Social Ills

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As Rich Johnston writes, "Earlier this week, writer Clifford Meth revisited his rather-abandoned-of-late column at Comic Bulletin, Meth Addict.In which he told how a project he was associated with, Dave Cockrum's The Futurians almost made it to the screen a couple of times.And how he was also hired to write a screenplay treatment for his IDW series Snaked, before being moved aside for another writer - and then discovering he was suddenly not getting paid his kill fee...

"We have a contract," I said. "Of course he's going to pay me." "No he isn't. He's pretty sure you won't sue him. The fee is too small and you'd have to fly to Los Angeles to file for damages. Apparently this is how he does things." "Tell me this is a bad joke." "Sorry Cliff," said my agent. "Welcome to Hollywood."


So Cliff describes how he offered to "talk" with the producer's parents. Whose address Meth happened to have. Which suddenly has the desired effect.The column has been pulled, after someone got a bit scared it seems. But I understand the specific column in question has been bought out by a bigger site who will be running it tomorrow.

Not Bleeding Cool, we weren't even in the bidding. But if you'd like to read the whole column now, go to Daniel Best's Blog, where it is re-posted here.

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Kenneth Tin-Kin Hung: Crypto-anti-Zionism? Crypto-anti-Semitism?

A (1) Passion play; in which the lead carries not a cross but rather a dollar sign made to resemble a (2) swastika; upon a floor tiled with (3) Stars of David; before a backdrop depicting (4) banking crises? Well, that's what Kenneth Tin-Kin Hung seems to have presented in his work In G.O.D. We Trust, on display through January 9, 2010, at Monique Meloche Gallery. Why?

Kenneth Tin-Kin Hung @ Monique Meloche

Hung is a collage artist; his collage is animated; colorful shapes pass across a singular wall-mounted video screen. And in that psychedelic motion, the most readily identifiable figure appears to be Hung's protagonist: President Barack Obama. It's through a series of graphic vignettes that Hung causes Obama to incarnate again-and-again as a prominent religious figure: Jesus, Buddha, Eshu [Nigerian], the Virgin Mary, Krishna, Mohammad, and finally Abraham. Sorry Moses!

One wonders how many consumers of Hung's work fixate upon the foreground, noticing only Obama. In fairness, the video's vivid hues and queer pace--if not also the smiling face of the President--are hypnotic. So that it's good to stop the action, examine a still frame, and ask: What is this fellow doing?



Lead (Pb) Rips our Engines

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Lead (pronounced /ˈlɛd/) is a main-group element with symbol Pb (Latin: plumbum) and atomic number 82. Lead is a soft, malleable poor metal, also considered to be one of the heavy metals.



Stopping Old Bullets

G B-day 1965.jpgThat’s me with a group of my buddies at my birthday party on April 4, 1965. We were a group of rowdy, rough-edged little lads, but old enough to start wondering about important things in our country's history.



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No Shit. A painting installation disappears in an opening in Colorado Museum. 26 of 31 paintings taken by visitors.

The cat is out of the bag, they have gone to the press, so now I can discuss and indeed complain about the events.



Dear Santa

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Hi.
This is the Q-mail send program at yahoo dot com. I'm afraid I wasn't able to deliver your message to the following addresses. This is a permanent error; and I've given up. Sorry it didn't work out. Sorry, I couldn't find any host named E-Z web dot H dot E dot J.P. Number five, dash twelve. Below this line is a copy of the message. Return path: Won You Hwa at S.B.C. global dot net. Received Q-mail seventy-eight thousand two hundred fifty nine, invoked from network on 31st of January 2008 at five-fifty one and twenty eight seconds, p.m., Central Standard Time. Domain key signature: A equals R.S.A., dash S.H.A.L., Q equals D.N.S., C equals N.O.F.W.S., S equals S, dash one thousand two hundred and four. Received from unknown ...



Information Booth:
Nicholas Frank:
Objects

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Former phone salesman has paranormal experience while trying to phone home. The visions prove to be life changing as he divines 19 seers to bravely take up the ancient challenge of completing the oracle. The twenty texts, subsequent phone calls, and nitro-booty mixtape that result change the course of global warming, end all war in the Middle East, and create a generally cozy feeling among all the world's peoples. Lives out days as a Human Nature D.J.™, three-legged furniture salesman, and breeder of world-class talking parakeets.




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Dear Seers, I don't feel responsible for my visions. The Gods are to blame. I must confess that I have been hearing voices and succumbing to seizures for the last few years that intensify when I huff the vapor and/ or hit the bottle. I have been completely unaware of their purpose until now.

The phenomena became impossible to ignore when I rented a rat-infested coach house built on a weird steaming chasm. The only place in the house where cell phone reception was to be found was the decrepit pantry. This seemed to link up nicely with the voices in my head and my day job, as I sold telephone book advertising from under the dim bulb there. The house burned down in 1978. Only to materialize like a ghost ship, long enough for me to sign the lease and set sail. My little home was most definitely haunted by the ghost of the Thick Grandmother who perished in my bedroom, lit cigarette at her fingertips. I was positive that I was sensing her balmy presence and green aura lurking over me while I tried to sleep. She smelled like onion borscht. I felt her cold breath on the back of my neck whenever crossing the threshold



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A Sharkforum Feeding Frenzy Funnies special by Steve Hamann and Mark Staff Brandl.



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Self-Reliance, A Thought

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As Harold Bloom pointed out, Ralph Waldo Emerson claimed the authentic religion of the American was self-reliance.

Where is it in artists nowadays?




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Josh Smith: does it look good, have any kind of real visual presence? Can he even paint? Is there any noticable rigor? As actual paintings devoid of art market hype are these things worth a shit? Of course not! But these trifles hardly matter, what matters, is SAATCHI BOUGHT ONE!



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I’d like to introduce a new term for a recent trend in Consensus Correct painting: Feeble Painting.

Actually, I already have been using it for a short while in my Art History classes when describing one current tendency. While discussing this with the Shark, he volunteered to help me delineate it and present it to a wider audience. We debated the idea in depth and here is the elucidation.



And Yet Another CC Genius

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This person has similar credentials to the last in many ways. Caro Niederer, a Swiss artist, wife (I think maybe now ex-wife) of David Weiss of the superstar Fischli and Weiss humorous Conceptual art team. (Their most famous, and most wonderful work, is the Rube-Goldberg-like film “Der Lauf der Dinge.”) Represented by THE premier and most well-funded Swiss gallery, Caro is highly career-success motivated and has had all the correct connections, due to her liaison, and knows how to use them. Unfortunately, she has spent almost no time or motivation on developing any technical ability or heart. A true study in “Alessandro-Allori-ism.”



Yet Another Consensus Genius.

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Yes, also at this moment greatly pushed by the Consensus Clique. David Chieppo. A very young American living in Switzerland, hanging with the Right Crowd. It can't have anything to do with that or his boyfriend being an important curator can it? He has even been recently put in a museum show with Nam June Paik, Bruce Nauman and Joseph Beuys. Good that the first and the last are dead, I suppose. Maybe True Consensus Correct "talent" has little to do with painting ability.



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It would be interesting to note whether or not Doig is aware of Uttech -who has been working in this manner since...probably before Doig was even born. It looks like.....nothing borrowed, nothing gained time......IN SPADES!



Another Consensus Genius.

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Presented without words. Getting better than Kilimnik, but ...

Peter Doig is a Scottish painter living in Trinidad. He's one of Europe's most expensive living painters.



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And the week is launched with a Feeding Frenzy Funny by Steve Hamann with MSB and some input by the Shark. Enjoy. MUCH more is to come!



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It’s in the system, baby. You get that for which rewards are given. Here’s how it works, in list form.

1. If you are a curator in an out-of-the-way place, or at least want to climb the social ladder as a curator...



U.S. military cemetery: "We are full"

Fleet
"OVERLAND PARK, Kansas (Reuters) - A Kansas military cemetery has run out of space after the burial of another casualty of the Iraq war, officials said on Thursday. "We are full," said Alison Kohler, spokeswoman for the Fort Riley U.S. Army post, home of the 1st Infantry Division. U.S. Sens. Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts, both Kansas Republicans, on Thursday sent a letter to William Tuerk, the under secretary for memorial affairs at the Department of Veterans Affairs, urging for full funding for a new cemetery for Fort Riley. "While a new cemetery would not be completed in time to alleviate this situation immediately, it is vitally important," Roberts and Brownback, a Republican presidential candidate, said in their letter. "We truly owe our military members a debt of gratitude and the least we can do is provide them with an honorable burial ground," the senators wrote."



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"War As We Saw It," a powerful and deeply skeptical Op-Ed about the Iraq occupation, written by seven soldiers in the field—Buddhika Jayamaha, Wesley D. Smith, Jeremy Roebuck, Edward Sandmeier, Jeremy A. Murphy, Yance T. Gray and Omar Mora—was published in the August 19, 2007, New York Times. "In a lawless environment where men with guns rule the streets, engaging in the banalities of life has become a death-defying act," the soldiers wrote. "Four years into our occupation, we have failed on every promise, while we have substituted Baath Party tyranny with a tyranny of Islamist, militia and criminal violence. When the primary preoccupation of average Iraqis is when and how they are likely to be killed, we can hardly feel smug as we hand out care packages. As an Iraqi man told us a few days ago with deep resignation, ”We need security, not free food. In the end, we need to recognize that our presence may have released Iraqis from the grip of a tyrant, but that it has also robbed them of their self-respect. They will soon realize that the best way to regain dignity is to call us what we are—an army of occupation—and force our withdrawal." Yance Gray, 26, and Omar Mora, 28, were killed in action Monday. [The art is by Wesley Kimler.]



Guest Editor Rob Miller: Two Years Later...

Editor's note - With the Katrina disaster now two years old we asked Rob Miller to send us an update. He was back in New Orleans recently, this time for business, and his observations are chilling -ed.

Two years.

It seems like only yesterday that I watched the destruction of a great American city, a great WORLD city, with stultifying disbelief. In almost real time, I watched how we all allowed the social contract that binds us together as a nation be trampled on or ignored. I watched as governmental agencies at every level exhibited new lows in craven self-preservation at the expense of real solutions and dedicated leadership.



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Steve Litsios is an artist and frequent contributor to the Swiss Sharkforum. He lives in the French-speaking part of Switzerland and has frequently exhibited paintings, sculpture and installations in many parts of Europe. Here, he discusses the “king” of art fairs, the Basel Art Fair, called oh-so-trendily simply “Art” in German and French, as if the fair owned the word. I hope to have contributions from him at Sharkforum central regularly as well.

Art Unlimited
I just had to laugh: a lottery had been organized in a nearby town at the soccer field which had been divided into 4000 lots. Two cows were set free and the winner was the owner of the lot that received the first cowpie.



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I just received yet another invitation to a symposium (the preferred form of communication in the Consensoriat) concerning the Role of Exhibition Development in the Contemporary Artworld. I have a proposal.



Dictatorship of the Consensoriat

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I wish to introduce a new word and a new phrase into the international artworld dialogue. The Dictatorship of the Consensoriat. Please assist me by using it every chance you get. Forming neologisms is one of my favorite diversions, especially now that I have been learning Latin. It may be a slightly arcane hobby, but I enjoy it, and terminology can control far more of ones thought processes than we are often happy to admit — therefore, why not grab the bull by the horns and begin to develop our own phrases for what we feel it is necessary to discuss or critique. Shakespeare created words like amazement and radiance, which have become commonplace. These made-up words have stood the test of time because they expressed notions people wanted to articulate, and because they were understandable. Let's hope I can do something similar, if less inspired. In fact, Shakespeare, in his plays, sonnets, and poems, used approximately 17,677 different words —and of those 17,677 words, 1,700 were brand-new, coined by him.



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Is it just me, or does the contemporary art world leave you wondering as well, just how far can the definition of towering, mind numbing stupidity, in concert with almost total cognitive, visual ignorance, intellectual/ esthetic bankruptcy (not to mention plain old specious vapidity and complete and utter venality) be pushed? I ask this question, as it is quickly becoming what's most cogent and, compelling when considering the International/ Chelsea based art scene.....






At Attytood, Philadelphia Daily News' Will Bunch describes his "lone nut" theory of the assassination of the American newspaper. "The American newspaper is being assassinated by "a lone nut." And we're going to tell you the name of that lone nut: Craig Newmark of Craigslist... —a man whose altruistic vision of running a business to NOT maximize profits is now threatening the livel[i]hood of thousands of working men and women across this country, your neighbors who work at and publish your local newspaper, jobs that were once supported by the classified ads that have migrated to the most[ly] free (or low-cost) Craigslist.



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No expense accounts, or lunch discounts
No slimy deals,with smarmy eels........





All Good Things Must Come to an End - A Photo Requiem for CBGB's


This was part of the display in the gift shop in CBGB's Gallery remained open through Cct. 29th





Critique vs. Cronyism

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My Latin professor, Clemens Mueller, has pointed out to me that there were Sophists and there were Sophists. There is an element of legitimacy in their appreciation of the fact that there are no ultimate answers in a Platonic sense. However, I stand by my Socratic disgust at their vision of argumentation as only a charade, of sorts, and their desire to teach its workings as career advancement, with active avoidance of any consideration for whether it tries to refer to any truth. The point is not to nail down one truth, in any transcendental sense, but in a highly pragmatic, moral sense to try to tell the truth(s) --- plural may be necessary there.

A recent comment exchange at Bad At Sports got me to thinking, once again, about basic misunderstandings in the artworld arising from the fact that so many artworldians see everything in careerist, KC terms. Never stepping outside that frame to imagine that it has ever or could ever be otherwise.



Hardcore Real Estate Development Has Replaced Hardcore Punk

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Nostagia has never served me well. Perhaps that’s why until recently I’ve been ambivalent about the closing of CBGB’s, which has been a fixture on New York City’s Bowery for over 30 years.

For the last 11 years I’ve lived just a few blocks away from the club. And for at least as long I’ve listened years to the stories of friends who experienced a rite of passage at CBGB’s. Whether it was being pelted with spit from the audience while playing on a stage sanctified years earlier by the likes of the the Ramones, Patti Smith, Television, or Blondie, or simply getting drunk and vomiting in the bathroom or on the sidewalk outside, where know your favorite punk rocker once did the same.




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The comments by Bill Dolan, Newbie and others on The Shark's previous post may have swerved away from his point, but they raised an intriguing issue — the pressure on artists caused by simply having to make a living. This discussion reminded me of a fascinating blogsite, and a post on it. The site is called "The Intrepid Art Collector." It is by Lisa Hunter. Her mission is to create, encourage and assist new collectors. A worthy cause and she does it with panache on her enjoyable and readable site.



The One Percent Doctrine
By Ronald Suskind
367 pp., $27.00
Simon and Schuster

For those interested in the back-room machinations that got us stuck in Iraq, this is the definitive explanation, the best book to read. Suskind previously aired the grievances of former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill and the author’s inside access is proudly on display here. There is no attempt made to skirt the idea that Bush and Cheney planned to attack Saddam from the moment they laid claim to power. The question was, always: How did they do it? This book answers that question. Reading it is like reading a professional arsonist’s commentary on the hows and whys of the Reichstag’s burning.




(Neo-)Sophistry

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Brandl, Blind Mute Cover, 2002, Ink on Paper

There is a new Sophistry now rampant in the world and even in the artworld, where one would least expect it.



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"I've seen most creative minds of my generation destroyed by obsequiousness."

One and all seem to want to rewrite the beginning section of Alan Ginsberg's wonderful first line of his poem "Howl." The original: "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, ...." Yet I could not resist, for in art, culture and politics, as well as elsewhere, I find my version to be true.



the swamp

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The Swamp: the Everglades, Florida and the Politics of Paradise
by Michael Grunwald 450 pp. $27.00
Simon and Schuster


It is timely, in its way, this harrowingly academic study of the history of Florida and its battle with its extraordinary natural makeup. A most unlikely book, indeed, to catch this writer's fancy, as I am neither tree-hugger nor Southern History buff.



When the Train Left the Station...

The magnificent Michigan Central Station is slated for renovation as Detroit's new police HQ. In the meantime it looks like this:

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"A perfect example of Urban Decay in America known as Detroit's abandoned train station. Also Known as Michigan Central Station. Michigan Central Station once was a thriving epicenter for the city of Detroit and the whole Midwest. Now the abandoned train station sits with most of it's windows broken.

The architecture of the building is beautiful and definitely deserves to be saved."
Check out the rest of the shots at seedetroit.com.



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Mark, Perhaps it is in your best interests to defend the indefensible....

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The allegedly 21-year-old, certainly talented singer-songwriter Nellie McKay ('mi-KAI') has two strikes against her in one month. First, a few new tunes go to waste in the awful movie Rumor Has It, and, reports the NY Times, she's the latest musician to be told by the suits that she doesn't suit their biz plans.



Hey bikers! Quit being so environmentally friendly and passive!

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Since the new era that dawned on September 11th, rights have been in constant jeopardy. By now, most people dont even think of this as newsworthy.



Time, gentlemen, please

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Division west of Damen, Friday, 1:48am.



"Researchers Find Barbie Is Often Mutilated"

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A UK study shows Barbie's in for it: "The girls we spoke to see Barbie torture as a legitimate play activity, and see the torture as a 'cool' activity," said Agnes Nairn, one of the University of Bath researchers.




I'll take Henry Moore for 5.3 million please

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Well, Who is Henry Moore? Only one of the most important contributors to the world of abstract sculpture, silly!



OH! So THIS is What The "War on Christmas" Is All About!




The Young and the Restless

The stigma of the young artist is overwhelming and complete. It has come to define reality to such a degree that even the daintiest step forward appears overtly smug and presumptuous. The result is the most talented are obligated to wade through the shallow infant pool until their number is called, and they can join the veterans on the big waterslides.




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