Megan Evans 'TO bee' opens

A wonderful crowd of Australians, artists, art appreciators, beekeepers, philosophers and bon vivants joined Megan Evans for the launch of her solo exhibition TO bee.  

The weather held and an amazing sunset peeked out below the cloud line as the crowd took in the wonderful works. 

 

The exhibition features large-scale drawings, photography, video and sculpture. TO bee will be on view until November 24th 2011. 

 

Look for related programming and events at BoxoFFICE, kicking off with Tuesdays conversation with Ron Breland (details here).

Burning Man 2011: Rites of Passage

Another Burning Man has flashed by and I am back at City life enriched, enlarged and a bit befuddled. How did it all unfold and then fold back up, slipping neatly into a packed case of the everyday. Or did it?



As with my experience two years ago, Black Rock City outstripped the Venice Biennale in terms of providing a compelling experience with the power to alter perceptions. The experience promised by the Venice title "Illuminations" was dark in comparison with the bright lights that shone on the Playa in Nevada.

Courtesy of Lady Bee

This year, I camped with a larger group, Camp Free Puppies. A diverse bunch from NYC, LA, Minneapolis, Boulder and San Francisco, we achieved that rare and wonderful state of drama free supportive cooperation. I was spoiled vis a vis earlier years - kitchen in a truck, shaded tent, shower structure, open hangout area and a wonderful domed hangout covered by a custom made skin of cartoon sheets and other bright prints. And community.

My week went by on a somewhat familiar schedule which leads me to think I will shake it up next year. One constant that I have no desire to give up is dancing at Pink Mammoth. A huge gift to the playa, Pink is the place to go for a cool afternoon dancing into sunset. Friendly folks, great beats and a spectacular setting. What more could one ask for? 52 weeks of it!

Courtesy of Lady Bee

Courtesy of Lady Bee

Monday - build camp and wander out with the group for an evening foray on the playa. Amazing how much is accomplished even this early on the week.

Courtesy of Lady Bee

Tuesday - a new experience that lead to some learning. I volunteered with a crew from Hushville to work at Arctica, the ice outlet. The shift was 12-3pm and we got there in good time. Owing to a bureaucratic snafoo too boring to go into, I wasn't able to cashier as intended. I had a moment of attitude before the shift manager suggested calmly that I just hang out. Minutes later he had rigged a chain and loop setup to the metal dome struts and had me up in the loops twisting and attempting to do my best Cirque du Soleil number. In a clown outfit complete with dayglo green and pink panels and fluffy white balls all down the center (thanks Lady Bee). Customers were not really impressed though staff found it a hoot. 



Then bureaucracy struck again - a Borg representative told me to get down as they didn't have liability insurance. This is the first time in 5 events that I have been asked not to do something at Burning Man.


Now amused, I got down to the ground and sought out another assignment. This one was really good. The shift manager gave me a large chunk of ice and suggested I go out to the long line standing in the heat of the day with an offer of an "icing" - the next two hours were spent painting numerous hot bods with trails of ice that provided a minute or two of playa style air conditioning. Hugs, thanks, smiles - what a great time. And a wonderful lesson from the shift manager on letting go of expectations and finding other ways to give. Thanks man. 

Then on to Pink Mammoth, reception at the Mansonian Institute, dinner at camp and an early night.....





Wednesday - shave, wash hair and off to the WNBR. Fun as always. Then on to Pink Mammoth, dinner at camp and out with the boys from San Fran. Zzzzzzz





Thursday - art tour and walkabout with Lady Bee, early return to camp to cook dinner, out with Dwell for the regional burn - 24 projects sourced from regional Burning Man groups went up simultaneously. Gorgeous works and spectacular choreography. A quick stop at Charon - a large-scale zoetrope depicting skeletons rowing across Styx to Hades. Wow. Then a dance at my new next favorite - Disorient (thanks Leo and crew). Zzzzzzzzz


 

Friday - how did it go so fasssst. Up at 6am to catch sunrise on the playa and photograph the art in great light. Flawed strategy only in that I totally missed documenting fire pieces that burn brightly at night. (All night images courtesy of the wonderous Lady Bee). The morning was spectacular although cold! Got to the task with a shiver and a quick morning dance at Disorient which was still going at 7am. 

A long stop at the Temple to take in its magic once again. Many people around catching the sunrise, listening to the gongs and even an early morning wedding. Powerful.



 



 









Then the playa provided - I ran into the Dust City Diner out near the perimeter. A performance piece that moves all over the playa, the diner is a fully functioning apparition that provides humor, coffee and pancakes in the morning - humor, coffee and grilled cheese at night. True joy.




On to center camp for my coffee shift - four hard and fast hours of greeting, meeting and providing a jolt to hundreds of lagging Burners. My barristas were a bit of a humorless lot and the week was getting to my lower back. Nevertheless, I generated it out and had a wonderful time interacting with so many faces. Pups Emily and Courtney came to visit and then Derek Mangot magically appeared. 




From there to Pink Mammoth, a joyful farewell with Derek, Kirk, Rick, Chris, Pup Sara G et al.


Last evening - another foray out with the Pups - checked out the scene around the Trojan Horse which was being prepped for it's burn after having been pulled onto the playa by 600 toga clad volunteers. Decided to skip the midnight burn and walked back toward camp only to stumble into the best firework display I've ever encountered celebrating the Flaming Lotus Girls stunning project Tympani Lambada. 

Courtesy of Lady Bee

Courtesy of Lady Bee

Courtesy of Lady Bee

 

Saturday dawned bright and early. I packed, got my stuff over to NYC Container Camp and hit the road. Farewell BRC - next year beckons.

Illuminating - Venice Biennale 2011 - To the Arsenale

Two and a half days in the Giardini - the minimum necessary to take in the dense offerings as well as negotiate the long lines - and then to the Arsenale. The massive darkness of the first long hall is a welcome respite from the sun, heat and frenetic crowds that typify Venice at this time of year.

First up for me was the marvelous para-pavilion by Song Dong. A maze of antique doors, door frames, closet doors and small building facades was a playful invitation to cross thresholds and change perspectives. Entering through a closet door (Narnia-like), I came upon a plinth on which Ryan Gander had depicted himself falling out of his wheelchair. A strange moment for me as I had recently met Ryan and came away with the sense that the wheelchair was the last and least thing one noticed about him.





Onward through the wide long space filled with offerings until I came upon the massive dragon made of inner tubes by Nicholas Hlobo. The giant creature hung from the ceiling seemed like a challenge to one's safety, aesthetic and otherwise, and reminded me of publicity for horror movies. My South African friends similarly decried it's merit - no matter as it has been purchased by Puma for display in corporate quarters back in the homeland. A couple of stitched works flanking the beast redeemed the effort for me.





A sucker for installation, my searching eyes were drawn to the mass of neon, metal tubing and silver tarp by Navid Nuur. The unfinished quality of the work, with the fabric drawn back and the neon brightly revealed in the middle, put in the mindset of planning for Burning Man - one never knows where inspiration for this year's shelter will come from.



Of the video works, I was drawn into Dani Gal's Night and Fog dealing with the scattering of Eichman's ashes. The video is a psychological portrait of the security forces carrying out an "act of honor". While I was taken with the stylized stuttering quality of the work, I was later told that this might have been a technological glitch. I clearly need to see it again.

The apse of the Arsenale was occupied by several large Urs Fisher works. They are giant candles, one a full scale recreation of The Rape of the Sabine Women, slowly melting away. Having not quite recovered from the Urs Fischer extravaganza at The New Museum, I moved on.



Next I came across a happy discovery - the complex yet lyrical work of Corinne Wasmuht. A large, multi-layered painting created a wonderful moment of fictional space. Someone for me to look out for.



Couches came next - First an installation by Rosemarie Trockel featuring the familiar draped couch and some unfamiliar wall works. Then the luxury of alarge screening room featuring Christian Marclay's The Clock. This was my third viewing, one at Paula Cooper in NYC and one two evenings before near the Biennale HQ. I had a restful and meditative half hour from 2.45pm to 3.15pm as the plasticity of time was so wonderfully deconstructed. A couple of afternoons previous, I had joined friends for a lecture by Jaques Ranciere on the interwoven elements of time and power, and the redistribution of time within the capitalist model. Strands of that idea greatly informed my viewing of Marclay's piece.

Now a left turn and down the short end. First up, a couple of people debating whether or not they were looking at art - namely the faithful reconstructions of garbage cans from the around the world. I'm sure a spare tissue or two got discarded into them.



Several national "pavilions" presented themselves next of which India was the most interesting to me. A mix of work ranging from traditional to high-tech, seemed to capture the cultural temperature as I imagine it to be. Most fun was a ride in an elevator - press the button, enter the cab and watch as floors go whizzing by simulated by giant video projection.



Croatia featured people behaving badly and Turkey provided a large set of piping that was another purification plant for local water. Did they text with Israel before coming to Venice?

South Africa was back in town after a 16 year absence and I was keen to be there at the official opening of the pavilion that afternoon. Down to the waterside to catch the shuttle which crosses all of about 100 feet of water (why no bridge?!). The shuttle could only take 12 people at a time (12 Angry Men?) and the line advanced little in my 15 minute wait. Luckily, entrepreneurialism is alive and well in Venice and an enterprising taxi driver was ferrying folks for a mere 5 euro. Cheaper than a vaporetto ride.

I strolled the length of the quayside in the heat until I reached the tower, guarding the inlet entrance, which housed the South Africans. Inside I found a thoroughly modern restored environment and an impressive array of large scale work by Siemon Allen, Mary Sibande and Lyndi Sales. While i did enjoy the works, it struck me that South Africa was putting forward its best foot in the context of "western" contemporary art and shying away from anything that smacked of post-colonial practice. Too bad - the country has been such an agent of change in other arenas, it would be wonderful to see work that challenged conventions in Venice.









Back across the water, I entered the Italian pavilion. This year, the work has been selected by 200 intellectual as a nod to 150 years of unification. Additionally, there is a second level installed which is a maze-like museum of the cosa nostra. Be it the mafia of the intelligentsia or the mafia of the Sopranos, the results were largely unintelligible and a real conversation stopper when brought up with citizens of the host country. I did like the simple poetry of a national flag made up of old t-shirts - it smacked of good, honest community art.



Next door, China was a contrast in simplicity. Clouds of mist rose from vats inside the space while in the garden beyond a large cloud sculpture was enveloped in yet more mist. Meanwhile, someone walked backwards with a clocks strapped to them that was - yes, you got it - going backwards. The mists of time were going backwards.







Moving in a forward direction, I walked through the gardens behind the Arsenale, took in the big pink Franz West protuberance from a distance and then happened on the most surprising display. Entitled Some Like it Hot, the installation/performance/event involved an audience sitting drinking wine. The wine bottles were whisked away when empty and thrown into a barrel in which they were mashed with a large pole. Glass shards were fed into a large furnace in the middle of the clearing and molten glass was removed from time to time and poured onto a growing mound. A live soundtrack was provided by a Brooklyn-based band called Japanther. The furnace was fed fuel from a woodpile stacked to one side. In front of the pile was a bench with some folks seated, including a very thin naked guy. At one point graffiti was written onto his back. He then went behind the pile, and emerged with a large axe. He approached a wood stump on which some older folks were seated and asked to clear it for chopping purposes. One woman, noting his scrawny body, offered him a sandwich which he ate with gusto. He then proceeded with the wood chopping. This was definitely different.







Enlivened by Gelatin's offering, I made my way to a cocktail party for the launch of a brochure by an Italian writer. In the garden of an old nursery near the Arsenale, the evening was a perfect way to segue out of Biennale mode.