Posts by Miss Rosen

Most Influential Artists of the Last 20 Years

Posted on May 2, 2017

Photo: Kusama’s Peep Show or Endless Love Show, 1966. Hexagonal mirrored room and electric lights. Installed at Castellane Gallery, New York, 1966. No longer extant. Courtesy of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.

“This idea of art for art’s sake is a hoax,” no less than Pablo Picasso observed, recognizing the bourgeois mentality that drove narcissistic self-indulgence into the creative process was merely fraud.

Indeed, art does not exist for itself; the greatest works are those that transform understanding into wisdom while revealing the truth of the times as not only a matter of the moment but of the underlying human condition. The best art is always one step ahead of where we find ourselves, predicting the future by bringing it to our attention today In celebration of the most influential artists of the last 20 years, Crave has compiled a list of men and women from all walks of life who work in a wide array of mediums, speaking truth to power.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Categories: Art, Books, Brooklyn, Crave, Exhibitions, Graffiti, Japan, Painting, Photography

Former Child Soldier Wins Goldman Environmental Prize for Protecting Wildlife

Posted on May 1, 2017

Photo: 2017 Goldman Environmental Prize winner Rodrigue Mugaruka Katembo (Photo: Goldman Environmental Prize).

Former child soldier turned wildlife park ranger, Rodrigue Mugaruka Katembo, 41, is one of the six people who has been awarded the prestigious 2017 Goldman Environmental Prize for his work to protect the natural environment. The prize, given to one person from each of the world’s six inhabited continental regions, was given to Katembo for his work protecting the majestic endangered species who populate Virunga, Africa’s oldest’s national park, from oil prospectors who are keen to gain access the pristine and untapped lands of this UNESCO World Heritage site.

At 3,000 square-miles in size, Virunga encompasses sections of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Uganda, and Rwanda. It’s lush tropical rainforest, active volcanoes, and mountain glaciers are home to the world’s last remaining population of mountain gorillas, less than 900 total, as well as elephants, lions, and hippopotamuses—making it one of the few Edenic spaces that exist on earth.

As a park ranger, Katembo is up against the very worst: political instability, armed poachers, and rebels, who outnumber the poachers ten to one. Militias have killed more than 160 rangers over the past twenty years, as Virunga has been the site of countless skirmishes and conflicts.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Bottom Photo: Virunga, the oldest national park in Africa and the crown jewel of Congo’s ecotourism, is an area of extraordinary biodiversity and an important habitat for mountain gorillas. (Photo: Goldman Environmental Prize)

Categories: Africa, Crave

Basquiat Before Basquiat: East 12th Street, 1979-1980

Posted on April 28, 2017

Photo: Basquiat in the apartment, 1981. Photograph by Alexis Adler.

Before Jean-Michel Basquiat was known by name, his work had already hit the streets of New York. Writing under the name SAMO©, Basquiat and partner Al Diaz co-opted the means of graffiti to build street cred and fame but they took it a step further by adding tongue-in-cheek turns of phrase in bold block letters. By avoiding the highly stylistic letterforms of graffiti writers, SAMO© made it clear: they wanted to be read, known, and understood. Theirs was a message to the people of New York.

SAMO© was a name that Diaz and Basquiat came up with one day while smoking they called “the same old shit.” They shortened it to “Same old,” then “SAMO” came through. At the time, Basquiat had been working in the art department of Unique Clothing Warehouse, perfectly situated at the intersection of Broadway and West Eighth Street. At night, they’d go out bombing, leaving messages behind, letting the city know what was on their mind.

“SAMO©… THE SO-CALLED AVANT GARDE”
“SAMO©… 4 MASS MEDIA MINDWASH”
“SAMO as an alternative 2 playing art with the ‘radical chic’ sect of Daddy’s$funds’

While art critic Jeffrey Deitch described the messages as “disjointed street poetry” in a 1982 issue of Flash Art, Basquiat admitted in a video interview that first ran on ART in 1998 it was, “Teenage stuff. We’d just drink Ballantine Ale all the time and write stuff and throw bottles…”—because, in fact, he was just 18 and 19 years of age.

But then, in 1979, things changed. Basquiat and his friend Alexis Adler got a small apartment in the East Village together. The Brooklyn-native was on his own, free to explore life on his terms. Although his work as SAMO© continued through 1980, it was slowly getting phased out as Basquiat began to develop his work as a fine artist.

Read the Full Story at Feature Shoot

Photo: Basquiat in the apartment, 1981. Photograph by Alexis Adler.

Photo: Basquiat practicing clarinet in the bathroom of the apartment, c. 1980. Photograph by Alexis Adler.

Categories: 1970s, 1980s, Art, Exhibitions, Feature Shoot, Photography

Most Scandalous Art Shows of All Time

Posted on April 27, 2017

Gran Fury for ACT UP

The best art upends expectations and social mores, challenging the status quo by transgressing the boundaries of polite society. Because, let’s face it, truth isn’t kind to those who lie to themselves. But like the sun and the moon, the truth will always out.

Great art is a vessel for truth, allowing artists to speak freely without ever uttering a word. The immediacy of sight and the way it work on the brain allows it to change the way we perceive the world by upending the power of words to articulate and explain. “Seeing is believing” as the old proverb goes, and with that in mind, artists can change your mind without giving you a chance to argue. In celebration of the power of art, Crave has compiled a list of the most scandalous art shows of all time.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Categories: 1980s, 1990s, Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Photography

Jamel Shabazz: Crossing 125th

Posted on April 26, 2017

Photo: Style and Finesse, 2010. Digital chromogenic print, 16 × 20 in. Courtesy the artist. © Jamel Shabazz

Harlem is the heart and soul of New York, the epicenter of African-American life, culture, history, and hustle. At the turn of the twentieth-century, this vast tract of land in upper Manhattan quickly became the destination for black folks leaving the South en masse during the Great Migration. Here, folks created a town within a city entirely its own, dominating the wide boulevards and stately homes with a style and approach to life that combined the very best of the North and the South.

It was during this first wave that the Harlem Renaissance was born, giving rise to a flourishing movement of a wide array of arts from literature, poetry, and drama to music, dance, and theater. Visual artists also took root, creating images that bespoke not just the times but also the rich and textured history of African-American life as seen through the eyes of the people.

Among the great artists of the era was James Van DerZee, one of the premier photographers of the twentieth century. During the 1920 and ‘30s, he crafted a compelling pictures of Harlem’s emerging middle class that employed the elements of traditional Victorian portraiture—but took them to new heights but connecting with the spirit of his subjects and bringing out their glamorous inner light. Van DerZee’s photographs came to define Harlem in a way that few other photographers ever could, and in doing so, he influenced generations to come—including the great Jamel Shabazz.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Photo: Double Exposure, 1990. Digital chromogenic print, 16 × 20 in. Courtesy the artist. © Jamel Shabazz.

Categories: 1980s, 1990s, Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Manhattan, Photography

Wall Writers: Graffiti in Its Innocence Exhibition

Posted on April 26, 2017

Photo: COCO 144, 1974. Photo by Michael Lawrence. Courtesy Roger Gastman.

Graffiti is a basic human impulse. From the oldest known cave paintings, going back 40,000 years in the Maros region of Indonesia to a toddler in 2017 who has discovered the magic of crayons and walls, the desire to leave a mark speaks to a fundamental tool of communication. The visual and the verbal commingle and merge in its purest form, continuing to speak for the person who may since be long gone.

Graffiti, in its contemporary form, found its footing in New York and Philadelphia during the Summer of Love as the idea of writing on the wall transformed from a primitive impulse to craft an anonymous message took shape as an increasingly stylized representation of a specific personage. As it did so, it became more than act of rebellion; it became a form of art, a flourish of a handstyle that was as unique as a signature and as bold as an autograph.

The earliest practitioners of the form have been left largely to the underground, to the myths of history or fallen into the cracks of the past. As pioneers and innovators, their work could be rudimentary, as it was more invested in discovery than perfection. It wouldn’t be until the second generation came along with its top-to-bottom whole train car masterpieces that many sat up and took notice. But the first generation certainly made waves, inspiring newspaper and magazine stories, books, and later collaborations and films. But quick as they came up, they disappeared, moving on with their lives as they aged out, from boys to men.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Photo: Photograph by Jon Naar, 1973. Courtesy Roger Gastman.

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, Art, Crave, Graffiti, Manhattan, Photography

Frieze A to Z of Contemporary Art

Posted on April 25, 2017

Photo: Wolfgang Tillmans, Lutz and Alex, sitting in the trees, 1992, photograph. © the artist, courtesy Maureen Paley, London.

In June 1991, frieze magazine appeared on the scene. A slim 32 pages, the pilot issue gave a taste of things to come. Inspired by the great British style magazines like Arena, The Face, and i-D, editors Amanda Sharp and Matthew Slotover decided to bring the same sensibility to the world of art. In doing so, the revolutionized the art world on two fronts, with publishing leading the way for art fairs on both sides of the pond.

With the sixth edition of Frieze New York coming up for May 5-7, 2017, we’re celebrating a look back at the magazine’s first 25 years in print with the publication of the handy new guide, Frieze A to Z of Contemporary Art (Phaidon). Drawing on the magazine’s incredible back catalogue of work, the book is organized in a simple to follow collection of essays that take you from Avant-garde to Zeitgeist, with stops along the way in a marvelous potpourri of topics that run the gamut, from Critics, Economics, and Jargon to Nostalgia, Taste, and Visionaries.

With essays like Glenn O’Brien on Andy Warhol for the chapter on Fame, Christian Haye on Kara Walker for History, and Jim Lewis on “Ren & Stimpy” for Television, there is something for everyone. Because that’s what frieze does best of all: it takes the obscure and the sublime and makes them accessible.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Categories: 1990s, Art, Books, Crave, Photography

Ryan McGinley: The Kids Were Alright

Posted on April 24, 2017

Photo: “Red Mirror”, 1999. Courtesy Ryan McGinley and team (gallery, inc.) © Ryan McGinley.

On a chilly night back in February 2003, Ryan McGinley: The Kids Are Alright opened at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Ryan McGinley, then just 25-years-old, was the youngest artist to have a solo show in the museum’s seven decades on Madison Avenue.

I’m not entirely sure the Whitney knew what to expect, as the denizens of downtown piled into the tiny gallery. I overheard a security guard say, “Excuse me, ma’am. Do not lean against the art,” to blonde in a faux-fur coat with slurry eyes. Moments later a security guard said, The blonde shoved on, disappearing into the throngs that jostled their way in and out of the exhibition. The lurid, glamorous and grizzled characters in McGinley’s photographs were there in the flesh, celebrating the artist’s quicksilver rise to the top. In a period of just five years, McGinley documented the luminous tail of the bohemian comet that swept New York throughout the second half of the twentieth century.

McGinley hung with a squadron of graffiti writers, artists, and personalities that made their own rules – and what remains of those days and nights are the photos. Some 1,600 pictures made between 1998 and 2003, most never-before-seen, have just been released in the new book, The Kids Were Alright, (Rizzoli) to time with an exhibition of the same name now at the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver through August 17, 2017.

The documentary-style photographs and Polaroids are raw, sexy images of intense intimacy. Whether partying, having sex, or just hanging out, McGinley’s photos present a portrait of his generation at their most uninhibited peak. McGinley spoke with Dazed about coming of age in True York.

Read the Full Story at Dazed Digital

Categories: 1990s, Art, Books, Dazed, Exhibitions, Graffiti, Manhattan, Photography

Anthony Bourdain and Balvenie Celebrate the Art of Rare Craft

Posted on April 21, 2017

Photo: Anthony Bourdain.

American chef, author, and television personality Anthony Bourdain is just as cool as he seems. Dressed in all black with a pair of well-worn Converse high tops, he sits comfortably at the Wythe Hotel in Brooklyn, musing upon the nature of rare craftsmanship.

Bourdain has partnered with The Balvenie Single Malt Scotch Whisky, arguably the finest in the industry, to host the 2017 American Craft Council Rare Craft Fellowship Awards. The event brings together craftspeople from all walks of life who share a love and passion for the mastery of age-old traditions that take time, patience, and skill, along with a gift for handwork that belies the illusions of progress.

Amara Hark-Weber, who hand-makes shoes and boots in her one-woman shop, was selected as the winner of the 2017 award. Bourdain, the lead juror, observed, “It’s always difficult to narrow it down to one winner, but what spoke to me about Amara is how she honors the tradition of her craft, while bringing exciting innovation to her designs. With only the use of her hands, leather and a knife she can create these shoes that are works of art.”

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Categories: Crave

Art Pioneer Carolee Schneemann Looks Back at 50 Years of Work

Posted on April 21, 2017

Photo: Still from performance of “Up to and Including Her Limits” (June 1976). Photo: Henrick Gaard

Artist. Feminist. Revolutionary. Carolee Schneemann, now 77 years old, has been traversing the sacred spaces of female sexuality and gender in the name of truth, liberation, and freedom from the patriarchy for more than half a century. Raised on a farm in rural Pennsylvania, Schneemann learned not to fear viscera, injury, or death. Instead, she embraced the creative and destructive forces of Mother Nature and fused them into work that challenged every assumption about women in the art world.

A multidisciplinary artist, Schneemann has created groundbreaking paintings, photographs, performance-art pieces, and installations that expose deep female secrets, pleasures, fears, and taboos. Using her body as a starting point, Schneemann also challenges cultural norms that discourage female artists from using their own nude bodies as the subjects of their work. Most memorably, in her landmark piece, Interior Scroll (1975), Schneemann stood on a table, assumed “action poses,” then slowly extracted and read from a scroll tucked neatly inside her vagina.

Her work shocked the establishment, but over the past 50 years, it has also become the foundation upon which generations of artists and pop-culture figures stand. From Matthew Barney to Lady Gaga, Schneemann’s influence is vast, yet she remains a solitary figure in the world of art, constantly reinventing her methodologies to examine the beauty and horrors of life in equal measure. On the cusp of her first United States retrospective, “Kinetic Painting,” at MoMA PS1 (running from October 22, 2017 to February 1, 2018), Schneemann spoke with BUST about her iconoclastic life in art.

Read the Full Story at BUST Magazine

Photo: Still from performance of “Eye Body: 36 Transformative Actions for Camera” (1963), photo: Erró

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Women

World Press Photo 17

Posted on April 21, 2017

“Post-truth,” which was chosen as Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year for 2016, is the very thing tried to define: “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” Propaganda by any other name would simply be…more of the same.

Perhaps the word appeals to those whose held fast to their illusions of some great Fourth Estate, able to disregard the consistent expression of disinformation and bias because it wasn’t directed at them. Oh, but how the tables have turned, and new words are created to disguise the new fictions from the old. Certainly there is an objectivity—but who perceives it, and by what means? And who, with the power to report, would dare deny their own inherent subjectivities? Wouldn’t we be far better served without such claims?

Truth be told, ambiguity is discomforting. So much that one needs to consider; no simple answers here. But as F. Scott Fitzgerald understood, “”The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.”

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Categories: Books, Crave, Photography