Posts Tagged ‘art’

Midnight I

Saturday, December 30th, 2006

The video above was made in the summer of 2005. It has become a substratum for our upcoming show.

Card For Dawn and Carl at Dogmatic 2007

In the video Dawn is working on the car at midnight in a parking lot. She has pulled out the left driveaxel shaft and is replacing it’s CV boots. At a pivotal moment in the film the metal fastener band snaps back and cuts her thumb, filling her glove’s thumb with blood.

Several things are happening here that are of interest to me. One, the video uses the traditional male gaze of painting. Two, I have given up the masculine privilege of auto work. Three, the climax is a bloody violence, which in the final tally is nothing more than a jump in the heart, a small bandaid, and Dawn finishing the job at hand.

Dawn Reed and Carl Warnick Opening at Dogmatic January 6th, 2007

Wednesday, December 27th, 2006

Carl Spraying Blocks, shot by Dawn Reed from outside.

Here is a little glimpse into production for our show which opens at Dogmatic on January 6th.

I am putting down a layer of orange paint on one of our performative sculptures. We will ask people who come to the opening to carry around these orange [red to yellow] blocks for a bit so the sculpture can move around the gallery.

Dogmatic is at 1319 W. Lake St in Chicago

Orange Blocks in Spray Room

Justin Cooper’s “Middle Management” at Monique Meloche

Saturday, January 7th, 2006

The Justin Cooper "Middle Management" show opened last night at Monique Meloche, and looks like a very interesting piece. I recommend that folks catch at least one of the Performances. The mood afterword was even somewhat festive in spite of the dour Chicago people and the gray weather, Usama Alshaibi was even there looking fabulous while talking a young french girl into modeling.

Justin’s work left me feeling optimistic about the state of art *grin* in Chicago today.

FUMED at Polvo

Friday, December 2nd, 2005

FUMED opened at Polvo tonight.

The curator Jaime Mendoza had this to say:

The participating artists have either practiced Graffiti for creative pursuits or have been influenced through contemporary urban culture.

Nino Rodriguez’s small paintings, especially the one pictured above center; have an elegant sense of line and color, which contrasts well with their somewhat brutal lyrical content.
In a mini-installation parallel to the Graffiti show Marcella Chaidez presented a wonderful sculpture resembling a small bustier with umbilical cord constructed out of dyed blue holes punched from books. Which of course raises the question, which books?

It is perhaps more proper to say that the sculpture resembles the shell of a torso, a shell representing a small child. However my first thought was bustier. That thought, mistaken as it might be, is infecting my read.

The thing about these blue punched paper holes is that they look like sequins. They look like sequins a lot! They also appear to be fused to the body. What we are left imagining is a child beauty pageant fire which fuses a blue sequin dress to a pageant model. Any critique which reaches Michael Jackson is then automatically complete.

Overly Familiar

Friday, November 4th, 2005

Why do I sign letters to other artists in the manner below?

love
carl
.

The dot is easy. The system that I learned to send email on was HP-UX, and on that system and many other UNIX systems when you were finished with an email you typed a dot on a line all by itself. This sent the email. The reason why I still use it [even though it’s now redundant] is partially habit and also as little mark to announcing those who would recognize it where I came from.

Love is a very flexible word in my culture, with a vast range of meaning. When I use it in the context of letters to Artists I am implying a strong sense of fondness, a respect for and a solidarity with those who try to make new things. This is also a performative move. Similar in some senses to Cindy Loehr’s Love Letters project.

I am not a purist and I must admit to being frightened by the social fallout of saying love to someone who may not be expecting it. A lot of my performative work is hard in this way. Hard is good right?

love
carl
.

Pablov Black – Mr Music

Saturday, February 26th, 2005

This is possibly the most brilliant cover of any recording ever.

There is the fetishization of equipment. That stack of keyboards is drool inducing, but real the brilliance lies in the Pablov’s eyes; in the expression on his face. It is at once blissful lost in the groove; and blissful lost in a haze of drugs. This is the twin pull that makes us wish we were there, or at the least allows us to gasp in narcissistic recognition.

References: Pablov Black – Mr Music