It's not over "Only the good Die Young"

Tim Spelios, Leon Dewan , Brian Dewan, and Ken Butler (link right)
(click on images to enlarge)


It is not quantity but quality. Marcin Ramocki and Tom Moody (right)
Matt Freedman

Scott Fulmer
Photos: artMovingProjects/Aron Namenwirth
To dis-spell a rumor this was a closing party for Cynthia Bloom and Jens Brand's show at aMP
not a closing of the gallery. Their work will remain up for at least another month by appointment only. We will remain very much alive. We regret having to postpone the shows of Adam Simon and John Giglio.
Let's start a new rumor - look
for artMovingProjects or a gallery with a different name, same players to open in china town near the new museum fall/winter 2008. Cheers and thanks to all the performers for keeping the spirit real, surfing and burning. Also, Thanks to Dan Davidson who came up from New Mexico to help with installation which is continuing with hand made kites baring the i ching.

Closing Party Easter Sunday

"Fallen House of Cards" part of exhibition currently up, note: I am bringing back 40 more credit cards found in the Block Island House- This piece is highly influenced by Marcin Ramocki's Credit Card "Neo-feudal Screensaver" as seen in Zing Magazine and Mike Smith's Credit Card Piece recently exhibited in New York.

Performance: "Only The Good Die Young"
7.00 pm Brian and Leon Dewan - Tim Spelios
8.00pm Ken Butler
9.00pm Scott Fulmer

at artMovingProjects 166 North 12th st. Brooklyn
info. 917.301.6680

Cynthia Bloom large Paintings

Cynthia Bloom "untitled" oil and mixed-media on linen 7 x 8 feet 1970's
Cynthia Bloom "Fenton River" oil and mixed-media on canvas 9x12 feet 1970's

Jens Brand New Media Project Space

Music=0D=0D1 The idea:=0D=0Dis a DVD extract of the "respirator =
tracts/tracks" project, featuring the breathing sounds of one singer =
(Madonna) and one complete album (Music), including the music videos =
that accompany it.=0D=0DThe concept is based on an observation of recent =
pop-music. =0DSince some years the singers produce intense inhalation- =
sounds, before they start to sing the next phrase. =0DIn some songs the =
breathing is so intense that, if one would try breath along, you will =
start to hyperventilate.=0DThis "breathing" is supposed to express =
intensity, but also creates the "concept" of reality and physical =
closeness in the time of more distance creating digital and sampling =
based productions. =0DIn this sense it's like the "dust" filter of =
Photoshop.=0D=0DThe installation "Respirator Tracts/Tracks" is based on =
8 tracks and 64 breathing circles edited from different songs and =
stiles. Every sound is a sample from existing songs. Although the short =
excerpt does not allow to recognize the source, it allows to recognize =
the style of recording of the specific age.=0DThe "RT/T" sample library =
contains beathings from Enrico Caruso, Elvis Presley, Patsy Cline, =
Barbara Streisand and Sonnyboy Williamson up ( or down) to Bruce =
Springsteen, Madonna, Celine Dion, Britney Spears and others. While =
"RT/T" is running from a computer and due to the logics of set up =
constantly remixes itself, "Music" is a 5 channel work played from DVD, =
and thus with fixed development. =0D=0D2 The structure: =0D=0DMusic=0D=0D=
The album contains 9 songs, three of them with video version.=0D=0D=
Impressive Instant / Runaway Lover / I Deserve It / Amazing / Nobody's =
Perfect / Don't Tell Me

Cynthia Bloom "only the good die young"@artMovingProjects

artMovingProjects
166 N.12th St, between Bedford and Berry Sts., Williamsburg (917-301-6680, 917-301-0306).
Subway: L to Bedford Avenue  Thurday -Sunday, 1pm - 6pm
http://artmovingprojects.blogspot.com
info@artmovingprojects.com

Feb.28th - Mar.30th 2008 :) by appointment only
Performance, Ken Butler, Brian Dewan, April Smith, Scott Fulmer, and others- to be announced

Cynthia Bloom

“Only the good die young”

Paintings, photographs, credit cards, and assorted items come out of a home prepared for sale to support her upcoming medical expenses. Also, savaged from the house the manuscripts for the “Happy Holocaust “ by J. Zvi Namenwirth and the definitive text in three volumes on Mahler by his brother Micha Namenwirth. A mother-son psychodrama.


A new fresh spring and a fresh new sound:
I want that this song rings as the birds call
That oft heard on a summer night
In an old town along the water way.
Inside, it was dark yet the silent street
Collected twilight, last rays shone late
In the sky, there fell a golden speckled shaft
Over the roofs into my window pane.
Next blew a youngster as on an organ pipe,
That shook ripely in the open sky
As mellow cherries do when a springtime wind
Awakes in the woods to start its trip.
It roams on bridges, and at waters edge,
So slowly going, blowing everywhere.
Chirping as a long bird, unaware
Of its joy over the evening’s quietude.
And many a spent man awaiting supper meal
Listened as if it were an old tale,
Smiling while the hand that closed the pane
Dawdled momentarily for the youngster sang.

At war, I did dream it was wartime yet:
A wooden airplane tumbled from the sky
And rockingly drove through the grass
To stop the groaning, singing, and relief.

From the sickly ark came wounded animals
Of each kind one, dragging feet to a tent
While I was to beautify this heavenly house
With grass, tree twigs, the fieri firmament.

Then what did I see on a long whitish table
But the white birdie with the bluest head
Just a blue fire that in the evening heat
Burns on a summery hillside top.

Was he badly hurt and should I care for him?
Firmly he clawed my finger tight.
Then, it was night. Blenchingly white
Removed the dawn when the sun appeared.

And, examing my own two tiny hands,
The finger that he clawed became blue.
I wrote this verse as the bird did burn:
He glanced back as to bless me as it seemed.

(in scripted Cynthia Bloom the last poem 1991 by John Ree aka J. Zvi Namenwirth)

New Media Project Space

Jens Brand
http://aronnamenwirth.blogspot.com/2007/12/jens-brand.html

Opti-Disc rocks Masthead

Tom Moody screen grap from http://www.artfagcity.com/featured-artist/

BAM Silent Auction

Adam Simon "Jog" 42x32" acrylic, resin and modeling paste on canvas

http://www.bam.org/bamart/availableworks.aspx
BAMart@BAM.org/ 718.636.4101
Silent Auction Silent Auction
Contributing Artists:
Ida Applebroog • John Arsenault • John Baldessari • David Bates • Tony Bechara • Brian Belott • Ellen Berkenblit • Max Blagg • Thomas Brauer Howard Buchwald • Luisa Caldwell • Beth Caspar • Phillip Chen • Nicole Cherubini • Christo and Jeanne-Claude • Emilie Clark • Elisabeth Condon Nick Cortese • Reuben Cox • Crackerfarm • Cris Dam • Pia Dehne • Michel Demanche • Chris Doyle • Craig Drennen • Valentina Dubasky Marcel Dzama • Ron Ehrlich • T.R. Ericsson • James Esber • Margaret Evangeline • Carlo Ferraris • Carl James Ferraro • Craig Fisher • Nobu Fukui Ralph Gibson • Kate Gilmore • Deborah Grant • Theresa Hackett • Chris Hammerlein • Keith Haring • Nick Haymes • Eric Heist Christina Hejtmanek • Elana Herzog • Alex Hubbard • Judy Hudson • Timothy Hull • Mala Iqbal • Bill Jensen • Jasper Johns • Joan Jonas Isaac Julien • Maira Kalman • Alex Katz • Ilisa Katz Rissman • Lisa Kereszi • KK Kozik • David Kramer • Fay Ku • Jenny Laden • Louise Lawler Jim Lee • Annie Leibovitz • Sol LeWitt • Greg Lindquist • Kalup Linzy • Jane Logemann • Michelle Mackey • Jill Magid • Christa Maiwald Joe Mangrum • Sheila Metzner • Gerald Mocarsky • Meredith Monk • Jill Moser • Walter Martin & Paloma Muñoz • Rob Nadeau • Morgan O’Hara Tom Otterness • Christa Parravani • Enoc Perez • Lamar Peterson • Pete Pezzimenti • Ellen Phelan • Danica Phelps • Richard Prince • Brent Ridge
Marie A. Roberts • Nicolas Rule • Annette Rusin • Julie Ryan • David Salle • Katia Santibañez • Kenny Scharf • Paula Scher • Michelle Segre Stefan Sehler • Jimmy Serkoch • Leslie Sheryll • Danny Simmons • Adam Simon • Carri Skoczek • George Spencer • Jered Sprecher • Doug
and Mike Starn • A.L. Steiner • Pat Steir • Derek Stroup • Donald Sultan • Scott Taylor • Yuken Teruya • The Depthography Group: Robert Munn and Sara Cook • Gwenn Thomas • Sandra Valenzuela • Paolo Ventura • Maria Vergara • William Villalongo • Ian Wallace • Susan Wanklyn Frank Webster • William Wegman • Jessica Weiss • Stanley Whitney • James J. Williams III • Karla Wozniak • Rob Wynne • Will Yackulic • Ion Zupcu
Visit BAM.org/auction for artist updates
fourth annual
APRIL 3—13 Bid online at BAM.org/auction
Honorary Artist Chair: David Salle
fourth
annual
AUCTION COMMITTEE
Richard Stewart, RichardStewartFineArt, Chair
33 Bond Gallery • A. M. Richard Fine Art •
Andrew Edlin Gallery • Bespoke Gallery • Brian
Gross Fine Art • Brian Paul Clamp, ClampArt
• CANADA LLC • Christine Wächter-Campbell,
Winston Wächter Fine Art • Corridor Gallery
• Dam, Stuhltrager Gallery • Daniel Reich
Gallery • David Zwirner, New York • Derek
Eller • Esso Gallery • envoy • Erika Greenberg-
Schneider, Blue Acier Inc. • Florence Lynch
Gallery • Florence Neal, Kentler International
Drawing Space • Fredericks & Freiser Gallery •
Frederieke Taylor Gallery • Freight + Volume •
Heidi Cho Gallery • Ingrid Dinter, Dinter Fine
Art • Jeff Bailey Gallery • Julie Saul Gallery,
New York • Kathleen Cullen Fine Arts • Kyle
Kauffman Gallery • LMAK Projects • Magnan
Projects • McCaig & Welles Gallery • Metaphor
Contemporary Art • Metro Pictures • Mitchell-
Innes & Nash • Momenta Art • Morgan Lehman
Gallery • Moti Hasson Gallery • Nancy Horowitz
& Aron Namenwirth, artMoving Projects •
Nicole Klagsbrun • Okay Mountain, Austin TX
• Parker’s Box • Paul Sharpe Contemporary
Art/Paul Sharpe Projects • PPOW Gallery •
Rivington Arms • Robert Miller Gallery • Samson
Projects • Sandra Gering, Gering & López Gallery
• Sara Tecchia Roma New York • Jessica Smith •
Smith-Stewart • Stephen Haller Gallery • Taxter
& Spengemann • The Proposition • Thomas
Erben Gallery • Tony Shafrazi Gallery • Tracey
Norman, Yancey Richardson Gallery • Tracy
Causey-Jeffery & Ch’i Contemporary Fine Art
• Tricia Wimmer & Joe Weiner, Pink Elephant
Projects • Yvon Lambert New York • ZieherSmith
BAM BOARD VISUAL ART COMMITTEE
Beth Rudin DeWoody, Co-Chair
David Ramsay, Co-Chair
Tony Bechara
John Morning
Danny Simmons
For additional information please contact BAMart at
718.636.4101 or at BAMart@BAM.org
Support for BAMart programming is provided by the
Robert Lehman Foundation
Bid online at BAM.org/auction
CLOSING RECEPTION
Please join David Salle, Honorary Artist Chair,
and Annie Leibovitz, Friends of BAM Chair, to
celebrate the closing of the auction.
SUN, APR 13, 3—6 PM
AUCTION CLOSES AT 5PM
NO RSVP NEEDED
DOROTHY W. LEVITT LOBBY
BAM / Peter Jay Sharp Building
30 Lafayette Avenue / Brooklyn NY
Silent AuctionSilent Auction
APRIL 3—13

Devon Dikeou and Luke Murphy@ artMovingProjects extended

The show is extended regular galley hours until Feb 24th

Wagmag Benefit

The Third Annual WAGMAG Benefit Art Show, TOMORROW, 7-9pm
Front Room Gallery, 147 Roebling, Brooklyn


Admission is free, Tickets for artwork drawing are $150
Tickets can be purchased at the gallery or online at:
www.frontroom.org or www.wagmag.org

WORKS AVAILABLE FOR VIEWING ONLINE

Reception and Raffle of work Friday February 8th, 7-9
Viewing hours: Fri-Sun 1-6

All galleries included in WAGMAG are have been invited to participate in this exhibition, as well as some prominent artists from the neighborhood. The resulting show will not only generate funding for WAGMAG but also reflect the spirit and personality of the Williamsburg art community.

Works will be on view from Friday, February 1st through Friday February 8th. Tickets available during viewing and on the benefit evening. A ticket for $150 guarantees a work of art, a drawing decides the order in which ticketholders select an artwork. Benefit evening, Friday, February 8th 7-9, drawing begins at 8:00.

Galleries:
3rd Ward, A.M. Richard, AdHoc, Art 101, ArticleProjects, artMovingProjects, Capla Kesting, Ch’I, Cinders, Dam Stuhltrager, English Kills, Figureworks, Front Room, Janet Kurnatowski, Hogar Collection, HQ, Jack the Pelican, Klaus Von Nichtssagend, Like the Spice, LMAK, McCaig-Welles, Momenta, Nurture Art, Parker’s Box, Pierogi, Pocket Utopia, Secret Project Robot, Sideshow, Slate, Stripeman, Vertexlist, Williamsburg Art & Historical Center

Works by:
Amanda Alic, Sarah Barker, Kris Benedict, Cecilia Biagini, John Breiner, Steven Brower, Ken Butler, Lincoln Capla, Nayda Collazo-Llorens, Andrea Cote, Ethan Crenson, Joy Curtis, Rosie Cutler, Peggy Cyphers, Joshua Davis, Lisa Dilillo, Ben Evans, George Ferrundi, Andrew Garn, P.S. Gordon, Erik Guzman, Steven Harding, Sean Hemmerle, Amy Hill, Eric Hollander, Brece Honeycutt, Mary Hrbecek, Richard Humann, Alessandro's Keegan, David Kesting, David Kramer, Brian LaRossa, Yulia Lanina, Brian Leo, Sean Bishop Leo, Terrance Lindell, Liz N’ Val, Ben Lorocco, Stephen Maine, Sasha Mallan, Stephen Mallon, Karen Marston, Patrick Martinez, Meridith McNeal, Loren Munk, James Austin Murrey, Aron Namenwirth, Mike Norkin, Ian Pedego, William Powhida, Cathy Nann Quinlin, Ross Racine, Ellen Rand, James Reeder, Ron Richter, Tom Rosenthal, Nickolas Roundané, Carlos Roque, Emily Roz, George Spenser, Sante Scardillo, Jimmy Serkoch, Philip Simmons, Skewville, Jeremy Slater, Patricia Smith, Rodger Stevens, Mary Ann Strandell, Sara Ching-Yu Sun, Miho Suzuki, Chris Twomey, Joanne Ungar, Kathleen Vance, Don Voisine, Jason Van Anden, Susan's Wanklyn, Chadwick Whitehead, Alun Williams, David Wells, Mika Yokobori

The Front Room is at 147 Roebling St.
(the corner of Roebling & Metropolitan, Brooklyn).
For more information please contact:
Daniel Aycock
Director
(718) 782-2556
daniel@frontroom.org

Sponsored by:

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Exchange in Berlin

We are in discussion on doing an exchange with this gallery in Berlin. artMovingProjects is growing wings.

http://www.neuesproblem.de/

http://www.okkupation.com/

Barack Obama

http://my.barackobama.com/NYlookup
With extremely close races shaping up in states across the country, we need to win every delegate we can in New York.

It's time to put an end to the say-anything-to-win politics of the past. Together we can face the challenges of the future with a new kind of politics and a new kind of leadership.

You have built an unprecedented grassroots network for Barack. You've made us competitive all across the country, so that for the first time in a very long time, every state, every delegate, and every vote will count.

Find your polling place -- then invite your friends and family to look up their polling places and vote for Barack this Tuesday, February 5th:

Representing Estate of Cynthia Bloom

Cynthia Bloom "untitled" signed reverse oil on linen 13x42" 1961

artMovingProjects is proud to represent the Estate of Cynthia Bloom

Dress Code

Dress Code an exhibition curated by Liselot van der Heijden, presenting the works of Robert Boyd, Elke Lehmann, Jillian McDonald, and Momoyo Torimitsu. January 10 - February 9, 2008 Opening, Thursday, January 10 from 6-8 pm LMAKprojects, 526 west 26th Street # 310, NYC between 10 and 11 avenue Dress Code emphasizes the social and emotional impact of clothing. Since the relationship between the body and the public sphere is mediated by clothes, the art projects in this exhibition understand clothing as a vehicle for generating meaning, situating the body as part of a larger social construction. The projects in Dress Code use clothing to examine the construction of identity within specific cultural frameworks like consumer and corporate culture, fashion, gender stereotypes, and a location where fears and anxieties are both a personal and a collective experience. The artists use humor and irony to communicate these complex social issues to audiences often unaware that they are part of an artistic project. The projects use various strategies such as performance, public intervention, displacement, ready-made objects, as well as subversion and appropriation of mainstream media, commercial exchange, commodity objects and advertising. The Virgin Collection was conceived by Robert Boyd while traveling through southern Spain. He was struck by the number of bridal stores and by the white-hooded robes worn by members of the Roman Catholic fraternity known as Nazarenos during Holy Week. Merging the two forms of gender-specific robes into one harmonious yet disconcerting ensemble disrupts and questions roles of gender, while the Nazareno reference can be read as a Klan reference. The juxtaposition of different attires becomes a disconcerting conglomerate of ideals-virgin purity, matrimony, beauty, fraternity, supremacy. The Virgin Collection functions as a dislocation of these ideals. The work is fundamentally political in nature but utilizes transgressive qualities of mimicry as its core. While neither didactic nor proselytizing, the work is simultaneously critical, bizarre, humorous and frightening. Through its biting humor, it asks that these ideals be reconsidered and viewed again. For Re-Bagged: First Collection German artist Elke Lehmann shopped at mega-brand stores including H&M, Puma and GAP to select materials for her clothing/packaging hybrids. Lehmann then employed various strategies to insert each shopping bag (sometimes even including the receipt and change) into the garment it contained, creating pouches, sleeves, skirts, hoods and adjustable design elements. Dissolving the boundaries between container and contained, Re-Bagged: First Collection collapses the effectiveness of seductive marketing displays. Lehmann's collection amplifies our consumer culture's emphasis on packaging, brand names and logos and ultimately issues of waste and recycling. Seams by Canadian artist Jillian McDonald is part of her ongoing series of performance interventions in public spaces that attempt to wrest everyday activities from their usual associations. In a downtown Manhattan storefront, one year after September 11 2001, Macdonald invited passersby to lend an article of clothing of personal significance, for the length of the exhibition. When participants agreed she asked them to speak with her about their personal fears and anxieties. Fears and anxieties are based on our personal and collective experiences. McDonald translated each individual's fear into a personal protection message, to counter the fear. During 4 weeks, McDonald was present in the storefront, hand-embroidering into the seams and inverted places of these clothing items the individual messages for each owner. Seams was commissioned by The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. In the Miyata Jiro project Japanese artist Momoyo Torimitsu uses the stereotypical image of Japanese businessmen: "I made a life-size crawling robot as a corporate soldier to let him crawl on the streets of big cities in the world. It provoked a variety of different responses showing how people react to the stereotype and revealing their own cultural preconceptions." The Miyata Jiro performances triggered a variety of different reactions on the streets in New York, London, Paris, Amsterdam, Sydney, Rio de Janeiro, ranging from smiles and amusement to anger, to worries from people who took him for a real person. In addition to the videos documenting Torimitsu's performances and the public's reactions, there will be documentation of "Non-art" media reactions to the project specifically made for this exhibition. These are mainstream news papers to gosship magazine, fashion magazine. Dress Code was originally shown at the Art Gallery of The College of New Jersey. For more information, contact the gallery at 212 255 9707 or info@lmakprojects.com. You can also visit our site at www.lmakprojects.com

New Yorker(short list)

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/events/art/2008/01/14/080114goar_GOAT_art?currentPage=5

Fine Art Adoption/Merit Badge2

from artistorganizedart
Jason Middlebrook at RoCA
Merit Badge2
Rockland Center for the Arts (RoCA)
October 14, 2007 - May 18, 2008

correspondent, Williamsburg Artist Carrie Waldman

"My father was an Eagle Scout in Michigan. He once told me that the only Merit Badge he didn't get was due to the fact that he didn't live near an ocean. As I grew older I knew I had two possible paths to take, follow his lead and try to become an Eagle Scout, or ignore the Boy Scouts all together. ...I never became a Boy Scout, but I did follow in my father's footsteps by becoming an artist." -Jason Middlebrook

The Artists Reception Sunday, October 21, 2007 1pm - 4pm

The children, the bikes loaded into 3 cars, the trip up the palisades…is there a merit badge for family loyalty? Nepotism?

We routed our family Sunday activities to include an expedition to the Merit Badge 2 show at the Rockland County Center for the Arts. The 2 young boys in our troop immediately made like scouts and took off for the woods. The trail beckoned at the far end of a sculpture strewn field. And at the entrance to the woods hung a series of framed images on the trees. Images of trees, framed with bark branches. No, they were bark, pieces of bark from trees like those in the woods, framed with bark branches. Pieces of landscape framed by other pieces of landscape. “Woodscape” by William Stone. And off into the woods we followed.

The Merit Badge Show was organized by Jason Middlebrook, a prolific and energetic artist living in the Hudson Valley town of Craryville, NY. He curated the first Merit Badge Show on his own land in Craryville. The idea of earning merit badges strongly resembles the approach of many current artists. “Scouts must follow strict required tasks to learn about subjects that they normally wouldn't investigate”, says the catalogue (and then make a show about it, if you’re an artist). That said, this is not necessarily the approach of the artists included, who used the theme to their own ends. Jason included his father, David Middlebrook, in the show. David constructed a poetic emblem of environmental abuse in which the sky is falling, gaining him the Sculpture Badge.

According to LYNN STEIN / ROCA Exhibition Director, David Middlebrook is a California-based sculptor who specializes in site-specific work, private and public commissions, and smaller sculptural elements. He works with a broad range of stone, marble, ceramic and bronze mediums in dimensions ranging from 50 lbs. to 50 tons. Middlebrook creates art that connects people with their cultures. He has more than 35 commissioned pieces to his credit. She includes that David Middlebrook's work, The Sky Is Falling, explores the quagmire of environmental abuses and unexplained natural phenomena portrayed here as a poetic mystery of a childhood innocence, first observed by "Chicken Little."

My brother, William Stone (participating artist,) followed his own surrealist/poetic approach to earn the Forestry Badge, with his piece, “Woodscape” (described above.) Interesting. Here's his quote:

"The landscape is the landscape. What an incredible concept Merit Badges are. They seem more Grecian than military. To earn all of them, the goal, would constitute a start on a truly liberal arts education. Perhaps they were originally intended to guide a boy to a hobby. I only earned one. I picked the one that already was my hobby, a no-brainier."

Hyungsub Shin’s artificial synthesis hung from the trees like a floating upturned root system. Julian LaVerdeire’s yellow rope swing most intrigued the boys, who were not permitted to follow their inclinations and swing on it. Other pieces were missed entirely in the conflict between following the map and following the boys- I guess we don’t get our Pathfinding Badges for the day.

The works on display will be left to weather the winter outdoors. One imagines some of the pieces looking quite beautiful in the snow.

Now, there I am, an artist writing on my own brother's work, wondering why he gets more attention and noticing that my own work is orphaned in the Fine Art Adoption Network. (FAAN, a great concept for organization, see my own work in it below.) In the interest of rivalry I probably should say something more competitive, critical and monotone.

William Stone has shown his work both nationally and internationally, and has been included in recent solo exhibitions at sites such as the James Fuentes Gallery, NY; and the Art Moving Gallery, NYC. Stone's recent group exhibitions were shown at Deste Foundation Galleries, Athens, Greece; the Archivo Emily Harvey Foundation Galleries, Venice, Italy; and the Deborah Colton Gallery, Houston, Texas.

#permalink posted by Carrie Waldman : 12/18/2007 09:21:00 PM

Friday, December 14, 2007

The Fine Art Adoption Network by Adam Simon
www.fineartadoption.net

The Fine Art Adoption Network was commissioned by Art in General, NYC, as part of their New Commissions program. The web master is John Weir. We launched FAAN in April 2006.

The goal of FAAN is to help increase and diversify the population of art owners and to offer artists a new way to reach their audience. Artists post images of works they are willing to offer for adoption and potential adopters email them through the site. The artists choose an adopter from among those that solicit them. The artist receives no money for the artwork and the only costs to the adopter are whatever is required to transfer the work. Once the transaction has been completed, the artwork becomes the property of the adopter.


Carrie Waldman, More Moonbeams, 2005. 192 x 144 inches

Since the launch of FAAN in April 2006, over two hundred artists have joined and bestowed their art, almost 1,000 people are participating as adopters, and 237 adoptions of contemporary artworks have taken place. In its first six months, FAAN recorded more than 80,000 visitors, and the audience increases monthly. Media coverage has included Art News, Italian Vogue, the Christian Science Monitor, the New York Sun and strong coverage on the internet.

What I would really like to see is FAAN expanding until it is functioning throughout the U.S. as well as internationally. If this were to happen, it would mean that we would truly have in place an alternative system for the distribution of art. Not one that is intended to replace the art market but one that serves as a necessary corrective, allowing artworks into homes without the prerequisite of purchase.

There is an interesting dialogue that naturally occurs around the subject of art adoption. It includes the art market, the relationship between art ownership and class, the degree to which artists are subject to market concerns and ideas about the concept of gift economy and its relation to art.

The art market is one of the few markets where supply is not dictated by demand. Artists continue to make art whether or not they are able to sell it. Meanwhile the market depends on an artificially created notion of scarcity of good art. The notion of rarity that the market requires depends on a small number of artists being selected from a large pool. Partly because of this, the art market can only accommodate a fraction of the art objects that are being produced. The market does a terrible job of putting art into a lot of homes.


Matt Freedman, Lost Puppy, 2006. 2 x 4 x 3 inches

Over 200 adoptions have taken place through FAAN in the past year. Artworks are finding homes in unlikely locations. A fifth grade class in New Brunswick, Canada adopted Matt Freedman's, Lost Puppy, an ironic site-specific work made for FAAN, as well as Perry Bard's Zone, a sculptural proposal for peace in Korea. A policeman in training adopted Cathy Quinlan's drawing of a head of the Madonna, after Duccio. Carrie Waldman’s billboard-format painting, an enormous, slightly pop view of daises in a field, has been installed on the outside of a building facing the town diner (where farmers have their morning coffee) of a small town in upstate New York. No one has adopted Sheryl Oring’s Writer’s Block, a series of metal cages each filled with approximately 30 antique typewriters, but I believe she is waiting for an institutional adopter.


Sheryl Oring, Writer's Block, 1999. 36 x 36 x 36 inches

The fact that both the artists and the adopters choose is one of the interesting features of art adoption. Ultimately though, it is the artist that chooses. Regardless of who gets to choose, a series of interactions is being initiated around the artworks. These interactions are multi-faceted and personal. For the adopters, it can resemble Internet dating. They present both who they are and the nature of their appreciation for the artwork. They are convincing artists by telling them what the artworks mean to them. For the artists, this can seem an unusual relationship to an audience. Typically in the art world, they are the ones soliciting recognition.

Art-lending institutions exist both in Europe and the United States and bartering art for services is not uncommon, but art adoption, as far as we know, is new. Both the artist and the adopter are aware of participating in something outside of the commercial norm. There is a shared sense of shaping a transaction differently, in part because they are in direct communication with each other. The art on the FAAN website is marked by its separation from expected venues. It is displayed, not as work soliciting buyers and not as part of an exhibition but as an object in a gift economy.


Cathy Nan Quinlan, Study for a Contemporary Portrait: Duccio,
2001. 17 x 17 inches

Once a system is established as the norm it becomes difficult to look at or to look for alternatives. The art market replaced a system of patronage by the aristocracy. I don‘t think anyone wants to see art adoption replace the art market. If FAAN continues to grow at the current rate, it could have the opposite effect of strengthening the art market by expanding the population of art collectors. Collectors who adopted work through FAAN have gone back to the artist and bought additional work.

It is too soon to know how many artworks adopted through FAAN are reaching homes that would be unlikely otherwise to house original artworks. Potentially, we are talking about a different relationship between art ownership and class. It seems clear that the demographics of people adopting art through FAAN are wider and more varied than those acquiring art through the gallery system.

The art world is small but the world reached by the Internet is huge. Ideally FAAN will continue to expand geographically so that someone browsing the site in Boise, Idaho or Brennero, Italy will be able to find artworks both locally and internationally. The one thing the adopters will have in common will be an appreciation for what artists do.

*artists wishing to post work on FAAN should contact info@fineartadoption.net


The Fine Art Adoption Network (FAAN)


Artists selected from the online network where all of the artworks on view are available for adoption:

Matt Davis

Laura Devendorf

Danielle Dimston

Marcy B. Freedman

Ben Godward

Jill Henderson

Matt King

Dave Krueger

Jacob Rhodes

Analia Segal

Jason Simon

Tattfoo Tan



January 4 – January 27, 2008

OPENING, Friday January 4 6:00 – 10:00 pm

POCKET UTOPIA

1037 Flushing Avenue

[Just off the Morgan L, Bushwick]

Open Saturdays and Sundays 12-6 and by appointment

Call: 917-400-3869

Pocket Utopia is pleased to present an exhibition of the Fine Art Adoption Network (FAAN). FAAN is an online network that uses a gift economy to connect artists and potential collectors. Pocket Utopia will function as a clearinghouse and will facilitate the adoption process. Post-studio artist and Pocket Utopia intern Audra Wolowiec selected the works on view. The adoption of artworks between the artist and collector will be finalized through the website (http://www.fineartadoption.net/); no purchases will be made.

This exhibition of FAAN is the third in a series examining creative pocket utopias that began by opening a file at Pierogi (The Pierogi Show at Pocket Utopia in September 2007). Then in December 2007 with a show titled “Etsy,” Pocket Utopia ventured into the crafty commerce of the online place to buy and sell all things handmade with the same name (http://www.etsy.com)

There will be a salon discussion held on Wednesday, January 23rd at 6:00pm where Adam Simon and FAAN artists will talk about money and its role in the art world. Refreshments will be served. This discussion is a part of Austin Thomas’s salon series titled, “Excuse me, you have art in your teeth.”

Pocket Utopia is an away-from center, off-center, exhibition, salon and social space run by artist Austin Thomas.


Pocket Utopia
1037 Flushing Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11237
www.pocketutopia.com
read the blog at:
http://pocketutopia.blogspot.com/