Marlene’s opening and getting trashed at David Zwirner’s house….

Last week, after an exhausting afternoon in Chelsea (by afternoon I mean an hour and a half, which is the max I can handle of Chelsea at one time, btw Robert Adams was my favourite show this time around) I went to Marlene Dumas’ opening at David Zwirner of which I was psyched about because I’d never seen her solo show before, and of course I was psyched to see her again too. The opening, to be expected, was hectic, so it was hard to look at the show as a whole, instead shuffling through crowds to see each piece. Kind of nice though to have those paintings, of which I feel more and more real mortality in them (and more grace too) to be surrounded by drinking and talking people everywhere. But to see the show properly, I have to go back when the place is empty and deathly still. Of course the first person I spot in the crowd outside was Dominic, the director of De ateliers (my former residency), sulking around and slurping beers…I thought to myself how lovely it was that he came all this way for her, and I was strangely touched by it. Later on we found Avery Preesman and his gf so it turned out there was an ateliers entourage after all. You could see Marlene all pretty in a shiny golden dress and birkenstocks that matched her hair, flushed from being interviewed in a corner that felt very hot full of people. From an empty stomach, I was tipsy after two couple beers at the opening; later she called us ‘tomato types’ from the way our faces reddened. I want to steal that line too, my mom calls me a chili pepper...
Afterward, my gal pal Dineo Bopape and I were invited to the dinner of which we were just given an address. I thought we were going to some fancy restaurant in the east village… we walked in and a lady took my coat, I thought it was strange she didn’t give me a number for it. Then as I walked upstairs I was greeted by this open domestic modern space full of art, I still thought it was some kind of fabulous concept restaurant. It was super comfortable, I only realized it was a collector’s house when I sauntered past some Lisa Yuskavage paintings off a mantel into the library with multiple copies of the same artist books, and a video installation of three televisions on the floor. OH- it’s David Zwirner’s house *lightbulb*. It was pretty fab/absurd to eat dinner next to what I thought was a Jason Rhoades shelf-like (domestic sized) sculpture, a Neo Rauch (museum sized) painting in front, to the right a whole room emitting pink neon light that I forgot to even check out, and open bar catering, all dangerous combinations for an impressionable emerging artist as I, very well behaved. By the end of the party Marlene, her South African friend, Dineo and I ended up holding hands, dancing and singing back up to Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’ and forgetting the words to Bob Dylan’s ‘Knocking on Heaven’s Door’ by a piano while everyone else patiently waited for us to finish. Then we jumped in a cab and sang all the way to a bar voor late night frites met mayonnaise, oysters and cocktails… the next day I lost my voice.


Kuniyoshi Love!

On March 10 I was invited to a preview of an amazing exhibition at the Japan society of Utagawa Kuniyoshi's prints by my new friend Mieko Anekawa (nice mouthful of Japanese names innit!), whom I had met recently in Toronto at the opening of her group show at Energy Gallery, run by my friend David Cheung. It was very kind of her to invite me, almost a stranger, to have champagne and sushi with her at this formal event.

Miraculously my roommate Kate found one pair of sparkly flats in her closet full of shoes that were too small for her, to fit me the night before the event, a little Cinderella-ish one might say. I had been warned that I wasn’t allowed to wear my converse sneakers in, not even paired with a skirt! Originally I thought I might just try to sneak by with my runners and I am very glad I didn’t. When I arrived I saw it was indeed a fanciful affair and I probably would have been sent home. It is very unusual of me to be in New York City and to have not bought any shoes by this time… actually no shopping in general (yet), my will power has been really holding up!

Anyway. I'd been a fan of Kuniyoshi for a long time and it's just stunning to see all these prints together in the flesh, in all it’s tactile, papery flesh glory. He has been one of my long-standing art husbands/historical passions, in that he is one of those artists who can do the time warp. Those prints could have been made yesterday if only contemporary artists still had that kind of patience and care for skillful craft. Of the popular edo print artists, he’s much weirder and funnier than say Hokusai or Hiroshige. I only made it through half the show since I was so mesmerized by the tiny formal details, hypnotized for hours.... the linework of the hair, the woodblock tiny calligraphy, all those subtle masculine and feminine shapes, compositions to die for! The humour and his mixture of beauty and grotesqueness is what makes him feel so fresh for me. A parallel to James Ensor, maybe even Frans Hals, also ‘historical passions’ of mine, also totally fresh, yo.

Last week was NY art week BABY

‘What’s this whole world coming to/Things just ain’t the same/Any time the hunter gets captured by the game’ *sexy harmonica follows*

I’ve been listening to this song incessantly by the Marvelettes, and it’s really been stuck in my head all throughout my battering from art fairs last week. I only made it to three, but as a small potatoes lightweight, I’m still totally wasted from them…

First up, I was on my friend Marjel’s guest pass for the Armory preview. Of course I was glad to experience this amazing monolith, but of course, if not for the free ticket I would never have been willing. Artists by nature dislike fairs more than anyone else, and why would any optimistic schlep pay 30 bucks to see the meat market grinding away at its hardest? Obviously, there is tons of fabulous work, but that’s beside the point.

The interesting thing though, is all the talk in the art world about, well the art world, and formats like the Armory being at its wits end... I could feel it, as if we were perusing the belly of a great old beast, holding dearly onto some fabulous prestige, trying to keep itself from imploding. The whole place felt kind of… humbled, as weird as that sounds. Over my shoulder I heard gallery assistants from these kinds of galleries, for the first time so gentle and coaxing with their explanations to potential patrons:
- Yes you know, well what makes this piece so special is that part of the area of the painting is shiny. And see here, how other sections are not, such as this part. The colours are also fantastically vivid, don’t you think? It’s another special feature. Are you familiar with Gary Hume’s work?
And around another corner:
- Much contemporary art today questions the notion of, reality. As in, what might be real, and what might not be. In photography, as in this example, the artist would like to question what exactly one might perceive as reality!

More than at any other art fair I’d been to, it was so clear cut then, that those with the booths were the ones with the merch, and those with the furs and rings were the ones with the money, on this afternoon preview since this was just before the regular ‘public’ came to validate it as a spectacle. Marjel and I felt like we were spying. You could tell clearly who was a gallerist, who was a curator, who was an artist, who was an associate of these said groups, and then who were the ones looking to invest, new money and old. As the evening progressed, normally dressed people and the eager students/artists began to stream in, balancing the demographics. That was the best part of ‘experiencing’ the whole hoopla for me, this nutty people watching. In any case, what calmed my nerves was seeing an Alex Katz and a Yayoi Kusama painting on the same day. It doesn’t matter their context, as soon as I see one, I feel so elated and peacefully content, my faith in art becomes restored. I am just an old fashioned painter after all.

Second up, the Independent was amazing for a fair, and by far the best. It was a very relaxed and chilled out ‘arty’ vibe, with lots of great work, way more my style, way more experimental and conceptual. But it made me feel like such a square, everything was presented so coolly. Michael Krebber, whose work was there, once made me feel that way when he dissed my (practice) paintings when he did an artist talk in Amsterdam…. same feeling dude.

One can easily find all sorts of great reviews for it, but while I agree with all the praise the Independent got, one could feel it was trying very hard to regain realness and intellect. A bit almost braggy for being open, more democratic, grungy (I mean one can be grungy and independent when galleries have reputations like that!) Almost like, ‘look at us, we are selling ideas once again, not just commodities!’ Anyway, I really liked how it was presented as kind of a cross between an exhibition and a farmers market, and it was much more propositional than a fair normally is, a nice big question mark.

Third up, while at the Independent we ran into a guy I met last summer, whom my friend Kate worked on a film set with, and lo and behold, turns out he’s an artist who had a booth at Scope. He gave us a free pass and I went because it was free, but unfortunately it was so horrible (Kim Dorland is in it, no offense to my friend or him), but it was a total waste of my last art fair hour. There was tons of figurative painting and I hated it, hoping no one ever lumped me into that type of hipster drivel. I really regretted that I didn’t instead rush to Volta, where my friend Jen had a booth and also there were a couple of Canadian galleries, but by then I felt like I had been captured. Time to go home… and watch the Oscars.

American border

I finished sweating my pants out at the American border just now. But I am still on the train, I made it past Niagara Falls after a long and painfully arduous interrogation regarding my status as an artist headed for New York. Feeling like a criminal for no real reason, hearing myself explain true yet false-sounding facts about myself, made me realize how my life does not make any logical sense! I had the strange sensation as if I was trying to pose as an adult to the US border patrol guard and was not convincing enough.

Never in all my travels have I gotten so much hassle, blessed with the privileges of a Canadian passport. However, this is the first time I have attempted visiting the States for three months, so I guess I was asking for it.

After spending a week without sleep, forcing oil paintings to dry in my Toronto studio, huffing too many fumes, packing up heavy paintings across town etc etc. I was absolutely determined not to get stuck at the border and sent home... but what power can one have!
The man in charge asked:
-You’re coming back in June! How old are you?
-28
Why are you traveling to New York?
-reunions with my peers, to see their exhibitions, see all the other exhibitions, get new inspiration… I have a show with a gallery in Toronto in June so I am returning home then….
-Where do you work, when was your last paycheck!
-I work for the City of Toronto, and for Jumblies youth programs in Scarborough… last paycheck was well, about a month ago.
-What do you do?
-I am a painter but I teach part-time.
-So are you a painter or a teacher?
-A painter, who teaches art part time.
-So you’re telling me your employers give you three months off just to look at art!
-Well, yeah.
-Your friend that you are staying with, how do you know her, where is she from and what does she do?
-I know her from when I lived in Amsterdam, but she is American, from Berkeley, living in New York. She does set design for independent films
-What does that mean? What design? What films?
-I don’t know!

This is when he came upon a form for the Pollock Krasner Foundation wedged between my paperwork… by the look in his eyes I knew there was something very wrong with that.
-This form is to get money in America! You can’t get money from America if you aren’t an American citizen. Why are you looking to America for money that is meant for Americans? This is very suspicious!
I tried to explain… it sounded insane. Why would any American foundation give money to international artists to make art outside of the United States?
And so I was asked to please take a seat on a bench next to a group of Parisian Arab men, a woman who claimed to be a volunteer for a living, and a girl of Tibetan descent, all suspect stereotypes.
Then I had to fetch my belongings while they kept my passport, so I assumed I was being sent home. But luckily it was only to thoroughly examine my luggage.

And after we each explained our individual travel histories we were gradually let back on the train. One of the Parisians chatted me up about it afterward, calling the U.S. ‘funny, huh’. He asked me about my travels and where I was from, then asked,
-So where you go now, China?
-No. New York, duh.
I get that kind of thing so much, as I get older I almost understand it.

Michael Snow

A friendly butcher:
As I type now, I am nostalgically reminded of ‘the friendly butcher’ – the name of a zine I made with my girl posse when we lived in Toronto as teenagers. We produced two issues of this obscure thing whose name we stole off an actual butcher shop in the east end, to serve as an anonymous moniker for us gang of four. It included all manners of diverse, idiotic cultural observations in the form of text and image couplings, an embarrassing reflection of my grunge stoner DIY beginnings, not so dissimilar to the paintings I make now actually. I do miss my old typewriter with the really tough keys, and earnestly stapling stacks of photocopies together.

On the opposite spectrum of nostalgia, was my visit to the PowerPlant a few weeks back to check out the Michael Snow exhibition, showing a new body of work by the Canadian fave at 81 years old, still going strong. Rock on man. It was nothing near the sort of ‘greatest hits retirement album’ that I was expecting. Instead, it was a display of fresh work based on his good old, concrete foundation, and it was dare I say, very cute. I was particularly captured by the language piece that interchanged English, French and Flemish. Since I have lived both in Montreal and Amsterdam but am not much with either of their languages (Dutch and Flemish are very close), it made me very happy to be realize I could ‘read’ most of the words in Snow’s piece, and a hoot to have the ones I didn’t know taught to me by disorienting video screens.

(Image caption: Michael Snow, Piano Sculpture (detail), 2009. Photo by Steve Payne)