‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – WHERE ARE WE NOW: JOSH HARRIS
JOSH HARRIS – the HEAD HONCHO. JUPITER COMMUNICATIONS.COM, PSEUDO.COM, QUIET the MILLENNIUM PARTY TO END ALL PARTIES, and WE LIVE IN PUBLIC – the first 24/7 wired surveillance live streaming interactive web project that defined a new generation, not to forget . . the still unfolding WIRED CITY . . . ALL HIS BABIES !!
the film ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – is his story. as director ONDI TIMONER put it: “this is the story of the greatest internet entrepreneur – you never heard of . . . ”
see: ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – the film’s official website . . .
top floor, the old industrial building at the corner of N. 10th and Berry – in WiIliamsburg – was home to JOSH HARRIS for about a year. from pretty much about the time ALFREDO MARTINEZ was rescued from CHINA. by Josh . . . with some (diplomatic) help from writer BYRON HAWES.
see: ALFREDO/ LOST & FOUND
but the Brooklyn gig’s up – and Josh is on the move . . . whereabouts: unknown.
the day before he split, he just managed to intersect with JEFF GOMPERTZ – a close artist associate of his from the Pseudo glory days . . . Jeff had flown in from Bangkok to clear up some business, Josh has packed up and is taking off. . . these are Jeff’s shaped canvas ‘boards’ on the floor . . . m/m encaustic wax-coated – canvas paintings – stretched over sono tubes.
detail: JEFF GOMPERTZ ‘board’.
it was Josh who set up the photo shoot. as anybody who has spent any time hanging around with him, can tell you . . . if he hadn’t been a visionary internet entrepreneur – he would have made for a great magazine creative director . . .
the down side ? the legend goes that hanging out with artists – is what pulled him too far to the other side – he got so distracted . . . he didn’t keep his eye on the color of the ink in the ledger books – to make a long story, short. but the reality is: what Josh claimed all along, while he was being hailed as a web guru and new age tech geek in the mainstream media . . that he was really – an artist. and you know what, he was.
the last NYC sighting: JOSH HARRIS. . . AUGUST 12, 2011.
he said he was off to fish in Connecticut, and then on to URUGUAY, where there were developers who were gonna work on . . . THE WIRED CITY.
then came a cryptic sighting in upstate NY on AUGUST 20th – that placed him in LORDVILLE, a small rural town where Gavin, that’s Gavin Brown to you, has a cabin . . the message:
“gavin’s generator got soaked in the rain . . now all he has is solar power.”
and that was before Hurricane Irene hit !! where Josh is now – is anybody’s guess.
I guess we’re back to that to that old artlovers game – WANTED: $10 for the first new sighting of JOSH HARRIS. or:
WHERE IN THE WORLD – IS – JOSH ?
oh oh . . speak of the devil. lordy, lordy – artlovers on the screen.
RAY’S A LAUGH !!
JEFF was getting some work ready to hang in the KCDC skate shop/gallery around the corner . . .
nice. real nice.
the works had been in storage . . .
long time, no see . . and still had the original provenance tags from Jeff’s earliest forays into the New York City art world: ca. 1989 . . . ANNINA NOSEI GALLERY – 100 PRINCE ST. (!!)
since Annina was Basquiat’s first dealer – Josh seemed to get a big kick out of that.
to Jeff it was: been there done that. don’t remind me.
Jeff had pretty much soured on that scene and forgot about it by the 90’s – when he was swept up by Josh’s dot com $$ bubble – and ended up making that iconic pod hotel for QUIET . . . face it: he was just a little too smart for the art scene per se. alot of the ‘underground’ artists of the 80s and 90s found refuge, not to mention fast-paced thinking – with Josh. Alfredo and me, included.
and that’s why Josh has often been termed the web’s Andy Warhol . . . he had a real boiler room going, funded by his web ventures, big time. oh yeah. those were the dot.com days !!
Pseudo ruled. Josh aka LUVVY was the master of ceremonies. and it was a wild wild time. just flat out wild.
like I said, quelle funny how our hardcore mayhem – paved a trail – spun a web ? – to the ‘social networking’ . . of the very public interconnected dot world – we live in today.
connecting the dots. the digital dots. the very definition of art – in a nutshell.
the book cover says:
“What Chess Can Teach You About BUSINESS Even If You Never Played”.
PHOTOS: NANCY SMITH, all art work by JEFF GOMPERTZ
posted on the 10th anniversary of 9/11, NYC.
~FAR OUT . . . JOSH HARRIS |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | September 12th, 2011, 9:51pm
‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – WHERE ARE WE NOW: JEFF GOMPERTZ
JEFF GOMPERTZ – ONE OF HIS HIS ART WORKS – BESIDE HIM . . . WILLIAMSBURG, BROOKLYN. NYC. AUGUST 12, 2011.
PHOTO BY NANCY SMITH
JEFF GOMPERTZ is the artist who designed and built the (sleeping) pod hotel, wired for 24/7 surveillance and multi-channel live streaming feedback – sometimes referred to in the press, as “the underground bunker” – for ‘QUIET’ – the JOSH HARRIS/PSEUDO funded year 2000 Millennium week-long party – that is the foundation of ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’.
It was home to 99 artists, resident in-house crew, and associated heavy-duty partiers and hangers-on. including some paid professionals, another story. ok, it got more raunchy by the day. and yes, there was a (completely) open toilet facility and transparent ‘group’ shower at one end, and on the other – a toxic room.
The toxic room – built for ‘the end of the world’ and conceived by AIDAS BAREKIS and AARON BREWER is also a whole other story !! but suffice to say – it was just what you thought, or heard . . . a small tucked-in room full of toxic paint, open cans of chemicals, and god only knows what else. no ventilation. right next door to where 99 people slept, (and played). just another one of the no-holds barred, full-on aspects of the place, and maybe one of Josh’s little inside jokes . . . that gave QUIET, and then ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC” – it’s street-cred edge & hard-core reputation – not to mention a good reason for getting it shut down !!
Jeff’s pod hotel, surveillance-wired and camera-accessorized, took the form of a light-weight portable jerry-rigged grid of individual stacked box-like sleeping compartments, quickly termed the ‘pods’ by the QUIET in-house crew.
Originally inspired by traditional way cheapo Japanese journeymen sleeping ‘pod’ hotels – the 99 person transient pod home – became an accidental metaphor for the whole project: i.e. the “matrix”, the social network “grid”, the whole wired world, the wired city – the wired “hub” of the digital future. in short – the “web”.
. . . all this was way before you could even stream live video on the web, never mind FACEBOOK.
and it was way way !! funny for us, the original hard-core crew – who blew the roof off communication/public living norms – as they had been pre-2000 . . . knowing how rocking-wild the scene had been – to see how the film’s director/shaper/interpreter/storyteller: ONDI TIMONER – reduced, perhaps morphed is the better word – Jeff’s minimal, but wired !! pod grid – into the classic ‘social networking’ logo, a blue grid of clean-cut computer users in their pristine ‘preppy’ cubicles – that opens the film.
ha.
see: ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – the movie’s official website
KCDC skateshop founder/owner AMY GUNTHER – with JEFF GOMPERTZ . . . and two of his ‘shaped’ surf/skateboard canvases . . . photographed in the on-site skateboard bowl – that animates this Williamsburg, Brooklyn-located store.
now, here’s the funny part . . . catch this:
Jeff G. had just come back to lock in some business, this past August (2011) . . . he has lived and worked out of BANGKOK, THAILAND for the past several years, and was retrieving some of his older, but futuristic forever – !! art work – when Josh, as in Harris of course – who was with him, long story short – went zooming around the corner on Berry – and asked Amy, who shows cutting edge local art in her shop – if she would exhibit some of Jeff’s work.
to her credit, Amy said yes. right away. right on the dime, the gig’s in play. well, speedsters-r-us . . . that’s just how we like to play the game, in Pseudo-land !!
but that’s not the funny part. the funny part is:
the KCDC skateshop is located at 90 N. 11th St – the very location of the ALFREDO MARTINEZ – post 9/11 – ‘WELCOME TO THE PLAYGROUND OF THE FEARLESS’ group show – featured in the previous post. shut up !!
it was Jeff who kept shaking his head – at the irony. yeah, he had had work in that Alfredo show. for sure.
I mean does the truth always go round in circles – or what ?
FAKE OUT !!
so, does the principle of YIN YANG rule – because its a round – globe – of a planet – we walk on ?
just that simple.
or is there always some kind of intrinsic beauty in life, as there is in science. in math. art ?
big questions for a skateshop gig, or what.
AMY GUNTHER of KCDC – making the world go round . . . with a JEFF GOMPERTZ ‘board’.
KCDC Skateshop – 90 N. 11th St. Brooklyn, NY 11211/tel: 1-718-387-9906
the store’s ad hoc gallery is on the other side of the bowl . . .
Jeff installing the ‘board’ work . . .
the show was titled ‘FAKE OUT’ – by Josh, I think. and for many reasons. but also as a play of words on one of Jeff’s prize projects – his website: FAKE SHOP !! (more on that, later)
JEFF GOMPERTZ, ‘Listening For Distance’, m/m on canvas, 23 x 68 in.
the shaped ‘boards’ – stretched canvas on sono tubes, m/m – multi-media, as in paint and xerox copies, with appropriated images . . .
all these ‘boards’ date from 1989, and have only gained in perspective – as far as I can see – from the vantage point of time – past. to my mind what really sets them apart, apart from the imagery and shape – and puts them straight-up counter-intuitive to real skate/surf boards – is the mute, if not downright mutant !! matte surface – the result of an encaustic wax layer that coats and permeates the already dull textured canvas, making for one – very un-shiny, very un-slick ‘board’ surface.
un-slick: I so like that. so up against-the-grain and contrarian. so, east coast, Americano.
you can see the concave aspect of the work – better, from an angle.
Jeff’s gone back to Thailand, but the show’s still up, as of Sept 11, 2011.
KCDC Skateshop/ 90 N. 11th just west of Berry.
JEFF GOMPERTZ currently works and lives in BANGKOK, THAILAND – where his most recent studio is a converted storefront . . .
where he runs a project . . . an interactive local community art web-based gig – a very post-modern ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – called: CHATROOM – which is dialogued on facebook.
or, as Jeff himself says: “Chatroom is my studio and ‘lab’ in Bangkok, which has presented various collaborations with Bangkok artists, focusing on net and socio-political thematics.”
see: CHATROOM/facebook
and then of course . . .
there is his pet web project: FAKE SHOP
yep, check it out, or be a loser. the future is up to you.
ALL PHOTOS: NANCY SMITH.
EXCEPT FOR THE LAST 2 IMAGES – WHICH ARE SCREENGRABS/COURTESY OF JEFF GOMPERTZ: CHATROOM & FAKESHOP.
posted on the 10th anniversary of 9/11. NYC.
.
~FAKE OUT . . . JEFF GOMPERTZ at KCDC |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | September 11th, 2011, 4:30pm
‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – WHERE ARE WE NOW: ALFREDO MARTINEZ
this is the card ALFREDO . . . put out for his post 9/11show: ENTROPY / WELCOME TO THE PLAYGROUND OF THE FEARLESS – A Nobody Creative Production – curated by ALFREDO MARTINEZ, NORI JUNG & JAMES FUENTES – with spatial design by John Demas & Sarah Woods. the show ran DEC 14, 2001 – JAN 10, 2002, and was dedicated to JOHN PERRY (NYPD/NYCLU) . . . a personal friend of Alfredo’s . . .
ONWARD. UPWARD.
amen. through personally I feel every building being built there now – is fear-based. in design.
I guess, what can you do. . . in a world rocked by terrorism ? well, I have my thoughts on that – but sending a small plane through somebody’s Middle Eastern brand new skyscraper hotel – might cause the whole world to go up in flames – so I guess I better stick to covering art . . . through the word entropy does come to mind.
‘Entropy’ was one of Alfredo’s favorite words – at the time. if you know Alfredo – then you know what I mean. he catches onto a word like entropy or misanthrope – and there’s no letting go . . . .
the show was held in a big empty ground floor space in Williamsburg – 90 N. 11th ST !!
ALFREDO was one of Josh’s closest confidantes at Pseudo – regarding the art game and the big Pseudo funded millennium bash: QUIET. Yes, he ran that gun, as in big gun !! AK47 – shooting gallery in the ‘underground bunker’ basement . . . wildly featured in the film: ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – and the gun component – helped underscore the end-of-the-world scenario – of the week-long year 2000 par-tay !! which took place downtown, in the very shadow of the Trade Center.
people ask me all the time – if those were real guns, people were shooting in the film. yes, damn straight – they were !! how did Josh and Alfredo – get over on that ?
they rigged the party as a “film production site” – which it was, or was gonnabe – with 24/7 surveillance cameras – and got the appropriate film permits !! – and complied with all the legal red tape – including having the required licensed gun prop masters on site. though they left out the bit about having the site operate simultaneously as a huge party – open to the public 24/7.
oops.
in a sad note: the NYPD, FDNY and FEMA teams that came to shut down QUIET, having nothing better to do millennium week in NYC – took a heavy toll – in the real deal – just under 2 years later.
ALFREDO currently resides in NYC – moving among a group of close pals and some favorite internet cafes, in Chinatown !! he is making gun drawings and selling them – with enough regularity to keep him welcome, fed and happy. if there is any sushi left over for anybody else, on the night he celebrates a sale – let me know.
see: ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – the film’s official website
posted on the 10th anniversary of 9/11, NYC.
~PLAYGROUND OF THE FEARLESS . . . ALFREDO MARTINEZ |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | September 9th, 2011, 9:08am
‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – WHERE ARE WE NOW: NANCY SMITH
NANCY SMITH, RE-PAIRED QUILT & PHOTO.
note: the WORLD TRADE CENTER TOWERS, RIGHT HAND/TOP OF PHOTO.
THIS IS MY HAND-STITCHED & PATIENTLY RE-STORED ca. 1860-80 AMERICAN QUILT. the pattern is called: ‘LIGHTNING STRIKES’ (!!) – PHOTOGRAPHED MID-WAY TOWARDS COMPLETION, ON THE 20th FLOOR TERRACE of MY FDR & GRAND ST APT, NYC. MAY 1998 . . . NANCY SMITH.
I was a resident artist, crew member and one of a handful of JOSH HARRIS key assistants – at ‘QUIET’ – the $1 million dollar+ PSEUDO sponsored/year 2000 Millennium party – wired with 24/7 live streaming surveillance – that became the foundation for – ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ . . . the Sundance award-winning documentary by ONDI TIMONER.
I founded (2005) – and currently run this website – artloversnewyork.com.
And, yes. I still repair old quilts . . . by hand.
see: ‘WE LIVE IN PUBLIC’ – THE FILM’S – OFFICIAL WEBSITE
this photo gives you a better idea of the terrace set-up. yes, that’s the East River, and the Brooklyn Bridge, in the background. although I photographed a number of my quilts on that terrace railing – this is the only one – where I went out of my way to get the World Trade Center into the composition. funny right, Lightning Strikes and all ?
it was a really shallow terrace on the 20th floor – so I really didn’t have that much room – to get a long distance shot in – unless I made a concerted effort, which I did this one time only – on a whim.
later, when researching the quilt – I found it was based on an old pioneer pattern, called Lightning Strikes, with a specific reference to “domestic fire” threatening one’s home . . . it is also called Zig Zag and Streak of Lightning, and it is a very popular pattern, that survived frontier times and got handed down in many a family – even when the totemic message was lost, mostly because of its striking graphic and dynamic visual appeal.
from: ‘Eight Hands Round – A Patchwork Alphabet’ by ANN WHITFORD PAUL:
“ZIG ZAG – This pattern was sometimes called Streak of Lightning. People who lived on the plains were especially afraid of lightning because during a hot summer, it could set the dry grass on fire. A strong wind could spread the fire, threatening their homes, their animals, and their crops. The whole family helped fight such a fire. They used wet blankets and pails filled with water from a well or a nearby stream. Maybe a woman sewed this pattern so she would not forget (!!) how hard everyone once worked to save her home from a lightning fire.”
posted on the 10th anniversary of 9/11. NYC.
and, yeah I watched the whole thing happen in real time from this very balcony with its bird eye view . . starting from the very moment the first plane slammed into the first tower to actually catching the 2nd plane slowly arc off the East River and head straight for the 2nd tower . . . while all the local TV stations were reporting “some kind of helicopter accident” (!!) – I was calling my kid’s school, to tell them the city was under attack. sure, they thought I was outta left field – but not for long !!
PHOTOS & ART WORK: NANCY SMITH
~LIGHTNING STRIKES . . . NANCY SMITH |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | September 8th, 2011, 10:54am
it’s lights out for: ASIAN SONG SOCIETY . . .
TERENCE KOH – TURNS OFF HIS GALLERY – ASIAN SONG SOCIETY, DOWNTOWN – WITH A DEATHLY PERFORMANCE . . . PHOTO BY: ADAM TYSON.
ADAM TYSON REPORTS:
The email sent to the Asian Song Society (Terence Koh’s gallery) list serve (last week) stated that the show would begin “88 minutes before midnight” — and that it would be his last show, as well as the very last show, in the space.
Around 10:20 PM there were about ten of us milling around out front. The metal gate to the gallery was shut . . .
11pm, still nothing.. Some of us left and went to another space to hang out.. We returned near midnight . . .
Gate shut. . . . A bunch of people there now. . .
A girl in a white dress emerged from the gallery door, slid the gate upwards, to reveal the glowing, misty inside of the gallery. We gazed through the big window at Terence lying on the floor in the distance..
You can’t see it in this photo – but there was a gaping hole in the ceiling (above the chunks of drywall scattered on the floor).
Just then, an NYPD paddy wagon with blinking lights rolled up and a cop told us through a loudspeaker to clear the sidewalk for pedestrians to pass.
After about eight minutes the girl slid the gate down and people went their ways.
see: ASS/ASIAN SONG SOCIETY
see: adamtyson.com
posted on the 10th anniversary of 9/11, NYC.
~TERENCE KOH/SWAN SONG . . . |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | September 7th, 2011, 9:16am
oh, yeah. file under: from dust to dust. and !! under water.
Hurricane Irene makes the scene . . . extreme weather, just like they projected. except happening faster than the projections, maybe ?
THRIFT SHOP VINTAGE – ‘DANISH ASSORTMENT’ COOKIE TIN, showing an OLD WOODEN COVERED BRIDGE – VALLEY BROOK FARMS, HAMMONTON, N.J.
PHOTO: NANCY SMITH
IRENE, the hurricane turned tropical storm of this past weekend (AUG 27, 28, 29, 2011) really hit hard and wrecked havoc in the up-state rural NEW YORK, NEW JERSEY and VERMONT areas – where the early settlements and later villages – were founded along the waterways. one of the saddest losses are some the area’s prized historic wooden covered bridges. R.I.P. Many of them are now replicas, but many are, or were, the real deal.
artist, quilter, master crafter SCOTTIE HARRISON reports from PLAINFIELD, VERMONT that: “20 miles from Plainfield, MORETOWN, WATERBURY (!!) and SOUTHERN VERMONT as a whole have experienced much destruction, rivers into homes, homes washed away, bridges gone, fields of crops covered in mud.”
here in New York, up-state in the Catskills – writer, producer, (and artlovers film reviewer) JAN ALBERT reports that the villages of MARGARETVILLE, FLEISCHMANNS, and ARKVILLE – were devastated. her friends Justin & Barbara write of Margaretville: “OTHER VIDEO” – the town’s DVD rental store – on the main street entry right off the highway – is “kaput” – as is the CVS. (both built right on the bank of the town’s signature waterway). . . “but the BUN AND CONE diner seems to be okay”. Bruce’s BLACK BEAR MAINE FISH & LOBSTER joint, well-known by locals and out-of-towners alike is “inundated with water and rubbish from top to bottom.”
and continue: “the TRAILER CAMP on Pavilion Rd looks like it was strewn with IEDs that exploded.”
artist, quilter, master paper cutter WENDY BRACKMAN, also of the CATSKILLS region – reports that she just took a walk: “on Hanes Hollow Rd right before the first wooden covered bridge – and the bridge is missing. GONE !! with a 10 ft. drop from the road on the other side . . . ”
apparently the best way to catch the region’s local status is on: WATERSHED POST/CATSKILLS
. . . the ABC 7 local news hurricane up-date reports that “the 156 year-old hand-hewn wooden covered bridge that used to cross the SCHOHARIE CREEK in BLENHEIM, NEW YORK” – is sadly, no more.
they also have a lot of local photos, see: ABC 7 HURRICANE IRENE UP-DATE
including one of a boarded-up Manhattan building that reads: IRENE, DON’T MAKE A SCENE !!
there is also an extended report on the status of Vermont’s covered bridges, on the BURLINGTON FREE PRESS, but note that their ‘featured’ photo is a replica, still better than nothing – and probably the inevitable future – of the genre. they also give some historical background, noting that many of the original covered wooden bridges have stood for over 100 years, surviving many a huge snowstorm, but not faring so well in the wake of Irene’s rushing torrential waters.
see: BURLINGTON FREE PRESS/TERRI HALLENBECK REPORTING . . .
. . . crew members aboard the INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION captured this video of TROPICAL STORM IRENE on Sunday August 28, 2011 as it moved over the (eastern) coast of the UNITED STATES. SCREENGRAB/NASA on YouTUBE
of course, as well as looking back with sadness – at lost icons of bygone times – you can also look, forward – at state-of-the-art digital photography from outer space, as in . . . filmed from above the earth !! and live-streamed back down: from the INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION – COURTESY OF NASA
wow. what a difference – a hundred or so years makes, or what !!
~HURRICANE IRENE HITS ON OLD WOODEN BRIDGES |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | August 31st, 2011, 6:16pm
VOLCOM STONES – WILD IN THE PARKS
HILLTOP SKATE PARK – PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY / SAT – AUG 20, 2011
~VOLCOM STONES/WILD IN THE PARKS |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | August 20th, 2011, 1:46am
‘CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS’ – DIRECTED BY WERNER HERZOG
REVIEWED BY NANCY SMITH, AUGUST 20, 2011.
ONE OF TWO ALBINO ALLIGATOR DELIVERED TO A CROCODILE FARM IN CENTRAL-EASTERN FRANCE – EXPORTED FROM THEIR NATIVE LOUISIANA (USA !!)
PHOTO: PHILIPE DESMAZES/AFP/Getty Images. FEB 04, 2010. COURTESY/LIFE
cute when they are young, aren’t they. wait til you see them all grown-up !!
nasty mothers, evil yellow eyes floating on the water horizon.
don’t even get me started on this one.
I swear WERNER HERZOG just used the ‘filming of the world’s first ever cave man drawings’ in Central France – (ancient) dead men talking, get it ? – as a ruse to expose France’s dirty little secret. I mean clearly, even he cannot believe he has scored the footage . . . of what must be a top secret project. France is raising, as Werner calls them – radioactive mutated albino alligators – just on the other side of the ridge of the now famous recently discovered cave housing the earliest known human drawings – in a man-made artificial jungle made from the hijacked heat and over-flow waste waters – !! – of France’s biggest nuclear power plant !!
NOT. . .
apparently according to a post by EDWARD DAVIS to INDIE WIRE – which includes a live clip of WERNER HERZOG on STEPHEN COLBERT – the albino alligator tale is: “a wild post-script, it’s a wild science-fiction sort of fantasy …”
see: WERNER HERZOG confesses/posted JUNE 7, 2011
“. . . of course it’s fictitious and that’s not a spoiler, Herzog has maintained for several years – that while some charge it to be irresponsible fabrication – that his films contain “an ecstatic truth” rather than the “accountant’s truth” . . . damn. is he senile. or did the French threaten to take him out, or what.
damn. I still say, no wonder McQueen wanted out. I’m thinking there still must be some kind of alligator farm out there, otherwise what’s with the LIFE photo ?
I mean it was way more fun to think JURASSIC PARK – was alive and well, and for real. in central-eastern France. STEVEN SPIELBERG – where are ya ?
than to learn, what probably everyone else already knows, that – WERNER HERZOG – is a kind of a fraud. . . for messing with the word: documentary and making it stupid . . . and I was thinking, wow – they gonna be mass producing haute couture albino alligator bags . . . in France, soon !!
As for the primitive cave drawings, they are very sophisticated and for the most part look to be done by one set of hands ?
the depicted animals are all graceful, with gentle faces. mostly bison. they do say: sustainable protein abounds in these parts – back in the day. way back. when humans survived and the Neanderthals did not.
these first human drawings are more ‘connect-the-dots’ than ‘think outside the box’. it’s clear someone – saw the animal profiles – in 3D – in the lines and crooks and nooks – of the natural rock cave walls – and they just followed the lines. much like the early Greeks traced the ‘animated’ constellations in the stars of the night sky. much like many sculptors (throughout the ages) tell ya, the stone speaks to them.
were the images just there for the taking, at random – or did a greater force lay down the blue print ? that’s the bigger question.
but do they sustain a botched-up documentary – not.
talk about the downward arc of civilization. Werner Herzog: zero. Anslem Kiefer: 10. (outta 10).
see: ‘CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS’/OFFICIAL WEBSITE
~NANCY SMITH REVIEWS: ‘CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS’/WERNER HERZOG |
Posted in Movie Reviews, The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | August 20th, 2011, 12:37am
it may be ashes to ashes, dust to dust . . . in mainland Germany and France.
but a little further north, on a small sea-bound island – it was visions of a way watery future,
that made Brit Alexander McQueen . . . cut out, quit, and split – the worldly dance.
PRESS PHOTO BY JOSH HANER/THE NEW YORK TIMES/SUNDAY, JULY 31, 2011
maybe it’s time to sneak in a brief and final good-bye.
the MET was incredibly locked down – no photos permitted – so it was stunning to see this one installation shot (above) recently published in the New York Times. This was also one of my favorite rooms – it housed the McQueen tartan-based “Scottish Rape” series on the left. absolutely wearable – strikingly ingenious in design – and terrifyingly fierce in historical context. when McQueen is quoted at the beginning of the exhibit as saying, in quite straightforward a manner: “I am a shaman” – everyone got it. All his work was imbued with a passion, an intensity – that transcended mere talent – and resonated with deeper meaning, usually messages of an historical or global – tribal – social – or ecological – nature. his work was imbued with vision. everybody got that.
as well, you can get a sense of the dramatic production and ace design of the show. here we have matte gold panels that grid off, against the focused light of golden wall sconces. it was goth, but it was chic. you can see the next room on, is completely different, but just as compelling. talk about detail, and sensuousness – some of the entry ways between rooms, even had simulated panels of – charred black burnt wood.
as for the holograms. well one was as large as a room. literally it was a room – and the scene that unfolded was cinematic – and dramatic. the trip into (real) inner beauty . . . the other hologram was as tiny as a cupcake – and featured Kate Moss twirling around.
the captions and text were sublime. moving is the only word that comes to mind. truly, the essence of the man – delivered clearly in few, yet poignant words. yes, it was emotional. in this New York Times article, penned by ERIC WILSON – it states how sad McQueen was not to have had a wider audience for his work in his lifetime – well, in this show – he crossed over. and the huddled masses found him.
see: McQueen’s Final Showstopper/New York Times
of course the most stunning heart-stopping section, was the very last wall – with his very last collection – his ‘Atlantis’ collection. a kind of futuristic waterworks print-dominated body hugging series – that was glimpsed on several high profile models throughout the past year – at different red carpet events. if you were paying attention, you caught it.
a kind of scary Star Wars Jar Jar meets moss green tie-dye.
apparently in Britain, it is a northern island after all – a small body of land surrounded by ocean waters – it’s not a dusty apocalypse, but the whole island and its civilization as we know it, going under, water . . . everything, great cities and all, disappearing under the huge deluge of water – that will be released by global warming – and the resultant, inevitable melting of the polar ice caps . . . that spooks the nation.
Apparently McQueen watched one too many digital renderings of the future – and it really got to him. SARAH BURTON the new creative director of ALEXANDER McQUEEN, is quoted as saying: “It was the idea of a sort of the reversal of evolution, how life would evolve back into the water if the ice caps melted and we were being reclaimed by nature.”
see: McQueen Plato’s Dress/THE MET
McQueen himself, is quoted as saying something like: only those who evolve for life under water would survive. I guess he saw it coming pretty quick – and he didn’t want to stick around. kind of like suicide by digital futuristic modeling ?
I’m thinking he felt the inevitability – as close to him – as real-time / day-to-day reality.
his creative force, the visions that were “channeled” through him – his words – had burnt through him, and he was done.
at age 40.
McQueen is also quoted as saying that death is good . . . as it allows the next generation, the next creative voice, the new shaman – to speak out.
Alexander McQueen (British, 1969-2010)
Dress
‘Plato’s Atlantis’, spring/summer 2010 – silk jacguard in a snake pattern embroidered with yellow enamel paillettes in a honeycomb pattern/courtesy of Alexander McQueen. PHOTOGRAPH COPYRIGHT SOLVE SUNDSBO/Art + Commerce
~AlEXANDER McQUEEN/Savage Beauty/famous last words |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | August 19th, 2011, 8:40pm
the 50 ft wide – “EDGE Of HARKNESS” – on East 75th St – new home to LARRY GAGOSIAN . . .
PHOTO BY JIM ALCORN – C/O NEW YORK POST
speaking of GOGO – I guess there’s gold in them thar ashes to ashes, dust to dust hills. well man-made ruins, is maybe the better word.
the NEW YORK POST’S JENNIFER GOULD KEIL reported yesterday that the mega dealer just blew $36.5 million on a Manhattan townhouse, make that mansion – that was originally owned by the HARKNESS family . . .
see: ART OF THE DEAL/GIMME SHELTER . . . NEW YORK POST/AUGUST 18, 2011
either that, and / or maybe – selling DAMIEN HIRST DOT paintings – is like having your very own currency – printing press !!
according to CAROL VOGEL, of the NEW YORK TIMES, DAMIEN and GOGO – will be presenting a gigantic simultaneous global ‘wave’ exhibition of some 300 DAMIEN HIRST dot paintings – around the world – or better put – in each of the 11 international Gagosian locations, including the three in our very own NYC. this despite a prior Hirst announcement that: “. . . his production of dead animals and spot paintings would be drastically reduced”. “Not exactly”, Vogel goes on to relate: . . . “reminded of that statement in a recent telephone interview, he chuckled and said: ‘I keep trying to end them. But then I get these crazy ideas, and I can’t stop.'”
Har-de-har-har.
in 2008 – Hirst staged a 2 day auction at Sotheby’s in London – where 223 examples of his work – totaled $200.7 million in sales. that’s when he made the above quoted ‘promised’ reduction of dead animal and dot paintings . . . as part of his sales pitch.
hey man, try dying. . . that will really put a bankable production limit – on the work.
(just joking, dudes. calm down . . . )
see: CAROL VOGEL … talks dots/NEW YORK TIMES/scroll down that post !!
guess they are banking on – all those dots – no matter how many there are ? – adding up – to a lot of zeros.
well at least, unlike the dead animals, and even the still-life ob-gyn offices – in over-size aquariums !! – you don’t need to employ an in-house haz mat team – to keep the thing, up and running. or – does that give you additional bragging rights ?
PHOTO BY BILLIE SCHEEPERS/DAMIEN HIRST & SCIENCE LTD/COURTESY: NEW YORK TIMES
~ashed to ashes, dust to dots . . . ? LARRY & DAMIEN business, as usual |
Posted in The Bomb | By Nancy Smith | August 19th, 2011, 8:23am
