Art Markets (and Creative Grove): Democratising or Demeaning?

The brand new Creative Grove art market kicked off yesterday at the Grove Street PATH, and it got me wondering about the social standing of such pedestrian (literally) events within the artistic community.

From a "fine art" perspective (aside from selling your work on a street corner) an outdoor booth is about as low on the totem pole as you can get. People: normal, common-denominator people, stop by, talk about your pieces, and--heaven forbid--sometimes try to touch them. But why does this sort of public display strike so many artists as demeaning, rather than as an opportunity for community engagement? Is it the nature of fine art to want to ascend into some otherworldly cloud and escape the prying eyes of the "less-enlightened", does wanting to withdraw really just highlight the fears these artists have about how the general public will react to their work, or is it merely pragmatic (how much do they actually sell-really)?

Showing in a gallery, or even at an established fine art fair (outdoors or not), is not the same thing as popping up a table at a major-transit-hub art market that also sells baby t-shirts. It all comes down to audience, and it's in this sense that Creative Grove is extremely democratic. Who knows what it will become as it continues (hopefully) to grow, but for the moment it is really smack dab at the intersection of art and life--and I like that.

Perhaps it's a romantic notion, but I really believe--or want to believe--that someone off the street can walk up to a great work of art, recognize its communicative or aesthetic value, and be moved enough to take it home. And I don't think that's anything for an artist to be ashamed of. I'm really not talking commercial design, or even screen-printed t-shirts, though they are an important first step in getting people comfortable with the idea of fine art, but rather drawings or paintings that aren't as instinctively functional. Jersey City isn't quite there yet. I think we need more jewelry and decorative wall-hangings before we can fully jump into the swampy territory of fine art markets and develop the more limited audience they rely on to survive.

Ultimately I think this type of market can serve as a source of civic artistic empowerment, but what's your take?

Note: Creative Grove will continue to run every Friday with a rotating group of artists and craftspeople throughout the summer.

The Hudson Current is dead

The bells have tolled for the Current. In more disappointing news on the local print media front, I heard today that the Hudson Reporter newsgroup will no longer be publishing the arts/ entertainment weekly. According to the editor, the Hudson Reporter will instead become a bi-weekly publication with some cultural listings. It's nice to see that the Reporter will be coming out more frequently, but...Jersey City has just lost its only dedicated arts publication.

UPDATE: Sean Allocca (former Current writer/editor) will no longer be on staff, but may be contributing freelance to the new bi-weekly Reporter. All future cultural or arts submissions should go straight to the chain's editor: editor@hudsonreporter.com

As my personal rants about the lack of arts coverage in the press seem to be falling on deaf ears, I'm taking this one step further. From now on, I am declaring myself Jersey City art media guru. Call it what you will, but I'll be posting the reviews (go ahead and demonize me) and features I've been longing to see right here.

The Met’s New American Wing

The New Engelhard Court

Every renovation the Metropolitan Museum made in the last twenty years or so has made the art experience better and better (unlike another museum I could mention). The light brought into the Greek and Roman Galleries is so beautiful, and their collection looks so stunning, I literally get high walking around. The new 19th C. galleries are harmoniously proportioned, richly warm spaces that were cleverly carved out of the Polynesian Wing’s soaring ceiling, and the catacombs under the grand staircase are an absolute delight. And of course the Chinese, Japanese and Egyptian galleries are some of the best in the world.

The old Engelhard Court (from the Bridge and Tunnel Club website).

But I’m sorry to say I’m disappointed with the renovation of the American Wing, at least with the Engelhard Court. Without the greenery, the sunken areas and the different color pavements that used to break up the space, the new court feels too large, too public and too empty. It lost the warm ambiance of the older space (see below) and it’s now more of a dull open plaza than an inviting sculpture garden. The new space does allow more sculpture to be displayed but, not being a fan of this period of American art (which I think is provincial, pretentious and sometimes downright silly), I don’t see that as worth the trade-off.

South Wall with loggia designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany

East Wall with the Vanderbilt Mantelpiece

The five-story south wall housing the pillared loggia designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany for his own home is especially blank looking, and ridiculously out of scale with the art. (Fortunately the opposite wall, the facade of Martin E. Thompson’s Branch Bank of the United States, hasn’t changed.) Likewise, the east wall (coming in, on the right) is comically out of scale with what’s installed there - the Vanderbilt Mantelpiece and Tiffany’s Garden Landscape and Fountain -- but at the same time these works feel weirdly cramped in the space.

This disturbing, contradictory combination of simultaneously being too open and too cramped extends to the Cafe. It is no longer separated from the main space by a lattice fence, so it feels too much a part of the larger court; nevertheless it feels confined because of the low ceiling needed to accommodate the new mezzanine. This is made even more of a problem because the windows overlooking Central Park have been temporarily frosted to hide an ugly staging area for construction they’re doing on the second floor galleries (see photo of staging area below). They promise the view will return in 2011.

Which brings me to another complaint: there are no comfortable places to sit and rest at the Met anymore. A cement bench or busy cafe just won’t do it. Before the cafe was added a few years ago, they had comfortable chairs overlooking Central Park where people could sit quietly, read, maybe take a nap, and rest up. The Brooklyn Museum has lately created many comfortable areas to sit, and the Frick is unsurpassed in that way (as well as every other possible way). In spite of all the past great additions and renovations, I’m beginning to get the feeling that the Met just wants to move the crowds along, maybe feed them in an efficient manner, sell a few books and art chachkas, and move 'em out.


Finally, speaking of cramped spaces, I’m reluctant to spoil the surprise, but an unintended (I assume) surreal treat awaits you in the newly renovated period rooms. Take the new glass elevator in the northeast corner of the Court to the oldest period rooms on the top floor, and you'll see what I mean. You might find a portal into John Malkovitch’s mind there.

Getting off at floor number 2 1/2.

My Favorite Record Album Covers

A recent post by Jonathan Jones, a passionate and insightful blogger about art for The Guardian discusses the banning of the Manic Street Preachers’ new album cover painted by Jenny Saville because it is so shocking (see above). It is a very powerful image, and it got me thinking about how I used to savor a great album cover as much as the music. Anyway here are my top ten favorites:

Art Jargon

I came across a zany British website that generates art nonsense (which they charmingly call "art bollocks") to describe art and impress people. Check it out, it's a real hoot. Just refresh the page to generate more inanities; some are better than others.

It got me thinking of some recent art jargon I find particularly grating: "art practice." "performative," and "agent." Feel free to join in.

Well...maybe not.

Music taken from The Who, A Quick One, While He's Away.

A New Gallery Plus ?

Photo by Jule Pike, FIFI projects

What promises to be a good new gallery just opened in the Lower East Side: FIFI projects, 29 Essex Street.

Even though the gallery is small, their first show is a seven-person exhibition of really handsome large photographs. I particularly loved the largest work (75” x 40”), by Mathias Kessler (no relation), of an iceberg in Greenland shot at night using movie lighting. Barbara Kasten (she showed with John Weber -- I miss seeing her work) used to do a similar thing, but used mirrors and brightly colored gels.

Another space also just opened in the area -- 169 Bowery: Collective Hardware. At first I didn't know if it was a gallery or what it was. The entire, relatively raw, ground floor had an exhibition by Steve Olson, but the door was wide open and no one was sitting the show. I heard talk upstairs so I walked up a flight and there were some people sitting around what looked like a living room in a large loft with a hair salon in the front. I asked them if this was a gallery and they said they didn’t know anything about the place and just wandered in like me, but they pointed to a guy passing by that might know. I asked him and got a major Charles Chamot type schpeel.

It’s a collective all right -- the entire building. FIVE stories! And it indeed includes a gallery and a hair salon, but also a clothing design studio and show room, a recording studio, a special effects studio and probably a lot more than I could take in from the guy. Their website isn’t completed yet, but he promised it would be ready soon. It isn’t far from the New Museum; check it out when you’re in the area.

NYTimes on Claes Oldenburg

Check out Carol Kino's article today about Claes Oldenburg and the late Coosje van Bruggen, his recently deceased wife and collaborator. (Click on the title of this post for a link to it.) Now approaching 41 years of marriage myself I may be particularly empathetic, but I was quite moved.

This was the first article in a long time in the Sunday Arts & Leisure section that I found worth reading -- the articles on art, that is. I don't get it. The articles are much longer than the weekly ones, and they're usually by good writers and on interesting topics. Am I the only one that feels this way?

Why isn't Jersey City Art a big deal? (because the press doesn't make it one)

In every city I've lived in new museum shows and elaborate cultural events created buzz. Trustees, board members, politicians, and artistic pundits would all crawl out from their meeting rooms to support (if only for the price of admission) the latest event on the artistic calendar. The newspaper would be there, snapping grainy photographs of the elites in action, and though I didn't always agree with the deference given to social rank and financial power at these happenings, their media presence ensured the status of both the hosting institution and the art they advocated for.

The Jersey City Museum had it's annual Artrageous Ball two weeks ago, and the press hasn't even whispered. According to the museum, 200+ people attended the event (its biggest fundraiser of the year) including the mayor, other government officials, and high-ranking professionals with a soft spot for the creative. Regardless of how I feel about the tangled web of artist/museum/patron relations--this is news.

Events like this are more than just fundraisers providing money needed to keep cultural organizations up and running (the museum will put these proceeds towards operating expenses- not such a sexy sell), they are reminders that the arts are a powerful force deserving of community recognition and respect. When the Jersey City Museum's press releases never go any further than it's own website and a few message boards, that's a failure--not of the organization, but of the local media. In fact, it's an affront.

I know art is sometimes difficult to understand and that the Jersey City press as a whole is wobbling already, but the reason we as a community tend to undervalue the Museum and our own artistic production is due in part to a lack of media attention. The museum contributes to the health and vibrancy of this community, but we so rarely hear about it that it's easy to forget what it has done, what it's working towards, and what it stands for. But the fact remains that it is a museum, "a permanent institution in the service of society and of its development, open to the public, which acquires, conserves, researches, communicates and exhibits the tangible and intangible heritage of humanity...", in charge of representing the finest art Jersey City has to offer and exposing it so we--the public--can better understand our own existence here and now.

Museums can put on bad shows too (and it's important to recognize that), but the press has got to step up to the plate and say "art matters". It's not the quality of Jersey City art that is sub par; it's the media coverage that makes it so.

PS. I write art features for JCI and they actually run them; thanks for covering the art news the Jersey Journal and Hudson Reporter often don't. If you've got an idea for a story-drop me a line.

Its Our Factory

It’s Our Factory

Industrial Sites / Art Destinations

Tom McGlynn

The city of North Adams, MA is situated in the northwest corner of Massachusetts. Once home to over 20,000 residents, this former industrial stronghold has seen its population decrease to approximately 16,000 in recent years.
   Sprague Electric moved into the site for what would prove to be a forty-plus year occupation. During this time, North Adams essentially became a company town-- at one point, about a quarter of the city's workers were employed by the company. A distinct workers' society sprung up within Sprague-- replete with publications, parties, and banquets-- which won the loyalty of many, even as their unions only slowly managed to get Sprague to increase the wages and benefits offered by the company to its employees. The complex on Marshall Street-- largely vacated in 1986-- once again faced a period of uncertainty and transition, with many of its former workers left feeling betrayed and bitter by the company's evacuation and confused about what to do next. Although the idea of bringing in another manufacturer to take Sprague's place was bandied about, the potential for traditional industry endeavors in western         Massachusetts was rather limited, and instead plans for a new museum featuring contemporary art were developed, proposing to change the city's economic focus from traditional production-oriented facilities to one based on new "high" technologically-oriented fields and tourism. The Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MassMoCA) opened in 1998, after a decade-long battle to obtain adequate funding and iron out a feasible development plan. It proposes to provide a boost to the struggling economy of the city, but will not employ nearly as many people (at least directly) as its predecessors. The nature of the project also leaves many residents wondering how the character of their living environment will be affected by the project, and looking to the past to help explain the present and move on toward the future.   from the North Adams Research Guide

On the ride home from Mass Moca, I had a conversation with Mike Weins, one of my senior art students from Castleton State College, over the border in Vermont, about the strangeness of viewing a contemporary art show (the late Sol Lewitt’s wall drawings) that was scheduled to last for the next 25 years. Mass Moca had followed the precedent of decades long semi- permanent or permanent “contemporary” shows that Dia initiated in 1977 with Walter De Maria’s Lightning Field and Earth Room, This tradition is continued at Dia Beacon in upstate New York, another vast and formerly productive site of manufacture.

Dia: Beacon, Riggio Galleries 
Dia was a pioneer in converting large industrial buildings for the installation of contemporary art—a practice now widely used by museums internationally. Dia’s latest such conversion, its museum in Beacon, is located in a former printing plant built in 1929 by Nabisco (National Biscuit Company). 
     Dia:Beacon’s expansive spaces are uniquely suited to the needs of large-scale installations, paintings, and sculptures. In keeping with Dia’s history of single-artist, site-related presentations each gallery in the museum was designed specifically for the art it contains. This includes Warhol’s 1978-79 multipart work Shadows, displayed in a single installation measuring approximately 350 linear feet; two of Beuys’s mixed-media installations, Arena—dove sarei arrivato se fossi stato intelligente! (Arena—where would I have got if I had been intelligent!), 1970-72, and Aus Berlin: Neues vom Kojoten (From Berlin: News from the Coyote), 1979, together with several of his Fonds (1979); Darboven’s monumental Kulturgeschichte 1880–1983 (Cultural History 1880–1983), 1980–83 (note: this work is currently deinstalled for conservation); De Maria’s multipart stainless steel sculpture The Equal Area Series (1976–77); selections from Flavin’s series of fluorescent light “monuments” to V. Tatlin (1964–81); and Heizer’s North, East, South, West (1967/2002), among others. The reflected north light from more than 34,000 square feet of skylights creates ideal viewing conditions, evidenced in the galleries devoted to the paintings of Kawara, Martin, Palermo, and Ryman.
     Dia collaborated with American artist Robert Irwin and architect OpenOffice to formulate the plan for the museum building and its exterior setting and grounds. The plan includes an entrance court and parking lot with a grove of flowering fruit trees and a formal garden, both of which were designed by Irwin.   from Dia's website

The concept of a museum- mausoleum had congealed in our lifetimes like the hardening arteries of a distraught octogenarian college football player dreaming about his glory days suspended in nursing home disbelief. Joseph Beuys’ Social Sculpture ideal gets co-opted by picturesque representations of rustic Empire.
“They’re assimilating our present experience” I lectured Mike in a pedantic rant. "That’s the mission. The gift shop, even, really isn’t the point of commodification. The real commodity being exchanged here is our dead mental labor. There’s no actionable intelligence here my friend, that is, the time folded back on itself suffocates aesthetic aspiration.” He looked at me with respectful partial comprehension, as if to say ” Time must really matter to you dude ”.  “Yes” I telepathically replied,  "I’m much more sensitive than your nascent self to the stench of immortality waved beneath my nose, as if my lack of critical presence needs to be revived by an aura of contemporary art that retains its contemporaneous-ness, paradoxically ad infinitum."

From the factory complex gangways the  spirits of the makers chant:

We vacate the lofts and factories for all this silly stuff. We don’t drive no Mercury, or anything quite substantial enough. The welfare state of Wal-Mart has colonized our hearts. Any day there’ll come a cleansing Tide to return us to machine parts.

   “Yes Mike, I hate to tell you, that your inheritance of facture is intact but virtually useless,” I grumble. He nods and looks ahead. 

We pass by Greek Revival farmhouses and low security correctional facilities. The sunset evokes a Sanford Gifford. 

Chelsea Lives!

I take back all the bad things I said about Chelsea art galleries: that the dealers are unfriendly and sometimes rude, and the art they show is boring and irrelevant. It sure wasn't true yesterday. The glorious weather may have accounted for them being nicer -- that and a desperate economic situation. But for the first time in years I had some really interesting conversations with some of the gallery people -- even with that dour guy who's been at Sonnabend forever.

Starting from 21st Street and working up, here are some of my favorite shows:

Picasso's Mosqueteros - first and foremost. (What, you're not surprised? Humph.) I've seen it FIVE times already. I can only look at about a dozen works at a time before I get overwhelmed (Stendhal syndrome -- I'm not kidding). Gagosian, 522 W. 21st, until June 6.

Sophie Calle, Paula Cooper Gallery next door at 534 W. 21st, until May 22. I saw it when it first opened and was the only man among about 30 women of all ages. (Yesterday there were a few more men.) No wonder -- it's embarrassing being of the same sex as the weasel who sent her the Dear Sophie letter. Be sure to see the parrot video.

Also on 21st (it's becoming the new 24th Street!) at Barbara Gladstone, 530 W. 21st, is Huang Yong Ping's room-sized Tower Snake. These huge sculptures/installations by Chinese art stars are a cliche by now, but still impressive.

Sonnabend, 536 W. 22nd. Beate Gutschow employs digital montage to construct large somewhat creepy photos of what looks like Brutalist architecture but isn't quite. It reminded me of the hauntingly still, end-of-the-world feeling evoked by Louis Kahn's Salk Institute.

Sorry to say the Alex Katz show at Pace on 22nd left me kind of cold. But it's right across the street so see for yourself.

Gagosian scored again with a knock-out show of Yayoi Kusama's paintings and installations, 555 W. 24th, until June 27th. Kusama has been doing these paintings for a long time now, but they're still incredibly intense and mesmerizing.

Betty Cunningham, 541 W. 25th, has a two-person drawing show of Jersey City's own Gordon Moore and my old friend John Lees. Both works are quiet and intimate and yet strangely edgy. John spends years working a drawing, erasing it, re-working it, patching it, until it has a palpable physical presence of its own. John is one of my favorite artists -- and I don't say that about all my friends.

Across the street at Pace is a Chuck Close show that sadly didn't do much for me. The guy has done so much great art, and he's such a mensch, I wanted to like the show -- but I just didn't.

There are seven or eight galleries on 27th WEST of Eleventh Avenue that are small, more like Lower East Side galleries. They are usually more interesting, provocative and experimental than the more established galleries on the other side of Eleventh -- and yesterday was no exception. John Connelly has a relatively tame (for them) show by Michael Wetzel of gorgeously painted food like spaghetti and meatballs. The reliably good Winkleman Gallery was closed for installation, but next door at Schroeder-Romero, 637 W. 27th, there's a must-see show by William Powhida. His work would take me too long to describe, but you can read about it in the Times (where you'll also find an excellent review by Roberta Smith of the Sophie Calle show). It closes May 16th, but they told me they're working on putting some of it into book form.

Buildings, Street Life and Art

From Frank O’Hara’s MEDITATIONS IN AN EMERGENCY: 

However, I have never clogged myself with the praises of pastoral life, nor with nostalgia for an innocent past of perverted acts in pastures. No. One never need leave the confines of New York to get all the greenery one wishes – I can’t even enjoy a blade of grass unless I know there’s a subway handy, or a record store or some other sign that people do not totally regret life. It is more important to affirm the least sincere; the clouds get enough attention as it is and even they continue to pass. Do they know what they are missing? Uh huh. 

My friends know I’m not one for nature; I love cities. It’s not a coincidence that great art is made in great cities. I know there’s a lot of great art being made now in the sticks, some by friends of mine, but would it exist if the artist hadn’t first spent time in a city? Would the artist be able to learn about art, get their work known, or make a living without cities? No. So great and vital cities are important for art and artists, and one of the things that makes a city great is its streets. 

What precipitated this rant is all the recent stories about Lincoln Center’s 1.2 billion dollar renovation and Alice Tully Hall’s new street-friendly facade. I always believed Lincoln Center was a major city planning mistake. Performing arts buildings should never be sequestered into an isolated campus. The very idea of creating a performing arts center wastes precious resources -- it would be better if they were spread out into different areas that need night activity, like Wall Street. (This is basic Jane Jacobs). Look at all the good Carnegie Hall does for Midtown. To make matters worse, Lincoln Center isolated the buildings away from the street, killing any possible street life. The Upper West Side is a thriving, lively area except for those blocks blighted by Lincoln Center.

Alice Tully Hall before & after the renovation by Diller Scofidio & Renfro  Alice

Tully Hall spent millions to overcome their awful street presence and the MOMA, on the other hand, put up a blank wall on 54th street. Jersey City is sadly challenged in this respect -- not the older parts which are rated as highly pedestrian friendly (see http://www.walkscore.com/). It’s the new buildings and streets along the Waterfront that are so bad. I don’t blame developers for this -- they have no interest in making nice for pedestrians. I blame the city who should be protecting the quality of life of their citizens, and who should know better. 

Here are some photos of the some of the worst offenders, and some examples of good street presence: In the 1980‘s this used to be called the Cali Building and now goes by the grandiose name International Financial Tower. It’s in a prime area right by the Grove PATH. This bunker is probably the worst building in the city, and a shameful example of uncongenial -- hostile really -- architecture. They only need a neon sign saying GO AWAY to make it worse.  

Liberty Towers, Exchange Place. The idea of a ‘tower in a park” went out with bell bottoms, but it’s experienced an unfortunate revival in Jersey City. Btw, the park is completely useless in this type of architecture; it’s just for looks. Essex Street, Paulus Hook. The sign on the gate says: “Please close the gate behind you.” Only a two- story solid wall could have removed them more from the street (see MOMA, above). Compare the welcoming street presence of this historic area of Paulus Hook with the new buildings above and below. And the rare times retail is provided on the ground floor they contrive ways to separate it from the street, as if to say the stores are for our residents and the street is for riffraff. I almost got arrested taking pictures of the Mack-Cali complex in Exchange Place for this post. A guard stopped me, and when I naturally objected (a free country -- supposedly) he called 4 other burly security guards who called the cops (for backup?). THREE squad cars came including an undercover car. Fortunately they didn’t do anything but geez, have we gotten so fearful and paranoid because of one terrorist act (however horrific) that we’re ready to give up our civil rights? Come on! Isn’t this just what the terrorists want? Talk about hostile streets! Ironically, I wanted a picture of their parking structure on Washington and Columbus (Harborside Financial Center Plaza 4A ) as an example of pedestrian friendly architecture. That says something: one of the best new buildings in the city is a parking garage. Mack-Cali said they’d send me some photos. If they’re suitable I’ll post them.

HEAVY CRAFT/SOFT LANDING

I just came back from seeing Art House Productions' original play, HEAVY CRAFT/SOFT LANDING. It was one of the best things I've seen in the last year or so -- and I go to a lot of theater. Typical of all of their productions, it was visually striking, inventive and poetic in an abstract way, but now, as the company matures, the structure and vision have become tighter. Tomorrow (Saturday, May 9th) is the last show and there are only a few tickets left. (You can buy tickets at: www.arthouseproductions.org). If you miss out on this don't make the same mistake next time.

I am not an artist

Jumping on Charles' question (Why did you become an artist?) and after much hemming and hawing have come to the happy understanding that I'm not one.

I have a studio, I’m constantly thinking about making things, and I sometimes show what I produce, but becoming an “artist” is something I’ve tried desperately to avoid. I’m still running away from the term. I have always been creating (in one sense or another) but what makes me differentiate myself for the A-word is an intense uneasiness over how I have come to define it.

I did not pursue a studio degree in school; I majored in other disciplines because I knew that no matter what my area of expertise was when I graduated, I’d still continue making art. Not having a BFA was not going to stop me. What I made I created out of personal desire; it didn’t matter if anyone else ever saw it or if the work just lived in a box in the basement. What I thought was a success I kept—what I hated (most things) I destroyed. To me, this wasn’t being an artist; artists exhibited in galleries, wrote statements, framed things, actively sought attention, and I didn’t really want that. I wouldn’t have said no to a little press, but I liked my anonymity and didn’t care if I was ever singled out for my work.

But I also wasn’t looking to studio art as a career: credentials didn’t matter—neither did the state of the market. At the time I didn’t personally know any artists who were supporting themselves off their work and, though I often would have liked more time to develop my ideas, working in other disciplines made every art session fresh and productive. I probably produced the most pieces when I was in grad school for French and working in information technology, just because of the variety. I don’t live and breathe art, and I can’t without going crazy. In the one “intro to drawing” class I took as an undergrad my professor told me that sometimes the most important thing you can do to a piece is to walk away. I walk away a lot.

Not that much of my time is actually spent making art, which is why I twinge at being called an artist. I don’t want to trivialize the dedication of people who actually spend most days in studio, or box myself in to a definition that is so malleable. Plus I think when most people ask you what you “do” they mean “for a living”, and I lose money on my art (I think that's ok).

I also think people hide behind the term artist to escape accountability, and that we let them get away with it. So I make things. Sometimes the things are art and sometimes they’re crap. But I keep making them, out of the need to express some vision that I can’t articulate (otherwise I would). That’s why I am—a creator, I guess.

The Powerhouse Arts District