Andrew Schroeder

Colleean Mullins 2009

It almost slipped my mind! But in all my thinking of the world of everyday life… I forgot to mention how engaging I find the concept of knowing everyday life only indirectly. What does this mean? Well, if we can never actually experience everyday life as a discrete subject, we can only bear witness to its presence through the objects/forms/interactions that are secreted from it.

Connected with this thought… over at Colleen Mullins’ blog, Elysium, she has written a great post about excavating her family home, making art, and moving through the layers of personal history that become concrete after an everyday life has been lived. The materials she finds are amazing (I’ve seen a few… including some authentic, vintage books on Modernist architecture). Colleen is also examining what constitutes being a “Mid-Career Artist”.

I think just maybe, we are on the same page as artists… going back through the images we have produced in the past, sorting through the layers of history and finding unexpected depth and discovery. But then again… I could just be caffeine hallucinating.

Either way… Definitely check it out!

Justin Lentz

During the avalanche of work yesterday, my friend in Los Angeles – Justin Lentz, sent me this great photograph from a photo shoot he was conducting. I’m excited to see the actual photographs that will emerge from his working process… but this iPhone image has me captivated right now. This little juicy tidbit reminds me of a recent blog post about photography as a lifestyle vs. photography as a strict, project based discipline. Personally, I love it when artists using photography are able to blend it into their practices as a human being… not simply running through the parameters of a project outline. (I will photograph X in X style until someone pays attention to how great thousands of images of X are)

It is only Wednesday and I feel completely drained. This week has been an energy vampire of unrivaled proportions. (Speaking of vampires, I find this article about fried blood on the menu in Chad really disturbing).

*****

On a separate note: I am finally going to break down and check out the “Quick and the Dead” exhibition at the Walker Art Center this weekend. Perhaps then, I will finally be able to see which ideas in conceptual art are officially DEAD and which ones the Walker has decided are ALIVE. Remember – ideas are just objects.

From Engadget

I am not the biggest Trekkie, but I found this image on Engadget this morning. Apparently I wasn’t the only person that thought product placement in the 23rd century was a bit ridiculous. I wonder, if Frederic Jameson, the author of Archeologies of the Future would have anything to say about this situation. Does the recent Star Trek movie further show the eroding of Utopian aspirations in our society? What ever happened to the future where it seemed people were no longer using the monetary system?

Hopefully soon there will be a big Toyota logo on the Enterprise’s warp core. Pepsi will sign an exclusive contract to be the only soft-drink that can be replicated in space.

But… ultimately… does this mean that we are now unable to see a future without our contemporary branding contining forever and ever?

Tengo Sed

I’m thirsty to travel again after making a pilgrimmage to the great state of Iowa this weekend. Yes. I went to Iowa. However satisfying as a deluxe tostada from Taco Tico may be… I wish that I were in Mexico City at the moment.

Just a couple quick links before the workday really kicks off:

Sinking of Thirst: Mexico City and Water
Dry Taps in Mexico City: A Water Crisis Gets Worse

Coffee @ MOMA...

Another highlight from my time in New York has been ticking that curious part of my brain. While having coffee in the cafeteria at MOMA, my friend Andrea pulled out all of the sweeteners for the coffee and remarked how they are in no-way labeled. White for sugar. Brown for raw sugar. Blue for nutra-sweet. Pink for sweet’n'low. Yellow for Splenda. This led to the rather strange feeling of how signs, symbols, and objects of daily life can be swallowed up by an over-arching visual culture.

Just a rambling… but… it has been tickling me.

London 2012, Diving

More HERE

Reminds me of the graphics from the Munich 1972 Olympics…

Munich 1972

White Record of Mystery

I am back from a particularlly satisfying trip to New York. If you happen to be in Manhattan in the near future, the drawings of Unica Zürn in the exhibition Dark Spring are incredible. I also recommend the Aeronaut Mik exhibition at MOMA… anyway…

My trip to NYC has me thinking again about the ways that human beings are able to participate and find validation in the great feedback loop of “culture”. In the past, I was an artist. That was my vantage point from which I diagnosed all of the situations I found myself in. I’ve lost that view point or at least I can no longer identify with where I was just under a year ago. Now, as a member of the working poor, things seem different: much more cyclical and much more bleak.

I buy into Baudrillard’s idea that the art world is a place of nullity. Artists and other members of the community stare infinitely inward, at each other… and call that meaning. In time I’ve found I’m simply not important enough to keep returning this gaze…

On the flipside to this type of production is material culture. Unfortunately, material culture has displaced any/all transcendental aspects of cultural exchange. Here consumers strive to collect fetish objects that increase their status. As I’ve mentioned before, when one is a member of the newly established working poor… there is little excess and little energy left for the pursuit of material gratification. By necessity, I cannot participate in this function of culture either…

So, where exactly does this leave me?
I’m somewhere outside of meaningful exchange with my culture. I’m not sure if this is equatable with being meaningless… but… it has to be close. Right?

Aging Informal/Formal Structure

Two great quotes from Baudrillard’s “The Conspiracy of Art”:

In a way, it {art} is worse than nothing, because it means nothing and nonetheless exists, providing itself with all the right reasons to exist.

Montesquieu once said that “the people can become so enlightened that they are no longer indifferent to anything.” Well, it seems that the people are just enlightened enough to choose to remain indifferent to certain things and to avoid the moral danger of being concerned by anything.

From Artist Fiona Gardner and writer Amy Zimmer

My point exactly: there are places where shared assets like public transit are considered valuable (even a source of pride). Such is the case in New York with the Miss Subways Pageant. LINK.
(Via Infrastructurist)

http://elysium-photographs.blogspot.com/

Photographer Colleen Mullins has a good running description of her experiences at Photolucida. It is definitely worth checking out if you find the economies of art production of interest. There is also some great work and a bit of that Minnesota anathema: sarcasm involved.

Both are good things for a Monday morning.