NEWSgrist - where spin is art

Closings (West Village) 237

Closings (West Village) 237, originally uploaded by Joy Garnett (archive).

Pass the Bill and Take a Pill

via NYTimes Op-Ed Columnist:

Pass the Bill
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: December 17, 2009

A message to progressives: By all means, hang Senator Joe Lieberman in effigy. Declare that you’re disappointed in and/or disgusted with President Obama. Demand a change in Senate rules that, combined with the Republican strategy of total obstructionism, are in the process of making America ungovernable.

But meanwhile, pass the health care bill.

Yes, the filibuster-imposed need to get votes from “centrist” senators has led to a bill that falls a long way short of ideal. Worse, some of those senators seem motivated largely by a desire to protect the interests of insurance companies — with the possible exception of Mr. Lieberman, who seems motivated by sheer spite.

But let’s all take a deep breath, and consider just how much good this bill would do, if passed — and how much better it would be than anything that seemed possible just a few years ago. With all its flaws, the Senate health bill would be the biggest expansion of the social safety net since Medicare, greatly improving the lives of millions. Getting this bill would be much, much better than watching health care reform fail.

At its core, the bill would do two things. First, it would prohibit discrimination by insurance companies on the basis of medical condition or history: Americans could no longer be denied health insurance because of a pre-existing condition, or have their insurance canceled when they get sick. Second, the bill would provide substantial financial aid to those who don’t get insurance through their employers, as well as tax breaks for small employers that do provide insurance.

All of this would be paid for in large part with the first serious effort ever to rein in rising health care costs.

The result would be a huge increase in the availability and affordability of health insurance, with more than 30 million Americans gaining coverage, and premiums for lower-income and lower-middle-income Americans falling dramatically. That’s an immense change from where we were just a few years ago: remember, not long ago the Bush administration and its allies in Congress successfully blocked even a modest expansion of health care for children.

Bear in mind also the lessons of history: social insurance programs tend to start out highly imperfect and incomplete, but get better and more comprehensive as the years go by. Thus Social Security originally had huge gaps in coverage — and a majority of African-Americans, in particular, fell through those gaps. But it was improved over time, and it’s now the bedrock of retirement stability for the vast majority of Americans.

Look, I understand the anger here: supporting this weakened bill feels like giving in to blackmail — because it is. Or to use an even more accurate metaphor suggested by Ezra Klein of The Washington Post, we’re paying a ransom to hostage-takers. Some of us, including a majority of senators, really, really want to cover the uninsured; but to make that happen we need the votes of a handful of senators who see failure of reform as an acceptable outcome, and demand a steep price for their support.

The question, then, is whether to pay the ransom by giving in to the demands of those senators, accepting a flawed bill, or hang tough and let the hostage — that is, health reform — die.

Again, history suggests the answer. Whereas flawed social insurance programs have tended to get better over time, the story of health reform suggests that rejecting an imperfect deal in the hope of eventually getting something better is a recipe for getting nothing at all. Not to put too fine a point on it, America would be in much better shape today if Democrats had cut a deal on health care with Richard Nixon, or if Bill Clinton had cut a deal with moderate Republicans back when they still existed.

But won’t paying the ransom now encourage more hostage-taking in the future? Maybe. But the next big fight, over the future of the financial system, will be very different. If the usual suspects try to water down financial reform, I say call their bluff: there’s not much to lose, since a merely cosmetic reform, by creating a false sense of security, could well end up being worse than nothing.

Beyond that, we need to take on the way the Senate works. The filibuster, and the need for 60 votes to end debate, aren’t in the Constitution. They’re a Senate tradition, and that same tradition said that the threat of filibusters should be used sparingly. Well, Republicans have already trashed the second part of the tradition: look at a list of cloture motions over time, and you’ll see that since the G.O.P. lost control of Congress it has pursued obstructionism on a literally unprecedented scale. So it’s time to revise the rules.

But that’s for later. Right now, let’s pass the bill that’s on the table.

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HAPPY HOLIDAYS from NEWSgrist.

Whitney Biennial 2010: News + Views

Whitney Museum founder Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney

via Lindsay Pollack - art market views:

Whitney Releases 2010 Biennial Picks

Curators Francesco Bonami and Gary Carrion-Murayari have announced the list of  artists for the 2010 Whitney Biennial.  The 75th edition runs Feb. 25-May 30. Eleven of the 55 artists have appeared in previous biennials. (Watch a video of the curators reading the list of artists here).

THE LIST

via NYMag's VULTURE:

Saltz on Art’s Triumph: Women Win Slim Majority in Next Whitney Biennial

12/11/09 at 2:28 PM

An art-world wall has fallen. The list of the 55 artists to be included in the 2010 Whitney Biennial was made public this morning, and 52 percent of those artists are women. Depending on where you stand, hell has frozen over, or there’s a fissure in the force. (The 2000 Biennial was made up of 36 percent women; in 2008, it was 40 percent.) When I asked curator Francesco Bonami about the unusually high percentage of women artists in his show, he said that he and associate curator, Gary Carrion-Murayari, “didn’t look for women artists. They were just in front of our eyes. It wasn’t conscious at all.” He added that it was “misleading” to think about the upcoming Biennial “in these terms.”

Perhaps. Still, the show will include excellent, newer, below-the-radar artists like performance chaos-creator Aki Sasamoto; Jessica Jackson Hutchins, whose arrangements of objects and ceramics create contradictory cosmic and formal storms; Kate Gilmore, who has been known to smash through Sheetrock walls while wearing party dresses and high heels; and Sharon Hayes, whose 2008 performance of her reading an imaginary letter about love and war on a midtown corner at lunch hour was one of the most moving things I saw that year. Also on hand will be powerful under-knowns Babette Mangolte, Dawn Clements, Suzan Frecon, and Lorraine O’Grady, who has invaded art openings dressed in various guises, addressing issues of race and class.

The inclusion of all the women artists in this cattle call does not mean that the upcoming Biennial will be much better or worse than usual. Art exhibitions should never be about quotas. Still, in all likelihood, Bonami’s 2010 Biennial will prove once and for all that women artists are no better and no worse than their male counterparts. Once this is acknowledged, we’ll be able to get on with the business-as-usual of tearing the Whitney Biennial to shreds. Or not.

via Two Coats of paint:

Thursday, December 10, 2009

18 painters selected for 2010 Whitney Biennial

According to Carol Vogel in the NY Times, the 2010 edition of the Whitney Biennial will not only try to chronicle current goings-on in contemporary art, but it will also reflect the world at large. "In these recessionary times, the show will be smaller than it has been in recent years, with just 55 artists, down from 81 in 2008 and 100 in 2006. It will also be contained in the Whitney Museum of American Art’s home, the Marcel Breuer building, rather than spilling over into a second location, as the 2008 Biennial did when it occupied much of the Park Avenue Armory or into Central Park as other Biennials have.

"Next year’s event, which runs from Feb. 25 through May 30, is being organized by Francesco Bonami, 54, the Italian-born curator who helped put together the Rudolph Stingel retrospective at the Whitney in 2007, and Gary Carrion-Murayari, 29, a senior curatorial assistant at the museum who helped with the Biennials in 2004 and 2006."

The eighteen painters include: [LINK]

Cherry Picker at the Whitney from joy garnett on Vimeo.

Cherry Picker at the Whitney, cont'd from joy garnett on Vimeo.

Katie Holten's Tree Museum, on Art:21

LEFT: "Tree Museum," tree #6, outside the post office at 149th Street, 2008. RIGHT: Katie Holten, "Grand Concourse Street Tree at 149th Street," ink on paper, 30 x 22 inches, 2008.

via Art:21...

Tree Museum

December 10th, 2009

by Katie Holten

We invited artist Katie Holten to write about her current project, Tree Museum, a public artwork in the Bronx, New York.  — Ed.

I think it’s fair to say that Tree Museum is unlike most other recent public art projects in New York City. The scale of the project is huge and at ten miles in length, rivals that of recent blockbusters such as Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s The Gates (Central Park, 2005), Olafur Eliasson’s The New York City Waterfalls (NYC waterfronts, produced by the Public Art Fund, 2008) and PLOT: This World and Nearer Ones (Governor’s Island, produced by CREATIVE TIME, 2009). But the comparison ends there. In all other regards, the Tree Museum is a different species.

Almost invisible, the Tree Museum, which quietly opened on the Grand Concourse in the Bronx in June, makes the hidden elements of the street visible. At the root of my practice is an understanding that nature is not somewhere else. Nature is not far away on an abandoned island or in a prairie; it is everything around us, including the unforgiving city streets and the inherently urban communities of the South Bronx. These very streets are natural and this environment – our sidewalk, our block, our apartment building, and of course our street tree — is our place in the city.

The Tree Museum invites pedestrians to experience the Bronx, and New York City, in unexpected ways. One hundred street trees, from 138th Street at the southern tip of the Grand Concourse to Mosholu Parkway at the northern tip, are the points of entry to this “museum-without-walls.”  The audio guide at the core of the Tree Museum links the natural and social ecosystems. The recorded voices and stories are used sculpturally to create an artwork whose roots reach down into the history of the place, while the branches spread out and offer insights into the resilient communities, fragile ecologies, and vibrant daily scenes to be found along the street...

[read on...]

more:

The Tree Museum audioguide is now available as a podcast -

http://apps.guidebycell.com/gbc/http/Podcast.jsp?phone=7184082501

Katie Holten interviewed by Ike Sriskandarajah for Public Radio International's Living on Earth show -

http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.htm?programID=09-P13-00048&segmentID=5

Tree Museum runs through January 3, 2010

http://www.treemuseum.org

Closings (Bowery) 235

Closings (Bowery) 235, originally uploaded by Joy Garnett (archive).

Ai Weiwei: “To use art is not enough”

Ai Wei Wei photographed in Beijing last week, with the scars of his ordeal clearly visible.

via The Art newspaper:

“To use art is not enough”

Ai Weiwei on the reasons writing, blogging and tweeting on politics matters

By Chris Gill | From Art Basel Miami Beach daily edition, 3 Dec 09
Published online 3 Dec 09

Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, speaking today at Art Basel Conversations (right), is recovering from brain surgery in Munich, the result, he says, of an assault by police officers in Sichuan Province. “The operation saved my life,” he said when The Art Newspaper visited his Beijing studio just before the fair, adding that it will take around four months for him to fully recover.

Ai’s popular blog on Chinese website Sina.com has been removed, and his activities are now limited to Twitter, on which he has around 10,000 followers. “140 characters is enough—following the operation, that is all I have the attention span for,” he said. “I cannot write long articles right now.” Twitter is blocked by the government in China, so users hack into the site.

Recent topics on his prolific feed have included his ongoing struggle with Sichuan police over the assault, his research into the Sichuan earthquake, the nomination of Chinese writers for the International PEN Writers in Prison award and the recent Obama visit to China, often using strong language. The police in Sichuan have issued an official denial of his assault (Ai says he has a recording of the attack that took place against him), and the government has now launched a probe into his finances.

Describing his move into the media, Ai said: “To use art is not enough, to describe your view, in the old traditional forms, such as painting, sculpture…as a citizen you need to express your views. Writing, blogging and giving interviews is a part of that, otherwise you will very easily be misunderstood by the establishment…as long as there is power and people there will be a struggle.”

Ai grew up with his family in exile in Shihezi, on a semi-military farm camp in Xinjiang Province, in the north west of China. “[The Cultural Revolution] was nothing but frightening,” he said. “The whole society was frightening. I was born in 1957—the year my father [the poet Ai Qing] went into exile. First he was sent to the forests in north China to work, then one year later to Xinjiang, so I grew up there until I was 18 years old. During the Cultural Revolution we were sent to live in the poorest conditions as punishment. I hate to tell those stories, there is too much sentiment there. The fact is people died, were dying. My father lost his sight in one eye, he almost died several times, and I came out of there very fragile.”

Ai then went to New York. “A completely different civilisation—1980s art, German expressionism, all these kinds of things there,” he said. His career started as a painter. “In school I majored in animation and then started doing more installations or objects. I came back to China in 1993, having left in 1981.” Ai was one of the original members of the Stars Group, considered the most important movement following China’s reform process of the 1980s. “This was completely new, freedom, but the party wouldn’t let you go too far, unless there was some structure. There were struggles, there was no real understanding of contemporary life then, it was more art for art’s sake—but quite political.”

Ai said he threw away his work from that period. “I never knew I would be so successful today…I had my first show in 2004, in Bern.” Ai had already been in China for more than ten years, working on his underground book project, and had founded the China Art Archives and Warehouse gallery with Hans van Dijk. He also co-curated the Shanghai exhibition “Fuck Off” in 2000 at Eastlink Gallery, with Feng Boyi. “I was quite unhappy about some of the content [of that show], but art is not about making people happy. Not much art touches the taboo—it was ugly, bloody, violent and sickening, but not far from reality. Reality in China is at least one million times worse.”

Ai’s latest work is Sunflower Seeds, 2009, a pile of 1,000 handmade ceramic sunflower seeds. “These seeds, they are a memory of the Communist times, we would share these seeds with friends,” he said. He does not know what effect the Chinese government’s censorship on art exports (The Art Newspaper, November 2009, p1) will have on future shows he may have abroad—works for his previous two major shows this year at the Munich Haus der Kunst and Tokyo’s Mori Art Museum were shipped out of China before the rules came into place in August. “I think strategically China has come to a very crucial moment, they have to re-justify themselves, even the past 20 to 30 years are based on a kind of destructive, suicidal act. Now they are trying to reach a higher level, but I think in any society, culture should have its own rights, not to be touched by the government, not to be promoted by the government, also not to be destroyed by the government.”

For the full version of this interview, see the January issue of The Art Newspaper

Download the complete issue (PDF)

Closings (Madison Ave - 60s) 225

Closings (Madison Ave - 60s) 225, originally uploaded by Joy Garnett (archive).

Just a Spoonful of Sugar Helps the Copying Go Down!

Winslow Homer, (American, 1836-1910): Art Students & Copyists in the Louvre Gallery. 1868. Wood engraving. Page from Harper's Weekly, January 11, 1868, vol. XII, p. 25. 9 3/16 x 13 7/8 in. (23.3 x 35.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum. Gift of Harvey Isbitts. Image Via

via TechDirt:

Researchers: Copying And Imitation Is Good For Society

from the it's-damn-important dept

When we talk about intellectual property issues, many maximalists on both the copyright and patent side of things have this inherent sense that "copying" is "bad." Not just "bad," it's downright immoral. You hear words like "freeloading," "parasites," "pirates," "thieves," "copycats," etc. Yet, time and time again, when we look at industries or societies where there is less (or no) intellectual property protection, we notice something interesting: while there is definitely a lot of copying going on, it hasn't proven bad for overall innovation, and at times it's been shown to be very good for overall innovation. When we've talked about things like the chemical industry in Switzerland in the late 19th century (which was not covered by patents), there were certainly many chemical companies who focused on copying -- but there were also many who were quite innovative, and the overall impact to the economy was very strong.

The same is true if we look at the fashion industry, which does not have copyrights. It thrives without copyright protection in part because of all that copying. The copying serves a few very useful functions: first, it helps "perfect" the offering, as each "copyist" may improve on it a bit. Second, it helps diffuse the new idea throughout society, by offering it up in many places and ways that the originator was unable to. Third, it offers an element of price differentiation (the wealthy want the original/official version and pay more for it, others want the cheaper knockoffs). Fourth, it actually helps to validate the original idea (if there's a knockoff, the original must be cool). Finally, it stimulates additional brand new creativity from the original creator, who must realize that he or she cannot rest on any laurels, and needs to get to work on the next great design.

Copying serves an important function in getting new concepts out there.

And, now some researchers have started to look into it, and actually have built a model that shows society is likely better off when copying is the norm. Aaron deOliveira alerts us to the research on this, which tries to model societies with creators and innovators, and finds that society is served best when 30% of the population is involved in creating new goods, while 70% is focused on copying. Now, you can read through the full research and quibble with the methodology, but the basic premise is sound, and has been borne out in real life, in situations where copying was widely allowed. Hopefully there will be more research done in this arena, to see if this sort of modeling can be refined a bit more to take more factors into account. But, for now, this is a good place to start, and a reminder to those who seem to think that "copying" is somehow bad, that it serves a valuable part in the overall ecosystem of building and distributing innovative offerings.

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Closings (Greenwich Village) 196

Closings (Greenwich Village) 196, originally uploaded by Joy Garnett (archive).

Fun in the Sun

Image Via

via NY Mag:

Holiday in the Sun

Decadence returns to Art Basel Miami Beach this year. Is the economy back? The art world sure hopes so!

By Alexandra Peers Published Nov 20, 2009

ever mind the recession, here’s the Sex Pistols. The eight-year-old Art Basel Miami Beach Fair opens December 3, bigger than ever, when it comes to sheer floor space, and accessorized by a robust bunch of rival fairs, fashion parties, book signings, benefits, and, yes, a Sex Pistols (or what remains of them) concert on the beach. Even as the rest of the country drowns in unemployment and lessened circumstances, the period of noble abstinence for this hedonistic set is apparently over.

“Collectors can abstain for a year, but then, when it seems that you can get great things for great prices because the world has changed,” they’ll buy, says Sotheby’s contemporary-art head, Tobias Meyer. But then again, he’s also fresh from selling Warhol’s 200 One Dollar Bills for triple its high-end estimate.

For better or for worse, much of the art world is feeling flush again. Since the recent auctions did better than anybody expected, Nick Acquavella of Basel Miami star Acquavella Galleries says he’s bringing pieces ranging from $45,000 (a Lucian Freud etching) to an $8.5 million Picasso. In June, when the Art Basel fair is held in Switzerland, sales were strong. “We believe the art market is coming back,” says Basel Miami co-director Annette Schönholzer.

In a nod to the realities of the economy, Basel Miami is actually constraining some large-scale parties, says Lee Schrager of Southern Wine & Spirits, the fair’s liquor supplier and sponsor. That said, “there seem to be more non-official parties than ever this year.” Luxury goods are back on the beach. Montcler and Cartier are both hosting events. Pucci, which skipped last year, returns. Collectors are back, too: More museum groups than ever have arranged to tour the satellite Art Miami fair this year, says Nick Korniloff, its director—over a dozen.

But excess this year doesn’t really add up economically, even morally. It isn’t like everything’s really back to normal. Some satellite fairs and events have spread away from South Beach to economize. (Rooms go for $615 a night at the Delano, which is next to Basel Miami, while the Deauville, 50 blocks north, where the nada fair is being held, offered a $99 special.) As a result, the walkable, boozy art Disneyland is now more like L.A. itself, stretching nineteen and a half miles down to the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, where Larry Gagosian will show giant works by Yayoi Kusama.

Who’s paying for all this? By and large, real-estate developers whose empty towers still ring the city like Stonehenge, hotels, banks, and corporations that are betting that, good or bad times, they’ll rarely get access to a crowd this moneyed, relatively young, and globe-trotting.

While last year’s Basel Miami (and its concurrent events) was a dour affair—low on sushi, sales, and spirit—this year, there’s optimism. “This has been a very mild recession,” Gagosian said in Abu Dhabi last week. “I don’t mean to be cavalier—galleries have closed”—but he describes the situation as “manageable.”

Others are hoping that it’ll return to being, you know, about the art. “I’m looking forward to a fair where I no longer have to talk about the economy. I like talking about art much more,” says gallerist Zach Feuer. But was it ever really about the art? “Miami is really just more about a party scene,” says Jeff Koons, who’s not showing this year. And you know things are really weird when a guy who makes giant stainless-steel bunnies is the voice of restraint.