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Bill Hicks on fundamentalist Christians:
"But get this. I actually asked one of these guys: Okay – dinosaur fossils. How does that fit into your scheme of life? Let me sit down and strap in. He says: 'Dinosaur fossils? God put those here to test our faith.' Thank God I'm strapped in right now here, man. I think God put you here to test my faith, dude. You believe that? 'Uh-huh.' Does that trouble anyone here? The idea that God might be ... fucking with our heads? I have trouble sleeping with that knowledge. Some prankster God running around: 'Ho ho ho. [imitates burying fossils] We will see who believes in me now, ha ha ha. I am God, I am a prankster. I am killing Me, ho ho ho.' You know, you die and go to St. Peter: 'Did you believe in dinosaurs?' 'Well, yeah. There were fossils everywhere. [sound of trapdoor opening] Aaah!' 'You fucking idiot! Flying lizards? You're a moron. God was fucking with you!' 'It seemed so plausible! Aaah!' 'Enjoy the lake of fire, fucker!'"
Ad from the Moonie paper, the Washington Times (online edition). They had to hire this T-shirt model because the Cheeto-eating guy with the laptop sitting in his underpants in his Mom's basement wasn't quite "there" in terms of selling the product.
Mailbox
"I went to your show last Saturday at and/or [gallery in Dallas]. A very humble space.
Your work looked good, I want to see those animations on BIG
plasma flat screens hanging on the wall... acting like pseudo-paintings.
Was kinda hoping some of your molecular boxes might make the trip too."
My reply:
Humble is the new bombastic.
Actually, I'm very open to working big: If you want to buy the plasma screens and a G-5 and some high-end software to enlarge the animations, I'm into it.
Otherwise I'll keep working on a scale that doesn't make me feel like a pawn of the system.
Thanks for seeing the show. Oh, and they have a couple of product boxes
Best, Tom
Another detail from an Erika Somogyi drawing. Her show at Monya Rowe is up through Feb. 11. My previous post on the show is here.
Earth Splits Open, Spews Huge Jet of Magma into Space
Artforum Changes Small Black and White Images in Back-of-Mag Review Section to Color
But, seriously, let's talk about the reason for those little black and white photos. It was not because of some written-in-stone policy of general pretentiousness on the part of the journal (and I had a funny conversation with someone the other day who thought ex-editor Jack Bankowsky was a promoter of turgid writing, prompting me to explain that he was actually for English sentences after the impenetrable jargon excesses of the magazine's '70s and '80s).
No, the tiny image policy was meant as a gesture of respect to the artist and testament of belief in the power of the writer.
We have a tendency to see a photo reproduction and say, "Yeah, I saw that show." The bigger and more colorful the photo the more certain we think we are.
So, by making the images postage stamp-like, the magazine was saying, "Stop looking here, you idiot, listen to what the writer is telling you. And if that sounds interesting, go see the actual work next time."
I'm sure the pressure has been enormous on the part of the collectors to see color pictures of the work they're buying, made by their children.
Also, testaments to the power of the writer are no longer in vogue when increasingly the magazine asks museum professionals to do year end Top Tens (it was out of control last December). You know, the people who write catalog essays and wall labels reducing every work of art to some vaguely uplifting, socially relevant purpose.
[/rant]
"Sonar Death Ray" [mp3 removed]. Plucky minimal beats, with death ray.
Two videos from art is for the people (Ludwig Schwarz):
Untitled (Zombies), 2005. I can't stop laughing at this but I could never explain it.
Black Pepper, 2002 (watch it all the way to the end)
John Parker, "Man and Machine" [8.8 MB .mp4]
Originally produced for mutaforma's collective intelligence online project, which involved a lot of remixing of found materials. I like Parker's the best of the videos I saw. His was the only one that seemed to be thinking about the scale of the medium and grabbing the viewer/listener with some kind of strange, immediate emotional experience.
I posted the Parker and Schwarz vids because I like them, and because my Guitar Solo and Drum Machine videos are lonely and wanted a school to hang out with. I've been turning over a vain satirical post about the new Pollocks being artist/musician/video artists who work on a micro-scale.