Wednesday, November 3, 2010

"Comics are not literature"


For classes of Nov. 10 and 15, we're discussing comics:
= “Art Spiegelman: Lips,” interview by Harvey Blume, Boston Book Review, June 1995.
= "Comics are not literature" panel, 2007.
= Chris Ware "Introduction" to McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, number 13, 2004.

Plus comics by
= Ron Rege Jr. (his work is pictured above)
= Lynda Barry
= Chris Ware

Re: Relational Aesthetics-Lisa Spellman and her 303 Gallery

New York magazine recently published a profile of Lisa Spellman and her 303 Gallery where Rirkrit Tiravanija" debuted his "Untitled 1992 (Free)" installation, "in which the artist took everything in the gallery’s kitchen, office, and storage room and set it all up smack in the middle of the space."

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Antagonism and Relational Aesthetics

For the next two weeks, we're discussing "Antagonism and Relational Aesthetics" by Claire Bishop in the fall 2004 issue of October.

Supplementary non-required research for the supremely curious:
= Boston's Platform2.
= Boston's National Bitter Melon Council.

Pictured above: Rirkrit Tiravanija recreates his "Untitled 1992 (Free)."

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

So, you want to be an artist? go HERE http://www.ves.fas.harvard.edu/BYO.html

http://www.ves.fas.harvard.edu/BYO.html

INVITATION TO BYO
(Bring Your Own: Voices of the Contemporary at the Carpenter Center)
BYO fosters discussion and debate about pressing issues in contemporary culture across Harvard and Boston area communities by bringing to campus emerging figures in contemporary art for informal evening conversations.

LOCAL FIRST!

October 19, 2010
7:30 p.m.
Sert Space
Carpenter Center, 3rd Floor
BYO: Voices of the Contemporary at the Carpenter Center is pleased to host a panel discussion dedicated to local alternative arts organizations in Boston/Cambridge, with representatives from Big RED & ShinyiKatun, andPlatform 2. The discussion will address such questions as:
  • What is it like to be an artist in Boston in 2010?
  • What are the political, cultural and infrastructural conditions that limit artistic endeavors in the city?
  • Is there a 'scene' that is specific to Boston?
  • If so, how might we characterize its potential, its challenges, its uniqueness?
The goal of this forum is to bring voices from local artist-run organizations into dialogue with students and scholars from Harvard, MIT, and other academic institutions.
PARTICIPANT BIOS
Matthew Gamber holds a BFA from Bowling Green State University, and an MFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts/Tufts University. He is currently a Digital Imaging Technician with Preservation & Imaging at Harvard University, and the former Editor in Chief of Big RED & Shiny. Gamber has taught at Art Institute of Boston/Lesley University, College of the Holy Cross, Savannah College of Art & Design, and Massachusetts College of Art & Design. He is represented by Gallery Kayafas, Boston.
Kanarinka, Boston, Massachusetts, is an artist and educator. Her art practice is interdisciplinary and is often distributed across various sites, physical and virtual. A single project might take place online,in the street and in a gallery and involve multiple audiences participating in different ways for different reasons. Many of her projects are collaboratively authored. Her artwork as been exhibited at the ICA Boston, Eyebeam in New York City, MASSMoCA, and the Western Front in Vancouver. Kanarinka, a.k.a. Catherine D’Ignzaio, is co-director of the experimental curatorial group, iKatun, and a founder of The Institute for Infinitely Small Things. She currently teaches at the Rhode Island School of Design in the Digital Media Graduate Program where she runs the Affective Geographies Research Cluster.
Digital media artist Jane D. Marsching's work explores our past, present and future human impact on the environment through interdisciplinary and collaborative practices, including video installations, virtual landscapes, dynamic websites, and data visualizations. Recent exhibitions include: the ICA Boston; MassMoCA; North Carolina Museum of Art; San Jose Museum of Art, CA; Photographic Resource Center, Boston, MA; and Sonoma Museum of Art, CA. She has received grants from Creative Capital, LEF Foundation, Artadia and Artists Resource Trust. Recent publications include: BiPolar (Cornerhouse 2008), Gothic (Whitechapel Press, London, 2008), and S&F Online: Gender on Ice (Barnard College, 2008. With Mark Alice Durant in 2005, she curated The Blur of the Otherworldly: Contemporary Art, Technology, and the Paranormal, at the Center for Art and Visual Culture, Baltimore, MD; a catalog of the exhibition was published in June 2006 with essays by Marsching, Durant, Marina Warner and Lynne Tillman. She is a cofounder and member of Platform2: Art and Activism, an experimental forum series about creative practices at the intersection of social issues. She is currently associate professor at Massachusetts College of Art in Studio Foundation. She received her MFA in photography from The School of Visual Arts, New York City, in 1995.
Matthew Nash is Associate Professor at The Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University, and publisher of the online art magazine Big RED & Shiny, which concluded a 7-year run this past August. Big RED & Shiny received 5 grants from the LEF Foundation. Nash is also half of the artist team Harvey Loves Harvey, whose time-based and experiential work explores themes of communication, friendship and failure. Harvey Loves Harvey will be presenting new work at Gallery Kayafas in January of 2011.
Savić Rašović a.k.a Pirun a.k.a. Sasha… born in Titograd, Yugoslavia;
now from Podgorica, Montenegro… lives and works in Cambridge,
Massachusetts, USA... entrepreneur, new media artist, performer, curator,
publisher, designer, programmer, political activist… co-founder of iKatun,
a non-profit with a mission to foster public engagement in the politics of
information… member of the Institute for Infinitely Small Things that
uses performance to investigate social and political everyday… editor of
kontrabanda, propaganda factory for future dada...
Andi Sutton is an artist whose work explores the ways performance art methodology can be used to create alternative models for community and social engagement. Informed by the Fluxus and Situationist art movements, feminist pedagogy and performance art practice, her interdisciplinary collaborative and solo practice draws on strategies from these practices to create large-scale, interactive public interventions. She is a member of the collaboratives the National Bitter Melon Council and Platform2, and was curator of the Public Art Incubator Program for the Berwick Research Institute. Sutton has presented projects in museums and festivals in San Francisco, Boston, Chicago, New York, Vancouver, Bogota, Yogyakarta (Indonesia), among others. She is the recipient of the Museum of Fine Arts Traveling Scholars Award (2010) and the Artadia Art Award: Boston (2007) with the National Bitter Melon Council. She graduated with a BA in Women's Studies and BFA in Fine Art from a combined degree program between Tufts University and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, and is currently the Program Coordinator for the Graduate Consortium in Women's Studies at MIT.

Monday, October 18, 2010

“Video games can never be art”

For classes of Oct. 20 and 25, we're discussing “Video games can never be art"

Readings:
= “Video games can never be art” by Roger Ebert, April 16, 2010.
= “Inside the Box” (review of Tom Bisell’s book “Why Video Games Matter” and a responce to Ebert) by Chris Suellentrop, NYTimes, June 9, 2010.
= "Trauma and Agitation: Video Games in a Time of War" by Claudia Costa Pederson from "Afterimage" Vol. 38, No. 2, September/October 2010.
= Selections from Cory Arcangel interviews:Turbulence 2003, Rhizome 2008 and Saatchi 2009.

Supplementary non-required research for the supremely curious:
= Arcangel’s website.
= Cambridge artist Brian Knep's website.

Video above: Cory Arcangel, "Super Mario Clouds," 2002–2005 (excerpt).

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Blogs to waste time with

A sampling of art blogs and websites:
Claire Beckett, personal site of Boston photographer.
"The Big Picture," amazing photojournalism compiled by the Boston Globe.
BoingBoing.
Sharon Butler's "Two Coats of Paint," aggregates of what's happening in painting everywhere, by a Connecticut artist.
Jordan Crane's "What Things Do" comics site. LA artist, formerly resided Somerville.
"Culture Monster," round up of West Coast and national art stuff by writers of The LA Times.
Dirt Palace, feminist art collective in Providence.
"Fecal Face," national reports with Lowbrow slant from San Francisco.
Raul Gonzalez's "Cerebot" personal blog. Somerville artist.
Tyler Green's "Modern Art Notes," national art reports by DC blogger.
The Institute for Infinitely Small Things' website. Boston conceptual art and performance group.
Paddy Johnson's "Art Fag City," New York reports.
Misaki Kawai, personal site of New York artist.
Fred Lynch's"Picture It" illustration blog. Montserrat teacher.
Jane D. Marsching's personal website. Boston artist.
Massachusetts Cultural Council's "ArtSake" blog of local artists and art opportunities.
Massachusetts Cultural Council's "HireCulture," site of Massachusetts art-type jobs.
Megan and Murray, personal blog of Providence art duo.
The Miracle 5, website for group of Somerville artists.
"New Bodega" group blog by cartoonists including, occasionally Montserrat's Greg Cook.
John Osorio-Buck's website. Boston artist.
Ron Rege's "Cartoon Utopia" blog. LA artist, formerly resided Massachusetts.
Randy Regier, personal site of Portland sculptor.
Alec Soth's "Little Brown Mushrooms" photography blog. Minneapolis artist.
Zoe Strauss's photo blog. Live from Philadelphia.
Andi Sutton's personal website. Boston artist.
Millee Tibbs, personal site of Providence photographer.
Pippi Zornoza, personal site of Providence artist.

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Edward Winkleman's blog

Rachel Perry Welty recommended this blog. Winkleman is a gallerist who keeps a blog that is a rich source for information about shows and artists.
http://edwardwinkleman.blogspot.com/

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Collaboratives


classes of the week of Sept. 27, we're discussing:
Collaboratives

= Triibe: “Three’s company, and they love it: Triplets serious when playing with identity” by Cate McQuaid, Boston Globe, April 18, 2010.
= “Doing Their Own Thing, Making Art Together,” by Holland Cotter, New York Times, Jan. 19, 2003.
= "The Royal Art Lodge" by Caleb Neelon, Swindle, c. 2005 (?). (Royal Art Lodge site.)

Related to (sorta):
= Raul Gonzalez talk at Montserrat, 11:30 a.m. Sept. 14, 2010. His work is on view in Frame 301 from Sept. 3 to Oct. 5. Gonzalez is part of the Miracle 5 collective and Yassie Goldie.
= “Triiibe: The Garden of Eden, Take 2” at Boston University’s 808 Gallery, Oct. 19 to Dec. 19, 2010.

ALSO students will turn in a brief written update on their artist interviews – how will contact artist, etc.

And please attend visiting artist talk by Christopher Mir at 11:30 a.m. Sept. 21. Did you see his show at Montserrat (up through Sept. 25)?

Collaborative opportunity:
The Boston-based Platform2 collective is meeting at Boston Common at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 23, to present “Climate Chorus,” and it’s looking for volunteer readers for the event. Platform2 includes some of the folks from The Institute for Infinitely Small Things. Details here.

Pictured: "Paint-by-Number" by Triiibe.

Wednesday, January 6, 2010