Your "Peace" in the Show: Joe Flood with Keith Mayerson

Curated by artists’ artist Keith Mayerson, the neo-NeoIntegrity (or post-NeoIntegrity) migrates from Chelsea to SoHo, where, 15-20 years ago, it would have been in the capitol of the art world.  The first incarnation at Derek Eller Gallery in 2007 felt like the Justice League Satellite, a zero-gravity chamber of unimpeachable art that surely anticipated Reporta Smith’s recent summoning for “art that seems made by one person out of intense personal necessity, often by hand.”  And this show does, too.

Inside the gallery at MoCCA (the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art), the show seems as far from Chelsea as Narnia, Gotham City, or Krypton, despite the presence of the Chelsea canonized Mike Kelley, Jim Shaw, Ellen Berkenblitt, Carroll Dunham, and Peter Halley.  And has the Whitney been by to see the Ad Reinhardt collages?

Big balls in a square-paneled world: Keith Mayerson's shout-out

Visitors to NeoIntegrity: Comics Edition might recall recent “visitations” in Chelsea from this alien planet: Basil Wolverton at Gladstone Gallery (2009), R. Crumb at David Zwirner (now), Thomas Woodruff at P.P.O.W. (2008), David Shrigley at Anton Kern (2008) and many other shows of artists working in sequential imagery, grotesque countenance and figuration, and mostly pencil and ink.  Keith Mayerson’s own mini-retrospective and end-of-empire narrative Both Sides Now at Paul Kasmin Gallery (2009) shuttled back and forth between these worlds.

(l) MoCCA Chairwoman Ellen S. Abramowitz, youngsters, MoCCA Director Karl Erickson

Generously funded by School of Visual Arts, a longtime fount of cartooning and illustration talent, Keith’s massive project includes over 200 artists and four or five times as many drawings, paintings, sculptures, and videos.  Hot!  The tiny gallery is packed from floor to ceiling, and you really have to watch your step, too.

Krazy Kats: (l-r) Artists Michael Magnan and TM Davy, muse Liam O'Malley, and artist Scott Hug

The bifocals crowd might struggle with the abundance of 10-pt handwritten text extruded throughout the paneled pages, and there is enough black-and-white action to make any newspaper’s editorial page see red.  But that just means that it’s even more of a knockout to see full-color from chromo sapiens such as Dana Schutz, David Sandlin, and John Wesley.  An “Adults Only” section designed by artist TM Davy includes grown-up material ranging from suggestive homoeroticism and explicit T&A to downright  obscenity – more, please!  Here, you’ll find a really beautiful and moody package from James Siena and a multivalent Shel Silverstein that gazes inward, outward, and downward, all at once.

Gold-Medal winning illustrator Yuko Shimizu, SVA MFA '03

More pictures to come after the rain subsides, but the photos today are from the opening reception last week.

IMAGES: Michael Bilsborough

“I think when we finally are living in space, as people will be doing soon, we’ll recognize a whole new freedom and ease of life.  These space habitats will be more beautiful because we will plan and condition that beauty to suit our needs.  I see a future that is very bright.”   –Robert McCall

Early this month, visionary space artist Robert McCall died of a heart attack.  He was only 90 years old, which, relative to Earth is .000000002* or 2.0 × 10^-8.*

One or two modifications of Ricky’s quote from American Beauty (1999) make it over to (space)suit McCall’s planetary poesy:

“That’s the day I realized there was this entire life behind things, and this incredibly benevolent force that wanted me to know there was no reason to be afraid, ever.  [Painting's] a poor excuse, I know. But it helps me remember… I need to remember. Sometimes there’s so much beauty in the world I feel like I can’t take it… and my heart is going to cave in.”

My crew bussed to D.C. and even walked through unforgiving precipitation during our trek to the Museum.  It was worth the soggy socks.

The Space Mural – A Cosmic View at the National Air & Space Museum is a highlight monument in the city of monuments.  It’s acrylic on canvas – hundreds of yards of canvas – reaching a stratospheric six stories tall – and illustrating a brief history of the universe, as seen from the terracentric eyes of our miniscule yet adventuresome mankind.

Robert McCall’s ascent to artist heaven should be lesiurely in pace and infinite in duration, so that he may cruise the cosmos as easily as I click through Google Earth.

Light Speed

*You should double-check this figure, because I am the absolute worst at math. Not joking. Ask any teenager who has helped me.

Tino Sehgal, 5:45pm on March 10, 2010, only minutes after This Progress ended…

…an occasion celebrated by the schoolchildren/guides, who promptly shouted at 5:30pm…

…”(1,2,3): THIS PROGRESS!”  They applauded, initiating a cyclone of applause that spiraled…

…up the ramps and to the peak of the rotunda, from which the guides and guests alike…

…were leaning over the waist-high walls and beaming to each other in a Kumbaya climax…

…that looked and felt even more utopian than the conditions of the performance itself…

…whereby everyone smiles and thinks, eager to discuss ideas with peripatetic leisure…

…and even forgiven for wearing UGG boots (still); they are tourists and forget about progress…

I am lucky enough to have a brave friend who just returned home after a month of organizing foreign aid efforts from a military camp in Jacmel, Haiti. From her most recent update: “The most amazing thing so far is how many people have a smile and a friendly word to offer to a stranger walking through their nightmare. It’s incredible.”

Maximizing the resources available to them, the chic chicks Diana Campbell and Julie Ragolia bring us Tools for Thought, a beneficent fundraiser event with lots of hot objets d’art to warm your heart and your briefs alike.  Joined by a few curatorially-oriented and well-connected friends, Diana and Julie invited almost 100 artists to select a tool or object relevant to their work or personal life.

African mask from Gordon Hull

“We are looking for a rather unusual donation from the best artists in the world:  a ready- made object…anything from a tool to a book to an old shoe…that the artist will sign and tell a story about.  That object, no matter what it is, will be sold at a silent auction that night.”

(l-r) Shoplifter's synthetic hair, Dan Colen's crackpipe vase, Francesca DiMattio's papier-mache vase

The event originally was scheduled for February 22nd, but in the days leading up to that, the organizers were overwhelmed with queries from collectors, press, artists, and other art world lurkers.  The promised Patti Smith performance might have something to do with that.  Lo, the extra weeks of prep time enabled them to design an impressive website and nearly double the number of artists taking part, which includes current Whitney Biennialinas Huma Bhabha and Aurel Schmidt; Skin Fruitcakes Dan Colen, Richard Prince, Liza Lou, Terence Koh, and of course, Jeff Koons; the recently repatriated Gavin Russom; and those geriatric giants Ed Ruscha and Lou Reed.

Skateboards by X-Games champs Jeff Koons and Marilyn Minter

Personally, I have my eye on the Ofiliated Voodoo Flag by Genesis Breyer P-Orridge:

Hot

And will cower as far as possible from this monstrosity:

"How High," 2010, pencil, mix CDs, and vitamins on paper

This looks promising and easily worth every penny of the Benjamins you and your date will drop on tickets, most of which is tax deductible.  Apotheke, the downtown cocktail specialists, will provide relief of a different kind.  Total fox Alexandra Richards will DJ (hey, u can brw my mix cds lol!).  And did we mention Patti Smith?

Banks Violette’s second solo show at Gladstone Gallery:

IED prop from The Hurt Locker?

Or Conceptual Framework?

Chandelier! Next show: sconces!

Party in the Back

Q: What do you call it when an electric guitar goes on a weeklong drug binge?

A: Fender Bender

It all looks so bright when your Heart is so Black