Mera Rubell in my Studio (Next to the last Part)

Part I here and Part II here.

And so I was in the position where I suspect every artist on this planet would love to be: Ubercollector Mera Rubell and a small entourage were in my studio, waiting for me to show them my art work.

But I am of Cuban ancestry, so rather than showing work right away, I started talking about it.

And because I am of Cuban ancestry, before I started to talk about the artwork, I talked about what led to the artwork.

I told them that when I found out on Thursday that I had been selected to be visited by Rubell, I was ecstatic and glowing with anticipation.

And then I told them that I had immediately realized that I had no current work to show them, because all of my work is in storage in Miami waiting to be shown at the Miami International Art Fair.

"Do you know about that fair?" I asked possibly the world's leading art fair goer. She said yes.

"So I thought that maybe I could ask you to visit me at the fair and see the work." I paused, and everyone looked a little alarmed, mostly me at seeing them a little alarmed.

"You have nothing to show us?" Someone asked.

"Yes, I do." I answered. "Because what I decided to do when I realized that I had no work to show you, was to create as many drawings as I could between then and now. And so between Friday at 3:30 AM and this morning at 9:00 AM I created everything that you will see today."

Rubell looked a little amazed. "You mean that you did all the work in the last 36 hours?" She asked.

I said yes.

"You see," she turned to the entourage, suddenly filled with vigor and energy, "this is the first artist who crated new artwork just for the visit!"

"Ahhh..." I stammered a little embarrassed. "I had to! I had nothing to show you." But I was inwardly feeling that things were going well now.

"What have you got to show me?" She said, the studio suddenly bristling with her energy. "This is a dynamo in human form," I thought to myself.

And yet, I delayed a few precious moments more, and then really started talking about what drives my imagery.

I talked about how I had discovered the Picts in my childhood reading and then re-discovered them in Scotland when I lived in that breathtaking nation from 1989-1992.

I told them about the research that I had done as an amateur historian on them and their tattoos, and I showed them some examples of Pictish artwork that I had pinned to my studio wall.


In this photo by Lisa Gold, Rubell is looking at me describing the tattoo artwork of the ancient Picts, as I weave a artistic genetic line to my current work.

I described how a few years ago I had a show where it was all about Pictish art. And then I led the discussion, minutes gone by, to the trail of that artwork to my current work.

I'm a good talker, and I think that they were all interested in this historic genetic line that I was weaving. No one was yawning, and the room was still charged with electricity.

I explained how the tattoos married with my interest in narrative art, and art that tells a story or makes a point, backs up an agenda or delivers a social commentary.

And then I turned over the gigantic drawing of Che Guevara with the writing on the wall behind the Argentinean icon.

"Asere, Si o No?" 19"x48" Charcoal on Paper
As I've described before, this is a huge charcoal drawing of Ernesto "Che" Guevara de la Serna Lynch. Che is to the left in a very Christ-like pose. behind him, a slogan or graffiti on the wall asks the question in Cuban slang: "Asere, Si o No?" which means "Friend, Yes or No? The capital letters answer the question by spelling out ASESINO or assasin. I explained all these Cuban nuances to the Spanish language and my agenda behind it.

"You did this in the last 36 hours?" Someone asked a little quizzical.

"You see!, You see!" beamed Rubell, this is what I'm all about!" she gestured at the piece as I discussed my historical affinity to Che Guevara, both as a hero to some and as a mass murderer and racist to others. Rubell noted that I had captured a strong sense of the zealous Maoist in his eyes and face.

"What else is there?"

The next few pieces went fast. With each I explained what the drawing was all about. I discussed the intimacy of drawing the viewer close. I discussed humor in art when I showed them the Superman drawing. I discussed being very tired and possibly hallucinating when I did the "Fuck Elections" Obama drawing. I discussed the nuance of words when I showed them the "Age of Obama - Nobel Peace Prize" drawing.

"Is that Catherine Opie?" Asked Rubell when she looked at "True Believer." I told her no (the model is actually a local Sunday School teacher). "She really looks like Catherine Opie!" she commented. Note to self: contact Catherine Opie and see what she thinks of the likeness.

I was in a groove, and I can't remember why, but there was a lot of laughter all the time. I think that I asked them if they were laughing so much because they were delirious from lack of sleep. They exploded in laughter at that. I laughed too, because I was indeed super tired from the last 36 hours, but I was also feeling quite on track.

I could sense that Rubell really liked my drawings, but that she also liked the reason for them, the "why I draw this" idea. Somewhere in there I talked about conceptual art and how often the idea is more interesting than the final product and people agreed with me.

More talking, more good vibes.

"Awright," she says, "can you step out for a minute?"

I leave them and go upstairs. "How's it going?" asks my wife.

"I think it's going great," I answer as a series of raucous laughter blasts emanate from the basement. My wife, Little Junes and I look at each other and wait.

An eternity goes by before I am called down to the basement.

"We were wondering," says Rubell with a devilish look in her eyes - this woman is not tired, at least not now, after a grueling 36 hours marathon of studio visits; that much is clear to the most casual observer.

"We were wondering if..." she pauses, "considering that you were a Naval intelligence officer... if you had done some intelligence preparations ahead of time and had all these drawings in your flat files and just pulled them out just before we came?"

I could see a glint of devilishness in her eyes and I wasn't really worried that they thought that was the case, and so I easily denied the issue. Nothing like having the truth on your side.

"Raise your right hand!" ordered Rubell, her Russian-ness suddenly coming to the front. I did.

Next I was made to swear that all the work had been created in the last 36 hours, while Jennie Yang recorded the event with her camera. For a moment there I flashed back to my days in the Navy, with the myriads of re-enlistments and ceremonies where oaths are taken.

But I was in a good place, and my tired bones and eyes were testament to the truth of my creation of these works in the last 36 hours. The swearing was easy, with the relaxing backing of the truth.

We all filed out of the studio. On the way out she looked at a handmade Valentine Day's card from my wife that I pinned by the door. "This is a love nest," she stated, "another love nest..."

"We'll let you know soon," said the WPA's Lisa Gold, efficient and precise to the last minute, and reading my mind as it wondered "Am I in?"

We got upstairs, and started to say goodbyes... it all felt good. And at this point I was just glad that this electrical woman had decided to work her tuchus off and charge up the artists of the DC area.

"So what do you think of the Washington art scene?" asked Mera as she prepared to leave the house.

She turned and looked at me, and I began to answer her.

More tomorrow...

Dawson on Rubell

The Washington Post's Galleries art critic, Jessica Dawson (whose writing role, as explained to me by the Post, has expanded a little, and will allow her to cover more art-related events such as this one, instead of just having Dawson do gallery reviews) followed Mera Rubell around to a few of her 36 studio visits and has the Dawsonesque take on the event here.

You could call it a Hanukkah miracle. Or the arrival of intelligent life from another planet. Last Saturday at 5 a.m., while the rest of us slept, megacollector Mera Rubell walked among us, hunting local art.

Read Dawson's report on the Rubell visit here.

As usual, Dawson adds her own bitter Debbie Downer flavor to a spectacularly positive event and tips her hand, when she introduces her log of the visits by writing: "Mera's troll through Washington's art warrens was akin to Santa visiting the Island of Misfit Toys."

What a putz... or maybe I'm the putz for just seeing just all the positive things that Mera and her interest has generated and will generate, and ignoring some of the things that Dawson highlights. And for the record, I know which Misfit Toy I would be...

As commenter "fisher1" noted in the Post's website in a comment about Dawson's article:

Jessica Dawson tactfully didn't mention one major reason artists in Washington feel neglected and isolated and that is the lack of any consistent critical voice. Any thriving art scene needs good critics as well as collectors and venues willing to take chances. We might have the latter two but certainly not the critical voice. Jessica Dawson might review one art show in ten if we're lucky; the Post's major art critic, Blake Gopnik is usually found wandering through New York's galleries ( admittedly, recently he has noted that art is going on in Washington)and people like Andrew Sullivan and occasional pieces in the City paper try to fill the gap but gap it remains and that's been the situation for many decades.

Unfortunately that wasn't "tact" on Dawson's part, after all, she's one of the critical voices in question.

You can see all the comments, or add your own, here.

Sweet 16

See the artwork chosen by Mera Rubell, who picked 16 artists, here.

Mera Rubell in my studio Last Sunday, around noon or so, when the doorbell rang, as chance would have it, I was carrying Little Junes around. I went and opened the door; Mera's Rubell's "36 studios in 36 hours" posse was at my door-step, the 36th studio of the grueling tour. She was here at last. All through the last couple of days my email inbox had been buzzing with artists reporting what was happening during their studio visit. "I think I'm in! said one email, "But even if I'm not, I'm feeling pretty good about my artwork!" it finished. "Mera Rubell..a total life force!!!! My studio still vibrating with her energy, dialogue, quick take on everything.....her bowler ha t-- 'The Unbearable Lightness of Being' bowler hat. I haven't felt such positive power in DC for so many years!!!!" shouted out another email from a very talented DC area artist. And now she was in my house. It all happened fast, but soon we were talking about the artwork on the wall, with one of the visitors commenting that she had some Sandra Ramos' works in her collection. The photographer documenting the visit was meanwhile admiring the photographs of Cirenaica Moreira and asking about her. The eyes and attention turned to Ramos as people looked around my first floor. Someone of the locals recognized an early Tim Tate sculpture, which I had acquired at his very first solo show. Meanwhile the wife offered fresh coffee, which was accepted by the tired, bleary eyed group. Little Junes, of course, was a big hit with everyone. Someone poked him on the side and he let out a big grin. "Everyone in the Campello household is working this visit except me," I thought to myself. "So, who's the artist in this house," asked Ms. Rubell, looking at me and Alida. "I am," I responded, but quickly added that Alida also had a formidable arts background, after all the Professor studied art at Colgate, Corcoran and MICA and was in the graduate program in printmaking and photography at the Art Institute of Chicago before she decided to focus on special education. Before I knew it, we were looking at the only piece of my artwork that hangs in my house: the 1981 collage of Frida Kahlo that I did while a student at the University of Washington. I almost panicked when I realized that we were discussing a 28-year-old piece of art done as a class assignment under Jacob Lawrence. "Maybe we should get down to the studio and see the work that I have for you," I said. We went down to the basement and Ms. Rubell looked to a wall full of certificates, photos and framed paperwork. "Who's got all these degrees?" she asked, a little amazed. I laughed and explained that I was a former Naval officer and all that stuff is what we call in the Navy the "I love me wall." There, framed for all to see was my entire Naval career: ships, submarines, medals, certificates, photographs, Arctic Circle papers, Equator crossing certificates, Suez Canal certificates, etc. She looked with interest at a photo of a massive Soviet Typhoon submarine, which I had taken from a British helicopter that I'd been riding at the time somewhere over the Kola Gulf. I identified the huge sub to her. "I was born in Russia," she stated. None of us knew that. I told her that Admiral Hyman Rickover, the father of the US Nuclear Navy had also been born in Russia. She thanked me for my service, told everyone that she had her Naturalized US citizen certificate framed and on her wall, and then we all entered the well-lit mess that I call my studio. "Show me what you got," she said, settling down on a stool.

The Mera Rubell Picks

“I certainly feel more connected to artists working in DC. These 36 hours were a beautiful, focused and intense time. Please express my thanks to the artists who took this ride with us. How amazing and magical were all the visits! The artists invited us into their studios and gave us a real understanding of their personal creative world. It was truly life altering for me. What an experience! And now, our efforts can only present a small sample of the many brilliant working artists in DC. It's a much larger scene than I ever imagined--how exciting!”

The artists chosen by Ms. Rubell and whose work will be featured in her Auction Exhibition section include: M.G. Barkovic, Holly Bass, Judy Byron, Rafael Cañizares-Yunez, Adam de Boer, Mary Early, Victoria Gaitán, Carol Brown Goldberg, Pat Goslee, Jason Horowitz, Barbara Liotta, Patrick McDonough, Brandon Morse, Dan Steinhilber, Lisa Marie Thalhammer and yours truly!


Mera Rubell in my studio. Photo by Lisa Gold
Congrats to all the selected artists, and I know that I am not the only one who feels that Ms. Rubell has added a significant new spice to the Greater DC area art scene's soup that will kick it up a hundred notches and perhaps help to crack the apathy that our local curators and media have towards DC artists.

Meanwhile here's a video note to all the Debbie Downer crabs of the Greater DC art scene, who now must focus on something positive for a change:

Tough jury duty

Jurying the Blackrock Center for the Arts coming gallery exhibition season was really, really hard! There were loads of good entry proposals from both artists and groups. Once the gallery director makes the final decisions and computes the voting and announces the selected shows, I'll let all of you know.

Mera Rubell Studio Visit

Background: As announced here:

"the Rubell Family Collection is one of the leading collections of contemporary art in the world. Started in 1964, soon after Don and Mera Rubell were married, the Rubell Family Collection operates as a non-profit organization based in Miami where it presents rotating, curated exhibitions and hosts a variety of educational and community outreach programs.

Mera Rubell will be one of eight esteemed curators selecting works for Cream, the WPA 2010 Art Auction Exhibition. Building upon the popular Experimental Video Series at the Rubells’ Capitol Skyline Hotel, Rubell has determined to see the work of as many DC-area artists as possible and select up to twelve to be included in the WPA exhibition and auction. Her visits to DC are typically 36 hours long, and she has devoted her next trip to this project.

For 36 Studios – Part 1, Mera Rubell and a team of curators and writers will conduct 36 studio visits over the course of 36 straight hours. Each studio visit will last approximately 15-20 minutes and will take place starting at 5:00am on Saturday, December 12 and continuing until 5:00pm on Sunday, December 13."

Got it?

So as all of you should have done, I threw my name in the hat for this spectacular opportunity to show my artwork to one of the world's leading art collectors, and the same person (me) who once missed a 160 million dollar lottery grand prize by one number, hit it this time and I, along with 35 other lucky DC area artists, was selected to be visited by "Mera Rubell and a team of curators and writers."

To say that I was ecstatic is the understatement of the year. I was dumbfounded and left a little speechless for the second time this month. An opportunity like this doesn't happen very often, if ever.

When I returned to Earth, to my horror I realized that... ahhh... I had no work to show Rubell.

All of my work is still in Miami, safely stored awaiting for it to be displayed again at the coming Miami International Art Fair at the Miami Beach Convention Center from 5-10 January 2010.

Best known art collector in the world is coming to my studio and I have zip to show her.

Effing Great...

The Grand Admiral of the Soviet Fleet, Sergei Gorshkov once stated that the "reason that the American Navy is so good in time of war is because war is chaos and the US Navy practices chaos everyday."

Thus, as a former Naval officer I have been well trained in dealing with chaos and once my heart slowed down I sat down to consider my options.

Should I put together a binder full of available work in Miami and pass it to Ms. Rubell in the hope that she would agree to check them out once she returned to Miami?

Should I sit her in front of a large flat screen TV and flash her digital images of my available work?

Or should I lock myself in the studio and create as many new art pieces as possible before her visit on Sunday afternoon?

Usually the hardest and most difficult path to an answer is the solution, and I decided to lock myself in the studio and create new art.

As a new father, this is not easy, and I discussed it with my wife. With her support, I chose the last option.

I spent the rest of Thursday doing and finishing up all of my chores, many of which had piled up while I was in Florida the previous week. I went to bed around midnight on Thursday night, with my head buzzing with ideas.

By 3:30AM on Friday, I was up, essentially unable to sleep and ready to create some artwork. This being the digital age, before I entered the studio I logged onto Facebook and began Facebooking the events about to take place.

Nine hours later, after a dozen sketches and several discarded starts, I had finished my first new drawing, a large portrait of Ernesto "Che" Guevara de la Serna Lynch, known to the world as "Che" and perhaps the most iconic figure in modern history.


"Asere, Si o No?" 19"x48" Charcoal on Paper
When I finished I had something special. The appropriated image of Che from a photograph by a Commie photographer somewhere (ironic that Communists always nationalize and appropriate private stuff, so I have no issues appropriating their imagery) is to the left in a very Christ-like pose. Behind him, a slogan or graffiti on the imperfect wall asks the question in Cuban slang: "Asere, Si o No?" which means "Friend, Yes or No? in Cuban street dialect and is meaningless to all other Spanish speaking peoples. The capital letters answer the question by spelling out ASESINO or assassin. This is the second version of this ASESINO concept.

It is now well into Friday. More Facebooking and by now friends and family are encouraging me. Art critic Kevin Mellema advices me that "Sleep is for the weak. 72 artist hours is like a week and a half of work for 9 to 5'ers.... Of course you do want to be awake and coherent when they show up on Sunday..."

The next time that I sit down to draw I hit a groove and deliver five new drawings in about four hours. I'm employing a lot of charcoal dust to cover large areas and create a minimalist drawing concept. "Superman flying naked and close to the ground in order to avoid NORAD radar" is such a drawing. We barely see the naked superhero, but we do see his elongated shadow on the road below. The lane dividers are just erased charcoal, now showing the not so pure white Arches paper underneath. I toy with the idea of rubbing more charcoal dust onto the drawing to create the impression of the car oil stains one always sees in the middle of the lanes. I abandon the idea; it is a pure and clean highway under the Man of Steel.


"Superman flying naked and close to the ground in order to avoid NORAD radar"" Charcoal on Paper. 20x24 inches.
"True Believer" and "Woman who thinks that the tattoo that she just got on her back reads 'Bring Bush Back'" come out next. Both are very quick drawings and the first one is a highly worked drawing with an almost fanatical message. I'm not satisfied with the charcoal aspect of the dripping blood from the newly finished tattoo and so I bring out colored pencils and apply a subtle sense of color to the piece. This is rare for me.

Now there's red blood dripping down her arm. The second piece is the opposite: a rough almost unfinished drawing with a harsh, funny message. It is inspired by a cartoon I saw once which showed a burly sailor's back. A tattoo on his back reads: "Don't tell this guy what this tattoo says, he thinks he has a battleship."


"True Believer" 22 x 14 inches. Charcoal and Colored Pencils on Paper.


"Woman who thinks that the tattoo that she just got reads 'Bring Bush Back'" Charcoal and Conte on Paper. 14"x10"
I had set aside a nice vertical piece of dark paper and "Fallen Angel" materializes on it as I work furiously. It is the most minimalist of the pieces and it is finished in less that 15 minutes from beginning to end.


"Fallen Angel." Charcoal on Paper. 21 x 11 inches.
On the radio, the pundits are discussing Obama's speech at Oslo accepting the Nobel Peace Prize. I take a break and do some more Facebooking and I come across Mary Coble's profile picture on Facebook and it triggers an idea in my head. Coble and Nobel seem to align and "Age of Obama - Nobel Peace Prize" is created. This is the second "Age of Obama" drawing that I've done. In the first, done while Obama was a candidate, the figure is canvas to a history of the candidate in the early days of the election. It is now in a private collection in Ireland.

In this second "Age of Obama" drawing, the figure is host to selected portions of the Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech.


"Age of Obama - Nobel Peace Prize" Charcoal on Paper. 16x12 inches.
I want to have some coherence to the work that I want to show Rubell, and many of these pieces have a seminal beginning in my historical interest in the Picts. And so out comes a Pictish drawing.


"Pictish Woman" Charcoal on Paper. 14 x 9 inches.
The Pictish drawing is the one that worries me the most. It is almost fantasy in nature. Will Rubell understand my historical interest in the subject and how it is the seed to the more contemporary work?

I take a break as I am tapped out and on Saturday afternoon we all visit some open studios and drop by the Washington Glass School, Red Dirt and Flux Studios. Rubell has already been to her designated visits there and excited artists tell me about her and her entourage. I sense some disappointment, some hope and certainly a lot of excitement.

I begin to gather another aspect of the impact that this influential person's tiring and superhuman effort (36 studios in 36 hours) is causing on the DC art scene. Even the Washington Post, well-known amongst DC area artists for its apathy and indifference towards the local visual art scene has sent the Post's freelance art critic along, and she has overcome her ennui about the DC artists and galleries that she is tasked with covering and is following Rubell to some of the studio visits, but soon drops out.

I'm angsty about the whole thing and can't wait to get back to my studio and create some more work. I want to make sure that I make an impact.

On the drive home I pass by at least three Vietnamese restaurants and wonder why all the Pho places have a number after it (such as PHO 95, PHO 301, etc.).

My head has been filled by my visit to the studios with a need to be "shocking" in order to stand out. I waste precious hours struggling with a shocking idea. I visualize a man crawling away into the horizon perspective. We see his body clearly from the back, his buttocks clear and white, and his penis dangling between his legs as he crawls away. A tattoo with an arrow points to his anus and letters instruct "Insert Penis Here." Another tattoo on his penis states "Suck This." His butt cheeks sport tattoos that say: "Spank Here."

The tattoo on his back says "Pat here" and the tattoo on his feet soles says "Tickle here."

The title would have been "Man with Directions" but it never came about. It just wasn't me. I'm no Chris Offili, taking a schlocky short cut to shock in order to gather attention. I feel guilty enough as it is about the drawing of the woman with the Obama tattoo on her back.

Instead another Che Guevara drawing begins to emerge. Much smaller, almost the opposite of the first piece. For almost a whole day the drawing looks like this:

A long-haired Che is to the left of the drawing (where else), with a vast empty space to his right. Long hair years before the Beatles and hippies, aloof and alone as an adventurer in a foreign land so much different than his native Argentina.

That night I can't sleep much between fighting a nagging cough acquired while in Miami and racing ideas about how to finish the drawing.

On Sunday I wake up, calm and ready for the visit. And the last drawing crystallizes suddenly.


Finalmente Denunciamos a el que traiciono al Che (Finally we denounce he who betrayed Che). 4 x 24 inches. Charcoal on paper
The Spanish words announce that "finally we denounce who betrayed Che." The capital letters answer the statement: FIDEL. I now have two of these... the circle is complete and I am ready for Rubell. It is 9:00AM on Sunday and I get a phone call from the WPA's Lisa Gold.

Is it OK if they come around noon instead of the originally scheduled time of 2PM? She asks. I will be either the last studio visited or the penultimate one.

I tell them that I am ready.

Next: What happened during the visit.

Look into my eyes...


Anderson Lennox Campello, also known as "Little Junes" while doing some open studio visits last weekend.

Mera Rubell Visit

Part one of the Mera Rubell visit to 36 DC area studios in 36 hours is up tomorrow morning... this was great for the DC art scene if a little chaotic for me.

The Grand Admiral of the now defunct Soviet Fleet, Sergei Gorshkov, once stated that the "reason that the American Navy is so good in time of war is because war is chaos and the US Navy practices chaos everyday."

As a former Naval officer, I'm good at dealing with chaos...

Studio Visiting

In the last few days, between visiting open studios and the terrific show at Gallery Neptune in Bethesda, I've acquired quite a few of the Xmas presents that I intend to give. Problem is that I'd really like to keep the cool Glenn Friedel photograph and/or the great Sean Hennessey sculpture.

And a little secret: both were great deals for excellent art.

Give art for the holidays.

Below is Little Junes in his cool puppy hat that will embarrass him forever on the Internets as we dragged him along studio and gallery visiting.

Emerging Artists at Museums

The Guggenheim Museum has Intervals and in 2010:

INTERVALS: KITTY KRAUS
Through January 6, 2010
Berlin-based Kitty Kraus has been invited to exhibit her work for the second installment of Intervals, a new contemporary art series designed to showcase experimental projects by emerging artists and reflect the spirit of today’s most innovative practices. Kraus works in a spare, elegiac vocabulary of monochrome forms and humble materials such as lightbulbs, ice, mirrors, and glass. For Intervals, Kraus has installed two sculptures in the Annex Level 5 gallery of the museum. This exhibition is organized by Nancy Spector, Chief Curator; Joan Young, Associate Curator of Contemporary Art and Manager of Curatorial Affairs; and Katherine Brinson, Assistant Curator.

How come none of our DC area museums offer an exhibition series for "emerging artists"?

The Arlington Arts Center Studios

The Arlington Arts Center is currently accepting applications for a space in the group studio. Applications are due by December 21 and artists will be notified on December 24.

The studio is available as of January 1, 2010. For eligibility requirements, process information, and to download an application, please visit this website.

Change in the air

For the last several months the newly appointed director of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Richard Koshalek, has been quietly at work on a plan to erect a 145-foot-tall inflatable meeting hall that would swell out of the top of the internal courtyard of the museum, which sits on the Mall midway between the White House and the Capitol.

Designed by the New York firm Diller Scofidio & Renfro, the translucent fabric structure, which would be installed twice a year, for May and October, and be packed away in storage the rest of the time, would transform one of the most somber buildings on the mall into a luminous pop landmark. It could be the most uplifting work of civic architecture built in the capital since I. M. Pei completed his East Building of the National Gallery of Art more than 30 years ago.

But it is what the project is intended to house, and to represent, that has the potential to shake up Washington. For decades government power brokers have dismissed much of contemporary culture as a playground for elites. Mr. Koshalek’s vision would challenge that mentality by using performing arts, film series and conferences to foster a wide-ranging public debate on cultural values.

Mr. Koshalek, who is known for his bubbly enthusiasm, has been a champion of architectural causes since his days as the director of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, in the late 1990s, when he helped lead the drive to build the Walt Disney Concert Hall. Later he worked behind the scenes with the city’s government agencies and cultural institutions to hire respected architects for their new buildings rather than the kind of politically connected firms that were then the norm.

He arrived at the Hirshhorn last April with a dual agenda: to raise the museum’s national profile and to put Washington in closer touch with creative life around it.

Read the NYT report here.

Lawrence on Wiley

During the 1970s in New York, artists working in the West Coast and Chicago—including H.C. Westermann, Robert Arneson, Robert Colescott and Peter Saul—raised hackles and gained fans for their cartoonish, jittery and emotionally direct works loaded with offbeat materials and associations. The earnest ethos of East Coast art was not in their DNA; minimalist purity and the high-minded musings of conceptual art were anathema.

Among this group was a slightly younger artist from northern California, William T. Wiley, who was being noticed for his skillfully drawn, pun-loaded and casually enigmatic work, often subverting modernism's language of geometric abstraction and assemblage with a glut of personal meaning. Already credentialed by exhibitions in his home state, as well as Chicago, Paris, Milan, the Netherlands and Germany, this "Huckleberry Duchamp," as an Art News reviewer called him in 1974, soon emerged as a national figure.

Read the Wall Street Journal review by Sidney Lawrence here.

Rocco Landesman on the line

The DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities is hosting an Art Works roundtable discussion with National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Rocco Landesman on Wednesday, December 16 from 9:30 – 11:30 AM. The location is Busboys & Poets at 2012 14th St. NW.

DCCAH Executive Director Gloria Nauden and Chairman Landesman will be joined by Busboys & Poets founder and owner Andy Shallal and DC Office of Planning Director Harriet Tregoning in a conversation before an invited audience of DC arts leaders.

That conversation will focus on, “How do the arts work in DC?,” the central question behind Art Works, Mr. Landesman’s leitmotif for his tenure as chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. Art Works is a triple entendre incorporating the Art Works created by artists such as paintings, dances, and music; the arts as part of the economy with art workers having real jobs, paying taxes, and spending money; and how Art Works on us as human beings with its capacity to inspire people and change lives. Chairman Landesman is spending the next six months visiting neighborhoods and towns all across America, seeing and spotlighting all the ways that art works.

After initial comments from the panel, the session will turn to the guests for their observations on how the arts do or don’t work in the District.

When: Wednesday, December 16, 2009 from 9:30 – 11:00 AM

Where: Busboys & Poets, 2120 14th St. NW

Contact: Marquis Perkins, DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities (202)286-5797

Go See This Show

Jury Duty

At the BlackRock Center for the Arts to select the exhibits for the gallery for September 2010 through August 2011.

The jury panel is comprised of my good friend and gallerist Elyse Harrison, Jodi Walsh, and yours truly.

Mera Rubell Studio Visit

Later today, Ms. Mera Rubell, one of the world's best-known art collectors, and whose Miami space, The Rubell Family Collection, features her and her husband's well-known art collection, will be making a studio visit to my studio in Potomac.

This is of course, both an honor and a spectacular opportunity to expose my work to one of the world's premier art collectors.

One fly in the ointment.

When I discovered this on Thursday afternoon, I was ecstatic. Then I realized that all of my work is in storage in Miami as it will be featured by Philadelphia's Projects Gallery in the Miami International Art Fair in January.

I had no current work to show Mera Rubell.

So from 3:30 AM on Friday to 9:00 AM this morning (with the exception of a Xmas shopping visit to the Gateway Arts District Open Studios yesterday), I locked myself in my studio and produced the below drawings to show Rubell later this Sunday.

"Asere, Si o No?" 19"x48" Charcoal on Paper
This is a huge charcoal drawing of Ernesto "Che" Guevara de la Serna Lynch. Che is to the left in a very Christ-like pose. behind him, a slogan or graffiti on the wall asks the question in Cuban slang: "Asere, Si o No?" which means "Friend, Yes or No? The capital letters answer the question by spelling out ASESINO or assasin. This is the second version of this concept.


Finalmente Denunciamos a el que traiciono al Che (Finally we denounce he who betrayed Che). 4 x 24 inches. Charcoal on paper
The Spanish words announce that "finally we denounce who betrayed Che." The capital letters answer the statement: FIDEL.


"Age of Obama - Nobel Peace Prize" Charcoal on Paper. 16x12 inches.
In this piece, the figure is tattooed with the text of Pres. Obama's acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize. Selected parts of the speech tell a story.


"Woman who thinks that the tattoo that she just got reads 'Bring Bush Back'" Charcoal and Conte on Paper. 14"x10"
I couldn't resist doing a humorous piece. That's just the way that I am.


"True Believer" 22 x 14 inches. Charcoal and Colored Pencils on Paper.
Click on the image for more detail, but the tattoo in her arm, the updated part still bleeding, tells the whole story.


"Superman flying naked and close to the ground in order to avoid NORAD radar." Charcoal on Paper. 20x24 inches.
So I couldn't resist another touch of humor. This is from my series of naked superheroes.


"Fallen Angel." Charcoal on Paper. 21 x 11 inches.


"Pictish Woman" Charcoal on Paper. 14 x 9 inches.
That's it! I'm exhausted but happy. Wish me luck!

Join me today over at Neptune

Some join me today starting at 2 PM at the gorgeous Neptune Gallery in Bethesda.

The event starts with a presentation and tasting with Cacao, fine European Chocolates, immediately followed by "A Conversation with Lenny Campello" in which I will answer any and all questions about anything dealing with art: framing, approaching galleries, collectors, collecting, etc. or even about the art fairs and how to get your gallery to do them, or even some guerrilla tactics on the subject.

Open forum, any and all questions answered if I know the answer.

See ya there!

Question Pho You

As I drove back home from the Gateway Arts District's open studios, on University Avenue alone we drove by several Vietnamese Pho restaurants (I love Pho and I love the taste that Plum sauce gives to the soup).

They all have names such as PHO 75, PHO 95, PHO 301, etc. Does anyone know what the number after the "Pho" stands for?

Baker Awards for Baltimore Artists

This is one spectacular opportunity for Baltimore artists as it returns for its second year.

The Baker Awards, funded by The Baker Foundation, in conjunction with the Baltimore City Department of Promotion and the Arts, is awarding three (yes three!) $20,000 prizes to Baltimore artists annually.

Although only Baltimore artists are eligible, anyone can sign up and vote.

Do it!

Details here.

I've decided this year to vote for someone whose work is new to me... this year my vote will either go to Rachel Bone or to Nicole Buckingham.

That's telling them...

"The service and sacrifice of our men and women in uniform has promoted peace and prosperity from Germany to Korea, and enabled democracy to take hold in places like the Balkans. We have borne this burden not because we seek to impose our will. We have done so out of enlightened self-interest – because we seek a better future for our children and grandchildren, and we believe that their lives will be better if other peoples’ children and grandchildren can live in freedom and prosperity.

So yes, the instruments of war do have a role to play in preserving the peace. And yet this truth must coexist with another – that no matter how justified, war promises human tragedy. The soldier’s courage and sacrifice is full of glory, expressing devotion to country, to cause and to comrades in arms. But war itself is never glorious, and we must never trumpet it as such."

President Obama
Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance speech

You go Mr. O!

Civilian Art Projects' The Shop

Join Civilian Art Projects for the grand re-opening of The Shop, their store of artist-made goods. The Shop has been in boxes since their second move but it is now time to break out the goods for the holidays.

Tomorrow - Saturday, Dec. 12th, the sale starts at 1pm and goes until 6pm and continues during all of their public hours through Dec. 19th.

With prices ranging from $5 to $200, you are sure to find a unique something for that special person for the holidays. Avoid the over-crowded stores full of junk made by people you don't know and buy some artist-made work, where your shopping will not only benefit your special person receiving the gift, but it will also benefit artists and a great and hardworking gallery.

If you come by this Saturday, Dec. 12th you will see the incredibly talented Chereya Esters and Jeremy Tidd installing their gorgeous "Twenty First Century Ghosts" hemlock tree sculpture in the window at Civilian.

Tomorrow: Gateway Open Studios and more

There are a ton of events happening in the Gateway Arts District this Saturday - Check it all out here.

ArtDC has their opening during their event - 43 works of art in addition to work in their flat files and print bins. Check that out here.

They will also have four bands, a lecture by John Mason on Art Law, and 15 vendors sponsored by the DC Conspiracy.

And of course, the various artists around the Washington Glass School will also have all kinds of events, open studios, food, art sales, etc. See all about that here.

Get down to Gateway tomorrow and buy some art! I'll be there spending my hard-earned sheckels.

2010 Whitney Biennial artists announced

From the NYT; 32 of the 55 artists live in New York and 12 in Los Angeles. I am also struck by the number of artists who live in two places at once.

David Adamo
Born 1979 in Rochester, New York; lives in Berlin, Germany

Richard Aldrich
Born 1975 in Hampton, Virginia; lives in Brooklyn, New York

Michael Asher
Born 1943 in Los Angeles, California; lives in Los Angeles, California

Tauba Auerbach
Born 1981 in San Francisco, California; lives in New York, New York

Nina Berman
Born 1960 in New York, New York; lives in New York, New York

Huma Bhabha
JoshuaBorn 1962 in Karachi, Pakistan; lives in Poughkeepsie, New York

Josh Brand
Born 1980 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin; lives in Brooklyn, New York

Bruce High Quality Foundation
Founded 2001 in Brooklyn, New York

James Casebere
Born 1953 in East Lansing, Michigan; lives in Brooklyn, New York

Edgar Cleijne and Ellen Gallagher

Dawn Clements
Born 1958 in Woburn, Massachusetts; lives in Brooklyn, New York

George Condo
Born 1957 in Concord, New Hampshire; lives in New York, New York

Sarah Crowner
Born 1974 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; lives in Brooklyn, New York

Verne Dawson
Born 1961 in Meridianville, Alabama; lives in Saluda, North Carolina, and New York, New York

Julia Fish
Born 1950 in Toledo, Oregon; lives in Chicago, Illinois

Roland Flexner
Born 1944 in Nice, France; lives in New York, New York

Suzan Frecon
Born 1941 in Mexico, Pennsylvania; lives in New York, New York

Maureen Gallace
Born 1960 in Stamford, Connecticut; lives in New York, New York

Theaster Gates
Born 1973 in Chicago, Illinois; lives in Chicago, Illinois

Kate Gilmore
Born 1975 in Washington, DC; lives in New York, New York

Hannah Greely
Born 1979 in Los Angeles, California; lives in Los Angeles, California

Jesse Aron Green
Born 1979 in Boston, Massachusetts; lives in Boston, Massachusetts, and Los Angeles, California

Robert Grosvenor
Born 1937 in New York, New York; lives in Long Island, New York

Sharon Hayes
Born 1970 in Baltimore, Maryland; lives in New York, New York

Thomas Houseago
Born 1972, Leeds, England; lives in Los Angeles, California

Alex Hubbard
Born 1975 in Toledo, Oregon; lives in Brooklyn, New York

Jessica Jackson Hutchins
Born 1971 in Chicago, Illinois; lives in Portland, Oregon

Jeffrey Inaba
Born 1962 in Los Angeles, California; lives in New York, New York

Martin Kersels
Born 1960 in Los Angeles, California; lives in Los Angeles, California

Jim Lutes
Born 1955 in Fort Lewis, Washington; lives in Chicago, Illinois

Babette Mangolte
Born 1941 in Montmorot (Jura), France; lives in New York, New York

Curtis Mann
Born 1979 in Dayton, Ohio; lives in Chicago, Illinois

Ari Marcopoulos
Born 1957 in Amsterdam, The Netherlands; lives in Sonoma, California

Daniel McDonald
Born 1971 in Los Angeles, California; lives in New York, New York

Josephine Meckseper
Born 1964 in Lilienthal, Germany; lives in New York, New York

Rashaad Newsome
Born 1979 in New Orleans, Louisiana; lives in New York, New York

Kelly Nipper
Born 1971 in Edina, Minnesota; lives in Los Angeles, California

Lorraine O'Grady
Born 1934 in Boston, Massachusetts; lives in New York, New York

R. H. Quaytman
Born 1961 in Boston, Massachusetts; lives in New York, New York

Charles Ray
Born 1953 in Chicago, Illinois; lives in Los Angeles, California

Emily Roysdon
Born 1977 in Easton, Maryland; lives in New York, New York, and Stockholm, Sweden

Aki Sasamoto
Born 1980 in Yokohama, Japan; lives in Brooklyn, New York

Aurel Schmidt
Born 1982 in Kamloops, British Columbia; lives in New York, New York

Scott Short
Born 1964 in Marion, Ohio; lives in Chicago, Illinois

Stephanie Sinclair
Born 1973 in Miami, Florida; lives in New York, New York, and Beirut, Lebanon

Ania Soliman
Born 1970 in Warsaw, Poland; lives in Basel, Switzerland, and New York, New York

Storm Tharp
Born 1970 in Ontario, Oregon; lives in Portland, Oregon

Tam Tran
Born 1986 in Hue, Vietnam; lives in Memphis, Tennessee

Kerry Tribe
Born 1973 in Boston, Massachusetts; lives in Los Angeles, California, and Berlin, Germany

Piotr Uklański
Born 1968 in Warsaw, Poland; lives in New York, New York, and Warsaw, Poland

Lesley Vance
Born 1977 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin; lives in Los Angeles, California

Mariane Vitale
Born 1973 in New York, New York; lives in New York, New York

Erika Vogt
Born 1973 in East Newark, New Jersey; lives in Los Angeles, California

Pae White
Born 1963 in Pasadena, California; lives in Los Angeles, California

Robert Williams
Born 1943 in Albuquerque, New Mexico, lives in Chatsworth, California

A door just opened

The biggest thing that has ever happened to my career as an artist will take place this weekend as a gigantic opportunity, a once in a lifetime change, just opened up.

More later if it is good news... or bad news.

Let's get together over at Neptune

Pencil in December 13 at 2 PM at the gorgeous Neptune Gallery in Bethesda.

The event starts with a presentation and tasting with Cacao, fine European Chocolates, immediately followed by "A Conversation with Lenny Campello" in which I will answer any and all questions about anything dealing with art: framing, approaching galleries, collectors, collecting, etc. or even about the art fairs and how to get your gallery to do them, or even some guerrilla tactics on the subject.

Open forum, any and all questions answered if I know the answer.

See ya there!

Future Generation Art Prize

The Future Generation Art Prize established by the Victor Pinchuk Foundation is a worldwide contemporary art prize to discover, recognize and provide long-term support to a future generation of artists.

Artists around the world, under 35 years of age, without restriction of gender, nationality, race or artistic medium may enter the competition through online application.

20 shortlisted artists will be selected to show their work in an exhibition at the PinchukArtCentre (Kiev). These artists will be judged by an international Jury who will award one main prize and up to five special prizes.

The first prize will receive $100,000.

Details here.

Washington Glass School Open House

This is where I usually get 75% of my Christmas gifts and this year plan to get 100% and get my Xmas shopping out of the way all at once.

Join the Washington Glass School in its 8th annual Holiday Sale - artwork and craft from over a dozen studio artists and instructors. Artists exhibiting include: Michael Janis, Tim Tate, Erwin Timmers, Syl Mathis, Nancy Donnelly, Sean Hennessey, Rania Hassan, Jennifer Lindstrom, David Pearcy, Anne Plant, Cheryl Derricotte, David Cook, Allegra Marquart, Chris Shea, Lillian Fitzgerald, Jim Manning, Nancy Krondstat, Debra Ruzinsky, Marty King and more!

The surrounding artist studios (Red Dirt, Flux Studio, Weiss/Stewart/Sinel, Janis Goodman, Blue Fire Studio) will be participating in the huge event, along with the Gateway Arts District’s Holiday events along Rhode Island Avenue.

Washington Glass School & Studio
Holiday Show /Open Studio / Sale
3700 Otis Street, Mount Rainier, MD 20712
202.744.8222
2 pm til 6 pm , Saturday, December 12, 2009
Free and open to the public

SCOPE reports

From the SCOPE folks:

SCOPE Art Show and ART ASIA closed Sunday, December 6, reporting doubling and tripling of gallery sales. SCOPE, Miami’s longest-running global fair in its eighth year, and second-year standout ART ASIA increased traffic by 20%, bringing in over 30,000 visitors. Both shows attracted prominent institutions, museums, and private collectors from the Americas, Europe and emerging markets from the Middle East to Japan, including Charles Saatchi, Agnes Gund, Marty Margulies, Marc & Livia Straus, The Oppenheimers, MOCA Los Angeles, MoMA New York, Guggenheim Museum New York, and artist Chuck Close.

Positioning museum-quality programming alongside an international roster, SCOPE hosted 75 galleries from 25 countries, including a section devoted to Latin American art. Founder, Alexis Hubshman enlisted curator and critic David Hunt to assemble a curatorial board of “the best up-and-coming, next-generation curators,” and Hunt’s four choices, Hubshman said, “were like kernels that popped while they were with us.”

Gallerists offered positive reports, including:

* First year exhibitor Anonymous Gallery from New York, commissioned three works by David Ellis with one going to collector Charles Saatchi, and sold several other pieces including a Romon Kimin Yang for $60,000.
* Mike Weiss Gallery sold $400,000, with two works by the newly discovered German painter Stefanie Gutheil going to Kansas’ Nerman Museum; and artist Liao Yibai selling three editions of Ring, and one Fake Bag.
* Aureus Contemporary sold 75-80% of the work they brought to SCOPE and 80% of that was new buyers.
* First year exhibitor Galeria Christopher Paschall from Bogota, Colombia sold seven pieces to a German museum.
* Irvine Contemporary and Elizabeth Houston reported a 50% increase in sales over last year.

Sister fair ART ASIA, the only Asian art fair outside its own continent, launched an entirely new curatorial platform with independent curator Leeza Ahmady titled TRULY TRUTHFUL that showcased internationally recognized artists whose works contest categorical presentations of truth and reality in the world. ART ASIA continued its film series with Yi Zhou’s THE EAR, featuring Pharrell Williams with music by Ennio Morricone, and costumes designed by Rick Owens and BBC Ice Cream. They also had a Contemporary Arab Art exhibition of non-political works focused on the humanizing factors of the culture.

Gallerists offered positive reports, including:

* Sundaram Tagore Gallery and Grotto Fine Art tripled in sales from last year (around $250,000 and $100,000 respectively).
* Kips Gallery sold six sets of work, selling more in their first time at ART ASIA than at any other fair they have attended in the past.
* Sculpture was a standout medium with RCM Gallery selling multiple pieces priced around $50,000 each. Grotto Fine Art from Hong Kong sold and had commissions for over $100,000 worth of sculptural works.
* 95% of the galleries reported strong sales including X-Power ($500,000) and Kashya Hildebrand ($200,000.)
* While Asian art might be new to the Americas, it sold to a wide variety of buyers, from local Miami collectors and buyers from NYC and CT, to Mexico, Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, France, Lebanon, Switzerland, Japan, Korea and New Delhi.

Beatles

Listened the the entire boxed set of the Beatles Remastered - Rediscovered while driving back from Miami to DC. The Fab 4 sound awesome in stereo and the huge bag of boiled peanuts that I munched on were a perfect companion to the music.

Sunday, Sunday

Sunday appeared to be the slowest day for most galleries at the fair, and it rained quite hard again.

We sold an Erwin Timmers glass piece to gallerist George Billis, who is also the organizer of the Red Dot fair, then a Sandra Ramos piece to close an otherwise slow day.

One of the key reasons why galleries need to take the huge financial risk involved in attending these art fairs (our booth was over $16,000 by the time one adds up all the details, and that doesn't include travel costs, hotels, staff, food, etc.) is that in addition to exposing the gallery and artwork to more collectors over a weekend than in an entire year in the gallery itself, the fairs also afford the opportunity to expose the artwork to curators.

As we all know, at least in the Greater DC area, our museum curators seldom take the opportunity to visit our local galleries and artists' studios. They do all go to the Miami and other fairs and thus it affords the galleries some precious exposure to them.

To underscore this point, as a result of this fair I am now negotiating the purchase of three original paintings by one of the artists that I represent by the curator of an University museum!

More on that later, once the deal is closed.

At 6PM the fair ended, and soon afterwards an army of worker bees descend upon the floors and begin packing the artwork for shipment back to home base. This is hard work after 4-5 days of working long hours standing on your feet, but by 8:30PM or so I was done and all the art was loaded in my van.

I then drove it to a storage site in Miami Beach, as I'm leaving all the work in Miami and I am returning in January to participate in the Miami International Art Fair, sponsored by Art in America magazine and the New York Times.

Yes friends, next month we get to do it all over again, this time inside the Miami Beach Convention Center.

More images from the Miami fairs

Tim Tate with Texas uber video collector Ardis Bartle and that's Tate's original video Ophelia playing in the background.

Video moves

Yesterday was a good day as the Tim Tate video "I see Myself as an Author," which is a very cool piece with both a micro camera and and audio component, sold to the art dealer who had it on hold since Thursday.

Also sold two cool photographs by Cuban photographer Cirenaica Moreira, whose Miami family had come by earlier to say hello.

"Vive en Cincinnati y ni siquiera me escribe" - (He Lives in Cincinnati But he Doesn't Even Bother to Write)
Signed, Numbered and Titled. Circa 1999. Edition of 15. Printed on 20x16 inches (51x40.5 cm)
And also moved several of my drawings, including a very large St. Sebastian, the largest drawing that I brought to Miami.

And also moved a small recycled glass sculpture from ubergreen artist Erwin Timmers. That piece has become the first work of original art in a new collector of art.

Yesterday it rained a lot. Heavy, powerful Florida rain that thundered on the tent's roof with amazing intensity, trapping visitors inside and slowing down the flow of people to the area.

Sunday is the last day.

Art fair horror story

On Friday a gallery at the fair makes a substantial double sale of two very large paintings to a local collector. He tells them that he's hosting a party on Saturday night and asks if the gallerists can deliver the painting after the fair closes later that night.

They drive to his home, which is clearly the home of someone of considerable financial health. Once there, the gallery's staff volunteers to install the two pieces, which actually becomes quite difficult as the large paintings, installed side by side have little room for maneuvering.

The next day the collector contacts them and let's them know how everyone at the party really liked the work, and was complimenting the home owner on his artistic acumen and taste.

Later this afternoon the collector's neighbor (yes, his neighbor), calls the gallery and informs them that the paintings are being returned as the "energy of the paintings is disturbing the home owner."

Later that day, the neighbor (yes again, the neighbor) shows up at the fair and returns the two works.

The perils of the artworld.

Picture this

Images from the Miami fairs...

Tim Tate with American Style magazine publisher Wendy Rosen.

Wendy will be organizing a new art fair next year right across the street from Art Basel Miami Beach.

Drop me an email if you want info on that new fair.

One at a time...

Today the person who had Sandra Ramos' "El Bote" on hold actually called and purchased the piece, but wanted it unframed so that they could reframe it to their own taste. Of course, "El Bote" is the largest framed piece that I brought down to Miami, and because of interruptions it took me almost two hours to unframe it, roll up the etching, store the big frame in the van and hang some new pieces in the area vacated by the piece.

But a sale is a sale and "El Bote" joins several other works by Sandra Ramos in this couple's collection.

Then we sold a Tim Tate video to a Miami collector. It is the sexy and mesmerizing Ophelia video; one of my favorites.

Tate has also been attracting the attention of the dealers themselves. There's a piece on hold by the owner of a local Miami gallery, and then a well-known video collector who already owns a Tate piece brought Tim's work to the attention of a super New York gallery currently showing at Pulse and that connection happened and hopefully something will come out of it.

Then a British gallery from Art Miami came from across the street - tipped off by Tate's Philadelphia gallery - and she wants to take all unsold Tate pieces with her back to London at the end of the fair. We'll need to seal the arrangements between now and Sunday.

Russian-born Alexey Terenin's work has also been attracting a lot of attention from art dealers, and Mayer Fine Art may have found Terenin a couple of American galleries to show his work. Two Terenin oils sold today as well.

I also sold one of my watercolors from the Cuba series and my Philadelphia gallery (Projects Gallery) also sold another watercolor from the Cuba series.

I also visited Art Miami across the street today, and was very impressed with the level of work at that fair, although I did find a few galleries showing work that was in the awful range, bordering on Artomatic as its detractors see it. More on that later...

Camper Contemporary at Art Basel Miami Beach

They've already been threatened with arrest by overzealous Miami cops; they've already been interviewed by the local press and NPR; they've already driven all the way from MICA and they've already hit a lot of the ABMB side fairs, and certainly the MICA students who are part of Calder Brannock's Camper Contemporary are one of the hits of this year's ABMB extravaganza in Miami.

"Camper Contemporary is a mobile gallery created and curated by Calder Brannock. It is a fully functional art gallery set up inside an altered 1967 Yellowstone camper. Camper Contemporary gallery poses a solution for many problems a gallery faces in the modern art market. It allows the gallerist to showcase work in a clean controlled gallery environment without being tethered to rents or a geographic location. The mobile gallery model allows the gallerist to maintain a physical space where work can be displayed with all the benefits and gravitas of a traditional gallery while easily reaching collectors at art fairs and other large art markets."

Brannock's terrific idea and initiative was funded by the MICA office of Research, which funded the Rinehart graduate school of sculpture's trip to Miami with Camper Contemporary.

See the students' work here.

Dreaming

Red Dot was quite hot for a while today.

Reason for that was that the air conditioning system took a few hours to cool the space down, although I heard that across the street Art Miami's AC system actually died in the afternoon!

We managed to put another Tim Tate on hold and are working on a commission deal for Tate as well. Also have a large Sandra Ramos' piece on hold pending measurements of available wall space.

Also sold the below piece by Michael Janis to a well-known Cuban-American collecting couple who live in one of the spectacular homes on Fisher Island here, as well as a home back in DC. I delivered the piece to their home after Red Dot closed, which meant driving to the ferry point and getting a spectacular view of the Miami skyline in a full moon, arriving at Fisher Island and upon arrival getting escorted by security to their home.

Cubans Dreaming of Liberty. Glass, powdered black glass and metal.
Michael Janis

Inside there was a massive treasure of an art collection, including one of the largest and best Jose Bedia's paintings that I have ever seen, in good company with Miro, Picasso, many Latin American artists and a surprising number of DC area artists, betraying the couple's DC roots. I saw work by DC area artists Yuriko Yamaguchi, Rick Wall, Carol Goldberg and several others whose name escapes me now.

And now Michael Janis' beautiful Cubans Dreaming of Liberty joins this spectacular collection overlooking downtown Miami from the bay.

Carlos Finlay

Medical history originally credited Dr. Walter Reed as the doctor whose work solved the scourge of 19th century warm weather, yellow fever, by proving that it was transmitted by mosquitoes.

This work eventually gave birth to the new fields of epidemiology and biomedicine.

But Cubans and even Dr. Reed himself knew that the real research hero here was a Cuban doctor named Carlos Finlay.

Finlay was born 176 years ago today in Puerto Principe, Cuba, the son of a Scottish immigrant father and a French immigrant mother. He studied medicine at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, from which he graduated in 1855. Ten years later Dr. Finlay

"sent a paper to the Academy of Sciences in Havana outlining his theory on weather conditions and the yellow fever disease. He was the first to theorize that a mosquito was the way by which yellow fever was transmitted; a mosquito that bites a victim of the disease could bite a healthy person and spread the disease...

... In 1871 he spoke at medical conferences in Havana and Washington, D.C., but his theory of mosquito transmission of the virus met with silence from the medical and scientific community.

In 1900, during the first U.S. occupation of Cuba, a U.S. medical commission led by Dr. Walter Reed went to Havana to study the disease. At first the U.S. scientists didn't pursue Dr. Finlay's "mosquito" theories, certain that it was "filth" that spread the yellow fever virus.

When all their experiments failed, they began to look over Dr. Finlay's 19 years of research. Eventually they concluded that yellow fever is contagious only in the first 3 days of illness, and this became the first layer of proof for Dr. Finlay's theory.

When Dr. Reed proved that Dr. Finlay had been right all along, mosquito control programs were introduced throughout Cuba, (and in the Panama Canal zone, where worked had stopped due to yellow fever outbreaks and many deaths) and the disease brought under control.

Sadly, however, Dr. Reed's original report failed to even mention Dr. Finlay's theories and/or research, and it wasn't until 1954 (39 years after Dr. Finlay's death) that the International Congress of Medical History granted him the proper credit.

At the end of the day

The VIP night was last night and the beer, wine and absinthe was flowing in large quantities at Red Dot.

Funny how things work out, but I had predicted that this piece below would sell right away, and it did, but not before I got loads of comments about it from the crowd. Most were anti-Guevara types - this is Miami after all - but I did get into an interesting discussion with an elder gentleman who seemed offended that I had taken such stance against the icon known as Che.

“ASEre ¿SI o NO?
6x16 in. framed to 14x22. Charcoal and Conte on Paper. 2009.
F. Lennox Campello

I asked him if he had ever read Guevara's own diaries, writing and speeches.

No.

I win. At the end, as he walked away he handed me his card. He was a visitor from Cuba. No wonder.

At the end of the day you get nothing from nothing.

At the end of the day we also sold a major Tim Tate to an Alabama collector and several Heather Bryant lithos.


A Question Of Evolution. Blown and Cast Glass. electronics and video. Tim Tate. 2009.

Torpedo Factory Holiday Open House Tomorrow

Giant head finished



On Monday I showed you Philly artist Frank Hyder working on his giant inflatable sculpture for the Giants in the City art project at Bayfront Park in Miami this week. As you can see, Hyder finished his work, and the piece looks great.

Giants in the City

That city is Miami and tomorrow the Giants in the City project, curated by my good friend Alejamdro Mendoza, returns to the ABMB festivities with the mobile sculpture project at Bayfront Park in Miami.

Inflatable art sculptures by Gustavo Acosta, Angel Ricardo Rios, Miguel Fleitas, Maite Josune, Tony Kapel, Anaken Koenig, Frank Hyder, Karen Starosta Gilinski, Maki Hachizume, Noor Blazekovic, Tomas Esson, Federico Uribe, Jose Bedia and the curator, Alejandro Mendoza.

By the way, these inflatable sculptures are looking for a venue to be shown in Washington, DC. Everything travels in suitcases and it is super easy to set up, in case some DC gallery or museum is interested in hosting these gigantic works.

Report from the war art front

And nu, so today was hanging day at the Red Dot Art Fair in Miami, and by the time that I got there at 1PM or so, most studious gallerists had already done a lot of hanging so I got a sweet Doris Day parking spot right by the door.

Red Dot is right across the street from Art Miami and nearby to Scope,. Art Miami is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year. All three fairs in such a new area of Miami's Wynwood Arts District that the Garmin GPS couldn't find it and I had to find the fair the old school way, which reminded me how scary it is to rely on GPS and then one forgets how to navigate the old fashioned way.

Inside it was a sauna, as the air conditioning won't be turned on until all doors are closed sometime tomorrow.

Anyway, by seven PM or so most of the hanging, wiring, light adjusting, etc. was done, and I walked around the fair to get an early look at what was being displayed. It was a quick look, and certainly more will come later.

The first glance found some really excellent artwork in some galleries and some really questionable work in a small number of booths.

Of early note, I saw some very good Mendives, Fabelos and a great Kcho at Miami's Oñate Fine Art. These were really world class pieces by some of the biggest names in contemporary Cuban art and so far stay in my head as some of the top work at Red Dot.

Tomorrow is press preview at 5PM and VIP party from 6-9PM.