greg.org: the making of

DAY AFTER UPDATE: Whoa, well, then. The Hirshhorn board split and Koshalek announced his resignation by year-end. What a way to go.

While designer Liz Diller made her politico-architectural case for The Hirshhorn Bubble in her 2012 TED talk, the Museum's own justification for the project has been unclear and uncompelling.

Explanations center on making the Hirshhorn "an agent for cultural diplomacy." In February director Richard Koshalek told Kriston Capps, "This institution should be the leader in terms of setting arts and cultural dialogue. Cultural policy is set in Washington, D.C." This is debatable enough, as both mission and content.

The programming that's always discussed, though, a "Center for Creative Dialogue," involves conferences and discussions created by the Council on Foreign Relations and outside staff, not the Hirshhorn itself, or even the Smithsonian. Critics of the Bubble vision like Tyler Green note this disconnect, and that the Museum doesn't need a bubble to host such policy-flavored forums and events; they could do it right now, in the existing auditorium. And in fact, they did just that last Fall, where a capacity crowd watched TV journalist Judy Woodruff moderate a panel on "Art and Social Change" during to the Ai Weiwei exhibition.

No, The Bubble is a thing apart, apparently, from the programming that would inhabit it. Its absurdist form on this symbolic site, and the transgressive gesture towards Gordon Bunshaft's concrete donut, are meant to be self-justifying. Capps calls it "a public art stunt," and the Washington Post suggests it could "break DC from stagnation." It's starchitecture as spectacle and a catalyst for attention and, eventually, one hopes, the holy grail of Washington existence: relevance.

Meanwhile, it's amazing that until Capps' reconsideration of the project last winter in the City Paper, there was no mention of what would be, for lack of a better term, the business model: The Bubble would be a for-hire event space.

Koshalek swears the Inflatable will engage the Hirshhorn's curators, too. When the Bubble is inflated, part of its programming will correspond with whatever's lining the gallery walls of the museum. The rest of the timeshare will go to whichever universities, think tanks, and corporations rent it out--a money-making proposition for the Hirshhorn which could lead to exclusive uses not quite in keeping with Diller's civic scheme. (And certainly not with the museum's artistic mission.)

The Hirshhorn's board is scheduled to vote on whether to proceed with The Bubble, the most prominent initiative of director Richard Koshalek since he arrived at the museum in 2009.

Even though The Bubble was the subject of one of my all-time favorite posts, I have not written much about it since. I have reservations about it, but I have only wished the museum's success, and so have been willing to give the current regime the benefit of the doubt as they pursue their vision.

But that has been a vague slog, and far from a sure thing. It's remarkable that the board which hired Koshalek is apparently reluctant to support his efforts to do what they presumably hired him for: raising the profile of the Hirshhorn, and raising money for the Hirshhorn and its exhibitions, acquisitions, and educational programs.

Maybe that is because there are persistent and unaddressed issues with The Bubble and its ostensible purpose. It is true that Koshalek's stated vision for The Bubble--to host some kind of cross-disciplinary cultural forum, with content generated not by the Museum, or even the Smithsonian, but by the Council on Foreign Relations--still comes across as squishy and alarmingly unconcerned with actual art and artists. That disconnect is even more inexplicable for being unnecessary.

About The Bubble itself, though: I didn't care much either way before, but after watching Liz Diller's TED talk from March 2012, I am really starting to sour on Diller Scofidio + Renfro's design and their entire approach. Titled "A Giant Bubble for Debate," Diller's speech is the rare, unmediated, extended discussion of The Bubble by a principal. As such, it's worth a closer read.

For Diller and her client, who wants to take advantage of the Museum's unique and symbolic site "at the seat of power in America," the National Mall, "the question is, 'Is it possible, ultimately, for art to insert itself into the dialogue of national and world affairs?' and 'Could the Museum be an agent of cultural diplomacy?'" Technically that's two questions, which not only are not answered, but which beg more questions--insert itself to what end, and agent for whom?

"I blush whenever I show this," says Diller of the slide above, to laughter. "It is yours to interpret." Wait, what? So I guess she interprets this insertion into the Hirshhorn's hole as a phallus? Or given the material, I guess it could be a sex toy, or a condom? Or at least some flavor of kink, given the "study of some bondage techniques" that went into the tension cable design on the next slide?

Diller continues: "We were asked by the bureaucracy at the Mall, 'How long would it take to install?' And we said, 'The first erection will take one week.'" And if it lasts longer than that, I guess, call your architect.

Diller shows the interior space of The Bubble in use, with renderings of a panel discussion in the round; a spotlit performer; a movie screening; and a Barbara Kruger-style text projection. In every instance, the activity is the same: an audience sits and watches something happen. This "breath of democracy" turns out to be just more entertainment and spectacle. And this purportedly transgressive, iconoclastic structure does absolutely nothing to change or challenge the programs of the Mall's museums Diller just criticized, or by extension, the structures of power she pretends to subvert.

Diller's claim that her structure, built to house extravagantly ticketed events like TED, the WEF, and CFR fora, will somehow embody "the ideals of participatory democracy" is obviously nothing but hot air.

Which is still just part of the problem, seeing as how the ideals The Bubble is embodying are those of pay-to-play capitalism. More on that in the next post.

As soon as I saw these images of Marines called in to hold umbrellas over Presidents Obama and Erdogan yesterday, I laughed imagining how the Booya! diaspora of military fanbois from the previous administration would take it.

And right on cue, they declared a scandal, because male Marines do not hold umbrellas. Which, honestly.

This round goes to Obama on points. [images uncredited somehow on booyahoo! it's like the first step of their tumblr acquisition is to stop crediting image sources]

A months-long investigation by WNYC and New Jersey Public Radio into New Jersey Transit's preparedness and response to Sandy last fall has produced at least one beautiful result.

The "New Jersey Rail Operations Hurricane Plan" was provided by the state agency in response to two separate Freedom Of Information Requests from WNYC and The Record.

The three-and-one-quarter-page plan was deemed exempt from FOIA and redacted completely. I don't think it diminishes the content in any way, nor our understanding of what happened to NJ Transit and its facilities and operations during the storm. In fact, it feels to me like it explains quite a lot.

I will add it to this series of monochromes. I feel a book coming on. Information wants to be free!

How NJ Transit Failed Sandy's Test [wnyc.org]
Previously: EPIC FOIA DHS

I just saw this blog post float by on Twitter, and the title immediately made me think of Random International's Rain Room, which, of course, just opened at MoMA as part of Expo1.

It also answered the question I'd never asked until that moment: what if Walter de Maria's Earth Room and Lightning Field ever hooked up and had a kid?

"Rain Room," according to MoMAPS1, "consists of a field of falling water that visitors may walk through and experience how it might feel to control the rain." Which is amazing, because on Saturday afternoon, I was sitting in my car in Chelsea as this intense downpour passed by and pummeled everyone on the street.

Gallery walkers would huddle under the High Line until it proved too tall and useless against the windswept rain, and they'd have to evacuate to a nearby street scaffold. People also ducked into the nearest gallery, even if it was one you never go into.

The storm warning announcement just a few minutes earlier on the radio had warned of "quarter-sized hail", so I parked under the High Line to protect my windshield and paint job.

But the WNYC storm warning also included something I'd never heard before: a warning to get inside because you could be struck by lightning. Which, honestly. What are the odds? Except that when you are in the middle of a weather event like that, it does feel like your odds get immediately, exponentially better. Or worse, I guess, depending. And for people standing on a railroad in the sky, they get worse still. Statistics and logic are overwhelmed, or at least put to the test, by physical experience and emotion.

And so The Lightning Room. It is an empty gallery where lightning bolts are occasionally generated. And none of this van Graaf generator, hair-stand-on-end science fair lightning, either: it has to be real, kill-you-dead-or-at-least-fry-your-eyebrows-and-zap-your-sense-of-smell lightning.

To enter it, you have to sit through a briefing or a safety film, some kind of orientation about the deadly risks posed by possible lightning strike, and then you sign a thick waiver absolving the institution of any liability or responsibility. Maybe you sell life insurance policies on the spot.

If you had certificates for the people who went in, or even stickers, it could be too much incentive for idiots to try it, so you really can't offer anything. And of course, most people who do go into The Lightning Room are not going to get hit. Nothing'll happen at all. The point has to be, though, that something could. As Maggie Millner said in that otherwise unrelated blog post mentioned up top, "An empty space is a space full of potential."

If art can be a giddy dance room offering the technologically mediated illusion that we can control the weather, it can also be a room with a potentially deadly menace where the only control we have is over whether we enter it.

Related: John Perreault's review of Voids: A Retrospective, an exhibition at the Pompidou and Kunsthalle Bern [above] in 2009 [artopia]

Wow, the first shipment of Canal Zone Richard Prince YES RASTA 2: The Appeals Decision & The Appendix arrived, and they actually look very nice.

Which is good.

Because people are writing about it. And buying it. And it would be kind of awkward if it sucked.

Your Thievin' Art: At play in the field of fair use [artnews]
Not yet in stores: Buy Canal Zone Richard Prince YES RASTA 2: The Appeals Decision & The Appendix direct, $12.99 [createspace]

Trophy I (for Merce Cunningham) (1959), collection: Kunsthaus Zurich

Robert Rauschenberg incorporated objects and materials he found on the street to make his early combines. Trophy I (for Merce Cunningham) (1959), for example, includes a beat up sign, poster fragments, and scraps of wood.

Volon (Cardboard), 1971, is my favorite among many [image via]

In the early 70s, Rauschenberg made a series of works out of used, altered, or dismantled cardboard boxes. He created editions with Gemini G.E.L. that meticulously simulated used cardboard, which he called Cardbirds. The Menil showed these Cardboards and related works, many of which had remained in the artist's collection, in 2007.

David Hammons, Bliz-aard Ball Sale, 1983, photo: Dawoud Bey, via group a ok

In early 1983, David Hammons laid out several dozen snowballs on an Indian blanket and sold them, priced according to size, alongside the junk merchants and fences of Astor Place. Dawoud Bey came along to document the event, which, everyone seems to have reproduced the one shot over and over ever since. Here is a different angle that shows more of the work's original context. It's not clear that Hammons got any takers, or what happened to the snowballs and other materials from the piece.

via wnyc's feature tied to Orozco's 2009 MoMA retrospective

Before his 1998 show at Marian Goodman Gallery, "The Free Market is Anti-Democratic," Gabriel Orozco had already been making artworks from shit he found on the street for several years. Mostly, he'd find or make a work, and then just take a picture of it. Like Island within an island, 1993 [above]

Penske Work Project installation shot, Marian Goodman Gallery, 1998-99

For the Penske Work Project, he rented a truck and drove around Manhattan, pulling things out of dumpsters and assembling them into a sculpture on the street just long enough to take a Polaroid. Then he'd throw the stuff in the truck and drive off. The photos served as instructions for reassembling the pieces in the gallery.

Here is Penske Work Project: CD Tube, 1998, a length of scrap pipe and a stack of CD jewelboxes, from Jerry Saltz's review of the show. 1998-99 was a very tenuous time for digital imaging, it turns out. Our web history does not age well.

All of this was in my mind last night when I caught up with @therealhennessy's tweets about making a sculpture on the street and trying to sell it via Instagram. He started out straight, with a found object.

I'm gonna start selling garbage I find on the street through my Instagram. Anybody wanna by this paper... instagram.com/p/ZEEc4ZLmu9/

— Hennessy Youngman (@therealhennessy) May 8, 2013

I just dropped the price to 20$.

— Hennessy Youngman (@therealhennessy) May 8, 2013

Then he did something to it.

C'MON I'LL TOSS IN THIS MINIMAL PLANK TOO. $20! SIGNED BY ME instagram.com/p/ZEFpWvrmgt/

— Hennessy Youngman (@therealhennessy) May 8, 2013

On Friday March 22, I went to see Kenneth Goldsmith reading Richard Prince's The Catcher In The Rye in front of a Prince rephotography piece in MoMA's 2nd Floor galleries. I'd been bummed to have missed Goldsmith's talk on Wednesday night [granted, I had an opening of my own, but still] so I wanted to make sure I didn't miss this most appropriate event. When he saw my tweets about it, KG graciously offered to reserve a ticket for me, a gesture which set a certain expectation in my mind of guest lists, seats, or crowd control.

Even as I asked at the desk for the ticket, though, my sense began to change. I suspected, and was right, that this was not a ticketed gig, or even a gallery talk-style crowd with a limited number of slots which, if you didn't get one, you could shadow and eavesdrop on anyway. The ticket was for getting into the Museum. Which, of all things and all places, I did not need a comp for MoMA.

I know the US Government is selling off lighthouses all the time, but the Liston Range Rear Light in Delaware strikes me as exceptional.

It is a 120-ft tall, braced iron tube built in 1876 that sits, unusually for a light house, three miles inland from the mouth of the Delaware River. It stands on around half an acre of land. It's a few miles south of 95; I think that's the exit where the Denny's is. There's a 100sf building at the base that's included, but the adjacent keeper's house and assistant keeper's house were sold quite some time ago. The cylindrical tower is lined with wood, and the steel spiral staircase has five landings, in case you need to rest on the way up.

As a range light, it is twinned with a front light which is lower and closer to the water's edge. Ships navigate by aligning the two lights in a range light.

The Liston Range Rear Light still contains its 2nd-order Fresnel lens, which is unusual.

It is now being sold by the US Coast Guard. The current bid is $10,000. I repeat, $10,000.

One catch, and it's a big one, is that the Coast Guard retains title to the Fresnel lens unless and until it decides it doesn't need to be in the range light aid to navigation business anymore. At which point, it may decide to give the lens to the lighthouse's owner. Who must agree "to display the Fresnel Lens if and when it is discontinued in accordance with the standards set forth in the Guidelines on the Care and Maintenance of Historic Classical Fresnel Lenses."

It's a bummer about the Fresnel Lens, but until I can get my hands on one of those late 19th century War Dept. Gettysburg observation towers, this range light might have to do.

Liston Light Tower [gsaauctions.gov]
Liston Rear Range, DE [lighthousefriends.com, bottom image of Fresnel Lens, LOC via LHF]
Liston Rear Range Light [wikipedia]

So I did this.

I am very pleased to announce the latest title from greg.org, Canal Zone Richard Prince YES RASTA 2: The Appeals Court Decision in Cariou v. Prince, et al., Also The Court's Complete Illustrated Appendix. It is available now.

It would have been available sooner. It really should have been available sooner. I got it all together by the end of the day the Appeals Court decision came down, but there was seemingly endless futzing and back & forth with the digital publisher about proofing and formatting, etc. So sorry for the delay.

CZRPYR2 is a follow-on and indispensable primary source companion to Canal Zone Richard Prince YES RASTA, [above, available here], which contains the full transcript of Richard Prince's incredible 7-hour deposition, as well as many key filings and exhibits from the first phase of Cariou v. Prince.

I wondered what you wondered: why not just add the Appeals Court decision to the original book? And if CZRPYR2 was only the decision itself, I might have done just that. Or not bothered with it at all. But then I found the beautiful Appendix the Court created for the decision, and I realized it deserved a permanent place in the history of the case, a book of its own.

Following on Patrick Cariou & friend's own slapdash effort, the Appeals court produced a high-quality, carefully cross-referenced catalogue of each use of Cariou's YES RASTA images in Prince's Canal Zone paintings. This indexing was the basis of the judges' Solomonic decision to divide the Canal Zone series into 25 non-infringing works, and 5 infringing?-who-knows-let's-look-again works. Where applicable, the Court added highlights to Cariou's images, arguably creating yet another transformative work. And submitting it into the public record.

For this 142-page volume, I integrated the Court's collections of Prince & Cariou images, to facilitate painting-by-painting review of Prince's appropriations. And I annotated them for easier referencing. But otherwise the Court's primary documents are preserved, with an eye to posterity, as they were prepared,

CZRPYR2 is in this way a salute to the Court's own transformative, creative spirit.

Buy Canal Zone Richard Prince YES RASTA 2: The Appeals Court Decision in Cariou v. Prince, et al., Also The Court's Complete Illustrated Appendix (142 pages, b&w, 6x9-in.) for $12.99 [createspace]
Buy Canal Zone Richard Prince YES RASTA: Selected Court Documents from Cariou v. Prince, et al for $17.99 [they can ship together, but I'll probably only sell 2-vol. sets in person. Maybe on a blanket next to Central Park.]