Why Is This Blog Dead? (Summer 2006 Recap)
This blog will be dead until I am fully back to normal
healthwise, and it is not the case presently (though I generally
feel good) because I need to have some extra surgery done.
Well...I'll be living with one kidney from now on, it seems.
I am cancelling all trips this Autumn until January,
hmmm...ok...Well not exactly, I'll try at least go to New York
once, and maybe see the Henry Rousseau in Washington,
and definitely the Mass Moca, but that will be IT for
this year so you can all tell me if you see some cool art
because I will likely be missing it.
This past summer was pretty off too, though
I'm sure I've seen some of the great.
Rapidly:
I did a one-off to New York just to not miss the end
of DADA at Moma. I am not sure why I went. It wasn't that
necessary as many of the landmark pieces are already part of
american collections. There was the couple odd bits and exclusive
(the Kurt Schwitters), and a lot of rare pamphlets and booklets.
Overall I found the exhibit pretty didactic and historic. I wish
I had seen this when I was 12.
In New York I also saw the Nancy Rubins outdoor sculpture that looked
like a Chen Zhen, but that was it, I had to be back to Montreal quick.
Ooops, nope, I forgot I also saw the Maya show at Metropolitan, that
was nothing to compare with the Aztec show at Guggenheim from a couple
years, but still some gems from recent excavations. I really only went
thinking "I've seen the Aztecs, I must see the Mayas". Now I can't help
but think I should have gone see other shows instead that I now realize I will
be missing. Sob.
On my way to Cleveland (to get health advice, and by the way all museums
in Cleveland were closed while I was there, how very weird, like a bad omen),
I stopped in Toronto fast to see Angela Bulloch at Power Plant which wasn't
too necessary: they were selling the book of the big european retro that we
canadians are too poor to get travelled, and that was depressing more than anything.
Actually as a cross Dan Flavin and Xavier Veilhan I think this artist rocks but
one needs to see many pieces of her work to get a sense of where she is moving.
Even the main installation was a reduced version. Maybe the Power Plant is too small. The different "systems" which commanded each works were not described.
With Bulloch it's good sometimes to know how the work is made because it is often about its interface. Nearby, the drawings of Annie Pootoogook were kinda sad, but I was glad to see some folks from the great north take place in contemporary institutions. My favorite part of the whole Power Plant offer was in fact the documentary of this artist, because she sounded so removed (and dare I say, lost) from the contemporary artworld: that was refreshing.
In Toronto I also visited the extra small Andy Warhol retro, more like a large rich gallery show than a museum show, but it did include many of the early landmark films,
which was sort of to the point: for me this was a David Cronenberg show appropriating Warhol. I'm glad Istvan Kantor did what he did. I'm sure both Warhol and Cronenberg would support it. Otherwise that show risked too much to pass into obliveon.
In Trois-Riviere (Quebec), I saw the Cai Guo-Qiang exhibit which was majoritarely stuff that I already saw at Mass Moca and Washington. Inopportune, the whole ensemble, is a major piece of recent sculpture history. Go see it in Seattle where it belongs, if you've missed it. The only new art for me was a hanging magic carpet thrown with arrows, and a couple majestuous fireworks drawings which would not pale next to Hommage A Rosa Luxembourg by Riopelle (well, they would, cos they're already pale, but you get the idea). I don't know if Quebec cared about this show but though it was a little short for how remote this museum is situated, I am proud that we had it, and Cai agrees with me that this place holds a lot of potential.
Also in Trois-Riviere, I saw the Second Bienniale De La Sculpture, which was my fave show of the summer. Nothing nerve-wrecking, actually, but some good samples of recent canadian sculpture, mostly of the strictly formal tendency (the show's theme was "verticality and horizontality"...wow...like we're back in the 60's). Even Michel Goulet (of course they were more artists from Quebec than anywhere else in canada, go figure...) was at his most formal, with his grillage of towers and chains somewhat deprived of the everyday connotations of most of his objects. I liked the little off-who's-who's aspect of the event, which is the result of half the works being selected from an open call. One local artist, Roger Gaudreau, impressed me with his series of suspended common fences sculpted directly from slices of a large tree trunk. Nearby was a gigantic drape (more like a cape) depicting the world map made with clothe tags. It looked like a large Alighiero Boetti but that was by Josette Villeneuve, another local artist. Michael A. Robinson's minimalist assemblage of stereophonic equipments looked like an early Alexandre Castonguay (except for the additional sound work and an accompanying video of redfishes in a bocal). Marc Dulude's sculptures of water vibrating on silicone tables felt up to date with the post-vaseline status of new sculpture, while Miguel-Angel Berlanga felt oddly out of place with his stuffed head of a buffalo. Both Alan Storey and Diane Morin did not disappoint with the intricate mechanisms that they put into place. Really a fine exhibit (in a fine, homely, mansion-museum like we miss them).
In Montreal, I saw Il Modo Italiano at Museum Of Fine Arts, a huge survey of contemporary italian design, worth seeing for its Bugatti and Ponti alone. The best Montreal exhibit of the summer if you've missed it. I also loved the Resider project by Karilee Fuglem and friends, which I had written an article about but it's forgotten somewhere in my files. That was mostly happening in a rented apartment in the far ends of St-Henri (there was a part at B-312 and another at La Centrale). Speaking of St-Henri, I visited the new most-majestuous gallery in Montreal, the Parisian Laundry, for a fine sculpture show (Archipel, made in conjonction with galerie Orange, which was itself presenting mostly wall works). Again, many older formalists at work but some damn good stuff (that series of cloned white tables of all sizes by Mathieu Gaudet, or an ambitous project featuring scales and beds by Michel Archambault). I hope this gallery delivers the goods. It took time and many student exhibits before I finally got interested. Than Pierre Bourgeault was up and around in a couple places, doing better in his Deacon-esque wood sculptures than in his installation at Quartier Ephemere, that left me totally dry (an ocean of salt blocks, what else could do). In the next room was the usual sound installation by Francisco Lopez and friends (I am saying this a bit sarcastically because he is probably the artist whose art is the most often presented at Quartier), this time a sound portrait of Montreal which you are "not supposed to perceived as a sound portrait of Montreal, because that would be lame, but more like a sound portrait of urbanity in general" (the press release translated in my words). Okidoo. The Treehouse exhibit at Saydie Bronfman Centre was cute but none of the works there can rival with the Treehouse Kit from Guy Ben-Ner coming shortly to this town. I agree that the forest framed by the Centre's windows needed an hommage, but I wonder why not invite the artists to present their works in the parc itself, directly onto the trees, instead of providing pseudo-"utopian" models. I finally had a chance to visit the CCA "urban sensations" exhibit which surprisingly covered more art than I expected, mostly, alas, in the form of photo documents (ultra-large photographs, mind you). It was fun to "smell" the city, thanks to a series of large perfume bottles. Finally, there was the Brian Jungen exhibit at the Mac, which I had seen previously, and which, for the amount of people it attracted, should have been bigger. Why was the last room filled with collection art??? (sacrificing the birdhouse and other works from Jungen???). Hey, hello, this is the MAC: you guys are supposed to command new works for the artist you are retro-ing. Maybe they did that one too fast: give it another couple years and a Jungen retro will be fastidious (hopefully). The MAC is also presenting Pascal Grandmaison, which seems to borrow from various sources, like Genevieve Cadieux, Bruce Nauman, David Blatherwick, recent Rodney Graham (whirling gems), I even see some Jocelyne Alloucherie, and so on, in his extremely clinical works which are for my taste over-simplified, bereft-of-humor takes on very basic aspects of form (specifically photographic). Some would call this a psychosocial, humanized version of conceptual minimalism but it left me cold (either the works are too theoretically blunt to offer me substance to reflect on ("my subject is boring, this photo is in fact a perceptual "screen", did you realize?"), or they speak of the precarity of human condition in affected ways ("beware my bubble the glass as I'm an antisocial fragile soul..")), but just towards the very end, finally there was some art that redeemed him, the quite cool abstract shots of border of shoes, to put in the same category as recent art by Wolfgang Tillmans. The best at the Mac was still the selection of music video-clips in the basement.
Well, that's about it.
Everything else, I missed (ok, maybe add to this a little stroll
for some public art on Mont-Royal street).
I will be back at the end of Autumn to tell about the little
I will be seeing this season (I'm sure this will include the Mass Moca
and Rodney Graham at the MAC).
I promissed the good lord to start an art career if I make it
through my health blockages (because somewhere I think I should've
but never did out of being too lazy and having too much fun watching
others do it), and it is probable that if all goes fine I will start
with a little something during the Rodney Graham show, because he has
been influential to me, and that would be sort of symbolic for me to start
just when he has his retro in town. Lol, I feel totally obliged to do this.
I mean, obligated. I'm right at this point now, totally on the edge.
Cheers,
Cedric Caspesyan
centiment@hotmail.com
PS: while I am absent from this blog I reply frequently on other blogs,
as I enjoy the passivity of letting others decide the subject of discussion.
I write mostly on Edward Winkleman's blog as I enjoy the activity there (many repliers), but I am sometimes on Simpleposie (will be back) and other places.
healthwise, and it is not the case presently (though I generally
feel good) because I need to have some extra surgery done.
Well...I'll be living with one kidney from now on, it seems.
I am cancelling all trips this Autumn until January,
hmmm...ok...Well not exactly, I'll try at least go to New York
once, and maybe see the Henry Rousseau in Washington,
and definitely the Mass Moca, but that will be IT for
this year so you can all tell me if you see some cool art
because I will likely be missing it.
This past summer was pretty off too, though
I'm sure I've seen some of the great.
Rapidly:
I did a one-off to New York just to not miss the end
of DADA at Moma. I am not sure why I went. It wasn't that
necessary as many of the landmark pieces are already part of
american collections. There was the couple odd bits and exclusive
(the Kurt Schwitters), and a lot of rare pamphlets and booklets.
Overall I found the exhibit pretty didactic and historic. I wish
I had seen this when I was 12.
In New York I also saw the Nancy Rubins outdoor sculpture that looked
like a Chen Zhen, but that was it, I had to be back to Montreal quick.
Ooops, nope, I forgot I also saw the Maya show at Metropolitan, that
was nothing to compare with the Aztec show at Guggenheim from a couple
years, but still some gems from recent excavations. I really only went
thinking "I've seen the Aztecs, I must see the Mayas". Now I can't help
but think I should have gone see other shows instead that I now realize I will
be missing. Sob.
On my way to Cleveland (to get health advice, and by the way all museums
in Cleveland were closed while I was there, how very weird, like a bad omen),
I stopped in Toronto fast to see Angela Bulloch at Power Plant which wasn't
too necessary: they were selling the book of the big european retro that we
canadians are too poor to get travelled, and that was depressing more than anything.
Actually as a cross Dan Flavin and Xavier Veilhan I think this artist rocks but
one needs to see many pieces of her work to get a sense of where she is moving.
Even the main installation was a reduced version. Maybe the Power Plant is too small. The different "systems" which commanded each works were not described.
With Bulloch it's good sometimes to know how the work is made because it is often about its interface. Nearby, the drawings of Annie Pootoogook were kinda sad, but I was glad to see some folks from the great north take place in contemporary institutions. My favorite part of the whole Power Plant offer was in fact the documentary of this artist, because she sounded so removed (and dare I say, lost) from the contemporary artworld: that was refreshing.
In Toronto I also visited the extra small Andy Warhol retro, more like a large rich gallery show than a museum show, but it did include many of the early landmark films,
which was sort of to the point: for me this was a David Cronenberg show appropriating Warhol. I'm glad Istvan Kantor did what he did. I'm sure both Warhol and Cronenberg would support it. Otherwise that show risked too much to pass into obliveon.
In Trois-Riviere (Quebec), I saw the Cai Guo-Qiang exhibit which was majoritarely stuff that I already saw at Mass Moca and Washington. Inopportune, the whole ensemble, is a major piece of recent sculpture history. Go see it in Seattle where it belongs, if you've missed it. The only new art for me was a hanging magic carpet thrown with arrows, and a couple majestuous fireworks drawings which would not pale next to Hommage A Rosa Luxembourg by Riopelle (well, they would, cos they're already pale, but you get the idea). I don't know if Quebec cared about this show but though it was a little short for how remote this museum is situated, I am proud that we had it, and Cai agrees with me that this place holds a lot of potential.
Also in Trois-Riviere, I saw the Second Bienniale De La Sculpture, which was my fave show of the summer. Nothing nerve-wrecking, actually, but some good samples of recent canadian sculpture, mostly of the strictly formal tendency (the show's theme was "verticality and horizontality"...wow...like we're back in the 60's). Even Michel Goulet (of course they were more artists from Quebec than anywhere else in canada, go figure...) was at his most formal, with his grillage of towers and chains somewhat deprived of the everyday connotations of most of his objects. I liked the little off-who's-who's aspect of the event, which is the result of half the works being selected from an open call. One local artist, Roger Gaudreau, impressed me with his series of suspended common fences sculpted directly from slices of a large tree trunk. Nearby was a gigantic drape (more like a cape) depicting the world map made with clothe tags. It looked like a large Alighiero Boetti but that was by Josette Villeneuve, another local artist. Michael A. Robinson's minimalist assemblage of stereophonic equipments looked like an early Alexandre Castonguay (except for the additional sound work and an accompanying video of redfishes in a bocal). Marc Dulude's sculptures of water vibrating on silicone tables felt up to date with the post-vaseline status of new sculpture, while Miguel-Angel Berlanga felt oddly out of place with his stuffed head of a buffalo. Both Alan Storey and Diane Morin did not disappoint with the intricate mechanisms that they put into place. Really a fine exhibit (in a fine, homely, mansion-museum like we miss them).
In Montreal, I saw Il Modo Italiano at Museum Of Fine Arts, a huge survey of contemporary italian design, worth seeing for its Bugatti and Ponti alone. The best Montreal exhibit of the summer if you've missed it. I also loved the Resider project by Karilee Fuglem and friends, which I had written an article about but it's forgotten somewhere in my files. That was mostly happening in a rented apartment in the far ends of St-Henri (there was a part at B-312 and another at La Centrale). Speaking of St-Henri, I visited the new most-majestuous gallery in Montreal, the Parisian Laundry, for a fine sculpture show (Archipel, made in conjonction with galerie Orange, which was itself presenting mostly wall works). Again, many older formalists at work but some damn good stuff (that series of cloned white tables of all sizes by Mathieu Gaudet, or an ambitous project featuring scales and beds by Michel Archambault). I hope this gallery delivers the goods. It took time and many student exhibits before I finally got interested. Than Pierre Bourgeault was up and around in a couple places, doing better in his Deacon-esque wood sculptures than in his installation at Quartier Ephemere, that left me totally dry (an ocean of salt blocks, what else could do). In the next room was the usual sound installation by Francisco Lopez and friends (I am saying this a bit sarcastically because he is probably the artist whose art is the most often presented at Quartier), this time a sound portrait of Montreal which you are "not supposed to perceived as a sound portrait of Montreal, because that would be lame, but more like a sound portrait of urbanity in general" (the press release translated in my words). Okidoo. The Treehouse exhibit at Saydie Bronfman Centre was cute but none of the works there can rival with the Treehouse Kit from Guy Ben-Ner coming shortly to this town. I agree that the forest framed by the Centre's windows needed an hommage, but I wonder why not invite the artists to present their works in the parc itself, directly onto the trees, instead of providing pseudo-"utopian" models. I finally had a chance to visit the CCA "urban sensations" exhibit which surprisingly covered more art than I expected, mostly, alas, in the form of photo documents (ultra-large photographs, mind you). It was fun to "smell" the city, thanks to a series of large perfume bottles. Finally, there was the Brian Jungen exhibit at the Mac, which I had seen previously, and which, for the amount of people it attracted, should have been bigger. Why was the last room filled with collection art??? (sacrificing the birdhouse and other works from Jungen???). Hey, hello, this is the MAC: you guys are supposed to command new works for the artist you are retro-ing. Maybe they did that one too fast: give it another couple years and a Jungen retro will be fastidious (hopefully). The MAC is also presenting Pascal Grandmaison, which seems to borrow from various sources, like Genevieve Cadieux, Bruce Nauman, David Blatherwick, recent Rodney Graham (whirling gems), I even see some Jocelyne Alloucherie, and so on, in his extremely clinical works which are for my taste over-simplified, bereft-of-humor takes on very basic aspects of form (specifically photographic). Some would call this a psychosocial, humanized version of conceptual minimalism but it left me cold (either the works are too theoretically blunt to offer me substance to reflect on ("my subject is boring, this photo is in fact a perceptual "screen", did you realize?"), or they speak of the precarity of human condition in affected ways ("beware my bubble the glass as I'm an antisocial fragile soul..")), but just towards the very end, finally there was some art that redeemed him, the quite cool abstract shots of border of shoes, to put in the same category as recent art by Wolfgang Tillmans. The best at the Mac was still the selection of music video-clips in the basement.
Well, that's about it.
Everything else, I missed (ok, maybe add to this a little stroll
for some public art on Mont-Royal street).
I will be back at the end of Autumn to tell about the little
I will be seeing this season (I'm sure this will include the Mass Moca
and Rodney Graham at the MAC).
I promissed the good lord to start an art career if I make it
through my health blockages (because somewhere I think I should've
but never did out of being too lazy and having too much fun watching
others do it), and it is probable that if all goes fine I will start
with a little something during the Rodney Graham show, because he has
been influential to me, and that would be sort of symbolic for me to start
just when he has his retro in town. Lol, I feel totally obliged to do this.
I mean, obligated. I'm right at this point now, totally on the edge.
Cheers,
Cedric Caspesyan
centiment@hotmail.com
PS: while I am absent from this blog I reply frequently on other blogs,
as I enjoy the passivity of letting others decide the subject of discussion.
I write mostly on Edward Winkleman's blog as I enjoy the activity there (many repliers), but I am sometimes on Simpleposie (will be back) and other places.
posted by Cedric at 5:39 PM
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