Monday, October 08, 2012

Congrats to the Nats! And a little history...

The Nats have clinched the title, the first since the 1930s and they deserve a HUGE congrats from all of us. As a baseball fan - and we all know how much baseball fans love stats - I want to share one stat that has never made the baseball books, and which is about a Washington team baseball player from the 1930s who carried a huge load on his broad black shoulders.

Yep... the 1930s!

We all owe a tremendous debt to Jackie Robinson. Not only because of Major League baseball integration, but more importantly, because of the significant advancement of race relations worldwide that was the real aftermath of his actions during and after his baseball career. His sacrifices must never be forgotten or diminished, and Robinson was and will always be a hero, not just for Americans, but for mankind.

Also important, and rarely discussed, are the Latin American baseball players, some of African ancestry, who played in the Majors before Robinson. These men, like Robinson, were often showered with abuses and insults, and like Robinson, were required to ignore these insults, but unlike Robinson, have now faded into forgotten pages of baseball history. I believe that these men played a crucial part in paving the way for Robinson. I also believe that they helped Branch Rickey to gather the courage to break officially the color line. And equally important, they helped the other team owners and Non Hispanic white baseball players to accept African-Americans and other players of color, into the Major Leagues.

This story is all about the Cubans, and the American confusion between race and ethnicity and the racist notion of the "one drop rule." At the heart of the story is the fact that Caucasian Cubans who could prove pure European ancestry were allowed to play in the United States, and many American white players played integrated professional winter baseball in Cuba.

In Cuba professional baseball was fully integrated (curiously though, amateur Cuban baseball was segregated and only white Cubans could play in amateur teams). As a result of this background, American baseball team owners saw first-hand many great Cuban players of all shades and races play in Cuba, and some of the more enterprising ones began to test the limits and patience of a racist society by introducing some of them to the US public many years before Robinson. But let us first review a little history.


Enter Baseball

 
Although Cuban baseball legend has it that the native "Taino" Indians really invented the sport, "real" baseball started to happen in Cuba around 1865.

It was then that American students studying in the island taught fellow Cuban students how to play the sport. The game spread quickly, mostly due to the fact that the sons of wealthy Cuban families usually studied in American universities, where baseball was also spreading quite rapidly.

Apparently the first organized baseball game in Cuba took place on December 27, 1874, when the Havana team beat the Matanzas team 51-9 at "El Palmar del Junco" baseball field.

One of the Havana players was named Esteban Bellan, a catcher who was the first Cuban and the first Latin American to play major league baseball. Bellan learned how to play baseball while he was a student at Fordham University from 1863-1868.


During his time at Fordham, Bellan played for the newly created Fordham Rose Hill Baseball Club. This was the team that history tells us played the first ever nine-man team college baseball game in the United States against St. Francis Xavier College on November 3, 1859.

In 1868 Bellan began to play for the Unions of Morrisania, an upstate New York team. A year later he joined the Troy Haymakers for whom he played third base until 1872. In 1871 the Haymakers had joined the National Association, which became the National League in 1876.

The Haymakers later became the New York Giants, now the San Francisco Giants. Later on Bellan was instrumental, both as a player and manager, in establishing professional baseball in Cuba in 1878. He died in 1932.

As early as 1889, the US Major Leagues showed interest in Cuban players, when the legendary John McGraw, who visited Cuba regularly and eventually kept a permanent apartment in Havana, tried to sign a Cuban player named Antonio Maria Garcia (nicknamed "The Englishman" apparently because he was so fair of hair, eyes and skin). Garcia declined, since he was making a higher salary playing in Cuba.


In 1900, a Cuban player named Luis Padron (who as a pitcher had lead the Cuban league in wins and also in hits! Is that incredible or what?) was asked to try out with the Chicago White Sox. However, when doubts as to his racial purity were raised, the White Sox immediately released him and he never played.

A couple of years later, John McGraw brought to the US a Cuban player named Luis "Anguilla" Bustamante, who he called "the perfect short stop." Unfortunately for Bustamante, who was half black, his timing was off by half a century.

Hearing of Bustamante's prowess, around 1903-4, Clark Griffith, then with the New York Highlanders (later the Yankees), had Bustamante brought up again for a try-out. As soon as Griffith saw Bustamante, according to Angel Torres, author of "The Baseball Bible," Griffith ended the try-out and simply said: "Too chocolate."

Let's now move the clock forward to 1910, when four Cubans debut in the Minor Leagues: Armando Marsans, Rafael Almeida, Alfredo Cabrera and a second chance for Luis Padron.

They play for the New Britain Class B team of the Connecticut League and a year later Marsans and Almeida begin to play for Cincinnati, and that's truly when the issue of race becomes a question in the mind of ignorant racists.

As published in the Cincinnati Tribune on June 23, 1911: The Reds have signed two players from the Connecticut league who have Spanish blood in their veins and are very dark skinned. As soon as the news spread that the Reds were negotiating for the Cubans a protest went up from the fans against introducing Cuban talent into the ranks of the major leagues.

Cuban baseball legend has it that when August Herrmann, the president and owner of the Cincinnati Reds, went to the train station to meet them, he gasped when he saw two young black men come out of the train, and that he even approached them first. 

But they were not the Cubans.

The two Cubans had an escort who had brought them to Cincinnati, and he in turn approached and spoke to a shaky Herrmann, who then met the Cubans for the first time. Herrmann was pleased and relieved about their appearance. 

They were not, as it was incorrectly reported in the next day's paper, "small and swarthy in complexion," [but showed] "practically no effects of the tropical heat and sun." The Reds appeased the alarmed fans by assuring them that both of these players were of pure European blood.

In fact, this was true, as according to Cuban sources and accounts of the times, Marsans was the son of Catalan immigrants to Cuba, and Almeida the son of Portuguese immigrants. This case of first generation Cubans was not that unusual in Cuba during the 1800s (both of them had been born in 1887) and even more after the Spanish-American War. The new nation had just achieved independence from Spain in 1898, and was in the midst of receiving large immigration waves from Europe. The large numbers of immigrants so alarmed native-born Cubans, that afraid that they would be outnumbered by European immigrants, Cuba severely curtailed immigration in the 1930s.

In fact, according to Hugh Thomas, in the first decade of the 1900s alone, nearly 200,000 European immigrants arrived in Cuba. Considering that the 1899 census noted that there were around 1.5 million people in the island, this immigration wave, together with significant immigration by Chinese and Eastern European Jews in the 1920s, had a significant impact on Cuban society and ethnic diversity.

To make matters worse for Marsans and Almeida, it was customary with Cuban and other Latin American players, regardless of race, to play in the US Negro Leagues.

In doing so, players could play year round: summer in the US and winter in Cuba. Both Marsans and Almeida had earlier played in the Negro Leagues.

This probably complicated things for Herrmann, and to further appease the fans, the Reds required that both Cubans bring notarized paperwork from the Cuban authorities, certifying that Marsans and Almeida were indeed white of unmixed blood.

Eventually the Cincinnati press must have been convinced of the racial purity of the Cubans, as a story appeared indicating that the Cubans were "two of the purest bars of Castille soap that ever floated to these shores." It is ironic that neither of the two Cubans was actually of any Castillian ancestry, but Catalan and Portuguese. It is also ironic, and erroneous, that several instances in recent books about Cuban baseball, by American authors, claim that either Marsans or Almeida was half black (and thus the first black person to play in the MLB). However, Cuban sources, such as Gonzalez Echavarria and Angel Torres, as well as the Cuban press of the time, clearly agree that both Marsans and Almeida were "blancos."

The unofficial honor of being the first player of evident African ancestry would fall on the broad shoulders of another Cuban a couple of decades later.

Cubans will also tell you that Marsans had accompanied Almeida as another interpreter, but when the Reds also tested him out, he ended up being the better player of the two and was also signed. Almeida played for the Reds for three years and Marsans ended up playing for many years for Cincinnati, St. Louis and the New York Yankees. In 1924 he also became the first Latin American to manage a professional US team, when he became the manager of the Elmira team.

The uniquely American cultural ignorance about the difference between ethnicity and race continues to this day (especially when dealing with whom we now refer to as "Latinos" or "Hispanics"), as Marsans and Almeida are still often referred to in articles and magazines as "light-skinned Cubans." It is as if the fact that they were born in a Caribbean island had somehow mutated their racial ancestry.

Although the abuse heaped upon them by newspapers, fans and other players eventually diminished, these two Cuban men played a key role in cracking open the race door, which would not open fully for many years later.

In 1912, Miguel Angel Gonzalez made his debut with the Boston Braves, and had a batting average above 300 for the four years that he played (1915-18) for the St. Louis Cardinals. Gonzalez spent 17 years in the majors, and also played for the Reds and Chicago Cubs.

But Gonzalez's true contribution to the story is more profound than his modest .253 career batting average. In 1934, with his playing days over, he was hired as a coach for the St. Louis Cardinals, and in 1938 he was the interim manager for the Cardinals, becoming the first Latin American manager ever in the Major Leagues.

He was fired in 1946 as a result of the famous controversy between MLB and Mexican baseball. Gonzalez is also one of the patriarchs of Cuban baseball, as he managed or controlled the legendary Cuban baseball team Havana Reds from 1914 until the end of professional baseball in Cuba in 1960, when it was terminated by the heavy hand of the Cuban Communist government.

Gonzalez tenure as both a coach in the US Major Leagues (in the photo we see Gonzalez (left) with manager Frankie Frisch and coach Buzzie Wares in the 1930s St. Louis Gas House Gang) as well as the Cuban professional leagues, had a profound impact on the constant flow of both Cuban players up north, and white American players to join integrated Cuban teams during the winter. This unique opportunity in Cuba for black and white American players, together with Cubans and other Latin Americans, to share a baseball diamond, was crucial to the eventual integration of MLB, and Gonzalez must be credited for his very important part in this tortured effort.

Enter Adolfo "Dolf" Luque

But the true patriarch and legendary superman of Cuban baseball, was without a doubt, Adolfo Luque, known in the US as Dolph or Dolf Luque. Much has been written about Luque and his impact on Cuban baseball (none better that Roberto Gonzalez Echavarria's The Pride of Havana). However, I believe that Luque's contribution to how US owners, fans, newscasters and players viewed Latin American players, as well as his outgoing, aggressive personality, and ability to float back and forth between professional Cuban and American baseball at all levels of organization, delivered a key ingredient for the eventual breaking of the race barrier.

Luque was the first true Latin American star of the Major Leagues. He won nearly 200 games, played in nine World Series, and in 1918 had an astonishing 27 and 8 record with a 1.93 ERA while playing with the Cincinnati Reds.

He was also a man who did not take insults from anyone, and according to Gonzalez Echavarria, he was a "snarling, vulgar, cursing, aggressive pug, who, although small at five-seven, was always ready to fight."

These characteristics served Luque well in the racist environment of the early 20th century MLB. Although he was very fair and blue-eyed, and no one could distinguish him from the other white players until he opened his mouth, Luque was nonetheless the butt of many racial insults, to which he usually responded with brutal beanballs.

Once, while pitching for Cincinnati, Luque heard insults coming from the Giants' dugout. The fiery Cuban charged the dugout and punched Casey Stengel in the mouth (Stengel later claimed it wasn't him who had called Luque a "Cuban N-word," but it was the man seated next to him, Bill Cunningham). The police sent Luque back to his bench, but his Cincinnati teammates took over the fighting to restore Luque's honor, and a near riot began. In the chaos of the fighting, Luque grabbed a bat and headed back to the Giants dugout.

Order was finally restored and both Luque and Stengel were ejected. It was not the first time that the aggressive Luque had taken matters into his own hands, for earlier in his career he had also fired a ball into his own dugout and chased one of his own teammates with an ice pick.

Luque died in 1957, after playing in the Majors from 1914-1935. After his playing career ended, he returned and began coaching in 1941 in the US Major Leagues and also managed several teams in the Cuban League (he even pitched in a game in 1946, when he was pushing 55) as well as many other teams in Latin America.

Adolfo Luque's overall impact upon the world of professional baseball certainly merits his inclusion in the Baseball Hall of Fame, where many lesser players of his era are included. As his New York Times obituary testifies to, Luque was a respected coach in the Major Leagues, and like Gonzalez, had a significant part in helping to establish Latin American players as part of the national game.

Because of his temper, Luque also commanded a respect, sometimes out of fear, that also played a key part in the acceptance of Latin American players, and helped immeasurably in paving the road for Robinson and all the others who followed in his steps. As Hemingway wrote in The Old Man and the Sea: "Who is the greatest manager, really, Luque or Mike Gonzalez? -- I think they are equal."

Between 1911 and 1929, seventeen Cuban-born Caucasian players played in the Major Leagues and many more, both black and white, in the Negro Leagues. Somehow, along the line, and probably helped by the full acceptance by MLB of players and coaches like Gonzalez and Luque, and clearly assisted by the exposure of American owners, white players and managers to Cuban baseball players, the pedigree requirement for obvious "whiteness" was discarded. As a result, in 1935, a Cuban of clearly defined African features makes his debut with the Washington Senators.

Enter Roberto "Tarzan" Estalella
 
There exists a fairy tale perception in the United States of a Cuban society that is a fully integrated, equal society where race doesn't matter, and everyone lives in a happy melting pot where the races mix and blend and racism is not a problem. Nothing could be further from the truth, even today (especially with the revival of tourism), and while many advances have been made for racial equality in Cuba, this perception diminishes the suffering and pain that Afro-Cubans, like African-Americans, have had to endure for centuries.

Cuba even had a race war in 1912, in which thousands of Afro-Cuban militants, demanding equal rights, were massacred in a matter of weeks by the Cuban Army. This genocide was the most dramatic example of how white Cuban rulers responded to demands for racial equality at the same time that Marsans and Almeida were playing in the Major Leagues.

As Roberto Gonzalez Echavarria eloquently discusses in his book The Pride of Havana, Cuban baseball was curiously integrated at the professional level while being racially segregated at the amateur level. The image at the top left says it all: It is the 1914 amateur team of the Central Soledad, a sugar mill plant near Guantanamo. The vast majority of Central Soledad's people were black Cubans, many of Jamaican and Haitian ancestry, and yet not one black man is represented in the team.

The Cuban baseball racial paradox is perhaps inexplicable to Americans, but made perfect sense in the racist Cuban society of the 20th century, which even allowed a President of mixed blood (the tyrant Fulgencio Batista) to take over the government in 1933, and yet refused him membership into the Havana Yacht Club, which only allowed white members.

But in professional Cuban baseball, black and white Cuban players, together with black and white professional American players and newscasters, as well as visiting US Major League teams, played in curious indifference to the racial division of baseball in the United States, and clearly showed Americans that black players - both Cuban and American - could play on an equal level to the MLB visitors.
 
Roberto Estalella was a handsome, powerful man, and his muscular appearance earned him the nickname "Tarzan" in the Washington press. He was also a man of evident African features, who in Cuba would not have been called black, but perhaps mulatto, or in the Cuban slang "jabao," which is the equivalent of the term "high yellow" used by African Americans to describe a light skinned person with some African ancestry, although in Cuba, "jabao" is not a pejorative or derogatory term.

Estalella's professional US career started with Albany in 1934 and then he played for nine seasons with the Washington Senators and the Philadelphia A's and also for other Minor League teams in the Deep South (he played for Charlotte and he also led the Piedmont
League in batting two years in a row in 1937 and 1938). He would have played many more years, but he was one of the players fined by MLB for his part in the Mexican League fiasco of the 1940s.

What tribulations Estalella must have endured! He was no blue-eyed, pale skinned Luque, able to blend in visually, and certainly in the Deep South, no one was fooled by the owners' claim that Estalella was not black but Cuban.

But the spectacular deception worked, at least on paper, and this talented athlete thus became the first man of recognizable African ancestry to play Major League Baseball in the US.

Were there players before Estalella who had some African blood? Probably, as race mixing was not a unique Cuban phenomenon, and there are many instances of "white" American players with African features being passed as "Indian" and being abused by fans and other players (in fact, recent DNA studies show that as many as 50 million white Americans have a black ancestor in their family tree).

Babe Ruth was perhaps the most famous example of this point. "Ruth was racially insulted so often that many people assumed that he was indeed partly black and that at some point in time he, or an immediate ancestor, had managed to cross the color line," wrote Ruth biographer Robert W. Creamer. "Even players in the Negro baseball leagues that flourished then believed this and generally wished the Babe, whom they considered a secret brother, well in his conquest of white baseball."

While there's no evidence that Ruth had any black ancestors, the racist American belief that any possibility of African blood immediately makes the person "black" was disregarded in the case of Estalella, and later in the case of Tomas de la Cruz, another Cuban player of obvious African ancestry who played for Cincinnati in 1944, as well as a Cuban of Chinese ancestry, Manuel "Chino" Hidalgo, who was signed by the Senators and played in the Minor Leagues, but never broke into the majors. Hidalgo was probably the first man of Asian ancestry to play in organized professional baseball in the US.

Another Cuban baseball legend is the story of Branch Rickey and black Cuban player, Silvio Garcia. If we are to believe many Cuban stories of the times, Branch Rickey started to seriously consider that the best strategy to break the color barrier would be by bringing a black Cuban player to the major leagues. His initial choice was a very good Cuban shortstop, Silvio García. According to Edel Casas, the noted Cuban baseball historian, Rickey met with García in Havana in 1945 to explore the possibility of bringing Garcia to the Dodgers.

As he would later do with Robinson, Rickey interviewed García and asked him: "What would you do if a white American slapped your face?" García's response was succint and sincere. "I kill him," he answered. Needless to say, García was never a choice after that.

In 1947, after Robinson finally broke the obvious racial barrier for African-Americans, many black Cubans followed in his steps, in many cases becoming the first black players in many MLB teams. None of these was greater than Orestes Miñoso, called "Minnie" in the United States. On April 19, 1949 Miñoso made his debut with the Cleveland Indians, and became the first black Cuban and Afro Latin American to play major league baseball. He collected 1,963 hits in his career and became the second major leaguer to play in five different decades.

However, like their American colleagues, many other earlier great black Cubans, such as the legendary Martin Dihigo, now in the Hall of Fame, never had a chance to play in the Majors.

It is thanks to the forgotten accomplishments of white Cuban players such as Gonzalez and Luque, and the hidden sacrifices of Cubans of color like Estalella and de la Cruz, and to the final smashing of the color barrier, accomplishments and sacrifices by Robinson, that many of today's stars of color from Latin America, Asia and the United States owe their success.
Great black Latin American players of all nationalities, such as "El Duque" Hernandez, Tony Oliva, the great Roberto Clemente and the record-breaking king of the long ball, Sammy Sosa continued to break new barriers and records, even in the 21st century, but they stood on the shoulders of those brave men who played in a brutal field where race was used as a weapon to diminish and destroy.

And perhaps there is no link more brilliant to this past than Roberto Estalella's grandson, Bobby, also a great Major Leaguer, who carried the great baseball tradition of this unheralded hero of the past.



This is a work in progress which ultimately will produce a book on this subject as well as a traveling photography exhibition. Please email me if you have any questions, corrections, additions, updates, images, etc.

Due by Friday!

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
FINAL DEADLINE: October 12, 2012, 5:00pm

Published bi-annually, this four-color, 8½ x 5½ inch directory is the definitive listing of established and emerging contemporary artists throughout the Washington region. It is widely used by galleries, curators, art consultants, and art patrons. Copies are distributed to selected art critics and other members of the press, and to museums both within and outside of the region. The 2013 - 2014 Artist Directory will be published in the spring of 2013, and will be available for sale on the WPA website and at select area retail locations at the price of $9.95.

Each participating artist will be featured on a full page (8½ x ½ inches). The page will include the artist's name, a color digital image of their work, their studio address and phone number, email address, web address, categories to describe their work and studio practice, and their gallery affiliation.

All current WPA members are eligible for publication in the Artist Directory. There is an additional participation fee that includes a copy of the Artist Directory.  The registration fee is $75. The final registration deadline is October 12, 2012. No submissions will be accepted after this date. 

Registration for the 2013 - 2014 Artist Directory will be handled exclusively through WPA's website.

Each participating artist can upload one image to be featured on their page. Images must be submitted as .eps or .tif files in CMYK format. They must be 300dpi and as close as possible to, but no smaller than 6 inches on the longest side. If you have any questions regarding the 2013 - 2014 Artist Directory or any issues with registration, please contact Christopher Cunetto, Membership Manager, at ccunetto@wpadc.org or 202-234-7103 x 2.

Sunday, October 07, 2012

Heard on Univision

Today Venezuelans as voting for President and running are the current strongman Castro-admirer leftwing nut Hugo Chávez, who over the years has shut down opposition newspapers, TV stations and other media, and who has even organized paramilitary militias to support him.

Running against him (and putting his life into the election) is a younger, more moderate centrist challenger, Henrique Capriles Radonski, and for the first time in almost a decade and a half, things look shaky for Hugo... if the voting is actually done fairly, that is. The government militias are apparently on the look out to make sure that "things go right..."

Univision reports that Hugo Chávez has essentially threatened violence across the country if he doesn't win - he won't be able to "restrain" the disappointed masses, who apparently have forgotten what a democracy is supposed to be like. However, the Venezuelan Justice Minister, Tarek El Aissami, has all but guaranteed "fair elections."

Like Stalin said: It's not the people who vote that count, it's the people who count the votes. 

Remember that when we have our election and your candidate doesn't win...

Update: Guess who was declared the winner? Didn't we know ahead of time?

(e)merge visiting

Dr. Alida Anderson, Mera Rubell and F. Lennox Campello at (e)merge art fair in Washington, DC 2012
The second iteration of the (e)merge art fair ended today. I went visiting yesterday (that's me with the amazing Mera Rubell and the amazing Dr. Anderson de Campello hanging out at the bar of the Skyline Hotel).

This second (e)merge cements this art fair as unique not only in its stated goal to focus on emerging artists - it does that and it does it well - but also it has become the leading art fair in the world for performance art.

Last year's (e)merge was the springboard for the extraordinary talent of Wilmer Wilson IV - a spectacularly intelligent performance and installation artist (and one of the artists that I mentored last year!) who used (e)merge to spring straight from student status to worldwide exposure via art fairs from DC's Connersmith.

This year the fair's center of attention was the brilliant performance of my good bud Andrew Wodzianski, whose Ishmael performance was described by a New York gallerist as "heroic" and he added that he needed to "look this guy up!."

Wodzianski (see photos from WJLA TV here), was a little shaky when he was finally "rescued" from the waters of the Skyline pool yesterday, but this multi-talented and multimedia artist was the hit of this second version of (e)merge. Let's all hope that good things happen to him as a result of (e)merge.

That's Andrew below with Mera Rubell.

Artist Andrew Wodzianski and Mera Rubell at (e)merge art fair in Washington, DC

Saturday, October 06, 2012

Art Maryland 2012

Exhibit: Art Maryland 2012

Location: Howard County Center for the Arts, 8510 High Ridge Road, Ellicott City, MD 21043

Dates: October 26-December 14, 2012

Reception: October 26, 6–8pm

Gallery hours: M-F 10am-8pm, Sat 10am-4pm, Sun 12-4pm

Art Maryland has long been one of the premier juried showcases for Maryland's visual artists. Art Maryland 2012 features work selected from nearly 470 entries submitted by 169 artists working in a wide variety of styles and mediums.

Juror Philippa Hughes, Founder and Chief Creative Contrarian of the Pink Line Project in Washington, DC, chose work with a clean, contemporary aesthetic, gravitating to photography and sculpture. Selected artists include: Fran Abrams, Ralph Baney, Kyle Bauer, Ronald Brown, Warren Chambers, Ed Charest, Travis Childers, Sara Dittrich, Annie Farrar, Karen Lynn Gray, Zachary Handler, Courtnee Hawkins, Eric Johnson, Penny Knobel-Besa, Cheryl MacLean, Hyeseung Marriage-Song, Diana Marta, Shelley Meredith-Cooper, Lindsay Rowinski, Daniel Rozmiarek, Charles Sessoms, Anthony Stellaccio, Robert Tennenbaum, Kristoffer Triplaar, Regina Tumasella, John Viles, Sarah Wegner, and Elizabeth Whiteley.

Art Maryland 2012 is on view from October 26 – December 14. Reception  is free and open to the public and is a great opportunity to meet and talk with a diverse group of artists from across the state.

ArtLeaks

(Via)
Depending on your relationship to the powers that be, Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange rank among either the brightest angels or the darkest demons of contemporary life. Harnessing the power of the internet to blow the virtual whistle on corruption around the world, Wikileaks demonstrated, if nothing else, how much tougher it is to cover up wrongdoing in the age of social media and self-publication. Now, ArtLeaks looks to shine the same spotlight on corruption specifically in the world of art, which they see as a power struggle between rich buyers and institutions and the creators and everyday workers with little sway or pay. Bursting onto a scene desperate for a savior, can ArtLeaks be the Wikileaks of the art world?
Read the entire piece by Bob Duggan here.

Friday, October 05, 2012

WaPo looks at (e)merge

Lavanya Ramanathan has a really excellent review here and Michael O'Sullivan has some great photos here. I'll be there tomorrow and review will be up NLT Sunday morning.

(e)merge art fair opened yesterday in Washington DC

The (e)merge art fair opened yesterday and runs through Sunday, October 7th at the Capitol Skyline Hotel in Washington, DC. The fair features new talent presented by an international mix of 80 exhibitors showing art from 152 artists from 24 countries.

(e)merge combines an exhibition platform for galleries and nonprofit spaces with that for vetted projects by unrepresented artists. Both platforms present new works by emerging artists in performance, installation, painting, sculpture, and video on multiple levels of the hotel.

EXHIBITOR LIST: HERE

(e)merge will present panel discussions on performance art and arts funding at 2pm on Friday and Saturday afternoons. The fair will also include artist performances, interactive works, large-scale installations, and special projects.

PANELS + PERFORMANCES: HERE

Thursday, October 4: 7pm - 11pm
Preview Opening Party and Concert by Thievery Corp with Eric Hilton
Friday, October 5: 12pm - 7pm
Saturday, October 6: 12pm - 7pm
Sunday, October 7: 12pm - 5pm

The Capitol Skyline Hotel
Washington, DC
http://www.emergeartfair.com

Campello on TV

Vanessa CampelloIf you watch the new CBS series "Vegas" - look out for my daughter Vanessa Campello -- she's a recurring extra on the show (she plays the receptionist)... yay!

And she's also a recurring extra on "The Mentalist."

36 Hour Live Performance at (e)merge starts at 5AM

Andrew Wodzianski at (e)merge art fair

Thursday, October 04, 2012

Ownership rights

Read this and then do what you think is right.

DC Fine Art Photography Fair

The DC Fine Art Photography Fair will feature 15 established fine art photography galleries from across the United States, with representative samples from their gallery inventories. An extraordinary range of photographs, from 19th century images to cutting-edge contemporary visions, will be on display and available for purchase.

HOURS
Friday, October 5, 2012: Opening Night Preview 6:30-8:30pm (By Invitation Only)
Saturday, October 6, 2012: Open to the Public 12pm – 7pm
Sunday, October 7, 2012: Open to the Public 11am – 5pm

Saturday, October 6, 11am–12pm: Panel Discussion "On Collecting Photography" (Panel will include George Hemphill.)

ADMISSION
The fair is FREE and open to the public.

LOCATION
Former Residence of the Ambassador of Spain
2801 16th Street, NW, Washington DC 20009
call 202.986.0105 for more information
www.dcfineartphotography.com

This is really funny!

Wednesday, October 03, 2012

Ouch!

Prez Obama wasn't the only one getting spanked on live TV tonight... A little while back I saw Mayor Guiliani spank Chris Hayes on live TV on MSNBC... Ouch!

Death of a dialect

With the political news flush with commentary about the opportunistic use of dialects, this is sad news for the language:
In a remote fishing town on the tip of Scotland's Black Isle, the last native speaker of the Cromarty dialect has died, taking with him another little piece of the English linguistic mosaic.
Details here.

Job in the Arts

 VISUAL ARTIST/EDUCATOR 
Part time, Seasonal 
Applications accepted through 11:59 PM on Thursday, October 11, 2012 (or until filled) 

POSITION SUMMARY 
This is a part-time, seasonal position working with teenagers/young adults for Arts on the Block (AOB). The Visual Artist/Educator works closely with the Lead Teaching Artist for AOB’s “Pour Your ART Out” workshop to deliver a high-quality art, job, and life skills training experience to up to 20 workshop participants (“Apprentice Artists”). The person who fills this position may have the opportunity to move into a Lead Teaching Artist/Educator position for the Summer 2013 workshop.  

ABOUT ARTS ON THE BLOCK 
The mission of Arts on the Block (AOB) is to empower creative youth to imagine and shape fulfilling futures and contribute to the quality of life of their communities. Arts on the Block achieves its mission by providing youth with paid opportunities to work with established artists/mentors on commissioned artwork and entrepreneurial projects.  Please visit www.artsontheblock.com for additional information. 

WORKSITE 
AOB Studio 
11501 Georgia Avenue - Wheaton, MD 20902 
240-645-0730 

WORK SCHEDULE 
  • Start Date:  Saturday, October 27, 2012; End Date:  Saturday, March 23, 2013 
  • Wednesdays (20) - 3:00 PM to 6:30 PM; Saturdays (19) – 9:00 AM – 4:30 PM 
  • Must be available for planning sessions, trainings, and staff meetings  

SALARY 
Commensurate with experience 

ESSENTIAL JOB FUNCTIONS 
  • Participate in screening and selection of Apprentice Artists 
  • With Lead Teaching Artist, design and manage all aspects of program including work flow creation, program budgeting and tracking, and quality control 
  • Manage customer relations on commissioned projects 
  • With Lead Teaching Artist, develop, refine, and implement project ideas 
  • Lead arts education and job training exercises 
  • With Lead Teaching Artist, maintain a safe worksite 
  • Document daily workshop progress 
  • Document completed artwork 
  • Prepare monthly reports and administer Apprentice Artist assessments 
  • Manage preparations for semi-annual open houses and/or other events 
  • Train Apprentice Artists to deliver effective presentations 
  • With AOB staff or volunteers, assist with management of blog and other social media efforts 
  • Other duties as assigned 

MINIMUM JOB REQUIREMENTS 
  • Undergraduate degree or higher in an arts discipline 
  • Five or more years professional arts experience including participation in local and regional exhibitions 
  • Five or more years working with a diverse population of high school aged or older youth 
  • Demonstrable interpersonal skills in working with a diverse population of employees, customers, managers, vendors, partners, and the general public 
  • Demonstrable business competence including verbal, written, and presentation skills as well as organizational, leadership, and supervisory skills 
  • Ability to pass conducted Montgomery County criminal background check 
DESIRABLE JOB QUALIFICATIONS 
  • Experience designing and implementing arts curriculum 
  • Experience with mosaics and other sculptural materials 
  • Significant experience in the areas of commissioned artwork and public art 
  • Advancing Youth Development training/certification 
  • Familiarity with the Washington, DC area arts community and art sites 
  • Experience creating fliers and other PR materials using Photoshop, InDesign and/or other software 
  • Competence with both Apple and Microsoft operating systems 
  • CPR/First Aid certification 
  • Some Spanish language speaking ability 

TO APPLY 
Please send cover letter, résumé, and three digital images of relevant work. 
By email, send to aob@artsontheblock.com  and include Visual Artist/Educator in the subject line. 
By regular mail, send to: 
Arts on the Block; Attention:  Mary Ngo; 11501 Georgia Avenue, Suite 104 - Wheaton, MD 20902 
If sending materials by regular mail, submit a CD containing images of relevant work. 
For most favorable consideration, applications must be received by 11:59 PM on October 11, 2012. Applications received after that date will be considered only if position is not yet filled.

Tuesday, October 02, 2012

Lida Moser's Exxon Building at Leggoland?

(Via) It has just been brought up to my attention that the Exxon Building made up of Leggos from Leggoland Florida is a pretty good copy of the iconic Lida Moser photograph of the Exxon Building.

I wonder if Lida knows about this?

I'm going to ask her tomorrow... details later.

Update: Talked to Lida Moser today (Wed) and she had no idea that there's a Leggo building in Florida that looks suspiciously like her iconic photograph.

Geez... all they had to do was ask!

(e)merge is here again!

Emerge Art Fair


OCTOBER 4 - 7, 2012  Facebook  TwitterFollow us!
The (e)merge art fair advances multiple platforms where artists, gallerists, curators and collectors can discover and experience emerging art.
(e)merge opening preview party + concert by the pool


Monday, October 01, 2012

Design a Wine Label

Attention Artists: The Capital Grille Now Accepting Submissions
for 2012 Wine Label Design Competition
Artists of all media are invited to enter; winning artwork will adorn bottle
of exclusive 2009 Arrowood Cabernet Sauvignon
 
 
ORLANDO, Fla. (Sept. 30, 2012) – The Capital Grille is now accepting artwork submissions for its fourth-annual Artist Series Wine Label Design Competition. Through October 19, 2012, aspiring and established artists nationwide, aged 21 years or older, are invited to submit original artwork that will be considered for the label of a limited-allocation wine served exclusively at The Capital Grille, whose award-winning wine program is routinely recognized by Wine Spectator magazine. In addition to having his or her artwork adorn the bottles of this year’s featured vintage, the winning artist also will receive an all-expenses-paid trip to the wine country of California’s Napa Valley.

This unique competition sponsored by The Capital Grille celebrates the art of the wine label.  For centuries, wine-label design was about as basic and austere as a shipping label. That changed in 1940 when Baron Phillippe de Rothschild of Chateau Mouton Rothschild began enlisting famous artists, including Joan Miro and Pablo Picasso, to craft a masterpiece for the outside of the bottle that would beautifully convey the work of art inside.  

The bottled inspiration for the 2012 Artist Series competition is a 2009 Arrowood Cabernet Sauvignon, blended by winemaker Heidi von der Mehden from Arrowood Winery and George Miliotes, The Capital Grille’s own Master Sommelier. Intensely purple in color, this wine presents aromas of ripe, dark fruits that are matched on the palate with notes of blackberry, plum and blueberry. Mehden and Miliotes describe this exceptional wine as “a natural beauty,” imparting layers of flavor that begin with a deep intensity and end with a soft, rich finish.

“This competition combines two complementary cultural passions: fine wine and fine art,” said Miliotes. “While my expertise focuses on what’s inside the bottle, I love that this competition is as much about the palette as it is the palate.”
Only 1,000 cases of the Arrowood Cabernet will be produced for this year’s Artist Series event, which will take place next spring in all 47 locations of The Capital Grille nationwide. The restaurants will donate a portion of the proceeds from each bottle sold to Share Our Strength in support of its mission to end childhood hunger in America. To date, The Capital Grille has raised more than $1,000,000 on behalf of the organization.

How to Enter
To enter, use the medium of your choice to create an original piece of art that captures the essence of this exclusive, world-class Cabernet Sauvignon. Entries should be original artwork and will be accepted through October 19, 2012. Entries will be accepted via mail or email. To enter, visit http://www.thecapitalgrille.com/enter/ for contest rules and details.

Sunday, September 30, 2012

New Drawing

Male Nude drawing by F. Lennox Campello, 2012
Male Nude in a Barnett Newman Composition (Detail). Charcoal on Paper, 2.75 x 22.25 inches. 2012.

Male Nude in a Barnett Newman Composition. Charcoal on Paper, 2.75 x 22.25 inches. 2012.

Saturday, September 29, 2012

Neoscona Crucifera?

As far as I can tell, these huge spiders (who seem to love to build their nests around my deck) are Neoscona Crucifera. They are apparently not poisonous, so I'm leaving them alone, but they are huge (about the size of a quarter) and rather scary-looking.

Neoscona Crucifera

Neoscona Crucifera

Neoscona Crucifera

Neoscona Crucifera