self promotion

Heading to Chicago soon and trying to get my ducks in a row. When we return it will be the week before First Friday and it will be April. Ah spring. Things are budding--all raw and insistent. A good time to note fruit trees...they flower in spring and a good time to think about the future.

In other news, please come to my show, The Economy of the Amateur, at Fluorescent Gallery (627 N. Central Ave, Knoxville, TN. 37917). You will have the chance to "make money" and to spend the "money" (what do all these quotation marks mean?) on locally sourced products. Fun for all ages and adult beverages for those who are adults.

Hope to see you there.

Ley of the Land

Nostalgia

I'm trying to embrace my nostalgia about art and labor-- to hold it up and laugh at it. This figure is my idea of salt-0f-the-earth, agrarian-based, slightly benign capitalism. Ah yes.

Riches!

I'm realizing (daily) that I need to pay more attention to the branding of this upcoming project. One, it will force me to nail down a sort of thesis statement or viewer experience. Two, branding will help me deal with the vastness of the gallery. It's a large space, and I can't have people wandering around without direction. I want to manipulate the viewer. Manipulation has a negative connotation, but you (the viewer) want to be manipulated. You do.

When you go to a concert, you expect the performer to be committed to her performance (early Chan Marshall excepted). It's not about convincing you to agree with the experience, but about the conviction of the experience itself. Joy Davis came and spoke to my foundations students about the importance of committing to your performance and actions. The sentiment extends across other media as well.

Over at boingboing.net (the bloggiest blog in the intersphere) they talked about the Cult of Done. While I don't agree with everything listed in the manifesto, I love #4 and 5:

• Pretending you know what you're doing is almost the same as knowing what you are doing, so just accept that you know what you're doing even if you don't and do it.
• Banish procrastination. If you wait more than a week to get an idea done, abandon it.

So, onward, upward, and back to my paper on the "ingenuity of the New York School in engaging their contemporary constraints." Ah, grad school.