The Whitney Museum of American Art has just released its list of artists participating in the 2006 Whitney Biennial. Curated by the Walker’s Philippe Vergne and the Whitney’s Chrissie Iles, the exhibition’s title, Day for Night, is derived from Francois Truffaut’s La Nuit américaine, a 1973 film that featured nighttime scenes shot during the day using special filters. (It also shares a name with a 2005 painting by Peter Doig, above.)
Of the first-ever titled Biennial, Iles says the exhibition “explores the artifice of American culture in what could be described as a pre-Enlightenment moment, in which culture is preoccupied with the irrational, the religious, the dark, the erotic, and the violent, filtered through a sense of flawed beauty. This reflective, restless mood is not unique to the United States; its presence across both America and Europe suggests a shift in the accepted values that have formed the basis of 20 th-century Western culture."
Details and the artist list here. Also: Carol Vogel’s “This Whitney Biennial Will Take In the World” in the New York Times.
As a delayed follow up to Paul’s post on the Performing Arts blog I’d like to mention the interview with Dave King on mnartists.org. It’s part of Radio mnartists an on going series of interviews by Marya Morstad.
For the full Radio mnartists.org podcast paste this URL into iTunes (or your podcast player of choice):
http://mnartists.org/tourContents.do?action=rss&rid=85725
As Modern Art Notes‘ Tyler Green told us long ago, the Smithsonian Museum of American Art is launching a blog. At last it’s online, and it’s manned by the able Grammar.police helmsman Kriston Capps. Check out Eye Level, a site that that’ll investigate “American art--its history, evolution, and currents.”
Speaking of Tyler: Green’s Los Angeles Times editorial on LACMA’s planned demolition–in three days–of a parking structure that’s home to murals by Barry McGee and the late Margaret Kilgallen is now online.
The photoshoppers at Fark are having their way with a Minneapolis icon (shown: Death Star Spoonbridge).
(Thanks, Mag.)
“Modernist prefab is still more of a meme than a marketplace,” writes fabprefab.com. But as the Walker exhibition Some Assembly Required: Contemporary Prefab Houses suggests, the meme is a strong one that’s quickly becoming reality. Opening December 8, the show features a dozen or so projects, from Lazor Office’s FlatPak to the sculptural metallic Turbulence House by Steven Holl. But my favorite is the BreezeHouse by Michelle Kaufmann Designs (above), mainly because its aims are ecological as well as aesthetic. Built in a factory to minimize the environmental impact on the home site, it maximizes natural light, uses bioradiant heating and recyclable building materials (such as bamboo flooring and countertops made from recycled paper). Its main design feature is a butterfly-shaped roof over a glass-walled main room that can open to let breezes in. Look for the exhibition website to launch in a week or two…
Some Assembly Required opens December 8 with a reception and a discussion with Michael Sylvester, founder of fabprefab.com. Details here.
And: Prefab for refugees and a list of green prefab projects from Treehugger.
I thought about alerting the Walker design department to this bumpersticker I saw on a truck (right next to a “Buy a Gun” sticker) on my way in to work the other morning:
At first glance, it looks like an unauthorized use of the Walker typeface, a proprietary font designed by Matthew Carter. Later, in the design studio I found this, wondering if maybe the design department was in cahoots:
The plastic deer, I later learned, will become part of a seasonal window display in the Walker Shop, and the bumpersticker was actually referring to Walker hunting dogs.
My post that mentioned Barry McGee’s mural at LACMA reminded me of a TV spot we made to promote our 1998 exhibition Regards, Barry McGee, curated by visual arts intern Eungie Joo (now director of REDCAT). Created pro bono with a shoestring production budget, the spot was the work of Planet Propaganda of Madison, Wis. So simple, it’s a montage of details from a mural McGee created for our show set to music by one of Planet’s founders and ambient street sounds. Since our web archive doesn’t include much documentation of the show (only this piece, a wall assemblage of drawings in thrift-store frames, that we purchased from it) here’s your chance to see this amazing mural. Click and enjoy.
Alas, the FBI’s list doesn’t include LACMA’s destruction of a mural by Barry McGee and the late Margaret Kilgallen in its soon-to-be-razed garage.
