Award-winning artist and teacher Kirk Stoller creates work that explores the themes of connection and support. His pieces are always auction favorites, and this year should be no exception. This colorful, adaptable piece functions as either a sculpture or a painting.
Kirk Stoller
Kirk Stoller
Rives Granade, A Minor Annoyance, Oil and Gold Leaf on Canvas
Multifaceted artist and writer Rives Granade works in painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, and video. He is noted for his portrayals of the nude, distinguished equally by their lavish treatments and curious settings. “Love Force,” his recent show at Steven Wolf Fine Arts, is a testament to this, as is this piece available in our auction on March 20.
Artist, curator, teacher, and writer Jamie Brunson has exhibited widely and prolifically since 1983. Her work has also been collected in both public and private institutions, including the San Jose Museum of Art in California. According to art critic and fiction writer Thomas Cunniff, Brunson “extends and refines traditional motifs in sophisticated ways” with a “devotional approach to art-making that is also informed by formalist tendencies.”
Jamie Brunson, Futura (2006), oil, mixed media, collage on Polyester over panel, 14" x 14"
By Stephen McMullin
There is an argument to be made that in a world gone mad, insanity is the only sane response. Shrieking hollerings from all sides — be they advertisers, newscasters, politicians or just that prick in an SUV who thinks it’s his Xenu-given right to honk his damn horn at everything that makes his eyebrow twitch in irritation for a split-second — mean that it’s always appropriate to quote the great Hunter S. Thompson’s words of wisdom: “When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.” People, people — the going has gotten weird and, thankfully, the weird have taken this call to arms seriously.
“Hm?” You might say, quite reasonably.
“Godwaffle Noise Pancakes,” is my retort.
“Oh.”
This past month, specifically Sunday the 21st of February 2010, saw SF’s port of call for experimental weirdness — The Lab — infested with noisemakers, some of whom had yet to get home after a hard Saturday night’s tequila party. Noisemakers and pancake-makers — because why not?
First of the day was Multifungi whose performance was… Well it was like… It was kind of… Um… Have a look at the video, because it defies explanation. Droning electronic noise combined with live stop-motion animation. No, this is not a joke, nor is it a drill. Awesomeness.
Next, local noisemaker Thomas Dimuzio teamed up with Pittsburg, PA’s Gregg Bielski to become, in true Power Ranger-style, Megagord 256. Yes, ‘gord’, not ‘zord’ - we’ll have no trademark issues here, thanks. Sonic texture, loop-magic and eardrum wobbling bliss ensued.
Following these two equipment-heavy acts was the stripped down Gumball Rimpoche - a man whose microphone and pedal combo proved more than the match of any amount of computerized techno-wizardry. Still not entirely sure what the hell happened, whether it was one man being meddled with or some kind of group performance piece. Either way…
Then came the first actual instrument of the day (unless you count T. Dimuzio’s keyboard - for the purposes of this blog I do not) as Windowpain Industries’ Steve whipped out a guitar to go along with his box of pedals and wires. There were fears that this was going to turn into singer-songwriter night at the Gaslight for all of about five seconds, until a screwdriver took the place of a guitar pick. Nice.
And finally, Gregg Bielski returned to centre stage, this time as Easy Bake Oven (which explains the chef jacket). Ever wondered how much noise one man and a pair of drumsticks can make? Wonder no more - the video speaks for itself. (Spoiler alert! The answer is “A lot of noise, provided he also has some form of synth-drum-loop-magic-machine-box…”)
And that, for this month, is that. We toddle off with ears bled and mind boggled and belly full of ginger-infused pancakes until next month, which will hopefully be the next time we have to be out of bed before midday on a Sunday…
Thanks to the artist and to honorary committee member Gregory Lind of Gregory Lind Gallery, one of the pieces we have in our auction this year is Limb by Seth Koen. Koen has shown widely in the U.S. and received his BA from Hampshire College in Amherst, MA and an MFA from Mills College in Oakland, CA. He has been the recipient of the Cadogan and Trefethen Fellowships, and the Jay Defeo Prize.
Seth Koen, Limb, cotton thread, plastic pellets, steel wire, mdf
Koen’s work brings a sense of play to object making, aiming to open a space for many simultaneous readings which move between the instinctual and the intellectual while connecting the functional with the transcendent.
Artwork for our auction on March 20 is starting to roll in thanks to the generosity of our arts community. Today we give you the first peek of many to come. Check out this awesome James Gobel courtesy of the artist and honorary committee member Heather Marx of Marx & Zavattero.
James Gobel, Untitled (2009), felt and acrylic on panel, 10" x 8"
According to curator Ken Pratt, “Gobel’s works — usually made as a form of beautifully crafted felt marquetry — create a camp sensual world that refers to iconography recognizable in most western gay cultures. Yet, there is something more than celebration going on here. In the construction of the images and the depiction of the characters that fill them, we are somehow invited to take stock.”
When the Love Art Laboratory came to The Lab on February 13, 2010, Annie Sprinkle and Elizabeth Stephens engaged the crowd with stories and performances about art, love, sex, breast cancer, and the environment. Below are some fantastic clips from the evening. Thanks to Ken Cory for capturing them.
In honor of Valentine’s Day, Annie Sprinkle and Elizabeth Stephens brought the Love Art Laboratory to The Lab for an evening about love, sex, the environment … and cake! Kathryn Robinson took the photos below in our Flickr slideshow. Stay tuned for video clips!
Lynn Hershman Leeson is an award-winning artist and prize-winning filmmaker based in San Francisco. Having held Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Davis and currently residing as Chair of the Film Department at the San Francisco Art Institute, Hershman has and continues to shape the practice of new generations of artists in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her entire working archive from 1966 to 2002 was acquired by Stanford University Libraries in 2004, furthering her ties to artists and scholars in the greater Bay Area. Hershman’s work is touched by a drive towards innovation across and within genres, particularly in the realm of technology. As an early pioneer of interactivity and works for the Internet, Hershman would eventually conceive a sophisticated artificial intelligence in the form of Agent Ruby, based on a character from her film Teknolust (2002). Agent Ruby exemplifies Hershman’s work not only through its cutting edge technology, but also by creating an encounter with that technology which forces us to ask, as do many of her interactive pieces, what it is we really desire from technology.
As part of our pastforward exhibition in July / August 2009, current emerging artists were asked to respond to the work of eleven Lab alum whose work has made a mark on the contemporary art landscape. Lynn Hershman Leeson was one of those eleven artists, having shown at The Lab in 1986, 1987, and 1995.
As a supplement to that show, Hershman Leeson also agreed to be interviewed by Anna Bunting for our blog. The interview follows.
You started out in the sciences, and still seem to have an interest in science, and have found ways to bring that into your artwork. What first attracted you to making art?
My family has lots of scientists in it. I did art since I can remember. It wasn’t a conscious choice. I couldn’t do anything else.
Do you think that your interests in other disciplines and kinds of knowledge have affected the ways in which you conceive of art, both when you started out and as you continue to develop?
I do think it is more holistic and interdisciplinary, because I’m interested I’m interested in everything, it seems.
You have worked in a huge variety of media, including performance, film, installation, as well as the Internet and Second Life. In your project Agent Ruby, the viewer can actually interact and talk with Agent Ruby online. Now she can also be downloaded onto a Blackberry and be carried everywhere. It is interesting to see a piece of work change as technologies change. Do you feel that current and changing technologies dictate the kind of work you are making.
Actually in several cases I extended the technology before it existed. Hyper text, artificial intelligence, touch screens extended existing possibilities.
So you would say that your work has also influenced technology as it has influenced your work. Do you see this to be true of artists and art in general?
If we are lucky we can shape technology. There is a choice to make it utopian and influence it before it influences us.
How has this progression of tools and media changed your work or the way you work? Do you feel that your ideas emerge from the ways that technology affects our lives?
In many ways yes, but the issues of identity and surveillance seem stable and constant.
From 1974 - 1978 you took on the persona of Roberta Breitmore. What was it like for you to take on a totally different persona? Did she rub off on you in any way? Do you miss her? Did becoming Roberta teach you anything about being Lynn Hershman?
Roberta was a separate person from me. She revives periodically, most recently in cyber Roberta and the Second Life avatar. Her recreation seems to happen on its own.
What do you think about the differences in the way that identity was constructed in the 1970s as opposed to now? With current things like Facebook, or the GPS tracker iPhone application it is so easy to keep very personal tabs on everyone we know. It seems harder to disappear or reinvent oneself because these social networking systems leave a public trace that’s hard to control. Do you think that a project like Roberta Breitmore would work today?
No, if I tried to make Roberta today, I’d be arrested. I made her pre-computers. She tapped too far into the system for today’s legalities. I think it is the public trace that is interesting.
You have made three feature length films…
Four, the fourth hasn’t been released yet, and I hope to make the fifth this year.
How is the process of making these different from your earlier, shorter pieces?
They are harder, take longer and cost more.
How does the production differ? Is the process different for you knowing that these films will probably have a broader audience since they can be rented or shown at film festivals and not just viewed in galleries?
No, I just try to make something relevant.
Last year you had a show through SFMOMA as well as many other museums in the bay area called Life To The Power Of Infinity. Part of this work was digitally relocating exhibition materials into a site in Second Life, creating multiple worlds for your work to exist in. Can you talk about this idea and your work with the program Second Life? What do you think are the differences for someone to encounter your work in real space as opposed to virtual space?
Life Squared is an animated archive and a model of the art museum of the future. Life Squared is an experience in an online world, a prosthetic world of avatars, their buildings and goods. It raises questions about contemporary experience: real, synthetic, mediated, technology assisted.
The objectives of this project were to use innovative technologies to investigate archives and develop new digital models for introducing new forms of active engagement with them; to create a new context for the investigation of contemporary art; to expand the audience for archives and contemporary art; and to instigate a hybrid genre through which to rework cultural archives.
Rather than conventionally digitize conventional archive items such as texts, images, movies, and than make them available in a static repository, this project seeks to invigorate the archives through immersion, interactivity and play.
You’re currently working on a documentary called the Women’s Art Revolution. Can you talk a little bit about this project?
Women Art Revolution (a Formerly Secret History) is a feature-length documentary film that annotates the evolution of the feminist art movement in the United States using intimate interviews, provocative art, and rarely seen historical film and video footage.
Women Art Revolution (a Formerly Secret History) elaborates the relationship of the feminist art movement to 1960s anti-war and civil rights movements and explains how historical events, such as the all-male protest exhibition against the invasion of Cambodia, sparked the first of many feminist actions against major cultural institutions. It details major developments in women’s art of the seventies, including the first feminist art education programs, political organizations and protests, alternative art spaces such as the A.I.R. Gallery and Franklin Furnace in New York and the Los Angeles Women’s Building, feminist art publications such as Chrysalis and Heresies, and landmark exhibitions, performances, and installations of public art that not only influenced, but actually changed, the direction and history of art.
The film also questions the idea of narrative itself, and creates a ground breaking reshaping of information through an archive being built by Stanford, which will include all of the footage and allow for cross-linking.
Do you think your work has influenced any current up-and-coming artists and if so, whose work currently do you think is picking up on your ideas and pushing them forward?
I don’t know; people do not know the extent of my work.