miscellaneous

I’ve been wanting to write but life was very busy for the past couple of months. I’ve moved to Oberlin, OH, where I’ll be teaching some very interesting classes: New Media Practices, Design as Social Process and Digital Photography. School will start in 2 weeks - I’m hoping to get some rest finally while waiting. I’ll be organizing some semi-formal artist talks in my new apartment: Sleepless Nights on Elm Street. Yea! I live on an Elm Street. More info about these gatherings and calender will come soon. I thought this is a good way of having friends come visit.

(Adbusters)

Opening Reception:
Friday, July 11, 2008
7 - 11 pm
Big Orbit Gallery, 30 Essex Street
AND
Artspace Buffalo Gallery, 1219 Main Street

Artists:
Hackworth Ashley – Brooklyn, NY
Kyong Won Bae – Buffalo, NY
Avantika Bawa – Atlanta, GA
Richie Budd – San Antonio, TX
Zoё Charlton – Baltimore, MD
Aoife Collins – London, UK
Rick Delaney – Baltimore, MD
Craig Drennen – Savannah, GA
Jacob Kassay – Brooklyn, NY
Arzu Ozkal-Telhan – Cambridge, MA
Leah Rico – Brooklyn, NY
Paul Lloyd Sargent – Brooklyn, NY
Kurt Von Voetsch – Buffalo, NY
Sarah Walko – New York, NY
Alexander Young – Buffalo, NY

Curated by Alexander Young

The Artspace Buffalo Gallery in conjunction with the Big Orbit Gallery is pleased to present the exhibition, Comfort, Burn. Culling its title from the text of William Shakespeare’s unfinished tale of fortune and misanthropy Timon of Athens; Comfort, Burn refers to a crucial moment wherein the eponymous Timon–a fallen plutocrat ailing and in exile–curses wealth, along with civilization, as a tool of hypocrisy and further condemns those who would seek or offer it. Combining regional, national, and international artists; this exhibition foregrounds both subjective comfort and the mastering of space and time offered up to the beneficiaries of the communication age and its phantasmagoria of speed and consumption. Much like the character Timon, the artworks exhibited are situated both within and against dominant cultural narratives through methods of reenactment, recombination, and reappropriation. From Paul Lloyd Sargent’s revisitation of the counter-cultural icon Abbie Hoffman as his alias Barry Freed, to Aoife Collin’s thread by thread disassembly and reassembly of common artificial flowers, and Craig Drennen’s ongoing recoding of the dramatis personae of Timon of Athens within his practice of conceptual paintings and multiples; each artist endeavors to investigate and introduce new layers of meaning and critique into both that which is familiar and that which remains concealed, inimical to casual perusal.

I’ve just finished designing a new website for Insoon Ha, a good friend of mine.
Her work is astonishing; I hope the site reflects that a little.

Anonymous Observer and Eating Disorder will roam the world in a small suit-case with the rest of the selected works. Read more:

you’re in Naoussa, Greece on these dates, go see my film “Murdered Brides” at the festival.

• 5th Naoussa International Short Film and Video Festival
8-11 May 2008, Greece

…and

if you’re in Boston on the 22nd come listen to me talking about my work. Oh! Even a very top secret new project…

• Upgrade! Boston
7:00 pm @ Studio for Interrelated Media - Massachusetts College of Art and Design
621 Huntington Avenue, Boston

(image: hurriyet.com.tr)

I feel very sad; Turkey has lost a very important woman (an actress, performance artist, example) in this very critical and difficult time for the women’s movement.

Another chance to watch Murdered Brides.

Selection of Experimental Films, Istanbul Independent Film Festival
Editors: Fatma Çolakoğlu, Eytan İpeker

February 9 | 2008 | Gato Vadio | Oporto, Portugal

“You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? Then who the hell else are you talkin’ to? You talkin’ to me? Well, I’m the only one here. Who do the fuck do you think you’re talking to? Oh, yeah? Ok.” Videolab Project is pleased to announce the beginning of what will be a monthly multimedia presentation in “Gato Vadio”, a bookstore-café, in Oporto, Portugal.

While preparing the event, due to start on February 9, important questions such as the place/specific ambiance of the bookstore were once again considered of utmost importance, thus allowing Videolab to continue to reflect on the issues that were defined during its foundation, back in 2004:

- What characterizes the language of video? - Which is the ideal place for its presentation? - Is there an ideal place?

“You talkin’ to me?”, an obvious reference to De Niro¹s talking to himself while staring at the mirror in “Taxi Driver”, is a selection of 17 videos whose main goal is to directly address the visitor/viewer. Videolab¹s intention is to make sure that the show will not use video works as some sort of decoration objects, to where the visitor/viewer may look or not. At the same time, narrative works were excluded because they would require the audience full attention. With this two requisites in mind, Videolab¹s selection of videos intends to free the works from the absolute need of the full attention mentioned above; but at the same time makes the works selected responsible for being able to attract people¹s look, be it for what they are trying to communicate, be it for the sound, or for a single image.

The 17 short films will be shown in loop during February 9, in “Gato Vadio” (Rua do Rosário, 281, Oporto, Portugal).

PROGRAMME:

“Loud and Clear” by Dietmar Krumrey | 3’ (excerto) | USA
“The State of Things” by Amelia Winger-Bearskin | 9’ | USA
“Entitled As” by Arzu Ozkal Telhan | 3′31 | Turkey/USA
”Gay?” by Jean Gabriel Périot | 2′ | France
”Packaged Goods” by Leah Meyerhoff | 1′ | USA
“Der Bewohner” by o habitante | 3′06’’ | Portugal
”Ornamental” by Anna Chiaretta Lavatelli | 1’50’’ | USA
“Baby Marleena” by Erica Eyres | 4′30 | Scotland
“Falling Down” by Jan Hakon Erichsen | 53” | Norway
”Mother look what they’ve done to me (a tribute to Amanda Lear)” by Risk Hazekamp | 5’20’’ | Netherlands
“Gender Bender Hallo” by Alison Williams | 5’17’’ | South Africa
“Perfect” by Johanna Lecklin |1′ | Finland
“O Burro” by Artur Varela | 4′ | Portugal
”Ah Pook is Here” by Philip Hunt | 6′ | United Kingdom/Germany
”Fine, Thanks” by Ruggero Mantovani | 1′50” | Italy
“Front” by Johanna Reich | 1’56’’ | Germany
“Slippy Bunny” by Corrine Bot | 5’40’’ | Netherlands