bump in the night

The Monster Show at the Haydon Burns Library was just about what I expected it to be…slightly homespun, ragged around the edges, packed, and overall fun. The unexpected factors included pre-recorded shrieks and music, and a few zombie girls to point the way downstairs…into the basement.

Placing the show in the basement was an aesthetically and functionally (lots of walls, no distractingly teetering easels) good move. Wandering through the interconnected rooms, with steam (?) pipes overhead, there was a certain Freddy-Kruger-goes-to-artschool vibe permeating the place. Or perhaps that is the impression that you take with you if, at the height of your impressionable years (4th grade), your best friend’s older brother lets the two of you enjoy the distinct pleasures of A Nightmare on Elm Street. It was decades before I could go to bed without the door cracked to let in a little light.

Interspersed throughout the place were, of course, the works. Ranging from sweet, slightly creepy drawings to Moby Dick/Cthulhu referenced installations the work was diverse, boasting a sense of humor, and a kind of recklessness (not to be confused with carelessness) that speaks to a feeling of joy in the act of creating. It also conjured images of your favorite art(geek) friend not exercising demons, so much as reveling in that 8th grade ambition to be a comic artist: fearless, foolish, brave.

Perhaps the most startlingly solid pieces were two “portraits,” by Clay Doran, a.k.a. Squidust. The portraits, which look like zombie clowns on the third day of a five day bender, evince a easy handling of paint, satisfying mark-making, and stand on their own outside the confines of the (so-called) monster art genre.

All in all, the only downside to show (the sense of fun pervading the space was enough to buoy even pieces I'd normally stop to question), was the meth-face with the quarter-sized-herpes-sore on his upper lip. I'm always down to talk about art--with just about anyone--but when you are so high, you can't read the artist's name in the corner of the piece, I'ma back away slowly. Incidentally, he was then ready to look for Brian Gray...who I described as a short, blond guy. Who's got your back?

*pictured: Squidust vs. Globotron, courtesy urbanjacksonville; the two portraits by Doran; an owl by Grant Thornton (I think…I left my pencil and pad in the car—my apologies to any misnamed persons).

Won't Pass This Way Again

The New York Times reports that Robert Rauschenberg, the irrepressibly prolific American artist who time and again reshaped art in the 20th century, died Monday night. He was 82.

From the Times' piece: "Cage meant that people had come to see, through Mr. Rauschenberg’s efforts, not just that anything, including junk on the street, could be the stuff of art (this wasn’t itself new), but that it could be the stuff of an art aspiring to be beautiful — that there was a potential poetics even in consumer glut, which Mr. Rauschenberg celebrated. “I really feel sorry for people who think things like soap dishes or mirrors or Coke bottles are ugly,” he once said, “because they’re surrounded by things like that all day long, and it must make them miserable.”

From PBS: "Born in Port Arthur, Texas in 1925, Robert Rauschenberg imagined himself first as a minister and later as a pharmacist. It wasn't until 1947, while in the U.S. Marines that he discovered his aptitude for drawing and his interest in the artistic representation of everyday objects and people. After leaving the Marines he studied art in Paris on the G.I. Bill, but quickly became disenchanted with the European art scene. After less than a year he moved to North Carolina, where the country's most visionary artists and thinkers, such as Joseph Albers and Buckminster Fuller, were teaching at Black Mountain College. There, with artists such as dancer Merce Cunningham and musician John Cage, Rauschenberg began what was to be an artistic revolution. Soon, North Carolina country life began to seem small and he left for New York to make it as a painter. There, amidst the chaos and excitement of city life Rauschenberg realized the full extent of what he could bring to painting."

To attempt to mount a suitable eulogy for him would be a sysiphean effort. Instead, I urge you to read the Times' piece, and then go look at his work when the opportunity presents itself.

Quarter-life Crisis

On his blog, furthermucker.com, writer Miles Marshall Lewis notes that the Thriller album turns 25 this year. And that in recognition of its lasting influence, the album has been reissued with many guest artists. Yes, it's under the auspices of the gloved one's empire, and yes, if you go to his website there's a big ol' ClearChannel logo looking back at you, but if it does nothing else, it sparks a few memories.

Also Lewis has a great essay on Thriller (new and old) over at the Village Voice: http://www.villagevoice.com/music/0807,lewis,79102,22.html.

And then there's Thrillercast...a podcast with music industry insiders recalling their own Michael Jackson stories and their experiences with the album. Good stuff if you, like I, were old enough to be aware of the MJ phenom, but not old enough to be cool. http://www.michaeljackson.com/podcast

...sometimes I still practice moonwalking around the house.