Image of the Day

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George Maciunas, Painting II, ca. 1950s.
On view now through March 31 at the
George Maciunas / Fluxus Foundation Gallery, NYC.
I am simultaneously repelled by this,
and find it interesting.

Image of the Day

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Willem de Ridder: European Mail-order Warehouse/Fluxshop, Winter 1964–65. From the show Thing/Thought: Fluxus Editions, 1962–1978, today through January 16, 2012, at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. More info here.

(Photo by Wim van der Linden/MAI; MoMA/Gilbert and Lila Silverman Fluxus Collection Gift)

Flux Finder

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George Maciunas, Fluxmanifesto, 1971. This was the first thing I read this morning, in an email from Maya Stendhal Gallery, one of my all-time favorites. The gallery's current show is Fluxhouse: Maciunas Prefabricated Building System: An Assessment Report and you can read and see much more on Maciunas and Fluxus here. An interesting review of the gallery's recent show Mr. Fluxus is worth a look here.

A Bullet and a Target

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The last couple of years that we lived in New York my office was just two blocks away from MoMA, and I took advantage of the proximity by signing up for art history classes that met in the museum galleries after hours. It was a great way to escape the stress of my job, and wandering around the deserted museum at night remains among my favorite NYC memories. Anyway, I had an instructor there who introduced me to UbuWeb, an online treasure trove of avant-garde and outsider art, including music, video, performance, and documentaries. It's easy to get lost and spend hours on the site...in fact, that's exactly what I did yesterday, and I'm back to share a few souvenirs.

The images above are street posters from the site's outsider art section (click to enlarge).

Here is the Cars' NSFW "Hello Again" video, directed by Andy Warhol:



And here's film footage of William Burroughs making his "shotgun paintings" somewhere in Kansas. After the film turns upside down at about 2 minutes it gets distinctly less interesting but the first couple of minutes are worth a look (could the outfit be any better?):



An excerpt from an interview with Burroughs about the paintings can also be found here.

There's lots more interesting and/or weird stuff to dig up on the site – documentaries on John Baldessari and James Turrell; Fluxus films by the likes of Yoko Ono, George Maciunas, and Nam June Paik; videos by Ryan Trecartin; Shipwreck Radio, a record created by Steven Stapleton and Colin Potter while intentionally marooned on an island north of Norway; and Images du Monde Visionnaire ("an educational film by Henri Michaux and Eric Duvivier which was produced in 1963 by the film department of Swiss pharmaceutical company Sandoz (best known for synthesizing LSD in 1938) in order to demonstrate the hallucinogenic effects of mescaline and hashish") are just the tip of the iceberg.

It can all be found at ubu.com (and New York readers can browse and register for MoMA courses here).

In Between Days

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A quick follow-up to this post on the current show at Maya Stendhal - the Chelsea gallery is currently offering four original hand-pulled 14" x 19" screenprints by Jonas Mekas, each in an edition of 300, each hand-signed, numbered, and dated, and printed on 2-ply museum board. Each print in the Summer Manifesto Portfolio, as it's called, is $4000.

It's a reasonable price, sure, but just a little much for my blood at this juncture. Still, I thought I'd post about it, because it gives me the opportunity to feature the above image, which I find very beautiful. Essentially the statement is neutral – both unsettling and calming at the same time. It's a statement of flux.


Make contact through mayastendhalgallery.com or jonasmekas.com to get more info if you want to spring for one of these babies.

Destroy All Art

I am, as my friend Head would say, SFP* that I'm not in New York to see this show. Seattle is great, lots of cool stuff going on, etc., but I am bummed to miss this, the follow-up of sorts to last April's show in the same gallery, From Fluxus to Media Art. If you, dear reader, find yourself in New York between now and July 25th, please go see this and report back:

D.I.Y.
A group exhibition featuring works on paper, film posters, diagrams, maps, charts, and documents by George Maciunas, Jonas Mekas, George Brecht, Ben Vautier, Yoko Ono, Paul Sharits, Shigeko Kubota, Chieko Shiomi, Henry Flynt, Ken Friedman, La Monte Young, and Paula Scher.

Opening reception tonight, 6-8pm

Maya Stendhal Gallery
545 West 20th Street
11am – 6pm Tuesday–Saturday

Ben Vautier Total Art Match-box, 1966

*Super Fuckin' Pissed

In Flux

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Emily and I went to the Chelsea galleries Saturday afternoon.

Mattia Biagi Rose Like a Phoenix from the Ashes at Anna Kustera

Jonas Mekas Warhol Series #1 from my favorite show of the day, From Fluxus to Media Art, at Maya Stendhal Gallery

24th Street

Also memorable: Gregory Crewdson at Luhring Augustine, Henry Darger at Andrew Edlin, Rodney Graham at 303 Gallery (mainly for the gigantic photo in the front room, which you can see on their website), and Marvin E. Newman at Silverstein Photography. Not a comprehensive sweep of the galleries but a few inspiring shows. Always a fun way to spend Saturday afternoon.