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Image Study VIII: Crude (part 1)

I think that I subconsciously selected this week's concept after working several shifts serving members of the "cultural elite". While I realize the irony in posting "works of art" - from the MET no less- as representative images of crudeness (an irony that the art world has reveled in for the past 100-150 years), crude images - or more correctly, what Western contemporary society has and has not deemed crude- is a compelling subject for study(so compelling, there's a part 2!). Particularly interesting and also frustrating is the acceptance of images that demonstrate the destructive and dehumanizing effects of capitalism as mere pieces of art, valued as commodities that represent the artist's insight into humanity. Over time do these images lose political valence? Did they ever have any?

"God" by Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven and Morton Schamberg
Morton Schamberg and Elsa von Freytag- Loringhoven - 1917
Photograph- Gelatin silver print

Portrait of an Italian Woman
German painter active first third of 16th century
Oil on wood

Apartment Houses, Paris
Jean Dubuffet - 1946
Oil with sand and charcoal on canvas

The Street
Philip Guston- 1977
Oil on canvas

Berlin Street
George Grosz - 1931
Oil on canvas

D'Angelo- Voodoo (yes, the whole dang album... and then check the new one)

red, red, red

Fifty Days at Iliam: The Fire that Consumes All before It
Cy Twombly - 1978
Oil, oil crayon and graphite on canvas

Self portrait in a Velvet Dress
Frida Kahlo- 1926
Oil on canvas

Liberty
Jean-Michel Basquiat- 1983
Acrylic, charcoal, crayon, pastel, pencil

Tilda Tuesday

runway. art.

Dirty Projectors- Two Doves

Image Study VII: Possessed

While this is one of my more rushed image study entries,  I think the subject is a rich one- as the term possessed has many different meanings, all of which are both conceptually and aesthetically evocative and controversial.

Melpomene- Landon Rives
Edward Steichen -1904-05
Photograph- Gum bichromate over platinum print

The Dance Class
Edgar Degas- 1874
Oil on canvas

Still Life with Teapot and Fruit
Paul Gauguin- 1896
Oil on canvas

Sir John Herschel
Julia Margaret Cameron- April, 1867
Photograph- Albumen silver print from glass negative

Portrait of a Woman with a Man at a Casement
Fra Filippo Lippi- 1440
Tempera on wood

So... Selma was not a good film

One of the many carefully choreographed moments in Selma that work better as a still than as a scene in a film 

I don't remember cringing more in a movie theatre. Perhaps it was because I had some high expectations, and as I scan the internet for reviews I realize that perhaps this was shaped by the nearly universal acclaim for Selma. The reason that I told myself and others why I was excited to see this film, though, was DuVernay- the film's outspoken and inspiring director. This was a film that had a lot of hype surrounding it, but the only press that interested me was on DuVernay's fierce persona, especially in the face of detractors who alleged Selma did not shine a bright enough light on LBJ's efforts to win African Americans the right to vote. Now, I will admit that I am generally attracted to historical dramas to see how powerful stories about oppressed individuals or groups can be told or retold in the film format, so my position is generally biased towards films that portray the ugly side of (white) American history. So it would seem that, at the very least, Selma should satisfy these basic list items and could perhaps provide an interesting lens onto a history that I am reasonably familiar with.

While Selma managed to show, in graphic detail, the terror African Americans endured in South, why did it have to be so ham-fisted, so full of unnecessary melodrama (including the relentless use of string music), so riddled with sub-par performances by strong actors given wooden scripts and spotty scenes? These are the trappings of a film and a filmmaker unsure of their material- but what could be a more powerful and rich historical plot than the one covered by Selma? While in the theatre, my friend and I, trying to keep our distaste for yet another overly- choreographed scene to a quiet hush (the most offensive being Dylan Baker's laughable Hoover and the strategy in the living room scene), I thought about what, as a whole, was this film presenting me with that was so off-putting. I think I've come up with a tentative overarching conclusion that ties in all of my singular dislikes, and that is that each scene felt intentional and not in a good way. For instance, the 'strategy in the living room scene' sets the major SCLC players in a casual setting to discuss which aspects of the voting laws of the south King should take up first with the president. Like a bad cop drama/comedy, each character has their own neatly-scripted opinion, each flowing logically from the next and through this moment the audience is schooled in the various ways blacks in the south were disenfranchised. Nice and neat right? But such discussions would never have occurred in such a tidy fashion- and I'm not even talking about any specific historical instance, I'm speaking in generalities here. These scenes pervaded the film's entirety. I recall thinking: now this is the scene where we see how evil Hoover is, this next scene shows that there was tension between King and his wife Coretta, and now we're seeing how King sometimes doubted himself- check!

Selma gets the violence right, as it correctly shows how horrifying white police officers were in the South, as well as the oppressive structures that maintained their authority and furthermore, why, today, we should be questioning the notion that all-white police forces are devoid of racist prejudice. The rest of the film, however, played like a series of poorly or overly-orchestrated music videos... and the music was wretched.

Oh how convenient that the original GDubya is in the background of this particular scene

thank you internet

hipster merkel

Winter Sleep

A really great film. I hope to write something of substance on it when I get the chance. In the meantime-- go watch this.

Tilda Tuesday

random associations -- special thanks to the best art tumblr page B-sides

Blue Balls
Sam Francis- 1961
Painting

Storm Fugue
Stephen Hutchings- 2012
Oil and charcoal on canvas

Just checked-- still my favourite song of 2014/early 2015... questionable video though--- I would have done a better job.

"Fingertips in the fountain
Fondle liquid gold
Ice on the horizon
The skyline folding in
Nothing is beginning
Edges falling off themselves
And the water is draining
Off the continental shelf"

Ian William Craig- A Turn of Breath (album)

I want to make a 44 minute long music video set to this album- it is so impossibly beautiful. For now I'll settle to listening to it on loop as I try to remember how to write academic prose.

 

Image Study VI: Glitter, Sparkle, Pop

I love the words glitter, sparkle and pop. They're the type of words that sound like that which they describe and they instantly remind me of happy memories of warmth, clarity and intensity.

Portrait of young women in red
Roman Period (A.D. 90-120)
Encaustic, limewood, gold leaf

Caught One Lost One For The Fast Student Or Star Catcher
James Rosenquist- 1989
Lithograph, coloured, pressed paper pulp, collage

Star Struck #3
Wolfgang Tillmans - 2000
Photograph- Chromogenic print

Star Burlesk
Reginald Marsh - 1933
Etching

Sutton Place, New York City
Jan Staller - 1983
Photograph- Chromogenic Print

Three mouths

Moby- Porcelain

Je ne suis pas Charlie

I do not support the actions of today's gunmen who shot and killed staff members of the notorious magazine Charlie Hebdo.* But I am virulently against the ways in which this incident, much like many related incidents, has been immediately taken up by Western states and mainstream media outlets as evidence of the superiority and preciousness of Western democracies and freedoms and furthermore, as reason to heighten the suspicion of and violence towards not only Muslims but any person with a complexion that could be confused as Muslim-ish/Arabic/Middle Eastern/ etc etc etc. Very quickly- with the help of our new means of communicating mass and at times unthinking solidarity- the hashtag #jesuischarlie went viral, linking African Americans struggle against racist cops and the racism of the American state and judicial system that upholds their authority, with the bigoted "drawings" of a French magazine. It was tragic what happened to the staff members whose lives were viciously ended by - what has been reported to be- the actions of Islamic fundamentalists. But what is perhaps more tragic is the rapid consumption of progressive activist tactics opposing state violence against historically oppressed people in the name of supporting a racist media institution and the racist state whose "democratic" policies have failed and continue to fail those citizens not deemed worthy of their liberte, egalite, fraternite.

typical french racism

Thus far, the only decent article to discuss the broader implications of the attack on Charlie Hebdo can be found here.












*I've looked at a bunch of the work published in Charlie Hebdo and it is terrible (terribly drawn, not funny in the slightest and also racist). I won't associate it with the press                                                                      or art.

Tilda Tuesday

Joanna Newsom- En Gallop

Bez Navzu (untitled)
Jan Hajn

Dystopian Autumn
Lafirme (not sure if this is the artist or the blogger)

cell phone photography + android photoshop
me

i'd wear this...

Valentino

Unknown

Prada

Image Study V: Regret

Regret has always been a very charged and complex concept for me. It is wrapped up in worry and change and fear and decision-making. It is not a absolute state because I change what is regretful and what is not and so sometimes regrets represent personal growth, but sometimes not.

Tadeus Langier, Zakopane
Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz - 1912-13
Photo- Gelatin Silver Print

New Kitchen/Aerial View/Seated
Laurie Simmons- 1979
Photo- Silver Dye Bleach Print

Memories
Max Weber- 1912
Painting- Oil on Canvas

Pentitence (Poenitentia)
Enea Vico- 1545-1550
Engraving

Sueno No. 1: "Articulos electricos para el hogar"
Grete Stern - 1950
Photo- Gelatin Silver Print

Fine dining -2015