~Dingle Balls, Dingle Balls, dingle all the way . . .

YES, I MOST DEF do have great GREAT pix – from that fun, wild and damn straight – great art, for sure . . . . TERRY RICHARDSON .. MOM .. DAD OPENING – at HALF GALLERY !!
THEY’RE COMING UP NEXT . . . cutting edge: New York City-style, just the way we like it !!

but first: DANGLE AWAY, MAURIZIO !!


MAURIZIO CATTELAN, taxidermied dog hanging in . . . ‘MAURIZIO CATTELAN: ALL’ – at the GUGGENHEIM.
November 4, 2011 – January 22, 2012.
PHOTO: NANCY SMITH.

note: general admission to the Guggenheim is $18.
students & seniors: $15 – with valid ID. children under 12 free. the museum is closed on Thursdays.
yes, the Cattelan show is worth the price of admission.
see: Guggenheim Museum for hrs.

so, I really got to say: what up with ROBERTA SMITH of the New York Times ? (no relation. believe it.)
and, you can see from this post’s date-stamp . . . I took a few days to consider this carefully.

I mean Charlie Finch I get – but Roberta ?
she’s supposed to be top tier – but she’s still, always ? missing that top 1% – and in the art world dudes, that’s a bad thing !! the top 1% just goes right over her head. and the top 1% is all that really counts.

cue in SHEPARD FAIREY, whose May 1, 2010 show at JEFFREY DEITCH, titled ‘MAY DAY’ – and which was Jeffrey’s swan song to NYC bye the way, resounded with a mythic and real-world S.O.S. – opening as it did, right on the eve of that huge gulf oil spill – and who is, Shepard, that is . . . really a kind of master of the universe, art world-wise, and which show she unbelievably trashed . . . and cue out RACHEL HARRISON. that’s right, Rachel who. but somebody Roberta thought you should know.
just saying.

her say, Roberta’s that is, carries a lot of weight in the art world. or did.
the New York Times under her headlining banner – used to be the bible of the art world. so, she’s fair game to take down. . . it’s like they sing in the streets: she who dish, and play hardball . . . can no turn around, and then, cry baby. her critical kibosh could, and very well used to, signal: the END.
if she didn’t cover your show, you were nobody.

and maybe that’s why the scene, if not just the art auctions – are off kilter, to put it mildly. or is that: kindly.

seriously, she hasn’t been the last word – for quite a while, and she certainly hasn’t been the trailblazing last word – on the contemporary scene, for quite some time . . . though she does a nice descriptive job, a summing up. sometimes. it sure ain’t cutting edge.

BUT for sure, after what she wrote about the MAURTIZIO CATTELAN show at the Guggenheim – people are really re-thinking their take on her opinion. and, if it matters. and why did it ever, anyways. no doubt about it. her rep is on the wane, that’s for sure – just with that one ‘bad’ review. not too many had the guts or vision to question it before.

they are not only questioning her relevance, but questioning how they let her occupy that black amex card ‘branding’ position in the first place. the art world’s a rough and tumble mash-up, make no mistake about it. a lot of (big) money rides on the art world and by implication – its critics, not to mention the sanity and health of its most important denizens – the artists, the creative talent at the base of the pyramid. and the most at risk.
amen.

so when she bombs, forget it. its bad. and most sadly, her say-so affects us all. so I’m not keeping my mouth shut, because – it’s a big friggin loss to let her run the game.

I mean Charlie’s one thing. he is entertaining and his (twisted) poetry – well, it just boosts the game . . . and nobody really takes him seriously, in terms of his words affecting whether someone will actually cut a check for you, or not.

but Roberta is another story.
she is a killjoy, plain and simple. but it’s worse than that, because of her perceived authority . . . . and I guess there goes my friggin career, down the toilet, too.
hey, Maurizio, move over . . . they be calling artlovers ‘toilet paper’ from now on, too. but really . . . why let the losers, the clueless – win ? what’s the point of caving . . . in the age of the web. the free and the brave.

my biggest wake-up call to her tin ear, glass eye ? apart from her ignoring WE LIVE IN PUBLIC – a Sundance winner if I ever did see one, and apart from her pushing Rachel Harrison, Rachel – who ? was when she called Rob Pruitt’s amazin’ glory of a pumped-up waterfall down those damn Shafrazi steps – for that epic Gavin Brown/URS FISCHER show of a few years back – sophomoric. translate: exhibiting immaturity, and lack of judgement. I think mostly because he called it . . . “Viagara Falls.” ha. it was a friggin gem of a piece, and a title. a sandbagged DIY waterfall that gushed water down 2 flights of gallery stairs. everybody was talking about it. nobody had seen anything like it. everybody loved it. and I dare anybody who saw it – to say they didn’t also gasp with disbelief at her low ceiling of a review. what a shame to be putting such a lame critical kibosh on something so so so so New York City cutting edge funny gritty awesome . . . and original.

SO HEADS UP – all you young dudes . . . and everybody else, despite what Roberta wrote – the MAURIZIO CATTELAN show at the GUGGENHEIM – is a-m-a-z-i-n-g. fantastic. super great. no words can claim it. you gotta go see it.
this is – one art world situation – where, for sure: the whole is greater than the parts.
this is the one single reason that validates your rent.
this is why you came to live in New York, in the first place.

what more can I say. how bout this:
‘MAURIZIO CATTELAN: ALL’ . . . is on par with that other recent museum super hit: the ALEXANDER McQUEEN retrospective at the Met – this summer (2011).
does that do it for ya ?
it’s only up through JAN 22, 2012 – so you better bust your little “I don’t go above 14th Street” footsies – and get there . . .
and soon, or the lines will be so long, you’ll never get in. because yes, despite Roberta’s in-vain rain cloud on the hangman’s parade – word of mouth is gathering among the tribes . . and the lines are starting to add up. not joking, you better get there this weekend. by next weekend, with the kind of word of mouth the show is generating – it’s game over . . . in and out, in a New York City minute, not !!

and, YO. CATTELAN, ding dangle away, you crazy Italian clown puppet master !! you rock and you rule.

running out of ideas, as if . . . . !!

as for CHARLIE FINCH. wake up, dude, and fling your damn dingleberries – in the right direction.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . . . and, as a FINAL BON MOT – FOOT in MOUTH – POST-SCRIPT – or – MAKE THAT: STICK A PIN in ROBERTA DAY !!

I offer you this – just check out her recent take on LOS ANGELES !! – lame as lame can be – can it get any worse ?
unless it’s the damn Lower East Side, and the New Museum ?
or maybe Performa. what ? who ? exactly !!

the article is titled: “A New Pin On the Art Map” – all I can say is: NOT !! more like a new low point for the Times. (!!)

the way this article reads, if anybody can actually stay awake long enough to get through it, maybe the B in Roberta – stands for for banal. and she’s putting down Cattelan ?

and since images do speak a 1,000 words, just contrast the article’s featured ‘artwork’ photo lead-in, (below) . . . (the artwork inside the article is even worse !! ) . . to the TERRY RICHARDSON MOM.. DAD.. graphic (in the post just previous).
and, let’s leave it at that.

enough said. game over. New York City is still the one and only. like I said, we like our art gritty in the city. it can still be pretty, pretty can still rhyme with gritty. but it gotta have that edge. you know, just like how Lou Reed laid it down, melodic can be tough. New York City is still the one and only. L.A. not, so much. Chicago and San Fran ? with the way this article bombed, I really don’t think so.

‘A New Pin on the Art Map’ . . . not the sharpest knife in the drawer.


IMAGE/newspaper scan: ‘A New Pin On the Art Map’ by Roberta Smith, ARTS & LEISURE, THE NEW YORK TIMES. Sunday, November 13, 2011.