DC Area Blogger Summit

The Washington Post is hosting the first ever "DC Area Blogger Summit" next week, and although I've been invited, I will be unable to attend. I hope to have someone represent Mid Atlantic Art News and I'll let you know what took place.

Peter Panse Update

Remember the case of the High School art professor suspended for the nude model issue? (Read this if you don't).

According to this website:

The Hearing Officer's decision in the case of Pete Panse - the New York art teacher suspended more than a year ago for having suggested that his advanced students should be allowed to enter figure drawing classes - is "imminent."

Selected Art-O-Matic

No Art-O-Matic this year? No problem! The Examiner's Robin Tierney writes a nice pre-opening salvo of the mini-AOM joint exhibition that several Bethesda, MD galleries, AOM organizers and Jesse Cohen's ArtDC are putting together.

Conservative anti-AOM critics have cited the lack of a curatorial hand as AOM's main flaw, as opposed to a more liberal and democratic view of it as an open show. It will be interesting to see what comes out of the picks by well established and successful art gallerists.

The gallerists selections will appear at Heineman-Myers, Fraser, Neptune, Washington School of Photography, Creative Partners and other Bethesda galleries with joint opening receptions on Friday, January 12, 2007 as part of the Bethesda Art Walk. Details, maps, etc. here.

Kim Ward's Top Shows of 2006

Kim Ward is the hard-working WPA/Corcoran Executive Director and she comes in with the following:

"One exhibition that was, as Mary Poppins would say, 'practically perfect in every way,' in 2006 was the Hiroshi Sugimoto show at the Hirshhorn.

Picking a non-profit/alternative group, I think that Ashley Kistler is doing fantastic curatorial work at the Visual Arts Center of Richmond, an example being the latest show 'Time for Design' which is a micro view of design in the greater Richmond area --- fashion, architecture, etc.

DCAC is creating some fabulous panels discussing art topics that are timely and in need of community feedback.

I have found stunning work at the Arlington Arts Center Spring and Fall solo shows and I applaud Molly Ruppert and Jack Rasmussen for their commitment to art that is politically charged and difficult. They consistently show political work and have been doing so for quite awhile.

Cuban Art

I'm in Florida for a few days, and of course Florida and all things Cuban are now tied together. Reading the Dec. 25, 2006 issue of Business Week. On page 116: "Art's New Frame of Reference," retired real estate investor, Howard Farber starting buying contemporary Chinese art a decade ago. Now, he recommends work by Indians, Russians, Polish, Cuban and Chinese artists. Here the Cuban part:

"These artists may get a boost from the expected opening of Cuba after Castro's demise... Cuban artists such as Armando Marino, 38 who lives in Spain have little auction history and sell for under 12K. To learn about this market, pick up a copy of Cuba: Avant-garde:Cuban Art from the Farber Collection (Harn Museum of Art, $29.95) coming out in March.... Pieces of his collection will be featured in a show at the University of Florida at Gainesville on May 29th.

A few years ago I co-curated and helped to introduce contemporary Cuban art to the Greater DC area art region with an exhibition titled "De Aqui y de Alla" (From Here and From There). It was an exhibition of Cuban art by Cuban artists and artists of Cuban ancestry from around the world and not only did the exhibition sell out, but it also yielded several key shows by the gallery, which picked up representation of many important Cuban artists since then. Two of the hottest ones, Sandra Ramos and Aimee Garcia Marrero will be showing at Fraser this coming May.

Laura Roulet's Top 10

Independent curator Laura Roulet, who amongst many great accomplishments helped to curate the great Ana Mendieta retrospective at the Hirshhorn a few years ago, sends in her pick for the top 10 DC area art show of 2006; her list is not in any order of preference:

"Dada," National Gallery of Art

"Societie Anonyme," Phillips Collection

The Walters (Ok, it's Baltimore, but that's close enough. This was a brilliant i"Louise Bourgeois: Femme,"nstallation)

"Joseph Cornell," SAAM (the re-opening of the National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art was one of the top 10 noteworthy events in general)

"Hiroshi Sugimoto," joint installation at the Hirshhorn Museum and Freer/Sackler

"Oliver Herring, Task," One day performance at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden

"Janet Cardiff, The Paradise Institute," Corcoran (not new, but the opportunity to experience it again was fabulous)

"Other Than Art," jointly held at Provisions, G Fine Art and the Curator's Room

And two group shows highlighting some of our best local artists:

"Conversions," WPA/Corcoran and Ellipse Art Center

"Phantom Floor," Catholic University Art Gallery

On the subject of contracts

My post on the subject of the unfortunate theft of Afrika Midnight Asha Abney’s work from a restaurant show, and the subsequent issue of who (if anyone) pays for the loss, and my mention of why it is important to have contracts when forming a business association with a gallery or dealer - or any exhibition venue, for that matter – brought an unexpected deluge of emails from artists (and one gallerist) asking why a contract is such a big deal.

Let me give you some examples:

1. Take Afrika’s case: An artist has a show and someone steals a piece of art. What happens next? With a signed contract, the artist would know ahead of time that either (a) the gallery has no insurance, in which case the theft is a full loss, or (b), the gallery has art insurance, in which case (a) the gallery puts a claim in with the insurance company, or (b) the artist deals directly with the insurance company. And, by the way, in the event that there’s insurance, don’t expect to get the full value of the stolen work, but in most cases (and policies) only the 50% commission that you’d have received in the event that the work had sold instead of being stolen.

2. Talking about commissions; how do you know, other than a handshake, what the gallery’s commission is? Let’s say that you are told that the commission is 50% (the general standard for independent commercial fine arts galleries around here). Is that 50% of the price of the piece or 50% of the final sales price? I know of at least one major DC area art gallery that has a record of really screwing artists by giving them 50% of an agreed price for a piece; however, the gallery also often sells the piece for a lot more money to its out of town collectors and keeps the difference. Here’s how it works. The artist agrees to sell the photographs for $500 each and thus expects a commission of $250. The unethical gallerist sells some for $500, and some to its out-of-town clientele for $1000, but gives the artist the same $250 commission on those sales.

3. But let’s say that you have approached a gallery, and show them the works, and discuss representation, and the gallerist agrees to hang some of your work in his next group show. You are not sure if you are “represented” in the sense of the word as you understand it, but shake on it and prepare for your first appearance in a well-known gallery and invite all of your family and friends. At the packed opening, your second cousin-once-removed is admiring one of your huge watercolors, which are tacked onto the wall in a really cool post-post-post-modernist style. He leans forward to admire your brushwork and accidentally spills his white wine onto your watercolor, immediately making your representational work of art into a messy abstraction. What happens next? Does insurance cover damage? Is there insurance? Is that the guy who spilled the wine making a dash for the door?

4. Having learned your lesson, at your next opening you resign yourself to getting your new work framed and spend a ton of money getting them framed at the most affordable (in other words cheapest) possible way, but still spend a considerable amount of shekels -- because as everyone knows, framing is very expensive (unless you attend the Boot camp for Artists Seminar and learn how to cut framing expenses by 80%). When you deliver the works to the gallery, the gallerist goes into fits about your gold leaf rococo frames from Target and silver acidic mats and refuses to hang the work. A good contract would have specified ahead of time all issues dealing with framing and presentation standards.

5. Having calmed down, the gallerist then offers to re-frame all the work for you. You accept with a sigh of relief, and at the opening your 20 newly framed watercolors look great in the 8-ply pH-balanced, acid free mat board, under UV glass and Nielsen mouldings and backed by half-inch, acid free, pH-balanced foam core. You sell four pieces and are happy that things worked out in the end. A few weeks later you get a huge bill in the mail from the gallery; it is what remains of the framing bill after the gallery applied all of your commission to the total framing bill. A good contract should also specify the economic who’s and what’s of any framing done by the gallery.

6. Your relationship with the gallery is now seriously on the rocks, but then you are told that a review in Art News will come out soon. Three months after your show has closed the review finally comes out in Art News and it’s a good one. A young computer geek in Bala Cynwood, Pennsylvania, who is waiting to see his doctor for his annual physical reads that Art News review while waiting in the doc’s office, sees the nice reproduction of your work and after he goes home, looks you up on the Internet and contacts you directly and tells you that he read the review of your gallery show in Art News and wants to buy the painting reproduced in the magazine. You sell him the painting and put all your money in the bank. Sixteen minutes after the painting is delivered to Bala Cynwood, the gallery gets a call from a collector in Spokane, Washington who has also read the Art News review and wants to buy that painting. The gallerist calls you and tells you the good news. You are ecstatic that two people want your painting, but then you tell the gallerist that someone else in Bala Cynwood read the review and that you sold the painting to that person. The gallerist congratulates you on the sale and then asks you to make sure that you send him the gallery’s commission. You are confused because you had no idea that you owed the gallery a commission.

7. Your review in Art News has opened a few doors for your artwork and you are invited by a non-profit art venue to have a solo show at their space in a year. You are pleased and tell everyone, including the gallerist, who informs you that because his gallery represents your work, you are not allowed to exhibit anywhere else in the city, or maybe the area, or maybe the state, or maybe the US, or maybe the world.

8. Then your Alma matter, impressed with your artistic prowess, invites you to a group show of alumni artwork in the school’s gallery. Since you attended art school in another state, you are pretty sure that it will be OK to show there, because after the last confusion, you discovered that the gallery had exclusive representation for your work only in DC, MD and VA, and your art school is in Brownsville, Texas. You tell your gallerist, and because he has never heard of Brownsville, Texas, looks it up on the Internet and then he informs you that if you exhibit your artwork in “certain places” it will bring the reputation of the gallery down and thus the gallerist doesn’t want you to exhibit in Brownsville, Texas – or anywhere in Texas, Arkansas and Nebraska for that matter.

9. You beg and plead because you really want to impress your ex-girlfriend in Texas, and the gallerist allows you to include one piece in that alumni show, but makes it clear that he needs to be consulted on any and all exhibitions of your work. And so you exhibit your best piece in Brownsville and a New York gallerist, who happens to be a Robert Ervin Howard admirer, visits Brownsville and decides to check the local yokels show at the art school. Because your immense watercolors are the largest works in the show, they catch his attention and he jots down your name. Weeks later his intern calls you and tells you that they want to show some of your work in their next group show. This is really hitting the big time, and you announce to your gallerist that a big shot New York gallerist is including you in his next group show. He congratulates you and reminds you that you owe him 10% of any sales made in New York, or in Brownsville, Texas, or anywhere for that matter. You rant and rave and ask why, and he tells you that the reasons for your recent success all lead back to the exposure that he has given you. You demand to know why none of this stuff was made clear from the beginning. The gallerist answers that “everyone knows this,” and that he “likes to operate on a handshake and without a contract.” You then realize that you have him by the balls, since you have no signed contract with him or his gallery, and tell him that you are leaving. He says some threatening stuff about verbal contracts, but you walk away anyway, wondering how you are going to get back the six paintings of yours that the gallerist still has in storage.

10. Nonetheless, New York is New York, and you go visit the big shot New York gallerist and meet with him, and over a handshake he agrees to put you in a group show and tells you that his commission is 60% - You are not sure if you are “represented” in the sense of the word as you understand it, but shake on it and prepare for your first appearance in a New York City gallery and invite all of your family and friends...

Happy 2007

Have a great 2007 from rainy eff-el-ay... soon it will be time for the top ten lists to appear. If you'd like to see your top ten art shows of the year published here, please email them to me.

Airborne again today and heading to Florida. More later...

Beatle Art News

"Police were called to the country estate of former Beatle Paul McCartney after his estranged wife reported the theft of paintings — including a Picasso and a Renoir — from the lodge they once shared, police said Friday.

'We checked the premises, and spoke to Heather Mills (McCartney), and as a result it was found to be a civil matter between her and her husband,' Sussex Police spokesman Paddy Rea said. 'There's been no theft.'"

Looks like Paul "had taken the paintings and reprogrammed the estate's alarm codes, and informed her Thursday night by text message."

Read the whole mess here.

Kolakowski on Amy Lin

The WCP's Nick Kolakowski comes in with a good biographical review of Amy Lin's current solo show at the District of Columbia Arts Center. Read the review here.

I've been harping for a while now that this hard-working and talented artist is a "must buy" now for anyone with a contemporary collection of DC artists. Lin is already in the collection of several DC area ubercollectors, always a good thing for any emerging artist.

Sex and DC Blogs

"Lurid testimony about spanking, handcuffs and prostitution aside, the Washingtonienne case could help establish whether people who keep online diaries are obligated to protect the privacy of the people they interact with offline."

The AP reports on the coming lawsuit involving the Washingtonienne releasing details of her sex life on her blog.

Details here.

Congratulations

To DC area arts patron Wilhelmina Cole Holladay, founder of the National Museum of Women in the Arts, who was recently awarded the National Medal of Art by President Bush.

CAG now online

Contemporary Art Gallery Magazine is now online.

Visit their website here.

Risky Business

DMV area artist Afrika Midnight Asha Abney posted the bad news in ArtDC.org about one of her works being stolen from a restaurant in Adams Morgan in DC, where they were being exhibited.

I responded to Afrika and passed to her my regrets that her art had been stolen, and also let her know that it has happened also to me in the past.

Let's examine this from both aspects:

First of all: stealing is a crime, so for someone to commit a crime over a work of art speaks something about how much they liked that art. When my work was stolen many years ago from an exhibition in Portsmouth, VA, I took a small breath of pride in knowing that artwork caused a person to risk getting caught and possibly going to jail. I know that it may have been a kleptomaniac, willing to steal anything, but I'd like to think that it was someone who wanted the art so badly, that they were willing to risk becoming a thief over it.

Now for the legal issues: Unless the artist has a signed contract with the exhibition venue (including galleries and museums) where it says that the venue is responsible in the event of damage or loss, then the artist eats the loss.

Warning: this can also happen in a "regular" art gallery - in fact most art galleries do not have insurance (or contracts for that matter), as art insurance is quite pricey.

You can also get (privately) what is called "event insurance" which insures your artwork just for that exhibition or event. There are several companies that advertise for event insurance in Sunshine Artist magazine.

And she was right!

Remember the story I discussed last month of the lady truck driver who has found an alleged Jackson Pollock painting in a thrift shop?

The issue of Horton versus the "art world" has predictably developed into a class war of sorts, but it seems that she may have the last laugh after all.



I'm up in the Poconos for a few days, and yesterday I caught the tail end of a TV show discussing the fact that Horton's alleged Pollock has a fingerprint that apparently has been found to be the fingerprint of Jackson Pollock.

The show also mentioned that forensic experts had also determined that the paint in the alleged Pollock is the same paint used in certified Pollocks.

Read the forensic report here.

Normally that would be enough to certify that this is a Pollock, right?

But that assumes that the art world "experts" that swore up and down that Horton's find was not a real Pollock are willing to admit that they were wrong.

So in spite of a fingerprint and same exact paint... don't hold your breath.

Is this a class issue?

I think so. It has always surprised me the curious reaction that most art world illuminati have towards the general American public when it comes to art.

Not exactly a loving, nurturing relationship, is it?

And on the art world side, we're all supposed to be militant lefties, always on the side of the poor, downtrodden masses, always on the prowl and look-out for the evil Republicans' latest plots and ideas, especially when it comes to art, in any manner or form.

But the art world left makes a curious right turn when it comes to the masses and to the public in general.

If the public likes it, it can't be high art. If a trucker discovers the art find of the century, it can't be true.

So it is easy to see why the Horton affair has been picked up by Hollywood and others as an example of a convenient class battle between art world elitists and people who drive trucks and have no idea who Jackson Pollock was.

And it makes it juicier when the "experts" and elitists are proven wrong (by science), and rather than offering a good ole "aw shucks folks, we wuz wrong," apology, they retreat into their galvanized white cubes and refuse to admit that probably science is right and what Horton found in a California thrift shop is not only going to make this tough lady super rich, but according to the TV show, she now plans to sue the two art world experts for defamation (I think).

And as usual, classy or class-less, money talks, and if I was in those experts' expensive shoes, I'd be worried, because now they may be dealing with a tough, trash-talking, ex-trailer mamma, and soon to be a super rich, pissed off, lady.

Go get them Terry!

"The bottom line for me is that most of the educated world lives by science and technology in the 21st Century. However, a small segment of the art market has chosen to stand apart. This is the only reason why Teri's painting has not yet entered the market. While the museum, academic, and legal world has no problems with forensics, a few in the art market do."
Peter Paul Biro

Pipe Dreams or Just Good Dreams?

Sean over at Paint & Plaster checks in with some interesting ideas for kindling the arts in the Greater DC region.

I particularly like his idea for turning the Martin Luther King,Jr. Library into a public arts center.

Read and discuss his ideas here.

New DC galleries

Honfleur Gallery opens next month in SE Washington, DC. According to the press release:

Based on a long standing vision for one of Washington DC’ most controversial neighborhoods, ARCH Development Corporation is pleased to begin the construction of the gallery, “Honfleur.” Much as Honfleur, a port in Normandy, France, contributed to the appearance of the impressionist movement and inspired painters such as Monet and Courbet, ARCH envisions its gallery as a creativity hub for this historic sector of our Nation’s Capitol.

The Honfleur Gallery plans to house an array of artistic mediums and styles and intends to incorporate exhibitions that reach all ages, genders and economic groups. Diversity is an essential part of the Anacostia neighborhood, where the gallery is housed, and it’s with that very principle in mind that the Honfleur Gallery plans to produce a spectrum of shows from community arts based events to figurative & abstract individual exhibitions.

The gallery will showcase Washington D.C., Metropolitan area artists as well as present new artists from both the United States and Europe. This gallery will be a cooperative art space that includes a 1400 sq. foot exhibition room with another 500 sq. foot space above it, which is adjoined by four affordable artist work spaces equipped with skylights . The exhibition space is available to rent for master classes, private functions or one on one instruction.

The Honfleur Gallery will be located at 1241 Good Hope Rd. SE Washington DC. It is within walking distance of the Anacostia waterfront and the Anacostia metro (green line), just minutes from downtown, Washington DC.

Their grand opening exhibition is titled "No Scratchers," and it is scheduled for Saturday January 20th, 2007 with a reception at 7pm. The show itself is an informal exhibition highlighting works of art created by D.C. Tattoo Artists. The exhibition curated by Imani Brown.

I also hear that a major commercial fine arts gallery which focuses mainly on fine art glass is scouting the Northern Virginia area for a Greater DC location, which I think will be their fourth US location. More on that later...

The end of art fairs is nigh

"In contemporary art, this is the decade of the fair, as the nineties were the decade of the biennial. Collectors, with piles of money, have displaced curators, with institutional clout, as arbiters of how new art becomes known and rated, and therefore of what it can mean: less and less, after qualifying as the platonic consumer good."

The above is from Peter Schjeldahl's excellent piece on Art Basel Miami Beach in the current New Yorker magazine.

Schjeldahl starts by making the above, by now worn-out, point that the legion of art fairs that have popped up in the last few years have become the centralized, easy way to go see and buy art.

But then he begins to go somewhere "new," or perhaps just ahead of everyone else. He sets it up by relating that:

"Mutual intoxications of art and money come and go. I’ve witnessed two previous booms and their respective busts: the Pop nineteen-sixties, which collapsed in the long recession of the seventies, and the neo-expressionist eighties, whose prosperity plummeted, anvil fashion, in 1989."

Once this historical ground has been planted, he then gives us an insight on the financial importance of fairs to art galleries:

Fairism (if you will) is inexorable, given today’s proliferation of galleries (hundreds in New York’s Chelsea alone). No one with anything else to do can more than sample the panoply. “Fairs are important for big galleries,” the gallerist Marian Goodman said to me. “For small galleries, they’re vital.” I asked many dealers how much of their annual income comes through fairs. Answers varied from ten per cent to “well over half,” spiking in the range of a third. Beyond that, nonparticipation may be suicidal, risking losses not only of revenue but of artists whose loyalty depends on how gamely they are promoted. The dealer Brooke Alexander said, “The art world is so event-driven these days that if you don’t take part in the major fairs you almost don’t exist in the public mind.”

And then the disection of fairism truly begins with:

The typical contemporary-art object, judging from Miami Basel, is well crafted, attractive, interesting enough, and portable...These impressions might fade if you focussed on any particular work, but fairs destroy focus. Thousands of works coexisted cozily in Miami, sharing a pluralism of the salable. Talent counts; ideas are immaterial... A decade ago, much new art was eyebrow-deep in critical theory. Now it seems as carefree as a summertime school-boy, while far better dressed. I found relief from the convention center’s crushing elegance at the alternative fairs — with names like NADA, Pulse, and Aqua — where galleries featured the scrappily zestful ingenuity of kids who haven’t had time to forget why they became artists: for joy, revenge, and camaraderie.

And then he begins to introduce the historical bubble:

It seemed that almost everyone was selling out of almost everything. “It’s incredible. No one questions price. They pay whatever is asked,” said a dealer friend who, with a discretion that used to be common in the art dodge, requested anonymity. Who are the collectors? Hedge-fund wizards are routinely mentioned. So are cohorts of Europeans, Russians, Asians, and Latin Americans. The startling costliness of recent art from China, much of it pretty bad, proves that the market is international as never before. People who were eager to deny the obvious — that the runup in art prices is a bubble headed for a spectacular correction — all cited this factor to me.

The fact that the art market is headed for a correction is pretty much a certainty, as it has happened many times before, just like any other "goods" market and anything that fits the Kondratiev wave theory. But the idea that the coming art market correction may deal a harsh and potential death blow to the art fairs extravaganza may be a new one and a fun idea to discuss and speculate.

Schjeldahl finishes with a funny visualization:

One day, perhaps soon, someone in a convivial group of money guys at a bar will say, “I just got back from [name of art fair]. It was fantastic!” Another will drawl, “You still into that?” In the ensuing embarrassed silence, the bubble won’t burst; it will vanish.

Read the New Yorker piece here.

New Arts Blog

Washington City Paper visual arts critic (and also a musician, teacher and painter - and sometimes radio personality and always a good friend) Jeffry Cudlin has started a new blog titled Hatchets and Skewers.

Cudlin writes that he's calling his new blog hatchets and skewers "precisely because I have a reputation for not liking anything -- for being a little mean. For always insisting on writing a mixed review, rather than a simple approving nod."

While Jeffry and I are friends, we often disagree on a wide variety of subjects and issues related to art, and particularly art criticism and what makes good and bad art.

And I think that writing a "good review" is a helluva lot harder than making it a "simple approving nod." And when a writer, much less a critic, approaches a subject with the already cemented idea and intent of finding something wrong, or negative, no matter what, and before actually seeing the works, then the well is poisoned and to a certain extent, so is the pen.

But unlike any other regularly published art critic in the DC area, Cudlin is also an artist (and a very good painter at that) and also teaches at the University of Maryland, so he comes "armed" with a good set of skills that most other art critics lack: hands on experience on both the technical and applied skills needed to be able to distinguish what makes an artist a good professional or a hack, and also the set of intellectual skills to be able to apply the unfortunate test of history and theory and tactics to an exhibition. So often what he finds "wrong" or "negative" in an exhibition, is actually based on some well-cemented facts and a strong reasoning, making the reading of his always mixed reviews a challenging (and award winning) exercise.

And because (in my experience) artists almost always tend to view their own works as failures, they are often the worst ones in recognizing their own successes. And I think that Cudlin brings this generalized sense of disappointment outside of his studio and into his writing, which is sometimes unfortunate, because he is a much better painter and a much better writer, than he allows himself to be.

Make sure that you read his blog every day!