Figment Dress

I will be creating a Figment Dress performance for Figment Festival. It will be free, collaborative and wearable, a figment of our own imagination. Be careful: No Weapons , No Alcohol, No Pets

June 9-10, 2012 Governors Island, NYC

What: FIGMENT is an explosion of creative energy. It’s a free, annual celebration of participatory art and culture where everything is possible. For one weekend each summer, it transforms Governors Island into a large-scale collaborative artwork – and then it’s gone.

When: Saturday, June 9 — 10AM – 6PM Sunday, June 10 — 10AM – 6PM

http://newyork.figmentproject.org/figment-nyc-2012/about-figment-nyc-2012/

XQUISITE SHODO! XQUISITE CORPSE invaded Central park for an impromptu large scale painting and installation

XQUISITE SHODO ! Big Brushes and hula hoop-la collaborative painting in Central Park. xquisitecorpse.org

XQUISITE SHODO ! turns into XQUISITE Kimono.. from mirena rhee on Vimeo.

XQUISITE CORPSE showed up in Central Park on Easter Sunday.. to color some grass. We decided to do XQUISITE the day before and next day we setup the XQUISITE SHODO which turned into a true collaborative effort in the spirit of XQUISITE CORPSE.

As time went on and with input from passers by ( Thank you, Harriet from London! ) the true colors of XQUISITE SHODO painting showed up and it turned into an XQUISITE Kimono!

Music - taiko drumming!

Thank you, grass, for growing.

Occupying my painting for the first issue of Revolt magazine

Come out and paint - XQUISITE CORPSE Open Studio

XQUISITE CORPSE Open Studio ( and party )Saturday, March 10, 12-6 pm and party 6-11 pm 526 West 26th street, studio 723, New York, NY 10001

A Collaborative art project.. with a twist. Please be cautious, this will not be a usual art party, you may need to wear art on your sleeve. The XQUISITE CORPSE will drink the new wine and art will be made by all and not by one! Paint, painting surfaces and booze will be FREE, make sure to wear comfortable clothes, if anything.

http://xquisitecorpse.mirenarhee.com/

XQUISITE CORPSE is part of High LIne Open Studios - Chelsea - 2012 and Armory Arts week New York.

Thanks to  Ian Mack.

A few great things - Damien Hirst's Spot paintings, The Happenings at Pace

I had heard so much criticism about Damien's Spot paintings before going to the three New York shows, that I had the sneaky suspicion I am going to love them. They gave me pleasure - pleasure is hardly an argument - you either like having it or not. The flavor colored paintings made me want to lick every single dot, were named after various chemical substances and defied Jerry Saltz's argument "You see one, and you really have seen them all." In fact, they all tasted different. When I think of Damien - I also can't help but think of Zaphod Beeblebrox. Hey, if that artist's intent is to make a lot of money - that is not a reason to reject the work - although this is not my intent but can't speak against that being someone else's. The spots aren't things by themselves and they do not create a traditional artistic value (via the artist's hand ). We all know from math that a dot cannot be defined as having a substance, it's a destination. Each room of the three Gagosian galleries was brilliantly hung - thus all the paintings in a room worked together with scale to triangulate space and create a giant, Three-dimensional musical piano ( you know, the toy ones - i had one when i was a kid ).

It was a pure pleasure to indulge in the simple language of color, to occupy the space within the dots and just listen to the music.

When I think of Damien - I also can't help but think of Zaphod Beeblebrox. Hey

The exhibition Opening at Pace gallery's Happenings: New York, 1958-1963 was packed with the Who's Who in the art world today. Although the crowds for the most parts obscured the actual show - I think it was more or less the point. The exhibition opening was, all over again, a Happening on its own.

Works by Jim Dine, Simone Forti, Red Grooms, Allan Kaprow, Claes Oldenburg, Lucas Samaras, Carolee Schneemann, and Robert Whitman.

Ai Weiwei at Mary Boone, questions, answers and the pigments of imagination

Ai Weiwei's Sunflower seeds at Mary Boone gallery in Chelsea.

One thing I learned - when art asks questions - please, do not answer. Asking is fun. Answering, on the other hand, is not.

Christopher Russell's strange, beautiful grey obelisks at Julie Saul gallery. Grey is a pigment of your imagination..

The Indian Painter's palette and its most seductive colors

..I have seen to have survived many centuries and hold their power, on paper. The Metropolitan Museum of Art mounted a lavish Indian painting exhibit and I managed to catch the last day and take notes, photography was not allowed.

The ultimate geek list of pigments used in Indian Painting:

White pigments: 1. Lead White ( basic Lead carbonate ) 2. Zinc White ( zinc oxide ) 3. Chalk ( calcium carbonate )

Red/Orange: 4. Cinnabar ( Mercury sulfide ) 5. Vermillion ( Synthetic Mercuric Sulfide ) 6. Lac ( primary colorant Laccaic Acid ) 7. Red Lead ( Lead tetroxide/orange red ) 8. Realgar ( Arsenic disulfide/bright orange red mineral ) 9. Saffron ( Crocetin and Crocin )

Yellow: 10. Opriment ( Arsenic trisulfide/soft yellow ) 11. Indian Yellow ( Magnesium euxanthate/ originally from the urine of cows fed mango leaves ) 12. Gamboge ( yellowish orange )

Green: 13. Verdigris ( Basic Copper Acetate/dark bluish green pigment ) 14. Malachite ( Basic Copper Carbonate ) Mixtures to make green - Indigo and Indian yellow

Blue/Violet: 15. Ultramarine ( Natural Ultramarine is the ground, separated blue particles - lazurite - from the gemstone Lapis Lazuli ) 16. Azurite ( basic Copper Carbonate/frequently found adjacent to Malachite ) 17. Indigo ( Indigotin )

Earth Pigments: 18. Iron Oxides

Black/Gold/Silver/Tin: 19. Carbon 20. Gold Ink ( Gold particles with gum ), similar with Silver and Tin ink

21. Beetle wings ( to represent Emeralds )

Inks: 22. Carbon inks ( Lamb black ) 23. Metallo-gallic ink 24. Indian ink ( naturally ) 25. Willow Charcoal 26. Lamp Black ( soot from fat, oil, tar ) 27. Ivory Black

Gums: 28. Ghatti gum 29. Suresh 30. Gum arabic

Postcards from the Edge benefit for Visual AIDS is this Weekend

I am participating in Postcards from the Edge benefit for Visual AIDS with a very special piece.. Hosted by Cheim & Read, 547 W 25th St, New York

The Preview Party is tonight: Friday, January 6, 2012 from 6:00 - 8:00 PM

Benefit show: Saturday, January 7, 2012 from 10:00 AM - 6:00 PM Sunday, January 8, 2012 from 12:00 - 4:00 PM

Were-Rabbit on the wall, a Bulgarian style feast, with a twist

As part of an Action Art project over the holidays, I invited my artists friends over for a Bulgarian style feast, with a twist.. As Bulgarian tradition dictates, you have to paint on the walls for food:) The twist was that my friends and participants didn't know that all the walls were tarped for painting.., I advertised the event as a sit down dinner with all the trimmings of a family event. I wanted to completely detach the action from a specific result and let things unfold.

..and here are the results

\\ Ink, brushes, charcoal, sharpies, pastels on butcher paper, red lights

The next day, I took photographs of all the walls in natural lighting..

In addition to drawings, there Were-Rabbits, poems and cryptic messages..

even a Were-Man..

Occupy Wall Street and Magritte also showed up.. with parts of a Christmas tree

100 percent Ultra Violet

I went to Ultra Violet's studio this past weekend to take photographs of her and her work. Ultra Violet said the first person she met off the boat ( arriving from France in the 60's ) was Salvador Dali.  She became his muse, and later on, became a muse to Andy Warhol and a superstar in his Factory.

What do Ultra Violet, Quantum tunnelling and Bhagavad Gita have in common?

Surmounting Uncertainty. Ultra Violet

says 99 percent certainty is 100 percent certainty.

Quantum Tunneling

Quantum Mechanics says a particle has a definite probability of being anywhere in the entire universe. Although any real distance from the particle’s expected classical path is infinitesimally small, since Quantum Mechanics is a statistical theory those small probabilities must be counted! Quantum Tunneling is a fascinating effect that arises out of these small probabilities. ( I certainly, 100 percent didn't write this )

Bhagavad Gita

Philip Glass' Satyagraha is based on Bhagavad Gita and sung entirely in Sanskrit, without titles for the audience. Bhagavad Gita says the world is not for the doubting man.

The Art of Occupy Wall Street.. now that it's gone

Yesterday I went to Liberty Plaza and took photographs of The Art of Occupy Wall Street. Including Lego OWS and the very special Octopi WS by the guy who Paints Outside his Own Box.

A few more digits

Painter Scotto Mycklebust, is putting together Revolt magazine, an art-talk large format, limited edition paper. I am heading down to Occupy Wall street to take some photographs for the first issue.  Also saw De Kooning show at Moma for the second time.. barefoot because my shoes were too tight and I couldn't think properly. I took the shoes off, and this being New York, no one seemed to care except that I gained a different perspective.. could be the height but this time I loved De Kooning's last paintings.

The power to feel

Painting is an active language. Pollock once told De Kooning "You know more, but I feel more". To feel and to observe are the two most powerful weapons an artist uses.. on himself. When you are out in the world you really see, you dissect the world down to the particles and reverse back through to the whole to construct a mental image, however distorted. You later bring these images to the canvas. In front of the canvas, you feel. To observe and to feel are somehow in a quantum entanglement, the better you observe, the better your ability to feel. You see a brick for what it is and then you really see it, for what it isn't, a sort of stereo vision which overcomes the senses. That's why if someone feels one, an artist feels ten. You need that feeling powers ten in order to get the feeling flick through to the brush ( or whatever tool is there ) and via the paint - onto to canvas and from there to the viewer. The feeling needs to have that power in order to travel.

The confusion is that art is about learning how to draw or paint, that ability to render some ( or even strange ) reality. I think art is about learning how to feel. To feel is a powerful narcotic and immensely seductive. It is the blue pill, and the red pill simultaneously.

I have a thing for this particular shade of brown.. and this particular shade of brown has a thing for me. A conversation with R. Serra

at Gagosian gallery.

Careful! Some bugs still in this one.

Pace Gallery in Chelsea mounted an amazing Social Media show but their Iphone App Fakes literally took my breath away... laughing. "The exhibition  features the first presentation of works from the David Byrne’s new Apps series from 2011. The works are advertisements for witty applications authored by Byrne that speak to the rapid proliferation of apps for the iPhone and other smart phones.."

Color speaking Shamans (Kukeri) at Mary Boone gallery in Chelsea.

The Nick Cave Shamans sing a colorful language... and I sang along with them at the show opening last night.