art-praxis-blog

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Explosive bursts of fire open Technology/Transformation, an incendiary deconstruction of the ideology embedded in television form and pop cultural iconography. Appropriating imagery from the 1970s TV series Wonder Woman, Birnbaum isolates and repeats the moment of the "real" woman's symbolic transformation into super-hero. Entrapped in her magical metamorphosis by Birnbaum's stuttering edits, Wonder Woman spins dizzily like a music-box doll. Through radical manipulation of this female Pop icon, she subverts its meaning within the television text. Arresting the flow of images through fragmentation and repetition, Birnbaum condenses the comic-book narrative — Wonder Woman deflects bullets off her bracelets, "cuts" her throat in a hall of mirrors — distilling its essence to allow the subtext to emerge. In a further textual deconstruction, she spells out the words to the song Wonder Woman in Discoland on the screen. The lyrics' double entendres ("Get us out from under... Wonder Woman") reveal the sexual source of the superwoman's supposed empowerment: "Shake thy Wonder Maker." Writing about the "stutter-step progression of 'extended moments' of transformation from Wonder Woman," Birnbaum states, "The abbreviated narrative — running, spinning, saving a man — allows the underlying theme to surface: psychological transformation versus television product. Real becomes Wonder in order to "do good" (be moral) in an (a) or (im)moral society."

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Meet the Kids in the Hall at the Whitney Biennialby by Stephanie Eckardt 

From the handful of 20-something artists that snuck into the latest Whitney Biennial to the 30-something curators that organized it, the Whitney Museum suddenly seems awash in youth (not to mention it's the first biennial in its brand-new building). That's especially true now that the show has opened to the public, revealing a crew of kids camped out directly at its center—a set of eerie, Nikes-wearing figures created by the Brooklyn-based artist Ajay Kurian, last seen hanging (literally) in the main stairwell on a series of wires that stretch from the museum's basement to its fifth floor.

Made of steel, epoxy resin, and polystyrene foam, and altogether titled Childermass, some of these youth sculptures seem downright diabolical, with features like metal claws for hands and a t-shirt emblazoned with the questionable slogan "ALL HOLES MATTER." But other than a giant figure with underwear pulled woefully over his head, as if he had been bullied, most appear to be simply misbehaving, like a disco ball-headed one or a glitzy chameleon with retroreflectors for eyes that seems created to show off its fur stole. Kurian may have intended the latter as "simultaneously open, changeable, and tyrannical"—as an allegory for today’s political climate—but it's actually the most delightful of the bunch, especially for all the Instagrammers out there.

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Ajay Kurian’s View of "Comfort Zone #3 (Heaven is for smokers and non-smokers alike)," 2014, Artspeak, Vancouver.

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Excerpt from “Interview: Emerging (and Rising) Artist Ajay Kurian’s Futures Long Since Passed” by Owen Duffy

If we are to believe artist Hito Steyerl, then ours is an age of planetary civil war. With conflict distributed across the globe, there’s a lot about the contemporary we might want to escape. For some, science-fiction is the lifeboat to new worlds beyond our immediate reality. But the most sophisticated science-fiction is always about the here and now; it defamiliarizes our experience of the present to make what we think we know strange. Many artists like Cao Fei, Amy Brener, and Steyerl have embraced art’s world-making potential to suggest alternative localities, modes of production, and politics. Current or recent exhibitions like the 11th Gwangju Biennale, titled “The Eighth Climate (What Does Art Do?),” and the 20th Sydney Biennale (“The Future Is Already Here – It’s Just Not Evenly Distributed”), function like seismographs, conglomerated readings of the present to ultimately explore art’s capacity to redirect our future.

Ajay Kurian is one such contemporary artist who uses eclectic materials–gold-plated ostrich eggs, gummy bears, and vaporizers – to postulate new worlds without leaving ours. Since 2015, the 32 year-old has had four solo presentations at JOAN in Los Angeles, White Flag Projects in St. Louis, Rowhouse Project in Baltimore, and Art Basel Statements, and was also featured in the most recent edition of MoMA PS1’s Greater New York. In our conversation, we discuss his vision of a future long since passed. Kurian also speaks to the unlikelihoods or anomalies in his emerging career: being brought up in an Indian family in white suburbia, and making a career without an MFA. His solo show, The Dreamers, will be on view at 47 Canal from September 10 to October 16.

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“Salome Asega is an important figure to include in the developing lexicon around futurism and participatory design. Her innate desire and ability to incorporate participatory research in an effort to fabricate interactive installation is an asset to the mining of black culture. We see this in a recent project in collaboration with Ayodamola Tanimowo Okunseinde entitled The IyapoRepository. In it, the duo collects crowd-sourced manuscripts to create a collection of physical and digital artefacts to affirm and forecast representations of what blackness could become in the future. I think too, Salome’s work is a part of this larger new school of creative technologists – like Jacolby Satterwhite, Complex Movements and Onyx Ashanti – who include ephemeral, digital, and science fictional elements of design to imagine utopias for people of colour.”

–Taylor Renee Aldridge

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Film Stills and Qoutes from Gregg Bordowitz’s “Fast Trip Long Drop”

Son- “At the time I came out. I was forced to talk about my homosexuality because of AIDS and being  HIV positive”   

Dad- “This is the way things are there are a lot of worse things that can happen you can get hit by a bus tomorrow”

Mother- “I remember later on in the evening we went upstairs and watched television as if we were other people for a while. You say to yourself, okay I am going to come back to thinking about that; we’re going to have a break right now.”

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Wednesday [February 1, 1956] High Lane, Cheshire Dearest Donny, I wonder so much what you are doing, and I hope so much that you're having fun and interesting adventures. Wednesday! And when you get this it will be Thursday — and then there will only be Friday, Saturday, Sunday ... But I mustn't get rattled. I keep looking out anxiously at the snow which fell last night and wondering if more will fall and block the roads. But I'll get through somehow — like in that Courbet at the National Gallery. This house is as damp as a sponge, and cold — you can see your breath even when standing by the fire — and the sheets are damp like graveclothes and the books on the shelves smell of corpses. And in the kitchen and scullery there are very old smells of dried fat in skillets and old old black rags that are quite frighteningly filthy in a 19th century way, like something out of Oliver Twist. I don't say all this just in complaint. A lot of it is hilariously funny, or very touching, and I'm glad I came alone because it's really easier to take. I spend a lot of time scrubbing things. If only the pipes don't freeze! My mother is absolutely marvellous — sharp as a needle, sees well, hears perfectly, remembers everything, talks all day long. Poor Richard is turning rapidly in[to] a prematurely aged freak — his face around the nose is dark purple (bad circulation, I guess) and he has lost several of his teeth in front and he walks with a stoop and keeps his head down. But he is so kind and gentle and anxious to help. He fills my bed with hot water bottles, leaving marks on the sheets because his poor hands are chronically covered with coal dust. He is forever building fires or making tea which is pure liquid brass. They have two white cats. The female has a black smudge over one eye and she is fat with kittens, fathered by the other cat, her son. She is one of the best-looking cats I have ever seen, and she doesn't give a shit about any of us. If I didn't hate the cold so, I'd admit that this place is marvellously beautiful. Cobden Edge, the first ridge of moorland behind the house, is all white and there is a strange orange light on the snow; the bare trees are so black against it. Cheerful stamping men in mufflers bring milk and newspapers — from which I see that Emlyn Williams and Charlie Chaplin were both at Korda's funeral. Maybe Molly will fix for you to meet him — and/or Lady Olivier, who was there too?! Unless I send a telegram to the contrary, I will arrive at Euston Station Monday afternoon at 1:55. No need to meet me if you have something else to do. I just tell you so you'll know approximately when I'll be at the hotel — about 2:30. Leave word for me there if you're not coming to the station. (But I hope you do!) Imagine — this is the first letter I ever wrote you! I think about you all the time, and about times I might have been kinder and more understanding, and I make many resolutions for the future — some of which I hope I'll keep. In any case, all my love, Chris. [Autograph letter on printed letterhead of Wyberslegh Hall, High Lane, Stockport, Cheshire] February 1, 1956 [London] Dear Chris, It is freezing here. It snowed most of yesterday, and even began to lay on the iron steps outside the window. But today it is all gone, and though clear & sunny, it is much colder. I am still in bed (it's past 12) because it's the only warm place. I have been reading, and working on my play! I am amazed — I worked three and a half hours yesterday morning and three hours this morning, and now I have eight pages of solid notes and, I think, a very good outline for the first two acts! I've managed to think up a surprisingly well-constructed plot (although there is not much of a story) and already I know roughly what the third act will consist of. I feel quite silly, especially in the afternoon and early morning, when I think of writing this play, but nevertheless it is going well and it is fun. It's a very heavy drama — I hope this isn't a mistake — and not very original, but with a few surprises. As of yet, you have not appeared. It may very well be a thing of the past by next Monday — I really haven't written more than just a few snatches of dialogue yet. John (I don't even know his last name yet — Cuthbert's friend) called yesterday morning and took me to Fresh Airs last night. I thought it was dull and trivial, and very poorly organized and produced. Too much really amazingly trashy sentiment. I thought a revue was essentially based on gags and laughs, but right in the middle of supposedly funny skits were very serious, straight-faced sentimental numbers with nothing but the corniest lyrics. There were endless sets and costumes, all ugly, and the most amateurish dancing and pantomiming I've seen out of high school. Here and there were a few amusing gags, all very proper except for a terribly shocking skit about a Paris pissoir and some "asides" from Max Adrian (who got in drag, too), but the funniest thing was a political skit making fun of America doing her all to make Germany happy. John and I got along well — he's really very nice and has a lot of the same difficulties that I've got, so there's quite a bit for us to talk about. I took him to dinner at the Comedy and we had drinks at the hotel before dinner. He even invited me to spend a few days with him and Cuthbert, but I firmly refused — for various reasons. I think he is interested in me, but I most definitely don't reciprocate any kind of similar interest. No one else has called and I haven't made any calls myself. Yesterday I saw The Constant Husband with Rex Harrison and Margaret Leighton (it was very boring) and A Life at Stake with Angela Lansbury and Keith Andes, a quickie thriller made on location in L.A. with a weak, silly story but still interesting. She was good. You don't have to bother with either film, though. The day before I saw White Cargo, which was mild fun, and Moulin Rouge, which was still beautiful but unbelievably trashy and pompous and self-consciously chic, and in places really foul. Huston gives himself away in this. I saw The Boyfriend in the evening. It's not nearly as good as in New York and seemed very "joke's over" this time after one act. But I had a seat in the front row and flirted unmercifully with the chorus boys all through it. But I miss rides through London on old Dobbin (especially in the snow yesterday) and think a lot about him, sleeping in a strange stable, eating cold oats out of an ill-fitting feed bag and having no cat fur to keep him warm. And don't let them put any frozen bits in his mouth. And tell him an anxious Tabby is at the mercy of the RSPCA and counting the days till his return.

The Animals

Love Letters Between Christopher Isherwood And Don Bachardy

by CHRISTOPHER ISHERWOOD, DON BACHARDY and KATHERINE BUCKNELL

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For pride week: 

Author Christopher Isherwood and painter  Don Bachardy in front of David Hockney’s second partner paintings, 1968, acrylic on canvas. 

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“ Everywhere you look, this is a very document-focused documenta, its works tending to come with paperwork attached.” - Ben Davis Artnet News

Banu Cennetoglu

Gurbet’s Diary (27.07.1995–08.10.1997). 2016–17 82,661 words in mirror image, 107 days, and 145 press-ready lithographic limestone slabs Length: 900 cm, weight: 1800 kg Stone preparation and graining, text transferring, inking, and finishing: Keystone Editions, Berlin

The work is dedicated to Gurbetelli Ersöz, who was a journalist, and the only woman to hold the position of editor at a pro-Kurdish newspaper. After being arrested and tortured, she joined the guerilla, keeping a journal from 1995 until 1997 when she was killed. After its first publication in Germany in 1998, the diary was published in Turkey in 2014, but banned shortly after. The lithographic slabs contain the pages of the diary, ready to be printed again.

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there “is no document of civilization which is not at the same time a document of barbarism,” as Walter Benjamin wrote in the shadow of Nazism, some 77 years ago.

Walter Benjamin 

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Rebecca Belmore “Biinjiya’iing Onji (From inside)” (2017) installation on Filopappou Hill next to the Parthenon(© Fanis Vlastaras)

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Margaret Lee founder of 47 Canal 

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“Taylor’s visionary color-blocked image shifts time, imagining a visit between two power couples—20th century cultural legends spending time with today’s most influential, history-making cultural figures.”

Henry Taylor -  “Cicely and Miles Visit the Obamas” 

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The Matters (2016) - Lynette Yiadom-Boakye 

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Exhibition View "Lynette Yiadom-Boakye: Under-Song For A Cipher”