stagnant vowels

2011-11-04T00:51:00.000-04:00

Our reality has changed, their is no norm. Economically we are experiencing the contractions of both the communist and capitalist theories meeting their limits. Aesthetically the Dada and Situationist moments were historical buffers to the shared social impact of massive economic upheaval in their wake. Both movements were quickly assumed by the political forces that drove their immediate realities. Quietly, since the 60's this battle has continued. The undecided sciences of aesthetic and economics are likely the driving ends of modernity. So we can design a future or die in the past. Think happy thoughts.

Not The Willem De Kooning Retrospective, Not Even Close

2011-10-26T16:07:00.014-04:00

Yesterday at work I bumped into this piece by Donald Kuspit on De Kooning's retrospective over at Artnet. Then this morning I bumped into this one on L Magazine's site, by Paddy Johnson. I don't know that Paddy Johnson demystifies De Kooning as much as she takes issue with his pallet, declaring it repetitive and boorish en masse. By contrast, Donald Kuspit writes an article painting De Kooning as a sadistic brute inextricably tied to the modern tradition in general and Picasso specifically. Together they make for some interesting reading, particularly as Kuspit never addresses the show itself in favor of drawing his conclusions from individual works. While Johnson seems to wear the show like an imaginary wool shawl, noting it's uncomfortable, out of style, and the zipper is broken. But she doesn't seem to get to a place that addresses what was actually there either, only what she felt was missing or to her mind was poorly executed.
Still it is interesting that they both portray De Kooning as essentially broken or flawed as a human being and by the end of his life as an artist. Yet in their characterization there exists several miles between what these writers perceive these flaws to mean in the face of the work that he created and the program that the MoMA presents. Its this spectacular geography between the two writers and what it is they perceive that to me is so engaging. Of the two, Kuspit is the more willing to make pronouncements about the artist and his work. While Johnson seems to avoid offering similar definition to De Kooning in favor of critiquing the institution and its presentation of his corpus.
The information available in the space between these 2 articles is not exclusive to De Kooning, his life, work, or the retrospective either. Each article portrays a lucid impression of it's respective audience and their expectations regarding institution and its function. They also percolate a few thoughts about the sizable generational gap that informs the writers definitions of art and its practice. I don't believe either writer is particularly right or wrong for their part. Personally I haven't seen the retrospective so I'm not about to judge it. I also don't maintain strong opinions about either writer, whereas I read Johnson more often, while some of Kuspit's catalog essays are favorite reads again and again.
This is really about the dwindling dead tree space that critical dialogue occupies. That the form of this dialogue is changing in the face of new media demands as the language itself evolves. Kuspit and Johnson are interesting here as they are at different ends of their respective careers speaking to different readers in the space of this evolution. I don't know that anything is crystallized by either one, but reading both is a bit like making the same trip by train and then by car. Different details in the landscape are made obviously more rich or poor by ones experience of time and presence in them. Regardless of what their stance might be, taken together they are offering an ephemeral view of change itself. While I've likely made this journey millions of times, it wasn't until this morning that I recognized that I'd been here before. That I should look around a bit and maybe get some snapshots before I moved on.

Jno Cook

2011-07-10T12:22:00.001-04:00

Something I thought you folks might be interested in. May 13, 2011 to August 7, 2011, Absolutely my Last Retrospective , Jno Cook and Gordon Ligocki, Valparaiso University, Brauer Museum of Art. Curated by the wonderful and insiteful, Linda Dorman and Tom Torluemke. For those not in the know, Jno Cook is an unparalleled artist with a sardonic streak a mile wide. He is a maker, a tinkerer, and thinker of sentences that almost always involve punctuation. Mr Cook has aggressively investigated aesthetic with camera's, computers, soldering irons, and screwdrivers. He has displayed his works with such great spaces as NAME, Randolph Street, Artemesia, and Tough. Jno maintained representation with one of the final Uncomfortable Spaces, Beret International Gallery through (2000) and then with Uncle Freddy's Gallery, in Indiana through (2009). Prior to Facebook Jno developed spaces.org the go-to spot for indy programs happening in and around Chicago, the site also featured invited artist's very early experimental projects with the web. Later on he assumed the caretaking responsibilities for the othergroup listserv. His work has been reviewed in the New Art Examiner, The Chicago Reader, The Chicago Tribune, The Sun-Times, The Atlanta Journal, U-Turn, Dialogue, and Sculpture. A sketch of the show can be found here http://jnocook.net/valpo.htm. It might be a hike, but the work is amazing in it's breadth and farsightedness.

The Sound of Reading Makes Me Swoon

2010-09-07T17:40:00.001-04:00

pissed off

2010-08-24T02:18:00.002-04:00

I was grouchy.

I'm better now...

Sorry I don't recall where I nicked this from. Regardless, thank you very much wherever you are.

Fiction... for fun and profit

2010-07-26T23:00:00.002-04:00

thinking of Windsor McKay... and dreaming my dreams of you...

Loretta Lynn is bigger than you are

2010-07-11T03:32:00.003-04:00

And Ernest Tubb knows it...

shitting bulls and pissing beer

2010-06-22T02:33:00.006-04:00

Wanted to thank all of the folks that came out on Saturday. Meg and I had a great time. We hope you did too.

we opened the door, you walked in...

2010-06-14T03:12:00.009-04:00

Hello World...

Then we left like fire finding smoke... Hello

the sexiest artists ever... in 2002 of course

2010-05-03T00:06:00.001-04:00

The Charles W Cushman Collection of the Indiana University Archives

2010-04-16T23:53:00.024-04:00

558 DeKoven St, Chicago IL (ca.1949)

I bumped into this online collection of 1,241 color slide photo's from Chicago via a similar collection of Charles W Cushman's intriguing period snapshots of New York, ca.1940-1960. These works were meticulously documented in his shooting journals which have been acquired along with his equipment and collection by the Indiana University Archives. Cushman gives dates and locations down to the cross streets, and in some instances even the house numbers have been included. On the site some of the journals have even been scanned and presented for closer scrutiny. Over the years entire streets have completely vanished in Chicago. But here they are again, preserved in uneasy, overly washed colors that we can compare to Street view images on Google.
The photograph above of 558 DeKoven St, the building on the left was shot in 1949. The backyard of this obsequious paint caked space is where the great Chicago fire of 1871 started. That block and much of the surrounding area was completely razed in the 60's and 70's. Big boxes made of smaller boxes, surrounded by gas stations and ATM's currently reside there now. Manny's, the best deli in town for like, a gizillion unspecified number of pro-rated crap memory years also resides in that area.
In his archive Cushman captures some of the richest photo's of Maxwell Street and the old market culture that I've ever seen. They include the mythic gypsies rummaging old refrigerator sized boxes looking for under wear, big junk piles made from smaller junk piles, old doors disguised as shacks and all of the other broken stuff one might expect from a shambling mound of crusty brick and sausage grease. Some of which has transitioned symbolically to where the great fire began, 558 DeKoven St. on Sundays between 8am and 4pm, weekly.
Cushman wasn't Ansel Adams, or Robert Frank, he was an amateur by all accounts. But his dedication to shooting crumbling neighborhoods like Bronzeville and Maxwell St resulted in a richly textured collection that marks the wide breadth between Chicago's intention and it's failure in a most remarkable way. We need the reminder of those crumbling structures and the reality of the solidarity that those lost communities can impart. It seems cruel to ignore what so obviously is an evocative celebration of that which backs might bear but arms can't hold and eye's shouldn't miss. Particularly when our eyes are lost, our arms are full, and our backs feel bent to the point of break. Why any curator at any Chicago institution hasn't secured even the most meager of elements of the Cushman Collection for an exhibition here seems criminal.

Armageddon never wept so...

2010-04-10T03:07:00.006-04:00

Thank you pipflinx,

I think we might say that this is haunting. Like the diaspora, and abuse, and all of the other mean things wrapped up like a cotton candy cylinder aimed at my heart here in the crazy. When they get jet trains... I want to hug my elephant mom too. I'm not a monster, but then you toss in the Armageddon soundtrack and make me wonder anew... where do you get goggles for a toddler elephant? Is it covered under the new health care plan? I know thats esoteric but Dumbo isn't an American right? Do intellectual properties have health care in the event of a meteor strike? Is that actually covered under an act of god clause? Do insurance companies really mean god, as in one god or a specific god, or even the potentiality of a cornucopia of godly folk running about... or is it really just chance, and thereby the use of a turn of phrase? Will their ever be jet trains or truly sad moments ever again if that meteor hits? When Dumbo saves us all will he become a real American and thereby justify his prescription goggles? I can't say, as the movie with all of it's heart warming themes really speaks for itself.

animal kingdom

2010-04-09T16:06:00.004-04:00

there's that thing, the one with the stuff... you know, it's like an umbrella but not like a spider at all, especially when its wet. oh, and there's color too and maybe some lines. well, it makes me wish...

instant gratification

2010-04-04T23:54:00.004-04:00

Android teats are seldom motivated from their hidey spots... Aren't we lucky? Buried as often as they are, beneath their deep brass brassieres all cold, digital, and alone. Having seen Metropolis and Lost In Space at least once each, I would say we are lucky. Like cold cold Witches they should be proud of their muffinous bounty tins. I say one and zero for you all in such a manner that you will interpret it as, thank you Madam Robot. Thank you my future overlord.

understanding... What, sorry! I must of dozed off

2010-03-25T23:53:00.010-04:00

Via Chicago Art Magazine

There's way too much, friend of my friend is on my blog slog going on here. I wasn't able to find any up to date editorial mission for the site which makes a project like this all the more disappointing for Chicago. Without a clear direction beyond the current haphazard articles being outlined, It's hard to say why I should continue to visit something like this. All of the writing is proportioned the same, whether its an essay, a review, or an interview. It makes the overall feel, the texture and the weight of the articles and the entire enterprise feel vapish.

The State of (visual ) Art

Then over here Kathryn makes a comment that frankly might make Apollinaire proud. As quoted, Worrying about editorial is “like organizing the kitchen cupboards while some dude bleeds to death in the living room.” Apollinaire's opinion on such matters aside, this statement is nothing more than a qualifier for shoddy oversight. She is then quoted, “We publish two unedited articles each day. It would be nice to have someone look them over, but we just don’t have the money.” This second statement seems very apologetic of the first, while pandering for substance from unknown benefactors at the same time. Given the depth and the overall lack of density that the pieces have, money isn't the issue with Chicago Art Magazine, selection and directorial vision are.

Then in the comments, Kathryn makes two unedited points which I could stand behind:

My opnions [sic] is that there are two issues not addressed that I feel contribute to the issue of non-interest in reviews:

1. the review form – the literary piece known as the art review – has lost its way.

2. Our relationship with experts/authority is in crisis or in flux.

But her thesis never bears any fruit. Opinion One is a short sanitized scree about form in which her argument has something to do with artist statements. While opinion Two is a generally woeful display of misunderstanding or a simplification of the context of Greenberg, his peers, and their work as, writers, and artists that gets wrapped up in her own opinions about white male hegemony. Neither opinion is reflected in any way by the tone of her web site. If anything, her endeavor succeeds only in adding more crisis and flux to the pile of bleeding tissue in the living room.
The defense of her thesis suffers greatly from a misunderstanding of what criticism is and how it coalesces to form a review. Art criticism shouldn't tell me it's, "It’s worth the trip down to Catherine Edelman Gallery on a Saturday or Sunday when you can explore the other galleries in the building," as Liz Dyla has. That's a statement best written in a Sunday church bulletin. Something Kathryn herself seems to posit, "With a review, anything goes. You can be poetic, historical, opinionated, snarky, speak in metaphorical terms, talk about other stuff. Anything goes. Maybe you’ll get some actual information, maybe you won’t. No wonder no one reads them, it’s a crapshoot." But a review is actually none of these things. What she has described is called, writing, a very close ancestor to Truman Capote's bastard, typing. At her site I should expect to see something different and substantive, something bereft the flabbiness that she decries. Instead it's riddled with descriptive adjective laden snot, to fearful of pronouncing meaning too extract either profundity or quality.
Some of this should likely be seen in the light of opportunities created. Artists and writers need opportunities after all, and the structure of Chicago's art community relies heavily on the work of inspired participants. But I would argue that without editorial oversight or a progressive long term vision for growth, an endeavor such as this one is hopelessly mired. After all criticism and opinion are not the same. Amateur criticism is little more than the ALL-CAPS and bold fonts version of a comment roll, and paying said amateur is in no way a transformation of this reality. So what makes a misinformed critic not, a knowledgeable and, or an opinionated amateur? Time, energy, condensed thoughts, research, an apishly large library surrounded by lovely black and white photographs of water fowl, and other bric-a-brac? No its constancy and persistence in the pursuit of understanding and conveying the qualities that define the arcane and metaphorical reality of objects and their surroundings.
The flux or crisis isn't with experts or authority per say, its in the distribution of opinion as though it were reasoned discourse. It's in the ongoing creation of model's for the dissemination of hyperbole without rational checks or balances. Whether it's Glenn Beck, or Jon Stewart, or Bad at Sports these models can do much to obfuscate legitimate dialogue if not entirely cripple its formation. By creating a platform for authorship without an editorial or directorial voice guiding it, Kathryn's personal responsibility to the community is ceded to those writers posting on her platform. She herself becomes little more than a placeholder, beyond all accountability.

Perhaps she prefers being held accountable for the posting of 2 articles a day rather than for the content of those 2 pieces that mark her domain. She would maybe, like to have an editor to hold accountable instead but can't currently afford one. But after all the accolades have rolled in to the New City and Time Out and Flavorpill and Fecalface and the Chicago Reader and ArtLetter and Art Forum for, BEST POSTER OF 2 ARTICLES A DAY... EVER, then her fortunes will change and she will accept the responsibility she hopes to profit from. Or perhaps she is actually an arbiter of culture reflecting a new age. It's your call. I have no editor, so I can't make that call.

with really big hands, we offer the sun to bacchus, indifferent to bees and pigeons alike

2010-01-28T15:09:00.008-05:00

Flat4: Untitled (Carnival), ran in December at Floor Length and Tux. This Program featured the work of Meg Duguid and Catie Olson. EC Brown contributed a collection of essays written by a diverse group of folks on the topic of Chicago's apartment or Indie Spaces. This collection also, Untitled, can be found at this link. Happily, my snark is included at the very end, pages 46-48. A 2nd draft of this piece appeared here. Selected essays from it also appear here at the Bad At Sports blog.
I also contributed a brief statement for Duguid and Olsons work at Flat4, as well as a recipe for Macaroni and Cheese that was printed in a booklet provided with a complimentary CD of selected musics.
Thank you all

Werner Herzog Reads Curious George

2010-01-26T00:05:00.004-05:00

This is freaking amazing. Did Norman Mailer ever read, Winnie The Pooh? Did Burroughs read, Horton Hears A Who? Oh Sad Sad Sad....Because this hasn't happened either. I suggest we hire a reluctant coach and get some red wine down to Dieter's joint stat

speared by it's dreams of sleep, metropolis gushes with the romance it cannot keep

2010-01-17T22:24:00.006-05:00

good morning again, only this is months later like time travel, yay

2010-01-17T20:41:00.009-05:00

Let's round out the day with a batch of artwork from Pedro Velez, Andrew Natali, some books with a Meg Duguid work, and a keepsake from Ben and Amy Stone's wedding. You get bonus points for identifying the books by both title and author then being smug about it.

good morning

2009-11-17T03:18:00.002-05:00

Sunshine is an evil drug meant for pixies and rainbows, not for my ilk
In hours I'll see you, raging like the dawn on a highway
Just remember, I'm fragile like you

look at the sky cars... they're free as the stars, meandering voidless forms of reason... shirt

2009-10-10T23:54:00.007-04:00

More amazing amateur footage from the Chicago's World Fair, A Century of Progress. Posted on the youtube by sky100. Thanks

Ikea Hieghts

2009-09-15T12:35:00.004-04:00

IKEA Heights from DaveAOK on Vimeo.

I found this posted at the Dollar Bin blog. As posted by DaveAOK on Vimeo, "It's An Ikea furniture store melodrama created for Channel101.com." It's rather inventive and quite funny given its low ball narrative container. I wish more about the project was posted. There really needs to be a making of style documentary about the project.

Produced by David Seger and Paul Bartunek. Directed by David Seger, Shot by Paul Bartunek, written by David Seger, Spencer Strauss, Paul Bartunek, and Tom Kauffman.
Starring: Randall Park, Whitney Avalon, Tom Kauffman, Jess Lane, Dean Pelton, Wade Randolph, Abed Gheith and Del Shoopman.

Amateur film: Chicago World's Fair] (ca. 1933-34)

2009-09-13T17:36:00.002-04:00

I've been absorbing a lot of random items from the Internet archive the last few days. Here is amateur footage from the Worlds Fair. Apparently the film is four reels long, with only the first reel being shot here. Click through for information about the remainder of the films locations. Truly amazing.

since we've lost and mourned, can we have treats now

2009-09-12T20:56:00.004-04:00

Good Bye John Gibbons

2009-09-02T01:45:00.004-04:00

Hello John,
I've just heard that you passed away from me, from us. Sadly I missed the opportunity to share my new life with you. I never had the chance to be proudly married or share our joy with you. Sadly our last correspondence was about Warren Zevon collaborating with REM, the Hindu Love Gods. I never said thank you for the sandwiches, or the coffee, or the time you helped out Justin. I thanked you for helping with the beer at the Butcher Shop. But I wished you would have stayed longer at the shows. I'll miss your surly laugh. I'll miss the sporadically missing beard. I'll miss the care that you gave to the small things that made you feel happy and safe. More importantly I'll miss your support.
Perhaps later we will share an Old Style and catch up on all of little things that make me bitch and make you laugh so much. I would like that. I would like talking about the things that I write again. I want to have you over for a dinner, a glass of wine, a bottle of scotch. I would like to hear about the way CTA does you wrong or about the walk you took through the neighborhood. I'm proud to think of you as my family. Until the universe tosses us together in a tank again, enjoy your stasis.
Skittles,

Artists Run Chicago

2009-07-12T22:20:00.004-04:00

Treatment For Three Volumes (2009) Van, Cardboard

Treatment For Three Volumes (2009) Van, Cardboard
Diego Bobby

Owing to the strength of modernity, with its pedagogical nowness, and it's remote biases, Treatment For Three Volumes acts as an “assemblage” of hierarchal moments in the stanza of a joke. It's punch line both eminent and expected within an accepted pattern of 3 passes. This work's treatment is the litmus of comedy in the crucible of specificity and timing. Its nature is narrative though not as an imperative but as a breathe following the mixed gestures of a hiccup followed then by a fart, and a sneeze. Driven as a device of element and process, Treatment For Three Volumes is the gleaned wit of spurned children blessed in the tidal waters of the 60's. It's notions to be determined in the gathering and assembling of the same materials thrice, immediately, and within the context of their immediate experience. It's understanding however lay in the post-contemporary earnestness for doubt and illusion that is both inert and pervading. Wherein the expense of suffering through the imminent moment of the narrative now, at the expense of the audiences voyeuristic instinct remains a sacrificial distinction of honest depravity. To you, I say good luck.

Shrill Show
Hyde Park Art Center
06-20-09

a pile of love songs for meg

2009-06-29T03:31:00.000-04:00

from the wikipedia...soup history

2009-06-29T00:30:00.002-04:00

Ramen Museum
The "Shin-Yokohama Raumen Museum" is a unique museum about ramen. In a gallery on the first floor, the museum presents the history of ramen in Japan, including the big success of instant ramen. It displays the variety of noodles, soups, toppings and bowls used across Japan, and shows how the noodles are made. On the two basement floors, visitors can explore a 1:1 replica of some streets and houses of Shitamachi, the old town of Tokyo, of around the year 1958, when the popularity of ramen was rapidly increasing. Nine ramen restaurants can be found there, each featuring a ramen dish from a different region of Japan. For visitors who wish to try multiple ramen dishes, the restaurants offer "mini ramen" small portions. Tickets for the meals are purchased at vending machines in front of each restaurant before entering.

should have done this a long time ago

2009-06-18T14:18:00.004-04:00

I've started archiving the images and data that Dogmatic accumulated in long stay in my life. Some of this can be found by following the links I've provided below. It's slow and tedious work but new stuff will come on line as I find it.

Early Dogmatic

Dogmatic Advertisements

1999 Made at Work: what Artists do when they are being paid to do something else

I loved this shit to death

2009-06-18T03:41:00.005-04:00

Here is a sad moment...

Characterized by an iterative structure and favoring modulating events to idol speculation, Meg Duguid and Catie Olson’s program navigated a space wherein process was investigated as an experiential device. At its core, Serious Laughter employed humor and absurdity as mediums with which contemporary aesthetic could be analyzed and its fraying bits snipped at the pleasure of a passerby’s joke. In their words this was, “based on a weird tracking of subject and object within a fictional world of serious laughter.”
This could have meant most anything, but it didn’t. It’s in fact a lovingly crafted piece of language that provides a specific literal introduction to a body of work whose feet existed in two streams of poetic distinction, with its patina of thrift and casual craft on one side and its postulations of action and experience on the other. This bit of doggerel, of tag line is in fact a very clever indication of the viewers “subjective” experience, much of which was wrapped around silent and not so silent observances of the body as an object that, creates, reiterates and disseminates text in the specific form of Art. “Based on a weird tracking of subject and object within a fictional world of serious laughter,” created a tacit consent with its audience by virtue of its accuracy in describing Duguid and Olson’s intention.
As tracking implies following or pursuit, it also implies intention. Ironically it’s this intention that was easiest to miss within Serious Laughter’s construct. But the thing is it was as there as the punch line in any joke. It was in fact so pervasive that the examination of any one piece offered a remarkable amount of insight into workings of the entire program. Its layout prescribed a situational foundation that made this possible even necessary as works had to coexist to function. In the case of What it all Means, a water colour representation of everything in the program and its placement within the gallery this becomes acutely evident as the show itself had to be constructed and hung entirely before this piece could be developed. Yet, What it all Means is clearly referenced in the documented correspondence between Duguid and Olson earlier in the year.
What it all Means, also provides an important chronological buffer for the work, as it acts as the distinctive point wherein Serious Laughter ceases to be a performance that Duguid and Olson are the primary participants of. After the completion of, What it all Means, Serious Laughter is transformed into a four week long performance that is mediated by the gallery and performed by its audience using the props that the artists have assembled for them. Making the banal inclusion of a chess board in the front room, far more significant as its inclusion personifies the relationship that the artists are forging with their respective audience in this fictional world of Serious Laughter.
Clown Car and C World were at the apex of this as both pieces formed nuanced theatres that highlighted succinctly the bond between artist and audience. Like nesting dolls, they were arranged so that they invited the viewer (participant) into static performative fantasies about looking. Settling on a couch or a toilet depending, they offered plastic moments of unkempt voyeurism in the one place were voyeurism, with its attending fetishistic qualities is not discouraged, the art gallery. This mode of hyper-textual theatre was then pushed even further by the artists with, The Joke Wall. As the gallery’s institutional role was usurped from a place for indicant texts and their believability to one of repression by an ever accumulating repository of low brow humor and the immediate critical response that accrued there. The audience (players), the unedited voice then relents to the same static conveyance that the artist relies on. By so doing they recreate the silent scrawl found in public bathrooms everywhere, but here it becomes anointed as an elevated action.
It is however what this work was not about that has been engaged most vociferously by unknown parties at the Butcher Shop. Since July 1st, their zeal in rallying against Meg and Catie and their work, with its casual appearance and mercurial substance has resulted in the vandalizing of 6 pieces over the course of 2 and a half weeks time. Typically, if this had happened in another space the artists would be notified and the damaged work would be quietly removed or replaced. Dogmatic however is not a typical space. Dogmatic is an ongoing series of relationships perched on the edge of a breath. Art after all can be housed in a garden shed, in fact in the future it might, but relationships can only be housed in the hearts and minds of a community.
When, so many years after Duchamp you can’t find the joke or take from it something progressive then maybe the institution wins, perhaps the big museum is right for the moment but Dave Hickey’s nostalgic butterflies certainly aren’t a substitute for real questions. This was a program with a light heart and deep questions. It invited its viewer’s participation openly and without bias. Its only request was that they be adults and pay attention. How shockingly different was that for a program by Artists? So on the 28th of July, I invite you as an adult, as an artist or as a viewer to bring to the Butcher Shop a piece of artwork to be destroyed. As Meg and Catie’s work has been remorselessly harassed by faceless critics at the Butcher Shop, I invite you to join us in reclaiming and rebuilding an idea. No, naughty words won’t be flung .

From Dogmatic Advertisements

structure, on cat, on toast

2009-06-10T15:51:00.005-04:00

Just watched the new video, jarring isn't really the word I want. However disorienting is close, with hints of haunting. As it stands, four disparate elements are converging in the piece, the Narrator, the Toast, the Cat, and the Sound Track. The Cat and the Toast are the true subjects which the Narrator is compelling the viewer to insert a mutually defined context for. Visually, the Cat and the Toast are the dialogue, in a mannered call and response structure, not unlike a Greek choir or even gospel music. This dialogue is an abbreviated syncopation, a symbolic texture at counter point to the lilting strands of orchestral melody provided in the soundtracks sweet lament. The Narrator is a non entity, a mere tool, a Charlie Brown cypher used to fashion the appropriate distance between the Cat and the Toast. The Narrator, this set of hands that moves like the Cat with persistence, and unlike the Toast, unhindered by the brevity of looking. These hands are manipulative. They effect change beneath the motivations of the music and provide a cogent continuity between the subjects. While the weight of meaning rests solely with the viewers interpretation of how Cat and Toast can be either like, or dislike. Its all very half-glass full, half-glass empty isn't it?

making with the wiggle fingers is tough enough, now eat some ribs

2009-06-03T23:06:00.001-04:00

SNKR becoming shy

soy sauce, splendid and briney placenta delicately hammered by the sun... and corn dogs.

2009-06-03T20:41:00.011-04:00

Soy Sauce Recipe

A random thought occurred to me, one finds a recipe for soy sauce and then follows it's instructions. Sadly I didn't find much in the way of home-brew, DIY soy sauce crafting. Its alchemical divinity apparently meant to sequestered from us rogue white devils seeking the ancient wisdom. However Wikipedia offers a marvelous entry on the general topic of Soy Sauce itself. Just to preserve a sense of random adventure, you might want to touch base with their entry on the corndog.

New Post is Old Post from Revolution Days in Living Room Now

2009-05-30T01:27:00.006-04:00

GONE FISHING, Eric Ehmert, Meg Duguid, Diego Bobby (2003) Latex Paint, Wood, Wire, and Nails with accompanying Text*

WARNING: This piece is grounded in the curmudgeonly language that is typified by subjective and conceptual constructs.

This work is an action and actions are not inherently artistic. Although some actions, like pouring cups of coffee, masturbating or watching the television have been explored for underlying artistic content. If artistic content can be found in them, it soon reveals itself to be derived of intention and thereby neutering it of any innate artistic sublimity. Making that action suspect and its motivations antithetical to critical analysis. Taking into account that analysis can be a subjective social construct employed by history to determine itself, one soon deduces that this piece is not art. Gone Fishing is Philistine in it's intent, it acts to circumvent the nature of institutional aesthetic and in turn the societal tendency to establish such an aesthetic by not participating in it. To this end the "Artist" has employed others to "decorate" this space resulting in a content that cannot be judged.

*This text has been altered from the original. It has been compiled from multiple original digital files which have undergone a variety of format, and platform changes since the original writing. Two primary files were used to reconstruct this text as the most accurate presentation of the original.

silly billy's, helplessness is one of two rational responses to capitalism. bitterness is a proactive response towards both of those.

2009-05-28T00:20:00.004-04:00

Some psychiatrists are trying to get excessive bitterness identified as a mental illness named post-traumatic embitterment disorder. Of course this has some people who live perfect little lives, and always get what they want, questioning the new classification. The so called "disorder" is modeled after post-traumatic stress disorder because it too is a response to a trauma that endures. "They feel the world has treated them unfairly. It's one step more complex than anger. They're angry plus helpless," says Dr. Michael Linden, the psychiatrist who put a name to how the world works.

in the works

2009-05-21T03:11:00.010-04:00

Regarding: A Specific History of Chicago’s Alternative Spaces from 1970 through 2004.

This article will include: Beer at it's beginning
This article will include: A primary history of the specific phenomena of independent art spaces in Chicago with the attending social, economic, and aesthetic motivations that have informed their development from, 1970 until May, 2004. It will be argued that in this time period the motivations for starting and maintaining such a space remained largely static regarding, aesthetic, and sociological positions within a decentralized International art community. While this may be the case, it is in the examination of the individual models developed by their executors where we can expect to find the greatest diversity in utility and attending speculations on philosophy and form.
This article will include: JPEG's, however it will not accept slides.
This article will include: Paint, a small tin of spirits, two brushes, and encouragement.
This article will include: Speculation that Gallerist, as a word might be little more than fashion with some French flare.
This article will include: An examination of the relationship that exists between the independent space and the academic institution. (tentative heading, But Decay Smells Sweet).
This article will include: 2 photographs of the Art Institute of Chicago.
This article will include: This sentence, "The Renaissance Society, The Chicago Cultural Center, and The Hyde Park Art Center can do this repeatedly precisely because they are not museums."
This article will include: Analysis of a philanthropic model side by side the analysis of a for-profit model (charts might be color coded for clarity).
This article will include: Materials as fact.
This article will include: the borrowed VCR from Meg's last show.
This article will include: An examination of the collectivist, pass-the-hat, and small institutional models conceived in 1970. It will also examine the more contemporary not-for-profit, 501c3's as organized social networks. Then it will pit them against one another in an arena of DOOM.
This article will include: An understanding that the models developed in Chicago, stay in Chicago.
This article will include: Chicago, and all of it's neighborhoods.
This article will include: Site specificity.
This article will include: Architecture because it's a must.
This article will include: at least 2 days to change the light bulbs.
This article will not include: An adjunct teaching position, a part-time art handling position, or free passes to the show in question.
This article will include: An archive of local art publications, broadsides, or magazines that might include, Ten by Ten, Cakewalk, New Art Examiner, FGA, CACA Newsletter, F student newspaper, CAC Newsletter, and maybe Lumpen.
This article will include: The Chicago Reader, in a section titled, Validity.
This article will include: Examinations of the Federal, State, and Local government agencies that have provided funding for the Art's, and their recipient cultural press.
This article will include: The New Art Examiner again.
This article will include: Labia.
This article will include: Resistance to a critical voice since 1970.
This article will include: It's own work in it's next show.
This article will include: A developmental history of the Chicago Art Exposition at Navy Pier from its inception through the development of the Stray Show by Thomas Blackman Associates.
This article will include: Nothing new or revealing about the motivations of an art fair.
This article will include: Disdain for systems that fail at an individual level.
This article will include: The names of many people that have left Chicago.
This article will include: The names of many people that have returned to Chicago
This article will include: A deeper sense of Meta than its readers might be comfortable with.
This article will include: Art listings, postcards, mailers, email blasts, BB's, LISTSERV's, and websites, but still may never be reviewed.
This article will include: A Dedication to John Gibbons

Note #30

2009-05-19T00:29:00.000-04:00

SNKR, she's a go getting

2009-05-15T23:48:00.002-04:00

snkr and skinny

2009-05-15T23:39:00.003-04:00

de chirico will get you soon enough, you'll see

2009-05-14T20:33:00.004-04:00

Not the Same Day That Judith Halberstam said, "Desire Has A Terrifying Precision." pt.3

2009-05-14T01:57:00.016-04:00

The wall in front of me, a little above and to the left wears it. The bleached glow from Soft System’s projection, it’s an ugly suit, tailored to the room. The cranky angles tease bloated shadows like harpies with an over full balloon while the what have you dregs of my patience fill my In-box, thank Bob. That red blink of text in the right corner; SGTMKR: 021742.0924.59. Insists I’ve seen it a lot in the last seventy two hours. So soft Seven.
So the little girl goes again, “I’m reactionary,” shrugging, “Its honest work.”
“Miko!?”
“Hmmm,” She pauses, scrunching a wink up real tight and slow. “How ‘bout this,” She says, “We’ll walk the beaches, hold all the hands and make love until nothing’s left. We’re not building their dotage. Nope, we’ll leave their toys in the rain. Then we’ll blow to hell, with candy kisses all we can. They don’t matter. We’re mean spirits. The righteous drunkards at their bed side. We’ll suffocate them with funny until they drown in their own pee. Demeaning their modernity, I'll fashion paper airplanes from its lofty bits and have a day in the park that they built.”
Then with a slight she adds, “Just for you. You like?”

gratification of one

2009-05-12T11:53:00.007-04:00

Nope, not until I get a bunny. Then I want a jar and a bag of buzzle bees. You can keep the chips for yourself. I only like birds. The fresh kind. None of those strung up stringy ones mind you. The real thing, now that's chap's.

Old Word's, Fierce Butter...

2009-05-11T12:18:00.006-04:00

In The Way-Back Machine we've sent you, here you'll find the niche.

Said Kitty, remit to midst amok, amok

2009-05-09T23:15:00.004-04:00

To wit the midst replied not. kitty

2009-05-09T22:53:00.004-04:00

said, one to the midst

2009-05-08T12:25:00.006-04:00

LA is hot
but not so nice...
june is the new august and so is july
wear a tablecloth
cinched at the waist
I'll come back a week later
a job
really
right
we had kittens
they came into our house
I loved that movie, my favorite movie
indeed
instructions directions... the move
yeah
she teaches
yeah
em hmmm
god.. its a god year for sabbatical
nice
what are you making
nice
(approx..laugh)

Dogmatic Dun, Robot Love Song

2009-05-07T23:38:00.005-04:00

Dogmatic, Robot Love (2000) Single Channel DVD, Flemming, Thomas, Duguid
His Name Is Not Kimsy, opened to the public as a critique of the Alternative Spaces which were then dissolving after nearly 20 years of service. The primary residents at Dogmatic believed that, experimentation, and the application of realism in the critique of aesthetic were a necessary means for change. The ordinary architecture of their surroundings provided a textured and nuanced pallet of familiar references for this change to occur. This video footage captures a community of artists gathering for a common celebration in a 2 story residential building. Their achievements are before them. Their shoes are their own. Dogmatic used these simple gestures to convey its grown-up thoughts until their own shoes became too many.

doe eyed, limp little trout. you have a light, no?

2009-04-23T17:21:00.006-04:00

sad rhapsody for washington's whiskey dreams

2009-04-20T17:25:00.018-04:00

Kidd sharp blossoms
muddy toes, crinkled
in the half street time
depth,
drawer of kant spilling ibsen, can will
smoking, instead of paper poking
with the treason
hammer as to a saint, to a stream
Kidd, hello Kidd
limp siege of slip bread, we have
meat and cheese
for your courageous, continual
dim and blunted from matriculations
of stacked furniture
and an empty drawer
and a vertical space blind as the sky
mop, now again
little comic
mop

respectively,
1. Orchid (intro)
2. Bellona
3. Lanya
4. Denny
5. Scorpions
6. Kid
7. Orchid (outro)
Dick Richards can be found here, http://www.archive.org/details/sine005

tumble like a blanket, gentle as a spoon

2009-04-20T17:05:00.004-04:00

image of ...

2009-04-17T23:37:00.007-04:00

Mine is Skirt, same as Nathan....
I don't fly
simple or heavy
all of it will not
break,
I won't see?
drift?

make us drip theory like ()'s from the old country, making their love to the idea of benjamin franklin...imagining him all being, all hot w/ plasym.

2009-04-01T00:21:00.014-04:00

cool futon
sweet...
history

more
opposed to fate,
( open, not spoke. As the forum does not grant the space I desire ) ... notes doting the end
dot
flush>PINK ed

THIS IS NOT WHOLE... thank you

remember the hosts of not, they are gardeners, ranchers, and preachers of bone

2009-03-19T00:29:00.017-04:00

simple, drugged meat weasel
so busy,
calm, sister pill
so pen the storm and call
...Trip [thin(below blue) well beyond trip]
blue's
after the simple
CHORUS

the features of tomorrow are loved in both belgium and in italy

2009-03-19T00:16:00.009-04:00

run standard operating, if the nail is
stupid, simple licker
bang
liquor, liquor
we have as yet, the penrose
the spoon
the sugared cube
with envy, awaiting, to the door
like a failed dictionary
a misspent penny or a cowboy's joke
really, pass-fail

(if ever the tine were neat) oops... as an errant finger to the key

2009-03-06T19:19:00.011-05:00

grope your extensions
little pinochio
you're but a spoon
savory
on one side only
trapped
meant for soup
like an ocean
begs for the moon

Totem

2009-02-28T00:32:00.009-05:00

Tonight is old. It's wett
but current and bored.
I'm watching nothing
but stars in the
often sky that happen... do...
tonight is lame like old,
young like song, even as blue...
Equal after the sun,
noon or scripted yellow
you are to me... A we (as sound)

Founding Fathers

2009-02-15T23:56:00.003-05:00

Season salad bowl by rubbing a cut half of garlic followed by 1 teaspoon oil onto bottom and side of bowl (reserve garlic).

Heat 3/4 cup oil with both halves of reserved garlic in an 8-inch heavy skillet over moderately high heat, turning garlic occasionally, until golden, 1 to 2 minutes, then discard garlic. Add bread cubes to oil and fry, turning occasionally, until golden on all sides, about 2 minutes. Transfer croutons to paper towels to drain. Pour oil through a small fine-mesh sieve into a heatproof measuring cup and add enough additional olive oil to bring total to 6 tablespoons.

Put anchovies in salad bowl and mash to a paste using 2 forks. Whisk in egg and lemon juice, then add reserved oil (warm or at room temperature) in a slow stream, whisking until emulsified. Season with salt to taste. E Pluribus Unum.

it's safe!?

2008-03-21T22:05:00.006-04:00

this changed in '99 when i needed something,
more space age sounding
but its been whittled down to a brief happenstance now
UNTITLED,

when's niel back (it started out, years ago with richard)
its a long time til the new year yet
can I borrow some hangers
the closets full

it doesn't matter
what happens then (epic couldn't happen, sorry gilgamesh)
i'll buy him a beer
how about the italian

mexican will do (and italian they're left over from earlier)
not yet, and us
i'm still sore (this end's too, i don't know)

the final piece, a wood block cut
the illustration is black, its white
2 figures, inertial penumbra poking broke-bottle ends
undone plus stop

one for me, one for you

2008-03-19T15:44:00.007-04:00

good bye mr. clarke, though i hardly knew you at all. you were something more then sensual....

an incomplete thought, a random floatation device

2008-03-17T20:59:00.006-04:00

DRINKING, BREAKING THE RULES, INSERTING BITTERSWEET GRAINS OF OUCH INTO THE MOST NON-PRECISE PLACES

###

The Players are
Auditor: Something worn and soft, with something glowing, and digital
Chorus: Casual Dress
Lead Performer: Formal dinner dress

###

To be performed vigorously in one fell swoop between two brown or grey curtains with no other obstructions.

###

Auditor: History's made art like fighting a blind bitch in the charnal house.

Chorus: No, really!?

LP: A pile of broke down prom dates, stacked like cord word at the door, discussing T-shirts.

Chorus: No, really!?

Lead Performer: There’s always some suck fed goose snicker looking for tit.

Chorus: No, really!?

Lead Performer: Back-assed neoprene shills, cameras in hand, real-timing to broke dick sequel-land.

Chorus: No, really!?

Lead Performer: Wearing not disposable enough like its yesterday. Economy, rinse, repeat as necessary...

Chorus: No, really!?

Lead Performer: Someone asks for a T-shirt, one way or other.

Chorus: No, really!?

Auditor: You’ll see, they’ll start quoting the press release like a left over Lincoln speech.

Chorus: No, really!?

Lead Performer: Artists make history. Then change it, quick like a bunny.

Chorus: No really!?

Lead Performer: Misspent T-shirts, stacked like cord wood are stupid.

Chorus: No, really!?

Lead Performer: There’s always a door. There's always the critics sponge.

Chorus: No, really!?

Lead Performer: Some straw sucking side feeder stands by it with a press release asking to type.

Chorus: No, really!?

Lead Performer: Asking about economy, asking after Uranus jockey's. No one asks for doorways.

on EXPLODING, not nice...

2007-09-24T02:10:00.004-04:00

thesisXantithesisXsynthesis...
after 10:00am coffee and thievery
after that cologne... lunch, dinner, beer, then bed
hurray

offering the limp version first

2007-09-24T01:56:00.006-04:00

...umbering word trains pointed at objects...they were meant to bounce here...and there with slit tab preciseness... It was a Gallery...white.
“Drab pisser. Dank and brown, it smells like ammonia.” I heard after a, “Hurm... But I didn't happen to chance upon any empiricist, inst...

Not the Same Day That Judith Halberstam said, "Desire Has A Terrifying Precision." pt.1

2007-09-11T01:34:00.004-04:00

First that I’ve been this far north, I concentrate on the Station. Not that it’s much different south of here. Nothing stands straight there either. If it’s standing at all, form’s gone mindless. It’s been raped for a millennia, maybe longer. Now look at it. I accept my position. There’s glass everywhere. Like fairies teeth ground into the concrete. Collage is brutal like this, but simple. It’s like a weapon. Bricks from a cornice are strewn in front of the old store up ahead. That heft of steel post, upended by the toppled bus beside it. There’s a jagged brace of stud on top of a cracked planter, probably from the blown out apartment across the street. Weapons everywhere, that’s function. That wins. Like a clot, for a damn of thumbs. Wash, rinse, and repeat until it's all tits up. Then its good night formality.

Instant, slow and boring

2007-09-07T22:17:00.000-04:00

I saw Paul Chan Sleeping on the L train the other day. He smiled alot. I wrote aimless prose in my blackberry. Gallery's suck.

making whoopie

2007-08-30T00:43:00.001-04:00

New York isn't against the world, It just doesn't care.

Not the Same Day That Judith Halberstam said, "Desire Has A Terrifying Precision." pt.2

2007-08-29T01:09:00.009-04:00

It was '66, definitely not any earlier. I was reading, The Way Home from Mars. They were lost, needing to make a difference when Buzz set them straight. "This is a democracy for leaders," his eyes glinted. "There's no lip gloss where we're going Mary." My glove was on the bed beside me. It's leather smelled fragrant. It had rained, so dad called the game. That Gainsborough reproduction hung over my desk. All gentry and horses in tobacco hues, I hated horses. Mom liked that, it's how she met dad. "But it won't be easy."
"Where's that button? Where's my great white horse?"
Then a knock, dinner?
"No the button must be here. It must." Clifford Humson was 42 when he wrote that. He lived in Saratoga Springs, in a cottage beside the woods with an old dog and a Ford truck. I bought his truck the same day I bought, Pyromania. The dog had died but Buzz was very much alive.
"This bed's musty."
"It's all we have."
"Casserole again." Monday's are macaroni something with mayonnaise.

Tomorrow Now

2007-08-14T01:01:00.003-04:00

...scratched knees on palm suffering drunkard nights. Our drafts are saved autoly. Corrosive Dee'n Agents reminding kids of our spilled evil in their marrow. Better than color its Black n Dubya, sifting the trim end of life with a hammers wit, all golden and viral when we meet. Genes in hand, knees in broken denim and a sloppy pour too near the bed. Todo... Todo... little house, red.

In the Future, this happens more than you might think

2007-08-11T02:46:00.000-04:00

librarian vs one eye monkey.....

2007-08-11T02:13:00.000-04:00

The Monkey is so gotta chance...

KNIFE FIGHT

Rusty George and the Cartographer's Tale

2007-08-11T02:07:00.001-04:00

Epstein sniggered, "Eggplant in the French room."
"Please," The Rothko, cushioning the passage in an ambient slip was met damply.

distant point oh dot one

2007-08-11T01:57:00.002-04:00

The photo’s make it green with a little pale flag on top like a war movie. A simple building constructed with long low lines, built from local sandstone, lime and resins. Enlisting nearby villagers for contract work, we fleshed out the ad hoc crew with truant grant writers and painters slung in from the states. We put it together very quickly, as the Theorists slopped their gnomic brews pitching laundry lists to and fro.

Bah....

2007-08-10T22:34:00.000-04:00

In the Tradition of Conceptual Geography

2007-08-10T22:27:00.000-04:00

Like a tilted breeze

2007-08-10T22:22:00.001-04:00

Little Machines...Yesterday and Today

2007-06-22T03:59:00.002-04:00

happy and thoughtful still

2007-04-25T03:09:00.001-04:00

open source fairy tale

2007-04-25T02:57:00.000-04:00

Farmer's wife
cutting knife
mmmm ickey mice

singing ghostly drunk

2007-04-21T05:50:00.003-04:00

engineering hat short days

as an open door

like soup...

Everyone likes soup.

2007-04-08T04:02:00.000-04:00

> You asleep on my shoulder like a tiny chrome
> angel.
> Lifting me open as I remember doctrines of youth
> and tears
> she is real
> mine in my dread
> Then thwarted, Solomon Heracles Atlas Zeus
> Achilles Mercury
> Oh Pooh, simple Eeyore and
> Grave, Grave Robins boot
> I miss

pepper's greed 03-93

2007-04-06T03:13:00.001-04:00

name tags for humanity

2007-03-28T06:03:00.000-04:00

cow wheel

2007-03-28T06:02:00.000-04:00

love letter .002

2007-03-28T05:27:00.000-04:00

seeing the need for a penguin

2007-03-28T05:20:00.001-04:00

more stuff

2007-03-22T03:29:00.001-04:00

a wad of Chan

2007-03-20T04:14:00.002-04:00

love letter .001

2007-03-20T03:45:00.000-04:00

explaining stuff pt.2

2007-03-20T03:35:00.001-04:00

explaining stuff

2007-03-19T04:29:00.001-04:00

bang

2007-03-19T04:24:00.000-04:00

The Human Torch

2007-03-15T03:51:00.000-04:00

12 step program

2007-03-15T03:46:00.000-04:00

A marvelous spray of salt shakers

2007-03-15T03:44:00.000-04:00

bus Station

2007-03-13T03:09:00.000-04:00

couple

2007-03-13T03:08:00.000-04:00

welcome to Daley Land

2007-03-13T02:51:00.000-04:00

barn board abstraction made real

2007-03-13T02:22:00.000-04:00

fire show prep

2007-03-13T02:17:00.000-04:00

pixle dust

2007-03-13T02:09:00.000-04:00

Truism

2007-03-11T01:56:00.001-05:00