Early in the summer, I attached a ribbon around my wrist that I acquired at Rivane Neuenschwander's show, A Day Like Any Other. By October, my shiny ribbon had faded from lime green bracelet to a faded, sorry looking string scattered about my wrist. "I WISH I WAS A FAMOUS BASEBALL PLAYER," it read.
The ribbon came from her installation, "I Wish Your Wish," in which a room on the ground floor of the musuem was full of thousands of ribbons that visitors were invited to take with them. The project is based on a Brazilian tradition in which people tie colored ribbons onto their wrists and keep them until they fall off, at which point their wish is to be granted. However in Neuenschwander's version, we are wearing the wish of someone else in Brazil, ultimately deciding their wish's fate.
I do hope that on this day in October, some young man in Brazil hit a career-launching home run!
2. UNTITLED
Joel Mesler made the move onto the Lower East Side's main drag, Orchard Street, this fall with the opening of his new gallery, UNTITLED. Sure, it's no Sperone Westwater, but Andrew Ong (the designer and architect) held its own without the help of celebritect, Norman Foster. The new gallery space looks like it could be based in London with it's high, lofted ceilings, bright, ambient light, and perfectly unused white cube walls. It's almost hard to believe that a space this big exists on a block with little'ole storefronts, the gallery is a pocket-size illusion, currently holding thirty-six 8x4' paintings by Matthew Chambers, comfortably. I greatly enjoyed the opening exhibiton with gallery artists David Adamo, Heather Cook, Brendan Fowler, Rashind Johnson, and Phil Wagner. In fact, one of my favorite pieces of the year, maybe ever, is David Adamo's Untitled (Duet). Adamo's red and blue M&Ms lost (or hidden) on the concrete floor create a work of art that both perplexes and humors me (two of the most essential reactions a good work of art, in my preference, should evoke).
3. Bruce High Quality Foundation's intervention on the Bruno Bischofberger ad on the back cover of the October 2010 issue of Artforum
Those sneaky little tricksters.....
4. Robert Rauschenberg at Gagosian (Chelsea, 21st St)
As if you weren't already told by numerous art history textbooks, Robert Rauschenberg is one of the greatest artists of the 20th century, and by greatest, I guess I mean the greatest at artistic invention and innovation. If a contemporary artist working with digital materials (computer screens, projectors, video, sound, light, etc) is doing what Rauschenberg did with tangible materials (paint, canvas, fabric, found objects, etc), and to the same magnitude, please let me know.
5. The Former Convent of Saint Cecilia
Artists and curators began using the former Convent of of Saint Cecilia in Brooklyn a little over a year ago as an alternative exhibition space. The four-story, now delapadated building has housed dozens of exhibitions this year, and I frequented it a few times this fall to prepare for a show that I was curating there. Walking into the cold, quiet building on a dark October night was an eerie, yet invigorating experience. The building on its own, without or without art, has a mysterious tranquility and lots of character. In it's earlier stages, the 97-year old building served the Catholic parish in the Greenpoint/Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, whereas most recently, it serves young curators who have zealously curating shows that showcase new media, elaborate, internationally-collaborative installations, sound programs, and "phantasmagorical performances" (as one press release describes).
6. Eric Fertman at Susan Inglett
I really can't say why this ended up being one of my favorite exhibitions this fall, but for some reason this show really stuck with me. I only spent a short amount of time at the gallery, but what can I say, I'm a sucker for wood, and the more grain the better (***unabashed pun alert: considering the numerous phalluses in this show, I guess this I really did like wood!). Okay, for my younger readers (do I even have any?) and to my brothers who may be reading this, I apologize. On a more critical note, the natural grain of oak has an incredibly seductive texture, and when rounded and sanded into the shapes of Fertman's desire, the innate patterns become smooth and lucious (perhaps I'm using these adjectives because the brightly colored stains, magenta and lemon yellow, remind me of juicy fruits).
7. Fall Foliage
My favorite season! Really, no words can describe....I might as well just start a life-long project of writing a novel describing how much I love the changing colors of leaves in the fall....
8. Painting Comes Alive! at ArtJail
What is this gallery? Why have I never heard of it and what kind of funding backs it? I forgot how important clean, white walls and clean faciliities can be in securing the success of a show of abstract paintings. The floating walls were solid and pristine enough for the paintings (and some non-paintings, a la Courtney Puckett, Joy Curtis, and Justin Aidan) to really pop off the wall. Additionally, the organizers of the exhibition send out one of the best postcards I've seen in a while: a fold-out image of the album cover of "Frampton Comes Alive!" -- an image from 1976 graffitied and recontextualized for this 2010 painting show.
10. Artfrombehind
I have a guilty art world pleasure: i love looking at blogs that have pictures of openings, after-parties, performances, and dinners that I never went to. Out of them all, I most enjoy looking at Kathy Grayson's blog, www.artfrombehind.net. The website borders a fine line between a personal blog, an art blog, and a professional blog. I like it in the same way I like www.thesuperficial.com and any food porn website, especially www.thisiswhyyourefat.com. Grayson feels no need to hide behind her pristine, white gallery desk and act like a well-behaved gallerist -- she is having a freakin' ball running her newly opened gallery on Greene St, The Hole. She follows no rules, and is clearly very successful at her job as a dealer and curator. Drugs, yes. Sex, yes. Dinner, yes. Dinner on the sidewalk afterwards, why not. She lets her viewers in on every aspect of her life, where Art Rules Everything Around Kathy (AREAT, Ms. Grayson, you should think about getting some AREAT grills).
