Reggie

Delia Brown// Mujeres Y Camaradas at D'Amelio Terras NYC

2010-09-09T20:26:25Z

Delia Brown: Mujeres Y Camaradas
September 10 - October 23, 2010
Opening Reception: Friday, September 10th, 6-8pm

D'Amelio Terras is pleased to present a new series of gouache paintings on paper by gallery artist Delia Brown. Here, in a continued exploration of the tradition of genre painting, Brown adapts the persona of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo in multiple iterations. Inspired by travels to Mexico City, as well as Los Angeles' Spanish Colonial and Mission Revival architecture, the paintings are a vibrant palette of red, magenta and turquoise, replete with traditional textiles and jewelry, set against a florid urban landscape. These images of lush interior and exterior scenes depict women dressed in quasi-traditional costume, backed by arched fireplaces, adobe walls and hacienda tile floors. Areas of expressive brushwork and dense layers of thickly applied color coexist with looser areas where graphite lines remain visible, combining Brown's painting style with the immediacy of her drawing hand.

In Brown's words:

"My work - in which I often appear - has often been criticized for its perceived narcissism. In thinking about the historical persona of Frida Kahlo, I came to realize that the main thing I envied was the late artist's complete indulgence in her own narcissistic preoccupations, and her refusal to contain her ego.

I identify with Kahlo on several points: I have also suffered from debilitating back problems for many years, I am also from mixed religious roots (like Kahlo, my father is Jewish and my mother is Christian), and, most obviously, we are both representational female painters. (I also happen to have a uni-brow, which I have disavowed with tweezers since childhood). I use role-play in my work as a means for the catharsis of fears or fearsome desires, such as the desire for children, marriage, moral decadence, or wealth. To my mind, my inner struggles have some parallels with Kahlo's, though her artistic outlet is narrowly trained, and mine tends to be more fractured, less concise (both in the variety of topics I take on as well as my tendency to mess around in mediums other than painting).

Kahlo focuses exclusively on her own image and her own pain, nearly refusing the outside world in her imaginary. For these self-representations, she has become a cultural deity for Mexico, feminist artists, and beyond. On a spontaneous trip to Mexico City in 2009, I decided to dress up like Frida and go "guerrilla lounging" (borrowing the homes of the wealthy to play house in) with friends. The idea of embodying a sacred cow - especially an ethnically and nationally specific one, not of my "own kind" - gave me tingles of nervous excitement (I wasn't sure whether what I was doing might be "very wrong", and that excited me in a similar way to smoking my first joint). Chasing our nerves with tequila, my girls and I began an exercise in masquerade and display that would become the series Mujeres y Camaradas (Women and Comrades), which we went on to continue in private homes and the streets of Los Angeles."

Mujeres y Camaradas is Brown's sixth solo exhibition at D'Amelio Terras. Brown was a participant in the 10th Biennial of Havana at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Arts in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Previous one-person exhibitions include: The Apartment, Athens, Greece; Baldwin Gallery, Aspen, CO; Il Capricorno, Venice, Italy; Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin, Paris, France; and Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles, CA.

Damien Hirst stole it and made millions

2010-09-09T15:30:29Z

"Lucky for me, when I went to art school we were a generation where we didn't have any shame about stealing other people's ideas. You call it a tribute. " Damien Hirst. ...And you get very rich doing it.

In 1995, Damien Hirst defended his work with the rationale, "It's very easy to say, 'I could have done that,' after someone's done it. But I did it. You didn't. It didn't exist until I did it."

In 2000, he decided that doing it was not the justification after all: "I don't think the hand of the artist is important on any level, because you're trying to communicate an idea."(text courtesy of Charles THomson)

In 2006, the idea of the artist was not important on any level either: "Lucky for me, when I went to art school we were a generation where we didn't have any shame about stealing other people's ideas. You call it a tribute".

In 2009, Anthony Haden-Guest interviewed Hirst: "Other artists have attacked you for using their ideas. John LeKay said the skulls were his idea. John Armleder ... was doing spot paintings. And some say Walter Robinson did the spin paintings first." Hirst's tribute was: "Fuck 'em all!"

Gives new meaning to the phrase emulate, don't imitate. If you don't know who artist John LeKay is, watch this video.

This expose video was created by Charles Thomson, co-founder of the Stuckists art group

Treehouse design// Takashi Kobayashi

2010-09-07T20:45:22Z

Architectural wunderkind Takashi Kobayashi and his innovative "Treehouse Design" create the most amazing tree sculptures. Japan, unlike America values their trees and sees them as national treasures. If you love what you see, check out David Larkin and Peter Nelson's Treehouse: The Art and Craft of Living Out on a Limb.

A message from
Takashi Kobayashi (click link to read more about his amazing work)

Sometimes I wonder where I would be now if sixteen years ago I had not moved to that small wooden apartment in the back alleys of Harajuku. I think about the living himalaya cedar I found there and the fundamentally different turns my life would surely have taken and can't help but feel the presence of some unseen power. Call it fate, call it what you will.

What exactly is it about treehouses that would so captivate a slacker like me, a man who could never devote himself to any one cause or finish anything he started? What is it in treehouses that attracts anyone? I've come to think the answer lies in the vitality of the trees themselves. Everlasting life.

Treehouse building has taken me to forests and woodlands across Japan - across the globe, and everywhere I've been, I've seen reflected in these largest and oldest of living beings the same nameless light that I've struggled to maintain within myself for so many years, the one that no one could tarnish and that never seemed to disappear. That comfort, that sense of calm, is something I'd like to share with as many people as possible. And it is with that in mind that I will continue with the one-of-a-kind rush that is treehouse creation, all the while carrying out my own personal dialogue with their hosts.

Because my companion is life itself. And as long as there are undiscovered trees still waiting...

Fashion legend Corinne Day passes away

2010-09-05T17:05:31Z

If you know Kate Moss and the FACE Magazine, you know the amazing photographs of British artist Corinne Day. Corinne passed away on Friday 27th August at 4pm peacefully at home, after a long illness.

More about her (from her website)
Corinne Day (b1965) is a British photographer whose influence on the style and perception of photography in the early 1990s has been immense. As a self taught photographer, Day brought a more hard edged documentary look to fashion image making, in which she often included biographical elements. Day is known for forming long and close relationships with many of her sitters (most famously Kate Moss), which have resulted in candid and intimate portraits. The most notable of these being the photographs of Moss in the 3rd Summer of Love editorial for the FACE magazine in 1990. Days approach as illustrated within the lifestyle and fashion magazines of the 1990s, came to be known as grunge and grew into an international style.

In 1993 Day photographed Kate Moss in her own flat for British Vogue. In the context of a fashion magazine the images appear to have a documentary feel about them and when published caused a certain frisson of discomfort.

For the following seven years Day spent much of her personal time taking photographs for her first book, Diary (Kruse Verlag, 2000), an intensely personal visual record of her life and friends. It is by turns both bleak and dispearing but it is also a tender, poetic and honest chronicle of young lives.

Corinne Day continues to take photographs for fashion magazines. She is regularly commissioned by British, Italian and Japanese Vogue. Days work has been exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery, Victoria & Albert Museum, Tate Modern, Saatchi Gallery, The Science Museum, The design Museum, Photographers Gallery, Gimpel Fils London and included in The Andy Warhol exhibition at the Whitney Museum NY.

Fashion week new faces

2010-09-05T16:21:15Z

(Cathy Horyn for New York Times) Now that we're practically on a first-name basis with Doutzen, Lakshmi and Anja, it's time we meet Bambi, Fei Fei and Kat. They are some of the new and almost-like-new faces we'll be seeing next week at the New York fashion shows.

This is crunch time for casting directors, with meetings over the weekend, as more new models arrive in town and people start making decisions about whom they want on their runways. On Thursday, after I spoke in the morning with the casting director Ashley Brokaw, whose New York clients include Narciso Rodriguez, Proenza Schouler and Rag & Bone, she reported in an e-mail message: "Just saw a girl Jessica Clarke @DNA. VERY excited about her. Classic supermodel material from New Zealand."

It's all about the "girls."

There are many casting directors working between New York and Europe, but among the top ones are Ms. Brokaw, Michelle Lee of the public relations and production firm KCD and Maida Gregori-Boina, whose clients include Calvin Klein and Jil Sander. They agreed on some -- but not all -- of the new models, and they had some thoughts about what differences to look for this season.

High on Ms. Brokaw's list are Bambi Northwood-Blyth, Melodie at Wilhelmina, Caroline Brasch Neilsen, Fei Fei Sun and Julia Nobis. She elaborated: "Fei Fei doesn't look like anyone else. She's an exceptional beauty. Caroline is the full package. She's got a great body for the shows, a beautiful face, she's smart. You can check every box. All these girls have great personality and manners. They're impressive in person."

Of Ms. Nobis, who is a bit of a tomboy, she said, "You can picture her leaving a casting and jumping on her skateboard."

Ms. Brokaw and Ms. Gregori-Boina say that clients want models with sensuality plus personality. "I think people are looking for muses, for more than a face and a body," Ms. Brokaw said. Recalling a meeting recently with the Proenza designers Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez, she said they told her they wanted to see girls with some life experience; maybe they've had a boyfriend or traveled a bit. "Things are steering away from the army casting we've seen in recent years."

Meaning the militias of blank-faced models.

Not that models won't be skinny, but there is a trend toward pouty lips, thick eyebrows, curves and, with some models, a bit of a pale androgynous look. Indeed, some of the girls recall the casting of early Raf Simons men's shows. Ms. Gregori-Boina says clients are referring to the casting of Helmut Lang, Prada and Jil Sander shows in the '90s. Among the new faces that she thinks will have a big season are Daphne Groeneveld, Iris Egbers and Hailey Clauson.

Ms. Lee of KCD suggests we might see two distinct model types this season: pouty Lolita, which certainly covers Lindsey Wixson, Barbara Palvin and Ms. Sun; and a somewhat androgynous girl, with linear proportions and striking features; maybe some freckles. Keep an eye on Chloe Memisevic, Ilva Heitmann and Kat Hessen.

Obama brings them home

2010-09-03T21:51:15Z

It's about f-king time. I want to celebrate for the troops, but at the same time I am saddened to learn that another 30,000 ground troops in Afghanistan are being deployed.

WASHINGTON -- Claiming no victory, President Barack Obama formally ended the U.S. combat role in Iraq after seven long years of bloodshed, declaring firmly Tuesday night: "It's time to turn the page." Now, he said, the nation's most urgent priority is fixing its own sickly economy. (writer: Ben Feller/ Huff Post)

From the Oval Office, where George W. Bush first announced the invasion that would come to define his presidency, Obama addressed millions who were divided over the war in his country and around the world. Fiercely opposed to the war from the start, he said the United States "has paid a huge price" to give Iraqis the chance to shape their future - a cost that now includes more than 4,400 troops dead, tens of thousands more wounded and hundreds of billions of dollars spent.

In a telling sign of the domestic troubles weighing on the United States and his own presidency, Obama turned much of the emphasis in a major war address to the dire state of U.S. joblessness. He said the Iraq war had stripped America of money needed for its own prosperity, and he called for an economic commitment at home to rival the grit and purpose of a military campaign.

In his remarks of slightly less than 20 minutes, only his second address from the Oval Office, Obama looked directly into the TV camera, hands clasped in front of him on his desk, family photos and the U.S. and presidential flags behind him. His tone was somber.

Even as he turns control of the war over to the Iraqis - and tries to cap one of the most divisive chapters in recent American history - Obama is escalating the conflict in Afghanistan. He said that winding down Iraq would allow the United States "to apply the resources necessary to go on offense" in Afghanistan, now the nation's longest war since Vietnam.

As for Iraq, for all the finality of Obama's remarks, the war is not over. More Americans are likely to die. The country is plagued by violence and political instability, and Iraqis struggle with constant shortages of electricity and water.

Obama is keeping up to 50,000 troops in Iraq for support and counterterrorism training, and the last forces are not due to leave until the end of 2011 at the latest.

As the commander in chief over a war he opposed, Obama took pains to thank troops for their sacrifice but made clear he saw the day as more the marking of a mistake ended than a mission accomplished.

He spoke of strained relations with allies, anger at home and the heaviest of wartime tolls.

Murakami added to lineup for T-day Parade

2010-09-03T18:19:24Z

(text courtesy of NYTimes blog/ Dave Itzkoff) If familiar figures like Kermit the Frog and SpongeBob SquarePants are simply too jejune for you as their larger-than-life, helium-filled representations wind their way toward Herald Square on Thanksgiving morning, the organizers of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade have added two new entrants to the 2010 lineup that they hope will appeal to more erudite tastes. Kaikai and Kiki, two weirdly cute (or is that cutely weird?) characters created by Takashi Murakami, the Japanese pop artist, are being turned into balloons that will mix it up with the traditional cartoon stars and corporate trademarks that will populate the parade's 84th annual run on Nov. 25, the parade's producers said on Thursday. (text courtesy of NYTimes blog/ Dave Itzkoff)

Kaikai, a childlike character in a rabbit costume, and Kiki, a companion with three eyes and sharp fangs, are examples of Mr. Murakami's signature superflat style, but their balloon likenesses will be about 40 feet long when completed, and about three stories tall when filled with helium. Since the spring, Macy's parade studio and Mr. Murakami and his Tokyo-based team have traded notes on two-dimensional sketches that were used to create clay models, which were then further refined and colored before the fabrication of the balloons (now underway).

Mr. Murakami will be the fourth contemporary artist in recent years to have his work translated to the Macy's parade-balloon medium, following Tom Otterness (whose upside-down Humpty Dumpty made its parade debut in 2005), Jeff Koons (whose inflatable bunny followed in 2006) and Keith Haring (whose estate contributed to a figure-with-heart balloon in 2008).

Asked in a telephone interview if Mr. Murakami's characters might be a tad unsettling for younger parade viewers, Robin Hall, the parade's executive producer said: "Fangs are very hot right now, if you've missed this trend. This is an excellent year for Murakami. And these balloons are adorable. They have a charm to them."

Mr. Murakami's sketches for the Kaikai and Kiki balloons, as well as photographs of their clay models and Mr. Murakami's work on them can be seen below:

Architect John Pawson at London Design Museum

2010-09-03T17:42:53Z

(text courtesy of Julie V. Iovine) British architect John Pawson was in town recently, conferring with a client about their new apartment in one of Richard Meier's Perry Street towers and supporting another whose film was premiering at the Museum of Modern Art. He took time out for a coffee to talk about the upcoming show of his work at the London Design Museum opening on September 22, as well as his new home for the museum--announced last month--within the repurposed Commonwealth Institute, aka the Parabola Building, a swoopy 1962 white elephant designed by RMJM in West London. (Also going on the site is a controversial Rem Koolhaas-designed apartment building.)

Pawson. (JVIovine)

Pawson beat out a list that included British familiars David Chipperfield, Haworth Tompkins, Caruso St. John Architects, Stanton Williams, Tony Fretton, and the Dutch firm Claus En Kaan Architecten. Director Deyan Sudjic, the author of several books on Pawson and a close friend (the architecture circle in the UK is pretty small and tight) said that in choosing Pawson he was sure to have an architect "who will bring out the best of this remarkable building."

Pawson has been given the job of transforming the "Parabola Building" into the new home of the London Design Museum. (Courtesy LDM)

From Pawson's description, the show Plain Space promises to be an architect's architecture show that's not academic, focusing on materials--no surprise considering the man favors four-inch-thick marble slabs for his kitchen counter and 45-foot single-plank floorboards in the parlor--and process. Plain Space will avoid show and tell through models and pre-occupancy photography in favor of a more immersive experience. "At my age, I had to ask myself, Why an exhibition now?" said Pawson. "Ten years ago, the reasons would have been more obvious, now it's more like, What's the point? For me, the answer was to make it something people will learn from, to make it something about space, to make it feel like you are walking into architecture, and to make it get across how architecture gets done."

The Novy Dvur Monastery. (Richard Davies)

Comme des Garcons SHIRT

2010-09-01T15:57:01Z

Sculpture, bear, wolf with a blowout? Who knows or cares, it's cool.

Gomorrah on the Camorra

2010-08-31T21:51:27Z

I just watched Gomorrah, which is an amazingly brutal film about the Neopolitan Mafia called the Camorra. Can u say badly dressed mobster? Wow, I now know where all that extra Christian Audigier and Fubu is going. Basically, they make the Sopranos look like a bunch of Pansies. No fancy mcMansions here, just disgusting slums. Reminded me of City of God.

The film came out in 2008 and was directed by Matteo Garrone, based on the book by Roberto Saviano. It's totally low budget and shot in a cinema verite' style. I loved the pace and saturation, so harsh and real. It was nominated for a Golden Globe and won 23 other international film awards and was made for 6 mill and grossed 34 so I guess it was a huge success. Two thumbs up- you can get it on Netflix.

The Archive of Modern Conflict curated by Martin Parr

2010-08-30T17:47:50Z

Back in the day arms dealer and all around rich sketchy art lover Adnan Khashoggi was the king of bling. Hookers came and went, nations were destroyed and Texas interior "artist" Michael Reese designed insane private jets.

text courtesy of William Oliver

Adnan Khashoggi jet interior shots by veteran airplane photographer Nick Gleis.

Selected by Martin Parr as part of his curated exhibitions at this year's Brighton Photo Biennial, the image was shot by photographer Nick Gleis in the mid 80s and forms part of a series of 15 photographs depicting dictator's, billionaire's and other megalomaniac's aesthetic sensibilities when it comes to the inside of their private jets.

"The Archive of Modern Conflict is one of the most remarkable collections of photographs I have ever come across. When I was putting together the programme for the Brighton Photo Biennial I had the image in the back of my mind, knowing that it had to be shown somehow," explains Parr.

This particular photograph was taken in the jet owned by Saudi Arabian billionaire Adnan Khashoggi. Khashoggi made his money brokering arms deals between Saudi and the US in the 70s and 80s and became infamous for his involvement in a string of scandals including one of the biggest divorce settlements in history. During the 80s he was considered the richest man in the world and conducted business almost entirely from his yacht, the worlds largest at that time. The design of the private jet was completed by renowned Texan 'interior artist' Michael Reese and featured a futurist theme with holographic arch, video projector, casino and revolving bed.

Described by Parr as "remarkable kitsch imagery that highlights a fantastic sense of bad taste and money down the drain", this photograph, and the others in the collection, allows the viewer to glimpse inside the otherwise unseen inner sanctum of the super powerful, super wealthy and very possibly super corrupt.

"These pictures are examples of the huge amounts of money that has been spent, in what are often the most impoverished continents, purely on the glory and the egos of these dictators. I mean, it's so wonderfully corrupt and disgusting, it's fantastic," says Parr.

Brighton Photo Biennial is on show at various locations throughout Brighton and Hove 2 October -14 November.

Steve McQueen/ his enduring style legacy

2010-08-29T18:50:04Z

It doesn't get any cooler. Steve McQueen is my style icon for men's styling every time. I love this William Klein photo with Peggy Moffit.

Tokyo per nuit

2010-08-29T17:55:31Z

Tokyo from my taxi

snap crackle pop 2

2010-08-26T16:28:54Z

Rural retreat

2010-08-24T16:41:37Z

I'm on Martha's Vineyard right now and I just love all the farms. Fresh eggs every morning, tomatoes and home cooked pies. You know us city folk really appreciate, the goats are really cute and friendly.