James Kalm, through his studies of the "beat" artists, has heard rumors of the legendary Brion Gyson for years, but it wasn't until this New Museum show, put together by Laura Hoptman, Kraus Family Senior Curator, with assistance from Amy Mackie, that he was able to experience the work that spawned the myth. Since the New Museum's relocation to the Bowery, this is their first show dedicated to a dead artist. Gysin is probably best known for his long term collaboration with William Burroughs, and his invention of the "cut-up" technique, which he gifted to Burroughs and used to great effect in his collage and poetry. With over 300 works, including the famous "Dream Machine", this show should be required viewing for anyone wishing a deeper understanding of the "beat". Includes an interview with Laure Hoptman and a conversational tour with Valery Oisteanu.
performance
Brion Gysin: Dream Machine at the NEW MUSEUM
Rammellzee 1960 - 2010
June 30, 2010. News has reached us from various Twitter accounts and other sources on the passing yesterday of legendary graffiti artist and hip-hop musician Rammellzee.
from Gawker:
Rammellzee, the pioneering hip hop artist and Wild Style star whose ten-minute-plus 1983 record Beat Bop is still fresher than just about anything on the radio, has apparently died.
His death was first announced on the Twitter page of Fab Five Freddy, who would know; and early this morning, a post went up on Rammellzee's Myspace page reading in part "...in mourning..as i type this, i'm numb from overwhelming sadness.....The Equation The Ramm:Ell:Zee has left his physical....left his pain." Details are unclear.
Dead Flowers at PARTICIPANT INC.
On the evening of June 20, 2010 in conjunction with the exhibition "Dead Flowers," a group show based on the work of actor/director Timothy Carey, a selection of performance pieces were presented at Participant Inc. "Veil" by Johanna Constantine is a mysteriously disturbing yet poetic "dance" alluding to flight and perhaps the rebirth of the soul. Genesis Breyer P-Orridge is well known for his/her work with the proto Punk band Throbbing Gristle. In the 1990s, with his second wife, Lady Jaye, P-Orridge began an ongoing experiment in body modification aimed at creating one pandrogynous being named "Genesis Breyer P-Orridge". In this performance P-Orridge is accompanied by the recorded voice of the late Lady Jaye. Marti Domination & Beaut riff on classic burlesque, using the novelty item known as a whoopee cushion to great effect.
Johanna Constantine "Veil" at PARTICIPANT INC.
On the evening of June 20, 2010 in conjunction with the exhibition "Dead Flowers," a group show based on the work of actor/director Timothy Carey, a group of performance pieces were presented at Participant Inc. "Veil" by Johanna Constantine is a mysteriously disturbing yet poetic "dance" alluding to flight and perhaps the rebirth of the soul. A full report will be forthcoming on the James Kalm Report channel.
Jill McDermid “Performance Art Makes You Think…” at ENGLISH KILLS
PDA = dancelovesart @ Art Basel Miami Beach
dancelovesart
presents
PDA
dancelovesart is a series of nomadic dance acts, installations, and video and performance interactions taking place in and around Art Basel Miami Beach.
dancelovesart will be hosted by Morgans Miami properties with daily performances and dance installations in the pools and onsite at Mondrian, Shore Club and Delano
Sunsets December 4 l 5 l 6 2009, 4 - 6pm.
curated by Natalie Kovacs
For more information go to PAM:
http://www.perpetualartmachine.com/content/view/677/48/lang,en/
Josh Harris and QUIET: We Live In Public
The recent commercial release of We Live In Public, a documentary film by Ondi Timoner (which won a Grand Prize at Sundance in January and also screened in April at New Directors/New Films at MoMA), has focused attention on Josh Harris, the erstwhile dot.com millionaire who presided over Jupiter Communications and Pseudo TV, and who funded various downtown New York arts projects in the late 90s and early noughties, culminating (at least for me) with QUIET: We Live in Public.
QUIET was a heady but deranged bit of social sculpture, enlisting 150 artist/participants to live communally in a bunker housed on three floors of a loft building at 353 Broadway at the end of 1999. It envisioned a Brave New World of surveillance, control and loss of privacy, both predicted and facilitated by the Internet. Harris imagined that these long standing dystopian issues would be given technological feasibility through an interlocking network of computers and webcams. It would re-invigorate the pan- in Panopticon.
Performance Power Grab, and MoMA Gets a Sehgal
January 1, 2009. On reading Erica Orden's "Collecting Smoke" text in New York Magazine examining MoMA's upcoming two year performance art initiative, which includes a Marina Abramovic retrospective and the acquisition of Tino Sehgal's The Kiss, all under the direction of the very enterprising Klaus Biesenbach, I felt compelled to jot down a couple of thoughts. A version of the text below also appears as a comment under my pseudonym on the New York Magazine site.
Klaus Biesenbach and Glenn Lowry, 2004
Tino Sehgal was selected for the German pavilion at the 2005 Venice Biennale, was shortlisted for the Hugo Boss Prize, and has been a darling of a small but influential coterie of international jet setting curators of which Biesenbach counts himself a particularly ambitious member. So it is not surprising to see MoMA finally buy one of the "constructed situations" pieces, following the lead of the Tate and the Walker. To paraphrase another Sehgal work, "This Is Not New", especially for a curator eager to establish his bonafides over an entire realm of artmaking.
Plazaville
Plazaville is a new media video art work. It is based on the classic 1965 movie Alphaville by Jean Luc Godard. It is set in 21st century New York City. The scenes from the original Alphaville are being re-enacted, interpreted and improvised upon by the artists, actors and videographers. The piece uses the internet as one means of distributing the short video clips. This is somewhat like a serialized program but is not in any order. Viewers can download new scenes as they become available on iTunes and youTube. The videos can be viewed on iPhones, computers and large screen HD televisions.
