Well, some weekends I’m responsible and write a post prior to heading out of town, other times I’m not so disciplined, and say, watch the first season of The Wire instead. Needless to say, I’ve got no posts for today, but we’ll be back in full swing within a day or two. I hope you will enjoy this space panda in my absence.
Big trouble for Big Three automakers | csmonitor.com
"Shares of General Motors are trading at prices last seen in the 1950s, their value cut in half in just eight weeks. Ford and Chrysler are in even worse shape, analysts say. The sobering implication: The Big Three may have to become the Big Two…"
Uncomfortable Answers to Questions on the Economy - NYTimes.com
An uncomfortable read. Tough times ahead.
Recommended. *SVA’s Design Criticism Reading Series: Michael Bierut, Jennifer Kabat, Paul Lukas and Phil Patton
We are living in a golden age of the pseudo-meaningful stunt. After all, the democratization of bullshit on the Internet is making it harder and harder to get noticed….This week’s delicacy comes from Sotheby’s, which delivers the news that Damien Hirst has produced a golden calf.
I Don’t Have Time For Noncontroversial Art Exhibits | The Onion - America’s Finest News Source
"These days, my schedule is pretty packed. Take this week, for example. Monday: Abu Ghraib flip books. Tuesday: a blackface reenactment of the Reagan assassination attempt. Wednesday: drive upstate to watch an amputee roast and eat his own golden retrieve
Behind Walls of Warehouses, a Trove of Artwork - NYTimes.com
At the same time that art museums and galleries have developed larger collections, they have fewer options to expand. Perhaps inevitably, an art services industry that has sprung up in the dark warehouses of New York City’s boroughs is also growing.
Zoilus: Woah, oh, oh, we’re counting to four
Carl Wilson think’s Feist remake of 1 2 3 4 for sesame street improves upon the original. A nice compilation of Sesame street counting songs including one by Phillip Glass. Via: ss
Why Do People Love to Hate The New York Times?: Entertainment & Culture: vanityfair.com
There are some good David Carr quotes in this piece.
ArtCal - East Village / Lower East Side - Canada - Journey to the Center of Uranus
Recommended. Eunice Kim, Paul Slocum, Alistair Frost, Willy LeMaitre, Ida Ekblad, Bjorn Copeland, Lizzi Bougatsos, Theo Mercier, Rob Swainston, Jessica Jackson Hutchins
Web Worker Daily Archive - What You Should Know Before you Switch from BlackBerry to iPhone
Blackberry vrs iphone. via: Bloggy
New Museum Launches Triennial - ARTINFO.com
“Younger Than Jesus”, curated by Massimiliano Gioni, Laura Hoptman, and Lauren Cornell will focus on the work of artists born around 1980. “We want to find the defining factors that shape generational change.” says Gioni, “We will try to analyze how generations emerge”
Kriston Capps: Jesse Helms: The Intimidation of Art and the Art of Intimidation
“It would take a political genius to drum up enough public outrage over obscene art to make these real-life obscenities fade..,” Steiner says. That’s surely true…but this this sort of strategy—promote a distraction, distort its significance—is the GOP’s favorite brushstroke.
As relevant as Eric Fischl. New York art news, reviews and gossip.
Art Fag City is Paddy Johnson.
Everyone should watch “The Wire.” Best show on TV!
There aren’t enough superlatives to describe that show. Has Wallace broken your heart yet?
Not having read artnet in awhile, I found catching up over morning coffee on the Mia Me fair fiasco to the Saltz/Finch take on things amuZing. The writers seem worried about the encroaching commercialization of the art world and whether this could be bad. Are they serious? When has the art world not been commercial? The only difference is we now have minute by minute accounts everywhere on Net 2.0. And, amaZing still, sexual bartering has hardly been touched upon, although it has a great past as in Caravaggio’s famous exchange w/ a Cardinal where two of his altar boys were part of the purchase price being a favorite. Charlie Finch, what a hoot, paraphrasing here ‘oh God, it’s bad, so bad, my art world is just so bad doom gloom.’ My father use to say ” You want something to cry about, I’ll give you something to cry about.” Recently, Blackwater, the famous Eric Prince private militia of Chaney, airlifted from Kenya, free of charge, a number of rich CRC ‘missionaries’ (who could have cared less about Kenyan culture, not even knowing tribal names) to safety, leaving the ‘others’ to fend for themselves amid a militia raid. If Charlie wanted to rail against something worth while, this genocidal sleight of hand would be it. Instead he moaps about the loss of authenticity all the while ejaculating; boo-hoo-hoo, I killed the bunny. Somebody should slap the sappy waste. On the other bipolar hand, there is the Florida sunshine boy talking up the ‘fun’ concept that is the Met, let’s celebrate the world and go to Starbucks to talk about it. Yeah. Long Pause. Somebody tell Jerry it’s okay to start realizing we are on Charlie’s downward spiral.
Are you in LOVE with the show? It gets only better!
Denny Greenway: When has the art world not been commercial?
Ab Ex painters notoriously never sold work. Also, prior to the 80’s market boom, there was a time when gallery work seemed to have a stigma attached to it. So yes, there is a shift. I didn’t think Finch’s piece was all that bad, even if the topic is a little tiresome by now.
Everyone else: I’m TOTALLY ADDICTED. I have a couple more episodes before I finish the first season up, but that won’t happen until the weekend.
Yeah, well, Charlie’s discounting anything related to the Warhol phenomena is starting, for me to smell a little like gay bashing.
AFC: Ab Ex painters notoriously never sold work. That’s kinda old school info, is clearly the exception not the rule, and that needs to be qualified. Pollock after moving to LI had contracts w/ Guggenheim and Betty Parsons. He sold to insiders like JJ Sweeney, Ossorios and some art historians. DeKooning/KLine sold thru Julian Levy, according to E. Navaretta, b4 the Stable took off. They just claimed to not have money; like Monet did. Motherwell was well financed. Rothko sold later. Donald Dudd or Minimalists and the Castelli crowd all did well. As we know, Renaissance and Baroque painters did well; Delacroix, David, Ingres and so on to Picasso and Dali. Duchamp never suffered either and called his various stages ‘ … my whoring periods …’.
Finally, according to Grace Hartigan, who’s a good source, it’s not like these painters did not want to sell, they were dying to sell. The idea that Abx actors were core authenticity and above the commercial fray is fetching, but mythologizing.
Denny: All I’m saying is that the kind of market that existed then isn’t what we are looking at now. This isn’t an arguable point, though you’re right, it’s more nuanced than I chose to express.