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"Chess Board Fish
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Definition of hu·mor: The ability to perceive, enjoy, or express what is amusing, comical, incongruous, or absurd.
“CERTIFICATE OF AUTHENTICITY“
This certificate (along with attached documents) is to verify that the artwork to which it is affixed, entitled: __Untitled_#3__ was created by, artist: __Leland_Schillenger__ on, date: __June 16, 2010__.
The piece measuring, 18X28 inches, was digitally printed from the original binary file name: __Untitled3.tif__. The print substrate is Hahnemuhle 10 mil. “Smooth Fine Arts” A Hewlitt-Packard Z3100 inkjet equipped with the OME “Vivera” inkset was employed to create the final output. This combination of materials is proven to be U.V. and water resistant* by the Wilhelm Independent testing lab (see attached document 1). This test data does not imply or in any way warrant the piece to be either fire-resistant or bulletproof. Neither the artist, the artist’s estate nor the office of Bradford, Langdon and Woo warrant this piece for any other use than it was originally intended.
This piece, entitled: __Untitled_#3__ is a “one-of-a-kind” artwork deemed and established by the irreversible magnetic erasure of, file name:__Untitled3.tif__ from, disk or drive name: __Apple Hard Drive__. The afore-mentioned drive was then removed from the computer and destroyed, as was the computer system in which the drive was installed. To insure that no unauthorized copies or derivative works of this piece are made the artist’s studio was disassembled and the surrounding house was burned down as stipulated and recorded by the Crowley County Gazette, June 17, 2010 weekly edition (see attachment 2).
Further warranty of the uniqueness of this artwork is substantiated and guaranteed in perpetuity through the Crowley Memorial hospital report documenting the voluntary lobotomization of, artist: __Leland_Schillenger__ on, date: __June 20, 2010__. All signatures pertaining to the medical procedure have been duly recorded and verified (see attachment 3).
No copy, reproduction or likeness of this image may be made without the express consent of the Leland Schillenger estate. Requests and enquiries for such can be made via the law office of Bradford, Langdon and Woo, 3198 Weebler Street, Suite “D”, Boschburg, NM, 88789.
Mr. Schillenger may be contacted through The Leland Schillenger Estate. Visiting hours are from 4 to 6pm Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.
Signed: Benjamin Woo, attorney-at-law
How to create a masterpiece
Today I spent a happy half-hour or so producing an abstract. I was inspired to do this partly by a painting done by an Australian of indigenous extraction who was apparently inspired by the works of the Dutch painter, Piet Mondrian. I had also just seen some beautiful photos on the net that were somehow created without a camera. One I liked in particular looked like one of those circular rainbows produced by inference patterns on the surface of a thin film of oil.
As I said, I enjoyed getting "in the Zone" painting my picture and even signed the result. No medication prescribed or otherwise was used during this process.
I have now come back a few hours later. What I seem to have produced is a rough looking close view of the wheel of a "flower power" painted kombi van as it hits a pothole on a rather wet road.
To put it politely: Shucks!
Just for laughs!?!
Social, Political Issues Drive Artist's Humor
Alejandro DÌaz once described himself as "a South Texas decorator and embellisher trapped in the body of a conceptual artist." To substantiate, see the cheekily titled "Just in Queso," an exhibition of the New York-by-way-of-San Antonio artist's work at David Shelton Gallery.
Among the many things going on in “Alejandro World,“ from social and political commentary to the gentle hijacking of everything from Modernism to Madison Avenue, the underlying proposition seems to be: Why can't art be funny? Why does it have to be so "serious?"
"I think all good art should elicit an emotion from the viewer," DÌaz wrote in a recent e-mail. "In my case I use humor as way to address political and socioeconomic issues of disparity. I think if I were to make in-your-face political art no one would be interested — I know I wouldn't. With humor you give the viewer an opportunity to be a part of the work without putting them immediately on the defensive. In a way, humor disarms people and allows them to internalize (in a more contemplative way) the issues being addressed. I also like giving viewers a choice — to accept the work of art solely for its humor and face value or to consider (listen to) the work's political undertones."
Once you enter the exhibit, it's impossible to suppress smiles, and you may just find yourself laughing along with the artist. At, say, the "Mexi-cans," fake plants in five facsimiles of Mexican brand-name cans — Jumex tomates and Herdez products.
(These are smaller versions of big trash-can-size planters commissioned by New York's Public Art Fund and exhibited on a Brooklyn boulevard median in 2005, now part of the permanent public art collection of the city of San Antonio and displayed at the San Antonio International Airport.) "I can't tell you how many people have come in and seen those cans and started telling a story about how their grandmother used them as planters on the kitchen-window sill," says gallery owner David Shelton.
DÌaz mines his Mexican American — specifically, South Texas — heritage in his work, which he has called "a collage of both high and low culture." In a 2003 photograph titled "Enchiladas at the Plaza," the artist stands outside the famous New York City hotel in full mariachi regalia, including sombrero and a curling moustache, holding a cardboard sign that reads: "Available for speaking role in a major motion picture." Behind him is one of his now ubiquitous "Make tacos not war" signs.
The artist, who holds a master's degree from the Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, began making and selling those cardboard signs — "Mexican Wallpaper" — on New York streets in the '90s. Later, he translated them into neon. One of those, alternately flashing the words "Siesta" and "Fiesta," is included in "Just in Queso," as is the brilliant "No Shirt No Shoes You're probably rich."
In the center of the Shelton gallery, DÌaz has displayed a pile of hand-lettered cardboard signs on a serape in an untitled floor sculpture. Among these are "Mexicans without borders," "In the future everyone will be famous for $15," "The filet mignon of affordable conceptual art," "Happiness is expensive" and, of course, "I can't remember the Alamo."
The stereotypical moustache, which adorned the invitation to "Just in Queso," plays a key role in a new work titled "Mothers and Fathers." It is a bi-portrait — a great aunt perhaps — of a woman photographically printed on two medium-sized canvases, side by side, with a fake moustache attached as a Frida-like unibrow in one picture and pasted on the woman's upper lip, Mexican revolutionary-style, in the second image.
The work, a comment on gender and sexual roles as well as a trick to the eye, speaks to the way the artist grew up — in a matriarchy of liberated, activist women prominent in the Chicano rights movement.
"At first glance, the work looks humorous, but the piece is about mothers being both mothers and fathers in Mexican American households where men are often absent," DÌaz says. "You also see this in African American families and families where there is economic hardship. The transgender nature of this work adds a personal note of the bond between mothers and sons. In most cultures, it's the mothers — not the fathers — that become the protectors of gay progeny."
What I try to do is merge a sense of pure absurdity with activism," he adds. "Being raised in South Texas, in a matriarchy of educated, hard-working Mexican American women who lived through the civil rights movement and women’s lib, I not only inherited a rich visual background but also a background full of social and political consciousness."
Source: My San Antonio
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A Few Things I Left Behind
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CALL FOR ENTRIES:
Artists are invited to apply for the MAB3 / MEDIA 3 ART BIENNIAL.
The competition is open to all artists and is judged solely by visuals submitted online or by attachment. All accepted works that pass the first screening will be entered into the competition and will be exhibited for 24 months beginning with the date of the inclusion.
Read more at: Art Addition
MOCA DOUBLE SHOW CATALOG ON SALE:
Includes all images from both shows at the gallery of the Museum of Computer Art in Brooklyn, NY: the Digital Art Olympiad 2010 and the Digital Art Summer Festival 2010. Gloss paper. 66 pages. 57 images, with titles and artist names. Winning images labeled. Softcover/hardcover. $55.00 USD.
SEE CATALOG
A valuable promotional tool for all artists entered in these two shows.
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This page posted 26 July 2010
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