The Nelson-Atkins, Shuttlecocks -- a stripper and a couple of acidheads.

Recently Tyler Green of Modern Art Notes posted a bit on the Nelson Atkins museum of Art which will be re-opening the Sculpture Park as well as the new Steven Holl-designed Bloch addition next year.

Reading Tyler’s post of his childhood memories of the Nelson did indeed spark some of my own: I was probably four or five years old when my mother took me to the Nelson to peruse the art. What I liked most were the Giant bronze Buddha in lotus position and the tiny ancient Chinese cricket cages complete with food bowls. When we came to Duane Hanson’s security Guard (Roy) my mother told me to ‘go and say hello to the nice man’ which I hesitantly did. A second later we were asked to leave the museum as my screaming and crying was disturbing the other visitors.

Much later, in a not so bright high school state of mind, my friends and I would drop acid and camp out under the Henry Moore sculpture. At dawn we would climb into Oldenburg’s shuttlecocks (apparently those pieces have really been around) to watch the sunrise. I often wonder what Claes and Henry would have to say about that.

So thanks for sending me down that avenue Tyler. And cheers to the Nelson and all its new endeavors.

Also for those of you in the area, tomorrow from 6 to 7 pm is a lecture by sculptor Tony Cragg. Tickets can be purchsed on-line here
Mary Atkins Lecture Series A View of Sculpture Speaker: Tony Cragg 6-7 p.m. Atkins Auditorium Single ticket cost is $10 members/$15 nonmembers/$5 students.

Two bronze works by Cragg, Turbo and Ferryman (below, but in NY), are the latest additions to the Kansas City Sculpture Park. Cragg's lecture is the premier event in the September reopening of the Park

The 2006 Charlotte Street Foundation Awards

Anthony Baab: A sacred place: Military tents

I know it's a little more review than press release but I couldn't help myself.

Currently on exhibition at the H&R Block space, a show representing work from each of the five local artists who recently received the Charlotte Street Foundation Award. Get beyond Andrew Wrinkle's brazenly haphazard installations with their somewhat tired and truculent political messages forming on the surface like pudding skin, and you may enjoy Justin Gainan’s punctilious dot portraiture. Needling clouds of pencil dots hover along the wall showing true compulsive dedication. Nearby stretches of paper with rubbed out pencil markings harbor a complex subtlety and reflect the delicate lucidity found in the drawings of Agnes Martin. An unusually large sized monolith supports his ink drawing sprayed with holes and lit from beneath. Anthony Baab woos us with an intricately spaced tape painting that undulates at just the right pace accompanied by some quirky sketches. Though hung without much consideration, these sketches reflect his process of finding pattern and in the end are delightfully eccentric. Baab’s installation propped in a dark backroom made of military tents lends one the impetus to enter or at least to know what’s going on inside. The ominous stagnancy seems to dissipate a bit with the in-too-clear-view black lighting, but the piece is chillingly effective as a whole. Also on display, intimate familial photographs by Deanna Dikeman, and Aqueous inkjet prints by Elijah Gowin. Now through October 14th.

H&R Block Artspace at the Kansas City Art Institute
16 East 43rd Street, Kansas City, MO 64111
www.kcai.edu/artspace

The Charlotte Street Foundation annually presents
monetary awards to Kansas City-based visual artists.

about 1:30

beginning stages

The Dark side of the shadow

Atomic shadows.
"Shadows" were left behind where objects shielded a surface from the heat.Where this happened, the shadow is the original color of the surface, and the area outside the shadow has been turned to a different color by the intense temperatures.

Aproximations/Contradictions

Belgian artist Ana Torfs and
Hans Eisler's Hollywood songbooks

(brought to you by Dia Beacon one of my favorite places so far on earth)

Some that I Love

Anish Kapoor
Rachel Whiteread
Wolfgang Laib
Other great and not-so-great contemporary designs

wry ry

As a dedicated, though sometimes-reluctant member of the Midwest peoples, I must admit Bill Gusky has a point.

Growing up in a place so plane, so continuously horizontal, one must draw up a wry sense of humor just to survive.

The flatness almost seems to seep into your being after a few years; your voice becomes flat, your hair flattens out, you and your loved ones may become flat chested or flat-footed. In many cases your general personality seems to flatten a bit.

I think as far as Bill is concerned, though he seems to genuinely miss these parts, his escape from St. Louis County which landed him in New England (a place I secretly wish to spend my later years) has lent him an equally valuable perspective.

Aside from the junipers and mountain laurels, (which I think sound lovely) you’ve got your maple syrup, your clam chowder, top o’ the line Universities, Emerson, Dickinson, Melville, the home of American Literature.

This quality and variety is emulated in Bill Guskys Artblog Comments, where he writes candidly about anything from the reciprocal values between braid theory and post-structuralism, to the playfulness of Tuttle’s paint on wood.

To be honest Bill, I could do without ever having to hear the words “PorkSteak” again.

David Harrison

Untitled, Acrylic on...plywood?

In the new gallery space of kcai
(still cubing it)

Beginnings Agains

still cubing it so far

Daytrotter

Many thanks to Sean Moeller of DayTrotter.com who is one of those responsible for the previous video post as well as this fantastic websight he has just introduced me to featuring well written reviews and free intimate recordings of artists such as Mr. Oldham.

Bonnie Prince Billy My Home is the Sea, Iowa City

The possible top of Jordans head?

Dan Walsh