James Kalm appreciates the efforts of the Whitney Museum and celebrity curator Robert Gober and is thrilled to bring viewers this glimpse of Charles Burchfield's "Heat Waves in a Swamp". Although classified as an "American Scene" painter during the 1930s, Burchfield was a true visionary artist. Using the humble medium of watercolor, his interpretations of the landscape and rustic urban settings, vibrate with a hallucinatory exuberance. Whether forest, field or street Burchfield's vision was open to cosmic harmonies that could overwhelm with their intensity or sometimes disturb with disquieting sinister qualities. Includes extended statements on the artist by curator Robert Gober.

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.

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.

James Kalm is cruising around the nabes and captures a couple of interesting local happenings, most notably the de-installation of the controversial New Museum exhibition "Skin Fruit". Rolling north-west from the Bowery, we visit the gem like mini-retrospective "Trim" and Other Works 1967-2010 by a personal favorite, Jim Nutt. This show features three recent "portrait" paintings and a group of related drawings. But the real treat is a small but choice selection of amazing work from the past forty years. As one of the leading members of the Chicago group "Hairy Who" Nutt has sustained one of the most consistent and provocative careers within the eccentric figurative mode.

James Kalm makes a early summer trek to West Chelsea to imbibe in the latest selection of works by Kelli Williams. If the Marquee De Sade was living in New York, surfing the internet, indulging in high colonics and hanging out with Brooklyn hipsters while writing "The 120 days of Sodom" Williams would be a shoe-in for creating the illustrations. Her obsessively detailed and patterned works challenge nearly every hierarchical notion of propriety and decorum, while simultaneously extending a formerly unfashionable legacy of fantastical Feminist Surrealist painting.

For the "Stuart Davis Group" James Hyde has selected one of American art's most cherished icons for this collaborative investigation. Taking his camera to the Metropolitan Museum, Hyde took high quality close-ups of Davis paintings which he had blown up and digitally printed onto vinyl supports. He then added his own painterly "riffs" using sign painters enamel, and rollers. The resulting compositions re-contextualize both classic modernism and conceptual abstract painting.

From the press release: "During the winter of 2002, Carlson noticed that many of the flags on display after 9-11 had started to fade...Looking to the faded flags of 9-11 she dyed fabric to match these faded colors. She then made the flag using a combination of hand and machine sewing." Since Jasper Johns reconceived this icon of America, there have been endless revisions of the flag. Mary Carlson's "Flag" however achieves a pathetic and fragile quality implying an obligation to continuity despite world weariness.

James Kalm believes in the serendipity of fate, and sometimes, despite the best laid plans, ends up turning on the camera and capturing intriguing happenings. Such was the case when he popped into view a debut exhibition by Trudy Benson. The artist uses thick slabs of oil paint in coloristically rich pictures that verge on relief. Trudy discusses her "fetishization" of paint, and her painterly influences in a brief chat.

Heading east we visit NURTUREART to partake in the opening of "Who's Afraid of Ornament?" curated by Natasha Kurchanova. This show investigates decoration and ornament and bares testament to the reemergence of the Pattern & Decorative movement from the late seventies.

James Kalm attempts to visit Shepard Fairey's May Day exhibition, the final show at this location of the Deitch Project. However, the crowds are too thick to get in the door, so your reporter documents some of the goings-on outside the gallery including a brief chat with Mark Kostabi, and the arrival of a motorcycle gang. A few days later, Kalm returns to tour the exhibition at an opportune time, without the mobs, for a better viewing of the art.