I’m on the road in Missouri, eating as much BBQ as is humanely possible, and a little bit stuffed and sick from it. I also just spent two days marveling at the joys of the Nelson-Atkins Museum, the Kemper Museum, the National WWI Museum and the Toy and Miniature Museum in glorious, smoky scented and fountain kissed Kansas City. What to do if you’re back in LA? Probably go to Comicon in San Diego, actually, if you can bear the crowds, and you’ve managed to get the stains out of your Pokemon fursuit, yet. Or hit Jay Bee’s House of Fine Bar-B-Que and get the best LA has to offer on the BBQ front. Join me in my smoke ringed paradise…

Back to art. I’d like to recommend one exhibition for my friends in LA, Looky See (.pdf press release here), at the Ben Maltz Gallery at Otis. A group show featuring lots of excellent folks, featuring Emily de Araújo, Eric Beltz, Barbara Berk, Joe Biel, Sandow Birk, Ann Diener, Roy Dowell, Erin Dunn, Erica Eyres, Iva Gueorguieva, Penelope Gottlieb, Richard Keely and Anna O’Cain, Takehito Koganezawa, Tucker Neel, Claudia Nieto, Aaron Noble, Chris Oatey, Ruby Osorio, Ebony G. Patterson, Ron Santos, Mindy Shapero, Fran Siegel, Coleen Sterritt, Fred Stonehouse, Randal Thurston, Elizabeth Turk and Xawery Wolski. It opens tomorrow, Saturday July 26, and the reception is from 6-8 PM.

At Top: Sneak preview image of Fran Siegel’s installation for Looky See.

Technorati Tags: Emily de Araújo, Eric Beltz, Barbara Berk, Joe Biel, Sandow Birk, Ann Diener, Roy Dowell, Erin Dunn, Erica Eyres, Iva Gueorguieva, Penelope Gottlieb, Richard Keely and Anna O’Cain, Takehito Koganezawa, Tucker Neel, Claudia Nieto, Aaron Noble, Chris Oatey, Ruby Osorio, Ebony G. Patterson, Ron Santos, Mindy Shapero, Fran Siegel, Coleen Sterritt, Fred Stonehouse, Randal Thurston, Elizabeth Turk, Xawery Wolski, Otis, Ben Maltz Gallery, Looky See, LA Art, art, contemporary art

I grew up playing Famicom. Living in a community chock full of shipped over salarymen and their families exposed me to 8-bit joy at an earlier age than most Americans. Although I had lots of non-Japanese friends, a lot of my friends were the “I don’t speak English, but we can play Famicom together” variety. And over endless, foil packed snacks, I was more than happy to oblige. So I don’t know if anyone gets as excited about Famicom related stuff as I do, but I have a serious nostalgia for it. I almost bought a pile of used Famicom equipment at a Thai night market about two weeks ago, even though I could easily Ebay better gear in the states.

My Famicase Exhibition is a a pile of made up Famicom cartridges (Like the one above, which is an awesome image with no explanation). Fantasy games that never were, and never will be, with case designs by artists. I normally don’t go into this kind of thing, but for Famicom, I’ll make an exception. Click the exhibition link to see all the carts.

Above - Burisu-kun - Some things are universal. The game of blowing on game carts to restore their connectivity.

Above - Agriculture! The Game! Get ready for backbreaking, dawn-to-dusk, virtual labor!

Above - AC Adaptor - Where you fight your enemies with a swinging AC adaptor.

Above - and Finally, the “Poland” FC-303 drum machine. Funny, because Korg just announced a synth for the DS.

Thanks to Kotaku for showing me the light.

Technorati Tags: Famicom, Kotaku, My Famicase Exhibition, Cartridge Art, Carts

The season is now officially on! Bring forth more tomato action, good, green Earth! This nicely sliced pile of Lemon Boys and Yellow Pears made their way into a delicious breakfast of chilaquiles.

Technorati Tags: tomatoes, Lemon Boy, Yellow Pear, food porn, food, homegrown

So, a suitable canvas acquired from the local art store, I….

…set up my projector in the condo of the 14th floor University condominium where I was staying, using the condo’s microwave as an impromptu projector stand. Where I…

… crammed myself into the corner of the hallway to trace the image so that I could…

…get my painterly action on…

…in the the Condo’s kitchen, my new studio.

Technorati Tags: Thailand, Chonburi International Art Exhibition, Marshall Astor, painting, projection, Avian Flu Awareness Project, Study

Just follow this link to get your instantaneous Master’s Degree in Art Crapwriting!

Thanks Tyler & C-Monster for showing me the light.

Technorati Tags: artwriting, Tyler Green, C-Monster, bad writing, phrase generator

Back in America. Still adjusting. Sleep rhythm all cocked up. Can’t seem to find a night swap meet anywhere, here. Feeling rice deficient and craving hot dogs way, way too much. Anyways. There’s always something to do.

Friday, July 18

Texas Chainsaw Massacre @ Roof of School House Structure. I’m recommending this classic, mainly because you can watch it on a roof. I used to do a fair share of 40 oz. drinking on various South Bay roofs as a teen, and in my expert opinon, I can assure you doing something on a roof makes it 10-15% better. Part of the Old Pasadena Film Festival. For those afraid of driving up to Pasadena, supposedly that giant, freeway eating sinkhole has been filled in and everything is fine. Blogging.la’s Mike Winder has a long post on this showing, check there for more details. Show starts at 10 PM and it’s free.

Saturday, July 19

Glow @ Santa Monica Pier. The big dog of the weekend. An all-night party with commissioned art projects. This is intended to be a biennial project. Generally, things that make noise or light up seems to be the theme of the night. Could be interesting, or not. Highlight of the night may be the Ferris Wheel Orchestra, presented by Machine Project. Worth checking out. Dusk to Dawn.

I AM I A KILLER @ Sam Lee Gallery. Sam curates close to my taste and heart, so although I don’t know all the artists, I guarantee goodness. Featuring Phil Chang, Sarah Conaway, Nancy de Holl, Alyssa Gorelick, Nicholas Grider, Ronni Kimm, Helen Levitt, Arthur Ou and Max Warsh. Of these artists, Nicholas Grider (image at top) is definitely one to watch - he’s led a project embedding Cal Arts students with military units as part of their training and I think he’s getting interesting results,as well as navigating some very interesting cultural territory. Reception is 6-8 PM.

Miracle Mile Art Walk @ Miracle Mile (doh!). All the galleries are open and if you use the secret password “Art Walk” at LACMA, it’s free. 1-5 PM (.pdf flyer here).

Bicycle Film Festival @ The Vine Theatre. Bike movies, pretty much all day. Maybe the asshole with the brake-less track bike that I saw swerving through lanes yesterday, near Union Station, will be there, and I can beat him down for making the rest of us cyclists look like assholes. Anyways… Road to Roubaix looks good. Program starts at 1:30 and goes on all day.

Technorati Tags: Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Old Pasadena Film Festival, art, LA art, Glow, Machine Project, Ferris Wheel Orchestra, I AM A KILLER, Sam Lee Gallery, Nicholas Grider, Bicycle Film Festival, Road to Roubiax

About a month ago I shot Jocelyn Foye’s first Roller Derby Project, the results of which are currently on display at Angels Gate in the show New In Town. You can read all about that shoot here. Joceyln wanted to try another take on the project, a version that was more focused on motion than on impact, and using a deeper clay surface than the first piece. So the surface that Joceyln is smoothing above is smaller, but covered with 150 pounds of clay - much thicker than the first version. It was way, way heavier than the first version. Jocelyn also wanted this version to have fewer hits, but that those hits be along the surface, capturing more lateral motion than the first piece. Again, LA Derby Dolls Kelly MacIntosh (Smacdown) and Diana Brooks (Thunder Kiss) were the performers/models for the shoot and they did another bang up job.

The first order of business was moving the clay panel into position. Unlike the first panel, this one couldn’t rest on the floor, so it had to be lifted into position. 150 pounds of clay on top of 1/2″ MDF board is nothing to sneeze at. It took Jocelyn, Kelly, Diana and me to lift it into position, and then it had to be screwed into studs so as not to dislodge under impact. Nothing would ruin the performance more than having hundreds of pounds of clay and wood come slamming down on someone.

Also unlike the first panel, Jocelyn intends to realize this version in plastic, rather than urethane rubber. So the final version of this will have a “hard” factor that’s not present in any of the other pieces in the series. On a certain level each piece in this series is totally experimental in its own way, each requires a different process and has its own challenges. Both the potential for unanticipated beauty and dramatic failure hangs in the air, and it makes these exciting to see realized.

Here are some of the images from the day’s performance. All of the rest of them are visible in the Flickr set for this project.

Above - Diana buckles a kneepad. If you notice the girls are less dressed up than in the previous version. Jocelyn wanted less “noise” from their various bits of bling. They’re still both wearing fishnet, which really transfers well to clay, but nothing really extraneous, beyond protective gear.

Above - Kelly gets her airborne slam on. Really excellent air here, IMHO.

Above - Diana slams into the wall. Notice the really distinct impressions on this version. There’s a real coherent “language of motions and actions” taking place here.

Above - Kelly knees the wall while Diana watches.

Above - Jocelyn wanted more motion, which means, more speed. So Kelly and Diana did many of their impacts while pushing one another or whipping one another into the panel. The small space of Jocelyn’s studio also makes it hard to build up speed, especially given the more acute angle of impact on this version, so this kind of assist really seemed to get great results.

This project is interesting in that it has multiple performers, but that they’re not in competition with one another, that they’re teammates. That’s very different from the pieces that involve fighting arts, where two individuals are in opposition. The whole feeling of the process is totally different.

Above - The whip!

Above - Thunder Kiss impression. Diana’s helmet has these sort of puffy letters on it. Impressions of her nom de derby are also in the first piece. Note the long, streak above. That’s the kind of lateral motion that this piece will carry, that differentiates it from the first one.

Above - Glove impression. There are a few of these on the piece, and I think they’re going to translate nicely to the final, plastic version. Notice how deep the impression here is - something not really possible with the first version.

Above - Posing with the finished piece. Since the girls only got to hit the surface so many times, I think they were still pretty amped up by the time we finished.

Above - Diana cleans clay from her hair. I had a bit of a photographer’s black hole moment here, when everyone was like “Why are you shooting rapid fire at Diana cleaning her hair?” I was into this shot for some reason.

Above - One of the neatest parts of the shoot was afterwards we took Diana and Kelly up to Angels Gate to see the first piece, which they had not seen yet. They seemed into it. Again, I love projects where non-artists become actively involved in the creative process.

Technorati Tags: Jocelyn Foye, art, performance art, Roller Derby, LA Derby Dolls, Diana Brooks, Kelly MacInotsh, Thunder Kiss, Smacdown, contemporary art, LA art, process, documentation is everything, clay

I spent 90% of my time in Thailand in Bang Saen, mostly in the neighborhoods along Long Hard Bang Saen Road, between the main coastal highway and Burapha University. Being a college town I expected to see some street art, and I did find it, but not much. On my last trip to Thailand, I was on the lookout for street art of any type, and I hardly saw any, even in Bangkok proper. I’ve heard rumors about multi-story ghost buildings in Bangkok filled with graffiti, but I haven’t seen if those are true, yet…

I don’t think there’s a lot of street art in Thailand because what can compete with the visual chaos and action of any urban Thai street. 90% of what I saw was amateurish and I only saw big pieces, like the ones here, on ruined buildings. I didn’t see anything bigger than a sloppy tag on anything that wasn’t already a ruin. Either penalties are too high to make the risk worthwhile, or there’s a general respect for private property that is lacking in the States. It’s also worth noting that spray paint is on sale everywhere. If you’re in Thailand and are looking to spray paint on something I recommend the ATM brand, particularly the automotive colours. Oh, and buy a lot, as Thai cans contain a really lackluster supply of paint. They also have really unreliable flow rates, and sputter a lot, no matter what you do. Sometimes even fresh cans barely want to spray.

On to the pics.

Above - An adorable throw up. This was spotted at a ruined two story building along the highway. I walked a few miles along the highway one morning and this piece, and the one below were the only graffiti I saw the whole time.

Above - Some pretty loose stuff going on here, and hat looks like an aborted white version of the piece above. This area of the building faced the street. There was a ton of great wall space in this ruin and an adjacent ruin, and they were both pretty much untouched. Note the Western bombs, with Thai script signatures. Thai script sometimes looks a bit like Bizarro English - you think you can read it, and see strange words in it, but you can’t, and I found the Thai signatures to be way, way more interesting than the bombs.

Above - This may or may not be actual street art. It was on the wall of someone’s home in an alley. Not sure what’s going on here, but it’s not good work by any means.

Above - This image, the tag at the top of this post, and all those that follow were all seen at the same ruined restaurant/nightclub near the University. I’m fond of this piece, both for its cyclopean nature and it’s rectangularity.

Above - Squared face.

Above - Another bomb.

Above - This image and the two that follow were the only really proficient pieces I saw in Thailand. Not sure if they’re the product of a local or of a traveler.

Above - Someone came along and went over the faces, but I kind of like the effect here.

Above - This had an unfinished quality, but was very well painted. This seemed very LA to me for some reason.

Technorati Tags: street art, graffiti, Thailand, Bang Saen

The crew at Pink Tentacle have blogged fourth another must see. Sato Jun Ichi has been photographing Japan’s flood control infrastructure since the mid-90’s. His website has an astounding collection of hundreds of images from this series (arranged in sequential sets), and he has also published a book of images from this series.

If you, like me, are a devoted fan of steel and formed concrete, you will love crawling through these. Many of them have a kind of postmodern-medieval castle look to them, that I can’t not love. I was just in Japan about 24 hours ago, on the briefest of layovers, and these kind of make me miss the beautiful, river laced landscape of the region near Narita airport that I only ever see from above.

Technorati Tags: Pink Tentacle, Sato Jun Ichi, floodgates, flood control, infrastructure, Japan, Japanese, architecture

Just found out that Jones has a new album, Hurricane, coming out, her first in far, far too long. If she tours the states, I’m going to follow her around from city to city like a couture Deadhead. Above is the very “retro early 90’s” maybe “retro cyberpunk” video for Corporate Criminal, a track from the upcoming album..

Technorati Tags: Grace Jones, Hurricane, Corporate Cannibal, video, youtube