off now than before we invaded, and don’t understand why they’re so ungrateful. You think Tim Russert was a great journalist. You’re hopping mad about an auto industry bailout that cost a squirt of piss compared to a Wall Street heist of galactic dimensions, due to a housing crash you somehow have blamed on minorities. It took you six years to figure out what a tool Bush is, but you think Obama will make it all better. You deem it hunky dory that we conduct national policy debates via 8-second clips from “The View.” You think God zapped humans into existence a few thousand years ago, although your appendix and wisdom teeth disagree. You like watching vicious assholes insult each other on TV. You support gun rights, because firing one gives you a chubby. You cuddle falsehoods and resent enlightenment. You think the fact that 43% of whites could stomach voting for an incredibly charismatic and eloquent light-skinned black guy who was raised by white people means racism is over. You think progressive taxation is socialism. 1 in 100 of you are in jail, and you think it should be more. You are shallow, inconsiderate, afraid, brand-conscious, sedentary, and totally self-obsessed. You are American.

Exhibit A: You’re more upset by Miley Cyrus’s glamour shots than the fact that you are a grown adult who is upset about Miley Cyrus.

hat tip: Jeffrey Weaver

2008 signoff

I think most of us are exhausted from 2008. Our world seems to escalate in randomness with each passing day. Let's hope 2009 brings less extremism of every order. Best Wishes!


image: Boston Globe

Concerning Bar Identity

Question- in a time of economic disarray, if the local bar moves does it retain any of it's prior identity? From the New York Times:

But if drinking and dining have always been a moveable feast in New York, is charisma cartable? Can the character of everything from venerable pubs to palatial eateries migrate with their names and owners? This portability issue has gained new urgency in a season of economic disarray, when property owners are less willing to extend the leases of even the most beloved old-timers. New York is so provincial, three blocks is a huge distance.

In New York, the cultural ramifications of a move are huge and the cross currents of the biggest building boom and economic crises in decades does not bode well for the local haunt or the over comfortable regular. Changing scene in Brooklyn has arguably eclipsed Manhattan. You find yourself routinely at a loss for all the new local spots mushrooming and at the same time lamenting that you now "hate the crowd" at most of the spots you've been anchored to for years. Here, the cultural turnover of a neighborhood has to be approaching the speed of light. It's not simply the old guard versus the transplants, it's the transplants versus the transplants too. I always assume that what makes a bar so great to be in is the place itself. A place built by the wear and tear of the clientele over the years. In New York, this often means a holdover from another era, heightening one's sense of legacy. In truth it is the balance of a predictable and familiar clientele with a storied room and bar. The local question is, will the "local" be part of the vernacular in the coming years in an atmosphere of rapid economic turnover and an increasingly transitory populace?


Hat tip: phronesisaical
Image: Rosemary's Tavern/NYMag

All Obama - the covers

I never did get a paper yesterday, but here is a link to all the cover pages from around the globe. Incredible.

happy halloween

Urgent help needed

Your Urgent Help Needed

Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a
transfer of funds of great magnitude.I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most
profitable to you.I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my
replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may
know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the
1990s. This transaction is 100% safe.

This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds
as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names
of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family
lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person
who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with
detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the
funds.

Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson

--

via: Angry Bear