Photorealism at Deutsche Guggenheim
hyde or die
The Guggenheim Museum and YouTube have finally announced the jury for YouTube Play.
Do I have thoughts about this Guggenheim/YouTube mashup ploy for attention and desperate attempt by the Gugg to be in with the internet age? I think I blatantly answered that question by just the wording of my question. Sometimes I am too obvious. Anywho, that’s not what we are talking about today, today we are talking about the selection of the jury! So who is this group of elite internet multimedia artists and experts to serve on this panel? I’ll tell you who, along with my unfiltered thoughts about their fitness as jurors.
- Laurie Anderson, I am not too familiar with her work, but from what I do know, she goes to the beat of her own drum enough that I think she will make some honest decisions.
- Animal Collective. REALLY!?! I already have mentioned what a ploy I think this is, but Animal Collective? I like there music just as much as the next girl who likes to occasionally listen to music that isn’t hip hop, but I really don’t see what they can bring to the table besides inexperience, naivety and a little “we’re in a popular band so our opinions matter” attitude.*
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Darren Aronofsky is a great director. Period. I love him and enjoy his work. Wait…aren’t you making Black Swan right now, Darren? Oh you are. Then you shouldn’t have time to be doing this! I am looking forward to that film and if it sucks I am going to blame your being sidetracked by this silly jury and farce of a competition as the reason and never watch The Fountain
by myself and cryagain. - Douglas Gordon. Gordon’s video and visual art are quiet and thoughtful enough that I think he is a genuinely good addition to the jury. Also he’s a little older, 44, and been doing this for a while, so that experience will be useful.
- Ryan McGinley seems to be too nice and too grateful to ever say anything critical about anyone in regards to art. That being said, I don’t know the guy, maybe he’s brutal in his opinions outside of the public persona he has created. I just really don’t think that’s the case.
- Takashi Murakami. Sure, why not? He hasn’t sold out with a museum show in a while so he has some spare time. Also, someone has to be there to defend anyone using semen as a lasso in their videos.
- Marylin Minter, I think that Minter was an early purveyor of video and she still employs it today, so I am ok with this choice.
- Shirin Neshat, Stefan Sagemeister and Apichatpong Weerasethakul, I have never heard of one of these people, although I enjoy the last name of Sagemeister, it makes him sound like some expert of the spices. He might make me a delicious bolognese sauce.
- Nancy Spector, Deputy Director and Chief Curator of the Guggenheim, is the Jury Chair. Understandable.
Now for more traditional interpretations including monetary advantages for the museum, I would highly suggest reading what Paddy Johnson and Tyler Green have to say about this.
*I’m sure they are very nice and smart people, I just think they aren’t necessarily qualified to be on a jury for something concerning the Guggenheim.
Dan Flavin untitled (to Tracy, to celebrate the love of a lifetime), 1992
Can you imagine? How I wish I was at the Guggenheim when this was up.
Side note: talk about the most romantic title ever. Am I right?
Not content with having one of the most iconic buildings in the world, northern Spain may now be gaining a rival to its Frank Gehry-designed beacon. The Museo Guggenheim Bilbao is completing feasibility studies for a satellite near the historic town of Guernica, just 40km east of Bilbao. Local and provincial authorities in the Basque Country anticipate that the new museum would extend the so-called “Bilbao effect”—the economic windfall catalysed by Gehry’s celebrated original—to a pristine but underdeveloped coastal region. The Biscay Provincial Council has allocated E1m to fund the environmental and economic analyses, and pledged €100m for construction, about half the estimated cost. But the Basque Country government, whose financial participation is crucial for the project to move forward, is reluctant to undertake the expansion amid the current economic crisis.
The proposed 200-acre site—currently owned by the Spanish bank BBK—is on the west bank of the Urdaibai estuary, a Unesco biosphere reserve a short distance from the Bay of Biscay. Juan Ignacio Vidarte, the director of the Guggenheim Bilbao, notes that land-use restrictions and conservationists have encumbered development. “It’s an area I would not call depressed, but certainly I would call it stagnant,” he told The Art Newspaper, adding that the proposed museum “could bring together culture and nature in a way which could be compatible with the preservation of the environmental quality of the space”. via…
Felix Gonzalez-Torres, “Untitled” (Golden), 1995
This was just installed last Friday at the Guggenheim in New York.
It will be up through January, at which point I will cross my fingers that it will come to California somewhere. Preferably within driving distance.
Online forum ArtBabblehas museums riding the digital wave with original video contributions:
The site features exclusive content from visual heavy hitters such as the Museum of Art & Design and Art Institute of Chicago, as well as a platform for user-generated discussion. Visitors can watch lectures from the 2009 International Design Symposium, scope demos of the art-installation process, and previewArt:21, all providing a diverse bird’s-eye view of the world of contemporary art. via…
Oooh, custom videos…
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Google today announced the launch of Design It: Shelter Competition, a global, online initiative that invites the public to use Google Earth and Google SketchUp to create and submit designs for virtual 3-D shelters for a location of their choice anywhere on Earth. The competition opens today, June 8, 2009, Frank Lloyd Wright’s birthday; closes to submissions on August 23; and ends on October 21, the 50th anniversary of the Guggenheim Museum’s opening, when two prizes, a Juried Prize and a People’s Prize, will be awarded. via…
Guggenheim wins Webby for best cultural website or something…
It’s not that I’m jealous per se, it’s just that I know I wasn’t in the running to begin with and I feel a little excluded…like when the Vanity Fair “Best Dressed” list comes out.
