Thursday, December 24, 2009
Jessica Rankin
Jessica Rankin is a New-York based artist who works with hand-embroidered text and geographic forms on stitched panels of cotton organdy: they become places where landscape meets memory. Her debut solo exhibition at The Project in New York in 2004 consisted of mixed media guache and text based drawings that referenced her passage from the coast of Melbourne to the heart of Australia’s Red Center, a meta-narrative of disjunctive language and internal and external journeys.
R. Crumb
… quite possibly our favorite ARTFORUM ad, ever.
scanned from the ARTFORUM FEBUARY 2007 issue
the caption texts read: “R. CRUMB and his li’l pal PRUFROCK PIGGY”
“SO, PRUFROCK, SO LIKE WHATTA YOU REALLY HONESTLY THINK OF ME ?!
Y’KNOW YER, LIKE, TRUE FEELINGS !”
“WELL, GEE, I DUNNO… TEE HEE ..”
“SCHMUCK”
DAVID ZWIRNER
Posted February 13th, 2007 by Nancy Smith
Source: www.artloversnewyork.com/zine/the-bomb/2007/02/13/r-crumbdavid-zwirner/
Monday, December 21, 2009
Raymond Pettibon
Raymond Pettibon, No Title (“Dateline: any town, anytime”), ink on paper, 2007.
Photo Joshua White. Courtesy Regen Projects, Los Angeles.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Friday, December 18, 2009
Spike Mafford
Spike Mafford - Braille in nature
Here's a photo inflected with dots that owes nothing to John Baldessari.
spikemafbrailletre.jpgIn Braille, the black dots spell out the title: The Meadow. Braille functions as a coded cloud, a darkness that inserts itself into the clarity of daylight. Mafford's Braille series at the Virginia Inn through Aug. 31.
Jennifer Zwick
Top 10 fears from the worrywart's bible
Tight, tiny handwriting bordered by smudged fingerprints: Jennifer Zwick came up with 100 answers to the old question, What MIght Go Wrong, and turned them into small intaglio prints. They're anxiety's answer to the false cheer of a fortune cookie.
From her 100, here's a sample of 10 guaranteed to take the jaunty down a peg.
Alfred Leslie
Alfred Leslie - the everything artist
Born in 1927, Alfred Leslie was a multidisciplinary artist by his late teens. Abstract painter, portrait painter, improvising sculptor; filmmaker (Pull My Daisy with Robert Frank, 1959), photographer, novelist and graphic novelist, he rejected the idea that he needed one style and a single point of view. In 1988, he made a terrific series of road trip drawings while driving.
Leslie began the drawings for what is now Attacked by the Heart in the early 1960s, some of which were published in Artforum in 1962, and all of which were destroyed by a fire in 1966. In 1991, he redid and enlarged upon them.
More JB
Enlarge: www.3quarksdaily.com/.a/6a00d8341c562c53ef0120a69f0df3970b-800wi
God Nose by JB
From www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2009/11/words-images-and-playing-games.html:
'Baldessari’s work is full of paradox. It liberates, irritates, inspires and disarms and has been an enormous influence on a whole generation of younger artists. Like looking through a kaleidoscope, he presents us with what is familiar with an unfamiliar twist so that we are forced to think about things in a slightly different way. We are continually confronted by images that ask ‘is this art?’ and if so does such a definition matter as long as the work prods us and makes us look at the world afresh. Baldessari’s own disarming answer, given in an early painting that escaped the Cremation Project, is God Nose.'
From: www.eai.org/eai/artistBio.htm?id=356
A major figure in contemporary art, John Baldessari has been termed "one of the most influential artists to emerge since the mid-1960s." From his phototext canvases of the 1960s to his composite photo collages and installations of the 1980s, Baldessari has contributed to the definition of postmodern art. His ingenious application of certain art-making strategies — including appropriation, deconstruction, decontextualization, sequentiality and text/image juxtaposition — was prescient, as was his cogent and witty integration of semiology, linguistic systems and mass media.
As one of the seminal figures in the language-based Conceptual Art movement of the early 1970s, Baldessari produced a series of videotapes in which he conducted ironic investigations into perception, meaning and interpretation. Rendered with deadpan, often absurdist humor, these droll conceptual exercises make use of cultural artifacts, from film stills and magazine photos to art historical in-jokes, as frameworks for irreverent philosophical inquiries into art and knowledge. With a cunning reliance on misrecognition and misinformation, Baldessari uses irony and incongruity to exploit the gap between what is heard, what is seen, and what is understood. His wry investigations of representation and sign systems succeed through strategies such as the ironic juxtaposition of photographic or video images and written or verbal texts; the use of appropriated material and found objects to underscore the embedded meaning of pop cultural genres; the construction of disjunctive narratives and surreal conjunctions from re-contextualized words and images, and the indexing of objects of actions.
Many of his exercises take the form of parables, allegories, or "art lessons," as Baldessari the performer assumes the role of teacher or storyteller. His fascination with jokes, dreams, aphorisms, sight gags and linguistic pranks, which are linked to Freudian notions of unconscious associations and verbal and written "slips," evoke the visual puns and word games of Dada and Surrealism. Pervaded with reference to art-making and art history, and responding to the tenets of minimalism, performance and Conceptual Art, his tapes question the very limits of art, and form an irreverent critique of modernist practices. Baldessari playfully compels the viewer to question not only the system under investigation — language, representation, narrative, art-making — but also the tools by which the interrogation is being conducted (photography, video, cinema) as conveyers of truth. Ultimately, Baldessari's idiosyncratic, often absurdist logic questions the very process of perception, from vision and meaning to cognition and knowledge.
Baldessari was born in 1931 in National City, California. He received a B.A. and an M.A. from San Diego State College. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, he has taught at Southwestern University, California; the University of California at San Diego; and the California Institute of the Arts, Valencia.
His work has been exhibited internationally in one person shows at the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Sonnabend Gallery, New York; Museum Folkwang, Essen, Germany; Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston; Santa Barbara Museum of Art, California; and Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, among other institutions; and in group shows at the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston; Documentas 4,5 and 6, Kassel, Germany; Venice Bienale; Palais des Beaux Arts, Brussels; Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; Kolnischer Kunstverein, Cologne; and the Whitney Museum of American Art Biennial, New York, among others.
In 1990, he was the subject of a major retrospective at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, which traveled to numerous sites around the country. In conjunction with this exhibition, a comprehensive catalogue of his work, entitled John Baldessari, was published in 1990.
In 2009, his retrospective exhibition Pure Beauty opened at the Tate Modern in London. It will travel to the Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, the Los Angles County Museum of Art, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 2010 and 2011. The retrospective includes a catalogue publication, also entitled Pure Beauty.
Voluble Luminist Painting for Max Kozloff, 1968
Acrylic on canvas, 59 x 59 inches
From 1966 to 1968 John Baldessari created a series of text-based paintings, hand-lettered by professional sign painters. The use of canvas was his only bow to conventional notions of painting. The canvases contain written extracts from art manuals, his own notebooks, and the essays of contemporary critics, including art writer Max Kozloff. In Voluble Luminist Painting for Max Kozloff, portions of a 1968 Artforum article written by Kozloff have been taken out of context and isolated by the artist. With wit and irony, Baldessari reversed the typical artist-critic relationship, using the tools of the art critic to make the painting.
Kosuth
JB
Pictures that paint a thousand words
Slide show: news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/8305619.stm
Martin Firrell
Keith Tyson
.jpg)
Ed Ruscha
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/arts_and_culture/8305617.stm
Tracy Emin
By Alex Hudson
BBC News
"We navigate our whole lives using words. Change and improve the words and I believe we can change and improve life."
Public artist and campaigner Martin Firrell has some big ideas about the use of words in art - both in scope and in scale.
He has emblazoned his work on St Paul's Cathedral, across the exteriors of both the Royal Opera House and the National Gallery, on each occasion the first artist to do so.
Originally trained as an advertising copywriter, his next project Complete Hero will involve a projection on to London's Guards Chapel from next month.
He has enlisted the help of members of the Army along with scientists, philosophers, thinkers and writers to question the modern idea of heroism.
But his project is just the latest example of the use of text in art.
Different picture
"When you look back in history you will see artists have forever used words in paintings," said the artist Ed Ruscha.
"There was a quiet time and come the 20th Century there was a different picture. There was a time in the 1930s, 40s, 50s where artists were producing abstract pictures that were off on their own.
"And I think the so-called Pop artists who emerged in the 60s were involved in something that was inevitable."
The Pop Art movement is widely believed to have come as both a reaction against abstract expressionism and a commentary on a new, commercial world.
Andy Warhol was one such artist who notably borrowed heavily from commercial graphic design.
"Some of the critics were so stuffy you couldn't believe their reluctance to accept anything new. Back then, it really was the dark ages," said Ruscha.
This movement reinvigorated the desire for text in art - paving the way for a whole new generation of graphically and media-aware artists.
Currently there is an abundance of artists showing their work.
In London alone, at least four separate exhibitions are featuring the work of text pioneers.
You can even sit in a gallery and read stories written on the walls.
But why would artists turn so quickly towards a form that appears so devoid of "art" in its most traditional sense?
John Baldessari first exhibited his work in the 1960s and has used words throughout his career.
"My ambience was first and second generation abstract-expressionism and I really got tired of hearing the complaint 'my kid can do that' so I said 'what would happen if you really spoke your public's language?'"
But the question remains on many sceptics' lips - is it art?
“ It is an artist's view of what text is, not an English Don's view ”
Keith Tyson, Turner Prize winner
"If I put [words] on canvas... then that's a signal it's art - a very logical way or reasoning," said Baldessari.
"Is it painting? Of course. Paint on canvas, that's a painting isn't it?"
Turner-Prize winner Keith Tyson's work often combines science, nature, art and literature.
In his piece Operator Painting: Large Abstract, the chemical symbol for chlorine sits next to a line of text about a swimming pool attendant, which itself sits above the phrase "children enacting excerpts from The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Big Splashes".
"It is an artist's view of what text is, not an English Don's view", Tyson said.
"It does things that an abstract painting might... or a non-linear novel - it's just a different type of text from the left to right that we're used to."
For others, the imagery created from words can match and even supersede traditional forms of painting.
'A striptease'
Fiona Banner has made a career out of thinking in more varied - and perhaps more complicated - forms than many of her peers.
She was nominated for the Turner Prize in the same year as Tyson, creating a show which described a pornographic film in detail across an entire wall.
Banner has produced works from the gargantuan - a 1,000-page book documenting six Vietnam war films frame-by-frame - to one piece that just consisted of a single, neon full-stop.
The artist has even done work with nudes.
She agreed with the actress Samantha Morton to produce a text portrait of her that Morton would perform the following evening - without ever having read it before.
"It's a striptease in words," Banner said.
"The language that I use is the language that best describes what happens in front of me. If that ends up being seductive language - it is.
"If it ends up feeling distant or objective at times then it is."
As the actress had never read the work before, Banner did not know how the piece would be received.
"The words are not flattering. If my words were a camera, they don't aim to airbrush or flatten, they aim to expose."
'Sub-poetic drivel'
Recently some critics have been using their own words to suggest that text in art could be losing its edge and slowing into decline.
Telegraph art critic Mark Hudson described Tracey Emin's most recent work with text as "sub-poetic drivel" and even described her medium - neon handwriting - as the "most hackneyed medium around".
And the information onslaught and the volume of work available has led John Baldessari to change his view.
"I haven't given up on text... but I would use it very judiciously knowing that we have information overload. It just makes people shut down and not notice it at all.
"The job of an artist is to get people's attention.
"I think I eased off the idea of using text when I thought the battle was won."
Texting Andy Warhol - An Exploration of Writing in Art, presented by the writer Bidisha, is broadcast Thursday 22 October, 1130 BST, on
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/entertainment/arts_and_culture/8305617.stm
Martin Firrell
Keith Tyson
Ed Ruscha
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/arts_and_culture/8305617.stm
Tracy Emin
By Alex Hudson
BBC News
"We navigate our whole lives using words. Change and improve the words and I believe we can change and improve life."
Public artist and campaigner Martin Firrell has some big ideas about the use of words in art - both in scope and in scale.
He has emblazoned his work on St Paul's Cathedral, across the exteriors of both the Royal Opera House and the National Gallery, on each occasion the first artist to do so.
Originally trained as an advertising copywriter, his next project Complete Hero will involve a projection on to London's Guards Chapel from next month.
He has enlisted the help of members of the Army along with scientists, philosophers, thinkers and writers to question the modern idea of heroism.
But his project is just the latest example of the use of text in art.
Different picture
"When you look back in history you will see artists have forever used words in paintings," said the artist Ed Ruscha.
"There was a quiet time and come the 20th Century there was a different picture. There was a time in the 1930s, 40s, 50s where artists were producing abstract pictures that were off on their own.
"And I think the so-called Pop artists who emerged in the 60s were involved in something that was inevitable."
The Pop Art movement is widely believed to have come as both a reaction against abstract expressionism and a commentary on a new, commercial world.
Andy Warhol was one such artist who notably borrowed heavily from commercial graphic design.
"Some of the critics were so stuffy you couldn't believe their reluctance to accept anything new. Back then, it really was the dark ages," said Ruscha.
This movement reinvigorated the desire for text in art - paving the way for a whole new generation of graphically and media-aware artists.
Currently there is an abundance of artists showing their work.
In London alone, at least four separate exhibitions are featuring the work of text pioneers.
You can even sit in a gallery and read stories written on the walls.
But why would artists turn so quickly towards a form that appears so devoid of "art" in its most traditional sense?
John Baldessari first exhibited his work in the 1960s and has used words throughout his career.
"My ambience was first and second generation abstract-expressionism and I really got tired of hearing the complaint 'my kid can do that' so I said 'what would happen if you really spoke your public's language?'"
But the question remains on many sceptics' lips - is it art?
“ It is an artist's view of what text is, not an English Don's view ”
Keith Tyson, Turner Prize winner
"If I put [words] on canvas... then that's a signal it's art - a very logical way or reasoning," said Baldessari.
"Is it painting? Of course. Paint on canvas, that's a painting isn't it?"
Turner-Prize winner Keith Tyson's work often combines science, nature, art and literature.
In his piece Operator Painting: Large Abstract, the chemical symbol for chlorine sits next to a line of text about a swimming pool attendant, which itself sits above the phrase "children enacting excerpts from The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Big Splashes".
"It is an artist's view of what text is, not an English Don's view", Tyson said.
"It does things that an abstract painting might... or a non-linear novel - it's just a different type of text from the left to right that we're used to."
For others, the imagery created from words can match and even supersede traditional forms of painting.
'A striptease'
Fiona Banner has made a career out of thinking in more varied - and perhaps more complicated - forms than many of her peers.
She was nominated for the Turner Prize in the same year as Tyson, creating a show which described a pornographic film in detail across an entire wall.
Banner has produced works from the gargantuan - a 1,000-page book documenting six Vietnam war films frame-by-frame - to one piece that just consisted of a single, neon full-stop.
The artist has even done work with nudes.
She agreed with the actress Samantha Morton to produce a text portrait of her that Morton would perform the following evening - without ever having read it before.
"It's a striptease in words," Banner said.
"The language that I use is the language that best describes what happens in front of me. If that ends up being seductive language - it is.
"If it ends up feeling distant or objective at times then it is."
As the actress had never read the work before, Banner did not know how the piece would be received.
"The words are not flattering. If my words were a camera, they don't aim to airbrush or flatten, they aim to expose."
'Sub-poetic drivel'
Recently some critics have been using their own words to suggest that text in art could be losing its edge and slowing into decline.
Telegraph art critic Mark Hudson described Tracey Emin's most recent work with text as "sub-poetic drivel" and even described her medium - neon handwriting - as the "most hackneyed medium around".
And the information onslaught and the volume of work available has led John Baldessari to change his view.
"I haven't given up on text... but I would use it very judiciously knowing that we have information overload. It just makes people shut down and not notice it at all.
"The job of an artist is to get people's attention.
"I think I eased off the idea of using text when I thought the battle was won."
Texting Andy Warhol - An Exploration of Writing in Art, presented by the writer Bidisha, is broadcast Thursday 22 October, 1130 BST, on
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/entertainment/arts_and_culture/8305617.stm
John Baldessari
Texting Andy Warhol
Last broadcast on Thu, 22 Oct 2009, 11:30 on BBC Radio 4.
Synopsis
Novelist Bidisha considers the role of text in art. Does a picture made from words count as literature or art? She talks to gallery visitors reading Richard Long's words on the walls, asks how it is different from a book by Dali, and considers text as art with Keith Tyson, Fiona Banner, Ed Ruscha and John Baldessari.
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/arts_and_culture/8305617.stm
Avi Adler and John Baldessari
The Pencil Story 1972 - 1973
Marian Goodman Gallery, New York © John Baldessari
Colour photographs, with coloured pencil, mounted on board
Prima Face (Third State): From Aloof to Vapid 2005
Courtesy Marian Goodman Gallery, New York © John Baldessari
Archival digital photographic print, acrylic on canvas
Artists who use text
John Baldessari in the 60's?
Born in National City, California in 1931, John Baldessari was influenced by Dada and Surrealist literary and visual ideas. He rose to prominence in the late1960s when he began combining mass media imagery with language, Pop vigour with Conceptual density. Baldessari, early in his long and much celebrated career, began incorporating layers of found materials (billboard posters, photographs, film stills, bits of conversations) on his plain white canvases. These montages, which result from the juxtaposition, edition and cropping of image and text, served to thwart narrative coherence and play off chance relationships between otherwise discreet elements. His photo-based work was also a means of introducing photography into galleries, in an ongoing attempt to undermine certain taboos.
From: www.artfacts.net/en/exhibition/john-baldessari-noses-ears-etc-56255/overview.html
Born in National City, California in 1931, John Baldessari was influenced by Dada and Surrealist literary and visual ideas. He rose to prominence in the late1960s when he began combining mass media imagery with language, Pop vigour with Conceptual density. Baldessari, early in his long and much celebrated career, began incorporating layers of found materials (billboard posters, photographs, film stills, bits of conversations) on his plain white canvases. These montages, which result from the juxtaposition, edition and cropping of image and text, served to thwart narrative coherence and play off chance relationships between otherwise discreet elements. His photo-based work was also a means of introducing photography into galleries, in an ongoing attempt to undermine certain taboos.
From: www.artfacts.net/en/exhibition/john-baldessari-noses-ears-etc-56255/overview.html
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