l’Encyclopédie De La Performa 2011. Courtesy if the author and Art in America Magazine.

On Nov 2, as part of the Performa 11 Biennal activities,’ L’Encyclopedie de la Parole’, a French performance group dedicated  to using speech as the central element in performance, produced a series of carefully chorused Speech Pieces based on familiar spoken texts taken from political rhetoric, YouTube’s  ‘most-watched’ videos and other pop American language sources.

Unlike spoken word performances, Slams and Rants, the work here is traditional-style rehearsed composition with a group of speaker/singers and a choral conductor. And the reference to older forms is an invitation to examine the appropriated content more closely: having been elevated here in a well-rehearsed aesthetic context that reinforces the sense of nuance and care that is central to this group’s exploration into linguistic constructs.

The French appreciation of language, the significance of words and their pronunciation, of complex verbal structures in that ‘diplomatic’ language alongside the more haphazard, innovative and free-style aspects of the American use of language is a striking mix that arguably brings out the qualities of both approaches; in this case American content presented into a French style structural form.

The group is composed of Francophone and Anglophone artists singing together; the words are carefully, maybe even over-pronounced so that we fully understand them, even though there are a number of different accents involved. The effect of American language constructs that went viral in one way or another, being turned into a kind of slo-mo, fastidious chant, is humorous and then revealing in the same way as other close-ups of pop phenomena.

On one hand, the greater significance of the content is in each case distilled down to it’s bottom line essence by virtue of being re-presented in this re-focused context; on the other the vapid superficiality of some of what goes viral is also laid bare. Not least here, the way language is used to express emotion becomes almost comic when elevated to song, then repeated in chorus structure.

In a sense, the emphasis on language, removed from its context and sung, can be considered analogous to the use of text in visual forms: Lawrence Weiner and Jean Michel Basquiat used words and phrases to add dimension and to express the back and forth of ambiguity and meaning that language is capable of; particularly when extracted from it’s original context.

In this case Presence, the primal, electro-magnetic even of Performance, and spoken word, replace text (and language) used in 2 and 3 dimensional traditional forms, but abstracted in a parallel way: Basquiat’s use of pop phrases clipped from common usage come more to mind here than, for example, Lawrence Weiner’s more heady single word byte constructions from a content angle are comparable in the way these demand that we focus on the actual non-contextural meaning. The polished  presentation is closer to Bruce Nauman. whose blinking neon phrases and video of a clown on a toilet agonizingly moaning out the letters of the alphabet come quickly to mind.

L’Encyclopedie has here blended 2 disparate cultural practices; the informal and formal, the structured and unstructured, in a way that reveals aspects of both; they’ve mined language in ways parallel to other contemporary forms; the focus on language is a striking reminder of the  complexity  power of word, and not least when the ever expanding theoretical language around art continues to become central to the actual content of art[.]

Link here to a video of L’Encyclopedie de la Parole.

This post was contributed by David Rohn.

Aaron Holz
How do you continue telecasting a football game when you’ve just announced that John Lennon has been shot?  Howard Cosell admitted the difficulty live on Monday Night Football. How does a young artist in England enjoy reading about the party in Miami when their nation proposes cutting funding for all art colleges to zero during the same week? The “artworlds” are at odds with each other as often as the world itself.

Tracey Harnish:
The art world is a gigantic universe filled with multiple realities.  Money is thought to be the big mover in all plays of the field, but it is high passions that are the bloodline that feeds the beast.  ABMB waxes the wheel with spectacle, keeping the current electric. When the largest museum complex in the world, the Smithsonian Institute, is responsible for the repression of an art piece, it is akin to taking an axe to the wheel. Worldwide our nation makes the statement that we have little tolerance for a point of view that is called outrageous by one small politicized group that yells the loudest; the result is the art world is held hostage by ignorance.

Jason Gringler:
I don’t think art leisure is in contrast with issues effecting contemporary art; not at this juncture in time.  After all, aside from the commerce and parties, art fairs are a great way for artworks to be seen by a global community.  Although the system is flawed, it is an invaluable system. The issue around Fire in My Belly is an unfortunate incident, but as a result of the censorship, ten times as many individuals are viewing the piece through networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, Vimeo etc.. This is definitely a positive outcome.

Jonathan Viner:
I have a love/hate thing with both Miami and the DW/NPG brouhaha.  Vis-a-vis Miami:  the more private jets we can lure, the better, but yeah, it’s a cheezy scene.  But fun.  As for DW/NPG, it’s just so heavy handed, desperately political, and martyr-complexy, but you can’t help but feel for and love the poor guy, and therefor his work. Life is complicated and tragic and whatnot.  We should just soothe one another, I guess.

Nancy Oliveri
Ignorance is an essential ingredient in manipulating an electorate to vote against it’s own best interests. A powerful artwork like “Fire in My Belly” requires visual intelligence and cultural literacy from the viewer that is not cultivated in the American public education or media.  These are the same qualities that a modern Democracy requires for survival.  Contrast the intellectual and aesthetic freedom on display at the privately funded Miami Art Fair with the Smithsonian’s publicly funded censorship and there is the evidence of an intellectual, aesthetic two tier system that mirrors the greatest unequal distribution of wealth since the Depression.

Campbell Laird:
The Art World always needs some Giddy-Up & Art Basel Miami delivers the Weird, the Wacky & the Overwrought in spades. Form without content seems to rule the day but no matter the usual sweaty bankers, trust fund party-ers, famous wanka’s and seriously Rich collectors of ‘bizarro incomprehensible ginormous stuff’ indulge until they pass out prostrate & naked on a Miami beach somewhere! On and waaaay off the main Art Basel site there is a Feverish mix of Art, Music, Innovation, Technology and Cocksmenship! Whats not to love! Gird thy Loins! Get down there! and Kick up a stinka! Art is starting to live Again Baby and not a Cleric in sight!

P. Elaine Sharpe:
Beyond the fact that these events shared a date in common with Day Without Art, this query is a little like comparing apples and oranges. While both involve a certain kind of contextualized perusal of the workings of art, one is free market and the other is policed by public funding. American right wing conservatives have found two targets in Wojnarowicz’s video. The more convenient subject is the one of ants crawling on a crucifix, a benign event which happens in cemeteries around the world every day. The less-discussed but more likely culprit in the object/revulsion/fear sweepstakes is the instant in which a man is finding comfort in his own staff and rod, stroking his penis. A similar video was shown in Miami at Raul Zamudio Gallery’s Scope booth. The piece (by NY-based artist Agni Zotis) is of a male curator stroking himself to climax under cover of darkness while a group of bystanders urge him on. Both these videos are arousing, stirring deep-seated fear and revulsion in equal measure with passion, and unfortunately the art worlds we inhabit are still driven by men who fear the revelation that they may not measure up. The difference is that in Basel the market controls what will be shown as opposed to artworks being censored by politicos who are self-appointed arbiters of my inner moral life.

Babs Reingold:
First things first! No artists. No art. No issues. Which in brief leads me to believe neither censorship nor the rich effect serious artists. Let’s forget for the minute knee-jerks against censorship and the outlandish 
dealings of the rich. Are they connected? Sure. Politicians 
and moneyed people seek acceptance, publicity (or notoriety), and inner-
circle massaging. In both cases, a disgustingly high degree of 
ignorance exists about contemporary art. The point, however, is not federal funding, nor parties, nor sales, though at times all are essential. Let’s not ignore the starting point. Art is first about the work.

Kathy Schnapper:
Art Basel-Miami was from its beginnings a prime mover in transforming Miami from a regional to an international art center. South Florida has been one of the areas that has been hardest hit, and slowest to recover, from the current economic recession. The success of the fair gave a much needed boost to the local economy, and will have a lasting effect as other fairs and conventions look to Miami for their future events. David Wojnarowicz’s video would have not have created a stir if it were shown in a private venue. Correctly or not, many people outside of the art world claim a ‘right’ to veto works that are shown in public, tax-payer supported venues. The censoring of this work comes at a time when civil liberties of many kinds are under assault, and we will not make headway in resolving these issues until we can discuss them within a larger social and economic context.

Mira Gerard:
Context alters the comprehension and meaning ascribed to works of art. A thoughtful and timely exhibition presented in a major museum, containing elements that may threaten those who wish to stifle ideas and expression, can stir up volatility and controversy. An art fair may easily pass unnoticed by most except for art-world insiders, art lovers, and collectors. Both are important and vital, as is every other possible venue where art can be displayed and experienced. David Wojnarowicz’s video is as powerful today as it ever was– a current, a basenote, a source of strength that will not be easily silenced[.]

This post was contributed by Thomas Hollingworth via Whitehot Magazine of Contemporary Art

Enjoy!

Art Basel Conversations | The Future of Artistic Practice | The School Makers from Art Basel on Vimeo.

Speakers | Eduardo Abaroa, Artist and Writer, Co-Founder SOMA, Mexico City
Bruce High Quality Foundation, Artists/Foundation, New York
Tania Bruguera, Political and Performance Artist, Founder and Director, Cátedra Arte de Conducta (Behavior Art Studies), Havana, Cuba
Domingo Castillo, Co-Founder of the nomadic artist-run project the end/SPRING BREAK, Miami
Piero Golia, Artist and Founder of the Mountain School of Arts, Los Angeles
Yoshua Okón, Artist, Co-Founder SOMA, Mexico City
Moderator | Hans Ulrich Obrist, Co-Director of Exhibitions and Programmes and Director of International Projects, Serpentine Gallery, London.

For a bunch of other archived footage from Art Basel Miami Beach visit www.vimeo.com/artbasel

This post was contributed by Thomas Hollingworth.

PULSE from artlurker weblog on Vimeo.

This post was contributed by Thomas Hollingworth.

If you came to this site looking for a guide to the fair week keep looking. You will not find any such information here. Instead, what you will find are honest reactions to the work and events that we have already experienced. Some may be happening tomorrow, but this is not our concern. What is our concern is to embrace the immediacy and inherent superficiality of our chosen medium to disseminate short, fast, sometimes ill-considered thoughts from a vaguely anonymous source. Part of this endeavor now includes first hand accounts of the community from behind a re-appropriated Halloween mask.

In FriendsWithYou’s Design District offices and boutique on the second floor of the Melin Building (corner of NE 39th Street and 2nd Ave) bright primary colors and elementary shapes dominate the exhibition Building Blocks and point to the usual happy, inclusive origins, but there is something palpably less-naive-than-we-have-come-to-expect from their approach and contribution to contemporary visual art to date, a shift toward something that betrays the simplicity evoked by the exhibition’s title.

Their work has always played with superstition and pareidolia, and their characters continue to serve as mirrors to the viewer, Waldorf-like catalysts for imagination, memories or self realization through play, but the proclaimed appreciation for the benign spiritual dimension that defined their process, at least until 2008, is somehow less present here.

Their aesthetic has always fallen into a vaguely Asian bracket. For better or worse this pressures the need for distinction amidst the sea of samey kawaii/anime related art/products. As they continue to work hard on that front this might be a moot point, but for the first time we saw other artists in their work, and the more we looked the more we saw.

They continue to tap into the child-like innocence thing very well – previously with a convincingly scribbled mock-incompetent aesthetic and now with more polished, almost edible creations – but this latest body of work definitely feels more grown up than elemental, as if their graphic sensibilities are hardening from their experiences with factory finished forms of steel and latex.

Our question is – because we pose questions here not point fingers – that while employing cute faced things when toying with the idea of the multiple has admittedly made for some stunning work does it seem to anyone else that the intention of this direction, in spite of the pair’s consistent ability to successfully broadcast themselves, is a predominantly commercial one masked by corporate pathos? OR do the apparent references simply point to a reverence for the Art, not just the Art World, inherent in FriendsWithYou?

After pondering this for a moment and concluding nothing is so black and white, especially in their colorful, make-believe universe, we moved down the road to check out the eagerly anticipated Rainbow City installation from FriendsWithYou, Paper magazine and Aol, hosted by Shephard Fairey and the special performance by N*E*R*D with Pharrell Williams and DJ Mia Moretti.

When it became apparent that being on the guest list still meant you had to queue for hours we hit up a few venues opposite event.

In Swamp Space, a couple of kissing booths are working to help raise funds for the local Design and Architecture Senior High school (DASH). Manned largely by hopeful young men we were lucky enough to catch the Principal of DASH, Stacy Mancuso in a three way clinch with gallery owner Oliver Sanchez and a mystery woman. As ever Swamp Space is littered with artistic gems, treasured remnants of bygone days and their artists past.

Next door in a shared studio space, Miami’s food artist Jason Hedges was serving up gruel in a gallery style setting. Less informal gatherings than installations or performances, although they are beautifully considered, Hedges’ exhibitions are equal parts informed experience, history lesson and if not always to everyone’s taste, at least consistently well prepared. A subtle element of showmanship is always affected, but the spectacle one perceives is often purely a reaction, an interesting twist of our evolution that methods once necessary for our survival are now novel. Whether the artist himself is a reactionary foodie who believes we should all return to the status quo ante is, like his recipes, as yet unknown.

In the end we never did get into Rainbow City. By the time the queue began to show signs of dying down the majority of our party had gone home to put their disappointed kids to bed, the rest remained only to be told that maximum occupancy levels had been reached. Its not surprising that being from Miami and/or knowing the organizers counts for nothing when trying to get into events like these during fair week, nor is anyone really to blame, but it does suck[.]

This post was contributed by Thomas Hollingworth.

Installation view of Between a Rock and a Soft Place featuring a hammock piece by Colin Sherrell at CasaLin.

And so it begins…after months of preparation, a few frantic weeks, and for most a 36 hour day that finally came to an end sometime yesterday afternoon, Art Basel Miami Beach is finally upon us once again. Amidst roads snarled up fancy rental cars, gaudy boutiques that seem to blob out of the dust, an influx of pasty skinned administrators and enthusiasts, graffiti bombed everything and Bert Rodriguez’s ass, this time painted silver, emblazoning just one of the usual flurry of economic, fair-centric, and largely sensationalist articles in the local press, Artlurker is drifting, sourcing and generally avoiding the hype. Last year we boycotted Basel all together, the year before that we focused on artists in their studios. This year, or rather this week, armed with passes and guest list invitations we’ll be seeking the truth behind the spin, speaking with regular people about their experiences of ABMB and hopefully making our peace with cultural tourism.

Tuesday night saw galleries in both Wynwood and the Design District throwing opening bashes, an evening which for many culminated in a bacchanal at Wynwood Walls. There were and are many good shows; Limestoned, a solo by Nicolas Lobo at Charest-Weinberg being among the best. And although we didn’t get treated to a band at the fair weather Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin, or should I say the Wynwood Art Garden, this year, it was sentimental for want of a better word to see the old/new building lit up again.

This morning was the breakfast opening of the annual outdoor exhibition space, CasaLin. As ever the catering was excellent, the atmosphere relaxed and the rum coconuts in full swing. The site specific work of New World School of the Arts students and faculty plus Joshua Levine in Between a Rock and a Soft Place, curated by Fredric Snitzer, was pretty good too. Here’s some pictures in case you plan on missing it.

A tongue in cheek tour performance of the exhibition by Patti Her and Abel Ramon greeted us as we arrived.

Cutouts by Carol Brown, this one hilariously featuring Helen L Cohen, famous Miami Herald arts critic.

Micheal Loveland’s annual chicken coop offering, this time around a metallic canoe ensemble. Thank the lord for the trees or we might have had an addition to the morning’s catering!

Another theme gathering momentum at CasaLin, the sand square. See Chad Cunha’s The Place Where Jesus and Logic Wrestled from 2009. Oh, hang on, no image on the website. Ahem.

The shed again takes on a new life through artful camouflage. Joshua Levine, I assume.

A collaborative book installation by Carol Todaro and Peter Borrebach. A round of beers for the folks at the lecterns, as Douglas Hanks of the Miami Herald would say.

In addition to showcasing Between a Rock and a Soft Place, this year was the grand unveiling of the new yard and house, a somewhat breathtaking addition to the already Eden-like space made possible by the acquisition and radical renovation and landscaping of the adjoining property. Native species from courtesy of Fairchild Tropical Gardens were then used to create a sensitive yet virtuosic botanical symphony.

According to Michael Loveland, an artist with Diana Lowenstein Fine Arts, a sculpture tutor at New World and a long time protagonist and friend of the CasaLin legacy, landscapers scoured the top soil back to the limestone, uncovering a series of magical, although now inert sink holes (see above).

After CasaLin was passed through the neighboring Fountain fair, a satellite fair that describes itself as “the installation-based exhibition of avant-garde galleries.” While the work was generally so-so, there was a great feeling to the fair, a refreshing artist-run kind of vibe that provided a welcome contrast to the hot-lamp, hard sell claustrophobia of its larger cousins. In case you’re too busy to waste your time with this kind of thing, I made this video for you.

Fountain Miami 2010 from artlurker weblog on Vimeo.

OK, that’s definitely enough sleep deprived spleen venting for one afternoon. Tonight we’ll be documenting the happenings at the FriendsWithYou event. The evening will start off with a reception at their Design District studio then move over to their expansive Rainbow City and Building Blocks installation for a concert by N*E*R*D. Maybe see you there[.]

This post was contributed by Thomas Hollingworth.

“Pure lyric is truth in rays of sun
all the flowers know it and are laughing”

-Ital Iman I

Teachings of The Rastafari

Today’s 4th Ave AG classes run like so: Morning class at 11-1230. Afternoon class at 2-430pm and practical at 4pm. Afternoon class will include a half hour of practical work after a quick break around 330pm.

If you think you would be interested in changing the existing destructive paradigm (and sweating buckets), please come by!

This post was contributed by Thomas Hollingworth.

Jimmy Clitheroe and Frank Randle courtesy of hotun.

This post was contributed by Thomas Hollingworth.

Dance sequence from the Josephine Baker film Princess Tam Tam (1935) [link]

Maya Deren’s, Ritual in Transfigured Time (1946) [link]

Maya Deren’s The Very Eye of Night (1958) [link]

Clip from Merce Cunningham’s Beach Birds for Camera (1992) [link]

A dance clip from the Bollywood film Devdas (2002) [link]

Clips from David Lachapelle’s dance documentary Rize (2005) [link]

This post was contributed by Annie Hollingsworth winner of this year’s Miami Writer’s Prize.