The Colours of Fall are settling in: Zen it

The month of September was very crowded, and went by way too quickly. The summer's gone, your tan never happened, the trees are already wearing their oranges, golds, bordeauxs and reds signaling their slow walk towards the death of winter, and you're thinking about Halloween costumes. Personally I feel like I missed the last rays of summer 2010 fighting with French grammar. Sounds tedious (and it is) but it remains a time warp.

Over at le Greffon they suggest a bit of Zenitude courtesy of Nam June Paik. I agree:

Zen For Film by Nam June Paik (1962-64):

The Pompidou also agrees: Autour de Zen For Film will be shown with a talk on the film tomorrow, 29th of September.

Murakami's Fall of Scandals

Takashi Murakami is an artist/designer/brand owner/billionaire and workholic. His work is based on the concept of the Tate Modern and National Gallery show "Pop Life: Art in a Material World," aka this object is a tacky, easy to make, and/or part of everyday culture, so is it art? (see past blog post). His latest venture is the design of the latest cover of Brit magazine Pop. Obviously the use of Britney Spears is 'edgy,' because, she too, is one of those ambiguous characters who is just as tacky, easily consumable but at the same time slightly auratic and controversial. So their association isn't that surprising - yet you should think it is. If anything is surprising here is the wonders done by good lighting, makeup and photoshop.

In parallel to that 'scandalous' cover, France is debating over the reasons why le Château de Versailles is presenting works by the Japanese artist, aka where is culture going? Where is the respect for the past going? etc... Like the Jeff Koons exhibition two years ago exactly, many are outraged but if things go as planned it will be a blockbuster exhibition. A scandal remains a scandal even if culture is at risk. It opens on September 14th.

NEW AGE FUN with a VINTAGE FEEL!!!

This is to American Apparel's bankruptcy, the New York Times' 20s something article and the death of the hipstamatic application:

One Goal, Two Girls: One Sound, Two Videos

One Goal, Two Girls Born the Same Day:

Aggravated beyond belief with the opening ceremonies of the Vancouver Olympics (between the plastic and simplistic versions of culture and history and the hypocritical nationalistic pride mixed in with the utopian beliefs of humanity as one although those Ralph Lauren suits sure made the Americans look a lot better than the rest of them) I promised never to watch any world event ceremony ever again.

But I did. I don't remember much of the Soccer World Cup opening, except for how annoyingly catchy Shakira and the Black Eyed Peas songs were compared to how much more talented and beautiful the South African Guitarist was (that I obviously, as well as symbolically for how the world works, don't remember the name of) but I do remember watching a video on female literacy that made me cry.

Obviously it was one of those change the world type of videos that immediately inflicts a deep feeling of guilt on any sane person by amalgamating 'african' children, poverty, dirt and destiny. But somehow in this video - by organization One Goal - that contrivedness is surpassed. It's a particularly precious, meaningful and poignant little video.  

Finally, I just put Florence and The Machine into the equation.

Florence and The Machine, Dog Days Are Over:

Arcade Fire's Nostalgia: The Past Packaged as New Age Fun with a Vintage Feel

Last month Chris Milk launched an 'interactive' video for the Arcade Fire's song "We Used To Wait."

While it has all the qualities to be the coolest thing on the planet - an interactive personalized trip into your childhood via multi-popup narratives (cool), google street view (super cool) and 2,335 likes on facebook (super cool and cutting-edge) - it's pretty much the visual version of the clunky nostalgia of the band's lyrics. 

If the polarized versions of the past and easy grabbing feelings of loss in their lyrics ("i don't want to work in a building downtown," "but in your dreams we're still screamin' and runnin' through the yard" or "all of the houses they build in the seventies finally fall") are tolerable because of the beautiful harmonies, in Milk's video it feels like a packaged rebellion (against what? time? change? suburbia?).

The plot is simple: in the pop ups trees growing through the (bad) cities our parents have built, and a runner (you) desperately tries to find his/her childhood by running away from his/her present (adulthood).

But the generic adolescent fear of change doesn't end there, the observer/main character can even send a digital message (a digital drawing/postcard from which root-like lines grow) to his/her past self (which is actually their tour).

Overall the whole thing is totally tacky. It's suppose to feel amazing;y cool and cutting edge, but it turns out ot be a bland version of what personal memories are suppose to be. Let memories run off on their own. Like Google trying to archive all knowledge, let at least memories alone (especially when google street view never gets an address perfectly enough for the thing to work).

To make your own arcade fire memories: http://www.thewildernessdowntown.com/

Slips instead of Bras, a Frank Capra passage into the 1930s: It Happened One Night

I saw It Happened One Night last night. I saw it on the premise that this was Hitler's favorite movie and that Claudette Colbert was French. 

Both arguments are true but slippery ones, and yet the movie is frankly quite great. It has the populist love affair mixed with the glitz and glamour of the contrived rich girl escaping rich life falls in love with handsome honest poor man, but it works. The scenario is witty, the acting actually believable. But the strongest point is the exterior settings which make the film a great medium to access the everyday (somewhat) of times past - 1930s roads, bus stops, stores, motels, farms - as well as customs - smoking, pressing clothes, hairdos and mustaches, slips instead of bras, manly high-waisted pants, print culture etc... 

Two extra details are the cherries on top: a flying machine worth Leonardo da Vinci's drawings of a half helicopter half plane makes it's entrance for the wedding scene and an actor playing a thief driver is 99% certain Doctor Phil's grandfather.

Here's an extract (with Doctor Phil's grandfather in the last second): 

Curating: Within Which All Things Exist and Move

I curated an exhibit opening at Art45. Although it opens saturday, the closing party is where things will be at: October 3rd with Pop Montreal, the artists and the catalog launch. Here's the press release:

Curated by Chloé Roubert, this exhibition juxtaposes images from Jon Rafman's Google Street View series with photographic urban shots from the 1950s onwards by Gabor Szilasi. By comparing these artistic approaches to past and current public space, the exhibit touches upon ideas of urban visuality, privacy and authorship.

Rafman will be in the forthcoming exhibit Free at the New Museum in NYC, and Szilasi is a recipient of the Governor General award whose retrospective was held at the National Gallery of Canada in 2009.

The Closing Party with catalogue launch and artists present is organized in collaboration with Art Pop of Pop Montreal, on Sunday October 3rd from 3pm to 5pm.

Art45 is open Fridays and Saturdays from noon to 5pm, or on weekdays by appointment.

Art45 - Edifice Belgo Building
372 St Catherine W. #220
Montreal, Québec
art@art45.ca

Lineups, Feeling Different and Dumping the Disc: Apple Marketing 101

Today Apple introduced the world to its redesigned iTunes symbol. Someone in their marketing department decided it was time to get rid of the CD that's hiding behind musical note. Who's uses CDs these days? Jobs doesn't.

Because I'm still not entirely over how the marketing geniuses that managed to create lineups for their new iphone came up with this boring logo, here's the totally iconic 1984 ad by Steve Hayden. 

It came out in 1984 to introduce the first Apple Macintosh personal Computer. A 'different' computer from the PC... Now people are lining up to be different. Which makes 1984 iconic and ironic.