Viva Las Vegas!

One of my favorite art encounters of Earthworks Road Trip Volume Two, featured James Turrell's Akhob (Egyptian for "pure water). We were not allowed to photograph it and the first two images below are by Florian Holzherr (via).

Akhob "is a series of rooms designed to cause peripheral and visual disarray through the intensity of 900 color-changing LED lights. With no apparent edges to walls or ceilings, the exhibit eliminates one’s ability to comprehend depth, providing a mystifying sense of infinity."

To view the installation, one must make an appointment with the Louis Vuitton flagship store and arrive on time (they were adamant about the latter). We were escorted into an elevator and deposited into a dark space reminiscent of a hotel lobby. Guides dressed in white introduced the artwork and James Turrell's other projects and then led us around a corner to the room above (far darker in real life). We sat on the bench on the right, removed our shoes and phones, placing them in wicker baskets, and ascended the stairs. The rooms were green when we entered and exited.

As with most of Turrell's artworks, the color slowly changed from warm to cool. In Holzherr's image above, the man is standing in front of a six foot drop and the entry stairs are in the extreme foreground. We stayed long enough to watch the edges of the walls disappear. Although I have never experienced this in person, I thought it could be similar to standing on a ship's prow in the middle of fog and seeing nothing but soft blue light and clouds.

Outside the Vuitton store in the Shops as Crystals, we were able to photograph another Turrell installation which our guide informed us was "broken" (the color stayed the same rather than shifting).

We took the elevators into the installation and even saw ...

... a magenta and purple cast sprinkler head on the ceiling (a small detail reminiscent of the plant growing in the Flavin installation at Chinati).

It was no surprise that swimming pools were high on the Las Vegas agenda. The weather was not as hot as anyone predicted over the course of two weeks and unfortunately, Las Vegas was no exception. Envision the above as a body of water one would jump into quickly and immediately search for warmth on the other side of the rocks. We spent time in all four of the Excalibur swimming pools...

... found our way into two at Luxor ...

... and later that evening, were asked to leave one at Caesar's Palace.

We visited the Neon Museum at dusk (and unlike a handful of inebriated people on the tour, were not dismissed because we could barely stand up straight). A few of the signs were restored while others were illuminated from multicolored lights on the path.

Here were some of my favorite details from the hour long tour.

The final two images remind me of the era my grandfather and his wife visited Las Vegas, sending postcards and the occasional $1 Eisenhower coin. The Strip's history rotates on a regular basis and we learned from the tour guide that the Flamingo will be the next to be demolished. The Neon Museum needs a few more acres to cover all the signs that will be donated in the future. In the meantime, it is one of the best places to see decades of history condensed into a small area.

Earthwork Viewing Kits and A Month's Worth of News

In a March of medical leave and recovery (long story), I am *slowly* working on catching up and preparing for the Photolucida portfolio reviews in April. In addition, everything is progressing well with the planned Earthworks Road Trip Part 2: Lightning Field is reserved, airplane tickets are purchased, rental cars and hotels are lined up, etc. This version of the expedition is in conjunction with a course I am co-teaching with Lara Kuykendall called Space, Land and Concept in Art of the American West. I have been moonlighting on that blog but also contemplating what artwork I can make during the second visit.

In 2009, the collaborative project was a huge undertaking and this year, as co-leader of a field trip with eight students, I will not be able to devote as much time as I would like to each space and will have other responsibilities. However, this will not prevent me from making art and I have a few ideas that I would like to pursue in May.

• First of all, the Amarillo Ramp rock will be tossed (it's about time)!

• Secondly (in the spirit of goofiness), the car will make another appearance. Rather than seeing how close I can drive to an earthwork, I will continue my sweeping panoramic photographs from the back seat.

• Thirdly (for Instagram), the I-need-to-grow-a-third-arm-and-hand binocular photographs will make another appearance.

• The fourth concept revolves around a photograph of James Turrell's Roden Crater Field Kit that I discovered last month.

James Turrell, Roden Crater Field Kit, 2000

I immediately thought of Fluxus Travel Kits like the one below:

Fluxus Travel Kit, c. 1970

I am going to make Earthworks Viewing Kits for the following: Amarillo Ramp, Lightning Field, Double Negative, Sun Tunnels, and Spiral Jetty. I have half a mind to make one for Roden Crater but since once again, we were dismissed by the Skystone Foundation (nor do we have $6500 each at our disposal and will have to resort to seeing this instead) a viewing kit for an absent piece might offer needed variation. I am withholding the details of what this entails but I promise it will not be as mundane as what one sees in the Turrell image above. In the meantime, it will be my first sculpture project that will not rely on a photograph and I couldn't be happier to add this to my never ending list of all the series I am currently working on and cannot seem to finish in a timely manner.

Saving the best news for last: I received my sabbatical and will be spending the 2016 spring semester finishing Autobiography in Water at the final two destinations: New Zealand and Australia. At least there is hope for completing something in the not so near future!

Artist Stalking: James Turrell #2

Once nearly five years ago, I was in a very small airplane flying over James Turrell's Roden Crater outside Flagstaff, Arizona. When the pilot offered to buzz over his ranch, the answer was an unequivical yes. A photograph was snapped and two years later, the series Stalking Artists: In Search of Home began. I have since learned that well-known artists often have one, two, three, four, and even five houses in his or her name. This week, I added the second of three addresses to my image folder on James Turrell. Here they are with a few observations.

How come every time I am (legally) around a property James Turrell owns, a truck appears making me look even more suspicious?

There is hope in making a decent living in the art world if Turrell now lives in a mansion this size (wondering if there are any experimental light spaces hidden behind all those windows?).

In addition to trucks appearing when I am nearby, the presence of a porta potty is also a commonality between his Maryland residence and Roden Crater. There is construction happening here unlike the earthwork in Flagstaff.

The front view was far more welcoming than I initially suspected from the satellite view on Google Street maps, as was the friendly woman who waved while walking her dog shortly before this photograph was taken.

Omnipresence: James Turrell

James Turrell  [image via]

Last week, the New York Times Magazine published a lengthy article  by Wil S. Hylton on James Turrell's concurrent exhibitions at LACMA, MFAH, and the Guggenheim. Considering how much I have researched Turrell in the past, there were many passages with new information that were fascinating.

"Not everyone enjoys the Turrell experience. It requires a degree of surrender. There is a certain comfort in knowing what is real and where things are; to have that comfort stripped away can be rapturous, or distressing. It can even be dangerous. During a Turrell show at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1980, several visitors to a piece called City of Arhirit became unsteady in the bright blue haze and tried to brace themselves against a wall made of light. Some of them fell down. A few got hurt. One woman, who broke her arm, sued the Whitney and Turrell for more than $10,000, claiming that the show made her 'disoriented and confused' that she 'violently precipitated to the floor.' Another visitor, who sprained her wrist, sued the Whitney for $250,000. The museum’s insurance company then filed a claim against Turrell, and although a member of the Whitney family put a stop to the suit, Turrell still gets sore thinking about it. He spent $30,000 to defend himself, but it’s not the money that bothers him the most. It’s the lingering feeling that the work didn’t . . . work. 'On some level,' he told me, 'you’d have to say I failed.'" 

"We were at his townhouse on Gramercy Park in Manhattan. Like Turrell’s other two homes, in northern Arizona and eastern Maryland, it was furnished mostly in the Shaker style." 

[I am more astounded at how many houses some famous artists own. Looks like I have more artist stalking research to do especially since James Turrell's compound near Flagstaff was the very first photograph taken that inspired this series.]

"Much of his art is located in the far corners of the earth. There is an 18,000-square-foot museum devoted to Turrell in the mountains of Argentina, a monumental pyramid he constructed in eastern Australia and an even larger one on the Yucatán Peninsula, with chambers that capture natural light."

James Turrell, Roden Crater [image via]

"On a recent drive across the desert to see the crater, he turned to me and said, 'I was absolutely going to get this project done by the year 2000, so I’m a little embarrassed by it. There have been periods of euphoria. There have been times that I’ve been discouraged, and times when I’ve just gone out and enjoyed the place — and realized that maybe this would be it. Maybe it wouldn’t get any further.'"

"In 1966, he was arrested for coaching young men to avoid the Vietnam draft. He spent about a year in jail, and after his release in 1967, moved into a shuttered hotel in the Ocean Park section of Santa Monica."

"Over the next five decades, he would become an expert on light-bulb varieties, studying the distinctive character of neon, argon, ultraviolet, fluorescent and LEDs. For his 70th birthday last month, a friend gave him a bulb he’d never used before; Turrell was ecstatic."

"We were pulling around the base of the crater and began to climb the side. Halfway up, we turned into the parking area of a small lodge. The lodge is built mostly from local stone and leftover materials from the crater project. There is a small kitchen, a large common area and four bedrooms tucked into the back. Someday, Turrell hopes to build additional lodges and rent their rooms, so visitors can spend the night at the crater." [someday indeed]

Chuck Close's experience visiting Roden Crater in a wheel chair and the author's description of seeing the crater at dusk are not to be missed. The article ends with this passage: "The crater was perfect, and incomplete, and his time to finish it was winding down. 'You know,' he told me earlier in the truck, 'I’d like to see it myself.' [I have always known that one day I will return and see the interior as the "grand opening" at the base was never quite enough.]

Follow this link to see how the Guggenheim is constructing his piece in the rotunda. The museum guards are going to have their work cut out for them preventing people from photographing it.

Water as Desire

Brent Cole and I are working on an exhibition proposal focusing on our mutual interest in water. He left a book in my mailbox today and after perusing through it, three images encapsulate the feelings of desire I often associate with clear (yet often blue) liquid.

Anonymous 1965 photograph taken in Corsica of a child learning how to swim. This contraption reminds me a tiny bit of this.  I would have loved to learn to swim in the Mediterranean and how much fun would it be strapped to this?

 Swimming pool in Saint-Martin, Lesser Antilles, 1986 (no need to elaborate)

I am wishing James Turrell made more audience participatory pieces like this. It was exhibited at Le Confort Moderne Center for Contemporary Art in Poitiers, France in 1991. "It displayed the four elements and invited the visitor to dive in." I'm wondering about fire...

James Turrell at the Franklin Park Conservatory

I had often heard that I should see the James Turrell light installation at the Franklin Park Conservatory in Columbus, Ohio. It was always followed by "It's a bad one though." I wondered what that meant and approached it this weekend with the hope of finding out. Light Raiment II, 2008 can be found in the Palm House at the Conservatory. As soon as night falls, the building is illuminated by bright colors that change gradually over the space of several minutes. For a sequential example of this, see James D. Decamp's photographs of it here.

What makes a James Turrell artwork bad? Some thoughts:

1) After calling the Conservatory and talking to a very nice woman who informed me of the best way to view it during a cold winter night, I learned about the back parking lot - "ideal for watching it from the car." Unfortunately, the only real view was from the "Reserved Parking" space where I illegally parked for 15 minutes. Even though the lot was empty, this activity produced anxiety nonetheless. As seeing two of Turrell's artworks in the past have induced vomiting, adding stress to the "physical discomfort" list surely wasn't promising.



2) There is a security truck that circles all the parking lots every 5-10 minutes. The headlights from this vehicle often obscure the night time viewing experience especially when parked in the wrong spot.

3) First and second impression of the installation itself: Laser show at the planetarium? Where is the Beastie Boys soundtrack?


4) What's this I see once exiting the car and looking up close? Dale Chihuly sculptures tucked in every nook? I couldn't help but associate all my opinions of Chihuly as a sell-out onto those of Turrell the longer I viewed this piece. Proximity was not helping.

My two favorite Turrells are the Skyspace in the Live Oak Friends Meetinghouse and The Light Inside in the tunnel between the two Museum of Fine Arts buildings in Houston, Texas. Both work with the existing architecture to a far better degree as the building doesn't dominate the changing light. His signature use of flat space is also missing at the Conservatory. I couldn't help but feel that Turrell was "phoning it in" with this installation.

Here's to another commission that will probably pay for Jimbo the security guard's salary who inhabits the top of the Roden Crater in a Land Rover looking for trespassers. Better yet, how about opening the Crater to the general public a year sooner than the always-delayed-expected-finished date posted on the website?

Artist Stalking

I'll get to the rest of the Chicago posts tomorrow (the photos have been trapped on my camera - not the iPhone - and have been difficult to get to), but while I'm thinking about it... the four images I've accumulated of artist's houses. I'm formulating an artist statement as this is a series that I will continue for years to come. I would like to include some females yet stick to houses, not apartment complexes or condos. This is also a rough print - I don't know if I will continue to use this scale or format or use of text. The Turrell piece will be substituted with my next place that may possibly take place next weekend.... Robert Adams.

I recently discovered John Gossage's The 32" Ruler and his images of his new neighbor's home... Donald Rumsfeld (both images below are Gossage's).



Glad I am not alone in this endeavor.



The quadrant at the top of the post is part of this exhibition. Illicit activity = yes!

Monterey Bay Aquarium: Mesmerized by Movement

Everyone is photographing the leafy sea dragon.


The top of the wave.


Underneath the wave (just like the car wash).


As visited earlier this month in Muncie.


The school of fish visible near the end were so breathtaking that I spent more than 20 minutes videotaping each one thereafter.


Imagine music like Enya playing amidst all those voices.


Then I moved closer.




James Turrell + Fish


Opting for the still due to many people not reading "No Flash" and flashes going off on multiple occasions in the middle of the video.


The seahorse the size of my thumbnail was this audience member's favorite but they were too minute to photograph with an i-Phone so here is a potbellied one instead.

Opening Week at the Venice Biennale

Sigmar Polke, Polizeischwein, 1986 in the ILLUMinations Exhibition at the Venice Biennale

The Venice Biennale opened to the general public on 4th June. Several people have asked me why I am not there now and there are several answers: 1) I have to go to California first (hence the title "From Venice Beach to the Venice Biennale") and this date occurs in late June due to a nonnegotiable family reunion, 2) I am not interested in the awards, parties, and general hoopla that goes with an opening - though secretly it would be fun to go once BUT the premise of my project is not based on attending this portion of the event, 3) I need time to make the work I am bringing to Italy after I visit California and unless I took the last month off school, that wasn't going to happen, 4) Many people visit the Venice Biennale after the opening - that is why it is up until November. Sure I will be missing out on seeing artists, curators, and (gasp) celebrities but in July I will have a clear view of the artwork and a good place to stay (even though I know the hotter it gets, the smellier it is in Venice).

In my extensive, watching the press and the Biennale Twitter feed (yes, I downloaded the iBiennale i-phone app too & have investigated buying my tickets online - it's only $32 for the day which seems like a steal considering it's Italy), here are some facts that I've gleaned. The Biennale is the oldest, most established and largest festival celebrating contemporary art. It is located in a park (Giardini) and comprises 30 permanent pavilions. In addition to various countries selecting artists to represent them in each pavilion, the director of the Biennale curates an exhibition in one of the large exhibition halls. Prizes are bestowed (Gold Lions) as well as Life Time Achievement awards. In 2009, Yoko Ono and John Baldessari won the Life Time Achievement awards; Ed Ruscha represented the US in 2005; 89 nations are included in 2011 including three newcomers - Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, and Haiti.

This year, Bice Curiger, co-founder of Parkett, curated the ILLUMinations Exhibition: "The work of Venetian Renaissance painter Tintoretto will play a prominent role in ILLUMInations. Many contemporary artists claim to be searching for the same light that animates some of Tintoretto’s later works." There are 82 artists represented in this exhibition including: Christian Marclay, James Turrell, Martin Creed, Trisha Donnelley, Fischli & Weiss, Gelitin, Sigmar Polke, Pipilotti Rist, and Cindy Sherman (i.e. ones I'm interested in seeing).

The art world and art prizes leave something to be desired (check out this link where Richard Bell flipped a coin to determine the winner of Australia's Sir John Sulman Prize) but here are the winners at this year's Biennale:

The German Pavilion received the Gold Lion for National Participation. Christoph Schlingensief died of lung cancer four months before the show opened. The curator, Suzanne Gaensheimer, wanted to "demonumentalize the German Pavilion" with the inclusion of his work. The installation looks fascinating so I'm excited to see it.



Christian Marclay's The Clock (in the ILLUMinations Exhibition on display at the Corderie Arsenale) won the Gold Lion for the Best Artist in this show.



The Silver Lion for the most promising young artist at the ILLUMinations Exhibition went to Haroon Mirza.

Of course there are the unofficial exhibitions like Commercial Break which features Richard Phillips's awful (quoting c-monster) "underwear ad" or Lindsay Lohan video. I love that much of the press Lohan is getting in regards to this video is how she is under house arrest in Venice Beach and won't be able to attend the Venice Biennale. Surely there is artwork to be made about that statement.

Here's a good video clip from the BBC on how art meets politics at this year's Biennale (and it shows Mike Martin's installation as mentioned below).

Here is some great coverage in the New York Times.

What I look most forward to seeing:
• The French Pavilion as represented by one of my favorite artists ever, Christian Boltanski:



• Christian Marclay's The Clock (particularly because I ran out of time to see it while at CAA in NYC in February)

• Gelitin's Installation featuring a glory hole (!) & James Turrell in the ILLUMinations Exhibition



• Mike Martin's transformation of the British Pavilion to an Istanbul house
• Thomas Hirschhorn because I loved his Universal Gym
• Harmony Korine and James Franco's Rebel


Maurizio Cattelan, The Others, 2011

• I will see any Cattelan installation any chance I get especially when he acquires 2000 fake pigeons from a theater supply company and installs them all over the Biennale.


Cindy Sherman, Untitled, 2010

• What on earth is Cindy Sherman up to in her ILLUMinations Exhibition entry?

The US Pavilion will have it's very own posting up next. All still images via.

Very Interesting.....

From the Art21 Blog: "Hiroshi Sugimoto and James Turrell are among several artists from The Pace Gallery who will present major projects during the Venice Biennale opening in Italy this June. Turrell will show a work at the Arsenale. Turrell will be included in "The Edge of Becoming" at the Museo Fortuny. The exhibition will include seven photographs from Sugimoto’s "Lighting Field" series—works created by applying electrical discharges to photographic dry plates to recreate major discoveries of scientific pioneers."



Installation View of "The Collectors" by Elmgreen & Dragset at the Danish and Nordic Pavilions in 2009 via.

Here's Looking at You James Turrell

Three Hours and Nine Minutes Away From Roden Crater

Yves Klein hated birds (yet imitated one convincingly in Leap into the Void)

Yesterday while sitting in the White House Cafe in New Harmony, IN where I went to pick up my artwork, I read Peter Schjeldahl's review on the Yves Klein retrospective currently on display at the Hirshhorn Museum. Klein has fascinated me since I saw another of his retrospectives at the Reina Sofia in Madrid in 1995. My Spanish was minimal and I didn't understand most of the text alongside the artworks so I came home and researched him extensively. I can't say I love his work but I do like his concepts - inventing International Klein Blue (IKB), serving blue cocktails at an opening that turned everyone's urine blue, convincing the post office to take one of his IKB stamps as an official way to send his announcements, using fire as a mode of making art, and the fine art of photo collage with his Leap into the Void.


Klein's Blue Monochrome, 1960

Schjeldahl writes: "He hated birds, he said, 'because they tried to bore holes in my greatest and most beautiful work.'" That work being the sky... and to claim it as his own is one of the most egotistical statements I have read in a very long time. I keep thinking about the bird as interruption and can't help but feel that Klein missed the point.

Once when viewing James Turrell's sky space at the Live Oak Meeting House in Houston, TX, I saw an airplane and it's trail mark the perfect blue. I have never forgotten my friend Kelli's description of watching a balloon float by one evening while staring into the void. Those are the moments that make that artwork memorable when an entity that shouldn't be there momentarily makes an entrance.



I think John Baldessari, whose retrospective is currently on display on the West Coast, would agree.


John Baldessari's Bird, Airplane, Bird

The opposite effect can also occur when the sky is obliterated by the birds as seen in Lukas Felzmann's photographs.



I've always loved this image and for a very long time, it was my desktop wallpaper on my laptop. Then one day my hard drive crashed and I lost the name of the person who made it. It's title currently exists as "0019E95D.JPG" so if anyone ever sees it and can give me the full documentation, I would be grateful to give credit where it is due. This sky interruption reminded me of Kelli's visit to Turrell's piece yet also of another beautiful ending...



to the Truman Show. Both these images show the moments where truth becomes a facade. The balloon's shadow gives it away and Truman on his quest to sail into the horizon, ultimately ran into it with his sailboat. I would never claim the sky as my own creation or sign it as Klein did at the age of 19. I am far more interested in those "holes" that Klein despised.