Molesworth/Barthes - Whitney Ratliff

Painting is not dead! 

Helen Molesworth, a chief curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Los Angeles, talks about some of her exhibitions and the conflicting issues she had with chronological sequencing. She says by placing photos in slideshows in chronological order or in groups by the decade, seemed boring and that that language isn't as influential alone but the images are more influential outside of that language, and that the language around the decade was so strong, it was so out of favor. If she reconfigured it outside of that language, she felt like the work itself emerged in a different way. By historizing the work in the moment made the work itself feel tainted.

The impact of criticism has on an art form is perceived by the culture, based on what is popular or in demand. "Criticism doesn't function in a highly speculative market, criticism functions in a depressed market where consensus building is more of the aim of the goal." Critics is a harder and rarer career to make. "The language of criticism and the impulse of criticism got pulled up in non-institutionally affiliated culturial projects. (I think that is what she said) A lot of the gravitas that were traditionally appointed to a critic was given to the curator." Critics and curators have essentially become one and the same but each holds its own fundamental goal to present the work and respect it as it is as well as what it is not.


Barthes
"Of course this epithet, to which we turn and return out of weakness or fascination (parlor game: discuss a piece of music without using a single adjective), has an economic function: the predicate is always the rampart by which the subject's image-repetoire protects itself against the loss that threatens it: the man who furnishes himself or is furnished with an adjective is sometimes wounded, sometimes pleased, but always constituted, music has an image-repretoire whose function is to reassure, to constitute subject, who hears it (would this be because music is dangerous--an old Platonic notion? Leading to ecstasy, to loss, as many examples from ethnography and popular culture would to show?)"

- Barthes, Grain of the Voice, pg 267-8

"The romantic "heart," an expression in which we no longer perceive anything but an edulcorated metaphor, is a powerful organ, extreme point of the interior body where, simultaneously and as though contradictorily, desire and tenderness, the claims of love and the summons of pleasure, violently merge: something raises my body, swells it, stretches it, bears it to the verge of explosion, and immediately, mysteriously, depress it, weakens it."

- Barthes, The Romantic Song, pg 289

"It is because Schumann's music goes much father than the ear, it goes into the body, into the muscles by the beats of its rhythm, and somehow into the viscera by the voluptuous pleasure of its melos: as if on each occasion the piece was written only for one person, the one who plays it; the truth Schumannian pianist -- c'est moi."

-Barthes, Loving Schumann, pg 295

These were just a view quotes I thought captured a good essence of each written piece by Barthes. Barthes does a great job analyzing the art of music and how it is presented poetically to the ear of its listeners. He describes current uses of work, such as the piano as a "nouvelle cuisine uncooked", most likely referring to current performances as being not as powerful or mesmerizing in good fashion as it once was when the piano was presented for a few listeners and more private performances of higher status. Music to the ear, is an intimate relationship between the listener who envelopes oneself into the work with great passion. It stimulates the ear into a state of euphoria in an emergence of pleasure and love. However, the voice as he describes in The Romantic Song, portrays two different sides that can be best summarized as being good and evil. A light and dark voice, one that displays an amorous, unisexual role within society towards love and passion or a demonic, diabolic evocation that divides, separates, dissociates, and dismembers the body.  Both affect the lost, the abandoned subject that the romantic song sings.

Shows at which to Shmooze

Ok, here are a few more options. One of them is in Denton, for those of you who hate to drive.

There's a Panel on Art in New York during the 80's on Tuesday at the Fort Worth Modern. Those of you thinking about what kind of art careers you might like to have can find models to emulate or work against here:

http://glasstire.com/events/2014/09/18/panel-urban-theater-new-york-art-in-the-1980s/

Michelle Mackey, Marcelyn McNeal, and Lorraine Tady at TWU September 30th

http://glasstire.com/events/2014/09/18/michelle-mackey-marcelyn-mcneil-lorraine-tady/

Aways in the back

This lecture was interesting mainly because it supports the idea that it the small, or less noticed, actions in time that make the large events that end up making history. Society would like for us to believe that great ground breaking events and people come to be as an instant influential force, that they were born that ground shacking, ignoring all the details leading and making up that said event. Really, these great people were influence and inspirited be so called smaller forces that made them who they are, and that they themselves are a small part of a even bigger movement. Everything big starts from the back door to become the front door.

Kenneth Goldsmith - Whitney Ratliff

"Poetry, today, occupies the position that conceptual art once held in the art world. Conceptual art was in its inception an act of resistance, one through the dematarialization called into question the status of the unique art object and the sole privilege of the author propose that art can be made by anyone regardless of their skill set. And it also claimed that art could have democratic distributions able to be experienced by all. Of course we know today that conceptual art has been thoroughly degraded into the canon of art history and has acquired great value. And yet its original utopian ethos lives on continually providing much needed framework, strategies of resistance, and roadmaps of art dematerialized, and radical democratic, digital world." - Kenneth Goldsmith (At 20 minutes)

Goldsmith talks about using the back door as the front door and how poetry is important and how using the back door is, for most of the time, the better way to into the art world. He explains in further detail poetry in relationship of conceptual work and continued by individually looking at artworks and explaining their construction and meaning about the piece and its relationship with the much wider world during a certain timeframe in history.

He later lists off everything society is doing such as tweeting, talking, facebooking etc except for paying attention to the art on the wall, that the art on the wall has become secondary to everything else in the world. No one is stopping to smell the roses. Everyone is in a rush, constantly wanting an instantaneous relationship with others and not understanding the meaning behind the art on the wall and stopping to enjoy the moment or to go and see a person in person rather than creating this distance between others and holding that relationship as more important than actually facing the person physically.

Clarification...

Hey everyone. It seems people are confused about what to blog on for tomorrow. Unfortunately, my email just stopped working altogether and I can't send the response where I set the record straight, but here's a link to the podcast you should be listening to: http://www.themodern.org/sites/default/files/kenneth_goldsmith3.25.14.mp3

Sorry for the confusion. You also should have pdfs for the Roland Barthes reading for next week, but if not I'll resend those once my email starts working again.

Mike

check this out

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-2762092/Marriott-virtual-reality-teleporter-booth-lets-travellers-feel-smell-holiday-locations-without-booking-flight.html

Things to go to this Thursday!

Christopher Blay discussion at Centraltrak: http://glasstire.com/events/2014/09/07/tete-a-tete-christopher-blay/

Art 21 episode at Texas Theater (you must RSVP, might be sold out?) - http://glasstire.com/events/2014/09/15/preview-of-art-21-season-7/

Bad @ sports: 330 Carolee Schneeman

       Carolee Schneeman is a character! This was a pretty interesting talk and good overview of Schneeman's thoughts on her own work. It was interesting to hear her talk about how she viewed her work at the time of creating it. She talked about how she was not misunderstood but that she had misunderstood her culture and what they were ready to receive. She mentioned was always shocked when her pieces were censored but now she is equally shocked when the censors are removed. Schneeman describes her early work at the juncture of sexuality and politics, but also how her painting was a personal venting of energy.
        She talks about how her early work studied gender roles a lot but in a way that focus more on men and how they would handle domestic normalcy that women are so often placed into. She talked about one of her first models being a man and how that was so different than the norm or women as models. It was interesting to listen to Schneeman who sounded like such a soft spoken lady, when her work had been anything but. I wonder how much has changed over the years. I think she feels she has spoken her peace on the body, saying that she will leave the body to other artists and seek to regain privacy in her own life.
    My favorite line was when the interviewer asked her "what is the most important truth you have discovered as a multidisciplinary artist and educator?" to which she responded: "To have a psycho, sensitive cat that sleeps with you every night."

Carolee Schneemann - Whitney Ratliff

Last week, I messed up. I posted the BAS about everyone but Greg Sholette! Guess, I didn't listen to all of it. Oops. 

In Carolee Schneemann's podcast, Schneemann talks about her artwork from when she first became an artist and what fueled her inspirations to create artwork that pushed the discourse of the human body, sexuality, and gender within society's perspective. One point she makes is that her and her respective artists were all hugely influential bringing together the intensity of their cultural discoveries and that she had brought issues of painting, not only with what she was doing but what she was learning at the time as well. Most of her works that were the most iconic even to this day were created in the 60's and 70's. Her mantra now is, "My use of my body reflected the body of the work." 

This podcast was a good overlook at all of Carolee Schneemann's past and present works. I felt like the questions asked were very insightful and well presented. It covered a lot of and Carolee was very open and humble with her responses. 

Alejandro's response

Ok so I accidentally listened, and made a response to this weeks podcasts last week. I could do the responsible thing and say that it was a mistake in my part, but instead I;m going to blame Mike, this is his fault :). Anyways, one question I still have for this podcast is whether the artist feels like there has been a tremendous amount work done by female artist, in means of have they gain better recognition or say in the art world, to does she think that there is still plenty more to do? She's been in this line of work far longer than any of us so I feel she would be a good candidate to help answer this question.

Bad @ Sport #413

   This was really interesting, I liked that they talked to a few different people during the podcast. That being said I feel like there were a couple different thoughts going on, as each person was being asked different questions. I think overall this podcast is really trying to give listeners a view of what SIGGRAPH is and what it hopes to achieve.  I think the first segment with Victoria Szabo was one of my favorites and made the most sense. I loved how she described the work on display, normally a difficult task but I could very nearly picture it. Szabo mentioned being inspired by William Blake's "Auguries of Innocence", and quoted a segment:

  "To see a World in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wild Flower 

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand 

And Eternity in an hour."

1) I loved this. 2) I think this is just a great picture of what New Media is, especially the last line. I think about how is my own work I've loved the exploration of manipulating time digitally. Szabo also talked a lot about how SIGGRAPH hopes to bridge the gap between art and technology. I think Jackie Morie also mentioned collaboration and how SIGGRAPH encourages artists and scientists to work together and inspire each other.
  This is one of the things that I think is the most beautiful about New Media. I think it is so versatile and really reaches and branches out into different fields that would otherwise not be paired with art. Ultimately New Media makes connections that couldn't otherwise happen.
   The last segment about "dark matter" was most confusing to me. It involved a lot of politics the speakers seemed a bit argumentative. They talked a lot about the art world and how some people sink into invisibility and others make it big. I think that is what they mean when they talk about "dark matter?"

Bad at Sports XYZN Scale Response

I guess the main theme I hear is about bringing the spatial element in art back into the digital world, where it can become so screen based ( the science ) into a blend ...right brain/left brain art with all kinds of art-making. It feels free to be personal and use whatever media you want with a piece that will express something even if only to you, but successful when it can express to many. Always a coin toss I suppose, but I agree when combining functionality (science) to artfulness it truly is a marriage of science and art that might benefit humanity. Scientist and Artist...both experiment.

Bad at Sports

What is interesting about SeaGraph is the ability that it has to bring artists and scientists together in a meaningful way that becomes mutually beneficial. I often find that artists represent scientific concepts very well, but in ways that aren't really very beneficial in any way to the scientific community. When we really create functionality with our art is when we can hone in on the needs of scientific community and provide aesthetic in any number of various forms. For it has always been artists who present science in an aesthetically meaningful way, ever since we first began illustrating anatomy and new species. As we develop and learn new technologies we have the ability to teach society in a very exciting and engaging ways.

VIDEO ARTIST TYPES: CHECK THIS OUT

On Sunday the 14th of this month, The Texas Theater in Oak Cliff will be playing a recent classic of the essay genre: Los Angeles Plays Itself. Those of you interested in video art or experimental film, especially non-fiction, essay, or appropriation, should definitely check this out:
https://www.facebook.com/events/1542426879309683/1554000378152333/?notif_t=plan_mall_activity

SIGGRAPH 2013 XYZN Scale Podcast - Whitney Ratliff

The SIGGRAPH 2013 podcast for the XYZN Scale Exhibition explained by Victoria Szabo was inspired by a William Blake poem presented on one wall of the sphere of the gallery space. This unique gallery space presents various artworks using emerging digital technologies and providing a sense of how these technologies provide a much broader, expansive means for the elements of art and reevaluating the essence of traditional means of artwork within a much digital world.

Although it was difficult to retain all this information from a hearing aspect, a more visual aspect of the podcast might provide an easier means of understanding the element of "visual information" presented in the cast. It did sound like an interesting gallery space allowing viewers and the artist to reestablish the analog aesthetic within a digital form, using traditional forms, rediscovering the past and presenting them within a present digitalization of what media art can accomplish. This interest group overall sounds like a very fascinating and well-needed group within the art world as they appreciate and provide all forms of artwork but present them within a much more modern take.

One take on this is the right-brain/left-brain where the artist inspire the scientist and the scientist inspire the artist allowing both artistic aesthetics and technological aspects together to provide a combined form of artwork. One point was made by Jackie Morie to have an open-mind and basically walk in another person's shoes and try to see it from their point of view, which is a great ideal and a huge factor of my own perspective of life. We need to learn that we are all individuals able to think and feel on our own and that in the end, agree to disagree when it comes to matter of differences. We need to become sponges of information and seek a perspective bent on wanting to learn more, like the great philosophers of Greece who, although were quite religious still were open-minded and willing to talk about matters such as religion and politics and not only question the aspects of another person or group but also see it respectively and at least try to understand the other side without dispute or conflict.

If ya want to take a test to see which hemisphere you dominate more with, take one here: Right or Left Brain Quiz

My Result:

David Byrne

 Just to preface, I may have a bit of a bias because of my previous love for David Byrne. However, I feel like this piece hit the nail right on the head, despite some of what I felt to be capitalist rhetoric regarding business and development. New York City can be a magical place, especially for an up and coming artist, in regards to garnering inspiration, connections, etc. Thus, artists have flocked to the city for decades now. While this has proven to launch many artists into amazing success, there are several disturbing factors at play. First, gentrification in New York is completely out of control, leaving people of color and underprivileged groups to extreme violence and further poverty. Tracing back lineage of this process, for example in Brooklyn, one will find that the onset of this neo-colonialism was brought about by artists finding their way into cheap or abandoned housing. What follows are developers and entrepreneurs that then capitalize on the process as the art community has done a great deal of the work for them. Now, several of said neighborhoods are chalk full of millionaires, and expensive restaurants. Not only has this happened in NYC, but this process is taking place all of the country right now. It is our responsibility as artists (especially as white artists) to take it upon ourselves to ACTIVELY fight gentrification as are actions in particular neighborhoods can ultimately lead to extreme violence and alienation.
  Another issue with NYC importing so many artists is that it becomes very disempowering for art communities in other places. I know so many artists that were working in DFW for example who left to areas such as Portland, SF, or NYC because of the expectation that existing in those places would ultimately make them more successful. While that is rarely working for folks anymore, it becomes very difficult to create a thriving art community in a place like Denton or Dallas when artists aren't willing to put in the work to create it on their own. Yes, that work is hard and sometimes you feel like you're in a fucking desert when you work in places like this, but what I've found from putting on independent shows here and encouraging local artists to become empowered in the place that they are - is that it is so much more exhilarating and rewarding at the end of the day to have built something, created something new. And that's what we do as artists right? Take a blank canvass and turn it into something beautiful and its time that we see the communities that we already live in as that canvass.

bad at sports XYZN scale

I wish I could have gone. I went and looked for pics from the XYZN scale show, couldn't find anything, lol speaking of invisibility.
I don't have a long response, it sounds like a bunch of my past professors mixed with all the art21s I've watched. Don't be invisible. Documentation is VERY IMPORTANT. creating an online presence is VERY IMPORTANT. Politics are in your mind. The structure is in your mind. Bend the spoon, and you'll be a famous artist.

David Byrne

I think that new media is all about changing the creative community landscape, redistributing the artistic wealth, and leveling the playing field so that anybody with a good idea, or a notable talent has a shot at fame. There is, however, a really special and beneficial effect you feel as an artist when you are surrounded by other artists. It's like the power rangers, when they all got together they could make that big robot. I think that these collectives can happen anywhere though, with an advanced online network and presence, anywhere on the planet can be an artist's headquarters.

A few Gallery shows to MINGLE at.

Hey guys, here are a couple shows coming up that you might use for your BEING SEEN schmooze assignment.

TONIGHT at Goss Michael Foundation - 6pm-8pm, Michelle Rawlings

Saturday at Zhulong Gallery - this Saturday September 6th 6pm-8pm, James Guerts

More to come...

Reading Response #1: David Byrne

Reading this article made me incredibly sad as I thought about my Drawing II teacher, whose name I won't mention. I keep up with him on social networking sites when I can-- before even reading Byrne's article I had already decided privately that I would never live in NY. I would like to visit one day sure, but never live there and this is why:

"I just felt I had nothing…. I felt I lost my family, home, car, dog, friends, money, pride, faith, dignity, and dream. All I have was shame.
But I was OK. I found a job and Apt. I was rather more cheerful and energetic than usual. Just only sometimes I started crying for no reason in a train, park, my room, street, anywhere. Just all of the sudden. I don't know why. I just could help it.
Then it was getting worth and started bothering me a lot.

It was the one of those days. You know, when you wake up, you feel still tired and you wish you could never have wakened up. You wish you were still in your dream.
I just felt empty when I woke up. I didn't see any excitement in my day. My empty heart was almost hurting or I guess I was feeling real physical pain, too.
I was just ready to give up my life. That doesn't mean I wanted to die… I just didn't want to live anymore. So I decided to let myself go. I sold my car for nothing. Actually I had to pay little bit. Anyway, with little money I had, I went to the Met. I didn't know why I just wanted to do some sketches. That was what I wanted for the last. In the Met, when I saw George Bellows’s paintings, I got the biggest breakdown. He was a good painter. Not my favorite painter. I don't really know what so special about his works, but just some of his paintings were really moving to me. Maybe the color.. maybe the brushworks. I don't know what was that. But I started crying. I mean really bad. I couldn’t breath and my head was pounding. I had to sit down and finally I had to leave…. Then I realized something was really wrong with me.

I’ve been meeting with my support group. I am doing really well. I quit painting. I will find something for me. I am in NY. Anything can be possible, right?"

"saying good bye to my paintings. I will never love someone like i loved painting, but its time to move on. I dont see myself painting again. This is over. i sound like Adele."

"I will visit denton in July. and i will get rid of all paintings. Sadly they are going to a dumpster. If you are interested in, please let me know. i wont charge too much. it will be like 90% off..."

NY caused him to have a mental breakdown. I am not saying that everyone who goes there would suffer the way he did, but I don't think that it's worth the risk of giving up on art. He gave up on art even though he said "<insert his name> - art = nothin but a hound dog..." It's not worth losing oneself.

Byrne's article as well as the many others that have agreed with him about NY's failing support of new talent, only supports my decision further that, as of right now with the state NY is in, I would not live there.

Lacey's Response - David Byrne

When I was younger I always imagined New York City to be the go to place for pretty much anything you would ever need in your life. Excellent job opportunities, huge cultural variety, and plenty of artistic gatherings and what not. As I've gotten older I've come to learn that New York is slowing descending into a monotony of business and finance, no more pleasure. Byrne says in the article that most of the 1% big wigs don't even live in the city anymore so why would they care to change the direction it's heading in? Lower class and most middle class citizens are struggling to pay rent and make ends meet while higher class have a pent house that they use for a few weeks out of the year. It is so difficult for budding artists to even make a living in the city let alone hit the big leagues that over time the harsh reality of failure would ultimately wear one down.