The cancer death, Wednesday, March 19, 2008 of anti-war free-lance photographer Phillip Jones Griffith gives those of us who learned to understand war through his lens and those who loved his brilliant photographs an opportunity to review his legacy. A somewhat mis-edited NYT obit is here which includes a link to a few photos. He sold his work through Magnum, a photographers’ cooperative of which became president and it is at the Magnum site that a massive display of his work is available.

Hooray!

We can finally all leave our various hovels and head outside without fear of drowning, freezing, or being buffeted by monstrous winds; Spring is, indeed, finally here.

In short, we have roughly three, maybe four weeks, before we can all again complain about the oppressive heat.

MARK NAPIER
new software art and prints

Thursday, April 12, 2007
6:30-8:30 pm

bitforms gallery
529 West 20th Street, NYC
(btw. 10th & 11th avenues)

If you live at a relative stone's throw from the Empire State Building, what does the ultimate symbol of capitalism become before your very eyes? How is this place tranformed by digital culture after 9/11?

In the creative mind of Mark Napier, the ESB is a cyclops formed of brick and mortar yet powered by flesh and cicuits. It is a symbol of a crumbling physical power caught in the webs of immateriality forged by software and the net. It is the very essence of the shifting structures of power.

Mark has been at work on this project for about 2 years now. It's interesting and horrific to live with a working artist. There is no reason for him to code the software that created the print for the sites or the actual artwork, yet it's more than just like a disease. He codes because he has to. That's how he builds his sculptures and paints his digital canvases.

In honor of the suppression of an art exhibition right here in New York where a crucified Jesus made of chocolate was found to be offensive, I present the lyrics to Tom Waits' song, Chocolate Jesus:

Dont go to church on sunday
Dont get on my knees to pray
Dont memorize the books of the bible
I got my own special way
Bit I know jesus loves me
Maybe just a little bit more

I fall on my knees every sunday
At zerelda lees candy store

Well its got to be a chocolate jesus
Make me feel good inside
Got to be a chocolate jesus
Keep me satisfied

Well I dont want no anna zabba
Dont want no almond joy

FINALLY! I have known for over a year that the Brooklyn Museum of Art had acquired Judy Chicago's "Dinner Party." But they have been building a new area to display it. Finally, it is about to open. Judy Chicago doesn't seem as well known here as she is out in Los Angeles. So it is nice to see her art reaching Brooklyn.

I have not met Judy Chicago, but my brother has worked with her on her show "Envisioning the Future" (mentioned here and pictured in the photo on the right in the Hawaiian shirt

He should have gotten one for Raging Bull, for Taxi Driver, for Gangs of New York; but last night, the Academy finally gave in and gave Martin Scorsese his Oscar.

I say, what took you so long?

On a related note, was this the most international awards show in living memory, or what? Was the Academy trying to apologize to the rest of the world for certain recent, cough George Bush cough, offenses to every other country on earth?

Oh and, forget about Al Gore running; not with those extra pounds, Mister.

Brooklyn Children's Museum

Planet Brooklyn: Chinese New Year celebration will kick off the Year of the
Boar at Brooklyn Children's Museum on Saturday, February 10, from 12-5pm. Families can create their own lanterns, learn to play shuttlecock and other Chinese games, and meet real "dragons" from the Museum's live animal collection. And don't miss a special performance by the lion dance team from Yee's Hung Ga Kung Fu Association of Brooklyn - including a peek inside the lion's head!

145 Brooklyn Avenue

Brooklyn Museum

Celebrate Heart of Brooklyn's fifth anniversary in Brooklyn Museum's spectacular collection of ancient Egyptian masterpieces. The galleries include more than 1,000 treasures spanning 5,000 years, from pre-dynastic times through the reign of Cleopatra. See beautifully decorated coffins, a mummy, monumental stone statues, jewelry worn by the pharoahs, and a relief with the world's first-known representation of a kiss, all a part of the collection considered to be one of the finest in the world. And be sure to catch the newly opened Landscapes from the Age of Impressionism. This exhibition has over forty superb examples of nineteenth century French and American landscapes by such artists as Gustave Courbet, Claude Monet and John Singer Sargent.

The Daily Gotham is pleased to announce a new contributor, Richard Rothstein; Richard will be blogging here, and - we wish for want must have - hopefully sharing his stupendous photography, otherwise featured on his other blog, Manhattan Details. Richard was recruited straight off Daily Kos, where he currently has a featured diary, which in turn led us to him. Here's a sample of his work:

So, welcome aboard, Richard.

Just got an email from my friend Susan well worth passing on; it's an article in Frieze Magazine written by her sister, Nancy Spector, who is Curator of Contemporary Art at the Guggenheim and Commissioner of the US Pavilion for the Venice Biennale 2007.

The impact of the Bush administration on the art world, I always thought, was confined to its serving as malignant inspiration for any number of deprecatory pieces. We tend to forget that they have their hands on the slender levers of the government's arts funding; and lo and behold, the results are the same rot we've come to expect everywhere.

When I received a gold-engraved card from the White House inviting me to a reception to launch the administration’s new Global Cultural Initiative, I thought at first that it must have been an art-world prank – perhaps a tactical media intervention by the Critical Art Ensemble. But then I realized it was my current role as the commissioner of the US Pavilion for the 2007 Venice Biennale that had earned me this unexpected distinction. The correlation between the Bush White House and culture seemed oxymoronic to me; the title ‘Global Cultural Initiative’ does, after all, have the same vague propagandistic ring and sinister undertones as ‘Operation Iraqi Freedom’.

Set in the White House’s grand East Room lined with portraits of past presidents, the presentation was introduced by Laura Bush, who reminisced about the influence of culture during the Cold War, citing the Voice of America’s broadcasting of jazz music into the Soviet Union as a catalyst for the dissolution of communism. Under-Secretary of State Karen Hughes, Bush’s personal propaganda tsar, proceeded to outline the multiple-agency programme, stating that ‘art and culture can play a vital role in helping achieve our strategic public diplomacy goals’. She stopped short of explaining what those goals might actually be.

So not only are there goals, to the delighted astonishment of the world, but they can be achieved through jazz. Nobody knows, of course, if Osama bin Laden is a jazz fan. Perhaps if we'd actually, you know, caught the man, we'd know.

During the 2006 Democratic Primary season in Brooklyn (a hotly contested fight in a place where few Republicans do well leading to the idea that through most of Brooklyn Democrats could run a sponge cake and still beat Republicans) I met a gentleman named Bill Batson.

The very first time I met him, he discussed contriversial issues that my wife and I had skirted, but had yet to publicly discuss. I rapidly became a supporter in his (ultimately unsuccessful) run for Assembly, but I also came to see him as an example of what I call a "community candidate," a political candidate who comes from a background of community activism and participation. Bill's opponents tried to portray him as a lightweight, a nobody. This was grossly unfair to a man who had served his community for years. He was the New York State Senate Democratic Leader David A. Paterson’s Director of Community Relations, the chair and Co-Founder of ACRES, (American Civil Rights Education Services), has worked at The Coalition for the Homeless, 1199 SEIU and the New York Civil Liberties Union, was campaign manager for Norman Siegel's campaign for Public Advocate, served as a mediator between a public sector union and a non-profit health care company, facilitating the end of a nine-month dispute, and has served as a member of Community Planning Board 8, co-chairing the Fire Safety committee and the special sub-committee on the Environmental Impact of Brooklyn Atlantic Yards Development. All of this he brought into politics when he decided to throw his hat into the ring. His failed bid for Assembly came because he ran as a grassroots candidate against big money and development interests. But he has not given up activism.