Dan Graham @ the Whitney
- read/listen/watch - Dan Graham on UbuWeb
Icons of the desert: Early Aboriginal Paintings from Papunya at the Grey Art Gallery
**This is a truly inspiring exhibition - an absolute MUST SEE this semester.
Related exhbition at the NYU 80 Washington Square East Gallery down the street from the Grey: Nganana Tjungurringanyi Tjukurrpa Nintintjakitja: We Are Here Sharing Our Dreaming, link to more information about these artists
P.S.1 - lots of fantastic exhibitions - only up for a few more weeks. For those of you interested in experimental video, Kenneth Anger a must see
Roam around Chelsea - I recommend all the shows from Time Out's Chelsea Top Ten
check listings before you go - see ArtCat, ArtLogs, TimeOut links on right. Here are some of my suggestions.
And if it is sunny on Sunday: This World & Nearer Ones on Governor's Island
While there, look for the Sculptors Guild at Governor's Island exhibit
Post information and reactions to what you saw on the blog
(and photos if you took any)
Oh, Avedon. So many conflicting emotions and images flash across my mind when I hear his name. He is obviously a technical master; his large format black and white fashion photographs dazzle the lowly photography student such as myself. Even photographs of black cocktail dresses appear silky, all their creases and folds visible. It’s hard not to look just at the perfect gelatin prints solely as technical masterpieces, and it’s even harder to analyze them when you are confronted with a subject matter that you have been told is aesthetically perfect all your life. The models are thin, glamorous White women in chic evening gowns frolicking with thin, handsome White men in suits. This time, however, when I went to see his exhibit of fashion photographs with a mind ready to analyze, I tried to get past the obvious beauty that slaps me over the head every time I look at his work. The first thing that occurred to me was hoe often he juxtaposed beauty, glamour and affluence with dirt, grime and low society. Think of this famous image “Dovima with Elephants, Doir, August 1955.” There is Dovima, dripping in a black and white Dior, lovingly touching two gentle beasts, standing on… elephant excrement and hay. Why did he make that decision? The elephants’ feet are shackled as well. The more you look at the image, the more disturbing it seems. This is true for almost all fashion images, not just Avedon’s; the process of selling an idea of glamour, perfection and excess to society always has some causalities (such as common sense and practicality). But honestly, I look at Avedon’s photographs as fantasies of an unrealistic dreamland, where I appear perfectly exposed on a sheet of gelatin, tripping gleefully over myself in Doir. Avedon is, was, and always will be a beautiful distraction.
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