4A ROCKS

My brain is still very fluffy from the night before, so this will be a misspelt missshapen fluff.

oh well.

I'm getting Joy Lai in this week to talk about her wor which is at 4A at the moment.

Her work consists of big photographs of skin printed onto banners. I'll save the words for the audio verson.

The 4A opening was a multi roomed extravaganza. There's lotsa stuff on and the new partitions are cute.

The street level space is a room of mirrors and alfoil.

kinda

Its a great installation of Lachlan Warners hollow buddhas and mirrors. Lots of bright red easter egg foil on the walls and a real cool take on Yves Kleins blue man in blue easter egg foil. The infinity mirror set up is the best. I remembered the first time I got drunk in a Thai restaurant and felt incredibly happy.

silver, foil, light.

Upstairs I ran into Joy's big skin banners curtaining the space. Through the transparent curtain I could peek through to Main Tans projection/sculpture things.

I reckon there was a nice formalist synaestheisa with the ice katchang (mixture of stuff conveyed by a mixture of stuff - if only martell could find a cocktail version of kachang) but a little less swayed by the other two pieces......... Bags and fish were nice tho. I'm really into the latest fad for plastic bag art.

At the other end, the top floor gallery is split into two small rooms. I didn't "get" Nell's work at all, but what I REALLY liked, was how it inspired all these comments from the punters.... "$2,500 for THAT!? ..... my six year old could do better!!!"

Oh! how many years since I heard this one! for joy! for joy! - all you need to do to ge tthe old duchampSHOK social vibe pumping again is to write on a black cushion with some fabric paint. Her crosses of polaroids of roadside crosses were nice - and this could have become a nice cohesive installation wiht the brushes - but the weird vipassana piece on the back wall, plus the video - didn't add to a sense of cohesion - more confusion. And I am a bit 'over' the sweeping arabesque lines. They evoke Byron Bay, Brett Whitely and dolphins - so should be used with complete abandonment or not at all.

I'm saving the best for last. Our houshold has been sniggering all weekend over this one. Jonathon Vencore's fossils. Nicely arranged in a small red walled room in cute little sample boxes. He's invented a new geology for every day bits. this was very camp, and a bit abject and hence right up the mayhem alley of delight. There's a whole heap of sculpted/resined rocky bits, with titles like "Anusite", "Littlite", "Dentatite", "Erectite", "Bunnite", "Pantitie" "Rimmite". And punters got to match the titles to what was in fornt of the eyeballs. Yum Yum, and I enjoyed explaining why the rimmite looked like a bunch of tongues to some young things.

Crikey - its hard being a critic. Here I am showing that my critical judgement IS largely dictated by my peurile sense of humour. I am also really obsessed by looking at rocks. I can't explain why. Nor can I explain that the one time my mum and better half bonded, was by spending SIX HOURS staring at and sorting geology photographs - after a solid xmas dinner. I think rocks are kind of exquisite and mineral - but also have this evocative quality that feeds into my own anothropomorphising tendences. So I reckon Vencore (note new buzz words) has mobilised this affective register rather well.

Thursday was a biggie for art openings but I managed only two. Before 4A I'd been down at Artspace avoiding pies. I'd killed time before the show wandering out along the cowper wharf. My god its an odd part of sydney, wiht bolted marinas - and Cafe Otto - which was full of scary loking dudes in suits. No women. I kid you not. Is this the new colombian?

ahem. Back to the gunnery. Inside.
Mari Velonaki's animatronic installation pulled the punters into the biggest queue - as eveyrone lined up to enter the space two by two. Its a good piece whihc consists of two wheelchairs moving around and writing letters whihc get spat out like ticker tape on the floor.

sublimely cute

I used the s word with caution and a delicate hint of irony, coz I'm always prickly aobut pompous write ups. But the following link does have nough of the eyeball informtaion wihtout too much dross....... http://www.artspace.org.au/2005/10/velonaki.html

I paced up the other end of artspace and eyed off the beverages on offer, and decided to decline. Strolling into Eugenia Raskopolous's 'there are no words" I was tempted to agree, and wished I'd imbibed a bit more. But then i left again and decided that I'm open for any challenge.


Her website bit has some nice words about filling up the dark cavernous bit of artpsace with more dark cavernousity.

We're in a region beyond speech, where there are no words, where there cannot be any words. There is only affect; consciousness gagged, choking down on a response which it will never articulate as such.

My own response, was to start looking at the exit sign glinting in the foyer to the toilets. This was probably not a great sign. It was light and polychrome. Her intervention was dark and gloomy. I'm afraid of the dark and quite claustrophobic.

I'm going to call that bit of artpsace - the dark cavern. Coz it is a dark cavern, and evokes emeories of artpsace as an old artists squat. It alos reminds me of an old squat in ultimo. Explosed beams, old bricks, DAMP. DARK. I go in there and can help but imagine old mattresses, bad goon and candlelight, so I'm always impressed when people can transform the space into something else (like Monica Bengoa) , or as the case of the lempriere - fill it with enough bright young things as to distract one from the gloom......


Anyway I saw something at artpsace a few years ago in the dark cave - which had all these projections onto double sided screens - and it was quite intriguiging and engaging. Eugenia's piece reminded me of that - but was less fulfilling. It's HARD to take people into the space of nothing especially when there's lots of other fund stuff happening around. I was reminded of the sensation of being at a warehouse rave without enough chemicals and I left.

Fortunately utopia was not far away. Telervo and Oliver Kalleinen have spent 3 months workign with old hippy communes in Australia, making stories based on experiences creating Utopian communities. As I live in the idyllic surrounds of an artists dystopia myself, I was pretty keen to see what they came up with. the main film is really interesting whacky coumentary amking that is somewhere between Australian Story and Lars Von Trier. I like the juxtaposition of projections of jumperclad old hippies and the black clad cool crowd of artspace. I like how the Kalleinen duo managed to make something unusual and odd, but not evoke a perjorative voyeuristic sensibility. There's the same sort of sympathetic engagement that Lucas's Kellerberrin blog had............. refreshingly free of cringe.

I reckon the Kalleinen's real genius was in creating the complaints workshop in BIRMINGHAM. Imagine that? Getting a whole bunch of whingeing poms to whinge into art. "Compalints choir" is heartwarming chuckle material. Get info at http://www.ykon.org/tellervo/ or go and see the film at artspace - in the room near the counter.

Shlepping, Sllippeng, Sleppign, Spilleng

Dear All

I thought the gestured frantic unsepllchekced typos style was kinda kool - and kinda kept me real and in tha hood of yer average art consooma.

I could diverge more into my own theories of the marked text and typography and post literacy spelling. but I won't. Its a bit 90's after all.

A few comments have alluded to my stylized screen dyslexia.

Ahem
I do type in a rush
I am unco and slapdash
I do like to leave a gestured, stuttering style in my writing

but if people are sick of reading through a skein of mispellings, then I could carefully make some amends.

anway. to the news.

Monday: listen to 2SER!

Tuesday: "The Space Between" at KUDOS gallery next to the greek orthodox church on Sth Dowling St, paddo

Wednesday: "To think we almost made it" at First Draft which is on chalmers street near central

Thursday: EAST: Sherman and Artspace
CITY:  "Out of Place" at Gallery 4A
INNER WEST: "Ambient Abstraction" at SNO galleries in marrickville

Friday: "Insidious" at Sir Hermann Black Level 5 Wentworth Building on city road at Sdyney uni

Saturday: "Tour of Beauty" meet at Ivan Dougherty disobedience show before 2pm and join the bus......

Gallery 4A finally reopens its renovated doors this week, with a big new group show.
I love to signpost contemproary art spaces by their vicinity to PIE CARTS. 4A is across the tram-tracks from harry's special at the capitol theatre, and the show opens on thursday night and runs for a month.

I haven't seen the new show but the invite shows a close up of brown rippled skin. Apparently (according to my neighbour who told me this before coffee) It's one of the pieces from Joy Lai, and the originals are big multi metre numbers. Yum Yum. The show is called "Out of Place" and the other artists are NELL, MEIN TAN, JONATHAN VENCORE and LACHLAN WARNER.
4A is an extremely interesting space and has really good quality shows of interesting, elegant work - which is chellenging without doing the head bludgeoning bit.

You've all Missed the Lempriere. You'll have to do the regular trudge to see the finalists in their natural habitats. Some are even still at ARI's like MOP.

There's a new show opening at Artspace on thursday night as well. One of the rooms has pieces by a finnish couple TELLERVO KALLEINEN and OLIVER KOCHTA-KALLEINEN, who've been exploring alternative documentaries with communities. They know dimitri vilenski well - and so should show something political and interesting, one hopes. Check out
http://www.artspace.org.au/2005/10/kalleinen.html

ON things political. UZE MUST giddown to Dockerty (the big gallery next to COFA) this week for disobedience. (http://www.cofa.unsw.edu.au/college/news/default.php?n=306) Its is the one chance Australians have of seeing Tony Negri (on video but beta than nothing). Also THIS SATURDAY Squatspace are running the Redfern/waterloo tour of beauty. Thiss should be fun but tickets are already sold out! - but go down & check out the show anayway. You can beg to be invduded on the next bus tour: http://www.squatspace.com/redfern

Before I continue with more interesting informative stuff, I need to do a grumpy rant. I've been bedridden for over a week, and unable to go ut to shows and art generally. Things got so bad, I have had to resort to the weekend SMH for entertainment. I know it isn't particulary original to whinge about John McDonald, but his columns really really got me down - especially this week. Here I was lying in bed, champing at the bit to get out and see all the nice stuff that gets reviewed in 50 words byt the other herald scribes - and longing to indulge my eyeballs in some contemplative goo - and all the big mac can come up with is a fairly tired whinge about patricia piccinini topped wiht a bit of retrogawgaw fluff about Mr. Squiggle.

It's not just the predictably and poorly disguised reactionary subplots of most of his reviews (fortunately he is slowly moving on from the 80's anger against the postmodernist art cospiracy) - coz in a way I still think that most art opens itself up to a type of infectious pluralism. (Oh god I'm gabbling theory) - I'm trying to say that most art has more going on than a simplified political spin could put on it - its AMBIGUOUS and CONFUSING and this is what makes it interesting............. s if he says something is crap then people can go and take a look and think well maybe it isn't crap (or vice versa)

What really shits me is that I suspect that the big mac decides what he'll write about and then come up with an angle to pitch it to the SMH readership (or their subeditor) and that this process probably takes about thirty seconds. Once having decided on 'the line', he then fluffs out a nice little illustrated sermon..... and .... and..... well, I'm all for moralising about art, it makes more far more interesting reading than "golly gosh, well thats new and COMPELLING" but, I'm finding it a bit too sturm and drang lately. I reckon the big mac needs to go forget the rage against the althussarians, and go read some Deleuze - and contemplate Deleuzes take on Nietsche. Then he should try a couple of bulbs, and a pie and then go to the MCA. And, you know, CHILL.

There are REALLY AMAZING AND GOOD THINGS HAPPENING in art that is being shown in sydney right now. Despite the moribund influences of studio closures, a horrible government, crap dole and charles billich, there are a lot of spaces where you can see interesting stuff - for FREE. There is also shitloads of boring stuff. Streetloads of it, and there new dimensions of boredom being plumbed every day in the interests of curatorial exigency, but I find it a bit whinely and neurotic to be constantly bagging boring shit. JM's point about Piccinini was , you know, OK. Arguable, but, since when was RosOx9 ever a hotbed of challenging contemporary culture? Maybe i've missed something but I thought it was meant to be like the collins&kent of contemproary art - one of those places that display THE BIG NAMES. so people can go there and see officially verfiable,silver stirling hot art market property right now. You don't need to have an opinion or engagement with it at all. I guess this explains the weird architecture (its not a really cruisy place for hanging out and picking your nose; believe me I've tried). No. One goes to the ox to be seen seeing what there is to be seen. The art content is just a side line, one might as well discuss the font on their floorsheets.

I just wish I could read art reviews on paper that are longer than 100 words. And I wish the beastly sermon on saturday could be given to someone who ENJOYS the art a bit more. I don't think this is incompatible with having a critical judgement - but I think (hope believe) that art writing can be done - which enables viewers to engage with and articulate their own responses. Maybe this is too much for the herald. Hell, it certainly is. But JM isn't the antichrist or a terminal fuckwit. He does actually make a point of visiting galleries and geetting to know artists and their work - so why not use the gig he's got to write something that might help more people enjoy art more?

Back to the news.

Wednesday night has a show opening at firstdraft with a scary curatorial statement.

this looks so interesting I'm scared its another slot style plot to undo me. But I'll chuck it in & Uze can make up yur own minds.

To Think We Almost Made It
THE ANTI-HEROIC GESTURES OF TRUE ROMANTICS

A magnificent exhibition of such unwavering doubt and investigation
that it is presented only through sheer will and unqualified
confidence.

Artists Craig Bender, Christopher Hanrahan, Andrew Liversidge, Rob
McLeish, Todd McMillan, Tom McMullan & Tillie Baker, Nigel Milsom,
Michael Moran and Vicki Papageorgopolous present statements as
questions, create beautifully detailed yet frightfully banal sets,
perform destructive actions, compile misguided thoughts, engage in
entropic searches and sing country songs. It hasn’t yet be discerned as
to why. If they knew that, there probably wouldn’t be a point.

Mind you, it has yet to be ascertained as to whether there is a point
or not; but then again, you’ve got to do what you can with what you’ve
got.

Curated by Michael Moran.

Opening night drinks: Wednesday September 21 2005 6-8pm
Exhibition open: Wednesday September 21 to Saturday October 8 2005
Firstdraft opening hours: Wednesday-Saturday 12-6pm

I wish it to be noted that I found this press release informative, thorough and correct.

Thursday looks like it will be one hell of a night with openings left right and centre. Grab yerselves a booze bus and get going.
SNO studio/gallery is an interesting space of mid career artists doing lots of stuff. They've gone retro this month with a special show with the legendary Syd Ball.
The show is called "ambient abstraction" with Syd Ball, Lyn Eastaway, Slavatore Panaterri and Justin Andrews.
If you like abstract pating or wanna see more of the good stuff - then this should be interesting.

11 Faversham Street, Marrickville  Thursday, Friday Saturday 1-6pm  (phone for


On friday - Sydney Uni Sir Hermann Black has a show by SCA students.The show is called INSIDIOUS: six
contemporary artists responding to the environment.

Snot A Lot

Couldn't give a rave on radio this week

I've lost my voice

I have beeen away from the computer for a few days.

I aslo missed the opening of disobedience (bugger) and Banalities for the perfect house (bugger).

Disobedience has a big bus tour thing on the 24th (organised by suqatspace)
the artlife did a promo: http://artlife.blogspot.com/

beofre collapsing I did see a couple of things that made me feel really happy.

One was Zanny Beggs "uniform " installation at mori. she's stretched a whole heap of tiny little canvases with bits of pretty cloth and arranged them up on the wall. the form a pixelaated image of a face -whihc only gets resolved when you Step right back.
Regina walter's big spectacl;e chain stalactite was nice wiht the other drawings. I didn't 'get the video" and everything looks forlorn in the hangar.
Luke Parkers "twin hanging" was a scarey sombre little piece in the back room. Its about the twin hanging of 2 boys in Iran for un husbandlike behaviour. He has some lightboxes with poignant text.

Before collapsing I also went to the MCA Primavera artists floortalks. Primavera made me rool happy this year coz it has a lotta painted stuff.

I was happy to see Monica Behrens crazy pop stuff stuck in a room - and bemused by her 'stupid as a painter' primitivist act. "Yeah, like I'm sooo hungover ...and yeah .... like this is how I kinda do stuff". Keeping it real, and playing dumb against the MCa edcuational staffs query about 'still life being traditional' - so that curator Felicity Fenner - could provide the authentic interpretation of Monica's work.
sorry that last sentence made NO sense.
the paitnings are big bright smooth oil paitnings of big kitsch objects. Like steaks, sausages, McMansions, prawns, a tin of Mr Sheen. Behrens' has arragned them into scenarious she calls still lifes and them painted them. they are cool. I wish she'd acknoweldged Gordon Bennets use of Mr. sheen to stand in for John Howard.

Tom Muller has to fight against my own fearful prejuedice agsaindst that old buzz word "mapping". His work was also minimalist, and geometric. Runways, weather. Dry. He spoke about the passport project tho.

Fiona Lowrys works are spooky and intense but scarily reminicent of Howard Arkley (its the spray can thing), and Madeleine Kelly's floaty weird images are...floaty weird images.

Yukultji Napangati has a whole heap of wormy scenes on the gorund floor whihc segued into another room of indegenouss abstracts by Pedro Wonaeamirri. The latter had lots of rarrking. I don't know much more aobut them than the colours and forms (yet).

Danie Mellors big shield room is absolutely fabbo. He's cast a whole heap of shields (that reminded me of Ned Kelly's armour) and painted them with iconographic hints of lost languages. THIS is mapping. There's a nother whole wall - of ceramic boomerangs too. This is a great opener for the show - and really accessible and engaing on fomral, emotic intellectula and aesthetic levels... But I wondered later about the tastefulness of the MCA - whihc hosted a DINNER in the gallery rom. Seeing a whole heap of plates and cutlery reflecting the formal arrouangements of Boomerancs and shields on the wall kind weirded me out.

Jemima Wyman - has convinced me that I need never pick up a paint brush for the rest of my days. She has done a MASSIVE DAYGLO ENAMEL PANORAMA of Cradle mountain in Tassie. And dried the enamel layers so bits of it shrunk and shrivelled. Its really really really yummy, and engaging and insane.

I was invited to be part of the panel for Michelle Usher's 'feedback' discussion on her installation. The discussion was kinda cool - but the objective/subjective split had me stumped a little (these are the disadvantages of having a degree in scientific epistemology - those terms dont mean much - and popper plus merleau ponty then means complete confusion...... fuck!)

Ignore the above. go see the work. She built a lean to structure with bits of string, canvas and ccurved cardboard in which she could shelter her work - and provide a context where viewers could enter the subject. she's paid such a nice amount of attention to the detial of setting and framing, and placement of potplants, chairs and the combo of works on the wall, the large scrolls and the small images is really really nice. I'm so glad we a re post post object, and post post dichtomising of media. This is a sensuous experiential and evocative work on so many levels.Makes me glad people are still making art.

Painful art

I'm meant to be doing matters tomal but reading through the comments I feel compelled to write some sort of serious response - especially to Ian & others comments about Parr.

What do you really think I would do if I saw someone get hit by a car????

I feel that I would

A) run over to them first
B) call for help
C) sit with them and bear witness to their suffering and terror - or death

For me, good political art is related to the latter - but oh but, art is related to life, and both (for me) at least are intensely related to FAILURE. (I want to do this -but I can't)

witnessing someone suffering is incredibly difficult and distressing and almost unbearable.

My way of bearing witness - or being with someone, or being with myself is to DRAW. Or to write. But drawing involves an immmediate response rahter than the refractory process of finding words........

I watched a close friend dying in hospital last year. I was sitting in a room with other artists. He was passing in and out of conscioussness and throwing up. He was in agony, and he was dying and there was nothing we could do, except to sit with him, so he wasn't alone. At the same time- he was so evidently alone. He begged us not to draw him. We didn't. At this point there was nothing I could do - suffering is a profoundly intimate experience - and yet also a profoundly social one. Later on I cried in my studio, while touching up paintings of him where he'd posed for me and others at a sketch club. Painting a body that no longer existed. Remembering flesh that was only mine to see and remember, not to feel. I finished the painting and gave it to his girfriend - who'd been the main carer as he died. My memories, sensations and impossible grief - all I COULD do with it WAS make a painting. I'm an artist and that's what artists do. Someone said to me that they regarded the exchanges of life drawing as about love, memory passing between people. we draw from someone that has a history of experiences, and who won't be present once they stop posing, and that won't be present when they die. Drawing is bearing witness.

I can't bear to visit the refugees in Villawood. I don't know how I would meet their face without sobbing. They would lose face and so would I. If I'd had the time, I would have attended Parr's live performance to sit with him and to draw him, slowly and intensely - so to have a discrete version of the exchange that is impossible to have. And yes - I would have like to have done a drawing of him, not to have an image of his performance - but to alow myself an extended moment of engaged spectatorship. I (niaively????) beleive that he did reach the Artaudian moment in these performances.

For a bit of context (this is where my life coalesces somewhat.) you can read about my experiences of activism, art and horrible suffering please see "this is what democracy looks like at:

http://minoumayhem.blogspot.com/2005_03_01_minoumayhem_archive.html

the hard copy is available at COFA art store in a zine on sale where the cash goes to the NSw refugee action coalition.

I really love Jebni's discussion of Woomera 2002 on anti popper.

For my views on 'regarding the pain of others' (the exprience not the sontag book) see:

http://minoumayhem.blogspot.com/2005/06/extreme-sports-abject.html


For my own visceral experience of pain and paint check out:

http://minoumayhem.blogspot.com/2005/07/extreme-sports-gazing.html

Hope someone has time to wade through the above.

ON pain and paint, Last night I attended the opening of my friend Steve Kirby at Legge Gallery.

His 6 small peices were in the back section of the downstairs gallery - and kind of next to the large collage works by Peggy Randall.

Both artists have produced these latest body of works while in physical pain. As I said, Steve is my friend, and I know more about his works and his conditions of producing them, so that's what I'll describe here.

Steve has previously shown works at Legge composed of collaged elements of paintings, all floating on a network of ply joints and floating in a box frame. An example of these is currently in the upstairs store room at Legge.


these latest pieces appear far more as representational paintings. There's one on the back insdide cover of september's art almanac. It looks like a bunch of flowers. Noice????


There is a big cultural schism between art criticism which describes art as a serious of semiotic elements - as representations of something (signifiers if you're a structuralist) or metonyic signposts of a discrete experience (if you're a phenomenological neo kantian) .... and the words of artists who experience art as a set of processes, exchanges with the pieces as residues of those experiences.

Steve is preoccupied with focal points - and what a painting becomes in the space within the focal point where it stops being an image. The difference for me between his last 2 shows - were that the collages - look like this: http://www.leggegallery.com/KIRBY/2004/Kirby4.html

ie large assemblies of pink blobs - objects/colours/abstracts....... they don't look like anything in particular - except something that the viewer wnats to have acloser look at. Once you are close, you can see the incredible array of marks and elementshat have beencreated and assembled together. Inside each fragment is another paitnng and another world that is incredibly suggestive.

the current paintings look like this: http://www.leggegallery.com/KIRBY/Kirby.html
which is ostensibly a view from his kitchen in the morning.

Up close the image looks like some delicate transluscent oil paint laid over a thick soft warm slab of gesso (plaster) which has bubbles in it. The image is disrupted by the surface of marks and the surface on which it is painted on. The varying densities of pigment in the windows is evocative of the abstract characters that Steve takes into his other works.

As I wrote earlier -he also has a bit from the mask of MArrickville Jelly Wrestling hero "The somnambulist". (www.mjwf.org). I'm not just adding this for official "quirky" kudos. The mask - a white disk with portals for eyes - evoke the role of viewing, and act as the figure within the painting - the mnemonic element which reminds the viewer of our own viewing into the scene. My favourite bit in the painting is actually the goopy little blue creature on the left (miraculously disguised in a bunch of lowers).

Steve's paintings are all about these strange little goopy creatures that viewers inveitably imagine when we are confronted with somethieng we can't quite understand. He has a strong intellectual interest in "analogic seeing" whihc is the historical process of how visual culture (everything form astronomy, to microscopy and art) has been informed byt eh processes of identificiation and imagination and anthropomorphism of viewers.

The best illustration of this preoccupation in this show (for me) is in the base of flowers. Steve said the only representaiton element is the shadow - whihc he copied onto the board from a shadow cast by a bunch of flowers. The shadows lookk almost lke a bunch of mayan glyphs on stalks. He repainted the vase and flowers - drawing from the shadow - again playing with the tension between object and image. If you have NO CLUE what I'm on about PLEASE go and look at the work. Stand up close and sniff - and go in the day - so you can see the crystalised glints of the gesso - and then stand back, and then move in again. Welcome to painting.

In these works the lumps, air holes and strange blobs act as a disruptive element for our desire to see an image. the present a type of visual static which is a distraction to the smooth play of verisimilitude. They are portals into this other play of objectness and suggestiveness within the medium of paint and the act of painting itself. What is interesting is to note, is the space inside the viewer - between the point of credibiility of an image and where it seems like mess or chaos, or disruption.

For Steve - this space is actually denotative of embodiment - and it is an extremely visceral and inarticulate space of sensation. Where something we look at is no longer an image and not quite a body - then what is it? "un tache" a stain, an abject remnant - it is extremely abject - something not quite us and not us - sort of evacuated from the body and yet intrinsically corporeal. Looking at something confusing in this way - does produce a deeply physical response. As much as I love these works - I and others EDGED AWAY when we tried to have conversations. They are discomforting, and affecting. They were interesting to be among, alone, but really disruptive to a coherent train of thought. they do evoke the strange spaces of being, of being as a confused collection of sensations and urges (oh dear I'm going Deleuzian).

they are also about pain and phsycial discomfort. I'm hesitant to write this because I'll end up presenting Steve's work like those foot and mouth painters. Hell . Everyone has a body - and bodies are painful annoying fleshy coils of mortality for most people - at least some of the time.

The visual censorship of imperfect bodies in consumer culture is not very far fremoved from the public cencorship of impoerfect images in art culture. I know when I'm teaching oil paitning - that I'm fascinated to watch the gestures of cleaning, containment and wiping that so many (women expecialy) engage in. Lots of my students ARE SCARED OF THE PAINT, and the awkward blobs of goop on their palette. The like to have perfect neat slugs of pure tubal paint that they squeeze out and apply onto the canvas as thin dry bits of colour in between pre drawn lines. They like neat palettes. Many othese paitners have neat houses, neat hair and neet bodies, and clothes purchased regularly washed and ironed. Its easy to mock the bourgeousie but its also amazing to note - when women spend most of their lives, wiping, cleaning, correcting themselves and their spaces that they carry this even into something as innoccuous as paint.

Here I'd like to revive my mank manifesto days and declare that the only form of artistic and personal liberation is through embracing chaos and abjection. (but fuck it was hard maintainign my dreadlocks).

What I'd prefer to emphasise -and what is more pluralistic - is that PAINT is an extremely good and safe space where we can explore a different form of embodiment and being in the world. We can be sloppy, and stupid, and messy and confused and cluttered and awkward. No one will die and you don't lose your day job. In painting we can fail and flail and its OK. For me interesting paintings are the ones where some of this fragility is maintained - not a dumb defiance or art brut - but a kind of aspiring, delighted, intense but not quite there yet, confused strange delerium. IN english paint is eaten up by the word pain. What a great language! I don't see pain as a morbid masochistic indulgencevof the tortured soul of 'the artist' (TM). but a space where life in all its mess and pain can be acted out and communicated to others. For viewers this erxists in the point where we fall in love with a work or can't take our eye off it and don't know why.

I'm starting to think of Cixous ravings about Rembrandt's Bathsheba and wishing I could be in Melbourne. Rembrandt rocks - his surfaces are very very embodied. His work "lives" todya not because he painted every day form teh age of 12 upwards and had a fine skill of a 17th century traditional craftsman (if you want see that do statens museuum fer kinst in denmark and you can trawl through rooms of the stuff - its cold). Rembrandt - especially in his later works -but hell its there in much of them - communicates a rich comfort with his own body - as a desiring, fleshy, goopy, aging feeling thing - his eyes are divine byt so art eh hands and faces - and this affective affinity wiht the complexity of feeling a body is what makes his work magic.

This segue is a prologue for me heading off to the MCA this arvo to be the "official painter" at michelle usher's audience forum for the Primavera artists talks. shebang starts at 2.30 - I'll be there by 4pm i guess. I doubt it'll be one of those painful new media vs old media debates (thabks god the 90's are over) so I'm interested to see what will happen.

Mayhem on Monday

Brain is very slow this week

I wnet to a nice opening of monoprints and drawings by PTerea Felows on the weekend. These are all works based on her Brett Whitely shcolarship residency at the Cite in PAris.

Petrea is one of the very few artists who has the drawing skills to pull of a 19th century tres retro tribute to the ville lumiere - and so the boyd of work was fairly unsurprising and quite conservative but still engaging and pleasing collection of images.

My favourite was the gouache on the paper plate of the the inside of Napoleon 3rds deluxe apartment. this guy crapped over Donatella Versace - and you can see the original in stu on the top floor of the Louvre. The smoky birdman on the balcony at Notre Dame - was also pretty nice - she's not a big figure painter - so this was a nice surprise.

There's a lot hapepning this week - and I'm tyring to ignore it.

Tomorrow night a close friend of me has an opening at Legge Gallery tomorrow night. He ernestly assures me that it is complete crap - but the invite image featres the mask from the jelly wrestling champ "the somnambulist" aka micky quick.......... how this ended up in a Bathrust interior is a mystery but proof that the art world is very small.

Mr. & Mrs won the Lempriere cash. A very fair choice - coz it'll be shared between two artists. Mr. & Mrs. are actually married - and are a couple of collaborating cofa students who do performancy stuff together......... this peice is Barneyesque - and less unsettling that the scarey little Britney clone last year........

Primavera is the other hot item of art news: To make up for the strict opening night entry policy they have a free public meet and greet thing on wednesdya arvo at 2.30pm.

" Meet the artists! Gallery talks by Primavera 2005 artists Danie Mellor (ACT), Tom Mùller (WA), Pedro Wonaeamirri (NT), Michelle Ussher (VIC), Monika Behrens (NSW) and Fiona Lowry (NSW)."

Primavera is the MCA's annual and highly-regarded “talent spotting” art event, unveiling works by artists from across the country, many of them the stars of the future! Under the direction of guest curator Felicity Fenner Primavera 2005 questions and re-interprets landscape painting as a genre. In the hands of the younger generation the landscape becomes a place of leisure, a view from the car window, a playing field, home, and a place of environmental concern. Wide-ranging in perspective but sharing a common passion for the Australian landscape and for painting, Primavera 2005 is a great place to see the next generation of young artists showing what’s pertinent to them, and how they’re reworking an old tradition to become fresh and relevant to today’s world.

Artists included are: Monika Behrens (NSW), Madeleine Kelly (QLD), Fiona Lowry (NSW), Danie Mellor (ACT), Tom Mùller (WA), Yukultji Napangati (WA/NT), Michelle Ussher (VIC), Pedro Wonaeamirri (NT), Jemima Wyman (QLD).


The interesting thing will be the disobedience show - opening at Dockerty on Friday.

http://www.cofa.unsw.edu.au/galleries/idg/news/

Knowing the curators and the artists - i believe it will be a very seriously considered use of the gallery space to frame some cultural interventions in social life.

I don't think I can edit the 40 minute interview with Dimitri Vilensky in time. shit. He has 3 videos - exploring the triad of artist/worker/intellectual. This includes some rare footage of TOny Negri - so punters cna at least get a gander at whoat the fuss is about. Squatspace will also be there as well as Suzanne (don't step on my hair!) Victor.

I was at a talk recently where some people were gabbing on about "The death of the artist" (big fat yawn). I'm really into the death of 1980's stalinist structuralism. The ego game is tres vile - but Getting socially ocnsiocus artists do duck out of it in the name of the revolution, Brecht or CCDP, won't help anyone really - and it means that the art star turf gets hogged by boring boy egomaniacs.........

I went to another talk where someone was reviving HABERMAS (See frankfurtschool intellectuals) as an exploration of the gallery as a public forum - moreover - a forum where one could learn how to behave in hte public sphere - itself being a rather selective group.

I guess the blogosphere is more pressing at this point.

but in defence of the big white cube - I like the idea of phsyical proximity to objects and ideas - and having a space where we can learn to engage with them in an honest but reasonably polite manner. I'm not sure if anyone knows how to do this.

I went to Sin city the other night - and was the only person in the cinema screaming with schock, schlock and delight. Everyone else is either feigning or has acutally become "the jaded cinema viewer" - even in the dark! gosh.

So what hope is there in a well lit white cube, where people are even conscious of their haircuts? How can anyone actually pull a face or moan at some gory schlock - or giggle at some silly crap? If publics don't learn or find ways to articulate incomprehension or alienation or confusion - then we do end up with a polarisation of bland ennui of tolerance - or reactionary censorship.

I was provoked to think about this - be remembering when Monica Tichahek finished art school before winning the Lempriere. Her final year piece - showed her suspended from a heap of hooks for hours. Crikey. My hair stood on end and I screamed just looking at it. No one else did. Why the hell not? And I woder if anyone acutally cired when they saw mike parr wiht his face sewn up? OK reading aobut it - it sounds like a banal stunt - but actually seeing someone in the flesh - trying to represent refugees in cocnertration camps - who do the same and CAN'T BE SEEN is emotive stuff. It'd be nice if a gallery would be space where the spectacle of pain could be something other than numbing and silencing....... dunno how tho.

Whats not at all cool in Melbourne

I skimmed this one off the artlife blog. http://www.mopba.org/index.html

Look, giggle and go back to my posting in defence of the Dilettante.

Diary entries for this week:

Tomorrow: Art in Life - Set in the stunning surrounds of the iconic operahouse forecourt this promises to be the best publicly funded spectacle to hit Sydney since Leo Schofield lit up the whole thing in ROUGE. Go down to Circular Quay to witness the performance by a large group of well trained well coordinated performance artists as they round up and beat the living shit out of public volunteers. Opera House forecourt, 5.30-7.30pm. Matinee performances on at lunchtime wednesday .

http://sydney.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=58192&group=webcast

If bloodsports ain't your cup of tea - then be aware that YOU are invited to attend the opening of "DISLOCATION" 6-8pm Tuesday 30 August at Kudos Gallery, 6 Napier St. Paddington.

Afterwards stagger down to the Hollywood Hotel in Commonwealth Street Darling it hurts. Simon Barney's (no relation to Mathew or Matrin Sastre) brief case gallery- still battling on after the bomb prank by Micky & Lucas a couple of years ago - is small art is in a briefcase in the bar so don't spill yer beers.

Wednesday - The Lempriere. I've raved previously. If you can decipher the cryptic information below - this may mean something is on at Firstdraft Gallery the same night.

Opening night drinks: Wednesday August 2005 6-8pm Exhibition open: Wednesday May 18 to Saturday September 17 2005 Firstdraft opening hours: Wednesday-Saturday 12-6pm

the above 2 line riposte followed a looooooooong couple of press releases all jammed together. Is ian millis playing tricks on me again - or do the current FD directors get a year 8 work experience kid in to do their written material?

These guys need SERIOUS REMEDIAL WRITING LESSONS. Sorry to bag youse but youse GET FUNDED. But I know the nature of bureaucrats and productivity so I'll spell it out here for free:
Floorsheets: Have title, artist, medium, dimensions and a number corresponding to a number on the wall or floor or plinth near the work - or on a label in same proximity.
Press releases: Have DATES, (Day, day number, month), times, venue, names of artists gallery address. All other info is optional. The KISS principal works best.

Vignets like "TOUGH NUGGETS is the physical remnants of an excitedly anticipated moment. For all its excess and painful attempts, it shall pass, a joyous flutter through the wet cheeks of history." just look insanely pompous when the basics ain't right.

Next Thursday - Primavera at MCA- sorry but the opening is STRICTLY invite only. And there's less cash up for grabs than the Lempriere. Still, Belinda Jackson's parents have gotta be saluted. And you can do it daytime for free - thanks to Telstra. (glad to know all those expensive landline charges are going somewhere)

No wukkas if you miss the primavera coz you can come over to My Ricky Vee Yeah for a Tres nice space doing tres nice stuff : S.N.O. New Artists Association and Project Space in Marrickville has a show opening on Thursday the 1st ofSeptember at 6pm .

The organisors of the SNO project in Marrickville are proud to announce thearrival of the internationally renowned installation artist and painterTilman, from Brussels, Belgium. Tilmans¹ art will be introduced for thefirst time to the Australian public by showing a site specific workconceived for the SNO showroom.

Tilman will becollaborating on this project with the Australian artist Kyle Jenkins whohas recently appointed head of Painting at USQ, Queensland. These artistsbecame friends through their participation in various group exhibitions heldin Los Angeles (2003), New York (2004), also Paris and Brussels (2005). Theyare aiming to produce a new work made here in Marrickville based on howcolour or light may be uniquely perceived as, ³Ða structural¹ orarchitectural element². As the artist further explains, ³Ðsince my earlyexperiments in photography in the late 1970s, the investigation of theelement of light has been the primary focus of my artistic practice. Theworks may be understood as a carrier, a mediator of light in its physicalquality².All are invited to attend the opening, there will also be informal drinks

Friday - the apparently invite only show for the $25,000 young painters prize is at the Brett Whitely Studio in the unfortunately named Raper street in surry hills. The whitely prize has produced such luminaries as Ben Quilty, Alan Jones (no relation to any shockjocks) as winners with Luke Scibberras and Craig Waddell, regularly featuring as finalists in their youf. Girls do get a look in at the Whitely - and even win regularly - but seem to slip into anonymity afterwards - proving that the art world still has its corners of old school gender divides. You can see the work of one unsung whitely winner on Saturday.........

Saturday - Petrea Fellows at Addison Road Gallery. 5 - 8pm. I forgot to plug this one (WHERE IS MY BRAIN???) . Petrea won the whitely in 2001 - and did a whole series of exsquisite etchings while at the cite. She's brought them here and finally put them on show. Check out http://petreafellows.com/ for a preview.

Coming up next week.

I will play an interview with Dimitri Vilensky - in an effort to plug the disobedience show - which opens next friday at the Ivan Dougherty gallery at COFA. (i think i made it sound like THIS friday at Dougherty - I'm sorry).

(Dmirty Vilensky is a video and installation artist who is involved in an art/theory/activism collective called What is to be Done?. For moreinformation go to http://www.chtodelat.org/. He was involved in the Russian andEuropean Social forum and is coming to Australia to participate in theSydney Social Forum.)

Check out the line up - which should offer a punchy riposte to "situation" (May dear debord turn in his grave) at the MCA............ (http://www.squatspace.com/situation/) oh god - recuperation. Its a tricky one ain't it?

8 September – 15 October
Disobedience
This is an exhibition of local and overseas artists who have critically
engaged with the process of corporate globalisation and supported the
global justice movement. It will follow the Sydney Social Forum, and will
be accompanied by a discussion/workshop, a film showing, and artists’
talks. Contributors include: Beluchi Weavers, Alexander Brener, Kendell
Geers, Michael Goldberg, Shilpa Gupta, Raquel Ormella, Dean Sewell,
Squatspace, Dmitry Vilensky, Ilaria Vanni, Susann Victor.
Curators: Zanny Begg and David McNeill

Don't forget next Thursday, Friday and Saturday - you can go to Performance Space for the visual spatial aural experience of Banalities for the Perfect house. I'd recommend thursday. It costs $10 but if yer broke and keen we'll do a giveaway on the program next week.

Wots Hot in Sydney

Contrary to my previous plg - of not wanting to become some sort of arbiter of cool - I am forwarding some info on the official ubercool megabuck prize for the latest hip youf art happening types.
Yep! its the Helene Lempriere . Properly pronounced Lom Pri Yeah, or Lame Prix Yeah by disgruntled anti conceptual types, or Lamp Ray by Lazy bastards such as Moi, the prize cash is $40,000.

Its bigger than the whitely, and not far off the Moran or theArchibald.
Further more it has the cache of being uber cool - and is approp[riately situated in Artspace.

So if you wanna see who and what the big punters reckon is really hapeening then breeze on down to wolloomoloo on Wednesday Night. Grab a pie and stroll accross the road to the gunnery. Hope the goon is good.

The judges this year - are pretty nice - Rosemary (flying brides) Laing and Euan (Skinny Men & chunky grey paint) McLeod plus Tony Bond to lend the Agnes Wales art institutional cred.

The lineup looks pretyt good - with Most names and works being regulars on the ARI circuit. Whoever wins - it is always UNFAIR. Bloody hell! $40,000! Do you know what I could do with that?????? On the other hand - if you're gonna score a shitload of cash then its probably better to do so when you've got nothing to start with.........

Official Details follow.

		HELEN LEMPRIERE TRAVELLING ART SCHOLARSHIP 2005
		zehra AHMED zanny BEGG lauren BRINCAT & william FRENCH simon COOPER alex DAVIES jacqui DRINKALL nicholas FOLLAND kirsten FARRELL hayden FOWLER marita FRASER david GRIGGS owen LEONG jess MACNEIL damien MARCH wade MARYNOWSKY julie MASTERTON vanila NETTO Ms & Mr huseyin SAMI aaron SEETO george TILLIANAKIS mimi TONG matthew TUMBERS simon YATES
Owen Leong
		The 2005 recipient will be announced by Dr CHARLES MEREWETHER Curator, 2006 Biennale of Sydney
Jess MacNeil
		The judges for the Helen Lempriere Travelling Art Scholarship 2005 are Anthony Bond, General Manager, Curatorial Services, AGNSW Rosemary Laing, Sydney-based artist Euan Macleod, NSW-based artist.

Banalities for the Perfect House

Here's the details of the show I'll get Ruark in (eventually) to plug in person.

BANALTIES FOR THE PERFECT HOUSE
A new performance installation by
Ruark Lewis & Rainer Linz about living more lightly
in the city and suburbs

8, 9, 10 September 8pm @ Performance Space

In Banalities for the Perfect House Ruark Lewis and Rainer Linz take a hammer to the dominant gridlines of the city and suburbs and smash down the entombment of conventional chamber theatre and music. They break through the constraints of spoken word, nail down the sound of the computer and it's network, and employ the carpentry of song lines to create an immersive environment of sound and installation.

Taking apart the concept of poetry readings and music recitals, visual and performance artist Ruark Lewis, in collaboration with Melbourne based composer Rainer Linz, use sound, noise and synesthetic transcription to build the perfect house for an imperfect world.

Poetry is stencilled on beams of wood that scale the walls of the theatre and timber frames hang suspended from the ceiling representing the framework of a house. The audience are invited to wander through the installation as Linz and Lewis perform, sample sound and project imagery from six stations throughout the space.

Banalities for the Perfect House is part 4 in the Who’s Afraid of the Avant-Garde? installation and performance series curated by Blair French. Each project presents work that engages with avant-gardism in manners suggesting its reinscription as a paradigm for art and social action in the 21st century.


ABOUT THE ARTISTS
RUARK LEWIS is a Sydney-based artist and writer who works closely with text and image relationships through installation, painting, artist-books, site-specific commissions and performance. He has exhibited and performed widely in Australia, the UK and Europe. His permanent installation Relay (with Paul Carter) is situated at Sydney Olympic Park. His publications include Depth of Translation: The Book of Raft’(with Paul Carter), Just for Nothing (with Nathalie Sarraute) and False Narratives.

Melbourne-based composer and sound artist RAINER LINZ has a long involvement in radio, music theatre, instrumental and electronic music. His work includes an opera as well as numerous chamber and electronic pieces intended for concert performance. He is also an author and publisher. The Oxford Companion to Music in Australia (OUP, 1999) notes "Linz's innovative and entrepreneurial work in Melbourne has been a significant factor in the city's prominence in experimental music." His recent collaborative work includes the sound installation Barcode (Graz, 1999), and the interactive gallery installation infonoise (Belgrade, 2001). . Under the title New Listener he has devised a series of computer programs where a music or sound composition can be adjusted to the listener's preference.


For more information contact Rosie Dennis at Performance Space
02 9698 7235 or, media@performancespace.com.au
Performance Space 199 Cleveland Street Redfern www.performancespace.com.au

Not In Our Name

SPACE 3

---

PLEASE NOTE :THE SHOW ON WEDNESDAY NIGHT 24-08-05.
THE RECONCILIATION UNITY NETWORK INC.
WAS NOT BOOKED BY SPACE3, IT WAS DONE VIA THE REAL-ESTATE ‘CENTURY21’
THE ORGINISERS PAID THE RENT AT 151 REGENT STREET TO HAVE THE SHOW.
IT IS NOT A SPACE3 EVENT, I THOUGHT WE COULD CRASH IT TO REMINISCE.
SORRY FOR THE TITLE LAST SHOW. I JUST DID SOME REASERCH ON THE ORGINSATION AND ITS NOT ONE THAT THE ORGANISORS OF SPACE3 ARE AFFILIATED ... WE DON’T PROMOTE OR AGREE WITH THE FUNDALMENTALS OF THIS GROUP. ALTHOUGH WE DO FIRMLY BELIVE IN RECONCILIATION.
SPACE3 HAS IN THE PAST RAISED FUNDS FOR THE reconciliACTION.org who we have mistakenly thought were the above mentioned group.

SPACE3 DOES NOT AFFILIATE ITS SELF WITH THE GROUP ‘THE RECONCILLIATION UNITY NETWORK INC’.

---

SPACE3 WILL HOLD A FINAL SHOW, NOT YET SURE WHERE AND WHEN, BUT IT WILL BE ABOUT OUR BOOK LAUNCH. CLOSE TO FIVE YEARS OF EVENTS..
SORRY FOR THE CONFUSE-MENT.


IMPORTANT: IF YOU FORWARDED ON THE ORIGINAL MESSAGE PLEASE FORWARD THIS ONE ON TOO..

SO MANY DRAMAS. KIND OF FUNNY..

KIND REGARDS
MELLETIOS.K
ANDREW .B

---

In Defence of the Dilettante

Because Ruark did a no-show on monday we were kind of STUCK with providing interesting or relevant material for Art & Mayhem on monday.

Never one to be deterred I pushed on - and Karen had the bright idea of asking me a question to get me blabbing. She mentioned the moral dillemma of her peers in the pub one night who thought art was self indulgent.

My riposte was that of "Of course art is self indulgent! so is masturbation! But look what happens when people don't masturbate? they become arseholes! So my advice is do it, do it badly, do it well, but do it often, just do it."

There's a deeper thought in there obscured beneath the guff. It's one that comes from my favourite literary lore - apparently about Isaac Babel (the Russian writer who had been a member of the Kossacs in the Red Army). He was up before the stalinist firing squad, accused of pety bourgeouse dilettantism - and is reply was "The right to write, is the right to write badly".

I feel this way about art - and 'Ian Millis" (bless his duchampian soul) brought this to my attention in his sweet little word play about bad flower paintings (see comments from previous post) by declaring the exhibition was a present for his Mum who was 80.

Mayhem the critic thought of the 80 year old I teach flower painting to on Tuesdays, and the other conservative, uptight, bourgeoise individuals entrusted to my aesthetic guidance on the other side of the bridge. I also thought of the amateur daubers and drawers I see regularly at the sketch clubs I attend or help organise each week. And I wondered how I could tell them about my writing, my critical views of art, my snide dismissals of whole streets of ernest exhibitors, in the same voice that I ask them to "put a bit of pale blue in that corner there - it will give that fold a bit more definition".

Ian Millis accused me of anonymity. HELLO! I give a radio program on 2SER Each week. My name is on the 2SER website. I am NOT anonymous. I don't stick up this blog as "Margaret Mayhew's Musings" because art and mayhem sounds more appealing - and it is NOT my personal diary. Hopefully its about more than me - and can promote some more of the art communities and activities in sydney, than my own admittedly very narrow range of interests. Writing is also a disguise in a way - I can and do project aspects of myself - and cerainly evoke a clear mood - which matches the typos, spoonerisms and the apellation of mayhem. Having a name - even a nom deplume is something which limits my critical freedom compared with those funboys at the art life. the essenc eof the flaneur is a type of insibility or unmarkedness. Which is why it wasn't done by many ladies in bustles back in the 19C - or why it ain't done by many sandwich board wearers in city streets today. Named, I become visible, and my viewing becomes marked and inflected by the look of the other in my viewing. Consequently I go out to less art openings than before. My liver is grateful.

Back to the point.

Jacques Delaruelle is apparently giving a talk on amaeturism and art at the Brandling street 30th anniversary exhibition. They've misspelt his name on the flyer - but its kinda cool (De La Rouel) and theres really cute cartoon of monkeys posing and drawing (whihc rmeinds me of another great bok called "the monkeys right to paint") The opening is on Saturday September 10th from 12pm. Manjam is on the same night. I'll post more information about both later on.

'Brandling Street' is a converted warehouse in Allen Lane in alexandria - but its near Brandling street in Erskineville - so hence the name. They have life drawing 5 days a week, and have done so since the mid 70's when they were located at the Sydney School of arts in Pitt Street (the current location of the arthouse hotel). Lots an lots of artists have attended Brandling street over the years - and it curiously arose as an institution at the peack of the life class as outre anachronism - back in the 70's - in the dim dark days of the post field abstractionist push.........

The above is a type of art mythology that I'm hearing again and again. Apparently life drawing and figurative painting became extremely daggy in the 1960's, in the wake of the US influence of abstract art, and then later influence of conceptual art, and performance art.

According to various horse-mouths - private sketch clubs have been the mainstay of much artistic activity throughout the history of sydney last century. Private sketch clubs on the north shore, in the rocks, haymarket acted as social nodes where artists of various persuasions could gather, draw and talk. In many ways they are comparable to jam sessions among musicians - bt often with more heterogeneous participants. There were sketch clubs for the contemporary art society, for graduates of Julian Ashton's, or East Sydney, and others comprising students, models and graduates of each. There were also sketch clubs of nuns, old men, younger men, bored housewives which as the bland sociological labels don't state - included ex students from the Bauhaus, or of Johannes Itten, as well as friends and associates of ex students from George Bell. Sketch clubs have acted as a broad network of contacts, and fanning infuences from various art movements form the 20th century. Skethc clubs have provided employment for models - but especially for many women artists -a form of introduction and graduated apprenticeship in the art world. Students and artists who couldn't be or wouldn't be supported by their families or art patrons - to attedn full time art school or devote themselves to full time practice, have found supportive envirnoment in which to gain some employment, and participate in networks of other arts, models, teachers.

The above may seem a tad scholastic, but I'm trying to provide some evidence for the importance of what may seem as peripheral, anachronistic or amateur activities - particularly in a cultural milleu as small as Sydney's (and the art scene here IS SMALL). Aside from life drawing as training, or life drawing as a practice, or life drawing as generation of some genuine soft porno kitsch - the importance of life drawing as a social and cultural activity has really played an important part in the development and sustenance of countless artists in sydney. I beleive it is in the act of coming together, and coming together to engage in a formalised cultural practice that generates the sense of cultural identity. The transmission of knowledge and experience and of providing opportunities for new experiences is a really amazing process to participate in. This is probably why I enjoy teaching art to people who I really don't care for otherwise - because it does create a bridge of visual communication and experience.

As for the art critic ......... maybe I'm not cut out for this? The hardest aspect of being a pen for hire - is dealing with the requests from countless artists to write catalogue essays. As far as I can see, the function of such pieces of writing is largely to provide an academicised gloss on the types of artworld marketting spin which promote art to the publics of buyers, competitions judges and occasionally viewers. My words are meant to give a critical cache to someones exhibition. The letters after my name can give the stamp of approval of said work as "ART", with a , postmodernist, queer, feminist, visually literate sensiblity. This is my ''specialised cultural product" as a critic.

Yuck.

I have written a couple of catalogue essays and 'glowing reviews' (wordy PR) for friends. Usually I've stated that the artists is a friend - to avoid any confusion about why I'm writing. If I like someone I WILL spend more time trying to engage with their work. I am not an austere accurate remote cultural barometer. Name me a critic who is, or was. The other thing I like to do - is to give readers a way to look into the work - and a framework for people to articulate their own responses to what they may see - on an invite or in a space. I do sincerely believe that art writing can function - not only to make up great stories about artists and their work - but to enable viewers to own, articulate and enjoy their own responses. this, for me, produces cultural and visual literacy.

In criticising work or exhibitions - the texts are a soft target. If I'm working with words and writing - then it makes sense to engage with the writing around an exhibition. Dodgy floorsheets, wanky catalogue essays, wordy and pretentious press releases indicate the lack of care that has gone into an exhibition, or the lack of awareness of and sensitivity to the role that text plays in framing and situating an exhibition within a cultural context.

Its hard and harsh to criticise the work of an artists. Any artist. I suspect Lucy wanted me on the show - to provide bloodsports - because canning some ugly or inept or kitsch work sounds funny and provides controversy, inrtigue and entertainment. These are all nice media fodder. However - bagging an exhibition or work - sets myself up as a type of tastemaker -and has the potential to be a silencing and disabling thing for audiences. (Like reading whats hot/what's not in trashy magazines). I don't think I am in any position ever to be an arbiter of fashion, especially in art. Art does have a strong link to the fashion cycle - and art styles come in and out. I like to name what is an 'style' and what may be linked to fashion. I don't think art should be separate from fashion - because it is too much fun as an aesthetic play to go all puritan and self denying about it. On the other hand - fashion is a good word to describe various waves of homogeneity and where and when they circulate, and its an enabling thing often to articualte why a piece may jar the eyes of a viewer - and it gives people mre infomration with which to articulate our own often conflicting responses.

The second dillemma or art criticism relates to artists. Artists - expecially ones that aren't so successful that they are permanently coked up to the eyeballs and wouldn't even notice - are not a fitting target for criticism. All artists live with failure on a daily basis. Art making IS about failing and failing and failing again, and continually failing and then occasionally getting it right. Sometimes its about getting it right and then failing all over the top of it. This is one of the reasons why a lot of artists are generally humble, humourous and interesting people, because living with so much failure has a great effect of self awareness and ego diminishment. On the other hand it also explains why a lot of artists are also twisted bitter individuals, or incredi bly depressed and fragile or rampant alcoholics. Living with failure is pretty demoralising too.

In Australia to be an artist means living in poverty, generally. In Australia the success of anything is judged in money (did you have a show? was it a success? did you sell? how much?). If someone does have a sell out show, they are lucky if they see half the proceeds. And this rearely exceeds the average salary of, say, a high school teacher. If you do succeed in these terms - then the pressure become to repicate oneself as a reliable and saleable successful product. Successful artists have less scope to fail - (unless they want to fail their dealer, their critics and their mum and dad) and so have less possibliities to experiement with the fun of making something half imagined. So for me to swan in and call something (and someone) patchy, half arsed, pretentious, bombastic or dodgy is problematic. I believe certain dealers (lets say all of them) do promote formulatic idenitifiably successful and quite possibly boring work. That's why I avoid discussing or mentioning most commercial galleries - and try to promote shows where viewers can be surprised and challenged a little, and I don't have to bite my tongue.

Art should be about constantly learning and discovering. This goes for an 80 year old or an 8 year old. It is probably exptemely hard for an 18 year old to do it "coz youf have ishooz". I also believe that 50 or 500 people doing BAD ART are more interesting than 5 masters doing mind blowing brilliance. Art works when it becomes, like music or fashion, something that people feel they can own and play with, rather that ossified brilliance glinting in the marble cube of the academy.

Stupid As a Painter

Egg is apparently good for the skin. This is why wearing it on ones face is not always such a bad thing.

Last saturday night I walked into the local pub with mayonnaise smeared over my lips. It's a long story why, but even thought the locals couldn't meet my eye, my pores haven't felt this good in ages.

Look at previous post. Read comments. Then look at the URL above. slot is a nice fun sort of space i guess
Mayhem has had lots of smart slaps from bright boys that know better. Apparently mayhem ain't bright enough, witty enough or cool enough to be in with the latest jokes made by bright boys from the stable of Devonshire Street. Readers please note that attacks on university fine art departments kind of slide off this ducks back (I DON'T STUDY THERE). Also - contemporary art speak has a lot that is obfuscating, indulgent and sloppy - and always ripe for a Duchampian going over ........ but o but, it is also such a soft target, and how enalbing is it - to go round launching obscure clever attackes on obscure clever people????? (errr..... shit, that's what I do).. Besides no amount of irony changes the fact that the irises were ugly.

I'll cease my neurotic whining coz its boring even me. I just wondered how the hell they got my internal uni email address. I think I'll change my name to Currer Bell.

In the meantime - I'll get back to art. I wandered down to sherman last week - coz I was in the area. I've forgotten what I saw in the artbox. I liked the paper jewellry in the 2/3 box and John Tonkins installalatinos reminded me of a Freaky Loops party I went to about 9years ago...........

Anyway - The reason I walked in was to see Shane Cottons paintings....... I like New Zealanders generally and he managers to defy Goethe and many many others but painting black WELL. He had large painitngs of tattoo type images on various heads and other shapes - and all in bright pacific denoting acrylics. (bluey aquas). but he used black - really flat acrylic black well. Its a rare thing. the show is over so you can't see it anyay.

They've now got mel o'callaghan doing striking contemporary figuration with hilary mas doing striking contemporary minimalism and the opening is this week....thursday i think.

I also went and had a perve at Craig waddells show at Mary Place. It was early and they gallery was empty save for pru and tru and lots of paintings. My preview comments last week - were based on his previous show at Maunsell wicks which seemed to be a bit of a rushed job of chunky Ben quilty meets Frank aurbach mixture of oozing (I mean wet) heads and tractors. Lots of energy, lots of fumes and the best cheese I've ever eaten in the southern hemisphere.

I was thinking of writing some osrt of compariative piece on sculptural painting - based on a comparison between James Rogers (a sculptor painting - space) and Waddells very scultpural use of paint........

....Fortunately reality intervened on my intellectual posing plans. In short Craig has spent more time on this show and on these paintings. To be honest - I wawn't really crazy about the tractors either. I really like a couple - especially where they were more going into the landscape - but last year it seemed that everyone was doing shows on cars, trucks, trains and it was getting hard to look at each batch as something fresh and meaningful and special........

Grounded is a nice name for a body of work that appears to be lot more so. Craig has also gotten back to his strengths as a painter - in exploring the spatial qualities of a landscape and pushing them into paint. there's ot more scraping, reworking, folding and pausing. And his done delicious marks that hint at figuration - wihtout breaking up the ground too much. the catalogue essay - is worthy of a wound rebuke from the bright boy brigade but who am I to whinge. tathra mentioned "an undercurrent of depthless prussion blue". Its a scary scary pigment - but Craig's best works in this show actually have quite a bit of it swiming around - and mercifully not drowning out everything else. Maybe such big heavy marks need a big heavy pigment - coz his boats that have a lot more consolidation than his light pink landscapes. Anyway - its a nice show, thoughtful and interesting........

I wandered past NAS and rumours have it that the men of metal have found plastic.........

There is AN IMPORTNANT SHOW NOT TO BE MISSED at Space 3. Its their last fling - and true to form they are thinking of others....... and are having a fundraiser for the Reconciliation Unity Network this wednesday 24th Aug at 6.30pm. Don't let the prospect of Peter Garrett put you off.

ON a bitchier note - the Affordable Art Oxymoron starts this week. My flatmate got 2 for 1 tickets - so we'd only have to spend $9 each (after parking fees) to enter the halllowed halls of murdoch - and wander around a bunch of commmercial art stalls with a complimentary glass of goon!!!! Yippeee!!!!! Not.

The opening night costs $40.00 Yep forty golden coins to stand around in a room full of mdf with a glass of wine and listen to Ian thorpe. they even have 'entertainment'. It might be from 2Day fm. They call it "sydney's biggest night in art". yeah right. save your cash and save your liver for the lampray next week. It's free, non commercial and at artspace - so even if you hate the art there's some great pies nearby and you get water views. If you can hold your horses there's the agnes wales gala in march.

However the Forgable Art Fair is not affordeable and certainly not art. Each week in sydney you can buy interesting art for less thatn $300 - and lots and lots of stuff for under $3,000. (and yes, much of it may even end up in the Micahae Reid investment portfolio goodguide). If you are a culture vulture and cheapskate wine freak - you can even go and see most of it for free - and grab a free glass of goon or five. Sometimes you can even have a bit of cheese too. and most galleries are easier and more plesant to get to than some scary hangar dumped in tourist land. Avoid the AAF. buy a copy of art almanac - and have your own art fair every week.

Words And Pictures - a postscript

Since 2SER is a radio and not a great medium for transmitting visual information - we tend to resort to a bit of a textual obsession in predicting, postmorteming and blithering about things we've heard about or seen.

This is one of the reasons why we spend some time baggin wanky or dodgy press reviews, or wafty and pretentious artists bios or exhibtion titles. When it comes to radio - the WORDS MATTER.

This probably ain't the place to explore my Derrida trips - and nayone who was mystified by my Deleuzian references to womyn being a "not very evocative of molecular becomings" PLEASE post a comment and I will please explain. Like much art, philosophy can be explained and understood, and enjoyed.
But we had an interesting quandry this week.
Karen mentioned a great press release that she received.
I've cut and pasted it below.

Chinese Whispers

“WAR IS PEACE. FREEDOM IS SLAVERY. IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH."*

This exhibition, or perhaps, this work, had its origin in something my mother said ten years ago – “You should paint flowers, people always like flowers.”

My mother paints flowers although often she is a sort of appropriation artist, painting not flowers but other artist’s paintings of flowers.

I never paint flowers but I decided I would follow her example. I copied one of her paintings, a simple painting of three calla lilies in a vase. My painting was much larger, slightly sinister in its sharpness and harsh colour. It was only later when looking through one of her books that I realised that she had herself consciously or unconsciously copied parts of a 1930s painting by Adrian Feint, a mixed bouquet of flowers in a vase. Among the flowers were three calla lilies which resembled those in her painting.

Sometime later my friend Guo Jian told me that his art teacher had said exactly the same thing to him, a piece of advice which Guo had ignored. He then painted a painting based on mine without having seen my mother's painting or the original Adrian Feint painting. His painting is the monochrome grey of dreams, hallucinatory and foreboding.

We live in a culture of Chinese whispers, a phantasmagoric world of lying murderous leaders, self deluded followers and manipulative propaganda from all sides. Try as we might, it is impossible to discern the original truth simply by studying the latest insanity, only knowledge of history gives you a thread through the maze.

Looking at our paintings I felt that unintentionally we had created a type of visual Chinese whisper, a cross-generational collaborative work of interpretation and misinterpretation symbolizing that dilemma.

But of course the problem with Chinese whispers is that by the end almost any interpretation is possible, we see whatever we wish to see, we believe whatever we wish to believe.

Ian Milliss
July 2005

________________________________________________________________________

* The slogans of the Party on the walls of the Ministry of Truth, from Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell. Orwell’s hero Winston works in the Ministry of Truth doctoring historical records in order to comply with the Party's version of the past. Since the perception of the past is constantly shaped by the events of the present, the task is a never-ending one.

Cool eh?
punchy, pertinent, political.
think you wanna see it?
It arrived in my inbox from the type of email address that made me think it was some sort of SPAM.

But the text had me hooked. I wanted to find out more.
This was all there was.

Chinese Whispers

an exhibition at Slot Gallery by Adrian Feint, Norma Cherry, Ian Milliss, Guo Jian

A bunch of flowers transformed as it passes from artist to artist, an exhibition of interpretation, misinterpretation, appropriation, misappropriation, subtraction, addition, understanding, misunderstanding, truths, untruths, and more. As my mother said “You should paint flowers, people always like flowers”.

No gallery address. No temporal details.
obejaysus (sorry benn reading a bit of ulysses lately)

Fortunately - there were a couple of image files attached.

And the images were......bloody dreadful.
they belong in cyberspace

Diary Entries - end of august

Are There Bored People in Sydney?
Is there anyone who lolls around the house wondering what to do?
they probably don't have internet access - and hence don't spend half their lives trying to clear their email inbox or update their blog.
So - if you've had your electricity cut off and can't watch telly or enjoy your home.
Or your cat/dog died
Or you're recently single
or you are a fine connossieur of cutting edge contemporary visual culture then note the following in your diary:

(I recommend buying a red zone travel weekly. DOn't drink & Drive - and try to reduce the global warming - this Brisbane winter is getting uncanny).


tonight (tuesday)
you missed the KUDOS opening - You have until saturday to see the curent show. or you could blink and miss it.

You also missed 2 openings at Legge Gallery (183 Regent Street Redfern) but you have until September 3 to wander in and see the work.

James Rogers is a former man of steel who has undergone a sea change (or whatever the equivalent is in Walcha) - to start making softer compositions of painted wooden discs and rods. This body of work follows on from a previous show of paintings of circles. (What?) This is where I get to use the conry line of "I dunno much about abstract art but I know what I like"
I got the impression from a long hard stare at the circles, whihc bore into my brain at the upstairs gallery that the crcles were a conduit for his preoccupation with the plane play of push and pull. (an addictive painters obsession of "if I put that colour next to that shape - what bit comes forward and what bit recedes - and then what if it is this hape or that shape....... and how can I make space with colour"?????).

Rogers' work over the past 2 years has taken this painterly concern back into sculpture - with his constructions of angled discs forming an evocative play of light and space with the 'ground' of the space around them. Syncopated Beach is a nice title for a body of works that reminded me of the time I sat on bombo beach eating a biscuit......

I hope he's donwstairs because Evan Salmon's big grey paintings of figther planes are a bit off putting for someone in a meditative frame of mind. If anyone reading this knows Damien Nugent or is passing the Green Park diner - tell him to go down to Legge - to cop an eyeball of err.. big grey fighter planes.

Wednesday

Craig Waddell's solo show opens at MAry Place Gallery. Its a little 2 story artists' hire space in Paddo - just behind the scarey strip of Glenmore Road. You can duck in behind dirty nelly's or "token oyrish pb inc" at top of Glenmore near okker street - and wander past the nice carports. Or you can head up Brown Street. I think it is Number 6.

We chatted about this on air. Craig is a fellow alumni and very much a painters painter. "Extreme sports painterly" with lots of gelato colours and drippy, swirly chunky gestures all nealty fattened out with the right amount of gel medium to ward off any fear of snot like crusts in the future. I think I'm meant to imply something edifying by the experience of looking at sensuous abstractly landscapes, but I won't. If you want to know why painters paint with oil and not acrylic - go and sniff the magic.

Braced from Mary Place - you could wander down the less scary end of Glenmore and chekc out Steve Lopez opening at Brian Moore (just past 5 ways). I'm not sure about the invite image. Maybe the wine is good.

Otherwise you could go and support those poor meadowbank students - who are having a graduation show at GLobal Gallery on COmber Street. I think I'll be sued if I explain my pity factor - but I'm not casting any nasturtiums on the sydney gallery school, its students or teaching staff. Judging by the usual standards of meadowbank, the work should be ecelctic, considered and energetic and probably worth a more fitting space.........

Thursday there is something on but I'm going to hear Michael Taussig instead. He's not an artist but I do have some small life outside of the art world.

Friday - there is something REALLY interesting - hosted by Marrickville COuncil - so its at the Makko town hall (catch 426 bus) on makko road. Maybe I'm just obsessed with finland. and Alvin Aalto. (I've always wanted to know how a v-shaped roof would work in FINLAND).

anywa check out following:

Liisa Roberts
2006 Biennale of Sydney Artist
Screening excerpts from her work 'What's the Time in Vyborg?'
(2000-2004) Marrickville Library
Marrickville Town Hall
Cnr Marrickville and Petersham Roads
Friday 19 August from 5-6.30pm

***************************************************

http://www.artmargins.com/content/feature/kopenkina.html


For the next month Liisa Roberts, an international artist from
Helsinki, is based at the Artist Residency at Petersham Town Hall, courtesy of
Marrickville Council.

Liisa Roberts has been selected for the 2006 Biennale of Sydney from 8
June to 27 August 2006, and is undertaking preliminary research to
develop work for the exhibition.

Since the early 1990s, Liisa Roberts has exhibited internationally,
including group exhibitions at Artists Space, New York; Helsinki
Kunsthalle and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, Finland.

Liisa is also a filmmaker. She will screen excerpts from her work
What's the Time in Vyborg? (2000 - 2004), which was inspired by the
restoration of the Alvar Aatlo Library, Vyborg, at the Marrickville Library on
Friday 19 August from 5-6.30pm. Liisa will introduce the film, and be
available to answer questions.

Saturday - is probably going to be one of those sunny days ideal ofr an art stroll. Check out the art & desgin wshow at dockerty for some good taste, then wander around the corner for the Erwin Olaf show and have a hurl at the creepy gory royalty. Or troll donw to Agnes Wales and get edified by MArgaret Preston, or Powerhouse and William Morris.

Actually there is some big symposium thing on at Powerhouse on satrudya arvo combined with the William Morris show. It ain't free - but hell - think of the money you've saved on wine and or movie tickets with all the art openings you can go to for free?

On the other hand you culd wander down to the Cross Arts Project. there's somehting informative amazing and FREE on at the same time.

WHAT COMES AFTER WAR?
ELIZABETH ASHBURN & A. KARIM RAHIMI
Miniature paintings of Afghanistan, Australia and Iraq
With Chireh, vernacular drawings by H. A. Wakil Zadhah and family of Herat

The Cross Art Projects warmly invites you to the opening of work by A. Karim Rahimi, a master of Afghani miniature painting, now resident of Sydney and Elizabeth Ashburn, a Sydney avant-garde artist who studied miniature painting under Rahimi.

OPENING: SATURDAY 20 AUGUST, 3.30 PM

BY DR ALISON BROINOWSKI, former Australian diplomat and author of The Third Try: Can the UN Work? (Scribe, Melbourne, October 2005).

At The Cross Art Projects
33 Roslyn Street Kings Cross Sydney 2011
(opposite St Luke’s hospital entry gates)

PRECEDED BY OFFICIAL OPENING
SATURDAY 20 AUGUST, 2 PM
At Tusculum, 3 Manning Street, Potts Point

OF “CHIREH HUNTING CLOTHS OF HERAT", SILENT AUCTION
In aid of the artisans of Herat
Andrea Neild, Curator
By H.E. M. Saikal, Afghan Ambassador to Australia and architect
And John McInerney, Deputy Lord Mayor, City of Sydney

WHAT COMES AFTER WAR? ON VIEW to 3 September 2005
Tusculum installation and auction closes Saturday 20 August, 4PM

----------

WHAT COMES AFTER WAR?

Traditional miniature painting is an unlikely form of war documentation in the age of embedded journalism, selective briefings and non-stop cable television. In this exhibition Ashburn and Rahimi question the human and cultural impact of the twenty-first century’s first imperial wars, seeking to return meaning to places of devastation. The Afghan war is widening, with growing anxiety that an Iraq-style conflict is developing.

---------

The Cross Art Projects
A space for independent art & curatorial studies
33 Roslyn Street Kings Cross Sydney 2011
Wed–Sat 11–6
T: (02) 93572058
E: joholder@aic.net.au
www.crossart.com.au

sunday sleep in.

monday listen to the show and then you can come and hit me in person at some QUEER ART SHOW. Its in the UTS tower so I have few excuses to miss it - even though Gay and Lesserbeing Art makes my bile rise just a bit, I'll drag my bilious eyeballs in with an open mind to prove myself wrong.

I also hope to prove myself wrong at KUDOS on tuesday night. I bagged the womyn word last week. Dissonance *might* be fully Deleuzian. Or like SHeila Jeffreys.

ON Monday I think I've got Ruark Lewis to come in and give his version of events in the art world.

I'm also hoping to get Zanny Begg in in a couple of weeks to plug the Disobedience show at Dockerty in September.









Friday

Eating My Hat

I've spent the weekend chewing ponderously on my hat.
Luckily for me its made from icing sugar.

It started with my rant about Tim Gregory's Dirty Laundry show at Kudos. I didnt like the PR and compared it to the worst excesses of Sydney Poets inc.

The day after publishing my insult - Benito De Fonzo met my Mum. He's going out with a(nother) friend. I still reckon "syphilitic urethra" deserves a caning. But it proves this city is just tooooo small sometimes.

Then someone posted a comment on my blog - saying I'd acted too rashly in condemning the dirty laundry show - and it contained some exquisite objects. Maybe it was the artist? or his mum? dunno.

I was relieved to hear my rash opines contradicted - and decded it was a great excuse to avoid the Raper Street Precinct. sorry Tim. Love your work! Love you - but I reckon the only big fat scarey beasties I wanna come near should be immobilised and monochrome - and I'm scared of polychrome mobile monolithic men with ties that match their soul.

so I trudged up okker street. Saw some nice stuff in I.D's. Margo Lewers was Australia's Sonia Delauney - and I wondered about the city and the old passages and arcades.

Out the front of Kudos there was a young pale male artist - looking scarily angsty. I grunted and pushed past the partition with "Dirty Laundry" adhesive writing. Felt relieved to see four partitions pushed together to make another square donut. Inside a nice narrative of small objects.

The bonk map scribbled on a fridge magnet, smoothly cast icing sugar mini bedcars, bullets, a large tablet wiht a map of the world in tea. Nicely titled, nicely arranged little haunting moments of angst. A c-type of a REALLY UGLY bed. I thought of my own emotional disatsters and fessed up.

The artists said he was into playing with people's perceptions and text. I felt myself falling into a large Griselda Pollock shaped Trompe L'oiel.

but wait.
I still reckon there is a space to fess up to how we describe out work - without pranking it off. To own the possible mirecognition, misunderstandings that arise from personal work - just because people have different life experiences.

and I think scary sloppy PR needs to be named as such.

so I wandered down the hill. And thought about droping in to Cross arts - coz it's an interesting space -with nice shows and a great library.
but the blue water beckoned - so I headed for he point and donw the hill - to PIE LAND!!!

Ahhhh artspace. What could top Sastre?

Well nothing. And the collabroative residency work by 4 female chilean artists was many shades softer than Barney the dinosaur.
Ximena zomosa had some nice hair - on some rococo wallpaper, - which all lined a rearranged "dungeon room" (the one closest to the servo) . SHe had two enigmatic speakers saying some stuff in spanish and english - but my bilinguiality failed me and I forgot waht it was.

Monica bengoa had probably the highlight of the show - which was a sample case of exquisite tapestry and photographed images of fruit. At first I thoguht they were indigenous americas fruit. But then I saw cabbage. Not sure what that was about.

Claudia Missana had a video with text about bodies washing up on shore - interspersed with projections of waves on rocks - flashed over floruo tape drawing. the subject matter was moving - but I'm not sure how many epople would 'get' the mulptiple references in the piece to Chile's history (bodies at sea being those of torture vbvictims dumped in 1974) as well as Australia's shame - the TAMPA scandal 3 years ago. This has all been overridden by the Tsunami. Maybe I shouldn't be so cynical. I was moved.

Paz Carvajal - probably left me the coldest - with a bunch of jigsaws spelling out a text. one idea taken too far........

I also read the highlight of pratty writing for the week which was:

"these projects will be tensioned in a staging privileging the conceptual and technical grazes among the works and the specific nature of the Australian context."

all of the above is worse than 50 sublimes put together.

a close second in words I don't wanna read has become "hybridity".
My cynicism towards this was impelled by my having to teach it to art theory students. (It's artspeak for "mixture")
This is quite unfortunate.

A friend of mine has just put a new link on their website called "the Hybrid Project".
Its kind of apt. It is a hybrid project. He's collaborated on some sculptures with his partner. (Hybrid = mixing two things and getting something new).
the pieces are a painters panty wetting dream. big gloopy paint monsters. and other funny things. onyas. pity aobut the poor lighitng for the photos. (everything is a little hazy).
check it out: www.craigwaddell.com

This week - was the 2SER radiothon and all volunteers were strongly encouraged to come up with new ways to encourage people to sign up to the station. This is all much more pertinent than in the past - because the universities have now withdrawn their funding (2SER - was initially funded as a training project for communication students at UTs and maquarie). The good news - is that there are les work experience announcers on air (thinking of some of the people I know who've studied media - being on radio makes me shudder). the bad news is the station needs volunteer cash support. Even more so - as some of the indymusic money has been diverted to fbi.

OK so my idea was to offer free bananas to whoever subscribed during monday overdrive. We got 11 punters. then I said I'd chuck in a vulva. then the phones stopped dead. bugger!

Anyway - I will be wandering around at mori gallery on wednesday night with a bunch of bananas. If you subscribed to 2SER during monday overdrive - then come up and tell me your name - and I'll give you a banana!

first draft also has an opening on wednesday night - but I'll be at Mori - coz my friend is in the show.

tomorrow night - there's a show opening at the UTS gallery..........Its called Making Silence. the photo made me yawn - but it should be easier to get to than SCA - who has Yuko Mamada showing in a thing called "artificial NAture". I like the spaces there- just not the bus trips and long wander through the park in the dark. Great if you cycle tho.

Apart from that I think this weeks cultural challenge involves catching all the shows that opened last week: TRacey Moffatt, Tim Kyle & James Powditch, Simon & Kypros at MOP, oh GOD - and these really WEIRD really Creepy drawings at Mura Clay gallery. the show is called "Darwins Nightmare" and it does really earn the epithet "hybrid".