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Lorna Mills and Sally McKay
Digital Media Tree this blog's archive OVVLvverk Lorna Mills: Artworks / Persona Volare / contact Sally McKay: GIFS / cv and contact |
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R.M. Vaughan's Top Five Disappointments of 2010 (it was such a disappointing year, I can't even come up with 10)
The Death of Gary Coleman
I always supposed that Gary Coleman would have a comeback - get a talk show, or a radio show, or a recurring part in an HBO series. Something. He was due: producers made millions off of him, but his parents stole his money, and then he tried to be a rapper and then he tried to be a preacher (and if you can't make money being a preacher in America, you are truly cursed). He married unwisely, and, of course, did not grow to an adult height.
The Elizabeths (Taylor and Windsor) continue to disappoint. They are just full of life.
Prince Harry
Speaking of the Windsors, Prince Harry is obviously on some very tight leash (maybe the Queen looked fish-eyed at him and made vague references to Parisian traffic?). He has not fallen in front of a cell phone camera red-nosed drunk, or in a Nazi costume, nor been photographed playing nipple bingo with his army buddies, all year long. Harry, Harry, Harry - you have a life of complete irrelevance awaiting you, why are you not acting like the wastrel you were bred to be? At least get caught with a tranny tart in 2011. You have a duty to your subjects.
Art World Crybabies
As at least 12 of you have noticed, I've taken to writing about art for The Globe and Mail. It's a nice job, for a people person such as myself - but, yikes, the hate mail! I can write the word "genius" next to an artist's name 99 times, and then finish off with the word "probably", and I'll get weeks and weeks of cunty emails. As Sky Gilbert once said to me, "what would these people do if they were in theatre, where an entire career can be destroyed by one 300 word review, written past the author's bedtime, in haste for the morning edition?" Indeed. In my own sad little enterprises, I've gotten the five stars and I've gotten the zero stars. On the latter occasions, I had a nice little cry and then carried on. But then, I'm an Atlantic Canadian. We fetishize disappointment.
The Departure of Nadja Sayej
Oh, now, stop it, stop yer fussin'. You know you watch her Artstars* videos, you know they make you laugh. And yet, you ran her out of town (see paragraph above). Say what you like about Nadja's journalistic practice, but she started a long-overdue conversation about the too ponderous tone of art reckoning in Toronto. Now she's doing it in Berlin - because that's what we do in Toronto, we drive all the clever people off the continent. Funny thing is, if she ever comes back, all you bitches will be clawing for her attentions, because she'll have been Berlinified, and you're nothing but a pack of whiny colonial neurotics. There, I fucking said it.
Democracy
The batteries are low. Not dead, but low, vole-belly low. For instance, in the recent civic election, I realized, as I sat behind the cardboard and made my marks, that I was voting for two gay men, neither of whom I actually wanted to represent me, in order to block the possible (and, it turned out, inevitable) win of two heterosexuals I really did not want to represent me. A pity date is not social progress.
Ross Angus Macaulay and Marlaina Buch' s Top 20/10 List (in no particular order)
FASTWURMS - Hood Woad at the Ministry of Casual Living, Victoria
The presence of a billboard sized, hot pink pentagram flag only upset one retirement party.
Die Antwoord - Launch of $O$ album, Commodore Ballroom, Vancouver
There's nothing hard to understand about Die Antwoord, people. They're from South Africa. Things work a bit differently there.
Ryan Trecartin - Any Ever at the Power Plant, Toronto
Your average day on Robson Street, now in contemporary art format for greater digestibility.
Alexis Gideon - Video Musics II: Sun Wu-Kong at Disjecta, Portland
Journey to the West related through the mediums acid rock and animation to a packed house in a post-war (does post-war even mean anything in America?) Portland burrough for five bucks.
Alison Pebworth - Beautiful Possibility, across Canada and the US
An entirely self-produced touring project as finely crafted and considered as Alison's handmade pioneeress outfits.
Adventure Time - The Cartoon Network, Everywhere
Stoner Bear/Man producer rolls out a charming, hazardous world charted by adorable protagonists surprisingly free of moral rectitude.
VanHalentine's Day Dance - Ministry of Casual Living, Victoria
IF YOU'RE NOT DANCING, YOU'RE GARBAGE.
Joon-ho Bong, Mother - at the Bloor Cinema? Toronto
DIY acupuncture and revenge.
Ross Macaulay and Luey McQuaid duet "Fire in the Disco" - Thanksgiving Day, The Astoria, Vancouver
The pregnant bartender says, "I think my baby likes this song."
Meatpaper Magazine - Issue 12, picked up in Portland
Did you know - dressing up your placenta used to be common practice?!
illustration by Emily L. Eibel
| Gabrielle Moser's Top Ten 1. Oliver Husain at the Art Gallery of York University  Photos by Cheryl O'Brien I think this is the first show I saw in 2010, and it set the bar pretty high. I love Husain's playful installations which combine unexpected, seemingly fragile materials with beautiful video pieces and audience interaction (The fan! The balloons! The scarves!). The AGYU solo show was impossible to explain to other people, and yet I kept talking about it all year. I still haven't caught his new solo show currently up at Susan Hobbs, but it is first on my post-comps viewing list. 2. "To Be Real," Althea Thauberger, Lars Laumann, Helen Reed, Prefix ICA, curated by Rose Bouthillier  Althea Thauberger This group show on art, ethnography and fandom, curated by recent OCAD Criticism and Curatorial Practice grad Rose Bouthillier, hit just the right mix of earnest and ironic for me. It was nice to see Althea Thauberger's work in Toronto, which seems to happen rarely, and to see Lars Laumann's very strange Berlinmuren put into conversation with Helen Reed's fantastic co-production with a bunch of Twin Peaks fan fiction writers (it helped that I was also re-watching Twin Peaks from the beginning at the same time). 3. Ryan Trecartin at the Power Plant, curated by Helena Reckitt and Jon Davies 
I usually have video art attention deficiency problems and find it difficult to sit through anything longer than 7 minutes, but I had to be pulled away from the beds, airline seats, picnic tables and bleachers that populated Trecartin's show at The Power Plant. The solo show was a big scoop for the gallery and, whether you love or hate Trecartin's frenetic, over-the-top productions, you couldn't deny that this seemed like an "important," truly international-caliber show. And, as Terence Dick pointed out in his list, after seeing so much work these past two years that was historiographic and obsessed with the past, it was refreshing to see an artist whose aesthetic seemed to herald something about the present/future. 4. "No Soul for Sale: A festival of independents" at the Tate Modern, curated by Maurizio Cattelan and curators Cecilia Alemani and Massimiliano Gioni  Black Dogs I caught this exhibition over two days at the Tate Modern while I was living in London. It marked the 10th anniversary of Tate Modern and invited more than 70 artist-run centres and non-profit/independent arts organizations to co-habitate in the Turbine Hall. The event was not without its political and organizational problems, such as a lack of artist fees or travel funding (some of them are outlined on Black Dogs' website, which used the event to discuss the implications of an "independent" event in a large institution like the Tate: http://www.black-dogs.org/index.php?/recent-current/how-not-to-sell-your-soul-at-tate-modern/), but it was also unlike anything I have ever seen before, and wandering amongst so many exhibits and events from all over the world did drive home the point that incredible things are happening in artist-run culture, in spite of (or because of) increased neoliberal pressures. 5. Wangechi Mutu at the Art Gallery of Ontario, curated by David Moos (I think?)  Maybe the biggest surprise of 2010 for me was Wangechi Mutu's solo show at the AGO, "This You Call Civilization?". After reading many critics' responses to her work, which can be a bit over-the-top (the pock-marked walls, for instance, were a bit much for me), I didn't expect to like the show, but Mutu's large-scale collage works, especially the ones that incorporate medical diagrams of women's reproductive "ailments", were both comical and icky. 6. Tacita Dean's "Craneway Event" at Gallery TPW, curated by Kim Simon  A co-presentation with the Images festival, this 16mm film that charts several days' rehearsal of Merce Cunningham's "Craneway Event" dance performance was more watchable and engaging than every commercial movie I saw this year. I brought several people to see it during its all-too-short run and kudos should be given to Kim Simon for bringing Dean's work to Toronto and presenting it with just the right amount of reserve. 7. Katie Bethune-Leamen at MKG127  I loved Bethune-Leamen's wacky mix of Victorian arctic explorers, experimental orchestral synth-pop, dazzle camouflage and Cold War spies. Her videos, sculptures and paintings were gorgeous to contemplate on their own, but also offered up more nuanced, layered meanings the longer you stayed with them and the more background research you unearthed about her references. 8. Ken Lum at Vancouver Art Gallery Offsite  Lum's from shangri-la to shangri-la seemed the perfect, subtle commentary on the effects of the 2010 Winter Olympic Games on Vancouver, recreating several shacks from the Maplewood Mudflats–the site of 1960s artistic radicalism on the city's North Shore where Malcolm Lowry and Tom Burrows both created work–at the Vancouver Art Gallery's "Offsite" location at the base of the city's largest building, a luxury hotel/condo complex called The Shangri-La. Whether you drove by it on your way to the North Shore, or saw it up-close, it was an understated reminder of the city's trajectory through urban development. 9. "Un-homely" at Oakville Galleries, curated by Matthew Hyland  Shana Moulton This two-site group show on the feminist uncanny was a pleasant reminder of what Oakville can do when it tackles a great combination of works in an original way (the Centennial location has never looked so different). Standouts were Paulette Phillips' new video work, seeing Martha Rosler's "Semiotics of the Kitchen" in larger-than-life scale and getting to watch Shana Moulton's "Whispering Pines" series in full. I'm already looking forward to the other exhibitions in the gallery's three-year series of feminist projects. 10. My favourite art discoveries of this year: Karen Asher's photography, Margaux Williamson, Carl Wilson and Chris Randle's blog Back to the World, Ryan Trecartin's list of inspirations/directions for his W magazine spread, "Studies in Motion" by the Electric Theatre Company, Bravo's "Work of Art" reality TV disaster, and the realization that NFL football makes pretty great animated gifs. |
Sunday - Miss Piggy
Woman w/ Raquel Welch
Never on a Sunday
Fuck the Pain Away
Joe McKay's top video game stuff of 2010
Minecraft
If you’ve ever said, “modern games are obsessed with graphics at the expense of innovative gameplay” and/or “sandbox games offer such promise yet never seem to really let you explore, interact and create in a fun way” then you must play minecraft. In fact, it’s about to come out of Alpha and go into Beta on the 20th which will mean a higher price so now is really the time.
You need to learn the basics (surviving your first night, finding coal and crafting) — http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Minecraft_Wiki — but I’d recommend against watching too many youtube videos (there are zillions) and explore the game on your own. Seriously - dude - this game is “emergent gameplay” at its fucking best.
Survivor mode is the only way to play, btw. All other modes are for posers.
Limbo
You’ll need to be on the Xbox, and you’ll need to have the xBox Live, but if you have all that get a download of Limbo. It’s a puzzle based side scroller with real innovative level design. You will die, a lot, and there’s real comedy/horror when you do.
Red Dead Redemption
The West done right (mostly). Rockstar realized that in the end, story is what makes a good western not horses and guns. A story about redemption and revenge and stuff. It’s the first GTA game that I actually finished, and the first game with cut scenes that I never skipped. Second best video game of the year (although I didn’t play Reach, Left 4 Dead 2, Masse effect 2, Grand Tourismo, or the new Need for Speed, so I’m not exactly an authority).
Peggle on the iphone
I’m still not sold on the iphone as a gaming device, but peggle was pretty fun.
HAWP
Hey Ashley Whatcha Playing is a very clever video-cast about games by brother and sister duo Anthony and Ashly Burch.
If you need to watch just one try this. It doesn't require any video game knowledge to get the jokes.
TRON (original)
In anticipation of having my childhood candy coated and turned 3D, I watched the original TRON again. My thesis has been that a remake will be impossible because the original was actually a crappy movie and our love for it is based on geeky nostalgia not actual movie goodness. But I was wrong. TRON is great! (Apologies and a hat tip out to Marisa - you were right, I was wrong, don't get used to it). There’s some seriously weird stuff in this movie and it handles the virtual world shenanigans with tongue in cheek cleverness, and NOT the naive 80’s optimism I was remembering. It’s refreshing to see after all the super seriousness post-cyberpunk Matrix / dark City / Johnny Mnemonic stuff that came later. Plus the graphics have that "they will never be this good again" feel vector graphics give you. It's hard to describe, but you can bet the new one is going to be ugly in comparison.
