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The Whitney Biennial opened yesterday. This map shows the locations of each artist generalized to the city they claim on their CV. This map doesn’t go into where the person was born, but more what art scene they engage in. A clear trend emerges for this year’s biennial of contemporary American art.

Further, this piece about Collecting Biennials in the New York Times is a great discussion of what happens after.

New York boasts 22 artists (+4 if you count Brooklyn). Los Angeles claims 12 artists. There are a few other American-based artists sprinkled outside these large art magnets, with single artist nods to the scenes in Portland and Chicago. The remaining 4 artists are based in Europe, although 3 were born in Northeast USA. Nothing to speak of from the South or Southwest, but are we surprised?

Feb. 28 – Update 1: Thanks to reader MLM, Tam Tran’s entry has been changed from Los Angeles (based on this page of outdated information on ArtNet) to Memphis, TN.

I will post photos from the show as I slowly get them finished. Exhibition runs through March 13, 2010.

Opening Reception: Thursday, February 11, 2010, 6-9pm

Facebook Event Page

(New York, NY) The Abrons Arts Center is proud to present the site-specific exhibition, Transparency Now, in the Charles E. Culpeper Gallery. Hunter Cross employs materials common to mid-1990s office environments and elementary school classrooms, stacking prefab bingo chips on overhead projectors to produce images reminiscent of microscopic imagery and vector graphics.

These ‘overheads’ work with the available color palette and are built from a set of devised rules, routines and patterns. This imagery creates a mysterious environment stuck in time, recalling an abandoned office meeting or scientific visualization. By focusing on color and light and its interaction with the site’s glass cases, Hunter Cross scales his work using the compression capabilities of the projected image (e.g. small objects creating larger images) to encourage questions regarding an art object’s materiality and the ease with which its image can enter and exist, perhaps more effectively in a virtual realm. This work is part of Transparency Now, a series of installations demonstrating the potential of this set of rules, routines and patterns when forced to adapt to different site scales.

Visitors are encouraged to walk around the projectors and photograph themselves in the projections to be included in an online archive. Photos of any quality should be emailed to: hunter@huntercross.com.

Hunter Cross (born 1980) received his BA from Trinity University in 2003. He has exhibited at Austin Museum of Art, Art Palace, Dallas Contemporary and Arthouse, and has recently been awarded a large-scale public art commission from the City of Austin. He lives and works in Austin, Texas.

For more information visit www.abronsartscenter.org or www.huntercross.com.

Abrons Arts Center Henry Street Settlement
466 Grand Street (on the Lower East Side)
New York, NY 10002
212.598.0400

Trains: J/M/Z or F to Delancey/Essex; B/D to Grand St.
Gallery Hours: Tues – Sat 11am – 6pm.

PDF press release

Come see Jubilee and many other large-scale works at the opening tomorrow on Saturday, November 14 from 7-9:30pm.

Box 13 Artspace
6700 Harrisburg
Houston, Texas
November 14 – December 17, 2009
Opening reception Saturday, November 14, 7-9:30pm

BOX 13 ArtSpace is pleased to present three exhibitions opening Saturday November 14, 2009, 7:00 – 9:30pm. The bulk of the exhibition spaces will house Hasta La Basura Se Separa [artcrush], an exhibition curated by the Austin-based group Los Outsiders: Salvador Castillo, Michael Anthony García and Hector Hernandez.

Originally presented at the Galleria del Espacio Cultural de la Antigua Aduana in the border town of Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mexico, Hasta La Basura Se Separa [artcrush] features the work of 13 contemporary artists from Texas, New York & Utah. The exhibition will be on view through December 17, 2009.

Candace and I are working together on the newly launched candacebriceno.com. We built on top of a custom version of Joe Tan’s Flickr Photo Album WordPress plugin that allows her to manage the new website conveniently from a Flickr account.

Her show in Dallas is still up at Mighty Fine Arts until October 25th, so get out there and see it.

Pictured: Lucky, 2009 © Candace Briceño.

Nancy Brown‘s new work will be on exhibit in Dallas, Texas at Mod Shop this Saturday. Full details:

October 24
6pm to 9 pm
5840 Alpha Rd #B
Dallas, TX 75240
map

More info available at the Mod Shop website.

I finished a new work in Nuevo Laredo. Jubilee uses personalized giftwrap, recycled boxes, barbed wire, fencing and steel frame. Directions to the exhibition, photos of all works and more information about the Antigua Aduana Centro Cultural Space is available at the artcrush exhibition’s website. Exhibition closes December 31st. This just in…the exhibition closes January 16th!

My presentation at O’Reilly Open Source Convention 2008 dealt primarily with using Ubuntu as a platform for software-based (particularly web-based) works. In brief, it outlines the specifics required to turn a recycled PC running Ubuntu Linux into a presentation kiosk using Firefox to access either a local or web-based work for presentation in a gallery. It’s not the most glamourous of topics, in fact it is probably one of the nerdiest, but some sort of standardization in this fundamental area in the presentation of contemporary art could enable a whole generation of new works and artists to contribute to the conversation. Curators, we’re looking at you!

Here are the slides, based on my experience with presenting High Five and previous flash-based interactive works. You can download the full file here: Exhibiting-Software.zip.

There are very few artists that I meet who would delve into the nerdiness that is spending any length of time discussing Linux, but then again, there are few SXSW Interactive visitors that would care to dissect the finer points of Jeff Koons’ Inflatable Hulk installation at the Lever House (pictured right). So where in the social Venn Diagram do these disparate groups meet? For some, it will no doubt be the philosophy of the GNU/Linux project. For others, it will be the price (free) and the ability to recycle old computers into digital art projects. And for still others, the meeting point at which the Art world meets the Linux world will be when Linux can provide the platform through which exhibitions can have supplementary material more easily presented about more traditional forms of art.

Regardless of those potential incentives, I believe Linux will become integral to the exhibition of software in contemporary galleries as we move forward, if for no other reason than the fact that Linux can emulate almost all the operating systems that have come before it. For archival purposes alone, Linux is an attractive endeavor for the future digital curators among us who seek to present exhibitions that include older digital works that no longer function correctly on current machines. Many early net.art pieces relied on early web technology that simply won’t run on the latest crop of high-powered machines.

Is it just a Kiosk, then?

My talk will be very brief, as I do not have the experience of artists such as Zach Booth Simpson, Joshua Davis or Jared Tarbell. The focus of the talk will center primarily on my experience working with Ubuntu Linux to create a kiosk designed for the traditional art gallery environment to adequately convey the digital experience of the High Five project proposal (pictured at right). Namely, I will cover:

Technical Concerns

• Art is always difficult economically, Ubuntu allows for computer re-use, dedicated computer that is not the artist’s primary computer
• Free Software, so entire project is therefore available for redistribution, re-deployment, no license fees to sell it, exhibit it
• Show proper setup of wireless router / computer combo to insure access to web
• Show the proper configuration for a boot immediately into Firefox
• Firefox plugin that locks onto a single webpage, kiosk-like operation
• Firefox resets every 10 minutes, insures experience begins at correct place, removes possibility of excessive shenanigans
• Proper screensaver settings
• Uninterruptible power supply, automate the turning on of the work
• Linux has a strong track record of sustained uptime – used on many webservers for his reason

Gallery Ritual Concerns

• Art is predominantly Mac market – it will not replace this currently
• Wireless access is key, negotiations with gallery
• Proper concealment, locking down of computer
• Have slanted screen, or projector – more comfortable than flat-on-the-wall screen
• Have a mouse but no keyboard

If I have left something out or you would like to share your experience with software in the gallery and its failure or success, please add a comment, or send me an email. I am most interested in how the presentation/orientation/interface of the work effected its experience, and how to improve the presentation of digital works in traditional gallery spaces.

Exhibiting Software
July 22 2008 : 4:20 – 5:10p
Ubuntu Live – Oregon Convention Ctr – Rm 2
Portland, Oregon

tags: portland, oregon, ubuntu, linux, contemporary-art, software, kiosk, ubuntu-live

Reception: November 17, 2007, 7 ~ 9:30p

Dallas Contemporary announces its upcoming exhibition Open Doors Expansion, is viewable Saturday, November 10 through January 12, 2008. Open Doors Expansion features large-scale, site-specific installation works by Open Doors Collective, an Austin, Texas based group of artists. A members’ opening reception, to which the public is invited at a $10 entry, is set for Saturday, November 17, 2007, 7 ~ 9:30 pm.

Co-curated by Texas artists Hunter Cross, Terra Goolsby, and Jacob Villanueva, Open Doors Expansion comes to Dallas for its first showing as another dynamic project of the Open Doors Collective.

Six artists will showcase new large-scale, site-specific installations that are multi-sensory, spatial, material inventions: Nancy Brown [Dallas] graces the wall with delicate assemblages; Hunter Cross [Austin] constructs a two-story steel stairway covered in collected trophy statuettes; Terra Goolsby [Austin] builds an environment of suspended acrylic spheres and discs decorated with nail-polish; Eduardo Navarro [Buenos Aires] sets up a bank of fax machines to fill the gallery with daily transmitted drawings; Maximilian Toth [New Haven] draws a large mural in his signature style; and Jacob Villanueva [Austin] combines cellar doors and video projections challenging the viewer’s notion of space and locality.

Six large-scale installations

Terra Goolsby manipulates translucent spheres injected with nail polish and suspended in arcing organic shapes to create an environment whose beauty compels the viewer into its formal grasp. Goolsby exposes the organic qualities of her hand-picked and deftly manipulated synthetic materials.

Hunter Cross has collected once coveted, but now unwanted, trophies from all over the United States and Canada. These golden statuettes cover his 20-foot ascending Stairway. The mini figures set in contrast to the black painted steel hardware deal with contemporary American culture’s complicated relationship with competition. The strangely beautiful collection of discarded memories becomes an abstract representation of a population connected by competition and collaborating with contributions.

Nancy Brown uses thousands of tiny pins to create representations of the many poses of a wild fox. Brown’s visual language communicates the movement and mischievousness of the fox. In her previous works, Brown explored the symbolism of animals in Grimm’s fairy tales and the figurative possibilities of “wall-stickable” materials.

Eduardo Navarro will draw directly on his recent experiences within the international art world. Working from his studio in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Navarro will transmit daily drawings to the gallery via a bank of 8 installed fax machines. In the tradition of deceased artist Felix Gonzales-Torres, these drawings will be available to visitors of the gallery for free. Navarro’s work is about building a relationship with space that involves exchange. Visitors who experience his work inevitably complete the work by choosing to leave or take the drawings, giving shape to his work.

Jacob Villanueva‘s previous sculptural video work has been leading to this installation of three cellar-like constructions that contain high definition LCD screens. The screens will be populated with new videos during the exhibition’s run that will show residential and industrial sites important to Villanueva. The artist continually challenges himself to incorporate the latest video technologies into his process while at the same time keeping his installations accessible and austere.

Maximilian Toth‘s paintings use multiple layers of meaning and symbolism to depict images from personal experiences, his friends’ stories, ancient mythology and gossip from his childhood town in Massachusetts. His images are raw, arresting and filled with the sinewy stress of excess, aggression and unfiltered loss. This mural of white lines on black ground is the largest work Toth has yet to complete, covering an entire wall of The Dallas Contemporary.

A history of installations

Site-specific installations have been an essential element in Dallas Contemporary’s exhibition history: including works in Building Blocks, Wall Power, Siting Sculpture, Constuctions & Architecture, and New Art in Austin: 22 to Watch. Mix! Artists such as Luz Maria Sanchez, Alejandro Almanza Pereda and Jose Krapp add spice to our site-specific history.

Showing concurrently with Open Doors Expansion are two exhibition series: in Hallworks, Sara Ishii presents paintings of faces emerging from poured paint, and in 3 D on Swiss, Jorge Misium creates an outdoor, site-specific piece of tensioned wire and bent shapes.

Dallas Contemporary publishes a color brochure to accompany each exhibition. The German art historian, independent curator and critic Till Richter is the guest essayist for Open Doors Expansion. Richter holds a Master’s degree from the Sorbonne, Paris and is currently a Ph.D. candidate in contemporary art history at the University of Texas at Austin.

tags: dallas, open-doors, exhibition, dallas, contemporary-art, site-specific, large-scale, art, sculpture, installation, austin, dallas, events, news