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    contemporary art, installation art, kinetic text, sound art

    Liliane Lijn, Moonmeme (1992-2011)

    December 21, 2011
    Installation view at FACT as part of Republic of the Moon Photographer: Brian Slater

    Investigations have taken place as to the feasibility of projecting a single word onto the surface of the moon. But Liliane Lijn is still waiting for a technical solution.

    In the meantime, we can make do with a simulation. And the word which appears on the virtual moon, both online and at FACT Liverpool, is simply “SHE”. What else?

    At time of writing, moonmeme is in near total darkness. So right now it works like a sound piece, the word ‘she’ breaking in layers of foamy sibilance.

    Lijn and a co-conspirator take turns to utter the three letter word. It is purred, growled, sang, said any which way which reminds us of the essential strangeness of language.

    Every 26 hours the piece updates to reveal a different phase of the moon. When it is full we can read the moon’s gender writ large across her face.

    But when it is two thirds full we can read, ‘HE’ or even ‘SH’. It is curious that a male pronoun is contained in the female, stranger still it contains a prescription of silence.

    Our creeping shadow (it is the Earth after all) connects moonmeme to earlier works by Lijn in which she made experiments with spinning words and kinetic texts.

    The tidal motion of the soundtrack and the lunar motion of the visuals put the meaning of this tiny word into reserve. The feminine principle is everywhere, but nowhere.

    Here we find only the reflection of reason, as we find ourselves washed ashore with only moonbeams to guide us. Moonmeme is as bewildering as a birth.

    This work can be seen in Republic of the Moon at FACT, Liverpool, until Feburary 26 2012. See gallery website for more details. Alternatively, you can experience the project online, in realtime at www.lilianelijn.com.

    aggregation, contemporary art

    Found Objects 19/12/11

    December 19, 2011

    Most favourite links from the past week, with a passing reference to xmas:

    • Take in a whole book on deregulated capitalism at a glance with this wall chart by William Powhida. Better still, zoom in and scroll around.
    • The Guardian interview the soi-disant Ikea anarchists, underemployed grads with time on their hands and photoshop on their laptops.
    • Kieron Long in Architect magazine is also sticking it to the man, or at least the men behind the Arcelor Mittal Orbit Tower (hat tip @kristoncapps).
    • Contemporary Art Daily showcases Merlin Carpenter’s scruffy, colourless cafe scenes (The cafe is in Tate Modern).
    • Louis Wain, schizophrenic cat artist of the early 20th century finds his way onto the internet, where he always belonged. See Beautiful/Decay zine.
    • The head of the arts programme at Cern argues the case for magic and mystery, even as particle physics illuminates all. (The Art Newspaper via @KatharineAllard.)
    • You get the stalker you deserve. Claire Breukel has been following Vito Acconci for Hyperallergic.
    • Van Gogh may have been an anomalous trachomat. Who knew? And Kazunori Asada has designed the software to prove it (via @inthecompanyof).
    • Chloe Nelkin bemoans the lack of festive tree at Tate Britain this year. It’s a good excuse to look back at the trees of Christmas past
    • And finally…Der Spiegel report on a rogue santa distributing ecstasy-laced drinks at a Berlin Xmas market.

    2011 lists, contemporary art

    Gallery, Show, Artist, Work of the Year 2011

    December 14, 2011
    Melissa Logan (Chicks on Speed) hanging out at gallery of the Year

    Coasting in the general celebratory mood of this time of year, it seemed harmless enough to pick out a few personal highlights for readers of this blog.

    Gallery of the year: Grey Area, Brighton

    Although I should disclose I’ve enjoyed a night out or two with the folk at this local venue, you would be hard pushed to find another small space punching so far above its weight. 2011 saw shows from Chicks on Speed, Plastique Fantastique and John Russell. Thanks to an oblique marketing strategy, one never knows what to expect.

    Show of the year: Laurie Anderson, Trisha Brown, Gordon Matta-Clark: Pioneers of the Downtown Scene, New York 1970s

    Barbican brought an architect, a musician and a choreographer back from the 70s to compile art show of the year. Of course it helped that Matta-Clark could also draw, that Anderson could also sculpt and that Brown’s postmodern dance was well suited to the gallery. The result was equal measures hope and nostalgia.

    Artist of the year: George Shaw

    Shaw’s has painted mundane landscapes all within two square miles of his home for ten years. What could the Turner Prize matter in Tile Hill? While their detail may be exquisite, the works themselves hardly seem the point. The overall project is the art, which, having found many fans from similar backgrounds, suggests he will endure.

    Work of the Year: The Trip, Marcus Coates

    Part time shaman Coates shed his comedy outfits this year to investigate whether art can be of any assistance to the terminally ill. But his light touch remained as he undertook a voyage to the Amazon on behalf of Alex H and this turned into another of his journeys to the spirit world. The result was a minimal but profound and useful 20 minute film.

    So, what about you? I’d really like to hear other people’s gallery, show, artist and work of the year. Comments, as ever, welcome.

    architecture, art nouveau, modernism, Uncategorized

    Toilet of Modern Art, Vienna

    December 13, 2011

    I’m not even going to mention the most famous toilet in modern art, but here’s another pretender to the throne, no pun intended.

    Hundertwasser was an Viennese architect. His quirky creations are a guide book mainstay, with their undulating floors and irregular windows. Coach parties love him.

    Just streets apart in the East of the city are the playful KunstHausWien, and a co-designed apartment block called Hundertwasser House. Both are equally tacky, equally welcoming.

    And I would defy even the most hardline modernist not to get sucked into the gaudy arcade opposite. It was so cold in late November, aesthetics were barely a consideration.

    This busy market is where you will find the so-called Modern Art Toilet. Which proved so irrestistable, I forked over 60 cents for a service I did not at the time require.

    Aside from some crazy tiling effects and cracked mirrors, it was not all that different from a less artistic toilet. But there was an option to wash hands in a fountain.

    Ahead of me in the queue were a delegation of elderly Italians. The turnstiles kept rejecting their money and they were exhibiting symptoms of toilet rage.

    This may not be exactly what Hundertwasser had in mind. But this art nouveau hippy does have an eye for the main chance. Upstairs you could buy posters and prints of his artwork.

    But say what you like about his nemesis, Adolf Loos. The more sober local architect, with his ‘devil’s tools’ (straight lines, according to Hundertwasser), has much more desirable merch.

    And his buildings do not pander to your inner child. Only streets away is a prime example built by his student Paul Engelmann and his friend Ludwig Wittgenstein.

    It’s a notorious fact that elements such as doorhandles took a year each to design. But still, one has no real desire to turn them and enter this villa of good taste. Perhaps that is the point.

    Is it me, or are these washbasins over selling themselves here?

    The door is locked. Come back when you’ve read Tractatus and make an appointment.

    Toilet of Modern Art can be found in the shopping complex opposite Hundertwasser House on the corner of Lowengasse/Kegelgasse.

    aggregation, contemporary art

    Found Objects 12/12/11

    December 12, 2011

    Clearly there has been a major art prize since the last Found Objects, but you’ve been spared any more links to it. Instead:

    • With great timing (both United and City crash out of Champions League) the BBC carry a slide show of a new show about Manchester after a speculative apolcypse.
    • Gabriel Orozco is the engaging subject of a Paris Review studio visit. He works in his kitchen, so where does he cook?
    • As Anselm Kiefer warns us, ‘there are only a few people who can say something about art’.  Great interview with Alex Needham.
    • Ignoring that sound advice I’ve sneaked onto a list of people making cultural predictions for listings site Spoonfed. Scroll down.
    • If you haven’t seen it yet, this bit of architecture crit from rapper Ice Cube is a joy. Give the man a BBC4 mini series.
    • More pre-seasonal good cheer is available from the New York Times. The paper interviews a comic book artist who also happens to be an asperger’s sufferer with no fixed abode.
    • And even more heart-warming fare can be found on the MoMA blog as they relay the runaway success of their new digital comments board.
    • But maybe we should get real.  Here’s some generally ominous war art gathered together by Will Brand on Art Fag City.
    • …and here’s some depressing photography about the oil business in Nigeria from We Make Money Not Art.
    • The panacea for all that is this wildly off-beam film about the internet made in 1969. Also from the ever-reliable @KathyKavan.

    contemporary art, painting

    Turner Prize 2011 @ BALTIC

    December 6, 2011

    They say no one likes a sore loser. And I’ve no doubt in person that after the winner was announced in last night’s Turner Prize, George Shaw was gracious in defeat.

    But shortly after Martin Boyce stepped up to claim the £20,000 award, it appeared to be paintings by Shaw which commented most directly on the evening.

    You don’t even need to see these works to get the picture. Titles included ‘The Age of Bullshit’, ‘Same Old Crap’ and ‘Landscape with Dogshit Bin’.

    BALTIC was heaving with metropolitan types. And it all at once seemed, no way could art’s most glittering accolade have gone to Shaw’s vision of dead end suburbia.

    But the Coventry painter offered something so different, one gets the feeling this year’s Turner was his to lose. Perhaps ‘humankind cannot’bear very much reality’, as Eliot might have said of the panel.

    Shaw’s exhibition was the last you came to after waltzing round the angular sculpture of Boyce, the heavy duty film rigs of Lloyd and the exploded soap factory of Black.

    His dozen or so paintings brought you back down to earth here. There were gray skies and graffiti many would recognise as humble origins not a million miles from their own.

    Too humble, perhaps, for a prize with international renown. So with those disgruntled titles, Shaw remains an outsider, his vision all the more powerful for not having won.

    The 2011 Turner Prize was held at Baltic, Gateshead on Monday 5 December. Thanks to sponsors Nokia for an invite.

    aggregation, contemporary art

    Found Objects 04/12/2011

    December 4, 2011

    A few of the least missable art links from the web this week. Peruse at will:

    • Here’s the most surprising thing written about art this week: Charles Saatchi on the vulgarity of the art world.
    • As if to make a similar point Miru Kim shacks up with two pigs for the duration of Art Basel Miami (as told by Animal New York.)
    • On the eve of the Turner Prize, you could do worse than listen to a mod-ish spotify playlist put together by nominee George shaw.
    • Sad news is they’ve fenced off Oscar Wilde’s tomb in Pere Lachaise. Good news is the BBC have interviewed the poet and wit’s grandson.
    • Corporate sponsors steer clear of historical shows in the US. Laura Gilbert says that‘s their loss.
    • The Walker Center in Minneapolis launch a new website. People in the world of online art appear to agree it is rather good (thanks, Eyeteeth).
    • 60s-style performance art meets contemporary RnB in this unholy YouTube clip found by Art Fag City.
    • A perverted but strangely beautiful twist on vintage erotica: Beautiful/Decay presents The Love Life of the Spumifers.
    • Meanwhile a new photography book uncovers a more banal world of sex. There aren’t enough Spumifers in the sex clubs of America.
    • Finally, settle down and watch this charming and poignant animation about the loss of classic high rise architecture in Chicago.

    Austro-Hungarian empire, funeral rites, traditional sculpture

    In Pictures: Kaisergruft, Vienna

    November 30, 2011

    An inscription reads Silentium and it is almost tempted to leave this post right there and allow these snapshots to speak for themselves. They are not a sight for chatter.

    But I wanted to share the impression made on me by these tombs in the Austrian capital. It was like encountering a fleet of dark limos or a batallion of war machines.

    Riding in these chariots to the afterlife are former members of the Imperial Hapsburg dynasty. They fill more than 100 ornate, unique sarcophagi dating back to 1633.

    The death rituals in this family would make those of, say, mine look as lightweight as cremation to the sound of Robbie Williams with a balled up pastel Kleenex.

    Hapsburgs cut out the heart and entrails of their deceased and buried them under two major places of worship. Only then was the corpse clamped in metal here.

    Towers in the sky characterise most cities today. But it may be crypts and cemeteries which provide them with gravity.

    Christ on the cross takes second place to a positively grinning skull with a broadsword.

    Maybe Robbie’s Angels would be an appropriate tune, but preferably a death metal cover.

    Another skull. You would think this sort of thing would be upsetting for the surviving family members.

    It was said the sun never set on the Hapsburg empire. Mexican influence, perhaps.

    Ornamentation piled on. Not hard to see what local architect Adolf Loos was reacting against.

    Shame about the scaffolding. But needless to say there were no whistling builders.

    The spookiest detail was this woman in a veil, wandering endlessly with the shades.

    Kaisergruft is at 1, Tegetthoffstrasse, Vienna. Open 10am-6pm daily.

    aggregation, contemporary art

    Found Objects 28/11/11

    November 28, 2011

    Welcome back to another round of art links from an exciting week on the Internet:

    • From the department of unexpected events, here’s news that the EU is planning to undertake its biggest ever funding drive for art and culture.
    • And here’s some more news that goes against the grain. Scientists have massively slowed up the rate at which Leonardo’s Last Supper is disintegrating.
    • Pop artist Gerald Laing passed away last week and you can read his obituary in the Guardian. I am really saddened by this as he gave me a great interview once.
    • If you need cheering up after that, you could read part one of Tyler Green on trees. In art, of course. These were prompted by an encounter with a van Ruisdael.
    • Next travel the world’s most remote byways in the company of Aaron Hobson. In his interview with Spiegel Online he talks about his project using Google Street View.
    • Hyperallergic reports on a photography show in Chicago which deals in the realm of crimes, both real and imagined. Sounds completely brilliant.
    • There’s another dose of vitriol from Alastair Gentry who reflects on the new Tacita Dean piece at Tate. I thought it quite good myself, but not so good I didn’t laugh.
    • New Art posted two videos featuring robots with a stirring introduction. One is funny and the other is elegant. You’ll know which is which.
    • Allow yourself to be entertained by a slideshow of the Shit London awards in the Guardian. I especially liked the depressing views from workplaces category.
    • Finally, a tumblr you may or may not have seen. It’s Ugly Renaissance Babies (via @electriclit and @alastairgenry).

    architecture, conceptual art, contemporary art, furniture design, galleries, intervention

    Adolf Krischanitz, Barhocker (1986)

    November 24, 2011

    With its dark, stained and somewhat splayed feet this stool looks solid enough. But it was still not clear that sitting there was permitted. It was, after all, part of an exhibition.

    It had its own plaque on the wall and, indeed, I was reading the very details relating to this piece, when I turned and saw what first I took to be an astonishing sculpture.

    Barhocker appeared to feature a hyper-realist old man with finely rendered grey hairs. It took a second to realise, this was in fact my gallery going companion.

    My father accompanied me on a recent trip to Vienna. But he wasn’t much interested in the meta-discourse on white cube spaces at the city’s famous Secession gallery.

    Instead he wanted to take the weight off his feet. And never mind the reference to Joseph Kosuth who is infamous for putting chairs into galleries.

    “You can’t sit on the art!” I almost shouted, pointing out that particular chair was an idea rather than a piece of furniture.

    Its designer is an Austrian architect who presumably made severeal Barhocker pieces to go with his rennovation of this world famous institution in 1986.

    This stool would have been the perfect place to gaze at the newly restored columns in the Hauptraum. They were once again clad in chrome steel and brass.

    Because in 1991, they were painted over for a show curated by Kosuth, whose best known work was a chair accompanied by a photo and a dictionary definition.

    His was not the only conceptual piece from the 1960s to involve a chair. Had this been a reference to George Brecht’s Chair Events, sitting there would have been just dandy.

    But that’s a lot of back story to explain to a weary relative why an inviting seat in a contemporary art show is probably a perverse conceit. It does sound foolish.

    DIE FÜNFTE SÄULE was a group show at Secession between September 9 – November 20, 2011. See gallery website for more details.