Tim Tate's Top 10 Artomatic List

Tim Tate (represented by us) is the Director and co-founder of the Washington Glass School, the 2003 Mayor's Arts Awards Outstanding Emerging Artist of the Year, and is one of this year's Out Magazine 100 Most Remarkable People of the Year. Tate has also been a fixture at Art-O-Matic for many years (in fact, we "discovered" him a couple of Art-O-Matics ago), and has walked this current version of AOM at least 20 times. Here's his top 10 non-glass artists list:

Thomas Edwards
Ira Tattleman
Dylan Scholinski
Mark Stark
Sondra Arkin
Sheep Jones
Philip Kohn
John Bata
Scott Brooks
Chris Edmunds

Krystyna Wasserman's Top AOM Artists' List

Krystyna Wasserman is the Director of the Library and Research Center at the National Museum of Women In The Arts. Her abbreviated list (she was unable to walk through the whole five floors of AOM):

Ruth Bolduan
Mansoora Hassan
Bonnie Lee Holland
Judy Jashinsky
Mark Jenkins
Joyce Zipperer

Milena Kalinovska Top 10 Artomatic List

Milena Kalinovska is the Programs Manager for the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, and she made a concentrated effort to try to pick artists who were not in other people's "Top 10 Lists." In the end, some did cross over from her colleage's list mostly!

Art Enables
Anne Benolken
Greg Minah
Linda Hesh and Ami Wilber
Dale Hunt
Mark Jenkins
"Poets Room"
Ming-Yi Sung
Kelly Towles
The Washington Glass School

Kristen Hileman's Top 10 Artomatic List

Kristen Hileman is the Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. She sends in her Top 10 AOM list:

Artomatic “Poster-A-Day” Designers
Scott Brooks
Richard Dana
Linda Hesh and Ami Wilbur
Mark Jenkins
Mudishi Maternity Project
Pat McGeehan
Ming-Yi Sung
Kelly Towles
Denise Wolff

Donna Robusto's Top 10 AOM artists

Donna Robusto is the owner and director of the Ozmosis Gallery in Bethesda and she recently walked Artomatic and sends in her top ten picks:

Kelly Towles
Tiik Pollet
Jackie Greeves
John M. Adams
Rosana Azar
Aaron Quinn Brophy
Anna Shakeeva
John N. Grunwell
Matt W. Sesow
Matt R. Hollis

DC BLOGs on AOM

City Desk: The Progressive Review on Artomatic. Read it here and here.

Conspiracy of Sound on Artomatic. Read it here.

Art of the Possible on Artomatic. Read it here.

DC Musica Viva on Artomatic. Read it here.

Photo Net on Artomatic. Read it here.

And... the Art-O-Matic artists on Artomatic. Read it here.

Dealing with the WaPo

Today is the day that the Post is supposed to cover our area galleries in the Style section. And yet there's nothing. You better get used to it.

As reported here, the Style section has decided to cut its "Galleries" column to twice a month, rather than every Thursday.

And yet (and these are the kind of things that make no sense to me), there's a pretty good piece by a freelancer named Andy Grundberg on Six Centuries of Prints and Drawings: Recent Acquisitions at the National Gallery of Art. Grundberg is the Chairman of the Photo Department at the Corcoran and certainly quite qualified to augment either the museum or gallery review scene at the Post.

So the Post has decided to reduce their already measly gallery coverage in half because one of its two gallery art critic freelancers has quit; rather than just seek the services of another freelancer or give the assignment to people already in their freelance art stables, such as Grundberg apparently is!

Oh yeah... there's also piece in Arts Beat about art by prisoners on exhibit at a Lutheran Church somewhere.

Makes my head hurt.

What can our visual arts community do? It is so obvious that we're dealing with a mindset at the newspaper that is not very concerned with our area's galleries, artists and other visual art spaces that do not happen to be large museums. At least not in the same coverage proportions to what the Post already does for theater, music, books, TV, etc.

Their cultural apathy seems strictly dedicated to our area's galleries and artists.

I am told that the WaPo takes every letter received on an issue and multiplies it by 1500 readers who feel the same way, but who do not take the time and effort to write an old-fashioned letter.

So if you feel (like I do) that it is completely unacceptable for the Washington Post to only publish the "Galleries" column twice a month, even on a temporary basis (can you imagine the uproar if they decided to review only two movies a month? Or two restaurants? Or two theatre plays? Or two concerts? Or two books? D'ya get the point!!!)... then write the paper's editor a letter (a proper letter, not an email; and please be respectful, intelligent and civil) and let him know:

Leonard Downie
Editor
Washington Post
1150 15th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20071

Here is an example of a letter that I wrote to the Post's editor in 1999 bitching about their galleries' measly coverage and making some suggestions (one of them - the mini reviews - was eventually implemented and O'Sullivan has drastically improved gallery coverage in his Weekend On Exhibit column) to improve their coverage. Sad to think that the coverage back then was twice of what it is now (both the "Galleries" and the "Arts Beat" columns used to be published every Thursday back then)!