Much enjoyed the Concord Art Association’s New England Impressions III,”  the Unique Print,  March 21-May3, 2009.”

Peik Larson, Red Tree

The show,  presented on two floors in  the CAA’s lovely colonial home at 37 Lexington Road in Concord Center,   is a colorful collection of monotypes, monoprints and experimental prints composed of  fabrics, hand quilting, stamping, sandpaper, and pastel, on wood, metal, ink and paper, and combinations of the above. In the words of curator Dorothy Thompson,   the show is one in a series celebrating New England artists and printers “trying something new, breaking the rules.”

All of the works–with photos of each work and a video of the opening reception available at www.concordart.com, were stunning. My  favorites included:

Inner Courtyard

Roz Karal Ablo’s Interior Courtyard--a dramatic collage and pastel work in vibrant blues, mauves, with a little red and green thrown in. It seemed to embody the splitting of space into time, a la Duchamp, a rushing, perhaps, through what might be a structural, village courtyard composed of buildings, streets and sky– or, perhaps, an inner personal one.

Randy Garber, Cognitive Dissonance

Randy Garber’s elegant Cognitive Dissonance, composed  composed of hard and soft grand spit bite etching, wood cut transfer, monoprint on piano player scrolls.

Pastel colors, different on each side of the scrolls, are printed with abstract shapes, hands, gears, heads and other forms. The scrolls, though still,  seem to undulate, mesmorizing the viewer as s/he comes to realize that words, presented in reverse order, actually make some sense. Appear may love where ing tell no there’s.

Michael Mazur, Rocks and Water

Debra Olin, Gliki's Flight

Jeanne Williamson, Orange Construction

Jan Arabas, Bird Flu.

From its title, “Oppression and Pleasure,” I expected  the Pierre Menard Gallery’s current show of works by the feminist writer and artist Kate Millett to be  heavy-duty, in-your-face and  angry but was pleased to find,  for the most part, colorful, simple brush-strokes that looked like Japanese characters, one to a painting.  Perhaps I am slow, but it  took me awhile  to realize that each was a representation of female genitalia  or other body parts.

Kate Millett artwork

I didn’t agree with one observer who found the work overly aggressive; to me,  the paintings seemed lighthearted and whimsical–despite my interpretation of the title’s message that women’s sexuality can lead to both misery and  joy.

I did wonder, however, if the two huge black and white close-up photographs of female sex organs (from which even the staunchest of men looked away)  had been placed just over the food table to cut down on the demand for wine and chips.

The show, at 10 Arrow Street,  in Cambridge, will be up through April 12.
AMH

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group, of Cambridge, MA.

I’m not much of an opera fan, but because friend Rachel was singing in the chorus I managed to take in the final performance of this year’s  Lowell House production: Otello.

The  Verdi opera itself doesn’t have much of a story (Rachel says it cuts back on the complexity of the Shakespearean drama to the point where it’s just the villain Iago planting the lovely Desdemona’s handkerchief in the home of his rival Cassio’s home in order to provoke her husband’s Otello’s jealousy-so I found myself thinking that,  if it weren’t for the music, there wouldn’t be  much there.

But the music was spectacular. Even before the opera started,  the tuning up phase brought palpable energy and anticipation to  the audience. And throughout, the orchestra, a mix of student and professional musicians  conducted by  Channing Yu (who,  in his other life, an attending physician at a Boston teaching  hospital) played dramatical clashes and soothing lows that provided a vibrant backdrop for wonderful singing by both professional  musicians and students.

I was particularly entranced  by Andrew Young, who played the villain Iago so well that he was  booed, during his graceful bow, at the end). I felt that his powerful performance upstaged Brian Landry’s  Otello, who, along with Malynda Davis, gave excellent performances–as did a slightly weaker Andre De Mesquita, playing Cassio. The principals, who also included Ana Ugarte as Emilia, John Erban, as Lodvico, an James Liu, as Montano, and DJ Robinson, as Roderego,  were backed up by an enthusiastic (if slightly hard-to hear) chorus–including the soprano Rachel who appeared to be dressed as a boy.

I never thought I was in Venice or at the Met, but the vibrancy and professionalism of the production and the performers far surpassed what I’d expected to hear–especially  in a college dining hall.

I was happy to join  a well-deserved standing ovation offered by the sold-out crowd.

In his 3-05-09 post “Probe the Past to Protect the Future,”  Washington DC business-advocate- returned-investigative journalist Andrew Kreig says that the idea that the country should look forward without addressing the wrongs of the recent past is  “nonsense”.

He writes: As always,  justice starts by a review of the evidence. ‘Sunshine is the best disinfectant,’ Supreme Court Justice Louis Bandeis famously said. But pest control is useful too.  Either way, strong measures are required to build public confidence for legitimate initiatives on such complex questions as which companies are “too big to fail,” and which ones should pay the price for their terrible decisions.”

The media are unlikely provide much insight,  he implies.

Their income stream is increasingly dependent on affiliated businesses and not on serving subscribers. The major TV networks,  for instance, make virtually nothing form direct customer billings via cable and satellite, although many in the public naively assume that they’re being served via a “marketplace of ideas.”

In fact, traditional and new media alike depend heavily on the goodwill of government officials, plus advertising. The financial reports of the Washington Post, for instance, show that since 2007, it has been making more than ten times its revenue from its education industry affiliates as from its Post subscriptions,  new media are more entrepreneurial and increasingly broader-based in consumer appeal, many of their roots are in fairly recent federal Internet research and privatization policy–and many of their futures are highly dependent on favorable regulation, merger approval and stimulus spending.

Kreig calls for transparency in the Obama Administration’s decisionmaking process and for vigorous public pressure to ensure that current Congressional investigations into allegations of Bush Administration wrong-doing are not just for show.

I’m not anxious to delve back into the murky recent past and don’t relish the possibility of investigations, indictments, or imprisonments. Bytemperament, like Obama,  I’d rather move forward and let it all go.  But as George Santayana said, “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”  I do think it’s important to find out why things went so wrong in hopes that we never have to go through times like those–or these–again.

AMH

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA.

Hatry photo, Menard Gallery Heads and Tales

If Heide Hatry’s provocative photographic show—Heads and Tales–at the Peirre Menard Gallery, (10 Arrow St. in Cambridge) is meant to shock: it does. In fact, for a few moments,  it made me fear for the mental health of the artist, who has (beautifully–even lovingly)  photographed her sculptures portraying female victims of violent death.

Hatry, who grew up in Germany and moved to New York City in 2003,  sculpted life-sized female mannequins from clay and covered them with untreated pigskin (a cold wet sample of which is available in the gallery with the notice: “please touch”). She added raw meat for the lips and fresh pig eyes—and in some cases, flies, safety pins, and other props—creating, according to the gallery writeup, “the illusion of life where there is none”.

Hatry then photographed the mannequins—some enlarged to 20”x 30”, others more life-size, at 12” x 18”.

Viewed from afar, the photographs appear lifelike, but close up, you realize the subjects are constructs—adding physical and intellectual layers to the artist’s statements on the horrifying situations faced by many women—and on photography’s role in bringing the inanimate to life.

Hatry’s “views” are further emphasized by accompanying tales about the “women’s” lives (and deaths) as imagined by 27 writers—some of them well known feminists.

The show is well-conceived and displayed, which makes its subject matter all the more disturbing.

The exhibit, which opened Feb 13, 2009, will run through March 15. It corresponds with the release of Hatry’s book, Heads and Tales, and with readings, book signings and the premiere of a play.

AMH

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA.

After spending Friday night in jail,  today,  street artist Shepard Fairey was arraigned today in Boston for allegedly  pasting “Andre The Giant” graffiti near an entrance to the Massachusetts Turnpike and the Boston University bridge across the Charles River–nine years ago.   Fairey also countersued the Associated Press–who  sued him last week   for basing his now famous Obama “Hope” poster on a copyrighted  AP photograph.

Having seen the poster at Fairey’s opening at the Institute of Contemporary Art last week, I agree with him that the poster significantly transformed the photo (actually, I think, improved it and turned it into art)  and, thus, does not violate copyright law.  What’s more, Fairey has not sold the work–and, while he might have enhanced (and now harmed) his reputation by distributing it for free, he did not directly use it for financial gain.

The “tagging” of public places and ensuing  arrests are part and parcel of Fairey’s art.   He  and his work present a provocative and humorous challenge to authority; the bruhaha  publicizes Fairey’s image and images,  delights upstarts, and, I suppose, infuriates the powers that be. It also  promises to enlarge the coffers of Fairey,of the ICA (whose director,  Jill Medvedow recently sent out an email of support on Fairey’s behalf)  and, especially, of the lawyers.

Still,  with the world  going to rack and ruin, it’s nice to know that some people are making money– and  fun to have a new set of old issues to focus on.

AMH

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA.

Shepard Fairey and poster

Kudos to Boston’s Institute for Contemporary Art for mounting a spectacular 20-year restrospective of Shepard Fairey’s work–which opened for members on Feb. 4, 2009.

Entitled  “Supply and Demand,”  the show, which runs through August 16, 2009,  includes some 200 stickers, posters, portraits, and murals, including the now iconic Barack Obama “Hope” poster which has found its way all over the world.

The show  traces Fairy’s work  to the 1980s when, as a teenager in Charleston, South Carolina, he was attracted to counter-cultures like skateboarding and punk rock–and their stickers–and began making his own.

As a student at the Rhode Island School of Design in 1988,  Fairey instructed a friend in making a paper cut stencil using an image of Andre the Giant, who a popular figure in the World Wrestling Federation, am  ICA handout explains.  The two then paired the face with the phrase “Andre the Giant has a posse,”  and over the next six years, produced more than a million hand-printed and cut stickers, which Fairey sent to friends who posted them all over the US.

(On a huge campaign billboard, he also used one to cover the face of then-Providence mayor Buddy Cianci, who says sheepishly in an accompanying video that this disturbed him because it was defacing property. It’s all the funnier in hindsight, knowing that Cianci was later jailed on corruption charges).

Toward the end of the 1990s,  Fairey started to challenge what the ICA calls the “corporate advertising machine…He asks  us to consider whether the so-called ‘public space’ is really public.

“Most advertising takes an ‘in your face’ approach to sell or influence consumers. Fairey’s Obey giant campaign–which features the word “obey” and other slogans [on a variety of images ]sells nothing but its mysterious imagery, ambiguity and underground appeal  has made passers-by worldwide question the visual noise that crowds our streets”–as well as the insidious advertising messages used to command us.

One large room features portraits–some of which  incorporate the “obey” command.  One print portrays George W. Bush as a vampire, with blood running out of his mouth.  Other portraits feature musicians, guerilla leaders, gang members,  Muslim women, and additional political leaders.

A highlight is  Fairey’s iconic “Hope” portrait of Barack Obama, which “has spread like a virus on TV, in print and online, on t-shirts and buttons, and guerilla-style on streets all over the globe.”

The poster seems particularly poignant with Obama, now in his third week as President,   facing not only a terrible economic situation and two wars, but also the disintegration of a seemingly promising leadership team whose members betrayed him and us for personal greed.

The exhibit, co-curated by guest curator Pedro Alonzo and Emily Moore Bouillet, former assistant curator at the ICA, and sponsored by Levi-Strauss culminates with a set of four stunning, intricately designed,  murals.

Commissioned by the ICA, the murals, along with  the other components and the exhibit as a whole  are inspirational.

Not only do they each  convey provocative messages about individuals’ relationship to power and commerce,  but they  embody and communicate  an individual’s ability to  follow his creative instincts and passion to achieve artistic and, ironically,  commercial success.

*

Having arrived on time for the opening, I didn’t have to wait in line–but in a lovely wine reception on the second floor, was told that people who  got there early had to stand outside in the cold until the official opening time. in leaving, at around 8 PM, I had to cut around long, winding lines of people in the lobby who were waiting to sign in.

My only beef  was the lack of beef…the wine was fine, but my companion, Mark H. and I would have appreciated a few chips to go along with it.  Next time, I’ll definitely arrive on time–and eat before I go.

AMH

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA.

Over a brown-bag lunch at Harvard’s Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, New York Times Business  Columnist Joe Nocera opened his talk on the daunting question, “The Economy: Where Are We Headed?” with a resounding:  “I don’t know.”

He  offered background on the current (and future, he predicts) financial crisis, focusing first on the  housing foreclosure  crisis, and then on the banking industry.

Regarding housing, he suggested that– unfair as it may seem to people who didn’t buy into risky mortgages they couldn’t afford–we as an nation should bite the bullet and find ways to help those who did hold onto their homes.  One suggestion:  rather than  kick people out of foreclosed  homes, banks could rent them to the forfeiters  with an option to buy them back in five years with a 10 per cent down payment.

Regarding banking, Nocera said he sees no reason why “shareholder value” should remain the cornerstone  of banking industry strategy.  He  feels little sympathy for those who bet that they’d win big profits–up to 25 per cent–but lost, he said.

In Nocera’s view, Washington currently seems paralyzed by indecision over how to proceed.

One option  is the “bad bank,” in which the government buys all of the bad assets but that option has stalled because no one knows what the assets are worth.

Another is an  “RTC”  strategy like that used during the Savings and Loan Crisis of the  1980s,  in which the government formed the Resolution Trust Corporation to take over  banks. The RTC  allowed some to fold, and sold others, without the assets to new owners. The RTC  then gradually sold aoff the assets, with riders assuring that if the new owners made money, the government would receive a portion of the profits.  The process took ten years, Nocera said, but it worked.

While  President Obama  is confident about his ability to make decisions on many topics, the economy isn’t one of them, Nocera said.   Obama  chose  Bush holdover Tim Geitner as Treasury Secretary over former Harvard President Larry Summers mainly for personality reasons, but, Nocera predicted, Geitner is not likely to be able to move away from the thinking of the previous administration in order to come up with much needed  new options.

Nocera commented  wryly that his  blog, the Executive Suite,  has served as a clearning house for ideas on how to solve both the economic crisis–none of which appear to have been taken up by either administration.

Nocera’s latest post as of this writing is entitled” Bankers Gone Bonkers.”  It appeared on January 30, 2009 at http://executivesuite.blogs.nytimes.com/.

AMH

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA.