The Art of Investing in Art

(Thanks AJ). According to this article, yearly art sales are now reaching an estimated $10 billion in the United States alone, and "While money invested in the stock market's S&P 500 Index -- a conservative bet on Wall Street's top 500 companies -- has earned an annualized 11 percent return over the past decade, that same money sunk into the contemporary art market would have produced a whopping 29 percent return."

That's impressive, but I want to know where the figures to determine these claims come from? Secondary art market sales? Examining the IRS returns of all art galleries in the US? Reviewing all the appraisals of artwork done over the past decade?

And I got my answers to those questions; not from the article but from doing a bit of digging on the web.

This all comes from a team of Wall Street analysts behind Fernwood Art Investments, a new firm with offices in Boston, New York, and Miami (I can understand New York and Miami, but Boston?).

According to their website Fernwood Art Investments is a

"...research and investment company focused on the art economy. We are the first independent firm to develop a comprehensive suite of art-focused investment research, advice, financial products and services for sophisticated investors and collectors. Our work generates new ways to participate in the art market and, in the process, brings significant new capital to the art economy.

In short, Fernwood is employing rigorous portfolio management techniques traditionally applied to equities, bonds and commodities, in combination with academic and art trade expertise, to derive investable art insight. We invite you to explore our vision of art investing."

Anyway, their website has some pretty impressive, if Wall Streetish sounding documentation and references and studies and words that show me that these guys seem to know what they are talking about.

And yet "investing" in art is such a fungible science (at best). I mean, basic investment means buy low sell high. Or to be safe, buy a steady, safe investment and keep it for a loooooong time and then sell it.

In art, to me that means something akin to buying a Cindy Sherman set of photos 20 years ago (and sell them now!), or a Jack Vettriano painting in 1989 (when I was offered one for 300 pounds) and selling them now for a couple of million... you get my point? The buy "low" is done at the early point in an artist's career, when more often than not, he or she is under the "radar" of most people that I imagine as "investing in art."

And the "safe art guys" are the masters, and they are already pricey, so only investors with bucks could buy a Picasso, or Van Gogh, or Renoir, etc. Buy one one, keep it for 20-30 years and it is certain to increase in price (less the 10% auction house commission).

And this is where it gets intriguing.... because, maybe... and just maybe... if a firm like Fernwood could gather a dozen rich investors, and acquire a Picasso oil with their funds, and then hold it for them, and when the time was right, sell it at a good profit... then this could work!

But the hard work for Fernwood will be to identify the up and coming emerging artists about to make it big, and buying their artwork early on, and holding onto it while it increases in price. That's a formidable task.

My tip to them? If anyone from Fernwood is reading this: Buy Tim Tate.

James W. Bailey's Top Five DC Shows of 2004

Leave it to James W. Bailey to take a simple listing of the top visual art shows from our region and end up with several thousand words on the subject.

Bailey’s had quite a good year in 2004 himself, with several national level group exhibitions, plus his premiere Washington, D.C. area solo exhibition, "The Death of Film," which opened in August of 2004 at the Rachel M. Schlesinger Concert Hall and Arts Center in Alexandria, Virginia. Bailey’s "Rough Edge Photography" will also be featured in two solo exhibitions in 2005: "Stealing Dead Souls," which opens in January at the Black Rock Center for the Arts in Germantown, Maryland, and, "Burnversions," which opens in August in Reston, Virginia. Bailey will also be curating a found photography exhibition, "i found your photo," that will open in November of 2005 in Reston, Virginia.

Bailey won three major national art awards in 2004: An Honorable Mention Prize for "Circle Theatre – New Orleans" at the 3rd Bethesda International Photography Competition, awarded by William F. Stapp, the first Curator of Photography for the National Portrait Gallery; The Albert J. Turbessi Award at the 47th Chautauqua National Exhibition of Art for "Woman at the Tomb," awarded by Dr. Donald Kuspit, considered as one of America’s leading art critics and art historians; The Juror’s Choice Award at the Peninsula Fine Art Center Biennial 2004 for "Angel of Death," awarded by curator for the High Museum of Art, Carrie Przybilla.

Here's his Top Five List:

2004 – The Year a Small Army of Mississippi Rebel(lious) Artists Invaded Washington, D.C.

For the last couple of years I have enjoyed some success (well, some might say so!) as a critically acclaimed experimental photographer who has been exhibited across the country, internationally, as well as right here in the Washington, D.C. area. As a native son of Mississippi, I have been proud and honored to represent my home state with my art.

I currently live in Northern Virginia and my wide range of artistic activities keeps me in constant contact with many independent visual artists, as well as with a large number of arts professionals who work with some of the most important museums, art centers and art galleries in the country.

Wherever I travel to exhibit my photography, my Mississippi background seems to quickly become the subject of intense conversation. Art knowledgeable people outside the South are fascinated by Mississippi; yet, the question I get asked most often lately by non-Southern art elites goes something like this: "How did an open-minded liberal white artist like you ever manage to develop in such a backward state that is on the bottom of every list that is so steeped in racist attitudes with such a hate filled history and populated with so many ignorant conservative Republican Christians?"

Of course, the art sensitive people who ask the above question are usually far too sophisticated to use such crude and direct language (the way we routinely do in the South!) so I’m forced to try and translate their unspoken thoughts... but I’m sure you get the point.

The negative stereotypes about the people of Mississippi are incredibly pervasive in the cosmopolitan world of high art. Many educated arts professionals that I deal with in the Washington, D.C. area seem to operate under this absurd media induced stereotype that the average white Mississippian is a dangerous gun-toting NRA member NASCAR-fan racist redneck Republican who drives around in a beat-up pick-up truck with Rebel Flag bumper stickers plastered all over his vehicle cruising the back roads of the state looking for liberal democrats to beat up.

Many people in the rarified heights of the art world don’t know, and don’t really want to know, anything about the real Mississippi. That’s a shame because this place called Mississippi, with a population less than 3 million, has produced more creative people than any other place in the United States of America.

But despite the condescending comments mouthed by those art snobs who soar in the thin air of high altitude art with the rest of the enlightened and seasoned cultural elite, the meaningful cultural legacy of the grounded dynamic multi-cultural vibrancy of artist heritage of Mississippi will be around long after these people have passed into historic obscurity and, indeed, long after the United States of America even ceases to be united. And no matter what happens in this world, no matter how bad things get, the creative energy of artistic Mississippians will continue to be one of the major forces of passion, hope and love of life that will inspire the world to be a better place.

Black or white, race doesn't matter, artists from Mississippi have a deep love for the world and have longed shared their talents (talents born from a reality that many of the elites in the world of high art will never understand) in a genuine effort to make the ordinary genuine person who lives in every neighborhood in America, and in every neighborhood of every country in the world for that matter, laugh or think or smile or cry.

This is what being a passionate liberal Mississippi artist and proud conservative Southern person is all about for me.

If you don’t get it, you never will... I guess it’s just a Southern thing.

There were 4 deceased Mississippi artists who have had a profound artistic impact on the world who were exhibited and/or noted in a major way in Washington, D. C. in 2004.

There was also a 5th living Mississippi artist/photographer who may have had (some are saying he did!) a certain impact in the D.C. area as well; I will let someone else comment on that fella’s contributions, if any, when that glorious day arrives:

1. Samuel "Sambo" Mockbee - "Samuel Mockbee and the Rural Studio: Community Architecture" at the National Building Museum.

"A true architect practices all three professions simultaneously. The role of an architect/ artist/ teacher is to challenge the status quo and help others see what the possibilities can be." – Samuel "Sambo" Mockbee

Only in the South could a white man get away with insisting that he be referred to as Sambo!

Sambo worked in architectural practice for many years prior to founding the Rural Studio. In 1977, immediately after completing his internship, he founded Mockbee Goodman Architects with friend and classmate Thomas Goodman. The firm quickly built a regional reputation for utilizing local materials in its exceptional designs, winning more than 25 state and regional awards in four years.

Architect Samuel Mockbee was convinced that "everyone, rich or poor, deserves a shelter for the soul" and that architects should lead in procuring social and environmental change. But he believed they had lost their moral compass. The profession needed reform, he believed, and education was the place to start. "If architecture is going to nudge, cajole, and inspire a community to challenge the status quo into making responsible changes, it will take the subversive leadership of academics and practitioners who keep reminding students of the profession’s responsibilities," he said. He wanted to get students away from the academic classroom into what he called the classroom of the community.

Architecture students enrolled in the Rural Studio actually live in and become a part of the community in which they are working. This "context based learning" format teaches them critical architecture skills with an eye towards social responsibility. It is said that to his students, Mockbee presented architecture as a principle that must be committed to environmental, social, political and aesthetic issues.

Samuel Mockbee was awarded the MacArthur Foundation Genius Grant in 2000 shortly before he died at the age of 57. He was post-humously awarded the 2004 AIA Gold Medal by the Board of Directors of the American Institute of Architects.

I considered Sambo to be a friend, an inspiration, a humanitarian and a consummate artist.

2. Walter Inglis Anderson – "Walter Inglis Anderson: Everything I See is New and Strange" at the Smithsonian Institution's Arts and Industries Building.

"I am continually arriving from some strange place and everything I see is new and strange." – Walter Inglis Anderson

Southern museum goers and art collectors have known of Walter Anderson for more than 50 years. They were introduced to him in 1948, when Memphians John and Louise Lehman persuaded Louise Bennett Clark, director of what was then the Brooks Memorial Art Gallery, to mount the first show ever of Anderson’s work. Art critic Guy Northrop, writing in The Commercial Appeal, instantly declared him a "genius." Memphians saw that genius at work again in 1950, when the Brooks focused on Anderson’s block prints, watercolors, and ink drawings, and again in 1967, when the museum put together a major retrospective.

Southern artists knew of Anderson too. Burton Callicott, painter and instructor at what would become the Memphis College of Art, traveled to Ocean Springs in 1948 for a crash course in pottery under Peter Anderson, the artist’s brother and head of the family’s business, Shearwater Pottery. (Walter’s "gift" to Callicott? A mound of clay, no note attached, one morning at Callicott’s door.) MCA students still camp every summer on Horn Island, Anderson’s Gulf Coast retreat 10 miles offshore from Ocean Springs, and the work they do there is still exhibited at the start of every school year.

Did Anderson have an "uneasy" life? Yes, to judge from Anderson’s difficulties as a breadwinner and also from the history of his sometimes fragile mental health — periodic verbal and physical violence, sudden disappearances, incidents of self-mutilation, cryptic utterances, and near-catatonic states, until Anderson, in a series of hospitalizations, underwent treatment at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore and the Mississippi State Hospital at Whitfield.

But it was Horn Island that, in a sense, saved him.

3. George Edgar Ohr – "The Mad Potter of Biloxi" by Bruce Watson in the February 2004 edition of the Smithsonian Magazine.

"I am the potter who was." – George E. "The Mad Potter of Biloxi" Ohr

Despite his reputation for eccentricity, George Ohr was a hard worker. In the later part of his life, he produced quality art pottery that will be appreciated and remembered for centuries. George cultivated the idea that he was crazy, calling himself "The Mad Potter of Biloxi." He said that he was "unrivaled" or "unequalled" and was, by his own estimation, the "world's greatest potter." His antics, self-promotion, and playful spirit are what people remember, rather than what was more likely the case, a determined artist who sought to create attention to his creative production through his eccentric character.

Ohr's skills exploded when he became an "artist-potter." His claim there were "no two alike" was true. The pinched, folded and twisted clay forms, thinness of the clay wall, fluidity of form, tendril-like handles, and freshness of Ohr's creations illustrate a technical skill that is still unrivaled. One hundred years later, potters marvel at his skill and cannot rightly say exactly how it was done. Critics of the day praised Ohr's glazes, but as his admiration for pure forms executed in clay increased, he left many pieces unglazed in bisque form. He believed only in this state could the form be clearly perceived.

Ohr's serious creations did not find popularity with the public. And because the Victorian art pottery of the day was carefully controlled and decorated, Ohr’s energetic and expressionistic treatment of clay was too wild even for refined tastes. Ohr was passionate about his work and supremely confident in his talent. He wrote to an art critic, "I am making pottery for art’s sake, God’s sake, the future generation, and — by present indications — for my own satisfaction, but when I'm gone my work ... will be prized, honored and cherished." In l899 he packed up eight pieces and sent them to the Smithsonian Institution. One of the pots was inscribed, "I am the Potter Who Was."

4. Eudora Welty – Passionate Observer: Photographs by Eudora Welty at the National Museum of Women in the Arts.

"I traveled the entire state of Mississippi taking pictures. I saw so many people who had nothing.. . . But even as people struggled, I was aware at a deep level of the richness of life going on all around me. I felt something about this time so strongly that the image stayed with me always." — Eudora Welty

Welty’s career as a photographer comprised a brief part of a long life, but it complemented her later work as a writer. In the late 1930s, Life magazine published Welty’s photographs. She also had exhibitions of her more artistic photographs in New York in 1936 and 1937. In the early 1940s, Welty’s career as a photographer for the most part ended after she decided to instead concentrate on writing.

The photographs that Welty took while traveling through Mississippi for the WPA didn’t get published until nearly four decades later in the book "One Time, One Place: Mississippi in the Depression." However, Welty’s photographs were never widely exhibited during her lifetime, besides a few limited-edition portfolios. In fact, most people did not even know of her years as a photographer until after her death in 2001.

5.) GUESS WHO?

The above 4 artists from Mississippi have all passed away and gone on to art heaven. Their living spirits collectively exert a tremendous influence on me and my art and my philosophy of life and art.

As I mentioned above, there was also a 5th Mississippi artist, a certain experimental photographer who will remain unnamed, who also exhibited around and made his presence known in the metro Washington, D.C. region during 2004.

I won’t mention his name or comment on his place in the pantheon of great artists because my Mississippi momma and Mississippi grandmothers raised me to be too humble to be so rude! I’ll leave it to the certified art critics, professional art historians and other credentialed art experts to decide what page, if any, this eccentric Mississippi photographer gets to occupy in the official art canon at the end of his life.

What does it mean to be an artist from Mississippi? Simply this: It means being true unto yourself and your vision and trying to do the right thing.

Where am I going?

What am I doing?

I don't know I don't know

Just try to do your very best

Stand up be counted with all the rest

Cos everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

– Mississippi Goddamn by Nina Simone

New Gallery to open in Dupont Circle area

JET Artworks will be opening January 7, 2005 in Elizabeth Roberts' old space at 2108 R St. NW.

The gallery will feature contemporary paintings, photography and sculpture. Their first exhibition is a group show by several of their gallery artists including Conor McGrady (whose work was seen in the 2002 Whitney Biennial), Gregory Euclide, Greg Murr, Michel Tsouris and Ken Bucklew.

DC Art News sends a welcome aboard to JET Artworks!

Bring in the New Year with ArtRomp!

Molly Ruppert announces ArtRomp #17 on December 31 at Warehouse on New Year's Eve 6-9pm. Meet old friends, meet new friends, watch performance and performance art (Performance artists Larkin and Ed at 7 & 8 PM), see art, hear music, see more art. Food, drinks, a picnic in the parking lot. And it's all Free!

Warehouse
1021 7th Street NW
btwn NY Ave and L Street
202 783 3933
www.warehousetheater.com
Metro: Gallery Pl & Mt Vernon Sq.
ArtRomp runs 6-9PM
Warehouse cafe/bar, theaters & music run 9-2am.

I cant wait to read this book

"A Cuban woman who moved to New Orleans in the 1850s and eloped with her American lover, [her name was] Loreta Janeta Velazquez, fought in the Civil War for the Confederacy as the cross-dressing Harry T. Buford.

As Buford, she single-handedly organized an Arkansas regiment; participated in the historic battles of Bull Run, Balls Bluff, Fort Donelson, and Shiloh; romanced men and women; and eventually decided that spying as a woman better suited her Confederate cause than fighting as a man.

In the North, she posed as a double agent and worked to traffic information, drugs, and counterfeit bills to support the Confederate cause. She was even hired by the Yankee secret service to find 'the woman . . . traveling and figuring as a Confederate agent' — Velazquez herself."

This is sort of a Cuban-Southerner-Confederate "Fidelio." I will do some more research on this subject which is sure to become my next series of drawings.

Loreta Janeta Velazquez hereby displaces Cuban Confederate Colonel: The Life of Ambrosio José Gonzales by Antonio Rafael de la Cova and the definitive biography of a Cuban and Confederate rebel; as my next obsessive subject.

Get the book here.

Online statistics are a tremendously valuable tool for anyone trying to do business on the Internet. They can also be seductive and maddening.

For example, our gallery website gets about 525,000 hits a month, but this last October it received a whooping 1,048,825 hits (our first month over one million hits) and 48% of those hits came on October 7, 2004.

I called my ISP to verify that this was correct and not a blip in their stats program, and the stats are correct.

So now I'm going crazy trying to figure out what happened on October 7, 2004 to cause nearly half a million people to come to our gallery website.

And the closest answer that I can come up with, is the fact that on October 7, 2004 I was on the Kojo Nmandi show!

But that fact alone cannot equate to 458,448 hits in one day, and in reviewing the show's audio files, the website is never given out or mentioned. And most of the hits came during hour three of that Internet day, whatever that means. And 36% of the hits that month came directly to the gallery URL, which means that those people knew our website; only about 5% of the hits came through referral from search engines.

Next is for us to review our October sales and see how many Internet sales we had in October.

For Women Photographers

Secondsight's next meeting will be held on Friday, January 28, 2005. The guest speaker will be Connie Imboden.

Secondsight is an organization dedicated to the advancement of women photographers through support, communication and sharing of ideas and opportunities. Secondsight is committed to supporting photographers at every stage of their careers, from students to professionals. Each bi-monthly meeting includes an introductory session, a guest speaker, portfolio sharing and discussion groups. Each photographer will have the opportunity to present their work within a small group of other photographers, ask for constructive criticism, gain knowledge or simply share their artistic vision and techniques.

For more info visit Secondsight's website.

More Questions for our WaPo critic art test

My DC Art Test seems to have raised some interest among some of you.

DC area artist Rosetta DeBerardinis adds the following questions:

1. What is Gallery magazine?
2. Who was DC artist Alma Thomas?
3. What is the group Americans for the Arts?
4. Where is Penn Quarter?
5. Which DC artist is known for his hearts?
6. Which was the first contemporary art museum in America?

While James W. Bailey (as it is to be expected) submits one of the longest questions ever devised for an DC Art SAT:

"If you found yourself being extradited to permanent life-long exile on a remote non-populated island (Navassa Island near Haiti comes to mind) because of a perceived subversive piece of art criticism printed in the Washington Post that severely disturbed the national security interests of the United States, and you could choose to take with you one work of art from any living contemporary artist, or any one work of art from any private or museum collection in the world (including the Mona Lisa from the Louvre), what piece would you choose and why?"

That's an easy one for me. I would take Adam Bradley's lifesize sculpture Please. There's enough knives and hardware in that piece to help half a dozen people survive and even start a small war on that island.

New Gallery in Town

Emma Mae Gallery, founded by Sandra Butler-Truesdale, opened last month in Washington. The new gallery is located at 1515 U Street, NW in Washington, DC. For further information call 202-667-0634 or 202-246-6300

Currently on view there are works by Sandra Butler-Truesdale, John Zaire El-Badr, Afrika Midnight Asha Abney and many others.

Opportunity for artists

Montgomery College Drawing National II

Deadline: January 20, 2005 (snail mail entries)
January 21, 2005 (email entries)

Exhibition dates February 21 - March 11 at Montgomery College in Rockville, MD. Open to artists living in the United States. All drawing media. One to three entries. No entry fee, no commission, return shipping paid for mail-delivered work. No size restrictions. Work must be ready to hang, presented in a professional manner. Insurance.

Approximately 35-40 works will be exhibited. Looking for straight, creative, and unusual approaches to drawing.

Juror: Sarah Stecher, Associate Professor of Art, Montgomery College. 301-251-7649, Email her here.

View and download prospectus here.

Some DC area art jobs

Deadline: January 17, 2005
Job: Assistant Director of the Art Gallery at the University of Maryland.

The Assistant Director works closely with the Director in the overall management and administration of the Gallery's exhibition program, permanent collection, education program, and fundraising.

The successful candidate will fulfill the following requirements: Possess a bachelor's degree. Must have 2-3 years experience in a museum of gallery setting involving exhibitions, handling art objects, and grant writing. Excellent organizational, time management, and oral and written communication skills. Ability to prioritize and manage multiple tasks and deadlines. Strong interpersonal skills and an ability to interact with a diverse public. Additionally, the preferred candidate will: Possess a bachelor degree in art, art history, or related fields. Possess a graduate degree. Demonstrate academic training in art history and/or art and understanding of current museum standards.

Salary: Low to mid 30's

For best consideration send a letter of application, resume or curriculum vitae and three names of references by January 17, 2005 to:

Dorit Yaron
Deputy Director
David C. Driskell Center
2108 Tawes Fine Arts Building
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742

---

Job: Assistant Professor in Graphic Design: American University

Deadline: Until filled

Assistant Professor rank. Tenture Track. Beginning Fall 2005. Qualifications: MFA or equivalent terminal degree in the discipline. Teaching and professional experience preferred. The applicant should be knowledgeable of current issues in design, the demands of the professional field and the tools, technologies and resources inherent to the discipline. Expected familiarity with theoretical issues of graphic design as well as its historical background. Ability to contribute to the teaching of interactive and experience design courses a plus.

Responsibilities: Teach courses in graphic design at the undergraduate level, basic through advanced levels; stduent advising, including mentoring women and minority students. Scholarship/Creative work: active professional in the field. University service: serving on Department, College and University Committees. Salary is competitive and dependent on qualifications and experience. Applications will be reviewed beginning January 15, 2005 and continue until the position is filled.

Selected candidate will begin appointment working at facilities located in a brand-new building. Visit www.design.american.edu and www.american.edu for further information on the University and design program. Include letter of application stating teaching philosophy, curriculum vitae, a minimum of 20 slides or disk media with samples of own work and (if available) examples of students' work, and printed writing samples if any.

Salary: Competitive and dependent on qualifications and experience.

Send materials along with a self-addressed, stamped envelope for their return, and three letters of recommendation to:

Graphic Design Search Committee
Department of Art
American University
4400 Massachusetts Avenue NW
Washington DC 20016-8004

Top 10 DCist Posts of 2004

DCist was one of the best things that happened to our area's cyberspace information grid (how's that for a new acronym? the CIG!). Anyway, they have their Top 10 DCist Posts of 2004 and were kind enough to have a few nice words about DC Art News.

Read their list here.

(Thanks AJ!) A tried and true formula for achieving and becoming temporarily notarious includes a healthy dose of anti-government political art. If the idiots in government (in this case the Swiss) bite and do any sort of censoring, the artist is guaranteed overnight exposure!

"No one paid much heed last year when the Swiss artist Thomas Hirschhorn stopped showing his work in Switzerland to protest a right-wing populist's entry into the government. Now, in a new exhibition in Paris, a biting critique of Swiss democracy, Mr. Hirschhorn has provoked stormy scenes in the Swiss Parliament that have turned him into his country's most talked about artist overnight."

Read the latest case in the NYT here. If you don't have a NYT password, get one: it's free! (or useAJ's).

Even the Swiss! Geez!

Faith Flanagan's Top Ten DC area exhibitions of 2004

Faith Flanagan is a local art fan, collector in the rough, and sometime guerilla curator. Here's her top DC area shows of the year:

Calder/Miro, The Phillips Collection
Douglas Gordon (with emphasis on 24 hour Psycho), Hirshhorn
Jason Gubbiotti and Ian Whitmore, Fusebox
Jenny Holzer, Xenon for DC, Curator's Office
Avish Khebrehzadeh, Conner Contemporary Art
Sally Mann, Last Measure, Hemphill Fine Arts
Ana Mendieta, Hirshhorn
Maggie Michael, Run, G Fine Art
Brandon Morse, These Things Happen, Strand on Volta
Esther Hidalgo - Lara Oliveira - Katherine Radke - Christopher Saah - Dylan
Scholinski, THE EXERCISES--E1: Contemplating Process, Transformer Gallery

Addendums -- (aka TG Awards):
Best After-Party: WPA/C Auction 2004, Black Cat
Best (sort of borrowed) Fundraising Idea: Anonymous One, Flashpoint
Best Non-exhibition art event: Opening of 1515 14th Street, NW
Best Place to look, as an emerging collector, for a great emerging artist (without really trying): Academy, Conner Contemporary Art, August

Liz Smith, gossip columnist for the New York Post writes about Chirstmas, PC and Blake Gopnik.

Post to hire another "Galleries" art critic

I have been informed that the Washington Post has decided to hire a second freelance writer to augment Jessica Dawson's "Galleries" reviews.

Since the Arts Editor (John Pancake) is still out of the country on a teaching sabbatical, and will not return until mid January (and maybe because the Post has received some many complaints from all of us), the newspaper is curently looking to hire a freelance art critic to replace Dixon and augment Dawson at "Galleries."

The Washington Post has assigned the task of finding a replacement to its Chief Art Critic, Blake Gopnik.

I'm glad that they're looking to hire a second voice and I am holding my fingers crossed that it will be someone who actually knows something about DC area artists and galleries and who can name more than five galleries and more than half a dozen artists.

In fact, free to Mr. Gopnik and the Post, I have devised a clever test in order for Gopnik and/or the Post staff to test a prospective applicant's knowledge of the DC art scene, since (as we all know), Mr. Gopnik has so far succesfully avoided writing about our artists and galleries.

Here's the test:

1. Signal 66 is/was a:
(a) TV show
(b) Gridlocked highway
(c) DC art gallery
(d) All of the above

2. What DC artist was included in a recent Whitney Biennial?
(a) Sam Gilliam
(b) Lou Stovall
(c) Chan Chao
(d) Maggie Michael

3. Which of these is not a real DC area art venue?
(a) Fusebox
(b) Flashpoint
(c) Transformer
(d) Multicoupler

4. Which of these DC area gallery owners are artists as well?
(a) Norm Parish
(b) Alla Rogers
(c) Elyse Harrison
(d) All of the above

5. What DC area artist was included in a recent Venice Biennale?
(a) Sam Gilliam
(b) Muriel Hasbun
(c) Kelly Towles
(d) Jason Gubbiotti

6. What DC area artist has been featured in the Hirshhorn recently?
(a) Chan Chao
(b) Muriel Hasbun
(c) Dan Steinhilber
(d) Sam Gilliam

7. What happens on the first Friday of each month?
(a) WaPo employees get paid
(b) Dupont Circle art galleries have their extended hours
(c) Corcoran has free pizza for all of its unpaid docents
(d) None of the above

8. What is Art-O-Matic?
(a) A computer virus that erases all the images in your hard drive
(b) A new British painting robot
(c) A huge, open art show roughly held every couple of years.
(d) An Irish racing horse

9. Which of these embassies also have associated art galleries?
(a) Mexico
(b) Italy
(c) Ukraine
(d) All of the above

10. What was the last piece of art that you purchased?
(a) A painting
(b) A print
(c) A photograph
(d) I have not purchased any real art recently, only a video

11. Which of these DC area art venues is a museum?
(a) Museum of Contemporary Art
(b) Museum of Modern ARF
(c) Artists' Museum
(d) None of the above

12. Name one DC area artist who's ever had a retrospective exhibition at the Hirshhorn.
(a) Ana Mendieta
(b) Carlos Alfonzo
(c) Fernando Botero
(d) Please...

13. Name a reason why Sam Gilliam has never had a major DC area museum retrospective.
(a) He refuses them
(b) Who is Sam Gilliam?
(c) He has had many
(d) He lives in Washington, DC

14. John Currin is to Big Tits as Gene Davis is to __________?
(a) Angela Davis
(b) Spanish Tapas
(c) Stripes
(d) Menudo

15. Which of these former DC area artists became really well-known soon after they moved away from DC?
(a) Joyce Tenneson
(b) Tara Donovan
(c) Martin Puryear
(d) All of the above

16. Name the single and only black artist who's ever had a retrospective at the National Gallery of Art.
(a) Jacob Lawrence
(b) Wilfredo Lam
(c) Romare Bearden
(d) Sam Gilliam

17. What is the Torpedo Factory?
(a) A sandwich shop in Adams Morgan
(b) A building full of artists and galleries in Old Town Alexandria
(c) A super secret building in the Navy Yard
(d) A chic clothing shop in Georgetown

18. Roy Lichtenstein is to comic books as Clark is to ___________?
(a) Construction
(b) Candy bars
(c) Strip joints
(d) George Washington

Hey! That was kind of fun! If any of you have any more questions that we can add to our questionnaire, please email them to me.

Holiday Teaser

I'll have a really interesting bit of information to post tomorrow; make sure you check in!

At the risk of having the ACLU sue me: Feliz Navidad!

O'Sullivan on Towles

Michael O'Sullivan reviews Kelly Towles' current exhibition at David Adamson and declares being a fan of Towles' work.

This is one of the reasons that I like O'Sullivan's writing. When was it the last time that you read a WaPo art critic declaring that they were a "fan" of anybody's work?

Other than O'Sullivan (this and in other past reviews), never. It is as if declaring that one actually likes the work being reviewed, with just a little bit of passion or enjoyment, is verbotten in the how-to handbook of modern art criticism.

Bravo O'Sullivan.

Top 10 Shows of 2004

With the large number of commercial fine art galleries, embassy galleries, non-profit galleries, artists cooperative galleries, alternative art venues and museums that we have in our Greater Washington, DC area, the task of selecting a list of top anything is not a trivial task.

To make matters worse, everytime that I've done this in the past, and after I see someone else's list, I always go "crap! I forgot about that show!"

Nonetheless, here's my top ten visual arts show of the year for our region, sans our shows of course. I was tempted, as 2004 allowed us to bring to the DC region some brilliant work by world-class Cuban artists like Sandra Ramos, Cirenaica Moreira, Marta Maria Perez Bravo and Aimee Garcia Marrero (all of whom were in Art Basel Miami Beach) as well as a spectacular second sold out show by Tim Tate, who enjoyed what can best be described as a record-setting 2004.

My Top 10 (in no particular order)

Ana Mendieta at the Hirshhorn

Sally Mann at the Corcoran

Chan Chao at Numark Gallery.

Bruno Perillo at Irvine Contemporary Art

Ian Whitmore at Fusebox

The Quilts of Gee's Bend at the Corcoran

Margaret Boozer at Strand on Volta

"In 2Words: Numbers" at Target Gallery.

Courtly Art of the Ancient Maya at the National Gallery.

Dan Flavin at the National Gallery of Art.

Washingtonian takes a swing at Glenn Dixon and Blake Gopnik

Washingtonian magazine's national editor, Harry Jaffe, has an article in the current issue titled "Three Best Post Columnists — and Two Worsts."

He writes:

Worst Review: Glenn Dixon on the Calder Miró show

Reading Post art reviews, one sometimes imagines the critics walking into exhibitions with their noses so high in the air they can’t see the walls. The height of naive nastiness came from Glenn Dixon in his October 10 review of the Calder Miró show at the Phillips Collection. Dixon, a freelance writer, tried to be more dismissive than the Post’s main critic, Blake Gopnik.

He succeeded in that but failed to describe the exhibition. He doesn’t like Miró. He denigrates Duncan Phillips, the museum’s founder. Every line reeks of animus. Viewers have flocked to the Phillips to see the wondrous and playful collection. Ignore Dixon; see the show, which closes January 23.

Regardless of how one feels about Dixon's animus, my question to Mr. Jaffe and to Washingtonian: How can you publish a magazine about Washington, DC and not have a regular column each month that reviews a gallery or museum show?

Like (cough, cough) the elegant and eloquent reviews of restaurants that the magazine publishes in issue after issue?

We need more critical visual art voices in this town to write about our artists, our galleries and our museums. And glossy magazines like Washingtonian need to step up to the plate and add to our city's cultural scene with more than just restaurant reviews and more than just listings of museum shows and the rare page about an artist or a show here and there.

One half page review a month is not much to ask, is it?

How about we kick start another letter writing or email-sending campaign? Let's all write to Mr. Jaffe and ask him to add a regular monthly art review column to the magazine (and not just museum reviews for chrissakes!). Make sure that you also copy the magazine's editor John Limpert and the arts editor, Susan Davidson.

Jeffry Cudlin Goes Yard

That's new baseball talk (new to me) for hitting a home run. The current issue of the Washington City Paper has Cudlin's review of the area's visual arts year gone by.

And I'll be damned if Cudlin doesn't just hit a very readable homer, but also throws a couple of tight fastballs (awright, awright... enough with the baseball talk).

On Blake Gopnik:

"Ostensibly, Blake Gopnik is the Washington Post’s art critic of note. But his coverage of the art scene this year has seemed less concerned with Washington than with a certain city to the north: He wrote a travelogue on the galleries of Chelsea, and he recently began conducting studio visits with artists living and working in Brooklyn. Still, certain D.C. events were on Gopnik’s mind, if not on his itinerary. We could count on him to draw attention to anything confirming his worst suspicions about his occasional hometown — say, those PandaMania bears, or, yes, the redundant controversy of Artomatic (in which I participated)."

That was very good, and it takes cojones to say it; and there's more. Cudlin praises Dixon, references a well-known BLOG and slams Jessica:

"Meanwhile, thoughtful freelance critic Glenn Dixon — the only area reviewer to write on a 19.3 grade level, according to one local art blog — bailed on the Washington City Paper and made an auspicious debut in the Post’s Galleries column. Then he promptly thought better of it and bailed once more —which leaves column readers again with Jessica Dawson and only the blandest publicizing imaginable. But now only twice a month."

Ouch! I do disagree with Cudlin's broad characterization of cooperative galleries when he writes that "Numark [Gallery] stands out in a ’hood that’s home to craftsy emporiums such as Zenith Gallery and — even more dubious — pay-to-show member galleries such as Touchstone."

I disagree 1000% with his characterization of artist-run cooperative galleries.

Cooperative galleries such as Touchstone are not "dubious" and in fact cooperative galleries in this town are some of the oldest galleries in our area, surviving the demise of many private galleris, and have been a breeding ground for many, many artists, who now show in other galleries - including now showing in most of the independent, private commercial fine art galleries mentioned in Cudlin's article.

In fact, I am told that at least one of those "other" galleries mentioned elsewhere in Cudlin's article is one that unfortunately has charged artists to exhibit. This is called a "vanity gallery" and it is much different than a cooperative of artists all sharing the costs of running a gallery space. Being a true "vanity gallery" is unethical especially when the gallery pretends to be a "regular" gallery and in private charges artists a fee to exhibit in their spaces. Very unethical.

Otherwise a superb round-up! Read Cudlin's entire article here.

Bravo Cudlin!

WCP's Top 10 Photography Shows of the Year

Louis Jacobson delivers his take on the photography year for 2004 in our area with a very good piece in the current Washington City Paper.

Lou's Top 10:

1. "Lost Images: Berlin Mitte" at Addison/Ripley Fine Art.

2. "Winogrand 1964" at the S. Dillon Ripley Center International Gallery.

3. "Maxwell MacKenzie: Markings" at Addison/Ripley Fine Art.

4. "Jacques Henri Lartigue: Vintage Photographs, 1905–1932" at Sandra Berler Gallery.

5. "Martin Kollar: Slovakia 001" and "Darrow Montgomery: Postcards From Home" at the Kathleen Ewing Gallery.

6. "ABCDF: Portraits of a City" at the Art Museum of the Americas.

7. "Room Service" at Panhwa Art Studio.

8. "Aaron Siskind: New Relationships in Photography" at the Phillips Collection.

9. "Christopher Burkett: Resplendent Light" at the Kathleen Ewing Gallery.

10. "Viggo Mortensen: Miyelo" at Addison/Ripley Fine Art.

Anne Truitt

One of the Washington area's best-known and most respected artists, Anne Truitt, born in Baltimore in 1921 and a resident of the Greater Washington, DC area for many years, has died at age 83.

Her work was and is represented locally by the Ramon Osuna Gallery in Bethesda.

Our best wishes to the Truitt family.

My current exhibition of nude drawings at Fraser Gallery Georgetown is online here.

Comments, criticisms and purchases welcomed.

The Lebanese newspaper Daily Star has an article discussing the work of GMU Professor Chawky Frenn, who is of Lebanese ancestry.

The article discusses the Dartmouth exhibition where Frenn outshocked Damien Hirst.

Read the Daily Star story here.

The Art League

The Art League is our area's largest artists' organization, with over 1,200 members. The Art League also operates a school with over 2500 students per term and a supply store for the purchase of art supplies by students and members.

When I first re-arrived to the Washington area in 1993, the first thing that I did was to join The Art League, and was a member for several years.

Each month The Art League has a juried competition, where members can bring two original works of art to be juried by a guest juror. Selected works are then hung at The Art League's large gallery on the ground floor of the Torpedo Factory.

The current show was selected by Maurine Littleton, the owner and director of the terrific gallery by the same name in Georgetown that is perhaps the finest glass gallery in the world.

I have been asked to be the juror for the January competition and will be doing so during the first week of January.

To get more details on becoming a member of the Art League, call them at 703/683-1780 or view their application form here.

A couple of days ago I was filmed by a TV crew who is doing a 13 part TV series called "Art Adventures." It is focused on collecting art, mostly for beginning collectors.

They also focused on the work of Tim Tate, as the series also identifies new emerging artists.

It was supposed to be a five minute screen time, which in TV-land always means a couple of hours of shooting.

Dr. Claudia Rousseau, the over-qualified art critic for the Washington Post-owned Gazette newspapers writes a singularly eloquent and intelligent review about our Winter Group Show in our Bethesda outpost.

Cough, cough...

At the risk of sounding nepotic (and definitely waaaaaaaaay past objective!), I think she really drilled into what some of the artists that she writes about are trying to deliver. It's hard to write eloquently about a group show (always some good.. always something forgettable).

Before moving to our area, Rousseau was one of Latin America's most influential art critics. It is no surprise that she gets Cuban artist Sandra Ramos right off the bat and writes:

"Cuban artist Sandra Ramos' approach to figuration uses a surrealist vocabulary to convey politically charged content. "In my paper prison" is part of "Isla prisión," a strongly emotive series about Cuba as a prison in both political and artistic senses. Here, the artist's body, wearing the uniform of Castro's "Communist Youth," lies in the shape of the island behind prison bars formed by pencils. Ten unmounted paper sheets in plastic sleeves comprise "The Inability to Trap Images." Each shows a silk-screened hand with a small image printed above it.

Taken together, Ramos' work can be interpreted as a reference to the failure of artistic censorship, or simply to the travails of the artist to capture reality. Either way, the images make an indelible impression because they clearly have profound meaning for the artist, and hopefully, for the viewer."

And she gets our own area's Tim Tate; she writes about him:

Glass artist Tim Tate's new works, "A Slice of Heaven/A Slice of Hell," the first an icy blue, the second red, hang side by side in long, narrow cast bronze frames. An examination of their imagery presents the same provocative vocabulary that has made Tate so successful in recent years. Much of it appears universal, even Dantesque, but is instead very private and autobiographical in nature. For example, what may recall a Catholic votive for many viewers -- a red glass flame topping a blown glass heart bearing a cross, in turn containing yet another red flame -- is titled with a distinctly non-religious ring: "Hunka' Hunka' Burnin' Love." Yet for the artist, the eternal flame on top, inspired by John F. Kennedy's tomb site, is a healing image, intended to convey ideas of love and spirit outliving death and pain.

Tate uses private images of healing all through his works. In "Nine Paths to Heaven or Hell," a circular piece made of nine glass voussoirs (wedge-shaped pieces that form an arch), the topmost element contains a hand surrounded by rays holding a beaded ball (a nucleus perhaps?), also conceived as a healing image.

Tate's technique is impeccable. Yet his allusive and mystifying content is a far cry from the craft approach often associated with glass art.

Read the whole review here.

New Gallery to Open in Potomac

Potomac, a wealthy Maryland suburb of Washington, DC is located within the Soviet Socialist Republic of Montgomery County, and it is one of the nation's most affluent regions, with an average household income of $246.271 and a median housing value of $919.958, and yet... there's not a single fine arts gallery anywhere in Potomac.

Soon to be resolved!

Potomac will have its first active fine arts gallery beginning early next year. The Kathleen Margaret Srour Gallery promises that it will offer an artists' cooperative gallery and will offer a cooperative management, quality work and low commissions.

Yolanda Prinsloo, its director and founder, is currently reviewing artists for membership. Anyone who is interested, please contact Yolanda at this email address or call her at 301.765.6739.

Artist's Studio Space Available

Premium artists' studio available immediately. Huge, open studio space on ground floor. Secure, 24 ft high loft ceiling, mezzanine, loading dock in prominent Brookland artists' building. Blocks from Metro. $2000/month. Smaller unit available also. Call 202/543-3370 for info or email to this email address.

Corcoran responds to Weil's resignation

Christina DePaul, the Dean of the Corcoran College of Art + Design has submitted the following response to the resignation of Rex Weil.

"Rex Weil is well loved by his students and respected by Corcoran faculty for his energy, passion and unique approach to teaching. We are sorry that he has chosen to resign and find it unfortunate that he does not agree with the direction the College is taking to advance the curriculum and integrity of the institution."

My thanks to Ms. DePaul for taking the opportunity and time to respond.

Congratulations to area photographer James W. Bailey, whose Circle Theater Rough Edge photograph will be published in the Winter issue of the Tulane Review back in his home turf in New Orleans.

Talking about New Orleans, another unusual fact that I discovered in my recent reading of Prof. Louis Perez's excellent book On Being Cuban was the fact that Truman Capote (who was born and raised in the Big Easy) got the "Capote" last name from his Cuban stepdad.

Museum Opportunity for Artists

Deadline: April 30, 2005

Call for Submissions: Radford University Art Museum, Virginia. Artists are encouraged to submit slides or a CD with images of recent work, along with a vita and artist's statement. They have several exhibition spaces ranging from 250 to 1750 square feet, and are open to novel approaches to the exhibition process. Qualifications: "Thoughtful and thought-provoking artists."

Send materials to:
Radford University Art Museum Curators' Committee
Box 6965
Radford University
Radford, VA 24142

20th Annual Mayor's Arts Awards

Everyone is invited to the 20th Annual Mayor's Arts Awards on Monday, January 10, 2005 at The John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

I've been attending these award ceremonies for the last few years and it is packed with great entertainment: dance, singing, poetry, music, etc.

This free evening of entertainment will feature award presentations and performances by the finest talents in the city. For more information visit the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities website here.

You can view Mayor's Arts Awards Winners since 1981 here.

Emergency Grants for Artists

Change, Inc. provides one-time $1,000 emergency grants to visual artists of any discipline who are facing possible eviction, unpaid bills, fire damage or any other emergency that the Change, Inc. board deems worthy.

Applicants must be professional artists who can demonstrate need. Send a letter of need, proof of inability to pay bills or rent, a resume, any reviews or press releases of past exhibitions, photos or slides of work and two reference letters from others in the field. Grant applications should be sent to:
Change, Inc.
PO Box 54
Captiva, FL 33924
Tel: (212) 473-3742

Prof. Kurt Godwin's Top 10 DC Area Art Shows

Kurt Godwin, is an Adjunct Art professor with Virginia Commonwealth University and a lecturer at Catholic University of America. He sends in his top 10 DC area art shows, saying that they are "perhaps in no particular order."

1. Mr. Whistler's Galleries - Avant-Garde in Victorian London, Freer Gallery

2. These Things Happen - video by Brandon Morse, Strand on Volta

3. All the Mighty World - Roger Fenton, photography at the National Gallery

4. Cai Guo Qiang - Hirshhorn Directions and the big boat at the Sackler

5. Surrealism & Modernism - at the Phillips Collection

6. Picasso - Cubist Portraits of Fernande Oliver - National Gallery

7. Diego Rivera - Cubism - National Gallery

8. 2004 Summer Juried Show - Signal 66

9. Articulating the Intangible - Group show - McLean Project for the Arts

10. Post Mortem: And Away We Go... - Group show - Signal 66

Rosetta DeBerardinis Top 10 DC Area Art Shows

If anyone around here sees a lot of art shows, then let me tell you: It is DC area artist Rosetta DeBerardinis!

Not only is she a talented and highly collected DC area artist, but for the last few years she has been leading guided gallery walks around the city, most recently as the leader of the new Bethesda Art Walk Guided Tours.

Rosetta gets to see a lot of gallery shows! And here are her top 10 picks:

1. Chan Chao at Numark.
2. Edward Clark at Parish. (Rosetta says that this show was her favorite).
3. Jason Gubbiotti at FuseBox.
4. Joan Konkel at Zenith.
5. Wayne Trappe at Zenith.
6. Sica at Zenith.
7. Tim Tate at Fraser.
8. Rima Schulkind at Touchstone.
9. David Flavin at the National Gallery.
10. Gyroscope at the Hirshhorn.

Corcoran Resignation

Rex Weil, who is the DC area editor for Art News magazine, as well as a highly respected artist, and part of the faculty at the Corcoran College of Art & Design has resigned and sent around the following note:

Dear Friend & Colleagues:

At the end of last week, I resigned from the Corcoran College of Art & Design. The teaching atmosphere at the Corcoran has become intolerable. I hope this will be heard as a resounding vote of NO CONFIDENCE in the administration of the College.

Rex Weil

I don't know what the issues that caused this "atmosphere" at the Corcoran College of Art & Design are, but I hereby invite the Corcoran to respond if they so desire, and I hope that they do, as this key DC area museum and school seems to keep getting into the news for the wrong reasons, and it deserves better. Furthermore, Weil is a very respected name in our area, and I am sure that his resignation will raise questions, as it already has done with me.

Corconites, the ball is on your court.

JT has an excellent review (over at Thinking About Art) of the Kelly Towles show at David Adamson Gallery.

I'll try to go and see this show soon. I must admit that I am a bit surprised to see David Adamson exhibit a young, new artist like Kelly Towles, as Adamson has historically, at least in my memory, rarely exhibited emerging local artists, and has focused more on exhibiting established artists and the Gyclee reproductions of the many art superstars that his superb digital printmaking reputation brings to his fold.

Congratulations to Washington, DC painter Maggie Michael, who was just awarded a $20,000 grant from the Joan Mitchell Foundation.

Earlier this year, Ms. Michael was also awarded $5,000 from the the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities.

Maggie Michael is represented locally by G Fine Art.

An Open Letter to the Washington Post

As I've discussed before, the Post's Style section will soon have a new Assistant Managing Editor leading it. Deborah Heard will be the person in charge of Style starting January 1, 2005.

I believe that this offers all of us in the area's visual arts community an opportunity to see if we can convince Ms. Heard to augment the WaPost's tiny coverage of art galleries and area artists and I have asked all of you to write to her, or at least email her, with copies to her boss, Lenny Downie and the Arts Editor, my good friend John Pancake. Ignore the fact that they are all focused on politics and a card-carrying member of the Fake News Industrial Complex.

In this spirit I have written a letter to Ms. Heard, with copies to Downie and Pancake.

December 19, 2004

Deborah Heard
Washington Post Style
1150 15th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20071

Dear Ms. Heard,

Congratulations on your promotion to Style section editor. It is our sincere wish and that of the artists whom we represent that you not only enjoy this important position, but it is also our hope that you may consider bringing some needed changes with respect to coverage of our area’s art galleries and visual artists.

It is thus why I am writing to you, in the hope that I can bring to your attention the perception by our area’s visual arts community of artists, fine arts galleries, alternative arts venues and artists organizations, of the poor coverage now afforded by the Washington Post to them/us.

As an artist, freelance art critic, radio arts commentator, publisher of DC Art News, and co-owner of the two Fraser Galleries, I believe that I have my finger on the heartbeat of our region’s visual art scene, and as I have discussed many times in the past with my good friend John Pancake, it is also my subjective opinion (but backed by empirical facts), that the Post does a very, very poor job in covering our area’s art galleries and visual artists, especially in comparison to your excellent coverage of the local theaters, area performance venues, as well as movies, fashion, books, etc.

For example, although there are almost twice as many art galleries in the Greater Washington region than theatres, for the last several years, the Style and Weekend section have consistently offered five to six times more print space, in the form of reviews, for theatres than galleries. Even plays in Olney get reviewed consistently (and we applaud you for this), while important visual art shows get ignored, simply because the Galleries column is the only regular column in the Post to cover local area gallery shows, augmented occasionally by the On Exhibit column in the Weekend section.

To make matters worse, the Washington Post is the only major newspaper that I know of, that has a Chief Art critic (Blake Gopnik) who does not review local galleries, and only (with a very, very rare exception) reviews museum shows. In fact, it was quite embarrassing earlier this year, when Gopnik was asked on the air (at the Kojo Nmandi show on WAMU) to discuss his favorite Washington area artist and he could not come up with a single name. In comparison, the chief art critics of major newspapers such as the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, etc. not only review museums, but also the galleries in their cities. It has been a mystery to our art scene why Mr. Gopnik has been allowed to segregate himself to only review our area and other cities’ museums and other cities’ art galleries and other cities’ artists, but not Washington area art galleries and artists. Does this make any sense to you?

Furthermore, your Thursday Style banner still claims that Thursdays is focused on Galleries/Art News, and yet, and consistently, there have been more theatre reviews on Thursdays than actual gallery reviews. Additionally, as you know, several years ago, the Arts Beat column, which used to be published every Thursday, was reduced to twice a month. Not only that, but that column, which used to often augment visual arts coverage, now has become, under the last two or three writers, a jack-of-all-arts column, more often than not writing about theatre, or music.

The evidence that the Washington Post has unexplainable apathy towards our area’s visual arts community is also highlighted by the recent issue with the reduction of the Galleries column to a twice-a-month column rather than weekly.

While we realize that a final decision has not been made in this issue, and that you are awaiting John Pancake’s return from his teaching sabbatical to finalize the issue, it nonetheless shows and adds evidence to the claim that the Post simply does not care about our city’s regional visual art scene (when it comes to our galleries and artists).

Why? Simply imagine that several of your many theatre critics all quit at once, leaving you with only one theater critic, who could only write one theatre review every couple of weeks. Would you reduce your theatre coverage from its very generous, almost daily occurrence, to twice a month?

I doubt it.

Why? Because it is clear that the Washington Post is dedicated to helping to grow our theatre scene, and this is a great effort that has yielded brilliant gains to our area’s cultural tapestry. Your effort includes not only daily coverage of the theatre, but also (I believe) around $300,000 in pro bono advertising for theatres.

This is great! And we all applaud the great theatre coverage. But what about us?

We also applaud your consistent coverage of our area museums, and as we are lucky enough to have some of the great museums in the world in our city, we are also grateful that the Washington Post affords great coverage through Mr. Gopnik in Style and the Sunday Arts, Mr. Richard once in a while in Style, and through Mr. O’Sullivan in Weekend, with Jacqueline Trescott and Teresa Wiltz also adding news articles and stories also dealing with our museums.

This is great! And we all applaud this informative coverage. But what about us?

And the Style coverage of movies (often then reviewed again by a different writer in Weekend), music (often then reviewed again by a different writer in Weekend), and dance is also adequate and informative, if somewhat repetitive, putting into question one excuse given in the past for not augmenting gallery coverage: "lack of newsprint space."

I will close this verbose letter with one last statistic: In the last couple of years the Style section has had over twice as many reviews and articles about fashion shows in Europe, New York and other cities, elegantly illustrated with color photos of gaunt models on the runways of Rome, New York, London and Paris, than reviews of art galleries in the Greater Washington area.

In my prejudiced opinion, I find it hard to believe that your readers would be more interested in un-wearable fashion from the runways of Europe than on our area’s art galleries and artists.

We welcome the change in command at Style and I sincerely and warmly wish you the best of luck in the job. I also hope that you bring an open mind to this subject, and consider augmenting gallery coverage to a level commensurate with Style’s coverage of the other cultural genres.

Warmest regards,

F. Lennox Campello

Cc: Leonard Downie
John Pancake

I hope that some of you write Ms. Heard as well, and I think that with enough notes and emails, she will realize that some changes need to be made under her leadership.

Last Thursday's Reviews

"[Contemporary] photography no longer bears any resemblance to photography in the past century's sense. If anything, it's a lot closer to the way old-fashioned figurative painting used to be."

Read Jessica's reviews of The Staged Body at Curator's Office, Athena Tacha at Marsha Mateyka and Brandon Morse at Strand on Volta.

And at the WCP, read Jeffry Cudlin's review of Brandon Morse here.

And also at the WCP, Louis Jacobson has three reviews: Christopher Burkett at Kathleen Ewing Gallery, and "Opening on 14th" at Hemphill Fine Arts, and "All the Mighty World: The Photographs of Roger Fenton, 1852–1860" at the National Gallery of Art.

Philip Barlow's Top 10 DC Art Shows of 2004

This is the first of about a dozen Top 10 art shows of 2004 that I've received so far. It comes from Philip Barlow, a well-known DC area art collector, board member of several DC art organizations and a knowledgeable member of our visual arts scene. I'll be posting the others during the rest of the week.

Barlow passes that his list is in order and that it was unintentional that he wound up with 10 different galleries in the list.

1. Invisible Things, Dan Treado, Addison/Ripley Gallery, May 15 – June 19

2. Run, Maggie Michael, G Fine Art, September 18 – October 16

3. Evidence, Robin Rose, Numark Gallery, February 27 – April 10

4. Leo Villareal Show, Leo Villareal, Conner Contemporary, May 15 – June 26

5. Concentrics, Craig Dennis, Jae Ko, Kathleen Kucka, Andrea Way, Marsha Mateyka Gallery, June 5 – July 24

6. AM I THE BeST, Carroll Sockwell, Washington Arts Museum (Edison Place Gallery), November 3 – December 17

7. On The Line: machines, maps and memory, Perry Steindel, Sylvie van Helden, Jennifer Swan, Andrew Krieger, Andy Holtin, Katy Uravich, District of Columbia Arts Center, April 30 – May 30

8. These Things Happen, Brandon Morse, Strand on Volta, November 18 – December 18

9. The Out-of-Towners, Laura Amussen, Lily Cox-Richard, Harrison Haynes, George Jenne, Michele Kong, Transformer Gallery, December 13, 2003 - January 17, 2004

10. Thom Flynn, Thom Flynn, Nevin Kelly Gallery, April 21 – May 9

The Sculpture-Stealing Capital of the World

What's going on in Fairfax County? As James W. Bailey points out, in 2004 there were three large sculptures stolen or dumped in Fairfax County!

1. Marc Sijan’s $40,000 "Legs Folded" from the Northern Virginia Fine Arts Festival. (It was eventually recovered from the apartment of the thief in Fairfax County).

2. Zach Oxman’s sculpture of Robert S. Simon in Reston. (Also recovered from Lake Anne and reinstalled at Lake Anne, Fairfax County).

3. And the PandaMania Panda found dumped in Fairfax County. (Recovered in Fairfax County - In today’s WaPo Metro section there is a picture with a photo caption line of a Fairfax County Police Officer pulling a stolen PandaMania Panda (originally stolen from the corner of Connecticut and Florida Avenues NW) from the Pohick Creek in Lorton.

Top 10 DC Area Art Shows of the Year

I had such an overwhelming response to my call for Artomatic Top 10 artists, that I thought that it may be fun to also have a call for readers' Top 10 DC area art shows.

I will have my top 10 listed soon.

Email me your Top 10 list and I'll post them here. I'd like to restrict the list to the Greater Washington area galleries and museums and other visual arts spaces.

A couple of Florida opportunities for artists

Since I was just there...

Deadline: December 3, 2004
The John S & James L Knight Foundation seeks work for permanent installation at the foundation's Miami headquarters. A total of 26 works will be selected, corresponding to each of the communities where the Knight brothers operated newspapers. For submission guidelines contact: Steven F Greenwald Design.

Deadline: December 3, 2004
The Fifth Annual Florida Outdoor Sculpture Competition, a joint project of Polk Museum of Art and the City of Lakeland, is accepting submissions for a Public Art exhibition in downtown Lakeland. Open to sculptors working in North America. Ten works will be accepted and will receive $1,000 to offset transportation expenses. $3,000 Best of Show. Deadline is December 31, 2004. Non-refundable $15 entry fee.

Artists should submit labeled slides of up to three completed works, with 2-3 views of each work, along with a resume, and one paragraph artist statement. Electronic submissions will be accepted via email or PC compatible CD. Images must be in .jpg format, no larger than 600 pixels wide at 72 dpi; and artist statement should be in plain text, Word, or .pdf format.

Send all materials to: Polk Museum of Art, Att: Outdoor Sculpture Competition, 800 E Palmetto St, Lakeland FL 33801-5529. No incomplete works or project proposals will be considered. All works must be able to be anchored to concrete and maintenance free for the duration of the exhibit. For full prospectus/further details, visit this website or call 863-688-7743 ext. 289.

There's an old Henny Youngman joke that goes like this:

I just flew in from Miami... boy are my arms tired!

Anyway, back in town; came straight from the airport to my opening at Fraser Gallery Georgetown. Thanks to all of you who came down and said hi and also thanks to those who bought some work!

Anyway... a couple of good online links:

One of the reader's of Jesse Cohen's excellent ArtDC reports on one of the art casualties of the baseball move to DC. Read it here.

Jesse, in a separate thread, asks the question: Should blogs follow the rules of journalism? Read all the interesting comments here.

And in today's Post, Michael O'Sullivan has a nice review of Alex Bay's terrific sculptural show currently at our neighbor MOCA. There's a couple of spectacular wall pieces in this show that ought to go directly to one of our area's museums.

Kelly Towles, whose work appeared in quite a few of the Artomatic lists, also opened tonight at David Adamson. This should be a good show to visit. This is the second (that I know of) of quite a few Artomatic artists' exhibitions that are mushrooming all over the city. And last week Jan Sherfy opened at Delila Katzka Fine Art.

JT Kirkland, over at Thinking About Art has a great opportunity for artists to discuss their work through the Ellipse Arts Center's space in Arlington. Read about it here.

I'm flying back to DC tomorrow... hopefully I'll make it in plenty of time for my opening at Canal Square at 6 PM.

See you there!

Opportunity for Visual Artists

I'm still down here in Miami, but I thought that this opportunity may be of interest:

The Virginia Center for the Creative Arts (VCCA), a working retreat for writers, composers and visual artists, has received a grant from the Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation to support fellowships for Washington area writers, composers, and visual artists. Applications are currently being accepted.

The program will support Fellowships for Washington area artists to attend the VCCA over the next several months. Artists, writers, and composers who are making serious work are encouraged to apply.

The next postmark deadline for applications is January 15 (for summer 2005). For more information, or to print an application, visit their website at www.vcca.com or call 434.946.7236 between 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. weekdays, or to receive an application in the mail, please send a #10 self addressed, stamped envelope to the VCCA at 154 San Angelo Drive, Amherst, VA 24521.

Greetings from Northern Havana

Hello from the land of exiles, still buzzing over Art Basel. Three of our represented artists, Sandra Ramos and Tania Brugera and Marta Maria Perez Bravo did exceptionally well during Art Basel.

Today I received a wonderful tour of the public art collection of the Federal Reserve Bank - Miami Branch. A beautiful building with a predictable collection of forgetable abstract paintings (lest we insult anyone with a representational painting that someone might actually understand visually).

It is astounding to me the buzz and interest and support that this area gives to the visual arts. I am jealous (and fired up).

Anyway... Another painter mocking Bush is getting publicity over idiots censoring his painting. Read the story here.

On the flight here, I began to read Louis Perez voluminous On Becoming Cuban (what an appropriate book to read before heading to Miami, uh?).

I discovered quite an interesting fact.

The father of the modern Irish republic was Eamon de Valera, who was born in New York in 1882. His father, Juan de Valera, although technically a Spaniard, was really a Cuban, born in Cuba (which was part of Spain back then), the son of a Cuban sugar planter and escaped to New York during the Independence Wars with Spain. There he earned his living as a piano teacher. He met and married Irish immigrant Catherine Coll. Juan died shortly after the birth of their son Eduardo. After Juan's death, his wife sent Eduardo to Ireland, where her family changed his name to the Gaelic version of Eduardo: Eamon.

Whodda thunk it?

I'm heading down to Miami this morning. I'll be posting later tonight. Y'all come back now, hear?

Do not however, forget that this coming Friday is the third Friday of the month, and thus the five Canal Square Galleries (Alla Rogers, Parish, Fraser, MOCA and Anne C. Fisher) in Georgetown's Canal Square will be having their opening nights and extended hours. From 6-9 PM.

We will be having an exhibition of my recent charcoal drawings. About 20 new figurative charcoal nudes.

Warning: More self promotion coming.

I've had the December show since 1997, not just one of the bennies of co-owning the gallery, but also because of the curious fact that December (at least in Georgetown) is a very dead month for art in general, and my past shows have sold well and even generated some press.

My 1997 show consisted of portraits of porn stars. Several of the women attended the opening, as well as a few thousand men! The Washington Post's review called that show "irritating."

The 1998 show was based on my interest in Celtic history and legend. The Potomac News wrote that I was a "throwback... but in tune with the times." It was also reviewed by The Bowie Blade.

The 2000 show was "Literary Drawings," and consisted of drawings inspired by some of my favorite books and literary characters. It was reviewed by The Georgetowner

The 2002 show was "27 Years of Frida Kahlo" and it consisted of my work about Kahlo since I first came across her work in 1977. It was reviewed by The Washington City Paper and was a "Hot Pick" in the Washington Times.

Last year's show was Pictish Nation and it was reviewed by The Washington Times and The Georgetowner.

Pictured above is "La Llorona" (The Crying - or Weeping - Woman), one of the new drawings in the exhibition. Learn more about the legend of "La Llorona" here. It is based on a photograph by the great Danny Conant.

Openings are from 6-9 PM. See ya there!

Studio Visits!

Blake Gopnik, the Chief Art Critic of the Washington Post is now making studio visits and writing a terrific and highly readable plug of the artist and his art. This is great news!

Read his first studio visit here. This character Jonathan Grossmalerman sounds like a Peter Sellers who can also paint.

By the way, Blake went to Brooklyn for his studio visit.

I am sure that LA is next, but I am also sure that will soon be making studio visits to DC artists as well. After all, it's easier to catch a cab to a DC area artist studio than the train to New York and then the cab to Brooklyn. Unless Blake subways to Brooklyn.

When I was a kid growing up in Brooklyn, my house was within a couple of blocks of the Atlantic Avenue stop of the LL subway line and by the time I was 12 or 13 I was a master of the New York subway system.

Betcha he took a cab.

Anti-OPTIONS 2005

As J.T. noted over at Thinking About Art, photographer J.W. Bailey, in response to the whole recent controversy of the WPA/C's OPTIONS 2005 show, has created his entry for the new OPTIONS curator Libby Lumpkin in the form of an Anti-OPTIONS 2005 website detailing his extensive and deep correspondence and research and battle (still ongoing) caused by the firing of Philip Barlow as the original curator.

This is either brilliant or demented. I am not yet sure which, but it is certainly interesting and certainly shows what can be fused when you mix talent, passion and a human pit bull like Bailey.

See Bailey's site here.

Fridaphiles of the World: Unite!

I am curating an online exhibition for Art.com on the subject of an "Homage to Frida Kahlo."

There is no entry fee and Art.com is funding the following prizes:

1st Prize: Airfare, hotel and expenses for 3-day/3-night trip for two to the Frida Kahlo Museum in Mexico City, Mexico. (Total package valued up to $2,500)

2nd Prize: $1,000

3rd Prize: $150 towards a Print on Demand order through Art.com Original Art & Photography

Work is uploaded online and there is no entry fee. The work must in some way relate to Frida Kahlo and her life, work, etc. No reproductions of Frida's own paintings will be considered, unless they introduce a new idea or vision or concept to the Kahlo phenomenom. To enter, click here.

Connie Imboden to Jury Annual Bethesda Photography Prize

The 2005 juror for our annual photography competition has been selected and it is acclaimed photographer Connie Imboden. You can read about the juror here. Her work is represented in the permanent collections of The Museum of Modern Art in New York, The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The National Museum for Women in the Arts, The National Museum of American Art, Washington D.C., Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, France, and many other public and private collections in Europe and the Americas.

This is our annual juried opportunity for photographers. The deadline for entries is February 3, 2005. In addition to cash prizes, the Best in Show winner will be offered a solo show in 2006. Other award winners will also be included in some of our future group shows.

To look at the prospectus for the competition, click here.