unplanned collaboration with mrheaIth, SeacrestCheadle and ryder
return of the energy cardigan
Thomas Frank, in a Salon article comparing Pres. Obama to Jimmy Carter and discussing Rick Perlstein's new book on the '70s:
Like Barack Obama, Jimmy Carter was drawn instinctively toward austerity—keeping the White House thermostat down and advertising his personal devotion to domestic thrift by donning a cardigan in a televised chat on the energy crisis.
Felt compelled to leave this comment, even though it's hopeless:
Ahh -- the myth of the Carter "energy sweater." The "sweater" wasn't about turning down the thermostat -- he began wearing it shortly after inauguration to show he was a down home guy, in reaction to the pomp of Nixon's "imperial presidency." Sometime in the '80s it became a Republican meme that Carter was a wimp shivering in the White House rather than a manly energy squanderer, and the sweater's meaning transferred from "humility" to "thrift." Perstein's book should have clarified this but perhaps it didn't.
John Pomara, Digital-Distraction exhibit
...at Barry Whistler Gallery in Dallas
Digital-Distraction
Oil enamel on aluminum
48" x 36"
There is glitch art and then there is obsessively hand rendered, meticulously-crafted (but not too meticulously-crafted) glitch art. Wish I could be in Dallas to see the show -- the artist's exhibit in NYC last year gave an idea of the surface sensuality and presence of this work. By "not too meticulously-crafted," that's to say there are little blurs and slippages that remind you a person is making these, albeit self-effacingly compared to painters who want you to notice what individualistic hands they have.
michael manning at bill brady
Am not going to make it to Kansas City to see this show at Bill Brady's gallery but this intrigues, as a way to present digital painting and collage. Instead of the usual chin-scratching circuit around the perimeter of the gallery, moving from one expression to the next and saying, "I see," the viewer inscribes a much tighter circle, gawking "into" this tangle of overlapping (literally and figuratively) ideas. Not to say this hasn't been done -- think Maurizio Cattelan at the Guggenheim -- but it seems like a good way to answer the naysayers who think this is just commodified abstract painting as usual. A cynic might say this is commodified media art as usual but that's why we need to be in Kansas City, looking at the individual objects in this cluster. I know (a) it's a combination of canvas, video, painting, 3D graphics, media quotation and photoshoppery, and (b) it's probably smarter than any attempt to reduce it to a discussion about medium, or post-medium, based on seeing Manning's shows in NY recently. The artist's site gives some additional insight into what might be on those screens and surfaces.
Update: The gallery has some additional installation shots up.
Quantum Leap Sideways (new Bandcamp release)
Am pleased, and yet, humbled, to announce a new LP on Bandcamp: Quantum Leap Sideways.
10 tracks, consisting of mostly new material, continuing some lo-fi sampling ideas explored on the releases 40 Yards from the Machine and Household Kit. A small, nerdy collection of Eurorack sampling modules makes many of the sounds. Lower sampling rates and bit depths sidestep the tech world's inevitable drive to bigger files and bloatware, while still exploring some twisted notion of the "state of the art" -- hence the title of this release.
This is my ninth release in 2014. Your support in the form of buying the LP or songs would be very encouraging, but all the material can be streamed.