REMOVABLE PARTS

It’s hard to really say how one should feel about a cabaret-like performance between two performers, where the bulk of the show is a series of tunes about Voluntary Amputation done in a fairly Magnetic Fields-esq style. At times I found it oddly exhilarating, and at times I must confess I found myself lulled into sleep. This sort of subject matter might appear shocking to some, but I’m not particularly put off by that so much as what it must take in the mind of an artist to commit so much time to producing a show like this. Hats off to HERE for consistently challenging the senses, even if they sometimes reach a bit too far out there.

TRIBUTES

Murals in a basketball courtyard in Washington heights for kids killed in gang-related and drinking circumstances.

FRANK STELLA

Up on the roof of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Large metal objects putting off a tremendous amount of reflective heat—a kind of art in itself.

GIACOMO MANZÙ

When I was in Rome, and in particular at the Basilica di San Pietro in Vaticano, my attention was quickly caught by a series of bas reliefs grimly titled Doors of Death on one of the doors (above) to the entrance of the Church. Intense, foreboding and thoroughly modern, the art only seemed out of place in it’s contemporary rendering.

Today while wandering in midtown by the Rockefeller Center I noticed another relief (The Immigrant) that bore a striking similarity in style, only to find it was indeed by the same artist whose work I had seen before, Giacomo Manzù. From there to here, through travel and impression, it was a kind of validation through recognition.

THE MET’S NEW WING

After having recently been there, I can say it’s the next best thing to being in Rome.

MORTON BARTLETT

I’m not quite sure what to make of the Morton Bartlett show at the Julie Saul Gallery, recently previewed by Roberta Smith in The New York Times. Smith completely skirted the overtly sexualized nature of these works, and instead concentrated on the (least controversial) complicated creation and acquisition process, failing to accurately describe the content of the show with its anatomically correct child-like dolls photographed in what appear to be highly suggestive seemingly Balthus-inspired poses, cleverly omitted from the gallery website. Wouldn’t want to get too controversial after all.

The work itself was never intended for public consumption, and for good reason. There’s an unsettling pedo angle to this stuff that gets the same “grown man had a horrible childhood and never quite grew up” critical explanation heard before when describing the works of Henry Darger.

That said, like Darger, the work is excellent, and fascinating in its ability to disturb by exploring a taboo subject within the confines of fantasy. It’s hardly pornographic, but all the same seems like it was by all accounts a safe outlet for desires limited to indulgence via film and sculpture.

THE CLOISTERS

I live about ten walking minutes from this place and I think I’ve only been there maybe three times, in particular to see the Unicorn tapestries that The New Yorker had an excellent article on and made me curious about coming here to begin with. I think though I had to go to Europe to really appreciate the concept of age and time on weathered stone and wood. Today, I took my friend Justine over here after swimming, she’d never been there and it was a good excuse to get out of the studio apartment. I thought I was back in Geneva, in the old town. It soothed my soul, grounding me as religious sanctuaries tend to do, and there’s something about a gargoyle always makes me feel consistently, deeply, thoroughly, satisfied.

LE DESIGN II

By far the most compelling graphic design I saw while I was in Geneva had to be the guerilla artwork I discovered hidden on poles, alleys and secluded walls mostly off the beaten path. While most were obviously overtly political and aimed at the neo-fascist American agenda and complacent citizenry, others were more oblique, offering no real explanation at all, which made them all the more fascinating. Tagging was prevalent and usually pointless, though there were some excellent examples of illustrative artwork there for the taking, the leaping Spiderman a particularly clever example.

THE VATICAN MUSEUM

The two hour wait in deathly heat to get in. Pants required. The stupefying amount of artwork.

The Sistine Chapel—“Please! No talking! No photography!’