Archive for the 'Artist Talk' Category
Saturday, February 27th, 2010
Big Week for Fairey Amidst Growing Controversy
Art of Elysium’s 2010 Heaven Gala (Image via Art of Elysium)
It wouldn’t be a week without some sort of news from the Shepard Fairey camp, and this one is jam packed.
Fairey was named Visionary of the Year and lent design and decoration to children’s charity The Art of Elysium’s 2010 Annual Heaven Gala (pictured above). Fairey is participating in their annual benefit auction, and has donated several items to the fundraising event. The most exciting lot is a personal portrait sitting with the artist. The winning bidder will be entitled to a visit with Fairey for a photo shoot, which the artist will use to create a one of a kind 30″ X 44″ mixed media canvas. The prize is valued at $30-$40,000 for the in person sitting and final artwork (or $20-$30,000 if photos are sent). Other lots include unique 40″ x 60″ canvas depicting his Burmese Monk image, estimated at $20,000, and a rather quirky one of a kind collaged 7 foot lamp, valued at $7,500 (both pictured below). Both the portrait sitting and Burmese Monk can be bid on live via CharityBuzz until March 4, 12pm EST. If interested in the lamp, download an absentee bid form here
The opening of the third and final stop of his museum retrospective, Supply and Demand, set record attendance numbers at the Cincinatti Contemporary Arts Center this past week. Naturally, while in town, Fairey and crew were also out making their mark on the streets. (Lots more photos of the exhibition preparation, opening celebration, and outdoor campaign at the end of this post.)
(All museum and street images via Obey Clothing)
Next, Fairey’s design firm, Studio Number One, has lent their hand to titling sequences for the new Basquiat feature film, which can be seen in the trailer below.
Finally, the controversy over Fairey’s Obama portrait continues. The artist is now the subject of a federal grand jury criminal probe. Authorities are investigating whether Fairey violated federal laws prohibiting evidence tampering and perjury in connection to his copyright battle with the Associated Press. In October the artist released a public statement admitting, “in an attempt to conceal my mistake I submitted false images and deleted other images.” As noted by Copyrights and Campaigns, the criminal investigation hinges on whether or not Fairey (along with his wife) violated 18 U.S.C. §§ 1512(c)and 1621. Section 1512 makes it a crime to “alter, destroy, mutilate, or conceal an object with intent to impair the integrity or availability of the object for use in an official proceeding,” while section 1621 declares that any person who “willfully subscribes as true any material matter which he does not believe to be true…is guilty of perjury and shall, except as otherwise expressly provided by law, be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.”
Fairey has filed an injunction hoping to postpone the civil suit with AP. The injunction argues
“Plaintiffs submit that there is a compelling case for postponement. Mr. Fairey is now the subject of a criminal investigation…It appears that the AP is, at minimum, encouraging and supporting that criminal investigation. Mr. Fairey’s criminal defense counsel believes that a deposition at this time would prejudice him and impair council’s ability to properly represent Mr. Fairey. Therefor, if a deposition does take place while the criminal investigation is pending, counsel would advise Mr. Fairey to invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.”
While we here at TAC have supported Shepard’s fair use claims in creating his Obama portrait (which now sits in the National Portrait Gallery), we will wait for the facts to further develop before weighing in on the separate criminal investigation, and confine our comments to reporting the findings as they emerge.
Read on for more pictures from Cincinnati opening night and installation Read the rest of this entry »
Wednesday, February 24th, 2010
Kill Your Television :: Vote for Ben Jones’ TV Pilot
Your television is one step closer to the psychotic visions of multimedia artist Ben Jones. On his own and as one-third of art collective, Paper Rad, Jones’ paintings, comics, animations, and sculptural creations have been exhibited internationally at many notable museums and galleries, including the New Museum, MOMA, Tate Britain, Peres Projects, Deste Foundation, and Deitch Projects. Now Jones is in the running for a new series on the Adult Swim cable channel. Do your part and vote online for his pilot, Neon Knome here. The world will be a better place.
Check out NY Times’ profile and video interview with Ben here
UPDATE: The world is not ready.
Wednesday, February 24th, 2010
Ed Templeton Rising
Internationally recognized for his painting, drawing, sculpture, and photography, skate-icon and artist Ed Templeton has several significant projects in the works.
Most immediately, Templeton opens a new photo exhibit at Roberts + Tilton (Los Angeles) this Friday, Feb. 26. The works on display are culled from the artist’s personal archives, and were shot spontaneously from the inside of cars over a span of 15 years. Speaking of the project, Templeton says, “I never went out driving just to shoot pictures. Each one of these was shot going from point A to point B for some other reason, organically; they represent the in-between. Most of it is from my frequent visits to LA from my home in Huntington Beach, 1 hours’ drive south. But there is also a lot from taxi rides in Paris, Moscow, London, Barcelona, and St Petersburg.”
Next up , Templeton’s photography will be included in the 2010 Photography Biennial at MAMAC (Liege, Belgium), which runs Feb 28 – April 25. Lastly, his first solo museum exhibition, The Cemetery of Reason, opens at S.M.A.K. (Municipal Museum of Contemporary Art) in Ghent, Belgium on April 2, and will include works across multiple disciplines.
Ed Templeton – The Duality of Femininity, 2009 (Courtesy of Roberts + Tilton and Tim Van Laere)
Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010
Marcel Dzama at Montreal Museum of Contemporary Art
Marcel Dzama - On the banks of the Red River, 2008 (Collection Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal)
Dzama returns home with a new exhibit at the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal. While several pieces on display first appeared in his 2008 showing with David Zwirner (NY), Of Many Turns is the largest exhibition of Dzama’s works ever organized by a museum, focuses on the artist’s recent multidisciplinary accomplishments.
All images courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner, New York except where noted.
Marcel Dzama – Of Many Turns
Feb. 4 – April 25
Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal
185, Sainte-Catherine Ouest
Montréal, Québec H2X 3X5
Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010
Coming Soon :: Rosson Crow at Deitch
Rosson Crow is set to unveil a show at Deitch Projects on March 4. For the series, the young painter relocated to New York City to research and submerge herself into the downtown art scene. Like the image above recalling Haring’s Pop Shop, we anticipate the other large-scale oils to drip from the canvas, conjuring up spaces past and present and the renegade debauchery and free spiritedness of this movement.
The show is Crow’s first solo with the gallery, and one of the last before it permanently closes later this year.
Rosson Crow – Bowery Boys
March 4 – 27
Deitch Projects
18 Wooster Street
NY, NY 10013
Thursday, February 18th, 2010
Erik Parker in Copenhagen
(All Images: Anders Sune Berg, courtesy Faurschou CPH)
Faurschou Copenhagen is currently exhibiting new works by New York based painter, Erik Parker. Along with his previous exhibit at Paul Kasmin (NY), Parker’s tightly rendered, candy-colored psychedelia are easily his most accomplished works to date. As the show’s title suggests, Adapt signals an artist who, after more than a decade of patient development and experimentation, has reemerged with a bold and compelling style that no doubt can catapult him to increased notoriety.
Read On For More Images Read the rest of this entry »
Wednesday, February 10th, 2010
Jeff Koons and David Byrne: 77
Here we see a young Jeff Koons in candid conversation with musician, David Byrne. The chat took place at 52 Bond Street, widely known for housing many artists during the 70s, and located just across the street from CBGB, where Byrne’s band, The Talking Heads grew their early following. While the video title suggests the talk took place in 1975, references to Jimmy Carter’s upcoming presidency and celebrating New Year’s at a NY strip club indicates it most likely occurred in early January of 1977, just two months after The Talking Heads signed with Sire Records. Their first album, Talking Heads: 77, was released in September of that year.
In more timely news, on April 10 Byrne and Fatboy Slim will release Here Lies Love, their collaborative concept record about first lady of the Phillippines, Imelda Marcos. Listen to Please Don’t, the first single, here (via Stereogum)
Tuesday, February 9th, 2010
Tomokazu Matsuyama at Frey Norris, San Francisco
(All Images via Frey Norris Gallery)
Around the turn of the century 20th century, the U.S. embarked down a road of increasingly restrictive immigration policies, including the Chinese Exclusion (1882) and Emergency Quota Acts (1921, 1924). Such foreign policy effectively stifled the influx of immigrants, while appeasing growing nativist concerns. Included here was the Gentleman’s Agreement (1907), a mutual arrangement whereby the U.S. would not extend such restrictions to Japan, as long as the island empire agreed to cut off all further emigration to the U.S. And while the goal was partly to cool relations between the two nations, competing imperialistic hungers eventually reignited tensions that sparked the Pacific front of the Second World War. By 1942 FDR had signed Executive Order 9066, forcibly relocating over 100,000 Japanese-Americans to internment camps. It was only in 1988 that the federal government acknowledged the prejudice of its past policy, paying over $1.5 billion in reparations.
With In Case You’re Lost, Tomokazu Matsuyama not only works towards reconciling the cultural tensions of his own Japanese-American identity, but addresses larger issues of nationalism and global relations. Here is a complex mix of autobiographical and socio-political commentary.
Surrounded by new paintings are the show’s centerpieces – two large-scale sculptures that contemplate notions of cultural heritage and nationalism, flip-flopping symbols of American and Asian identity. Wherever I Am, a life-size reworking of Frederick Remington’s Bronco Buster, recasts the famed late 19th century American sculpture with a Japanese-pop sensibility, replacing the iconic cowboy rider with a Playmobil character. Chogen, based off the original 13th century Japanese treasure, substitutes the praying monk’s prayer beads for beer cans and cigarette butts, and his original meditative state, for a glazed-over drunken one.
Speaking of the new sculpture, Matsu notes, “I wanted to keep that rigourous, very expressionistic feature but flip to an American context, so what I did was I made him an alchoholic – like a drunk man in a sports bar…From a distance, he looks somewhat fanatic like its original. Close up, you’ll see his eye focus is gone and he’s just drunk. The eyes are actual glass eyes, made of gold leaf inside with the addition of my painting color scheme of neon pink and dark brown. The sculpture looks aged and few centuries old but the material used to paint it looks like 70s auto paint…[colliding] aged with the contemporary art material.”
Tomokazu Matsuyama - In Case You’re Lost
Frey Norris Gallery
456 Geary Street
San Francisco, CA 94102
Tuesday, February 9th, 2010
Last Chance :: Josh Keyes’ Fragment
(All Images Jeff Newman/TheArtCollectors)
Over the past few years Josh Keyes has fast built an almost fanatic collector base, with his last four shows selling out prior to opening. With Fragment, the Portland based painter further solidifies his appeal, as a waiting list of over 400 eager fans clamored for a chance at the ten 40″ x 30″ acrylic panels on view. Most of these paintings continue the familiar themes Keyes’ has been honing in on, with one piece taking on new ground – the plainly titled Self Portrait as an Old Man.
What makes Josh Keyes great is his mastery of both the overt and covert. First, there’s the hook. Through meticulously rendered and graphically compelling imagery, with obvious environmental and political connections, his works are instantly accessible. Yet, the complexity of these works, with deeper concerns borderlining on the metaphysical, is what makes them so compelling.
Josh Keyes – Fragment is on view until Feb. 13 at Jonathan LeVine, New York. Read on for our images from the show. Read the rest of this entry »
Monday, December 14th, 2009
Lowride to High Art :: Dzine at The Bass Museum
(All Images © Jeff Newman/TheArtCollectors)
Chicago based artist, Dzine (Carlos Rolon) appropriates the aesthetics of lowrider “Kustom [car] Kulture” into high art circles. In doing so, he redefines these objects, deeply rooted in Chicano ethnic and communal identities, as vibrant and viable works of sculpture.
As noted by Denise M. Sandoval in Cruising Through East Los Angeles: Chicano Lowrider Stories, “lowriders can be seen as embodiments of Mexican-American or Chicano social history, a heritage that is often misunderstood by other segments of the American populace…and speak to the creation of cultural space[s] within the urban environment…” While celebrating this heritage, Dzine simultaneously urges the viewer to see beyond such connections. “On one level its a folkloric tradition, but its also just one degree away from a Mariko Mori sculpture,” the artist reflected. “To put my work in a different environment where people might look at it as its Starke or Gerhy did it, is to make it aesthetic rather than sociological – to see this like I do, as a sculpture (Paper Magazine; Carlo McCormick, May 2008).
Dzine’s works are currently on view at The Bass Museum of Art, Miami (he also had a new work on display earlier this month with Deitch Projects at Art Basel, Miami – pictured below). The most innovative piece in the exhibit it a customized chandelier, tricked out with 24 karot gold, crystals, speakers, velvet, and rear view mirrors. Here, Dzine has flipped his usual method appropriation on its head, taking a high culture status symbol and reworking it into the lexicon of the street. With such compelling and instantly accessible works of art, we can’t help but imagine one of his wheeled-wonders bulldozing over Damien Hirst’s Diamond Skull. Here’s to wishful thinking.
Read on for our extensive images – click for larger views. Read the rest of this entry »