Shanghai at an Angle

A couple of weeks ago, we visited the Shanghai exhibition held at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. Although some of my classmates have already written about this exhibition on the blog, I wanted to write about my own experience.

Two days before our fieldtrip I injured my back. Needless to say, I was in a lot of pain and could barely walk. So, the day we went to visit the museum I was offered to be pushed around the exhibition on a wheelchair.

It was a very interesting experience looking at an exhibition from a wheelchair, when it’s designed for people of normal stature. Most of the artwork hanging on the walls I could appreciate, but some were too high, so I had to be pushed back to be able to see them. Some pieces were on display encased over tables, where it was very difficult for me to actually see what was in there because of the angle I could look from. What was very delighting to see on a wheelchair was the section in the exhibition where the museum was showing contemporary videos. The video exhibition is designed for people to sit and watch, as I can assess by all the chairs placed in auditorium mode in front of the screen. There, I felt comfortable appreciating the exhibition that was designed to be looked at from my angle.

Although I'm aware that most exhibition designs are created with the average walking person in mind, it got me thinking about all the people who cannot walk around a show as I did that day. Can we really design exhibitions that will accommodate both the walking viewer and the public in wheelchairs? Perhaps we should reconsider alternative angles of viewing artwork that are not necessarily in an upright standing position. We build museums and gallery spaces that are wheelchair accessible, but what about the exhibitions? I hope we can integrate all public into exhibition making, no matter from which physical position they may view artworks.

-- CLAUDIA SCHIDLOW

What We Want Is Free, or is it?

Published in 2005 by State University of New York Press

Five years ago, when the book What We Want is Free: Generosity and Exchange in Recent Art was published, its goal by the editor Ted Purves was to start a conversation about particular practices that began emerging in the late 90s; the act of giving, or gifting that began disrupting the cult of commodity that had dominated the art world for-almost-ever. Having come across this book now, in 2010, the material is not dated at all. The continued move by many artists to explore the ideas in this book continue to expand into even more defined practices. However, one irony that I found was that the cover price for this thin hardback was $50.

Artists have been dabbling in alternate ways to interact or engage with their audience, but the somewhat lofty notions of a roving audience that was eager for a chance to eat for free or get a free poster was in some ways a fantasy that was never realized in the same way that the artists dreamed. Not to dismiss the success or ambition by any projects like this, but there is an expectation that people will want something, and be grateful when they get it. I recall stories of one of the Felix Gonzalez-Torres (1957-1996) works that was at the American Pavilion at the 52nd Venice Biennale in 2007; the series of stacked posters that were free to roll up and take with you. Patrons who had rolled them up and had them sticking out of backpacks and back pockets like cumbersome fishing poles were either asked to not bring them into other pavilions because they might harm the works by accident, or they simply got tired of carrying them around. People that I talked to said that it was kind of funny to see them littered around the Biennale grounds, or stuffed into garbage cans haphazardly.

I mention this because there seems to be a difference in the intention of the artists, and the outcome that is a result of a kind of naive artist ego; where they never meet expectations. This being said, there are some projects that do truly connect and fulfill the hopes that the artists had when they began to dream them up. Mary Jane Jacob, former cheif curator of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and the MOCA in Los Angeles, starts the book off with the essay 'Reciprocal Generosity' that truly addresses many of my concerns when thinking about generosity as a mode of operating in the art world. For her starting point–once getting beyond some of the historical trend setters in the field, going as far back as the early 70s with artists like Gordon Matta-Clark–she admits, "...my engagement with this concept is a critique of the arts institution's relationship to its audience." If, as I would assume we all agree, that an arts institution–and more than that of a school, but rather that of a museum–operates from a position of privilege and power, Jacobs recognizes the essential equation that must be negotiated. If these privileged institutions,"'Charged with giving, the receiver–their audiences–is seen as being in need, lacking, or deficient," than what Jacobs so perfectly acknowledged is that for the act of generosity to perhaps be most successful, it must enter into public space and away from an institutional setting that constructs scarcity. Later in the book, what I see to be the most inventive works by the many artists that this book covers take place in the most non-art environments imaginable, giving the works the greatest chance at having an impact and living up to the concept of generosity.

Other essays really dial in a deeper critical engagement with the concepts of exchange and generosity. The idea of surplus and the construction of scarcity get addressed by Kate Fowle and Lars Bang Larsen. Tackling the notion of public space by unpacking the planning codes in San Francisco–which implement mandatory public space–is revealed to be what is described as 'institutionalized generosity.' Now, in the past few years after San Francisco re-fashioned Union Square–once an epi-center for assembly, where such legendary anarchist voices in labor and immigrant rights movements like Emma Goldman spoke to crowds–Union Square has been turned into a corporate staging grounds. On any given day if you try and cut through the square, or attempt to go have lunch and people watch, you are confronted by steel barricades at all entry points as teams of workers take down or put up massive climate controlled tents for corporate pow-wows. The 'institutionalized generosity' that is spoken of in this section of the book is directed at individual entities like the CNET building, which even though it is open to the public, it is still controlled by access and surveillance. The 'exchange' of space here is far from free. The farther we get from the urban center, we start to see that darlings of the 'relational aesthetics' brood like Rirkrit Tiravanija and his free curry lunches provided at Jack Hanley gallery back in the day get eclipsed by larger projects like THE LAND (1998-ongoing), where Tiravanija along with the collective Superflex and many local artists in Thailand initiated a project that developed artist residencies and also a kind of free open space where people could come and live, experiment and work the rice fields (this was not mentioned in the book.)

Jens Hanning Foreigners Free

In the second half of the book we are introduced to dozens of amazing artist projects that take on different facets of generosity and exchange. A favorite of mine was Danish artist Jens Haaning and his work FOREIGNERS FREE (1997-2001), where he simply placed text at the window of the museums that had invited him, reading-Foreigners Free, allowing any individual who was not a local in the country in question free admittance.

Michael Swaine Reap What You Sew

Other great projects that utilized the urban terrain were Michael Swaine's REAP WHAT YOU SEW (2002), where the artist walked the streets of San Francisco's Tenderloin district with a cart that had a sewing machine, offering to mend the clothes of anyone that needed his service. I was privileged enough to have seen Michael on many occasions doing this, and the way this work transformed the people on the streets was remarkable. Small crowds would hang out, socializing and having a moment that would brighten their day. Occasionally, I hear that Michael still rolls out his cart when he feels the need to. Jon Rubin, who is mentioned more then once in the book, has done such amazing works like The Hillman City FREEmobile in 2003, where a modified ice cream truck, of which Jon did all the modifications himself, was tricked out and offered to the community of a residential neighborhood in Seattle for the summer. Individuals, groups and families used the truck to distribute free goods and services to their fellow community members. Everything from homemade candle giveaways, free bicycle repair and line-dancing lessons were given out that summer. Jon Rubin is also the founder of the now legendary, but defunct Independent School of Art (ISA) which was a free art school started in San Francisco after an ambivalent stint as a teacher at the San Francisco Art Institute. He now teaches at Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania.

Jon Rubin The Hillman City FREEmobile

New practices have emerged in the years after this book came out, and new projects have been inspired by some classic works, like Joseph Beuys 700 Oaks project at Documenta 7 in 1982, where the process or sowing oak trees continues till this day under the auspices of the FIU (Free International University). Artist Pedro Reyes developed the project PARA POR PISTOLAS (Guns for Spades) in 2007, where, through a campaign of television commercials and public outreach, had members of one of the most gun totting communities in Mexico trade in guns for credit at local businesses for food or appliances. The guns were then crushed, melted down and turned into shovels at a local fabrication site, then distributed all over the city so that school children could plant trees with them. The project was, more than just steeped in an inventive strategy of exchange, but also became a kind of artist initiated alchemy. In the post-relational aesthetics art world, almost like the art worlds own little Post-Fordist moment, many artists are now involved in what is being called 'service-aesthetics', "...at the Whitney Biennial in New York [...] artist Bert Rodriguez presented In the Beginning . . . , 2008. The piece consisted of a simulacrum of a generic psychologist’s office—complete with de rigueur stuffed leather chairs and potted plant—in which the artist (although he is not a trained therapist) held forty-five-minute personal consultations."*

Exchange is now becoming an activity that, although still largely run by gallerist bloated events like Art Basel in Miami, or by auction houses all over Europe and Asia (Hong Kong is home to a new branch of Sotheby's which is becoming a huge player in the art market in Asia of the works of artists from the west) – yet the work covered in this book, as well as the other works I have mentioned, are harder to weave into the traditional methods of economic exchange embedded in the art worlds mechanisms. There are still ways that these artists mentioned above make money, but they survive more so off of grants, and funds earned through becoming educators as well as getting involved in social concerns in a variety of locales. The idea of the artist as commodity maker is starting to fade as we move into the twenty-first century, and as far as I am concerned, this has been a long time coming.

Stay tuned to this blog for my look at the published exhibition series CHARLEY by curators Massimiliano Gioni, Ali Subotnick and artist Maurizio Cattelan.

*From the Steven Henry Madoff article on Personal Transactions in Art, September 2008 issue of ARTFORUM.

-- VIOLET MENDONÇA

Searching For Feminist Traces Within SFAI MFA Performance

The artist Anna Mendieta who was born and raised in Cuba came to the United States in her early teens. Her work involved her body in ritual acts (often with the body absent) and is documented by photographs that exhibited the impression of her body on the landscape, reminiscent of ancient sculpture.

Anna Mendieta (Photo courtesy of Whitney Museum of American Art)

She has said, “My art is the way I re-establish bonds that unite me to the universe. It is a return to the maternal source. Through my earth/ body sculptures I become one with the earth… I become an extension of nature and nature becomes an extension of my body.” Ana Mendieta’s Earth Body, Sculpture and Performance, 1972–1985, were rigorous projects that included tough performances, which often responded to feminist concerns. In Mexico she made the first of her Siluetas (1973–80), symbolic and strange works in which she cut, burnt, drew or otherwise shaped a human silhouette, often her own, in the outdoors. In Cuba, she produced her Rupestrian Sculptures (1981), carving anthropomorphic shapes into ancient limestone grottoes. Terming her work as Earth Body to describe her ephemeral interventions. She drew heavily on research about indigenous beliefs and later tried to distance herself from her work’s association with feminist goddess cults, but did not completely succeed.

Taking this into consideration, I present you with a work I viewed as part of the performance exhibition in the Swell Gallery a few weeks back. Our colleague, Mick Larusso performed a piece he titled Breathing Landscape. He described the piece with the following text, “I will be laying nude on the ground with three cross-sections from a felled tree covering my body for an hour…. The piece relates to Ana Mendieta, since my body becomes a landscape. At the same time I address the guilt of deforestation in the ideology of environmentalism, since I am struggling under the weight of the tree stumps. I'm calling it Breathing Landscape.” The card that was placed on the wall to the right of where Mick was performing proposed,” The reclining body has often been related to the landscape. Can the weight of a freshly felled tree be sensed ion the body as remorse for an imagined lost relationship; with an ideal of wilderness?”

Mick Larusso Breathing Landscapes (Photo taken by Frida Cano)

Taking into consideration Mick’s intentions, as well as his reference to Anna Mendieta, I ask myself can a work so deeply invested in referencing goddess culture be seen in a performance by a white male in the space of a gallery? Is the effect of these “living sculptures” the same for the observer?

Mendieta’s ritualistic emphasis and the spiritual value attached to the female body in its absence and presence is key to her work. However the ritualistic emphasis in Mendieta’s work doesn’t seem as applicable to Larusso’s performance. It may be that his spectacle of pain provides him with a purifying effect in that it exemplifies the pain he feels as a result of the destruction of nature. Instead of humans destroying nature, nature is weighing heavy on humans. Rather than the symbiotic appearance seen in Mendietta's work, Larusso’s performance is much more of a confrontation and disruption. Like Ana, his body is his material and his performance is emotive and produces a human sculptural form that is deeply referential of form in it.

Mick Larusso Breathing Landscapes (Photo taken by Frida Cano)

A concern for many performance artists is the opportunity to “re-site” art outside of standard art appreciation systems, often as a protest against the objectification and commercialization of artwork, and as a way to provide for more of an exchange between artist and viewer. The denial of hierarchy of form and acceptance of artifice can be seen in Larusso’s piece however the effect of his work is unlike that of Mendieta’s, partially because of its lack of specific ritual, its disrupting nature and the fact that he is performing within a gallery space in an academic institution with an audience that is very exclusive and makes up only a small part of the general public. Had he performed his work in a more public space with somewhat of a reference to history or culture there may be more of a link to his indented historical reference and stronger social critique. What do you think?

-- KIM SILVA

Examining The di Rosa Preserve

Location: di Rosa Preserve 5200 Carneros Hwy Napa, CA 94559
Website: http://www.dirosaart.org/

Interior of gallery (Photo courtesy of http://www.dirosaart.org/)

After hearing about the di Rosa Preserve from several people since moving to the Bay Area, including my parents, I decided to make the trip out for my birthday, which coincided with spring break. I did not know what to expect, except for Bay Area contemporary art on a vineyard, it sounded like a perfect combination for me; wine and art, bring it on! We made a reservation for the “Discovery Tour”, supposedly lasting two hours (but wound up being more like three). The grounds and building upon arrival were spectacular with the 35-acre Winery Lake hugging the parking lot, it seemed the day was off to a great start. Entering the “Gatehouse Gallery” reminded me of many of the contemporary galleries in Chelsea with clean lines and poured concrete floors. The art in the gallery was a combination of works from the permanent collection and a rotating exhibition space that is currently showing, MFA Selections – A Salute to Emerging Artists from Bay Area Master’s of Fine Art Programs and will be up through June 12, 2010. The work was strong but did not indicate which programs the students were attending, which I thought was unfortunate, but maybe that is just me and my picky attention to detail.

Interior of home (Photo courtesy of http://www.dirosaart.org/)

The overbooked group (annoying) was gathered by two docents and told the ground rules, “stay together, don’t touch, don’t wander off, the lay of the land, etc” as well as some minimal background information on the collection and the di Rosa’s themselves, Rene and Veronica. It appeared that these docents as is the case in many institutions are people of a certain age who graciously donate their time but do not necessarily know much about the art they are guiding patrons through and have merely memorized a handbook and when one deviates from the questions they have memorized they become flustered and somewhat annoyed (hopefully Melina’s thesis will address these issues and set a new docent standard for US institutions.) Enough with the complaining, the group boarded the jitney and was driven onto the property which was full of breathtaking views reminiscent of Tuscany and I was itching to get off and explore the grounds.

Peacock (Photo courtesy of http://www.dirosaart.org/)

Another contemporary gallery space was welcomed and the permanent collection is housed here. The work ranged in skill, medium, size, etc as well as the presentation model. Some works were given a great deal of space and proper wall texts while others, in particular the photographs were crowded together and merely numbered, correlating to a checklist I would assume, though I found none. There were probably about 300 works in this gallery and there was much to see. There were works by Jay DeFeo, Joan Brown, Bruce Conner, Viola Frey, Robert Arneson, and David Best to name a few. I was not familiar with David Best’s car sculptures, which after researching I now realize the connection to Burning Man and the community effort to make his sculptures, but they were quite fascinating and there were two on view in the collection. I then got scolded for going outside to observe an intricate David Ireland installation with a flying angel sculpture that looked like something out of the Da Vinci Code, but was then led to my favorite aspect of the collection, the residence.

David Best Rhinocar (Photo courtesy of http://www.dirosaart.org/)

Led in through a precarious stained glass chapel like setting and made to meditate until the docent finally announced what was abundantly clear that the windows were not actually stained glass, but a computer program made to generate the illusion of futuristic stained-glass. This was the awkward part of the residence, but it quickly recovered once being led upstairs to the original house from 1855 that the di Rosa’s inhabited and hung their collection in a salon-style manner. Everything was left as the couple had intended and it was almost like visiting a natural history museum and the experience was eerie, quirky, non-thematic with over 100 works and much fun to see. I like seeing homes and being voyeuristic in general, so this was right up my ally. The architecture of the home is gorgeous as well as the land surrounding it, complete with over 6 peacocks who made themselves known by yelling and flaring their feathers, which left me in utter awe as to how such vibrant colors can actually occur in nature. To me, these were the best works in the collection. The house is surrounded by sculpture in the Courtyard and one can see from a distance the Sculpture Meadow that can be toured beginning in April and looks stunning.

Overall it was a good experience, with a lot of art to see of artists I was not familiar with and gorgeous land, a fun place to visit on a nice day in wine country.

-- MARLY HAMMER

Discussing The Fruit Fly With HP Mendoza

Originally posted at http://www.fruitflylife.com:

Fruit Fly (trailer) from H.P. Mendoza on Vimeo.

A few weeks ago I attended a screening of Fruit Fly at The Berkeley Pacific Film Archives. Currently wrapping up a worldwide tour, the film is HP Mendoza's directorial debut. Well known throughout The Bay Area and beyond for his modern interpretation of the musical, Mendoza gained notoriety when he both wrote/starred/composed in the 2006 indie sensation Colma: The Musical. Documenting youth in a suburban town south of San Francisco in which - as the tag line described - "the dead outnumber the living one thousand to one," the picture instantly gained a cult following. Backed by IFC and widely shown at film festivals across the globe, Colma: The Musical helped HP Mendoza attract a loyal and diverse fan base. And with Fruit Fly, Mendoza challenges the musical to an even greater degree.

The film stars L.A. Renigen as Bethesda, a Philippine migrant performance artist who recently moved into an artist commune in The Castro. The plot quickly unfurls and the protagonist finds that San Francisco is not the safe-haven she so craved. Instead, she is road blocked by failed auditions and the constant struggle to piece together her fragmented past. Thankfully, her ostentatious male, gay roommates ensure fun and excitement with every passing day. It is through these men and their subsequent posses that she discovers the term "fruit fly." Previously not aware of such a term, she adopts the label as she finds "fag hag" derogatory and crude. Did I mention Fruit Fly is a musical? So for our San Francisco readers, you too can giggle at chorus lines set outside The Cafe and rhythmic interludes with a Valencia backdrop.

Outside the theater I chatted with HP Mendoza about the transformation of terms and whether his feature was attempting to erase gay stereotypes. Noting that he himself does not have a fruit fly, he continued by stating,

"I'm not really trying to do anything to change the term 'fruit fly,' be it through reappropriation, reclamation, or redefinition. I just want to raise the dialogue. Notice there are two sides to the argument in the movie. I just got into it with someone on-line about the usage of the word 'nigga' by non-blacks. I then went into how we can't be too dogmatic about policing people and their words because we end up looking didactic. I used to crusade against the word 'lady' because it implied that the woman was owned by a 'lord.' Then I learned to just lighten the fuck up."

Well put HP. Well put. At first, the film left me neutral. However, upon further thought and investigation, I realized the brilliance. Fruit Fly is not a film attempting to reclaim gay culture or redefine the hetero-social bonds between homosexual men and straight counterparts. Instead, Fruit Fly is a film that expresses the liveliness of such friendships and the many way such relationships need not be over analyzed. Bethesda unassumingly entered into a gay-oriented circle upon moving to The United States. Such was not intentional. Though the film could attempt to further explain the how and why of her friendships with gay men, the film instead represents the simplicity of the fruit fly - gay male bond. In other words: the "just is" attitude of the fruit fly.

Unfortunately, due to the current economic climate, the movie is not receiving the funding necessary to garnish a wide release. Furthermore, due to the nature of the picture, the audience members have been limited. HP continued,

"I'm happy with the audience I've been getting, but I do hope that more Filipino women learn about this. I shit you not, twice, at different festivals, female performance artists from the Philippines have walked up to me saying they were looking for their biological moms."

For the few fortunate to view Fruit Fly, it seems each day is a bit more lyrical and a bit more colorful. A San Francisco homage painted with synthesized solos and more-real-than-one-might-think characters, Fruit Fly is definitely worthy of a Dolores Park screening. (And you can imagine, due to the title of the movie, I am as critical as they come.)

-- COURTNEY NICHOLS

Montgomery Gallery

Camille-Jacob Pissarro Upper Norwood, Londres

Location: 406 Jackson San Francisco, CA 94111
Website: http://www.montgomerygallery.com

Take of virtual tour of San Francisco’s Montgomery Gallery’s stand at TEFAF.

Founded in 1984, Montgomery Gallery deals in late 19th and early 20th century European and American paintings and sculpture. Located in Jackson Square, Montgomery Gallery currently is exhibiting Spring Selections of European and American 20th century works of art by Camille Pissarro, Albert Bierstadt, Auguste Renoir, Max Pechstein, and Norton Bush.

-- CHARLOTTE MILLER

Matisse To Malevich

Henri Matisse Game of Bowls

Exhibition Title: Matisse to Malevich: Pioneers of Modern Art from the Hermitage
Location: Hermitage Amsterdam
Dates: March 6 - September, 2010

Matisse to Malevich: Pioneers of Modern Art from the Hermitage is an exhibition that is taking place as the Hermitage Amsterdam from March 6 through September 2010. Displaying 75 works selected from the permanent collection of the Hermitage St. Petersburg, Matisse to Malevich displays works by the masters of Modern art such as Matisse, Picasso, Van Dogen, De Vlaminck, and Derain, but through the lens of two collectors: Ivan Morozov and Sergej Shchukin.

The two Russian collectors, Ivan Morozov (1871-1921) and Sergeij Shchukin (1854-1936) sought out revolutionary French art in order stimulate art in Russia. Shchukin bought 51 works by Picasso and 37 by Matisse thus dominating the art world in Russia. The works were displayed in their homes enabling young Russian artists to view French works of art. The start of WWI marked the end of Morozov and Shchukin’s collecting and during the October Revolution of 1917 the collections were confiscated. A major of the works in both collections were donated to the Hermitage in St. Petersburg.

Morozov fell in love with Impressionists such as Cezanne, Van Gogh, Dennis and Bonnard, while Shchukin sought after works by Matisse and Picasso. Shchukin’s collection included works by Matisse such as The Red Room, Game of Bowls, and Woman on a Terrace, which expressed his desire to find the latest and more revolutionary works of the European Avant-Garde. Shcukin also commissioned Matisse to paint Dance and Music for his staircase.

The exhibition takes an interesting angle on exhibiting the art historical narrative as the show includes a discussion of the collection aspect of works of art. The exhibiting provides a refreshing view on masterpieces of Modern art by bringing in the history of ownership of famous modern masterpieces. Matisse to Malevich expresses the profound impact that collectors can have on art history.

-- CHARLOTTE MILLER