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June 29, 2004 (Tuesday)
I started a new page on the eBay Fraud incident, so that I could attempt to get back to normal here. The last several days have involved way too much computer and telephone time, and not enough painting time. Thank you to everyone who wrote, and I'm especially grateful to:
- my lawyer, Steve Gorski
- artist Elise Tomlinson
- artist Marja-Leena Rathje
- arts writer/consultant, Charlotte Knable (and Larry)
- Mike Kendall and Scott Zoog at BANG
- Andrea Pramuk at Ampersand
- the folks at the Craigslist art forum
June 28, 2004 (Monday)
More about the the ebay art fraud - Maybe you're wondering, "Why should it matter to me if the art is a fake? I like it, I can afford it, why not buy it?" Well think about this: you're walking down the street when someone comes running out of a building just in front of you. They're carrying an expensive stereo, cord dangling. They offer it to you for ten bucks. You like it, you can afford it, why not buy it? If you're the kind of person who sees nothing wrong with buying stolen merchandise, then nothing I can say is likely to change your mind. But if the stolen stereo bothers you, then stay with me while I explain one visual artist's view of plagiarizing.
Last Saturday I came home after a pleasant day in the city to find a message from R---- on my telephone answering machine. He said that he was a fan of my paintings and he had just seen some of my paintings for sale on ebay, under another artist's name! I had never been on ebay before, but I wasted no time checking it out. What I found was that eBay Inc. seller "MikeK30" is selling work by "Outsider" artist Geraldine Klemmer, and it is labeled as "original art". But it is not original art, it is reproduced from copyrighted images belonging to many other artists, including me. (Ms. Klemmer's promotional materials mention that she is talented in "many styles.")
The work is advertised as original paintings, acrylic on canvas. The brushwork and colors are a messy and incompetent echo of the original paintings, but the underlying structure of the image is an exact duplicate, at 50% scale. My guess: she downloaded a copy of the image from the web, printed it on canvas, and did a quick paint-by-numbers kind of thing over the surface.
Some people have asked me why, since I have long since sold the originals, it matters if some yokel in Texas is copying my paintings.
I make my living as an artist, and my reputation as an honest businessperson is as important as my reputation for high quality work. When my clients see work that looks almost identical (at least to them) to paintings they have purchased from me, paintings they thought were one of a kind, and those copy-cat paintings are selling for a fraction of the price they paid me, those clients feel cheated. This impugns my reputation, lowers the value of my work, and makes it difficult for me to make future sales. Which adversely affects my already faint income.
And then there's the issue of stealing. It just burns me up to think of all the time and effort I took to come up with those images. I walked all over town, took lots of photos, revisited sites so that I could be there when the light was just right, collaged and edited multiple photos to compose the images in such a way that they were pleasing to the eye, as well as descriptive of my city. THEN I started the painting. All the con-artist did was steal that beautiful image and copy it. Not use it as inspiration, not interpret it - copy it, as exactly as her feeble skills could manage.
From what I could tell, based on the public records on eBay, this con-artist has sold at least 483 works, at $40 to $80 each, for approximately $19,000 to $38,000 worth of plagiarized art. Some of the buyers of this plagiarized art have purchased up to 55 pieces, and it's my guess that this work is being resold around the country in little boutique gift store galleries as "original art by Texas painter, Geraldine Klemmer."
I attempted to remedy this situation by contacting ebay, but so far I have not been successful at getting through to them. When I posted messages to their forums (Community Help boards, Member Violations, Fraudulent Activity, Customer Support) I received quick admonishments from the forum moderators that informed me that I was using the forum inappropriately. But no one from ebay has answered my requests for help in dealing the fact that one of their members is violating my (and other artists) copyrights as well as defrauding ebay customers who think they have purchased original art. They do not have a listed phone number, and calling 411 is no help. It has been three days now, and still they do not address this issue at all. Meanwhile, this person is free to sell more fake art.
Luckily, I do have other avenues for pursuing this problem, and I'm doing just that. I can't tell you any more about for now. But stay tuned for updates.
June 25, 2004 (Friday)
The Louise Nevelson show at Hackett Freedman
Louise Nevelson is one of those artists I admired, loved to read about, and respected. But I just don't "get" her work. I've really tried. I want to like it. I've spent long stretches of contemplation in front of her big black sculptures and... nothing. On Thursday I stopped by the Hackett Freedman Gallery to try again. It's a beautiful show. For one thing, they have a nice selection of brown/black found-paper collages that I'd never seen before. At first glance, the collages resemble Japanese brush paintings. Then there's the big room full of the big black wall sculptures. These seemed more delicate, and more animated than similar pieces I've seen in the past. The gallery staff told me that these were some of the last pieces she did - they were in her studio when she died. In the back room, with the Manual Neri marble sculptures, is a wall case with small sculptures by various artists. I'd seen most of these on previous visits, but I noticed one carved wooden piece that I'd never seen before. I was attracted to it immediately.
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It was a deep red wood block, about 12"x9"x2", minimally shaped and inscribed with a seated figure, then sanded and varnished. It reminded me of a sheila-na-gig figure. I was stunned to hear the gallery staff say that it was a very early Nevelson. There's no image of it on the gallery web site, and of course they don't allow photos, so this is a sketch of my imperfect memory of the piece.
Finally - a Louise Nevelson sculpture I can get enthusiastic about!
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Biography of Louise Nevelson from Guggenheim website
The Louise Nevelson show at Hackett FreedmanWebsite
Alan Bamberger's review & photos at SFArtOpenings
Kenneth Baker's review of the Nevelson show from the SF Chronicle
June 24, 2004 (Thursday)
Buying work from the artist's studio....
Yesterday afternoon, I visited an artist's studio to pick up one of his paintings, then in the evening another artist came over to my studio to get a painting from me. My home and studio are full of art - mostly paintings and photographs. Some I bought from the artists, some were purchased from a gallery, and some were obtained through barter.
My visit to David Steinhardt's studio was a wonderful and enlightening experience. I had been coveting one of his larger paintings for some time, when I hit on the idea of the "layaway retainer" system of creative financing. Which means that whenever I had a successful show, or sold a few paintings, I would give him some cash to put toward my credit for a painting. Not a specific painting - just my choice of whatever paintings were available, within my price range, at whatever time I chose to use my credit. Last year he boosted my credit by commissioning me to do a couple of small paintings for him.
So finally the day arrived for me to go pick out a painting. He offered me a cup of tea and set up a director's chair in front of a well-lit wall that was prepared with hanging hardware. Then he proceeded to pull paintings out of the racks, one by one; hang a painting on the wall in front of me; and step back to allow me as much time as I needed for contemplation. He stood slightly behind me, and was available for questions, but there was no pressure to talk about each one. Mostly, I just said "OK" when I was ready to see the next one. I narrowed it down to four pieces and asked him to take those out back so that I could see them in natural light. It was a tough call, but I chose one, and then immediately felt a possessive surge of confidence that this was undeniably the best painting in the studio. Now I have to find somewhere to hang it. My place already looks like Gertrude Stein's apartment, so this will be a real challenge.
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It was a fabulous way to look at art, and it made me rethink my own routine for visitors to my studio. When I have a client coming over to look at work, I clean the place up and then hang as much of the new work as I can. Most of the paintings end up in the hall, some in the living room, some elsewhere. When the client arrives, I give them a quick tour of the whole place and then let them wander as they wish, while I attempt that awkward balance between giving them enough space for contemplation and being available for questions and conversation. But now I'm thinking it might be better to pick the best spot for art, put the client in front of it, and move the art in and out...
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27 rue de Fleurus (Gertrude and Alice's place)
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| I wish I could say I gave Mark Grim and his wife Carol that treatment when they arrived at my studio to pick up a painting shortly after I returned from David's. But then, Mark was not here to decide on a piece, he had already given me a deposit on a painting he picked out of my most recent show, and I had the work wrapped and ready to go. We talked briefly about artists buying work from other artists. Most of us do, but I know a few who don't, and I've always wondered how you could justify asking other people to spend money on art, when you don't do it yourself. |
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June 23, 2004 (Wednesday)
A couple of blogging artists have commented about the effects of mental ecology on creativity:
Cinque Hicks:
"Last year I talked about getting out of a mindset of scarcity and moving into a mindset of abundance. I talked about it, but it was still in the realm of theory and difficult to put into practice.
So I don't know how I've finally clicked over, but I have. Turns out when you think there's plenty of time and money and creativity in the world, that turns out to be true. I reflected on this while running yesterday--that finding time to run used to be such a chore, everything used to be such a chore. I'd really forgotten how to have fun with a lot of things. Then somehow click! it changes over and I have almost more time than I know what to do with.
Which makes for much better art making. Or at least happier art making, not looking over my shoulder to watch the clock gaining on me."
Cinque Hicks at Bare and Bitter Sleep, Sunday June 20th
Witold Riedel:
"How much of the thought real estate in the head of a large part of the population here is set aside for nutritional matters these days? How much is taken by matters related to looks? (and this includes those whiter and whiter teeth, I think.) How much is taped off for that danger zone called career? How much of the emotional and thought real estate remains available for actual independent thinking and for this really stupid thing called dreaming? How much remains open for that thinking that is just seemingly useless and not really translatable into anything that could be sold or bought or… outlived."
Witold Riedel, June 21, 2004
I too have noticed a gradual shift in my perception of time, as I focus more on painting and less on "the world." I got rid of the television years ago, and cut way back on my exposure to print advertising. I almost never answer the telephone. My studio is next to my living quarters, so commuting is not an issue. I do what needs doing, when it needs doing. One thing leads naturally to the next, and when an idea comes, it has space and time to develop. Calendars and clocks seem more like arbitrary and peculiar social systems than heralds of the natural order. I have an abundance of time, and I greedily suck the marrow out of every last bit of it. "Entertainment" (as escape or relief) is not something I seek or need. Not that I don't enjoy theater, opera, walks in the park, or dinner and conversation with friends. But those activities are a natural part of the seeking, exploring, and ruminating that is the process of making art. Watching television and reading "People" magazine steal time and energy from that process. "Gee, she must be rich," you may be thinking, and I am, but not in dollars. I feel rich because all my basic needs are met and I have the luxury of spending my time however I want. Most of my friends are creative people so my life is filled with art, music, dance and literature - what could be better than that?
June 22, 2004 (Tuesday)
Best wishes from a foggy San Francisco to Rachael in Atlanta (soon to be in Rochester.)
June 21, 2004 (Monday)
Unbelievable - I just got a "members e-flash" from SFMOMA informing us that on June 30th, during the big whoop-dee-do members-only reopening of the permanent collection, the Museum book store will be closed for inventory.
I was at the corner of 11th and Ortega Friday evening when I looked toward the park and saw this view of the (under construction) de Young Museum tower:
June 18, 2004
Great posting by Tyler Green this morning about the center of the art world. He says there is no center to the art world, and that sounds right to me. Check out "We don't need no stinkin' center."
Yesterday I stopped in at the Catherine Clark Gallery (49 Geary, 2nd floor, San Francisco) to see the new Chester Arnold show.
The common thread in this show is multiples and how they make (or break up) the whole. Mostly it's bricks and people who work together or fall apart. And then there's the triumphal arch, which reappears as a central element in many of the paintings. Sometimes the arch is the only thing left standing in a wasteland, other times it's surrounded by crowds of people, or abandoned to slowly disintegrate in a classic Chester Arnold junkyard. He still likes to use fire and smoke in a landscape.
His painting style here is somewhat looser than I've seen before. The thin sketchy black outlines that define the composition are not always developed, leaving ghostly line images in spots. And his splattering in the underpainting is more apparent. Actually, all of these paintings are in thinner (or fewer) layers than much of his previous work.
It's difficult to draw or paint hundreds (or thousands) of small, similar-shaped objects. The creative mind rebells at this kind of repetition. It doesn't matter if your painting style is photo-realism or impressionism, this kind of scene is tricky. When I first started doing cityscapes I tried to avoid painting hill-top views. All those cars and tiny buildings receding into the distance... but then I got a commission for exactly that kind of scene. About half way through it, I finally got into the flow and was able to paint it easily. Then, just to make sure I didn't forget it, I made myself paint a couple of parking lots full of cars. I think of this whenever I see Chester Arnold's work. He's always painted scenes full of lots of little things (trash, tires, frames.)
This show has an additional treat for Chester Arnold fans - he painted 42 little self-portraits (2.5" x 2"), at a rate of one per day. They are delightful, beautifully rendered images. Some are reminiscent of Robert Arneson's funny faces. Others are serious, classical miniatures. One is him as an old man. One looks like it was done looking into a mirror first thing in the morning (before coffee.)
Another Gallery that shows his work, HERE
Kenneth Baker's review of the show HERE
June 17, 2004
Art and Books - Last night I trekked on over to the Parkside Branch of the San Francisco Public Library, to hear a lecture by local artist Janet Rosen. To be honest, my primary motivation was to scope out the situation, since I'm giving a lecture there myself next month.
She talked about understanding the creative process as a ritual, and using the physical aspects of the ritual "to get into a specific psychological space." She also demonstrated her palette set-up, and described the fast-drying nature of acrylics as " a feature, not a bug." A short question and answer period followed her talk.
Before the lecture I, wandered through the 700 section in the stacks to see what kind of art books they were carrying. Which reminds me - does anyone remember when I said I was going to do a survey of the best places to buy art books in SF? It was months ago. My original plan was to personally visit every bookstore in SF and put the info into a spreadsheet... but it's too big a job for the likes of me. There are waaaay too many bookstores in SF (over 200.) So let's just call this an informal review:
My Personal All-'round Favorite Place to Buy Art Books:
store - Green Apple
address - 506 Clement Street (at 6th Avenue)
shelf feet for art - 500 ft
It's the best if you're into browsing - they have mostly used books, an inconceivable number of books, in two buildings with many rabbit-warren rooms, sky-high shelves and stacks on the floor. I have come here looking for a particular book only a couple of weeks after the release date and found a (used) like-new copy for half-price. This is a big deal, when you're talking about big art books. Fine Art is divided up approximately like this: Collections & Monographs - 300ft, Art Criticism-45 ft, Artist Bios-30ft, Cartoonists, Comix & Graphic novels-30ft, plus two locked cases of collectible art books, and many open tables of remaindered art books.
My Next-best Bookstore, when I'm looking to browse recently published art books:
(and I apologize in advance to everyone who hates corporate booksellers, but they have the best selection)
store - Borders Stonestown
address - 233 Winston Drive, San Francisco
shelf feet for art - 300ft
They have maintained a surprisingly diverse and intelligent selection of new art theory and criticism since they opened a few years ago. Better than average selection of books about California and women artists. Good magazine section. (Incidentally, this Borders has twice as many art books than the one downtown at Union Square.)
My other favored places to search for art books:
store - Booksmith
address - Haight Street
shelf feet for art - 81 ft
Decent section on local artists. Excellent magazine section with lots of art, music and literature selections. Author trading cards, fantastic lineup of author readings.
New and remaindered are filed as "Art & Architecture"-11 ft, "Regional Art"-3 ft, "Criticism"-5 ft, "Monographs"-25 ft., One locked case with Boxed sets of JRR Tolkien, Robert Crumb, and a few other books over $150.
store - Black Oak
address - Irving Street (between 7th and 8th Aves)
shelf feet for art - 150 ft
Mostly used books, at higher prices than Green Apple, but less junk to wade through; Art History- 50ft, Architecture & Design-30ft, Monographs-58ft, Folk, Ethnic, Primitive-12ft. Black Oak has more expensive books in the open stacks (the kind that other stores would have locked up.)
store - Stacey's
address - 581 Market Street, San Francisco
shelf feet for art - 102ft
New and remaindered books; So-so general art section, but the best place to find art technique books. "Art History"-25ft, monographs-25ft, Critique-10, architecture-42ft. plus 40ft of art techniques. Excellent magazine section.
store - Alexander Book Co.
address - 50 Second Street
shelf feet for art - 54 ft
New books; "General Art"- 40ft, Architecture-14ft, Small selection, heavily influenced by the store's proximity to the Art Institute, and the needs of the students. There's about 80ft of graphics and design books. Intelligent, knowledgeable staff. Strong poetry and African-american literature sections. Interesting author events.
store - City Lights
address - 261 Columbus Ave, San Francisco
Small selection of new art books, mostly paperback, strong focus on design, avant-garde, low-brow, and fringe art. Same thing with the magazines - you won't find "Art in America" here, but you're almost guaranteed to find an art magazine you never heard of before.
store - Forest Books
address - 16th Street @ Valencia
shelf feet for art - 26ft
Very small store - used books, very discriminating selection, nice ambiance: neat, clean, organized, soft classical music playing, incense in the air. Small selection, but high quality, hard to find books
Best Museum stores:
SFMOMA - my favorite, because it's the biggest, it has the best selection of contemporary American artist monographs, and it's easily accessible from the street (without going through the museum.)
Cartoon Art Museum - Fantastic selection of comix and comic artists, graphic novels, and photography books - located just off the lobby (and right around the corner from SFMOMA!)
And SF artist Heather Robinson says this about buying art books:
"The place I actually buy the most art books from is amazon.com. I can browse topics there and find books I might not have seen otherwise, and the "serendipity factor" is high. I like also being able to resell books through them that I end up not using. They have a wide selection of Dover-type pattern books, which I use a great deal in my work, and technique books.
(You can sell TO amazon?, I asked)
You don't sell books to Amazon but you can sell thru them. Art books seem to sell pretty well; I just sold a couple of collage technique books I decided I wasn't going to use. It has to be a book they have listed on
their site. You set up a seller's account through them and can list any
number of books; you put in the ISBN number, set the price and condition. If it sells you ship it media rate within two business days. They reimburse you a bit for shipping but take a cut on the price, and deposit the money immediately into your account. The easiest way to get started is click the "sell yours here" button on a book page.
In person, I don't buy a lot of technique books, but I love browsing the
art books (monographs, criticism, collections) at the SFMOMA bookstore for inspiration and food-for-thought. And my absolute favorite to spend hours in when I want to treat myself is William Stout Architectural Books, at 804 Montgomery Street in SF, but I don't manage to get there very often. It's stuffed to the gills with books. Artwise, they seem to mostly have monographs. I can indulge my modern-design fetish there (though it's not something I really explore in my artwork)."
June 16, 2004
Two weeks from today (June 30th - members only, July 1st - general public) SFMOMA will be re-opening the permanent collection for a "fresh look." They have it divided between two floors: 2nd floor holds work from 1900 - 1960; 5th floor holds work from 1960 to present.
I just got an email from another artist who lives near me in the Sunset and I like his work (at least what I can see on the web.) His name is John Paul Turnage. This is a good time to remind everyone who lives in or happens to be in San Francisco, that we hold an art salon every Thursday morning, 9am, at the Corner Cup, 43rd and Lawton in the outer Sunset neighborhood. Drop on by if you want to talk about art. But be sure to introduce yourself - there are other folks just hanging out with their morning brew and we try not to harrass them.
June 15, 2004
Artists are touching up the murals around town... here are a couple I saw on Sunday:
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The North Beach mural, at the three-way corner of Columbus, Broadway & Grant. It's a beautiful montage of fishing boats, musicians, and local celebrities. This wall is in full sun most of the day, and the images were badly faded. |
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This Chinatown-North Beach mural is in Romolo Alley (off Broadway) and was still vibrant, but it was marred by graffitti.
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Painting Prototypes - how to make a living as an artist, part 2
A month ago (May 2nd) I mentioned that artists do all kinds of arty odd jobs to keep the bills paid during those long dry stretches when we wonder if we're ever going to sell a painting again. I described art supply demos as one example of that kind of work. Another example is painting prototypes for inventors and entrepreneurs. They have an idea for something they want to mass-produce, but first they need a single example to show the money people, and it has to look perfect. These guys (so far, they've always been men) find me through my website. One guy wanted me to paint a face on a robot. Recently I was asked to translate a photographic image into the pixilated format of a needlework canvas. My rates are pretty high and, whenever I ask them why they want a fine art realist painter for what seems to me to be a simple craft job, they say want someone who can render accurately. They seem to feel that if I can paint anything and make it look "real" I should be able to make their project look exactly the way they want it. And they're right.
I saw a brilliant advertising banner custom-made for a building near the Financial District. The designer copied the window style, size and placement to create this scene:
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| This is the view from the sidewalk. Straight-on view is below. |
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June 14, 2004 (second post):
Last Word About the Capobianco Gallery:
As of yesterday, it looked like this (at left, and below.) Seems to me she's out of business. Wonder why Lori Haigh emailed folks that she was reopening. Wonder what's going to happen to the art work still on the walls.
SF Examiner update:
"San Francisco Supervisor Aaron Peskin has dropped an idea to make City Hall the temporary home of a controversial painting depicting U.S. soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners. Apparently, the artist, whose painting started a series of strange threats and attacks against the owner of a North Beach gallery where it was displayed, doesn't want it shown there."
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Photos of Capobianco Gallery taken by Anna Conti on June 13, 2004. Interior shot through front window, above paper covering. |
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"Money, of course, is still needed to survive, but time is what you need to live. So, save what little money you possess to meet basic survival requirements, but spend your time lavishly in order to create the life values that make the fire worth the candle."
from Ed Buryn, via Rolf Potts, at Vagabonding.net
June 14, 2004 (first post):
I'm back from a week in Yosemite and the high country, hiking every day. I haven't read or listened to any "news" for almost 2 weeks, although I heard from fellow travelers about Ronald Reagan, Ray Charles, and Ashcroft's refusal to hand over the memos.
I saw this old juniper tree (at left) as while walking along the soft duff of the Lyell Canyon trail. The only sounds accompanying these views were wind in the trees, bird song, and the sound of my own breathing. Pine needles on the ground, warmed by the sun but still damp from the snow banks in the shadows, smelled better than any gift shop balsam pillow. It was the perfect attitude adjustment.
Now I'm ready to get back to work... spiffing up the website, cleaning up my studio, deleting all those returned postcards from my database, sending out slides, and oh yeah - painting. The first project is a job for cash, which I will tell you about tomorrow.
Catching up on the rest of the blogosphere, I see that:
Roberta Fallon and Libby Rosof at artblog posted this tip for artists on Friday, June 11th:
Foundation Center website will let you look for grants to individuals, for free (for 7 days) because June is "Funding for Arts Month"
Tyler Green at MAN pointed to new blog, Thickeye, which looks interesting.
Cinque Hicks at Bare and Bitter Sleep had this great observation on June 8th:
"Whenever I see works by self-evident brilliant minds deployed in the service of increasing alienation, pointless nihilism and the like, my brief moment of anger is always quickly overcome by a sense of sadness... Because I see all the energy, all the resources being poured into various forms of nothingness. I see entire rooms in museums and whole galleries turned over to Nothing. The reign of the cool kids. And it makes me sad because yet another opportunity to help people connect with each other and understand something real about the world has been lost."
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June 7, 2004 -
I am completely and utterly exhausted and I'm leaving for Yosemite in one hour - for the next week I'll be out of touch. I'll be back by the 14th with a full report of the show, but here are the high points:
- approximately 3000 visitors came through the door
- some people drove all the way from Sacramento, Petaluma, and Atherton to see my work
- many long-time fans/patrons came, and had encouraging things to say
- one couple brought me a framed photo of one of my paintings hanging in their home
- another couple wants to commission a painting
- I sold three paintings
- I made two gallery contacts
- I talked to an art student who wants me to lecture to his class
(and I didn't get any painting done)
Here's the show Saturday morning right before the doors opened:
June 2, 2004 -
And the plot thickens....
Hank Donat's column about the Capobianco Gallery closing up (because the owner, Lori Haigh, was assaulted after exhibiting Guy Colwell's painting of Abu Ghraib) presented a different view from the Chronicle and wire service stories:
"What started as a rally for supporters of freedom of expression had become an odd mob of confused art lovers trying to offer encouragement to someone who was either freaked out or indifferent. The artist, inexplicably angry at a generally sympathetic media, scorned supporters entirely."
Donat also says SF Supervisor Aaron Peskin may propose "a resolution affirming artistic freedom" - he wants to hang Colwell's "Abuse" painting at City Hall. (There's a front page story about Peskin's resolution in the June 3 SF "Examiner.")
The SFgate article, which earlier today had several photos of the "rally", as well as photos of the artwork, has removed most of the photos, but last time I checked the painting was online at Zeke's Gallery.
Today I got an email from Lori Haigh saying that the KRK Ryden / Winston Smith opening is back on- this Saturday, June 5th at 7pm (Capobianco Gallery, Powell at Columbus, in North Beach, SF.) Ryden and Smith are popular with the Squid crowd, so it should be an interesting opening.
An Irish paper questioned Lori Haigh's motives, dredging up some unsavory facts about her past and then saying:
"At best it appears Haigh was naîve - judging by her own statements - with regard to the impact of such an potentially explosive exhibition. In the worst light, savvy art dealers know political art will stimulate a strong public reaction, which is inevitably given a good deal of press coverage. The coverage is usually not a hindrance to any art dealer or artist's career. In this case it seems irrelevant to doubt the authenticity of Haigh's attacks. It is important to raise the issue of the nature of exhibiting art that is going to elicit a strong public response, and examine the motives behind doing so."
So... even though I'll be at my own show all day Saturday, I'm planning on heading up to North Beach afterwards, to the Capobianco opening... that is, if I can get near the place.
If you're new to this space, check out some of last month's entries:
May 2004
May 31 - the Stress of show Openings
May 27 - Pensions for Artists
May 26 - Working Under Pressure
May 25 - Focus on the Work
May 22 - Building art show Panels
May 19 - Jane Jacobs
May 18 - painting water
May 16 - Janet Rosen - why do we make art
May 14 - Welcome to new readers
May 12 - Salvador Dali
May 11 - James Turrell
May 8 - First Thursday was depressing
May 5 - Hairspray
May 4 - Botero
May 2 - How to Make a Living As an Artist - part 1
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