Category: Uncategorized

Romy Alizée – Je sais que tu me regardes (2016)

Originally, my thought had been to post the above side by side with this image (by fuckingfilthyminds).

My interest was contrasting the degrees of abstraction vs contextual clarity in the two images. (The above is better, the linked image diminishes context in favor of both anonymity and to encourage an experiential POV perspective for the viewer–which makes the classic cishet mistake of assuming the entire rest of the world is straight like you.)

The linked image is technically superior–the flash above isn’t overexposed in the foreground and almost over-exposed against the white wall in the background but at the same time there’s no texture whatsover in the cushions on the couch. I’d give it a pass except the way that her head bleeds out into the cushions in a way that’s just sloppy.

Unfortunately, the other blog is fairly clear about their desire not to have the images copied and posted. And the image I wanted to post is at the tail end of a post where the quality of the images is just inexcusably and narcissistically bad.

Source: the-room-got-heavy

[←] Hans Bellmer – Bound (1959); [→] Ana Mendieta – Untitled {Guanaroca [First Woman]} (1981)

I have been watching from the sidelines and even occasionally wading into the melee on the topic of the responsibilities of art and makers of art in this time and place.

It’s not that I think it’s an unimportant conversation–it’s crucial. I just don’t really understand why every time we have this conversation, it seems like it’s the first time we’re having it.

I fancy myself a bit of a curatrix–y’all likely see me as a snobby poseur; still, I’ve been thinking about Bellmer in the context of Ana Mendieta and vice versa.

The idea has sort of gotten stuck in my head that not only are they fascinating artists to juxtapose–like I could put together an entire exhibit just on the interplay between their respective deployment of gender symbolism.

However, beyond even that, I think it’s interesting the way they both strove to stand against the prevailing ethos of their time without buying into an either/or arch- dichotomy.

I sort of envision an exhibition that is a joint retrospective of their respective bodies of work presented side by side. Call it something like RESIST! Hegemony.

Alas, I don’t have the clout or gallery connections to do this and I don’t know that there’s enough critical work to back my thesis–although my gut says that there’s plenty, I’m just not yet familiar with it.

Would anyone be interested in potentially seeing such an exhibit even if it’s only ever lives on this blog?

Tweet: Jess Dweck
Image: Andrew Shurtleff/Daily Progress

First off, let’s get the context right.

In advance of the removal of a confederate statue at the University of Virginia, several thousand Nazis traveled to Charlottesville, Virginia to protest.

The image above is from Friday evening. (The caption is brilliant and hell of accurate.)

Violence marred the protests from square one. Who did what to whom is immaterial. I am very much in the pro-Nazi punching camp. (No, that is not an anti-free speech position–it’s a pro free speech which is also a position that exercising free speech almost always has consequences. And make no mistake, this entire issue on the far-right has fuck all to do with free speech and everything to do with a retrogressive desire to go back to a world where if a white man told you to sit down and shut up, you sat down and shut up unless you wanted to die. What these fuck wits want is free speech independent of any consequences–but only for themselves.)

On Saturday, anti-racist counter protestors clashed early and often with the massed Nazi scum. Shortly after noon, a Nazi drove his car at considerable speed into a group of counter protestors killing Heather Heyer and injuring dozens more.

I need you to note how The President of the United States of America responded–by condemning “egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides. On many sides.“

Let that sink in for a second. The President of the US just stated in terms free and clear of the usual GOP dog whistles that: being labeled a racist is actually more offensive than you know actual racism.

That he refused to call out White Terrorism is unsurprising–that’s sort of his thing.

Make no mistake: when 45 promised to Make America Great Again, he envisioned more or less what happened yesterday in Charlottesville, Virginia.

I hear a lot of things about how violence doesn’t solve anything and how principled non-violence is the only progressive alternative. Historically that just doesn’t track. It’s not just WWII, violence is the only language that these goddamn fucks understand.

If you see a Nazi, concuss a motherfucking Nazi.

Arno Rafael Minkkinen – Laurence, ‘Ta Cenc, Gozo, Malta (2002)

Honestly, this post should be relatively uncomplicated. If I had any sense, I’d point out that Minkkinen’s strongest work seems to always be the work that is–strictly speaking–the least original.

For example: Fosters Pond (2000) is unquestionably a riff on M. C. Escher’s Drawing Hands.

I’d characterize the above as Dalí’s Persistence of Memory + Klimt’s Water Serpents I remixed by Minkkinen.

But the idea for referring to it as a remix wouldn’t be mine; in this case, I’m borrowing it whole cloth from the most recent episode of Adam Conover’s TruTV series Adam Ruins Everything in which as the title proclaims Adam Ruins Art. (<—this link hits a paywall; you can find a pirated version of the episode on YouTube with a bit of elbow grease but here’s a link to the official upload of the segment most germane to this post.)

But there’s also a way in which this relates to other things which I’ve been thinking about a lot recently. From the prosaic: I’m really into Finnish metal–especially Circle and Oranssi Pazuzu (who I saw when they played their first show stateside earlier this year and remains the most incredible live performance I’ve ever seen). Minkkinen being Finnish as well–in case that wasn’t immediately clear.

And then two days ago I watched the recent documentary Burden focused on the life of proto-performance artist Chris Burden.

I was already super familiar with Shoot, 110 or 220–and his street lamp installation at LACMA (even if I didn’t immediately know it was his).

I found myself amazed an repulsed in equal measure. His unhinged behavior when his girlfriend broke up with him and he essentially made TV commercials to narrative revenge fantasies is extremely fucked up. His TV Hijack piece is equally fucked up but definitely maintains a rigorous self-critique that points out that the problematics are part of the point.

Still I find it interesting that he viewed himself as another historically great man of art. And frankly as much as Burden impresses me (at least in theory), I am increasingly put off by this great men of history bullshit.

There’s a great deal of current events that I didn’t/couldn’t include in the post preceding this. But whether it’s the current president using taxpayer funding to stroke his ego twice a day or an engineer at Google losing his job because he circulated a sexist as fuck and egregiously erroneous (his scientific claims about why there are fewer women in tech are bullshit, but he also implicit reifies the notion that here are only two genders) screed to his co-workers against diversity.

What we’re seeing happening in every corner of society right now is that those accustomed to privilege are having their privilege questioned/challenged and to them that feels a bit like oppression. Or, to put it even more plainly, consider James Baldwin:

Which brings me–of all places–to the current trial happening where Taylor Swift is suing a DJ who apparently groped her. I am not a TaySwif fan girl but I do have to say that her commentary and the way she is handling this situation are as scathing as they are stunning and astute.

#1450

Okay, so straight up here: if you think that the fractious realpolitik under Obama was motivated by anything other than racism–you’re a racist.

What were the prevailing faux scandals during that administration? Obama being a Muslim/not an American Citizen? (I.e. notions that were categorically repudiated throughout his tenure?) HRC’s response to Benghazi–in which how many hours of Senate testimony were heard and which the FBI investigated only to determine that nothing criminal occurred?

Basically, all they’ve got is that time Michelle Obama invited the rapper Common to the White House for a poetry event? The current administration colludes with Russia and invites Russians to the White House and conservatives a like–whatevs, at least this one isn’t black?

We have the House which conducted something in excess of 50 procedural votes to express their displeasure with the Affordable Care Act. (These votes did nothing but waste tax payers time and funds and creating gridlock.)

Oh and remember how Paul Ryan and his ilk were everywhere pissing about how the ACA was being ramrodded through after months of testimony and public debate? And then the House with an iron fisted GOP majority passes a repeal bill that’s DOA in the Senate and the Senate then decides to write one bill in secret–which fails spectacularly and another bill that they essentially wrote over a lunch break which also fails spectacularly.

So conservatives are not only racists, they are hypocrites–because they are fine with what the expressed objection to when it was against their stated interest but fine when it’s for it. Dems aren’t exactly pristine at this but there is more of a respect for precedent and the rule of law on the left. No one with a fraction of a brain can argue any differently at this point.

So what else… 45 tweeted that trans folk can no longer serve in the military because medical treatment for transition is too expensive–of course, overlooking the fact that the military spends 10x more on Viagra than it does on medical care for trans service people. (Also fuck the military, I’m not a fan. But for a president to say that trans people don’t belong is an effort to normalize hatred and bigotry against trans folk. It’s why I’m afraid to wear a dress outside and when I do dress as femme as I dare, I still get menaced by muscled cismen on subway platforms.)

The DoJ–in the same week–noted that LGBTQ folks are not protected by federal workplace discrimination protections. (Thus if you are openly gay and work for the federal government, you can be fired.) They also want to make it harder for students attending colleges to report rape/sexual assault. And with a complete straight face, Jeff Beauregard Racist Fuckface Sessions opened an investigation on whether or not affirmative action represents reverse racism. (Reverse racism which is not a real thing and never has been a real thing, ever.)

Oh yeah, and North Korea can now launch tactical nuclear strikes that could reach every major US city except Washington D.C. Yes, granted: they do not currently have a small enough warhead to fit those missiles. And yes, they probably haven’t figured out how to get their missile to navigate atmospheric re-entry; but those are all things that they’ll have ironed out within a year.

This is our world now. And I’m completely overlooking the fact of how things are rapidly degenerating in Venezuela.