Schimmel Latest in Series of Staff Losses at MOCA
With the artworld in almost unanimous head-shaking mode over MOCA’s firing (?) of respected curator Paul Schimmel, the LA Times puts the episode in context of a series of staff losses since the arrival of art-dealer-turned-museum-director Jeffrey Deitch. Chief curator Paul Schimmel is only the latest of many being shown the door at Jeffrey Deitch’s [...]
Art Fugitive: Menil Vandalism Suspect Crit on Artinfo, Discussed in Wall Street Journal
The Menil Picasso vandalism story is working its way up the media ladder: the Wall Street Journal‘s Eric Felten pokes at the art/crime knot without unraveling it, referring to a tongue-in-cheek “portfolio review” of Landeros’ rambling, immature symbolist paintings, on ArtInfo.com, based on pictures posted on Landeros’ Facebook page. Not really getting the humor, (admittedly [...]
Paul Schimmel Fired from LA-MOCA
Paul Schimmel, highly respected chief curator at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art for 22 years, was fired by the museum’s board, over disagreements about the museum’s direction. Billionaire philanthropist, and virtual museum-owner Eli Broad delivered the chop Wednesday, much to the dismay of the artworld.
Frank Stella At Leslie Sacks Contemporary
Pick of the week for June 25th, 2012 Frank Stella has created distinct bodies of work every decade for the past 50 years. His working methodology has defined the template of the contemporary artist-variations on a theme. Whether by his artistic nature or by design, this approach has all but become de rigueur in MFA [...]
Levitated Mass at Rest: Heizer’s Big Rock Stops Today
Michael Heizer’s monumental sculpture Levitated Mass will open to the public TODAY Sunday, June 24, 2012. A formal dedication ceremony will take place at 11am, inaugurating the artwork’s official debut.
Social Practice 101: Mobile Pinhole Project Shows How It’s Done
Artist Jonas “Nina” Becker’s meme-friendly combination of quaint photographic technology, van customization, and arts education for neighborhood youth, the Mobile Pinhole Project, has sprawled across the media and the streets of Los Angeles. The Project uses a 1991 Toyota Previa refitted as a giant pinhole camera to bring alterna-tech photographic experiences to kids used to [...]
Folk Artist Mr. Imagination, aka Gregory Warmack, 1948-2012
Gregory Warmack, better known to a generation of art lovers as Mr. Imagination, one of the few outsiders artists whose work was collected by the Smithsonian and reproduced in many standard art history texts, died on May 30 in Atlanta of complications from a blood infection. Obsessive and accessible, Warmack’s signature bottle-cap encrusted, spiritually motivated [...]
5 from 1: Rebekah Myers & Tim Berg
5 from 1 presents the work of one artist in conversation with five sources that are driving their studio practice. The rest is up to you. Rebekah Myers & Tim Berg (link) Installation in a Valise (Cause & Effect), 2010 earthenware, glaze, gold luster, walnut, Styrofoam, wool felt, black acrylic, spray enamel, brass, velvet 32″ [...]
Southern Naptist Convention II: Taking It To The Beach
Houston artist Emily Sloan is taking her Southern Naptist Convention on the road to Venice CA next weekend. Sloan, also noted for being the curator of The Kenmore, and “exhibition object” that encloses artistic expressions inside a working mini-fridge, held her original napping performance at the Houston Art League in 2010; the first Southern Naptist [...]
The Painting Factory: Abstraction After Warhol
For decades now, a sure way for an artist to be irrelevant would be to become an abstract painter, the form having long gone the way of Existentialism, black turtlenecks and angst. At its height in the 1950s and early ‘60s, avant-gardism and abstraction were practically synonymous, but since then very few artists have attempted [...]
