Takashi Murakami Sculpture Installing @ 56th St

A piece of his ©MURAKAMI show that was too big for the Brooklyn Museum and has ended up at the Atrium in 560 Madison Ave. Naturally, it's across the street from Louis Vuitton. ©MURAKAMI opens Saturday.

Sagmeister at Deitch

The new year is rolling along like a dog wearing sunglasses on a well-greased skateboard. You keep staring at it, thinking "Aw, that's cute. Look at it go!" and then BAM! It's February. Wait, now it's damn near March? How the fuck did that happen? It makes one reflective, gazing off into blank white spaces, thinking about what could have been, what will be, what is. It was in this spirit, and the spirit of book promotion, that design master Stefen Sagmeister gave us "Things I've learned in my life thus far."



His lessons are pragmatic and simple: be confident, money can't make you happy, and drugs are fun at first but can be a drag in the end. These were rendered in a variety of ways including photographs, unripe bananas, video, and interactive projection, all spelling out the lessons word by word and all pretty awesome. This was a very fun show and a very crowded one. On ice was my own art opening beer-of-choice, the Grolsch swing-top bottle.

The Sagmeister himself barely moved all night, but he sure seemed like a happy fellow. He was constantly greeting people and signing books, with a little grin never leaving his face. This is how I imagine all Scandinavians are outside of the Norwegian metal scene. David Byrne was there, perfectly matching the giant gorilla in the middle of the room. Hanging around in the window of the gallery was Milton Glaser, writing messages to the people outside.










Back inside, one of the walls was covered with these hands reaching out, only a couple of which were real and occasionally moved. They all had on these golfing gloves with something along the lines of "Everything you do comes back to you in the end" written on them. Even with this warning, some dick stole one of the ones closer to the floor. Only time will tell that creep what ancient Norse curse Sagmeister put on those gloves. In the meantime, enjoy the book and his appearance in Helvetica (SPOILER ALERT: he's anti-Helvetica). Next up at Deitch's Grand Street Gallery is a show by Tim Noble and Sue Webster, who are currently setting up "Electric Fountain" in Rockefeller Center.

And now, we'd like to introduce what promises to be a long and distinguished series: Gallery!Baby!

Hunter College MFA Show.

Here are a few snaps from the Dec. 13th Hunter College Show.

They had glasses and dishboys too

I neglected to take a picture of the most orderly alcohol queue in all of New York's history. Sorry.

Julian Schnabel at Sperone Westwater
"Navigation Drawings"




We took this show in quickly after a round at a wine bar down the street. There were many suits and proper women and young ladies trying to look like proper women. D feels this is what "old new yorke looked like" and she does not mean the 70's.

There are a ton of openings on Thursday that we will miss, but it's still nice to see 2008 in full swing.

- W

Michelle Segre

at Derek Eller Gallery

Andrew Guenther, Things Ingested and the Shapes They Become

From a Distance
at Wallspace Gallery

Aqsa Shakil, Traces & Oliver Kamm
at 5BE Gallery

Ivin Ballen, 50/50
at Winkleman Gallery

In the hallway between Winkleman and Schroeder Romero. Not sure who curates this space or who it belongs to. Currently, its filled with green things and this...

Keeping Up With The Joneses
at Schroeder Romero Gallery

W 25

Andrei Molodkin, Sweet Crude American Dream
at Daneyal Mahmood Gallery

Bill Thompson and Peter Weber
at Thatcher Projects

Not sure who the two fellows are who H photographed.


Pieter Hugo, The Hyena Men [recommended]

Lust and terror falls over Chelsea

Photography: Julianne Swartz "Placements Portfolio"
Zane Lewis "Paradise Lost"
at Mixed Greens

The office that sits in the middle of the action here and just out of reach of the public was half-full with very nicely dressed young co-eds mingling with a framed portrait of Barack Obama and some wine, while the public got Rolling Rock. This gives it the feel of a country club that you are invited to by a member whose friends drop subtle reminders that you are a guest and have little chance of ever joining their club. Being that it is half country club and half public golf course, the name Mixed Greens could not be more appropriate. This place really does bring me back to my own days at the Academy, though it must be noted that they have much better taste here than did the exclusive scene that chose to shun me back in New England.

No major surprises here tonight, except for when I discovered the large drip portraits were of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt and not Jackie Onassis and Jack Kennedy. It also took us about 5 minutes to remember the name "Dakota Fanning," though D was right on point recognizing the Marc Jacobs ad. This was early, however, being the very first place we chose to meet up at. The gallery was nearly empty, while we were afforded the time to collect ourselves and get something in our stomach.

It should be noted that due to Mixed Greens' "shopping cart" feature on their website, the Internet has now enabled us to purchase the Paris Hilton CD and Zane Lewis' reworking of the Paris CD in exactly the same fashion.


AES+F Group "The Last Riot"
at Claire Oliver

Young adults and children in an apocalyptic struggle in a 3d rendered world with samurai swords, horses, UFOs, and stuffed animals. This was presented in three forms: a creepy video, prints that seemed to be stills from the video (though I could be mistaken), and faux-paintings of the same. For some reason, the images on the canvas was the least distracting and tied it all together in the most compelling fashion, though the video was very well done as well.

Will Yackulic "Focused Aggregate Intensity"
at Jeff Bailey Gallery

Jeff Bailey Gallery has put on some great shows this year and this was no exception; simple and hypnotic. D wants me to add that you can always count these guys having vodka tonics, a huge plus.

Javier Pinon
at ZieherSmith

Some woman who was somehow affiliated with the gallery took instant notice of me when I jokingly (okay, half jokingly) and joyously sang the praises of the fresh tub of PBR that had been freshly brought out. She started stalking me like a hungry leopard in the cold, desolate forests of northern Russia; keeping me at a safe distance, but never letting me out of her sight. H assured me that the room was full of gays, at least more than usual, and this must have increased her sensitivity to my raw masculinity. Plus it was apparent from my enthusiasm that I’m a fun guy, and let’s face it, she’s getting kind of sick of the circle she’s been in since she came to this city. Nobody just screams with raw passion anymore, nobody can just really enjoy a great laugh over a cheap beer. Her friends greeted cases of PBR like a diseased gypsy child in the street, but I embraced it like Mother Theresa. Well, after a few minutes of knowing glances being exchanged at close range and a couple hard winks I threw in her direction, she started to become self-aware and embarrassed. Don't worry your little head, sweet thing, there's nothing to be ashamed of. You dig my style and you know what? I dig yours too. The Mike Womack tripfest you guys put on last year was one of the best things I've seen in NY. But I do have a girlfriend.

On this night, they had some very clean collage work by Javior Piñón. It mixed cowboys and medieval dragon slaying. Nice.

Charline von Heyl
Wade Guyton
at Friedrich Petzel Gallery

Charline von Heyl’s show was the quiet yang to Guyton’s yin. First off, while both of these shows were packed, they still had Stella at quarter to eight, and we respect that. We went to von Heyl’s first. The press release says that the combination of printing methods (silkscreen, woodblock) mixed with paintbrush “creates a tension of stillness and speed, of noise and silence.” It doesn’t seem like this mission was successful, as the balance tilted much more towards the stillness and silence. The bright oranges, reds, and yellows weren’t as jarring as they intended to be, and the cumulative effect was fairly bland. As I think H pointed out at the show, though, there were more than a few pieces that would look pretty nice outside of the context of the gallery. Wade Guyton likely worked in a mailroom once fixing copiers and printers and has held a grudge ever since. I pray that with this show, he has found his peace. The space was reminiscent of a giant warehouse outfitted with harsh florescent lights that bathed everyone in office light. The floor was painted black and was quite sticky. The walls held the last works of an overworked inkjet printer that he had tortured to death. We really felt like we had entered the remnants of Manhattan's administrative Abu Ghraib, which, considering all of the jobs we had just got off from, was fairly traumatic. You can see how the printer struggled to survive, simply carrying out the suicidal mission it was programmed to do, and the best pieces on the wall was where you could witness the traces of the coughing fit the printer threw out before succumbing to rest. It's hard to really communicate how sinister this whole experience was, certainly a testament to an effective show. On the one hand, this managed to transform the entire room and everyone in it into part of the work, or rather made the focus of the room on the people and not on the black rectangles surrounding us. On the other hand, this was something we wanted little part of and quickly had to exit.

I do have to give props to Petzel for the balance of these two shows. One, a quiet peaceful experience with harmonious blends of printing. The other, a horror show of black ink death.


Clara Fialho
James Sheehan
at Merge Gallery

This was a nice capper to the evening. The gallery is out of the way, but I’m sure we'll come back. I’m also kind of a sucker for signs on walls saying “Wet Paint – Do not touch.”