Francising apexart

Apexart is a very cool, non-profit gallery in NYC. Every year it has a call for curatorial proposals from non-curators.

Now it has a call for "franchise" proposals. I've put franchise is in quotes because it's really about doing a one-off show outside of NYC, rather than opening up an on-going gallery.

apexart wants to come to you. Any city, any town, anywhere in the world. We are franchising a one-time exhibition opportunity where apexart will come to your city and appoint you the director of your own temporary non-profit exhibition space. For a four-week exhibition in May, 2009, and in the months preceding, you will be the director and/or curator and/or staff of your own institution with a budget, a salary, and complete control.

We will provide up to $10,000 USD in funding and the guidance to make your curated exhibition happen. In addition, prior to your show, we'll arrange to bring you to NYC for three days, all expenses paid, to visit apexart and meet our staff.

I don't know for sure, but I suspect all things being equal that apexart will give preference to proposals coming from cities that are further afield art-wise (i.e., I think a proposal coming from Deluth might have a better chance than a proposal coming from Los Angeles).

Studio 360 on New Media art

This weekend the public radio show Studio 360 had a interesting segment on new media art. The piece focuses Jonathan Carroll, who collects computer-based art, and deals with the difficulty tech-based art has had finding a commercial niche.

Here's the segment's audio:


Here's one of the works in Carroll's collection:

Eye Contact, Rafael Lozano Hemmer

Eye Contact shows 800 simultaneous videos of people at rest. When someone walks in detectable view, the miniature video portraits "wake up."

Susan Robb's "Warmth Giant Black Toobs"

Susan Robb is a Seattle-based artist whose work includes these 50' long, air-filled, sun-powered sculptures made out of garbage-can liners:

Warmth Giant Black Toobs, 2007
Susan Robb

At first the tubes seem to be moving in slow motion, but when humans enter the frame it becomes clear that the video's speed isn't manipulated.

Robb has also done some work where she creates a face out of landscape using image mirroring:

I Am A Land Animal, 2008
Susan Robb
Epson archival inkjet print, paper, glass, powder coated steel shelf
22 x 28 x 6 inches

It reminded me a bit of Anthroptic, a project I did with author Benjamin Rosenbaum in which we used facial recognition software to find faces where none exist (and tied them together using short stories):

"Citizens" from Anthroptic, 2006
Ethan Ham & Benjamin Rosenbaum
Photograph & audio

The story which goes with Citizens is one of my favorites from the series (I also particularly like The Gardeners of Rhododendrons). Click here to hear the audio read by the wonderful Vanessa Hart (or here to read the text).

Sculpture in Motion

The Atlanta Botanical Garden has a kinetic sculpture exhibit through October 31st. The show includes a couple of artists I blogged about before ( see the Tim Prentice and Sachiko Kodama posts).

In addition to Prentice's & Kodama's works, Zachary Coffin's Rockspinner 6 (2007) stands out:


To build the sculpture, Coffin found the exact center of gravity of the five-ton granite boulder and inset an extremely low-friction bearing and installed it on top of a stainless steel shaft.

Also notable is David Fried's Self Organizing Still Life (SOS), Terra Incognita (2008, 34" x 55" x 67"):


Other self-organizing still lifes (lives?) can be seen here.

I'm struck how Coffin and (especially) Fried have hidden the high tech processes & materials to present a seemingly simply work of art.

The World's Largest Wargaming Table

Timothy Hutchings
The World's Largest Wargaming Table, 2006
29' x 28' x 4' MDF, wood, styrofoam, etc.

I'm a fan of Timothy Hutchings's work.

His The World's Largest Wargaming Table is very striking. I love how it starts as a blank landscape and becomes populated by gallery visitors playing with it.

His cardboard works, which range from formalist studies to large-scale models, are quite interesting, too.

Hutchings also runs PlaGMaDA (The Play Generated Map and Document Archive), which I blogged about earlier.

Sunsetting technology

Sandy Smith's Mauritian Sunset (2006) converts obsolete computers into a wall of sunset.

If you're not inclined to epilepsy: Sandy Smith's website.

[via Make]

Machines by Michael Kontopoulos

Machines that Almost Fall Over from Michael Kontopoulos



Machine that Tries to Draw Circles from Michael Kontopoulos

[via John Michael Boling at Rhizome]

Ball-bearing balancing

Here's a neat project... the folks at the Real-Time Systems Laboratory (RETIS lab) of the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna in Pisa has a touchscreen platform that detects the position of a ball bearing. Two servo motors tilt the platform in order to keep the ball from rolling off.

[RETIS Lab via AI Robotics via BotJunkie via Electronics Lab via Make]

Trevor Paglen's Spy Satallites

KEYHOLE/IMPROVED CRYSTAL Optical Reconnaissance Satellite (USA 129) near Scorpio, 2007

Lacrosse/Onyx IV Near Alfirk (USA 152), 2008

Wired Magazine has an article about photographer Trevor Paglen's show at the Berkeley Art Museum:

His shots of 189 secret spy satellites are the subject of a new exhibit -- despite the fact that, officially speaking, the satellites don't exist. The Other Night Sky, on display at the University of California at Berkeley Art Museum through September 14, is only a small selection from the 1,500 astrophotographs Paglen has taken thus far.

...

"What would it mean to find these secret moons in orbit around the earth in the same way that Galileo found these moons that shouldn't exist in orbit around Jupiter?" Paglen says.

Satellites are just the latest in Paglen's photography of supposedly nonexistent subjects. To date, he's snapped haunting images of various military sites in the Nevada deserts, "torture taxis" (private planes that whisk people off to secret prisons without judicial oversight) and uniform patches from various top-secret military programs.

[via Art Threat]

Ranjit Bhatnagar's Trumpet Marine

Ranjit Bhatnagar's acoustic/kinetic sculpture Trumpet Marine was part of the 2008 Figment Festival on Governor's Island in the NYC harbor.


[via Make]

Marisa Writes Her Disseratation

Marisa Olson, performance-techno-artist/new-media-critic/curator, is writing her PhD dissertation as an online performance in 31 acts. From the project's website:

Veterans of web-based autobiographical performance, Olson and "Coach Mandiberg" have teamed-up to get Marisa through her dissertation by framing it as an act of endurance. Every day for the month of September, Olson will spend all day writing while webcam shots and screencaps of her desktop are automatically uploaded to the net every 60 seconds. This gesture of transparency is a continuation of Olson's research into the role of sousveillance in "The Art of Protest in Network Culture."

[via Networked_Performance]

Yale MFA student kicked out

Modern Art Notes included this in its last Friday Links post:

A Yale MFA student was kicked out of school because she "listened too much to her instructors' advice?"

That does sound ridiculous, but it makes perfect sense to me. The interactions between MFA students and their professors is an odd one and can be frustrating/mystifying to those involved who do not fully understand the format & goals.

The students' role in critiques is to distance themselves enough from their work so that they can participate with the faculty in deconstructing it and discussing its perceived merits and deficiencies. Ideally the student is simultaneously open to criticisms and ideas and firm & pushing back where appropriate.

Graduate students need to maintain their voice, integrity, & vision while genuinely considering the given feedback. This ideal is a tall order and its not uncommon for graduate students to be too obstinate or too accommodating (or waver between the two).

A student who too closely follows professors' advice isn't learning to be an artist--s/he's learning to be an artist's assistant. And the artwork will suffer because it will look like it's being pulled in six different directions.

When I was in graduate school my fellow students would occasionally complain about the feedback given by one professor during a studio visit was exactly opposite of another professor's opinion. I always enjoyed those situations because it indicated to me that there was no "right" answer and I could simply use my best judgment. In contrast, when every professor is in agreement about where an artwork is falling short, the student should really sit up and take note (& action).

For those who are interested in this topic, I'd recommend the The Critique Handbook by Kendall Buster & Paula Crawford. It really should be required reading for everyone entering an MFA program (though it is a bit pricey at $33 for 150 text-only pages).

Related post: How to Apply to a Studio Art MFA Program

Telemegaphone

Telemegaphone is a 23-foot loudspeaker of a Norwegian mountain. The loadspeaker receives phone calls and projects them out over the lovely and remote village of Dale.

The project (which just ended due to deer hunting season) powered the speakers using the wind--on calm days no calls received!

From the FAQ:

Some people complained that the volume was too loud for sleeping with open windows during calm, warm summer nights. After adjusting the volume slightly, others complained that the volume was now too weak.

One woman said: "This is great. I will sit on my porch with a cup of tea and listen to the world."

Another woman said: "We like things a little bit crazy here in Dale."

Expect many more opinions from Dale-ites to be published here in September.

The Present Group Retrospective

The Present Group is a cool art subscription service. Subscribers receive four small-editioned works of contemporary art per year.

If you're in the Bay Area, think about going to their one night, two-year retrospective show:

Where: 465 9th Street (9th and Broadway), Old Oakland
When: September 5th, 2008, 5-10PM

Included in the retrospective is Benjamin Rosenbaum's and my Anthroptic, which was The Present Group's premiere issue.

100 $ Grants

JSG Boggs, "$1 FUNback," 1998.

ASDF is a set of collaborative projects by Mylinh Trieu Nguyen and David Horvitz.

One of their current project is One Hundred $1 Grants, which offers, well, one hundred $1 grants:

ASDF is offering One Hundred $1 Grants. All selected projects will be available in a downloadable exhibition in February 2009. Anyone is eligible. There are no restrictions on proposed projects. All forms of creative activity are encouraged. Money can be used for cost of production or for monetary compensation.

The deadline is November 30, 2008

All recipients will be announced December 31, 2008. Projects should be completed January 31, 2009.

We will review each application.

To Apply:

Download the proposal form here. Email us when you have completed it.

Please put "100 $1 Grant Proposal" in your email subject.

[ via Art Fag City]