The Barry McGee installation at the Oakland Museum of California
There is much excitement in our local community this weekend due to the grand reopening of one of the Bay Area's most prominent museums. And also because of the news that cabaret reform has passed effectively, ending the strange situation where many galleries, cafes, night clubs and bars in Oakland were regularly in violation of the law, risking closure or hefty fines. This comment by Vsmoothe, who writes the excellent blog, A Better Oakland, illustrates just how out of touch many of our local politicians have been in regards to the arts -- "[Jane] Brunner thinks allowing coffee shops to have a guitar player without spending thousands on a permit will destroy neighborhoods." Thank goodness, reason appears to have prevailed. Can't we have an art murmur with music and little mirth?
What else is in store this month, art-wise? You can check out a large scale commissioned work from one of San Francisco's most prominent artists, and an Art Murmur gallery will be featuring one of the highest profile artists ever seen at such a space. Who and who and where? Read on to find out.
The Secret Society
- Programmed by Joseph del Pesco
Berkeley Art Museum
2626 Bancroft Way, Berkeley
Friday, April 30, 5 p.m.- 9 p.m.
The Oakland Museum's grand reopening this weekend will surely overshadow this one, but it will not be on terms of merit or worth as by the end of the year, both the Berkeley Art Museum and the Oakland Museum of California should be be considered to be on a more equal footing. Right now, among all local museums that aim to show the many varied forms of modern and contemporary art, the BAM is, to me, unarguably the leader both in terms of fully realized exhibitions like the recently closed retrospective of outsider artist James Castle and events like this one which is a part of their "L@TE" evening performance/entertainment programming series which I found to be strongest of its kind in the Bay Area.
The event's organizer, Joseph Del Pesco, has thus described the meeting of his secret society: A society for the production of secrets rather than a society that is a secret, the Secret Society will produce an evening of sudden events, unscheduled music, and back-channel food, interrupting business as usual at the Berkeley Art Museum. A secret starts with an individual or a small group and spreads outward from person to person, turning into a public secret and then finally public knowledge. The events at the Berkeley Art Museum will follow this logic of dispersion. With the help of clues and signs, rumor and suggestion, the visitor will be led toward the moment of discovery.
There will be a back room card game happening, a speakeasy in evidence and 'clandestine' tours set to give the very secrets of the museum itself. I couldn't think of a better way to take the stuffyness out of the museum and inject some life into a place the uninformed could very mistake as stale.
Writer and broadcaster Chloe Veltman recently critized the clumsy juxtaposition of art and entertainment at such late night events at local museums, saying, "To stand out, the programming should make the art on display come to life in ways that are not necessarily possible when visitors are walking through exhibition halls during normal hours." Thoughtfully overseen by BAM Larry Rinder and a rotating hosts of co-conspirators inlcluding Joseph Del Pesco, Oakland's Rock, Paper, Scissors collective and the folks behind San Francisco's Needles and Pens, L@TE has regularly been the least forced and most creative of such events in the Bay Area. One night, you can find yourself drawing on the museum's walls (I did), and tonight, you can find yourself uncovering the secret wonders held by the institution itself.
Opening Celebration Weekend
Oakland Museum of California
1000 Oak Street
museumca.org/
Saturday, May 1, 11 a.m. through Sunday, May 2, 6 p.m.
It was a given that my one of my picks this time out would be the reopening of The Oakland Museum of California. Who'd want to miss 31 hours of programming, a large scale brand new commissioned piece from the famed San Francisco-based artist Barry McGee, the chance to see great new additions to the permanent collection from folks like Hank Willis Thomas and Trevor Paglen as well as live entertainment from the likes of Tommy Guerrero and the Oakland Soft Rock Choir, who will be giving a musical tour of the art gallery at 2 a.m.
For the most part, what will be open is the newly expanded art collection and its two freshly built out adjoining exhibition spaces, featuring some of the new works added to the museum's collection in recent years. This week, I got a preview and the results are encouraging, but not completely done. According to senior curator René de Guzman, Mr. McGee could very well, "...be working on his piece up until midnight the day before the opening."
It's easy to make a case to go to this event. And did I mention this event is free, thanks to Target, and open round the clock? How often is it that can one wander a museum in the wee hours pondering issues of self in relation to wryly humorous sculptures by Robert Arneson?
Krowswork: Closer Than They Appear
Krowswork
480 23rd Street
krowswork.com/
Art Murmur reception: Friday, May 7, 6 p.m. - 9 p.m.
William Eggleston is a giant in the history of photography and video art, securing in the words of Mark Holborn, "...the acceptance of colour photography by the highest validating institution" in a groundbreaking exhibition at New York's Museum of Modern Art. He also was a pioneer in the world of video art. His images and video of the south have been used as record covers for artists as varied as Big Star and The Silver Jews, and the work evokes a stark naturalism that is deeply lyrical and nuanced. Krowswork, which has had a strong run since its opening this last December, features a video from Eggleston in the excellent groupshow, Closer Than They Appear. The show also has a video installation by Sade Huron, and photography by Ryan C. Smith. I recently had the chance to talk with gallerist Jasmine Moorhead about the show, the south and the history of video art.
Theo Konrad Auer: What drew you to chose these three particular artists for this show? What qualities are in each artist's work do you think have been highlighted by this mix?
Jasmine Moorhead: Each of these artists is looking at something very personal but without judgment or sentimentality. It's a hard mix for an artist to achieve, but I think each of them does it fabulously. There is also a mix of the familiar and the edgy that makes for a compelling viewing experience. Aesthetically, the work of the young photographer, Ryan Smith, reminded me a lot of Eggleston for the clarity of vision about the people and places he is photographing. Sade Huron's video installation piece, Marked, very much represented the literal road that each of us travels, a constant process of simultaneous engagement with the anonymous highway of history and the unique experience of the individual.
TKA: In William Eagleston's Stranded In Canton, the banal and perhaps baleful are seen alternately and simultaneously over the course of 77 minutes. What slice, what corner of the south do you think Eagleston found?
JM: When Eggleston took this footage in 1973-1975, he was already becoming established as a photographer. I think in some ways then this piece is a double document--both of a South that historically was disappearing but also as one that he was necessarily going to have to estrange himself from in some way. So it's a very personal piece, of course, but still with that Eggleston frankness. These were Eggleston's peers, or they had been, and in some ways he was hoping to preserve that. But the footage is such--violent at times, drunken--that there can be no sentimentality, and that's a very good thing.
TKA: In the film, fragments are sewn towards a greater whole - what does the film say about the south for you?
JM: I grew up in Mississippi, and I recognize the personalities to be sure. Southerners are polite but frank--at least the old-timers. And friends are friends because a space and place and experience are shared. That is primary, far more than shared interests, for example. The thing that was different, for me, though was the lawlessness and the freedom. The people in this film are not answering to any abstract sense of country or expectations. This is interesting because it dovetails with the whole situation of photography and video at this moment. This was perhaps one of the last moments in time where being photographed or videoed was neither commonplace, but neither had it taken on this weighted meaning of more than it was. There was a real one to one relationship with the maker.
TKA: Music is central to the film and the sound at times has a rough cinema verite quality in only that regard, as most of the movie does not appear staged. What do think the music brought to the film?
JM: Some of the music is live, some has been added. I think it was added just as a narrative convention, but when Eggleston is filming blues singers, for example, it is history.
TKA: The Sony Portapak camera at the time of this film's making has just been recently introduced. It would prove to be a deeply influencial tool in the development of video art. Could you elaborate on that?
JM: The Portapak was perhaps the defining moment in the history of video. Eggleston has commented that many people he was filming probably weren't even aware of it -- because it wasn't a normal "film" camera, with lights or the other trappings that were expected. It allowed for a more personal exploration of spaces and people, as it was the first time video could take place out of a studio in a casual, spontaneous way. Not to mention the cost savings. Eggleston, apparently, changed the lenses that came with the Portapak to something more custom. But really it's the way Eggleston holds the video camera--disorientingly close to his subjects in some cases--that defines the aesthetic of this video, more than the technical aspects of the camera itself. |