Your Social Life With Iannis Xenakis, Rachel Lachowicz,Edgar Arceneaux, Etc.

FBC! is still marveling at the awesomeness of last week when the Blinky Palermo and the Matthew Brannon exhibitions illuminated what is otherwise a really trying period of my life, so I can only encourage my beloved readership to run see these shows as fast as they can, and to see the Kaltenbach exhibition at anotheryearinla before it closes (on the 10, I think).

There are a few openings in town this week, starting with FBC! pal Edgar Arceneaux at Susanne Vielmetter  who's also showing Martin McMurray. Still in Culver City, where you can also go attend Kelly Barrie's at LAXart. While in the neighborhood, don't miss Zoe Crosher's An Unveiling at EGHQ. Also in Culver City, Stop Move at Blum and Poe, a group show with Nathalie Djurberg, Hirsch Perlman, Robin Rhode and Matt Saunders. At François Ghebaly, Candice Lin presents Holograms.

FBC! never sets foot on the Westside (given the traffic there and the horrible parking situation) but I highly recommend the Rachel Lachowicz show at Shoshana Wayne at Bergamot Station. It's been a while since I've seen Lachowicz work, about a decade at least, so I'm curious to see where she's at with her work right now.

On the other side of town, MOCA presents something really interesting and not completely vapid for once, the Iannis Xenakis (who once taught John Cale avant-garde composition at Tanglewood) event Persepolis, at Los Angeles State Historic Park (on the Eastern edge of downtown). It starts at 6 PM and it's free, without reservations required. And, if I wasn't going to the Edgar Arceneaux opening, I'd attend it, it's not every day you have avant-garde music/events being recreated in LA. It goes with the MOCA/Pacific Design Center show about Xenakis, which I assume comes from the Drawing Center in NYC. If you click on the link above you can go through the sketches/notation and listen to his music.

On Sunday there's a mega-event at LACMA to end (?) the year-long Fallen Fruit residency, Let Them Eat LACMA,  with many performances (including Ann Magnuson) but I won't attend because I work on Sundays, and also I need to come  clean on that: I really, really dislike group activities and participatory/interactive art. I understand how people like to have fun together, but I like my art less crowded. Which makes me a fucking elitist, I guess, a label I can live with, as long as I don't have to mix up with hundreds of people.
This being said, I wish Fallen Fruit lots of success in their enterprises.

(pic on top from the MOCA website, I suppose an original photograph of the historical Persepolis event, but I couldn't find credits).

Your Social Life, Rather Late Today

Hello my dear faithful, devoted readership!

This new installment of Your Social Life is rather late today, and I apologize, sorry my beloved readers!
I'm engrossed not only in frantically trying to finish writing my novel until I run out out of money and need a job (anyone?), but Ive also been busy this week transcribing a 3-hour interview of LA artist Edgar Arceneaux for the next issue of Area Sneaks. It's painstakingly slow, and with the heat we had over the last few days, I'm getting headaches that slow the process even more. But I'm pretty happy with what Edgar and I got, so brace yourselves for a 50,000words interview. Or more!!!

I hope to be done in the next 4/5 days, unless a hot, hot, young and gratis intern decides to show up. Not allergic to cats is a must. Needless to say FBC! isn't an equal-opportunity employer, so my unpaid future slave has to be male, dark-haired, not too tall (5'7"" to 6' at best, OK?) and straight. Dimples are cute. I like 'em swarthy, it means hairy-chested in French. In exchange for your labor, dear future sexy intern, you will get the fabulous opportunity to hear firsthand Edgar's great ideas, and I make very good coffee. Plus you get to know which very select openings and other art events to go to each weak! A great job, let me tell you.

Anyway, before your dark-haired version of Daniel Craig comes and rings my bell, I'm not a b*eotch, so I'm taking care of your social agenda. It's unlikely I'm going anywhere until the transcript is finished, so if you spot me it's because I need a break badly.

So, what cool things should you do this weekend, to recover from the debate, the heat, the stock market crash, the bailout discussion and the upcoming resurrection of the Bretton-Woods agreement (I've seen that one coming for several weeks now, I feel vindicated.)? That's right, come to think of it, where should you go?

Well, not too far: There's Martin Kersels at Acme, to accompany is current retrospective at SMMOA, on Saturday. I think Ricky Swallow opens at Marc Foxx as well on the same day.
On Sunday, you can go see the much anticipated special project by Haim Steinbach on Mike Kelley at Overduin and Kite. Right after you should rush to the Mandrake in Culver City, as there's at 7:30pm for a screening of videos from the exhibition Documental, an exchange between artists from Dusseldorf and Los Angeles. The show closes on Saturday at Chapman University.
If you had forked over some monies or been invited by grand and well-connected people, you may also go to the Hammer Gala this weekend. The difference between the Hammer Gala and the other types of fundraisers in LA Museums is, since the food isn't catered by the Patina Group, but by Suzanne Goin of Lucques and AOC fame, it is in fact really good (the desserts tend to be just OK though). I wish they won't have rain.
And on Wednesday is one of LACMA's lame openings. I love LACMA, I think their shows tend to be under-reviewed and under-estimated, but please, please, please, add at least 500 more people to your sacrosanct-invites list, and revoke that lame contract with Patina. The food sucks to such an extant it's unbearable. Anyway, there's an opening for a show that is already open, but is really good, Fabiola by Francis Alÿs. They also open the CP11 show (yours truly curated the CP10 in the past), and I'd love to be supportive, but the subject I find boring and very dated, "Masculinity and Sports". Let's try the gender opposite "Feminity and...and? Needlepoint? Knitting?". See? 'nuff said. I'll have a look because I'm going to see Fabiola and I'm all for supporting Belgium, my favorite country that's constantly on the verge of self-implosion. But I wouldn't make a detour out of my own volition, not with that type of title. But I'm looking forward to the Hearst Collection one (Hi Mary!).

OK, with all that, I have more Edgar Arceneaux prose to materialize on paper, so have a nice weekend and enjoy your art!

Edgar Arceneaux at Susanne Vielmetter

Saturday FBC! broke off a 2-months long seclusion to attend an equal number of openings. And I got lucky, since both shows proved equally good! Now, when was the last time you scored a 100% satisfaction rate while opening-hopping? Yes, I thought so.
I still don't have much time to write (I do want to finish that damn novel 1st draft before I look for a job full-time), so I'm going to post a few pictures of Edgar Arceneaux's opening. If you clink on the link you will find the press release, and I hope you will go see the show. Meanwhile, I'm going again into seclusion next week, but I will go see galleries int he next couple of days so I may post more pictures if my faithful camera doesn't betray me. Stay tuned!

Pictures: "Circle Disk Rotation", "Moon Creeping Through the Window", "Opiuchus constellation is Laocoon's Serpent", all works made in 2008, Peter Zellner and Aimee Chang admiring "Leo" (2008), their astrological sign, Edgar Arceneaux and Susanne Vielmetter in the project room, with artist Susan Stilton in the background.

More Edgar Arceneaux To Cheer You Up!

So last Saturday I've gone on a Culver City stroll right before heading to Surfas to buy fresh yeast (and duck sausages). I didn't take pictures and I don't have much time tonight to really speak about the art at length. Just wanted to remark there's an unmistakable scent of upcoming art market recession, since there was quite a bit of video work rather than the usual slapdash figurative acrylic stuff.

1. Best show: Go see Adrià Julià: A Means of Passing the Time, at LAXart
2. The show I'm annoyed at myself for liking, but I cannot help it: Sue de Beer at Sandroni Rey (in passing, the first show I've liked at Sandrony Rey over the last 3 years). I find her work derivative, but there was a sequence in the video that looked like a crossover between Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Mike Kelley's Day Is Done sprawling installation-cum-film. It's the Goth aspect, I'm sure. BTW, not the best Cherkaoui piece but I took what was available on YouTube.
3. The show I'd like to like, but for the life of me I cannot: Slater Bradley at Blum and Poe. Bradley was there performing in his costume. It looked too much like an undergrad take on Surrealism via video, and I think Zbigniew Rybczynski has already done it so much better 25 years ago.
4.Biggest disappointment, Nicole Eisenmann at Susanne Vielmetter.


Just seeing that 3 out of the shows I mention were showing video and installation would have sufficed to make my day.
In addition, I had the ineffable pleasure to know Edgar Arceneaux had just won a USA Fellowship AND was going to be included in the 2008 Whitney Biennial. I am so very happy for Edgar, whom I have known for 10 years and is one of my favorite artists in LA!
In addition to Edgar, the list of artists makes me want to truly go see the Biennial, since it will include Michael Queenland, Ruben Ochoa, Mary Heilmann, Michael Smith, John Baldessari, Walead Beshty, Rodney McMillian, Stephen Prina and a few others. LA is very well represented, as usual.
Congrats to Edgar and the LA contingent (and to Prina by extension, since he is now bi-coastal).

Next Spring, NYC, here I come!

Your Social Life, At Home and Abroad

Hello my dear humongous readership,


This week is very busy, with tomorrow's Edgar Arceneaux book launch at LAXart, and Matthieu Laurette's opening at Deweer Art Gallery in Belgium this coming Saturday (pictured above, please click on link for the info).

And on Thursday evening, here in LA, a treat: a free lecture at LACMA by Kevin Salatino on Fuseli's erotic drawings. See press release below.
I can only urge you to attend because:
-a) Fuseli's drawings are amazing, erotic or not
-b) Kevin is an hilarious speaker, if very scholarly, and he is such a treat as an orator/speaker his lecture shouldn't be missed. And, it's free!








Fuseli's Phallus: Drawing Sex in 18th-Century Rome
Kevin Salatino, Curator of Prints and Drawings, LACMA

Thursday, November 8 | 7:00 pm

This lecture closely examines a remarkable group of erotic drawings made by the great Swiss-English artist, Henry Fuseli, while resident in Rome in the 1770s. Placing these drawings in their larger historical and cultural context, as well as probing the relationship between drawing and meaning, the lecture argues for a broader consideration of pornography as a liberating force in Enlightenment Europe and the important role that Fuseli played in that liberation.

Please note: some material may be considered objectionable.

Bing Theater | Free, no reservations
Call 323.857.6074 for more information

Errare Humanum Est: Errata

The title above is just a very pedantic way to announce some corrections:

The ever delightful Alexis V. who has been profusely thanked in October signals to my attention the following: his driving school project was a series of lectures, not a show, and that his inclusion of Mrzyk and Moriceau in a group show a Monolilithic French Institution *allowed* young curators to organize within its venerable walls was also a way of curating a solo show in the context of a group exhibition.

And, in case my previous post was confusing, the LAXart fundraiser is tonight.

I'd like to take advantage to announce the book launch of Edgar Arceneaux The Alchemy of Comedy ... Stupid at the same location this coming Wednesday, 6 to 9 PM.
I've known Edgar for many, many years, and over the last 3 years I've seen him rapidly developing in a major artist on the American scene, first with a fabulous show at The Kitchen in NYC, then with his collaboration with Charles Gaines at Redcat and most recently his solo show at Susanne Vielmetter. I think Edgar is poised to become a huge artist in the next few years. And, not only he is very talented but he is absolutely charming in person, in addition to being an artist who likes to collaborate with others.
Go support Edgar!

And go support the striking writers-in-arms: donate them food, warm picketing clothes and sturdy boots, and maybe try to help them find shelter when their rent checks start to bounce. Go writers!