Arcadia

"Nature frees our minds, but as we search for that release, we see no reason to let go of the confines of our constructed lives." So is the introduction to a new architecture book, Arcadia: Cross-Country Style Architecture and Design. With winter descending I've been spending pretty much all my time indoors, in spaces that are small, dark, and uninspiring. Looking at the pictures in this book, however, create a drool factor and a desire to suddenly move to Switzerland! Being indoors wouldn't be so bad if you could feel like you were still somehow connected to the outside environment. "This book profiles architects, designers and artists who are embracing nature and creating provocative rural hideaways that adapt to their surrounding habitats and their special topographical and extreme climatic conditions and challenges." pix from Sight Unseen.

Mix it up

My friend Shamus Fatzinger, a career photographer, just sent me a link to some of the paintings he's done. I like the way he incorporates photography into his painting along with mixed media, found objects, and untraditional canvases. Here are a couple of my favorites.

The Skeleton in My Closet Has Moved Back Out to the Garden

Super jazzed about the new John Lurie exhibit at Fredericks and Freiser gallery. Lurie best known as the frontman for avant garde jazz group, the Lounge Lizards, is also a prolific painter. He's been exhibiting for awhile and has 2 books published about his paintings John Lurie, A Fine Example of Art and Learn to Draw. I love his paintings for their humor and interesting pairing of colors and rough primitive style. He paints predominantly in watercolors although there's some oils in this exhibit. I'm also seeing some Francis Bacon qualities showing up in terms of long brush strokes in the backgrounds. His work seems to be maturing and is stepping away from the childlike playfulness that was dominant in his earlier work.
From the press release:

Like his music, the work has a broken, childlike quality that gives a glimpse into an visionary world. Alternatively exposing or addressing the larger, enduring myths of our culture through sketches of seemingly lost childhood reveries, John Lurie’s paintings presents his musings through interpretive storytelling—haunting, poignant, or puerile as the outcome may ultimately be. Glenn O’Brien writes, “Like Thelonious Monk, Lurie knows how to exploit the seemingly wrong note, the wrong color. It is a private language of hieroglyphics reflecting his unique self-education. His paintings, while sometimes pointedly primitive, are beautifully crafted with a refined obstinacy.”

all images from Fredericks & Freiser

The Red Book

NY Times posted some interesting news about the upcoming publication of psychologist Carl Jung's secret, private, psychic exploration book, the Red Book. I'm really looking fwd to perusing this book as it looks really interesting, just the paintings alone hold a fascination. It does give one pause to consider the publication of this much guarded, very private book. It was, as Jung describes it, his soul. What happens when it enters a capitalist system to be made a commodity for all to buy? Or is it to the benefit and enrichment of society that such a seminal work will be available to inspire others to explore their inner worlds?

From the article:

"about halfway through the Red Book — after he has traversed a desert, scrambled up mountains, carried God on his back, committed murder, visited hell; and after he has had long and inconclusive talks with his guru, Philemon, a man with bullhorns and a long beard who flaps around on kingfisher wings — Jung is feeling understandably tired and insane. This is when his soul, a female figure who surfaces periodically throughout the book, shows up again. She tells him not to fear madness but to accept it, even to tap into it as a source of creativity. “If you want to find paths, you should also not spurn madness, since it makes up such a great part of your nature.”

The Red Book is not an easy journey — it wasn’t for Jung, it wasn’t for his family, nor for Shamdasani, and neither will it be for readers. The book is bombastic, baroque and like so much else about Carl Jung, a willful oddity, synched with an antediluvian and mystical reality. The text is dense, often poetic, always strange. The art is arresting and also strange. Even today, its publication feels risky, like an exposure. But then again, it is possible Jung intended it as such. In 1959, after having left the book more or less untouched for 30 or so years, he penned a brief epilogue, acknowledging the central dilemma in considering the book’s fate. “To the superficial observer,” he wrote, “it will appear like madness.” Yet the very fact he wrote an epilogue seems to indicate that he trusted his words would someday find the right audience."

The actual book itself will be making an appearance on New York soil when it will be shown at the Rubin Museum.

In the spirit of RMA's exhibition The Red Book of C.G. Jung, personalities from all walks of life--including performance artist Marina Abramovic, film director John Boorman, actress Kathleen Chalfant, entrepreneur Robin Chase, writer and activist David Harvey, graphic designer Stefan Sagmeister, painter Philip Taaffe, Tibet scholar Robert Thurman, novelist Gloria Vanderbilt, and many others--will be paired on stage with a psychoanalyst and invited to free associate, using a folio from Jung's Red Book as a starting point. The pair will then explore in conversation the themes that develop.

Handpainted Signage

I came across these really kool photos of hand painted store signs from West Africa. I love the typography and also the portraiture along with the bold colors. These are so fun to look at and inspiring. As with most places on the globe, hand drawn works are slowly methodically going the way of the computer and desktop publishing. I myself often feel conflicted between my computer graphic design work and traditional tactile fine arts. I guess there's room in life for both and its a fine balance to maintain.







all pix from Voodoo Funk blog

Waste Not

A few pix from chinese artist Song Dong's installation at MOMA titled Waste Not. It's the complete contents of his mother's house over the last 50 yrs. It's an interesting an idea and visually appealing to see objects set up so neatly in rows etc outside of a house setting. I overheard one person exclaiming its too much stuff and that all this couldn't possibly come from one woman in China's house. Meanwhile the average American house would have 10x more than that. over 50yrs? it wouldn't even fit in the museum. I didn't think it seemed like alot esp for the time span. I think its just harder to visualize since its out of context.

Moonmilk

I love alot of the photos from the new Ryan McGinley exhibition. Its showing in London but I'm hoping it will make its way over here. The pix have a great sci-fi feel and I love the combination of eerie colors juxtaposed with the other worldly looking landscapes of the caves they're taken in. Really kool. (pix from Alison Jacques Gallery)

Creative Time

I went to Governor's Island to check out some of the art in Creative Time's latest exhibit, This World and Nearer Ones. My favorite work by far was by artist Anthony McCall. McCall uses light as medium which reminds me of another favorite lighting artist, James Turell. The work titled, Between You and I, is housed in a chapel on the island and is encased in complete darkness. 2 lights in the ceiling beam down through mist being sprayed in the air. The result is seemingly tactile shapes but the illusion is they are completely ethereal and you can in fact walk through and around these shapes. The exhibit is playful and dream like and time is easily lost track of while in there. After taking many pictures I walked back outside into the blinding sunlight and present reality happy for the temporary respite. Here is the official description:

"Consisting of two elegantly simple light projectionss, Between You and I expands on the two basic components of cinema, time and light, in order to create a spectacular, immersive environment. As the projected light beams slowly travel through mist, they begin to carve out sculptural shapes in space. The fields of light interact with one another, the visitors in the space, and the striking architecture of historic St. Cornelius Chapel. Though the 2 shapes never meet they are in a constant play–suggesting that, like 2 human companions, they attempt to comprehend themselves in relation to one another."