What Art Did You Like Best in Houston This Year?

Robert Boyd

One thing for sure, when it came to art in Houston in 2012, we weren't starved for choice. There were tons of exhibits and performances--so many that I don't think anyone could have seen them all. (Not even me.) I count over 500 separate exhibits or events. I've got most of them on this survey, but I know I missed at least a few.

The lists are organized by artists names, more or less (multiple artist shows complicate the issue). You can check off as many as you want on questions 1 and 2 (but you can only make one choice in question 3). Don't worry if you didn't see every show or even a majority of them--this about you telling us what you liked best of the shows you saw. If you only saw one exhibit and you loved it, vote for it!

I've embedded the survey here, but if this is hard to navigate, you can go to the Survey Monkey page.

I'll collect results until January 7, and then I'll publish the results. So get voting!

Create your free online surveys with SurveyMonkey, the world's leading questionnaire tool.

Gary Panter on Modern Painting

Love this lecture by Gary Panter. Anyone who is interested in the interplay between comics and modern art will probably already be familiar with the artists that Panter discusses. (And he does get some minor art history facts wrong--as he warns at the beginning.)

He mentions that many of his cartooning peers have a really low opinion of modern art. This lecture is, in a way, a way to counter this distrust. Part (but only part) of the bad feelings cartoonists have towards contemporary art has to do with the condescension that the art world has expressed for comics. This condescension is expressed in many ways--artists who appropriate the work of comics artists, and in doing so deny the cartoonists the personhood that is implied by being a creator of a piece of art; museums and galleries that display art inspired by comics, but never display comics art; art critics who are unwilling to take the effort to distinguish between artistically interesting comics and commercial hackwork (after all, it's all just spectacle, just precession of simulacra).

That is one reason I do this blog--I want to consider art (primarily contemporary art) and to consider comics as a subset of art. I want the two worlds to overlap. Gary Panter is an exemplar of what I'm talking about.

(Hat tip Gene Kannenberg.)

The Great God Pan is Dead

But as William Burroughs noted, he seems to be lurking behind much of the creative energy of the world, so maybe he is not so dead after all.

In honor of that creative energy, I initiate my art blog. This is a spin-off from my "anything goes" blog, Wha'Happen. I have copied all my art postings from the old blog to here, and will continue cross-posting for a while. But eventually, Wha'Happen will be devoted to oil, finance, cycling, books, etc., while The Great God Pan Is Dead will handle all the art, with only occasional cross-postings.

The Great God Pan is Dead is growing out of my effort to educate myself about the Houston art scene. So if you are a Houston artist or gallerist, keep me in the loop.

(Cross-posted at Wha'Happen)

Pieced Together and the Tradition of Graffiti

Robert Boyd

I went to the opening of "Pieced Together" at the Aerosol Warfare Gallery, an exhibit of graffiti art by a variety of Texas artists. This show has been traveling around the country, and Aerosol Warfare is the final stop. Aerosol Warfare is a local gallery devoted to graffiti art and related items.



exterior of Aerosol Warfare



interior of Aerosol Warfare

The pieces on display are small, essentially acrylic versions of the type of large-scale wall pieces that typify the artform.



"Icons" by Reks and Worms



"Extended Release" by Dmise

The opening was not just a passive viewing experience for gallery goers. They had a wall of tiny canvases where you could make your own micro-graffiti piece for $5; it was very popular with the kids (and their parents). They set up a computer-controlled projection system that allowed people to create large scale graffiti pieces projected onto the wall of a building across the street. And they had car-hoods on easels with local artists creating pieces on them.













Even notorious local poster artist Give Up did one. I asked if Give Up was present, but the publicity-shy artist apparently stayed away, lest someone snap his photo. (Someone even asked me if I was Give Up.)

There was an amazing display in the store.

 

Commemorative Puma sneakers in honor of the late, great Vaughn Bode. This shows that the proprietors of Aerosol Warfare have an awareness of history.

Graffiti art is essentially ephemeral. Illegally put up on walls and concrete barriers, they get rapidly painted over by property owners, city workers, highway departments, transit agencies, etc. This situation would seem inimical to the formation of a tradition. And yet, in pre-literate societies, traditions like this of impermanent artforms (performed music, spoken poetry) have lasted for centuries.



"Michelle" by Sloke

So who was Vaughn Bode and what does he have to do with graffiti? Was he a graffiti artist? Nope. He was a cartoonist whose style informed a lot of the early New York City graffiti artists.




Early writers not only imitated Bode's art style. They included many of his figures in their pieces--Cheech Wizard, the lizards, the "Bode broads", etc.

What were some other non-graffiti sources? I think the psychedelic rock posters of the 60s had their effect. I also think these artists were looking at the artists from Heavy Metal magazine (which started publication in the U.S. in 1977). Specifically artists like Caza and Druillet.



"Supher" by Supher

But these artists who were covering subway cars in NYC in the 1970s have no relationship to an artist like "News" from the Rio Grande Valley--except that a tradition has been established and spread across the U.S. and indeed all over the world.



"Daily News" by News

This artform has been given a certain degree of respect from the fine arts world, analogous with its grudging embrace of comics art by the art world. Art critics respect its folkish traditions and seeming authenticity. But graffiti art has some problems as far as being a part of the art world. It's not a perfect fit. There is a basic truth about graffiti--it is a fundamentally adolescent artform. This is not to say its practitioners are teenagers (although many are), but graffiti, like so many adolescent activities, involves the thrill of petty crime. The colors and cartoonish origins also feel adolescent.

I am not trying to insult the art of graffiti. But I do wonder what it would mean to be an old graffiti artist. Maybe it would look something like this piece.



"Paper in the Wind" by Spain

Frenetic Fringe Festival -- Weekend 2 Bullets

Last week I complained about the Fringe Festival not being quite "fringe" enough. This week was an improvement on that score, and over-all a more interesting and pleasurable evening. You can still see it tonight (Saturday, August 15) or tomorrow. Again to be brief, I'm going to use bullets.

There's a Tsunami at Your Door

• A short play by Mary Ellen Whitworth.
• A woman about to commit suicide is interrupted by a desperate cable salesman.
• Similar to "Velocity" from last week it its use of a tragedy that happened in the past as the cause of what's happening now.
• But it is a straight-forward narrative, not fractured like "Velocity."
• The acting was slightly raw.
• The play had funny moments despite its grim subject.

Dancing Diana

• This struck me as fairly innovative.
  
• Instead of a musical score, there were three short, personal stories by Diana Weeks.
• They were recorded by her and played over loudspeakers.
• She sat stage (she's an older woman, perhaps in her 60s or 70s) while the dancers danced.
• The dancers "interpreted" her story through dance.
• The connection was tenuous, but--
• Both aspects--the story and the dance--were enjoyable.
• It was like, say, riding your bike while listening to your Ipod. You get simultaneous pleasure from both activities.

Spelling Bee Sluts

• A short play by Paul Locklear.
• Slight, farcical story about a hillbilly who comes to L.A. to make it big on the spelling bee circuit.
• He ends up working as a male prostitute.
• A pretty minor piece of work, I'd have to say.

G.I. Joe PSAs

• These were cartoon public service announcements from the 1980s, featuring the G.I. Joe characters telling kids about safety.
• Eric Fensler has recorded new dialogue for them.
• This had the potential to be funny but predictable.
• But Fensler's dialogue (often sounds or made-up foreign languages) was absurd and bizarre.
• It wass still really funny--but not in an easy or obvious way.

Thurmond, W. Va.

• A documentary by Laura Harrison about a soon-to-be ghost town.
• 18 people still live there.
• The National Park Service has bought out most of the folks in town. The intent is to turn this coal mining town into a park along the lines of Mystic Seaport.
• It felt like a typical documentary, one that had neither the power of the old-school documentaries of, say, the Maysles brothers.
• Nor did it use the innovations of Errol Morris or Michael Moore.
• Not that it was bad, just not all that exciting...

Three dance pieces choreographed by Toni Leago Valle

• These were the best things I saw all night, indeed the best out of both nights.
• Three solo dances, three solo dancers. They were highly controlled athletes, but each with a kind of way about her that marked them as artists.

"Silent Victim"

• Catalina Molnari is stranded on unsteady looking rectangular boxes. She barely moves as she grips them and attempts to balance.

"Interview for a Date/I Take My Clothes Off"

• Mechelle Fleming is the dancer in this strangely sexual piece.
• In the first part, there is a film of a girl (Valle) being questioned, job-interview style, about why she would be a good girlfriend for the unseen male interviewer.
  
• The interview itself is forced and calculating, dealing with the value she brings to him as a girlfriend. She is desperate.
• When the interview seems to go wrong, she remembers something.
• She tells him, "Oh, I forgot! I'm good at sex!"
• The whole time, Fleming is sitting on a chair, facing away from the audience.
• She twitches and makes small moves, as if she is constrained and ready to move.
• The movie ends and she starts dancing.
• Her dance struck me as almost tortured. I can hardly describe it in a way that makes sense.
  
• She seem struck by things outside herself, while engaging with a negotiation with herself.
• She seemed buffeted, struck by forces.
• (But, it should be said, it was clear she was fully in control as a dancer.)
• Finally, she took off her dress.
• And it ended with her standing there in her underwear.
• It it appropriate to mention that she is an astonishingly beautiful woman?
• I regret not having photos of the Fringe Festival, especially for the three dances that Valle choreographed.

"I Am Mother"

• The dancer was Valle.
• Her skin was covered with white, pasty makeup except for her eyes, which were kind of a red racoon mask.
• The dance was done seated, under a soft, dim red spotlight.
• Weirdly enough, I was reminded of the installation by Carlos Runcie-Tanaka called "Tiempo Detenido/No Olvidar." The atmosphere was similar.
• Her movements were constrained by her seated posture.
• But the effect was nonetheless electrifying.

I haven't seen enough dance to have a vocabulary to describe what I was seeing. But Toni Leago Valle's three dance pieces were undeniably moving; thrilling even.

General vibe.

• I sat under a fan, so the lack of AC wasn't too horrible.
• They have us fill out an audience poll that includes demographic info.
  
• Apparently collecting this info will help them get grants.
• With which they can, say, buy central air-conditioning.
• The seats at Frenetic are only slightly more comfortable than airline seats.
• It seems like a lot of folks are there just to see their friends or family's performance.
• Consequently, a lot of people leave at the intermission.
• Maybe it's not so bad on Saturday and Sunday.
• But one would certainly wish for more support from people who have no personal connection with the performers.
• (Of course, I could be wrong about the audience...)
• I wish I could photograph some of the performances and put them up here.
• That said, there were two photographers with serious-looking photo set-ups in the audience.
• So perhaps if you search the web, you can find some images.

I thought the show was well-worth the modest ticket price, so catch it tonight or tomorrow if you can.

The Art of the Offshore Oil Platform

For some reason, the offshore oil rig has never (to my knowledge) been a popular subject for painters. Obviously, their remoteness is a reason--hard to paint what you can't see. And they have bad associations with many people, particularly sensitive artistic types. Plus, I think folks generally (and wrongly in my opinion) think of them as ugly.

So imagine my surprise when I stumbled across this spooky image:


"Longfall," mixed media, Brook Salzwedel

This was reproduced on the L.A. Times art blog, Culture Monster. I went to artist Brook Salzwedel's site and found this image:


"Unphased," graphite, tape and resin, Brook Salzwedel, 2006

Like it. Perfect art for oilmen!

(Hat tip Art Market Monitor.)

Frenetic Fringe Festival Week 1 bullets

Friday night I attended day one of the Frenetic Fringe Festival at the Frenetic Theater out on Navigation. This was the first night of a month-long series that combines theater, dance, and film/video pieces. My expectations were for some really avant garde stuff. But what counts as avant garde today, after a 20th century full of it? I imagined the theater would be Samuel Beckett or Charles Ludlam-type things, or maybe pieces related to modern performance art, or Antonin Artaud-Alfred Jarry-like provocations. For the film, I imagined Bruce Conner-like assemblages, Stan Brackhage-ish abstraction, or even Andy Warhol-esque minimalism. And I know nothing about dance, so I didn't have much in the way of expectations there--or so I thought.

The Festival was not as radical (so far) as what I expected. The pieces were all pretty approachable. I was hoping to be challenged a bit more.

Nearing Velocity

• A short play by Liz Gilbert.
• In fragments, we see all the people who were involved in a car accident at Richmond and Montrose.
• One driver Mallory is now paralyzed, a man, Boyd [sic], in the other car paralyzed with guilt.
• It was a strong opener, with good actors and a play that unfolded in an interesting way.
• I now realize that they bookended the opening night of festival with their two best pieces (of the night).
• It might be my old age, but I sometimes had to strain to hear what the cast members were saying.

Beyond the Sphere

• Three women dancing.
• Supposedly about life after death. Music combined with a tape of someone relating a after death experience.
• I have a preconceived notion that all dancers are perfect physical specimens, strong but elegant and beautiful women.
• (See Olga Khokhlova and Lydia Lopokova of the Ballets Russes, for example.)
• But one of these women was a bit on the chunky side.
• People in glass houses should not throw stones, yet this slightly disturbed me!
• The piece was long (it seemed) and by the end, I was in a pleasantly hypnotic state.
• Despite having not understood it at all.

Nevel Is the Devil

• This short film was mildly amusing, but not particularly "fringe."
  
• Office Space was a better movie on a similar theme.

Bruna Bunny and Baby Girl

• The second play of the evening had a tepidly surreal premise.
• A former circus performer's 12-year-old daughter has hair on her chest.
• The girl, Baby Girl, was actually played by a little girl, who did a hell of a job.
• But the play's point was lost on me--it seemed silly without being all that entertaining.

Access Pending

• This dance piece seemed a little more what I would expect from a dance piece than "Beyond the Sphere."
• At least, so it seemed to my dance-virgin eyes.
• I was impressed but the dancer's skills, but not particularly engaged by them.
• But again, maybe that's just me.
  
• I don't know what to look for really.

Kuliman mixes YouTube--ThruYou

• This was a rather astonishing piece of appropriation.
• Kuliman took bits and pieces of solo music uploaded to YouTube.
• (Often these were music lessons, sometimes they were musicians showing off some of their skills.)
• Out of all these disparate bits of music, he created coherent, multi-instrumental songs.
• The lyrics were often based on spoken-word YouTube videos auto-tuned.
• I recall Thomas McEvilley discussing Hellenistic poetry that consisted of appropriating different poets lines into a single poem.
• McEvilley was making the point that post-modernism's practices of appropriation was an ancient practice.
  
• But this piece reminded me very specifically of those ancient Greek poems.
• The skill shown in finding and mixing these fragments is astonishing.
• But the results, while perfectly good, are not great.
• This is a complaint that can be made about much OuLiPo-style art.
• i.e., art that puts a really complex, limiting constraint on the artist with the intent of fostering new, creative ways of making art.
• It's amazing, for example, that A Void was written at all.
• The fact that it is also a great novel is a fucking miracle.
• Kuliman's mixtures are totally listenable--but won't stick in my mind.

So the Fringe Festival's first night was a mixed bag. I would have been surprised if it hadn't been. I will be there for the subsequent shows. My hope is that someone in Houston will amaze me.

(There is an art show along-side the Fringe Festival. The artworks are for sale. Stephanie Toppin, for some insane reason, is selling her drawings for $25 apiece. I personally think this is a bargain. I encourage anyone who liked her work at Diverse Works and Box 13 to pick up a drawing or four, before Toppin comes to her senses.) (Toppin, not "Tobbin"--corrected now.)

Frenetic Fringe Festival Starts Tomorrow

I plan to be there for it and possibly to blog it, in my ongoing project of educating myself about the Houston art scene. The Frenetic Fringe Festival runs every weekend for the rest of August. If you miss the program tomorrow, you can see the same program Saturday and Sunday.

In addition to the the theater, dance and film presentations, there will be an art exhibit. Among the artists is Stephanie Tobbin, who I have blogged about here and here. Here's one of the drawings she will be showing.

Art and the Death of a Cat

This is maybe the weirdest and yet most moving blog post I have read in a long time. Houston artblogger B.S. Houston writes about the death of his cat, Pumpkin.



Read it.

The Big Show at Lawndale

As I understand it, Lawndale has been doing "The Big Show" every year for the past 30 years. I don't know if the format has always been the same though. This version of it featured works by a whole bunch of artists from the Houston area. They were chosen by a guest curator from St. Louis from works by 409 artists who entered works (and paid an entry fee for the privilege). The show on the walls is what Laura Fried picked. You can see it until August 8.

I don't have any idea what was rejected from the show, but I was surprised by the number of paintings (as opposed to sculptures or video or installations or mixed media work). I was surprised by the number of basically realist paintings, or paintings that used elements of realism within postmodern contexts. It seems like a really conservative show over-all. That's OK. I was impressed by the painting prowess of Houston.


Kevin Peterson, Hope, oil on canvas, 2009

Like this amusing painting byt Kevin Peterson. The artist assures us that the man on the left is not meant to be Obama, and that indeed both men are white. He made this statement at a slide show given by the artists. Not all the artists spoke, though. I am pretty sure we didn't hear from Michael Arcieri, for example.


Michael Arcieri, Nation Builder, acrylic and oil on canvas, 2009

The idea here is kind of cheesy, juxtapozing a baroque style painting with grafitti. I think he may be suggesting that the two modes of expression are both highly coded in ways that their intended audiences would understand easily, even if they are opaque to 21st century gallery goers. I just like the contrast between the flatness of the grafitti and the depth and roundness of the baroque figures.


Michael Arcieri, Slave, acrylic and oil on canvas, 2009

Grafitti played a part in several pieces. Street art has come a long way since I was doing pieces in the early 80s. I like the way David Cobb painted an illusionistic depiction of basically flat grafitti here, and I like the feel of the railyard.


David S. Cobb, Blue Camel, acrylic on board, 2009


Mindy Kober showed slides of her work over time (as many of the artists did). Her work began being done mostly with gouache but she recently changed to using crayon.


Mindy Kober, Contemplating the Universe, crayon and gouache on paper, 2009

The reason she gave was simple--crayons were cheaper than gouche. The recession has hit everyone hard, hey.

Jed Foronda was one of the slide show artists. He showed a lot of older work that seemed fairly loud and colorful, a little like Ben Jones, but now, as he put it, "painting wasn't working" for him anymore. What he was doing now was excavating magazines with a sharp knife, creating these debossed objects that, in contrast to the earlier work in his slides, seem quite elegant.


Jed Foronda, Glory Hole No. 8, primer, wood, excavated Artforum, 2009

I like how they look like colorful, terraced open-pit mines.


Jed Foronda, The Wheels Keep On Spinning, primer, wood, excavated Artforum, 2009


Jed Foronda, The Wheels Keep On Spinning, primer, wood, excavated Artforum, 2009 (seen from an angle)

Foronda said the best magazines to use for this kind of piece were art magazines and porno magazines--because they both have really good colors.


John Runnels, From the Series: Whisky Tango Foxtrot - For Ultimate Carnal Knowledge, encyclopedia and bookends, 2009

There are a couple of punks in the show. This by John Runnels piece amused me. It was also one of the few sculptural pieces in the show.

Jasmyne Graybill managed to get three sculptures in the show. Well-deserved--these pieces are astonishing (and really disgusting in a totally surprising way).


Jasmyne Graybill, Specklebelly, steamer basket and polymer clay, 2008

Yech, right?


Jasmyne Graybill, Citruspur, lime squeeze, polymer clay and plastic, 2008

This is art you can almost smell--musty, gag-inducing. The craftsmanship is astonishing.


Jasmyne Graybill, Crested Buttercream Polyps, muffin pan and polymer clay, 2008

I love them. Perfect art for the kitchen!

Over all, the artists seemed too smart. Lots of references to other art and to art history were worn too close to the surface. When the artists spoke, they often spoke of "exploring issues around" this or that. I kept waiting for someone to say, "I paint X because I like X." For all the skill shown here, I didn't feel much. Even the political pieces seemed old hat. I saw reflections of art from New York and elsewhere, filtered through BFA and MFA programs. This may be unfair because I know not all the artists come out of that world of university art education. And I liked a lot of the work! I just wasn't blown away by much, and maybe part of the reason for that was hearing the artists speak about their work. Maybe that was a mistake.

The earnest, intelligent artist statements perhaps gave me extra appreciation for Jim Nolan's slide presentation. He described his work as post-minimalist, and name-checked one of my least favorite artists of the 80s, Joel Shapiro, but in contrast to so many of the artist here, he felt free to declare, "I try to stay away from craftsmanship as much as possible." After all, he added, "if you spend a lot of time on something, does it get better?"

Box 13 Bullet Points

Box 13 is a storefront artspace with studios. Located on Harrisburg near the corner of Wayside, it seems physically far from the Houston art world (the Frenetic Theater is relatively close by, though). Harrisburg is lively and urban, but decidedly working class and Mexican-American. I wonder what Box 13's neighbors think about them.



So when I heard they were displaying a Stephanie Toppin painting, I went to check it out. I liked her work in $timulus.


Oneself by Oneself, Stephanie Toppin, 2009

• The piece is huge.
• Evidently, the piece at Diverse Works and this one are part of a single larger piece.

Oneself by Oneself detail, Stephanie Toppin, 2009

• The bigger piece is a "self-portrait" in the form of a timeline.
  
• It might be better to call it a "memoir".
• But of course, no one would be able to figure out the subject of this large abstract work by looking at it.

Oneself by Oneself detail, Stephanie Toppin, 2009

• Instead, one sees a brightly colored abstraction that rewards close looks.

Oneself by Oneself detail, Stephanie Toppin, 2009

• Her handling of paint and colors remind me of early Melissa Miller.
  
• I love this work.

Black and White Picket Fence, Emily Sloan, 2009

• Emily Sloan had three pieces that I thought were cool.
  
• The show was somewhat lacking in identifying labels, so I don't know what they were called.
• One could call them "Picket Fence," "G Cone," and "Castors" I guess.
• Update: I have titles for her pieces, as you can see beneath the photos.
  

Traveling Bauhaus R, Emily Sloan, 2009

• These sculptural works kind of belong to the category of works that can be described thus:
• No Artistic Talent Was Required to Make Them
• But They Are So Intriguing and Visually Interesting, They Must Be Art

Turf, Emily Sloan, 2009

• This is not meant as an insult.
• After all, Duchamp proved that this approach could be art back in 1913.
• It becomes incumbent on the viewer, aided by contextual clues, to decide what is art.
• Postmodernism contended that this was always true.
• See for example 'La Mort de l'auteur'* by Roland Barthes.
• And in my eyes, Emily Sloan's work is cool.
  

Stampede, Kia Niell, 2009

• I guess the same could be said about the flying buffaloes of Kia Niell

Stampede, Kia Niell, 2009

• I liked how the shape of the piece changed as you walked up the stairs.

from "Zen and the Indulgence of Environmental Destruction," Anthony Day, 2009

• The notion of building things out of the interesting "negative" shapes of styrofoam packing material is not a bad one.
• But with the weak coloring (stryrofoam is notoriously hard to paint) and scattershot approach, Anthony Day's totems have little impact.

back yard of Box 13

• Remember Kathryn Kelley? I think Box 13's back yard might be her studio.
• All in all. Box 13 is one hell of an art space. I'm embarrassed that I had never heard of it before this weekend.
  

*That's French.

$timulus and I Love You Baby Bullets

Two art shows opened Friday so I decided to check them out after work. First was $timulus at Diverse Works, a group show of 2009 recipients of grants from Artadia, a grant-making outfit that supports selected artists in selected cities, including Houston. So like any group show, you have some winners and losers. Usually I only like to talk about the art I like, but I have to complain about El Franco Lee II (or Junior, for short).

• He is the son of Harris County Commissioner El Franco Lee.

not sure what the title is, El Franco Lee II

• Junior's art looks inept and adolescent.

Blaqsheep vs Marvel, El Franco Lee II

• It troubles me to look at it--is Junior being ironic or is this work just plain dumb?
• You are meant to wonder this when you look at some of the work of, say, Mike Kelley or Lisa Yuskavage. But, y'know, really it's obvious that these two are clever postmodernists producing double-coded art.
• The only hints that he might be an ironist are his elite education (Yale, UH MFA) and where his art is shown.
• But for me, that just doesn't make up for the bad drawing and general stupidity of the work.

Blaqsheep vs. DC, El Franco Lee II

• If he were 16 years old and drawing this, I'd feel slightly embarrassed for him.

from "The Young Manhood of Dan Pussey," by Dan Clowes

• I'm reminded of the Dan Clowes story where Dan Pussey shows his art to Gummo Bubbleman.

• But I like to think I'm less naive than "Bubbleman"--I don't care if Junior is being postmodern. This art is horrible.

Blaqsheep vs. Triad

• I mean "Blaqsheep vs. Triad"--Jesus.
  
• But some of the art in the show was good.

Self-Portrait, Stephanie Toppin

• Like this.

La Llorona in Lilith's Garden, Delilah Montoya with Tina Hernandez, 2004

• And this.

La Llorona in Lilith's Garden, Delilah Montoya with Tina Hernandez, 2004, detail

• Here's a detail of that last one.

Mam E, Dawolu Jabari Anderson

• This one made me laugh. (Laugh with it, not at it.) Dude digs Kirby, eh?
  

I left Diverse Works with mixed feelings. I was worrying over whether ineptitude as a strategy, as a way of questioning certain artistic meta-narratives, butts up against ineptitude that happens because an artist doesn't know any better. With Junior, like with so much postmodern art, context is everything. If you saw one of those "Blaqsheep" drawings in a teenager's notebook, you might be encouraged that he is being creative, but you certainly wouldn't encourage him to pursue an art career. My question is, does this really change just because the work in on the pristine white walls of Diverse Works?

These questions didn't get easier at my next stop for the night. An art group, I Love You Baby (ILYB for short), was showing at The Joanna.

• The Joanna is just an ordinary house on Graustark across from the University of St. Thomas.
• Its shows last one night only--on Friday, that was from 6 pm til 2 am.
• The group I Love You Baby is a collective of anarchic art punks.
• They were among the exiles from the Commerce Street Artist Warehouse who were in the movie by Skeezer Stinkfist. (They were ones who had the office Christmas party that degenerated into an orgy of destruction.)
• Their paintings seem a bit cleverer and more knowing than Junior's.

unknown title, ILYB

• I liked this one.

unknown title, ILYB

• And this one made me laugh.
• But even though they were basically exhibiting in someone's living room, context was everything.

unknown title, ILYB

• The work would seem ridiculously crude and inexplicable outside a gallery.

unknown title, ILYB

• One last I Love You Baby painting.