Heaven – Morgan Thorson

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Heaven is visually quite stunning. If performance simply existed for the sole purpose to be photographed, or if this happened to be a site-specific installation with a live performance component, where the audience was free to come and go and experience it on their own terms, this might have been perfect.

I was very excited to see the ps122 space transformed into something so white, yet plush, a matressy, doily, embroidred, bandaged, quilted space. From the pillars to the audience seating to the onstage sound equipment everything was transformed to fit into this new environment. As the audience was filling-in, the dancers were already in movement, setting the mood, with their slow deliberate and trance like circling of the space. This movement tableaux was quite arresting with the performers moving in and out of your consciousness.

Morgan Thorson’s pursuit of a “a real-time performance ritual” that moves from the “religious to the theatre world” is commendable. However, I’m not sure it worked. I was intrigued visually, I admired the lighting (and the haze machine) while listening to the sublime trance inducing slowcore of LOW (Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker), but overall the performance was a little too stuck on ritual and I wasn’t able to get much more out of it.

In general I think re-enactments, and experiments in liveness are great, but for many of them, when they start to go into religious, or even simply, spiritual territory, as this show does with a few overtones, as long as they are in a theater, along with us (an audience), all of their attempts at authenticity only serve to highlight the artifice of what they are doing.

october 25th – 30th
Performance Space 122
150 First Ave. at E. 9th St.
New York, New York 10009

Donald Judd Quiz

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I’m guessing the point of this quiz is to make fun of contemporary art. That’s fine, because in many ways if you make a quiz like this then you’re missing the point entirely. Not to mention the fact that a lot of contemporary art is precisely about figuring out this kind of distinction (think Andy Warchol readymades).

In any case, whew, I’m glad I don’t have to eat my words. I was able to get 100% on this. In my mind, this proves that maybe to the untrained eye Donald Judd and cheap furniture are indistinguishable, but in reality they are worlds apart! The whole reason I love Donald Judd is his perfect minimalism, and that is very hard to imitate.

Try to make the distinction yourself here.

Quote

I wanted to get to non-art, non-connotative, non-anthropomorphic, non-geometric, non, nothing, everything, but of another kind, vision, sort, from a total other reference point.

— Eva Hesse

(via Leah Wechsler on FB)

Liu Bolin

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I first saw some of his work at an exhibit of contemporary Chinese art, about a month ago, at one my favorite places to see contemporary art in Chicago, the Chicago Cultural Center. (It may not seem like it but they usually have some pretty amazing art there and it’s all free!)

I’ve said it before, but I love to have something performative in all my art no matter what the form. I find these photographs fascinating. Especially the ones where there is interaction with others and I love the foreground/background interaction that relationship creates.

I enjoy these purely from a formal perspective but his intent is quite a bit deeper. Read his statement and check out more images here: Galeries Bertin-Toublanc.

(I recently saw a post about him on the donut project, so also via them)