Transratfashion by Brody and Paetau

Transratfashion custom-made fashion accessories. 5 pieces of fake Chanel fashion accessories made out of taxidermised rats: a rat-bra, a rat-slip, a rat-handbag, a rat-handkerchief and a pair of high heel rat-shoes. The interview at VICE: quote [Kristofer Paetau and Ondrej Brody's TransRatFashion first appeared in our Tidbits section, but we figured only a fairly unique pair of minds would want to spend their time creating fake Chanel bikinis from rat bodies and have them modeled by Brazilian transvestites who then masturbate on them].
[Previously: Brody & Paetau: Degenerate Art - Salvador DaliX by Brody & Paetau - Brody & Paetau: The Studio Visit - Brody & Paetau: DogCarpets]

Antlers

Flower Twins

Démoniak Serie X

Démoniak Serie X is a pubblication featuring french celebrities and politics involved into "insane cameos". There's also a blog about it called Les Actes de *Démoniak.

8-BIT CHAMPIONS at La Flaq Gallery, Paris!

Bonjour mon amies de francais!

I am SUPER thrilled to announce my artwork making its Parisian premiere at this fantastic show produced & curated by CHOGRIN and Thomas Olivri! (MERCI BEAUCOUP!!!)

Thursday, September 15 · 7:00pm - 10:00pm

LA FLAQ GALLERY

36 rue Quincampoix ( 75004 )

Paris, France

Facebook Event Invite

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=260287763981520

(poster art & design by Glen Brogan / www.albinoraven.com)

Come and join The Autumn Society & special guests for their very first international show in PARIS, FRANCE! The show will be held at LA FLAQ GALLERY (36 rue Quincampoix, 75004), premiering September 15th, starting @7pm.

Geek-Art.net et The Autumn Society joignent leurs forces pour vous proposer l’exposition « 8-Bits Champions », un hommage aux premiers héros des jeux vidéo ! RDV le 15 septembre à 19h à LA FLAQ, 36 rue Quincampoix à PARIS.


8-Bit Champions will pay tribute to classic "8-BIT" games from the 80's (from your favorite arcades to your beloved home entertainment systems).

This show has become a reality thanks to Geek-Art.net and Thomas Olivri (merci beaucoup pour tout!).

8-Bit Champions is produced & curated by CHOGRIN and Thomas Olivri.

---------------------------------------------------------------

Geek-Art.net et le collectif Américain Autumn Society joignent leur forces pour vous proposer l’exposition « 8-Bits Champions », un hommage aux premiers héros des jeux vidéo !

RDV le 15 septembre à 19h à LA FLAQ, 36 rue Quincampoix, 75004 PARIS.

Jusqu'au 15 octobre, venez nombreux admirer les oeuvres d'artistes US et Français inspirés par les héros de pixels...


Curateurs : Chogrin (Autumn Society) et Thomas Olivri (Geek-Art.net).

www.theautumnsociety.com
www.geek-art.net

Marina Abramovic: The Artist is Present

On Sunday I went to MoMa to see "The Artist is Present," a retrospective of Marina Abramovic's work. And Marina was present, sitting on the second floor of the museum in a brilliant, flowing red dress. At 62, Abramovic doesn't look at day over 38. I jumped to the conclusion that she must look healthy and young because she gets to live her passion every day. Even if that passion is sitting in MoMa, staring at strangers.

Or carving a pentagram onto her stomach using a razor blade.


Or cleaning hundreds of cow bones for the Venice Biennale.


Or handing 72 objects of pain and torture to an audience and telling them "do to me what you will."

Or screaming at the top of her lungs until she lost her voice.

Or standing in the center of a blazing star until she lost consciousness from the fumes.

Or breaking up with her partner and collaborator by each of them walking the Great Wall of China from opposite ends, only to say goodbye once they reach the center.

The list goes on.

Obviously Abramovic can't been in twenty places at one time, and I don't think the Great Wall will fit in MoMa, so most of these pieces are exhibited through video. A few of them, however, are performed by actual human beings. (No, sadly not the pentagram piece). As a patron you do have the option of entering the exhibit by walking in between two naked people (Marina and Ulay in the original below).

I walked in between two naked guys. At first I was nonchalant about it, but after squeezing through I felt a surge of euphoria closely followed by panic and shame. Both of them looked wildly uncomfortable, and hot. MoMa had the heat on, and everyone was sweating - even the naked performers. Squeezing past them with a bag, a purse, a heavy coat and my big military boots wasn't easy. After, I felt bad. It's strange to look at art and have it look back at you. One performer, naked, laying on a slab that came up about waist-high in another room was covered in a skeleton. He looked at me, I looked at him. I tried to focus on looking at his body as a whole, avoiding eye contact, but I couldn't. He seemed sad, in pain. I wanted to bring him some water.

After the exhibit I was so exhausted (mentally, physically, emotionally) that I collapsed on my living room couch and didn't move for nearly two hours. I was overwhelmed by Abramovic's body of work, both in its scope and its nature. There's no distinction between Abramovic and her canvas. She is her canvas. I can't think of any kind of living that's more alive and real. Surely there will be haters who think the exhibit useless, but to hell with them. This exhibit is an inspiration. I walked out of MoMa feeling violated in the best way possible, thinking to myself: how can I live and feel and work on this level? I want it. No matter how uncomfortable. I want that kind of work. Every day. So now: how to do it?

Everybody Is Stupid Except For Me

and Other Astute Observations


Everybody Is Stupid Except for Me and Other Astute Observations
A Decade's Worth of Cartoon Reporting for Reason Magazine
by Peter Bagge
112 pages, Fantagraphic Books (2009)
peterbagge@earthlink.net

I've loved Peter Bagge ever since I started reading his Buddy Bradley and Hate comics back in the Nineties when Seattle's hipster grunge scene was reigning supreme. Post-Hate, Bagge dropped below the radar for a while, had kids, and became a libertarian ("the other 'L' word" in his words). But regardless of his politics or life situation, Bagge has always maintained a critical eye for pretentiousness and pomposity - whether it be from the left or the right - as this collection of comic rants from his Noughties stint at Reason magazine ("the magazine of free minds and free markets") makes clear.

The book is organzied into thematic chapters of comtemporary American stupidity - Stupid Sex, Stupid War, Stupid Business, Stupid Arts, Stupid Politics, Stupid Tragedy, Stupid Boondoggles - culminating in "Our Stupid America." Bagge is even-handed enough to follow-up a dig at war protesters (with whom he sympathizes in idealogy if not execution) with an even harsher lambasting of pro-war zealots, and he even takes his libertarian chums to task - including his beloved Ron Paul ("In Search of the Perfect Human Being") - but what struck me most was his take-down of modern art and artists in "'Real' 'Art'" (Reason magazine, August/September 2004). They already made a movie out of Daniel Clowes' lampooning strip "Art School Confidential" but had Terry Zwigoff elected to make a documentary instead of a narrative film, he might well have used Bagge's cruel observations as source material. Brilliant stuff. I'm sure the old school folks at Baltimore's Schuler School of Fine Arts would be proud!


Real Art, page 1


Real Art, page 2


Real Art, page 3


Real Art, page 4

The Indian Holi Festival (Festival of Colors)

Amazing Folded Money Heads !

Louise Bourgeois

Once again, the editors at More Intelligent Life have honored me by publishing my piece on the recent retrospective at Centre Pompidou of the brilliant artist and living legend Louise Bourgeois. The piece also concerns the Gustave Courbet exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum until May 18th.

If interested, you'll find it here.

Cheers, and thanks for reading,
Jessica

© MURAKAMI

The award for most disappointing, revoltingly consumerist exhibit of the year goes to Takashi Murakami at the Brooklyn Museum for "© MURAKAMI."

Now, now, before you get your panties in a twist, let me explain myself. I know pop art is supposed to be consumerist. I know it's supposed to stroke the monolith of capitalism. I know Warhol, I know, I know, I know. But Murakami has taken it another step by designing handbags for Louis Vuitton and then SELLING THEM INSIDE THE EXHIBIT. I repeat: One can go to view ninety works by Murakami and then walk out of the exhibit with a handbag that costs about a grand.



You know I love fashion. I love Marc! And hey, I could maybe even love Murakami. But, and correct me if I'm wrong here, isn't the point of pop art to use elements of popular culture against themselves to make a comment about said pop culture? No? Yes? I thought so. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it doesn't matter anymore. But I'll tell you what the Murakami exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum is for. It's not about art, it's about making a buck.

As if the Louis Vuitton handbags weren't enough, the gift shop embedded at the end of the exhibit was enough to make me (and my poor mom who I subjected to this bullshit) hurl. My younger brother studies Japanese, and my mom and I thought he might like something from the gift shop. A shirt. A key-chain. A postcard. Something. Well, the postcards cost $2.75 EACH. A t-shirt on starched white cotton was FORTY TWO BUCKS, and one of these little plush toys (that every single Park Slope mother was purchasing in volumes from her droves of offspring) costs a clean FORTY-NINE SMACKERS.



What makes me the angriest about all this is the fact that this exhibit was SWARMED. Mom and I had to wait thirty minutes to get into the museum. The gift shop was cleaned out, and yes, I even saw a woman buy a purse. In the exhibit. I want to emphasize that the Vuitton shop (complete with shop boys in crisp white linens--at one point I said, "what the hell, does that white boy practice Santaria?" And my mom replied, "no, I think he works in the Louis Vuitton shop.") was inside the exhibit. Not at the end, or in another part of the museum, but IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ART EXHIBIT. Why?! So one can buy the fucking purse and then walk through the exhibit and look at the paintings and say, "hey! my purse kind of looks like that painting!" ?!?

Granted, I'm not a big fan of Murakami's work to begin with. I think it's repetitive, derivative, and stupid. There were highlights, like this piece:



Or this one:


But, really?


Thankfully, Judy Chicago's "The Dinner Party," is part of the Brooklyn Museum's permanent, fantastic wing of Feminist Art, so the visit was redeemed. But I couldn't get the taste of Murakami out of my mouth. I still can't. I think there's something very evil about all this. I'd like to hear a compelling argument about his work, if there is one.



Sorry, Murakami, but you're just not my bag!


*

If you want to vom, or you're way into the cultural implications of bullshit and derivative pop art, © MURAKAMI runs until July 13th, at the Brooklyn Museum.