Structural Patterns

Imagine this crazy, detailed mess of small motors, gator clamps, cables, seemingly fragile steel armature constituting a kinetic sculpture set against a beaming light that projects elements of the sculpture onto a backdrop. These sculptures are part of the staging or more appropriately actors of Verdensteatret’s performance titled “And All the Question Marks Started to Sing” which was at Dance Theater Workshop this past week. As a performance, I hated the piece and wanted to leave ten minutes into it, but I would have very much enjoyed the work as an installation. I loved the kinetic sculptures and portions of the interactions between the sculptures and animations projected onto the walls, but as a performance, it was painfully dull.

I enjoy experimental work, but if I’m expected to sit in a seat for nearly an hour, I expect to be given something that I can follow, get lost in, or will take me somewhere. There were elements of “And All the Question Marks Started to Sing” which were exciting, but as a whole it seemed disjointed. There was no anchor or narrative that allowed me to follow the work as a staged linear performance. Perhaps it was merely presented in the wrong venue, rather than a seated stage performance, the piece seems to be produced for a gallery or museum environment in which the audience may come and go as well as walk through the staging. Better yet, I would have loved to have interacted with the sculptures and manipulated the playing of the animations and sound.

There were four actors that worked with the sculptures to seemingly manipulate video and animation projected onto the walls as well as the sound in the environment. There were a couple spoken portions, but they were not translated into English, so I had no idea what the actors were saying.

Move On is running a poll to help stop threats to cut federal funding for NPR and PBS:
http://pol.moveon.org/nprpbs/

Please take a moment to sign the poll and share with others. The government once protected the radio airwaves from corporate ownership, because it was recognized as a public service. NPR and PBS are amongst the most important public services that present a space in the media for intelligent and critical perspectives rather than inane entertainment. NPR and PBS are a citizen service that must be protected!

The Move On page states: “With Republicans back in charge of the House of Representatives, funding for NPR and PBS is in grave danger. Again. The Republicans just released their budget proposal, and it zeroes out funding for both NPR and PBS–the worst proposal in more than a decade. We need to tell Republicans that cutting off funding was unacceptable last time they were in charge, and it’s unacceptable now. A compiled petition with your individual comment will be presented to your Senators and Representative.”

The Ben Rubin show at Bryce Wolkowitz titled Vextors is definitely worth the visit. Although the work is a bit slick for my taste and some of the most interesting aspects about the work get lost in the presentation, it’s an attractive show. Also Rubin’s form of data visualization is much more exciting and creative than most of the data viz we see… black screens with floating vectors.

Walking around Chelsea yesterday, I stepped into David Zwirner that had a show titled 112 Greene Street: The Early Years (1970-1974) and was excited to discover Gordon Matta-Clark’s “Fresh-Air Cart” from 1974 (pictured below).

Once again, last semester I had a talented group of aspiring animators in my introductory 2D animation class. Here are a few select links:

Links to several other animations are available on my Hunter page, enjoy!

Since we’re spending the holidays in San Francisco, we drove to San Jose to check out Vagamundo currently installed as part of San Jose Museum of Art’s Retro Tech exhibition. A couple months ago I had to ship out a new joystick and in trying out the game, it’s still running or at least running as well as it ever did! The show looks great. It was fun to watch my son desperately trying to play the game.

Following an excellent dinner at Woodward’s Garden on Mission and 13th, Brooke and I headed to 19th and Bryant. We mistakenly attended a guest list party at Guerrero Gallery and were happily surprised by two good bands. We’re not sure about the names, but the pictures are below. We hope that one day the drummer from the first band plays with the cello player of the second, because both these people were amazing.


Later that night we realized that it was the first New Years since 2007 that we’d been out and about.

Last night, upon the invitation of Moritz von Rappard, I attended the performance of KLASSENTREFFEN by the Ballhaus Naunynstrasse theater company at PS122 and it was excellent. KLASSENTREFFEN is a documentary theater piece in which the performers retell their personal stories as Turkish immigrants living in Germany or first generation Germans of Turkish descent. The piece revolves around identity politics and the memories and emotional histories that are recounted touch upon cultural loss, the difficulties of being Turkish in Germany, and ultimately the construction of cross-cultural identity. I don’t feel that the stories told represent new discoveries or new perspectives regarding the “other,” rather the power of the piece lies in entering these people’s lives and listening to the accounts not from an actor, but from the individual who has lived the difficult experience of defining oneself between cultures. It is the unveiling of personal experience from the individual in real-time that establishes an emotional reaction in the audience.

Pictured above sitting in a row are the performers: a taxi driver and owner of a taxi company, a publicist, a Green Party politician, a police woman (the first female police commissioner), a Turkish/German pop music producer, and a professional actress. The last man in the row is Moritz von Rappard, the production manager and I don’t recall the second to last man, sitting to the right of Moritz, I believe he may have been an artistic co-producer. Sitting behind the actors are artistic director Shermin Langhoff and director Lukas Langhoff

Lately, I’ve been struggling with a “What’s it all for” period. Generally, when I’m in between projects or exhibitions, I go through a period of questioning my work, the relevance of art in general and wondering what I’m doing and why… The last several weeks, I’ve been feeling this way more strongly than usual. Fortunately, today, I enjoyed a stroll through the Chelsea galleries (yes the heart of the beast) and appreciated work that wasn’t necessarily critical or trying to present alternative perspectives, but reflected the hard work of individuals enjoying creativity. It’s important to be reminded that engaging in a creative process is meaningful even if it isn’t a mechanism for social change or greater awareness (as art seldom is).

Dear Father Knickerbocker, I Just Googled You, William Earl Kofmehl III at Lombard-Freid Projects

I knew Bill Kofmehl from Carnegie Mellon University. He was in undergrad while I was in grad school. The guy worked like a madman and he took on projects/performances that no one else would, such as building a giant tree house behind a science building and living in it in a costume as Lobster Boy.

Waste_Generation, Chris Doyle at Andrew Edlin Gallery. Chris is a friend who has always been supportive of my work and I’ve always been grateful for his. It was great and inspiring to see what he’s been up to.


Chris makes his videos available on his portfolio site: http://chrisdoylestudio.com/animation/
Be sure to scroll to the bottom of the pages to find the videos and you can find them on his Vimeo page.

Hard in the Paint, Raymond Pettibon at David Zwirner

The major league championship turned into a battle of Blue State (Democrat) vs. Red State (Republican… The Gay Haven, Hippie, Immigrant, Latino, Liberal city of San Francisco vs. conservative leaning, home of George Bush x2 Texas… The San Francisco Giants dominated the Rangers and became champions in five games.

Today – Tuesday, November 2nd, national voting day for the Obama Administration’s midterm period has been predicted as a landslide win for the Republicans and Tea Party hate mongers… a day of reckoning when voter anger will rule upon the next two years of bipartisan politics leading to a purchased presidential election. BUT could the Giant’s win stir a liberal awakening? Could the unexpected Champs of the World Series, bring a fresh air to Tuesday’s elections – a fresh air that cools the anger and brings outraged voters to marking their ballot with reason rather than angry reaction? After all, if people are so angry about the economic situation and the level of unemployment, what party and what administration lead us into this situation?

The REPUBLICAN WHO HAD BOTH THE CONGRESS AND WHITE HOUSE FOR SIX YEARS AND THE WHITE HOUSE FOR EIGHT, PRIOR TO OBAMA’S PRESIDENCY THAT IS ONLY TWO YEARS OLD. I hope that the Giant’s spirit stirs in voters! I like the way that Mark Fiore puts it in his latest NewsToon – Watch Little Suzie describe her Halloween costume.