Yet again, Maurizio Cattelan achieved his admitted goal: he is on the covers of magazines.
The finger, called L.O.V.E.*, has been erected in front of the Milan stock exchange for the duration of the Fashion Week happening in the city.
Everyone is happy: Cattelan gets his attention, the public is proud of such a daring representative, the city gets its Fashion Week (kind of) publicized, and the brokers… well, the brokers have a good laugh and continue their business as usual.
That is not to say the work is not good. It is poignant. The finger that is sticking is the only one remaining on the hand. The others seem to have been severed. So is this hand telling the bankers to go fuck themselves, or is that the only thing it can say? Or maybe it’s that when you have next to nothing, the middle finger is the one to resist longest.
Oh, but of course, it’s made of marble and put on a pedestal.

But that, really, is not the work at work here. The work is to have been able to put it in front of the Stock Exchange. To have shown them the finger and have them accept it. This is what makes a real contemporary trickster – not the sculpture, but the context.
“We want to be confirmed as the capital of contemporary art”, the city’s administrators officially stated, “and we have to not only mediate but also accept what we do not like”.
Which is a hilarious comment, and only confirms Cattelan’s intelligence. One wonders how he did it. Maybe what he said was, let’s cut the crap, it is a criticism, but it will attract more tourists than you can ever imagine, and will not hurt you in any way whatsoever, because no one is going to take their money out of the stocks after seeing my work. On the contrary, the tourists will leave their money in Milan.
But the controversy remains. “It is unacceptable that the City sticks its finger up to the Stock Exchange” – said the councillor for Town Planning Carlo Masseroli in a fervent discussion.
Masseroli says: “the administration cannot be culturally subordinate to a self-styled artist like Cattelan who wants to use Milan to earn money”.
Oh, that’s right, Cattelan made money off this! I wonder who payed him.
So the question is, who is Cattelan showing the finger to?
I’m not sure, but the pictures suggest that the finger is in front of the stock exchange. And is not pointing towards it, but from it.

Which could end this text. But will not. Because even if Cattelan laughs in our face, even if he plays a trick on all of us, he still plays out the crucial role of catalyzer – he materializes the tensions that are already there. He makes us go “Hey! Wait a minute!” He sticks the finger where it hurts.

*The title was originally supposed to be “Omnia munda mundis” (“To the pure ones everything is pure”).

As photographer of details of architecture, I am conditioned to observe my surroundings carefully. I notice buildings, but I hone in on the line of a corner; the angle of a gable; a fashioned decorative vine on a wrought iron gate and the stone carvings on a façade. Fine tuning a bit more, I visually thrive on the textures used for building: grainy granite, polished marble, satiny wood, rough brick, smooth cold iron. These elements create an environment that promotes creativity for me. And above all the light that permeates the scene sets the tone of my photography. Rembrandt ’s art and the light of his world are the reasons that I recently went to Amsterdam. To know and to understand an artist ’s work on an intimate level, it is essential to see the light with which the artist worked. I believe that the light of Amsterdam defined Rembrandt ’s paintings, drawings, etchings. The way that the master saw his subjects, gave him the framework for the art he created.

Amazingly, in a world that is evolving with split second timing, Amsterdam welcomes the future to blend smoothly with the past. It is quite possible to imagine that you are walking along the canals with Rembrandt in the 1600 ’s. The city is criss-crossed with canals that reflect the soft misty light back into the sky. In late May, when I visited the city, the huge puffy clouds of Rembrandt ’s landscapes were just as low to earth as in his paintings. It seemed as if I could pull off a piece of cloud like cotton candy if I stretched out my arm. The marvelous billows of grays, whites, ochres, yellows, blues and many other colors were dotted with openings, big and small, to the soft sky beyond. Through these portals light drifted in soft shafts. Rays that lit fragments of a building, a tree or a face. The delicate way that the light illuminates in Amsterdam creates a mood of fluidity: seamless values.

When the sky turned darker in the late afternoon, I could see the glow that glorified so many of Rembrandt ’s subjects. The setting sun through the mist that was usually present allowed beams of radiant light to highlight with a luminosity for which the master is famous. The golden shafts of light were slightly blurred by the watery atmosphere to create a soft, ethereal radiance that was both brilliant and subtle. The night sky also presented a much more diffused dark than I have experienced. The celestial bodies, when visible, seemed to have a filmy edge with a sparkling central area that gave the sky a surreal enchantment. Perhaps the same magic that suffuses the nightscapes Rembrandt prolifically painted.

On one extraordinary day, my son Joe, who had generously gifted me with the wonderful trip, and I took an excursion to Ghent and Bruges in the Flemish region of Belgium. Throughout the drive (furthest four hours outside of Amsterdam) there are farmlands and grazing cows, and other farm animals. Occasionally we spotted a windmill. The scenery was so much like being in a Rembrandt work that the experience may have surpassed seeing the master ’s paintings and drawings in the Rijksmuseum. The day was sunny, but the light was, again, as in Amsterdam, filtered, soft, delicate. The pastoral landscape was filled with water trenches that collect the abundant rainfall and irrigate the farms. Enormous clouds hung low and echoed the blues, greens and pale yellows of the countryside. Remarkable light.

Our journey was filled with marvelous sights and delightful chance encounters with people we met along the way. Always, I felt the presence of Rembrandt: walking by the canals, sitting in a charming courtyard or square, traversing the countryside and seeing the light that he saw. Although four hundred years have passed since Rembrandt lived and created art in Amsterdam, he is very much alive there today.

Created by Ellen Fisch On 06/29/09 At 04:43 PM

On June 4, 1989, Poland held the first (partly) free elections of the so-called Eastern Block.
It was the first time since WW2 that opposition parties could legally participate in the political process, and the result – a smashing success of the opposition – was the end of communism and the beginning of a new, free Poland. These elections are generally considered the single event that began the overcoming of the totalitarian regimes in this entire region of the world.
And among the ways in which Poland will be celebrating the 20th anniversary of these events, one is particularly interesting.

Tomorrow, the excellent Polish artist Pawe? Althamer (I’ve written a short note about him before), will land with 160 other passengers of a Boeing 737 in Brussels. They will all be wearing golden suits that look like a combination of space suits and fairy-tale costumes. Even the plane will be specially designed and painted gold – all as part of Althamer’s work Common Task (the Polish expression “Wspólna sprawa” could also mean “common issue” or “common quest”). Their first stop in the city will be the Expo 58, a modernist dream-town. A model of an atom will be a starting point of the visit to the European Parliament and “meetings with the residents of the city” (How does that work?). They will be making a tour of the city as strange, alien visitors. 160 gold-dressed aliens.
Who are they? Mainly Althamer’s neighbors, family and friends, who have been joining him for other performances he organized.
Who are they? Poles. Strangers. People from outer space.
They are the winners. The visiting winners. The happy neighbors. The curious onlookers, the modernist dreamers, the naive children of freedom, the believers. They are the pure creators, the dreamed Europeans, the perfect people, they are the unexpected turn of events, where everything turns gold.

The words on the page of the entire commemoration state:

The motto of the commemoration, It all began in Poland, is a bold reference to the fact that Poland was the first European nation to oppose, in 1939, the spread of Nazism and communism, and was the first to remove their communist government from power in 1989.

The gold suits seem to fit. And yet, what I like about this social sculpture (as Althamer sometimes calls his works) is something quite opposite to that spirit of heroism and pride we so desperately claim. It’s… you guessed it – the lack of pathos.
Or rather – the way pathos is masked by the gold suit.

Two things that I have quickly noticed about the city of Melbourne is their love for AFL (Australian Football League) and their love for Melbourne artists. I passed thousands of supporters dressed in brown and yellow everything yesterday, so I’m glad I wasn’t wearing the colors of the opposing team. It’s not just guys that are fanatical about the sport, everyone seems to be. If I hang around Melbourne for much longer I might even go to a game to see what they’re all so excited about.

After reading a few reviews in local newspapers of the current John Brack exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria, it makes me think that they love their artists as much as their athletes. I can’t remember the exact words of one glowing review in a major newspaper but it called it a perfect exhibition and urged anyone with an Australian bone in their body to rush down and experience this art utopia.

I wouldn’t dare tell this to a Melbournite, but I wasn’t that impressed with the John Brack exhibition. He does have a few iconic pictures that depict a particilular time and place in Australia like Collins St, 5p.m. from 1955 (pictured), The Car from 1955, and The Bar from 1954.

After the 1950s I started to lose concentration. It was like he was trying to be something that he wasn’t, trying to be new like a lot of art being produced in America around the same time. I became a little more interested in the 1980s when he was painting pencils, but I eventually returned to the 1950s rooms to leave the exhibition on a high note.

The Battle – 1983 – John Brack uses pencils to depict French and British soldiers in the Battle of Waterloo

I was much more impressed by a room of Fred Williams paintings in the free section of the gallery. Here’s some work by Fred Williams online. Fred Williams is also from this area, so I probably wouldn’t be hung for admitting that I like him more.

Posting has been a little light lately as I have jumped in the car and just kept driving. I’m about 5 hours south from home and am freezing. I’m in the Australian Capital Territory, in the city of Canberra to see Jackson Pollock’s Blue Poles: Number 11 from 1952 at the National Gallery of Australia.

It was bought by the Australian government in 1973 for $2 million USD and created a lot of controversy at the time. If the much smaller and much less impressive No. 5, 1948 painting was sold by David Geffen in 2006 for $140 million, Blue Poles would easily be worth $150 million today.. even in a financial crisis. I rarely ever put a money value on art when I’m in a gallery, but for Blue Poles I’ll make an exception.

Also, I find it funny that a city filled with politicians is based around circles. You can drive around and around and not really get anywhere.. just as politicians go around and around and never really get anywhere. See what I mean on Google maps.

My next stop may be Melbourne.. then maybe Tasmania.. but I’m taking each day as it comes and seeing where the wind blows me. A big gust of wind could even pick me up and take me to London or New York. You just never know what’s around the corner when you’re a paper bag blowing in the wind.

Many scholars mark Allan Kaprow’s happenings as the beginning of performance art. Others have named Ghandi as the first actual performance artist. Others still have identified the beginning of performance art in the Dada and Futurist movements.
Unfortunately these scholars are all dead wrong. The first performance art piece actually took place during the Renaissance and was commissioned by none other than Pope Clement VIII. The first performance art piece was a true masterpiece that still burns in our memories today. It was a real sacrifice on the part of the performer and the work deserves to be added to RoseLee Goldberg’s next anthology of performance art.

On February 17th, 1600, a crudely erected stage appeared in the middle of a main city square in Rome. A crowd gathered to view a performance they had seen advertised all around the city. General admission was charged for viewing, and the performance began to take shape.

Two assistants were busying themselves on the uneven wooden platform in Rome’s Campo di Fiori as they tried to make last minute adjustments to the performance area. Silence overtook the crowd as they began to realize that the event they were about to witness would never be repeated. Giordano Bruno ascended the stage and solemnly took his place in the center. His two assistants rapidly descended from the stage and left Bruno to begin his performance. Bruno waited calmly as a third assistant quietly lit a torch. The crowd watched in disbelief as the third artist assistant gracefully walked about the stage igniting it in various places. Flames quickly overtook the stage and Giordano Bruno was burned alive.

This might appear to be just a routine Inquisitional burning at first, but let’s examine the facts a little further. The stage name of the artist in question was Giordano Bruno, but his birth name was actually Filippo Bruno. Early in his artistic career, Bruno dabbled in other forms of expression, such as writing, rhetoric, and vagrancy. Unfortunately none of the art forms gave him much pleasure until he discovered the rewarding field of performance art. Once he found he desired path, he had no shortage of supporters, patrons, and disciples. He was later to become the darling of the Inquisition set and was invited to all their high society gatherings. It was in this enlightened environment that he gained the attention of the Pope who agreed to commission Bruno to burn himself alive before an audience.

Records from the era show the Pope’s skepticism regarding the public’s response, but the turnout proved his skepticism to be unfounded. Bruno’s performance piece remains the most lucrative artistic event in history, with gross earnings reaching upwards of 10,000 Florins, a sum that would be unimaginable today.

Created by Jeffrey Andreoni On 04/14/09 At 08:38 AM

I am convinced that the Modigliani exhibit at the Vittoriano Gallery in Rome was curated with one thing in mind: pencils.
The only way a stodgy museum gift shop could ever get more than 1 Euro for a pencil is by hosting a name brand artist’s exhibition. At the Modigliani exhibit, they were asking 5 euros for one such item. The man was a tubercular caricaturist who did a great Cycladic Idol impersonation. Sure, he did paint a few interesting portraits, but the majority of the wallspace was submerged in wine stained sketches. Recipients of the sketches, which were scribbled in exchange for said wine, probably thought nothing of the indistinct little scraps of barroom genius. Decades later however, the would-be collectors soberly went back to their closets and dug out the sketches when it was established that they were drawn by a bona-fide genius.

I paid 7 euros, with a student discount, to see the exhibit. That means I paid close to 1 Euro per square meter of art – prime beachfront property in Vietnam costs about the same. How do they arrive at such sums? Is there an admission to art ratio I am unaware of? The Louvre costs twenty and is not nearly as scant.

As I said, the story far outweighed the productivity. Why is it that storyless art doesn’t sell? Much like Gould on the piano, playing a lovely five minute piece and then talking about how lovely he played it for two hours afterwards. Modi, on the other hand, has others to speak for him. Probably dealers that want to up the value of their inventory. They talk the city into hosting the show, for free I might add, at the gallery commemorating Vittorio Emmanuele – you couldn’t vote for a better location; the flow of tourists is constant!

The city gets the take from the door, while the organizers get the gift shop proceeds. After packaging Modi properly, they ask 5 Euros for a pencil with his name on it, and the posters cost about 20 Euros. The profit margin is enormous; we are talking about wood and paper! -And the city covers their overhead.

Does this mean that in the future I will be paying 40 euros to see a vomit stain on the wall of a subterranean abode where someone who was thought to have been artistic lived? They will put an M.R.I. scanner on my head to map the amount of neural stimulation my hippocampus received, whereupon I will be charged a second time based on my cerebral response to having seen the vomit stain.
Modi was starving most of his life and now, after his death, the money comes rolling in. He was a martyr who provided collectors with the means to profit by the poor and hungry artist’s own demise. Hungry artists just work better I guess. Drawings must sell better.

These days non traditional art forms have to battle it out to get a brief showing in some obscure gallery on Via Dei Querceti, where the poor artists must then converse with wealthy provincials about their creations. This is a fate worse than Modigliani’s. Living artists must die of exhaustion before they can reach a global audience, or at least a tour group.

My solution is this: a worldwide gift shop pencil price index. It is just like the Big Mac index from The Economist. Every reader who attends an art show from now on must record the price of the pencils in the gift shop, and we’ll average it all out. We will then create a database which we can use to appraise our own work. The idea is this: you no longer have to worry about selling your art; you just sell pencils with your name on them while you give your art away for free. No more talking to nouveau riche art collectors or energy sapping dealers; you just hang out in the gift shop and count those pencils. The employees are more fun anyway!

Once we have an idea of what Picasso pencils get in Japan and Manet pencils get in Romania, it will be easier to give your work away on Craigslist and then have a show of your pencils in Guam. Auction them off at Sotheby’s, sell them wholesale on eBay, or stockpile them for a rainy day. You could even let your dealer sell the pencils for they’ll be otherwise unemployable. Start keeping track of those gift shop sales everyone, I want to have an Excel sheet done by next month…

Created by Jeffrey Andreoni On 02/19/09 At 01:36 PM

Here’s a new type of scam that I came across yesterday. I received an email from what looked like an artist that I listed in an art directory that I look after. I was suspicious immediately, but they did a lot of things right, which could have fooled those that are new to the internet (or much more trusting of people than I am).

The artist (Linda Blondheim) was using a Hotmail email address, which was hacked and stolen by scammers in Nigeria. The scammers then set out to scam her friends and contacts using her Hotmail email address, asking for money as she was stranded in Africa and needed $2300 to get back home.

It’s easily one of the cleverest scams I have received from the idiots. I was familiar with the name of the artist and they were using her real email address, but the mention of “Nigeria” and “Money” in the same email gave the scammers away. Legitimate businesses in Nigeria (if there is such a thing) must have a lot of problems dealing with international clients/customers as these scammers have given the whole country such a bad name worldwide. I know it’s wrong to generalise, but I wouldn’t deal with anyone from Nigeria as I don’t trust them.. and for good reason.

Here’s the email that I received..

Subject: Reply Soon…From Linda

How are you doing today? I am sorry i didn’t inform you about my traveling to Africa for a program called “Empowering Youth to Fight Racism, HIV/AIDS, Poverty and Lack of Education, the program is taking place in three major countries in Africa which is Ghana , South Africa and Nigeria . It as been a very sad and bad moment for me, the present condition that i found myself is very hard for me to explain.

I am really stranded in Nigeria because I forgot my little bag in the Taxi where my money, passport, documents and other valuable things were kept on my way to the Hotel am staying, I am facing a hard time here because i have no money on me. I am owing an hotel bill of $1050 and they want me to pay the bill before checking out,Else they will have to seize my bag and hand me over to the Hotel Management.

I need this help from you urgently to help me get back home, I need you to help me with the hotel bill and i will also need $1250 to feed and help myself back home so please can you help me with a sum of $2300 to sort out my problems here? I need this help so much and on time because i am in a terrible and tight situation here, I don’t even have money to feed myself for a day which means i have been starving so please understand how urgent i need your help.

I am sending you this e-mail from the city Library and I only have 30 min, I will appreciate what so ever you can afford to send me for now and I promise to pay back your money as soon as i return home so please let me know on time so that i can forward you the details you need to transfer the money through Money Gram or Western Union.Hope to hear from you.love,Linda

Advantages to Visiting Linda Blondheim’s Studio

Patron Club members receive excellent pricing on in studio and web site purchases.
Gift wrapping and gift cards are complimentary to patrons.
Delivery of larger paintings to Lake City, Gainesville, and Ocala areas free of charge.
Studio gift certificates for new patron referrals.
Commissions welcomed.
Enjoy a cup of coffee and visit with a professional established painter just minutes from Gainesville.

Email: lindablondheim12@hotmail.com
Web site: www.lindablondheim.com
Blog: http://lindablondheimartnotes.blogspot.com/

Note: The email above was Linda Blondheim’s real email address used for this scam, but she has since changed it. See her website or blog above for her new contact information.
>> Art Scams, List of Thieves

The Greek billionaire businessman and art collector Dakis Joannou has had the exterior of his 114 ft luxury yacht designed by Jeff Koons. The owner called his yacht “Guilty” after a Sarah Morris text painting according to the Monaco Eye website.

Joannou launched the yacht with get-together that included art world notables like Nicholas Serota, Jeffrey Deitch, Larry Gagosian, Marian Goodman, Maurizio Cattelan, and Ashley Bickerton.

The closeup of the luxury yacht looks more Roy Lichtenstein than Jeff Koons, but the artist said he was more influenced by WW1 camouflage patterns.

It’s different. I’m not sure Jeff Koons would be my first choice if I had a giant yacht to paint. I might choose Jeff Koons to trim my hedges into giant puppy dogs or to hang hoovers and household items on the wall, but I wouldn’t let him touch my yacht. I would probably call in a minimalist artist and tell him or her to paint it white.
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