Review of Joan Miró: The Ladder of Escape (5/11/12)
The Broadly Politic
Miró as political animal? This show doesn’t make the case.
In the history of modern art, Miró was the real thing: He could make an increasingly attenuated focus pay off in new and startling ways, decade after decade. In “Ladder,” he emerges as an artist professionally committed to Surrealist strategies for throwing off repression and self-censorship via automatism and dream imagery—and as a man personally alarmed by fascism and war, afraid for his family in the face of violent upheaval. But these sides largely remained separate.
READ MORE
Miró as political animal? This show doesn’t make the case.
In the history of modern art, Miró was the real thing: He could make an increasingly attenuated focus pay off in new and startling ways, decade after decade. In “Ladder,” he emerges as an artist professionally committed to Surrealist strategies for throwing off repression and self-censorship via automatism and dream imagery—and as a man personally alarmed by fascism and war, afraid for his family in the face of violent upheaval. But these sides largely remained separate.
READ MORE
WASHINGTON POST reviews SHE GOT GAME
Holly Bass, NWBA #1, 2012
Michael O'Sullivan reviewed SHE GOT GAME at the Arlington Arts Center in the Washington Post's Weekend Section:
"[Jenny] Drumgoole's documentary 'Wing Bowl' looks at competitive eater Sonya 'The Black Widow' Thomas, a 98-pound Korean-born American who has often beaten men three times her size. In the nine-minute video, Drumgoole compares Thomas's appearance at the Wing Bowl, an annual chicken-wing-eating contest, with the artist's starkly different role at the event. (Drumgoole auditioned for, and was chosen to be a 'Wingette,' a scantily clad food server.) The contrast between Drumgoole, in a get-up one step away from a Playboy bunny, and Thomas, who takes her 'sport' very, very seriously and who is shown being heckled by male fans who see her as a usurper of traditional sex roles - is, by turns, funny, sad and sharp."
Read the entire review here.
See a WaPo blog post about the show--featuring additional images and commentary from Michael-- here.
Read my curatorial essay here.
See a gallery of installation shots on the AAC website here.
"[Jenny] Drumgoole's documentary 'Wing Bowl' looks at competitive eater Sonya 'The Black Widow' Thomas, a 98-pound Korean-born American who has often beaten men three times her size. In the nine-minute video, Drumgoole compares Thomas's appearance at the Wing Bowl, an annual chicken-wing-eating contest, with the artist's starkly different role at the event. (Drumgoole auditioned for, and was chosen to be a 'Wingette,' a scantily clad food server.) The contrast between Drumgoole, in a get-up one step away from a Playboy bunny, and Thomas, who takes her 'sport' very, very seriously and who is shown being heckled by male fans who see her as a usurper of traditional sex roles - is, by turns, funny, sad and sharp."
Read the entire review here.
See a WaPo blog post about the show--featuring additional images and commentary from Michael-- here.
Read my curatorial essay here.
See a gallery of installation shots on the AAC website here.
UNDER COVER @ MICA
ON VIEW Feb 2 - March 11, 2012
Decker Gallery, Fox Building
My 2011-2012 Exhibition Development Seminar (EDS) students created a show!
Visit the website for info on programs here.
Read the Baltimore City Paper review here.
Listen to an interview with Tom Hall on WYPR's "Maryland Morning"--featuring student/curator Tahira Christian, artists Nate Larson and Vin Grabill, and me--here.
Watch an interview with Tahira and me on WJZ's "On Time" here.
Read about the show in the latest issue of Urbanite here.
Decker Gallery, Fox Building
My 2011-2012 Exhibition Development Seminar (EDS) students created a show!
Visit the website for info on programs here.
Read the Baltimore City Paper review here.
Listen to an interview with Tom Hall on WYPR's "Maryland Morning"--featuring student/curator Tahira Christian, artists Nate Larson and Vin Grabill, and me--here.
Watch an interview with Tahira and me on WJZ's "On Time" here.
Read about the show in the latest issue of Urbanite here.
SHE GOT GAME @ Arlington Arts Center
Martin Schoeller, "Kim Harris," 2008
ON VIEW Jan 13 - March 18, 2012
Curated by Jeffry Cudlin
On Friday, January 13, AAC kicks off SHE GOT GAME, a show that features strong images of strong women created by male, female, and transgendered artists from around the region and across the country.
The show opens just a few months shy of the 40th anniversary for Title IX, the historic legislation that leveled the playing field for women athletes—increasing their participation in college athletics some 450% over four decades.
SHE GOT GAME includes images that are iconic, like Dewey Nicks’s ultra-glam video of current tennis superstars playing amidst clouds of glitter and puffs of colored smoke, or Tara Mateik’s reenactment of the 1973 Billie Jean King/Bobby Riggs “Battle of the Sexes,” in which King trounced the older, swaggering male tennis star.
But it also includes images from the margins, like Nancy Floyd’s photos of shooters training on the target range for the women’s three position rifle event at the Olympics, or Jenny Drumgoole’s off-beat video love letter to competitive eating champion Sonya “The Black Widow” Thomas.
Ultimately the show treats women’s sports as an arena where redefinition of the self and slippage across boundaries of class, gender, and race seem possible.
In February, the show will feature live performances: On Saturday, February 11, Chicago/Brooklyn artist Amber Hawk Swanson will perform "Online Comments (August 2007 - February 2011)." While completing a grueling three-hour CrossFit workout, the artist will read every anonymous online comment she has ever received for her previous projects—including her controversial "Amber Doll Project," in which the artist commissioned the creation of a life-sized sex doll that resembled her exactly.
"Online Comments" reflects Swanson's real-life engagement with CrossFit, a fitness movement with an unusually large online community often characterized by cult-like devotion from its adherents. It also offers a direct expression of the element of physical endurance typically involved in performance art.
Washington, DC artist Kristina Bilonick designed her recent "DC Cheer" project as an open community-building and morale-boosting effort for the DC arts community. Typical "DC Cheer" performances involve artist or arts-community volunteers offering vocal support at local cultural events.
At AAC, Bilonick will give the audience an opportunity to become a part of DC Cheer: The artist will host a workshop in which participants draft and rehearse their own cheers together. Audience members are encouraged to bring their own t-shirts--which the artist will transform via silkscreening into official "DC Cheer" uniforms.
READ MORE
Curated by Jeffry Cudlin
On Friday, January 13, AAC kicks off SHE GOT GAME, a show that features strong images of strong women created by male, female, and transgendered artists from around the region and across the country.
The show opens just a few months shy of the 40th anniversary for Title IX, the historic legislation that leveled the playing field for women athletes—increasing their participation in college athletics some 450% over four decades.
SHE GOT GAME includes images that are iconic, like Dewey Nicks’s ultra-glam video of current tennis superstars playing amidst clouds of glitter and puffs of colored smoke, or Tara Mateik’s reenactment of the 1973 Billie Jean King/Bobby Riggs “Battle of the Sexes,” in which King trounced the older, swaggering male tennis star.
But it also includes images from the margins, like Nancy Floyd’s photos of shooters training on the target range for the women’s three position rifle event at the Olympics, or Jenny Drumgoole’s off-beat video love letter to competitive eating champion Sonya “The Black Widow” Thomas.
Ultimately the show treats women’s sports as an arena where redefinition of the self and slippage across boundaries of class, gender, and race seem possible.
In February, the show will feature live performances: On Saturday, February 11, Chicago/Brooklyn artist Amber Hawk Swanson will perform "Online Comments (August 2007 - February 2011)." While completing a grueling three-hour CrossFit workout, the artist will read every anonymous online comment she has ever received for her previous projects—including her controversial "Amber Doll Project," in which the artist commissioned the creation of a life-sized sex doll that resembled her exactly.
"Online Comments" reflects Swanson's real-life engagement with CrossFit, a fitness movement with an unusually large online community often characterized by cult-like devotion from its adherents. It also offers a direct expression of the element of physical endurance typically involved in performance art.
Washington, DC artist Kristina Bilonick designed her recent "DC Cheer" project as an open community-building and morale-boosting effort for the DC arts community. Typical "DC Cheer" performances involve artist or arts-community volunteers offering vocal support at local cultural events.
At AAC, Bilonick will give the audience an opportunity to become a part of DC Cheer: The artist will host a workshop in which participants draft and rehearse their own cheers together. Audience members are encouraged to bring their own t-shirts--which the artist will transform via silkscreening into official "DC Cheer" uniforms.
READ MORE