Gayle Friedman makes great earrings

Look at these fantastic earrings that Gayle Friedman fashioned for me. They're made of silver and marmot fur - and before anyone starts squirting red paint all over me, it's recycled fur that one of her friends was going to throw away. Gayle makes beautiful and often whimsical jewelry that is always unique. They are tiny works of art.

Crossfire II by Oliver Vernon

Oliver Vernon, Crossfire II, 2007

Once again, this graffiti-inspired artwork does not look nearly as good on screen as it does in person. They never do, but I think this jpg does particular injustice to the work. It's still hanging over at Irvine Contemporary for another week or two if you want to take a look. Did not buy this piece at artDC. In fact, got out of the fair with buying only one small thing. (Hello Goya from the Curator's Office - a totally clever riff on the masterworks in which the artist recreates iconic scenes from art history and then inserts a little Hello Kitty drawing on top. Ha!) But that is not a reflection on the quality of the works there - only that the budget is reining me in. Although, don't be surprised if a Massimo Vitali shows up on this blog soon . . .

Support the Warehouse

The opening party for No Representation was really fun. I LOVE the Warehouse space - it's a little quirky and I was worried that the art would not look good. Ancient faded and peeling wallpaper barely stuck to the walls of the third floor rooms. A couple small walls were covered with siding on the second floor. And unfinished plaster adorned the first floor walls. But Molly Ruppert kept reassuring me that it'd all work out. And she was so right! The art looked wonderful in this eccentric space.

The Warehouse fills a great need in DC - offering a casual venue for music, performance, films, art, and great cocktails. Please support this family-owned business that has become a Washington cultural institution! They recently received a very high tax assessment that could put them out of business if they don't succeed in their appeal. Although it's great that Washington neighborhoods are undergoing renovation and revitalization block by block, the city ought to consider ways to preserve places like the Warehouse, which add so much to the community. It's places like the Warehouse that make DC neighborhoods feel like neighborhoods. If we chase them off, then all we'll have left are a bunch of bland stores and boring chain restaurants and banks. Yuck.

My favorite guys: Adrian Loving and Ayo Okunseinde

Sondra Arkin, an artist and a co-curator of the No Representation show

Hanging out on the Podesta's back porch

Allison Cohen, Henry Thaggert, Steven Stuart, Philippa Hughes, David Hughes

The Podestas hosted a reception for art fair attendees to see their amazing art collection, which includes many works by Nikki Lee, Angela Strassheim, Wolfgang Tillmans, a Massimo Vitali that I lust after, and many other contemporary art photographers. I admire their generosity in opening their home because I think that art collectors who are passionate about art and who want to nurture artists and who view art as a way to connect people do not hide their collections.

Press mentions of No Representation

The Examiner did a nice review of No Representation.

Please stop by tonight!


N O R E P R E S E N T A T I O N
[abstraction in the capital]
Saturday, April 28 from 6 pm - ?
Warehouse Gallery and Café
1021 7th Street NW

With a nod to the disenfranchisement of the residents of the District of Columbia (and all other interpretations), the Warehouse Gallery on Seventh St. NW will host a show of local artists called “No Representation” from April 26 to May 12, 2007. The show, curated by Molly Ruppert, Sondra N. Arkin, Ellyn Weiss and Philippa P.B. Hughes, will include all media and has two rules only: all of the art by local artists and all the work is abstract.

No Representation is scheduled as a (friendly) counterpoint to the first DC International Art Fair, which will be held directly across the street at the DC Convention Center and as an educational opportunity for the art world visitors to the fair. The wonderfully quirky Warehouse space, with its cafe, gallery and performance spaces, is DC’s answer to the international sheen of the art fair. The artists exhibiting are a selection of many of the most interesting our town has to offer. There will be painting, video, installation, sound and more. Head on over after your day at the fair or around town . . .

Freeform Bash, an unCONVENTIONal opening on Saturday night, April 28 from 6 pm - ??.
drinks | food | music | art
Revelry strongly encouraged

artists include:
Sondra N. Arkin
J. Belmar
Mark Cameron Boyd
Renee Butler
Tory Cowles
Laurel Farrin
Michael Gessner
Janis Goodman
Pat Goslee
Tom Green
Eve Hennessa
Kristin Holder
Brece Honeycutt
Becky Jones
Joanne Kent
Adrian Loving + Ayodamola Okunseinde (Dissident Display)
Aubrie Mema
Elizabeth Morisette
Emily Piccirillo
Lynn Putney
Marina Reiter
Nooni Reatig
Chris Tousimis
Dan Treado
Andres Tremols
CC Vess
Gail Vollrath
Anita Walsh
Rex Weil
Ellyn Weiss

N O R E P R E S E N T A T I O N
[abstraction in the capital]
Saturday, April 28 from 6 pm - ?
Warehouse Gallery and Café
1021 7th Street NW
Gallery hours are:
Mon - Fri: 5pm - 11pm
Sat: Noon - Midnight
Sun: Noon – 6pm
www.warehousetheater.com

DCist reviews artDC

A review of artDC in DCist yesterday: www.dcist.com/archives/2007/04/27/artdc_1.php.

And my response to the critique and to the ensuing comments about the bloody performance art at Supple that everyone's abuzz about:

Comparing artDC to major art fairs like MiamiBasel or the Armory is like comparing the proverbial apple to the proverbial orange. This is not a major art fair so criticizing it like one doesn't make sense. It's more like one of the satellite fairs, like Scope, Aqua (one of my favorites), or even Bridge (even a little farther downscale). At those fairs, you see a lot of crap and a few gems. That's just how it goes when you're picking your way through what can seem like the tag sale of contemporary art. But that's also the beauty of contemporary art and what appeals to me as a collector! That ecstatic feeling of finding the gem hidden in the mud and dirt. More importantly, if DC is to become any kind of an art center, we need MORE artistic experimentation and we need more art. I am squeamish about adult circumcision as art, but I'm glad someone did it. There were few things beyond my usual DC gallery haunts that I liked at artDC, but I am glad it's here. Although I wholeheartedly believe that we need to take charge and create a DC art scene ourselves.

BFFs on the red carpet

Veronica Jackson, Zoe Myers, Philippa Hughes

My BFF posse walking the red carpet at Kathryn Cornelius' performance of Recognition at artDC. Kathryn debuted a great piece that poked fun at the self-importance and superficiality of the celebrity worship culture that pervades our society today. We sipped champagne (provided by The Pink Line Project!), minlged with Washington's art glitterati (OMG, can you believe Philip Barlow was there!? I wish I'd gotten his autograph.), and a camera crew interviewed me. I felt like a rock star!

"Who are you wearing tonight?"
"Bernard Kalb. A great under-recognized designer." (I made this up, of course, because I didn't remember right away that I'd bought the dress at the BCBG outlet store for 1/4 the original price. How embarrassing. Also, I'd just met Bernard Kalb earlier in the evening, who claimed he'd designed a similar dress back in the 60s or something like that. Charming fellow.)

"If you could choose any movie star to play you, who would it be?"
"Renee Zellweger."
"Oh yeah. I can see that."

dcART opens tonight!

ArtDC opens tonight with a party to benefit the Cultural Alliance of Greater Washington!
Buy tickets at www.dc-artfair.com.

The fair officially starts tomorrow with a free day. After that, $12 gets you in over the weekend.

Washington Convention Center, Hall E
801 Mount Vernon, NW, Washington, DC
Friday-Saturday 11am-7pm
Sunday 11am-5pm

Art fairs are a great way to introduce yourself to contemporary art if you're interested in starting a collection or simply enjoy being around the art world.

If you want some guidance, my friend Allison Cohen, an art consultant, will be giving tours of the fair. You can find out more at www.sightline.bz.

Exciting news about Jiha Moon & Kathryn Cornelius

The girls of Curator's Office: News about Jiha Moon & Kathryn Cornelius

Curator's Office is delighted to announce news about artists Jiha Moon and Kathryn Cornelius.

The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts has acquired a large work by Jiha Moon entitled Farewellscape (2006). Recommended by John Ravenal, the Sydney and Frances Lewis  Family Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, the work was purchased by the museum's Fabergé Society whose goal is to support art acquistions at VMFA. Jiha Moon, Farewellscape, ink & acrylic on HanJi paper, 57" x 30", 2006 Additionally, Jiha Moon will be having her first solo museum exhibition at the Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina from January 26 - July 6, 2008 as part of the museum's Vantage Point series. Jiha Moon will be having her second solo exhibition at Curator's Office in September of 2007. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________ Kathryn Cornelius is currently exhibiting a body of work entitled Resolve at The Palazzo delle Arti in Naples, Italy. The exhibition is called Eroi! come noi...?  (Heroes! like us ...?) and runs April 5 thru June 27, 2007. Curated by Julia Draganovic, the exhibition includes artists Charlotte Ginsborg, Marco Giovani, Ilya Kabakov, Tom Sanford, and Hu Yang among others. Kathryn Cornelius, Resolve #2, video still, archival digital print, 20" x 30", 2005 Kathryn Cornelius will be performing a Hollywood-style piece called Recognition at the artDC Fair this Thursday evening, April 26, at 8 pm. Tickets that evening to the greater artDC Fair from 7:30 - 9:30 pm are $ 35. Go to artDC fair for more ticket information. Kathryn Cornelius will present a durational live performance piece as part of Site Projects DC during June and July as part of a project curated by Welmoed Laanstra for the WPA/C (Washington Project for the Arts/Corcoran). Cornelius will be having her first solo exhibition at Curator's Office in October/November, 2007. __________________________________________________________________________

Supple joins No Representation

JT Kirkland's Supple show was all planned out. Three nights of receptions during artDC this weekend to showcase some of Washington's finest artists at The Space with music and drinks. At the last minute, The Space pulled out of the deal and JT announced that he'd have to cancel the show. Sondra Arkin, my co-curator for the No Representation show, read the announcement on JT's blog and whirled into action, asking me, Ellen Weiss, and Molly Ruppert if we could give up some of our space at the Warehouse to allow JT to hang his show. We happily agreed and now Supple will exhibit alongside No Representation. Please come to the reception at the Warehouse on Saturday night at 6 PM and you'll get a two-for-one-deal on art viewing.

More about what happened to the Supple show: www.thinkingaboutart.blogs.com.

Going Out Gurus cover No Representation show at The Warehouse!

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/goingoutgurus/2007/04/alternative_to_artdc.html

word is getting around

My buddy Don emailed me this yesterday about last Saturday's Press Play party:

So I'm tending bar Sunday, lamenting as usual the deplorably banal state of DC art and performance when an old and dear (and authoritatively creative) customer relates a tale of animation, amplification and a haircut involving a pink Vespa and restraints that went on the previous night around 14th & P. Anything to add?

Cheers!

D

No Representation: Abstraction in the Capital

I helped curate a show called No Representation: Abstraction in the Capital, which will hang at the Warehouse during artDC, Washington's first contemporary art fair. The exhibit highlights that fact that residents of DC do not have representation in Congress. Doesn't sound much like democracy, now does it? All the participating artists live and/or work in DC.

Please come to the opening reception and support great Washington-based artists and enjoy music and wine!

Warehouse Gallery Arts Complex
1021 7th Street, NW
(across the street from the convention center)
Saturday, April 28
6 pm until whenever

www.artmarketdc.com/no-representation/norepresentation.jpg

Mingering Mike

www.mingeringmike.com

Curator's Office and artDC are Rolling Out the Red Carpet For You!

Curator's Office and artDC are Rolling Out the Red Carpet For YOU!

Join us for an art-filled evening unlike any in Washington, DC!  On Thursday, April 26, 2007 we'll celebrate the first annual artDC Art Fair at the new Convention Center with an extraordinary  "Hollywood-style" performance by one of the District's own emerging artists, Kathryn Cornelius. Don your finest evening wear (semi-formal attire is suggested and highly encouraged!), walk the red carpet, sip complimentary champagne, andreceive full star treatment while previewing the fair. The celebration continues with the official kick-off of the live performance RECOGNITION at 8pm. We hope you will join us for this exciting event - it will rival any Hollywood premiere!

This event is made possible in part by the following sponsors and contributors:                         surroundart                                                   SIGHTLINE Planet Vox   |   BV Consulting   |   Urban Style Lab Eat Well DC   |   DJ Services   |   Untitled Furious Sound Productions

Painted Lady Performance Project

The Painted Lady Performance Project made a spectacular appearance at the Press Play party on Saturday night. The ladies stunned the crowd with silky, and dramatic costumes set off by skin painted luminescent bronze. Their deliberately slow, regal movements and elegant, statuesque poses struck awe all around. For several hours, they never left character, even when leading the way to the after-party across busy 14th Street at Viridian. Four volunteers hoisted a blanket above their heads to protect them from the rain as cabs swerved to miss the slow-moving procession.

whitehot magazine: Nelson Loskamp Interview

whitehot | April 07, WM Issue # 2: Nelson Loskamp Interview

Loskamp at work

The Electric Chair Cut

Nelson Loskamp

In conversation with

Joe Heaps Nelson

"Yeah I have boxes and boxes of people's hair. I guess I roughed somebody up a little too much and they said that I needed sensitivity training. Maybe I should be my own victim some time and see what it's like."

I reckon I have known Nelson Loskamp for about nine years. In the 20th century, we both used to try and hang around American Fine Arts on

Wooster Street

, which was, at the time, the coolest gallery in New York . In those days, everybody knew Nelson, but nobody knew his last name. He was strictly a one-name guy, like Cher . He was low-key, but not necessarily low-profile, and "the Electric Chaircut" was really, well, how do you say? Downtown.

We got to know each other better when we were neighbors in DUMBO. His studio was crammed with paintings. Just about all of them were paintings of a head. Day after day, Nelson painted these mysterious heads, with lopsided, searching eyes. He was a big time palette knife man. I remember asking him then what he was up to, and Nelson replied, very humbly, "Oh, I just come in here and move paint around until this guy just kind of... shows up." Every so often he would wrestle some giant tree stump out on the fire escape and molest it with a chainsaw until it became truly odd. He is a triple threat - painter, sculptor, and... electric chaircutter!

Besides being an artist/superhero, Nelson works as a hairstylist. He grew up in L.A., then lived in San Francisco for a long time before he moved to New York . That California vibe is a major feature of his personality. He's remarkably gentle. We met at his studio on

Classon Avenue

in Brooklyn , where I was surprised to encounter a new set of paintings that were, for Nelson anyway, nearly serene .



PAINTINGS:


Joe Heaps Nelson: It seems like you used to work in a style where you were describing an internal state.

Nelson Loskamp: Yeah, exorcising demons. Now, I'm actually trying to paint pretty ladies.

Heaps: You're painting more realistically.

Loskamp: Yeah, I'm looking at things, referencing the real world. I wasn't very interested in that before but I thought I might as well do something different.

Heaps: There's still an expressionistic quality.

Loskamp: Oh, definitely. They are figurative, they're expressionistic. They have a little more suggestion of the outside world.

I like the outside, I like trees, I like hammocks, I like my wife. (pause)

They're weird, right?

Heaps: Your paintings have some kind of funky special effects. What kind of medium do you use?

Loskamp: Well they're oil. I painted on wood for a long time and I used a knife, and I recently switched to canvas. I'm using brush, and some knife, but I prep the canvas with a lot of matte medium so it retains the raw canvas color, but it's a smooth surface. I put on a lot of coats and sand it down so I can use a knife on it.
I use some medium in there, thin it down, use some varnish, it's all different. It goes from really flat black thinned down black, to heavy, knived in black and purple.Some of the actual canvas shows through. It's a combination of knife and brush work. When I was younger I really hated brushstrokes. That's why I started painting with a knife. I've loosened up on that. Now brushstrokes are OK. But I don't want anything to be consistently the same all the way across the painting. I like to break it up.

SCULPTURE:

Loskamp: I like to carve wood - figurative stuff. I whittle some, chain saw some. I haven't done any in a while. I'd like to, but my space is a little small.

Heaps: Well now the weather is getting nicer maybe you can work outside.

Loskamp: Maybe. We'll see what happens.

Heaps: Tell me about the sculpture that was in "Dead Kids Do Nothing" at 31 Grand.

Loskamp: Oh, Mr. Shiv'd. I'll describe it. There's a large, carved, animal-like head on a table, with hair wrapped around it, presented like the head of John the Baptist or something, and a bouquet of knives stuck into the top of the head. I found the bouquet of shivs, and I had them in my studio, and the hole presented itself to me, and I stuck 'em in there, and it just worked.

Heaps: So you found the knives on the street, already taped together?

Loskamp: Yeah, already taped together. Somebody was throwing them away. Yeah, I just stuck 'em in the hole in the top of the head and it was perfect.


CHAIRCUT:


Heaps: What's an electric chaircut like?

Loskamp: It's a haircutting performance. I'll select my victims from the audience - they volunteer - I tape them in the chair and I cut their hair.

Heaps: Yeah but you also blindfold 'em.

Loskamp: I do.

Heaps: Did any of your electric chaircut victims ever get really mad?

Loskamp: Get really mad? Not really. I have found some notes, after the fact.

I've had people request to have their hair back, on occasion.

Heaps: I should mention that Nelson keeps some of the hair, after he cuts it off, as part of the documentation of the project.

Loskamp: Yeah I have boxes and boxes of people's hair. I guess I roughed somebody up a little too much and they said that I needed sensitivity training. Maybe I should be my own victim some time and see what it's like. People generally like it. I had one guy tell me I made him look like Elvis. He didn't like that. I had to re-cut his hair. It's difficult because you have to judge what a person wants in a matter of seconds.

Heaps: I thought you just kind of did what you want.

Loskamp: I try to do what people want.

Heaps: But you never ask anybody what they want.

Loskamp: Oh yeah!

Heaps: You do?

Loskamp: I do. I didn't ask you? I think you said, do whatever.

Heaps: Oh, I thought that was just how it went.

Loskamp: I can't cut holes in people's heads, and expect them to like it.

Heaps: Yeah, but you could say, I'm the artist, and this is my vision!

Loskamp: It takes the right person for that.

Heaps: Explain the technical apparatus.

Loskamp: My scissors and implements are prepared. The sound is amplified. I wear a practice amp on my back, some pedal effects and I can change it up a little bit. Sometimes I have somebody mix live. My friend John Blue does that. While I'm doing it, he'll take the sound, re-sample it and project it out. I do have another piece I have been working on called a "Scissor Symphony" where I have 7 people cutting hair all at the same time, all with amplified scissors. The sound is a little different on each scissors. I hope to do that here. I did it in Peekskill at the Peekskill Project last year. I got the beauty school kids doing it, and I amplified their haircuts and got video footage. That was scissor symphony #1, and #2 is coming soon!



To find out more about Nelson Loskamp, http://www.chaircut.com

whitehot gallery images, click a thumbnail.

Joe Heaps Nelson is an artist and writer in New York City. http://www.joeheaps.com

Painterly Visions: A Night To Remember

Painterly Visions: A Night To Remember

Electric Chaircut

Do you have any idea what is happening here? You would if you were at the hippest party in town last night. Press Play was a huge success - over 500 people attended! It felt like the beginning of an art revolution in DC.

Oliver Vernon

Oliver Vernon: Macro/Micro
Paintings and On-site Sculpture
April 14 – May 19

Opening Reception with the Artist: Sat. April 14, 6-8 PM
Preview Day: Friday, April 13

Oliver Vernon’s paintings present new visualizations of our interdependent organic and humanly constructed environments. Using multiple layers and planes of space, his paintings capture both macro and micro views of worlds in convergence: a viewer may imagine simultaneously the inconceivably vast spaces of the cosmos, the invisible and infinitesimally small spaces revealed in electron microscope images, and maps of data and information zooming in through networks or laser beams. Vernon achieves this fusion of macro and micro with his own original architecture of space and composition. Planes of space overlap and interconnect, and we see all at once a new visualization of the structures of the city combined with the fluid rhizomes of interconnected organic forms.

Drawing from his roots in the Brooklyn street art and music DJ scenes, Oliver Vernon also combines bold graphic elements that quote graffiti styles fused with meditative and reflective symbols. His work represents a bold and confident fusion of many trajectories in contemporary painting never before combined in one coherent vision: post-pop surrealism and visionary art, high-tech science fiction, figural abstraction, street and graffiti art, and the multi-layered, complex visualizations of artists like Matthew Ritchie, Julie Mehretu, Fred Tomaselli, and Ryan McGinness.

Alberto Gaitán

Curator's Office is opening
Remembrancer: An Installation by Alberto Gaitán
April 14 at 6: 30 - 8:30 pm

Remembrancer, n.
One who, or that which, serves to bring to, or keep in, mind; a memento; a memorial; a reminder.

Over the first four weeks of the exhibition, three networked machines with robotic arms will deposit paint little-by-little on three panels. The amount of paint placed at a given moment shall be controlled by a computer program that will be interpreting data from gallery-installed sensors and from Internet sources. Along with the daily changing accumulation of paint, a field of sound will be similarly generated in response to the same data. The completed work--an accretion of overlapping monochrome fields of color and sound--will be exhibited over the last two weeks of the exhibition. The machine-mediated process provokes questions of authorship and translation.

Remembrancer confronts the loss inherent in transformation, the distortions introduced by the medium onto which--and the assumptions in effect when--memory is transcribed, the inevitable simplification of phenomena that accompanies acts of observation, and the spacial, temporal and cultural resonance of events.

Billy Colbert

Press Play is getting lots of press!

The Pink Line Project's Press Play video and performance art party on Saturday night is getting lots of media attention. I wouldn't miss this party if I were you.

dcist

Washingtonian

Washington Post

Saturday, April 14
7 - 10 pm
1520 14th Street, NW
(corner of 14th and Church)

After party at Viridian with Dissident Display and the Painted Lady Project.

Friday the 13th

Friday the 13th kicks off an art-filled weekend. Here are a few highlights:


Conner Contemporary is opening an exhibit of paintings by Howard Mehring from the Vincent Melzac Collection.

Mehring has been called the "sleeping giant" of Washington Color Painting and was the first of the second generation of Color Field painters to explore the potentials of color through novel experiments with painting techniques including pouring, staining, stippling, and sectional painting. Early in his career, Mehring created innovative abstract paintings in distinctive all over styles, so called because the artist eschewed a central focal point in favor of a uniform presentation of saturated color. These canvases were best known for their breathing, pulsating, lyrical expressions of color, which the artist identified with tonal qualities of music.

. . .

Guerilla Film Club is hosting a party at Civilian Art Projects (7th and D) from 6:15 to 9 pm before everyone heads over to E Street Cinema to view The Lives of Others. This movie is one of the best I have seen in years. It's beautiful, subtle, taut and most of all, reflects on the transformative power of art. www.gfilmfest.com/gfc17.html.

. . .

Gallery Neptune presents "Behme Craghead Wallace", three artists whose work is inspired by literary influences.


Mark Behme presents a collection of five hand carved wood sculptures based on the early 20th century artists drawing game known as Exquisite Corpse. A master of intricacy, Behme's alluring sculptures are fascinating studies in metaphor and mystery.

David Wallace, a collage artist from Pittsburgh, uses old advertising images and text in his paintings and collages. His bold images layer font design with unrelated pictures of animals and people that together send new messages to a modern audience.

Warren Craghead III, inspired by the French surrealist poet Guillaume Apollinaire, presents ten mixed media drawings and a book of drawings called "How to Be Everywhere". Craghead aligns his own creative impulse to that of Apollonaire's to create new art that pays homage to this visionary poet.

. . .

WISH I WAS THERE
Showcasing the artwork of Gary Fisher, Glenn Fry, Jason Wright & John Talkington, the event happens on Friday April the 13th , 2007, 7PM – Midnight in the old Lee Jensen Brake Service at 1333 14th Street NW - a great raw space provided by Fathom Creative. The show continues on Saturday, April 14 from 12 – 5 PM for additional art viewing, sales and pick-up. The artists are donating 15% of all sales from the 2-day event to the Sitar Center for the Arts. Sounds will be provided Friday night by DJ Daweson. Food and drink are compliments of W.Millar & Co Catering, 18th & U Duplex Diner and Halo, co-sponsors of this event, along with Fathom Creative and BlackBox. So come, enlist, enjoy the show – and take home some great art by the artists from Studio 14 while helping the Sitar Center continue to feed the creative juices for the young artists among us.

. . .

Artomatic, the Washington, D.C., area’s eclectic, engaging — and occasionally even eye-popping — arts extravaganza is back this spring and promises to be more of a draw than ever before. Held regularly since 1999, Artomatic is the region’s one-of-a-kind multimedia art featuring more than 600 regional artists and performers. The free five-week event, to be held April 13–May 20, will feature nearly 90,000 square feet of paintings, sculptures, photography and other creative work.

April 13–May 20, 2007
2121 Crystal Drive, Arlington, Va.
Metro stop: Crystal City
Free admission. Donations accepted

Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday: Noon–10 p.m.
Thursday: Noon–11 p.m.
Friday, Saturday: Noon–1 a.m.
Closed Mondays

Cardenio Found at Woolly Mammoth's Melton Rehearsal Hall

Taffety Punk Theatre Company

presents a World Premiere...
a punk theatre adaptation of a lost Shakespeare play

CARDENIO FOUND
adapted and directed by Christopher Marino
featuring Terence Aselford, Kathy Cashel, Chris Davenport, Maia DeSanti, Kimberly Gilbert, David Bryan Jackson, Scot McKenzie, Mark R. Ross, Ben Shovlin, Steve McWilliams

In Woolly Mammoth's Melton Rehearsal Hall
APRIL 12 - 22
All tickets $10, general admission
Tickets thru Woolly Mammoth at 202-393-3939 or
www.woollymammoth.net

PAY-WHAT-YOU-CAN PREVIEW:
Wed, April 11 (7:30pm).
Two per person. Cash/check only. Tickets on sale starting at 6pm at the door only.

The Taffety Punks rock a Shakespeare play lost to audiences for 395 years. In true T-Punk style, we rescue this story from centuries of poseurs and controversy, with the help of Shakespeare's poems, some text by Cervantes - who Shakespeare stole the story from anyway, so don't worry about that - and LIVE music composed by DC-based Dischord Records artist Kathy Cashel.

Synopsis: Julio loves Leonora and Leonora loves Julio.  They want to be married, but before that can happen they have to get their respective father's to agree on the deal.  Pretty straight forward, right?  Enter Henriquez, a bad boy with a taste for women and bad music; a wronged woman Violante; a Duke; the good brother Roderick; a forced marriage; a trip to a nunnery; some sheep and you have an outrageous and edgy twist on Don Quixote.  This new adaptation of a lost Shakespeare piece will be served up as only Taffety Punk can; raw, immediate, and visceral… in other words - PUNK. Further info: www.taffetypunk.com.

Woolly Mammoth is located at 641 D Street, NW (7th & D)
Use Gallery Place or Archives/Navy Meml/Penn Qtr Metro.
Discounted $10 parking at Interpark Garage across the street from theatre entrance.

 

po box 15392 wdc 20003 www.taffetypunk.com

 

Company Members: Lise Bruneau, Marcus Kyd, Christopher Marino, Erin Mitchell, David Polk, Amanda MacKaye
Board of Trustees: William Colgrove, Eli Dawson, Philippa Hughes, Amanda MacKaye, Cara Pomponio, Gwydion Suilebhan
First Ten: Anonymous, Sam Fleming, Christine Farley, Philippa & David Hughes, Anthony & Cathleen Nelson, Ryan Nelson

 

 

MORE NEWS:

THE FUTURE:

ARTOMATIC. Company choreographer Erin Mitchell teams up with Paulina Guerrero for an evening of works in progress featuring music by Dischord recording artist Ryan Nelson. May 19th at 8pm. 2121 Crystal Drive, Arlington, VA. Near Crystal City Metro. Free admission. Donations accepted. Check www.artomatic.org for details.

THE DEVIL IN HIS OWN WORDS now, re-worked and re-charged, we are slated for a two week run at the Flashpoint Mead Theatre Lab (916 G Street NW) this summer, in cooperation with the Cultural Development Corporation. Opens August 10. Directed by Lise Bruneau, with Marcus Kyd as the Prince of Darkness.

OTHER WORK:

Lise and Marcus are currently immersed in production for "The Wars of the Roses" at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival in Montgomery. This is John Barton's famous adaptation of HENRY VI parts 1,2, & 3 and RICHARD III. Lise plays Margaret through the entire cycle, while Marcus plays Suffolk, and returns as Clarence in the later plays. They have opened the Henry VI plays, and are simultaneously rehearsing RICHARD III, and soon will be running all three in Rep. Lise and Marcus will return this summer.

PLEA FOR FILTHY LUCRE:

As always, the works of our company depend on the good will of folks like yourself. Anything you can spare will help us make a powerful statement that theatre can - and must - do more. Even $20 will make a significant contribution toward more exciting productions like "And Then It Faster Rock'd", "LET X", and "The Phoenix and Turtle".

We've also begun a special program for the first ten donors of $1,000 or more, whose early generosity will help us leap over key important hurdles in establishing ourselves as a company and reinvigorating theatre. If you're willing to join the "First Ten", while the energy behind the Taffety Punk Theatre Company is beginning to grow, you'll receive free tickets to all of our shows, invitations to special events, and a permanent dedication as a member of the First Ten in everything we do. Your donation is tax deductible! The Cultural Development Corporation has offered to act as our fiduciary agent to help us bring DC smarter, better, cheaper theater. Here's how:

All you have to do is:
1. Write a check to the Cultural Development Corporation.
2. Put "Taffety Punk" in the memo field of your check.
3. Send your check to us at PO Box 15392 Washington DC 20003 and we'll do the rest!

Thanks for your support. We hope to see you at CARDENIO FOUND!

xo,
The Taffety Punks!

 

 

................................................................
Taffety Punk Theatre Company
PO Box 15392 Washington DC 20003
202-261-6612
info@taffetypunk.com
www.taffetypunk.com
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14th Street ain't what it used to be

This weekend is filled with art events. The most important one for you to attend, of course, is mine: The Pink Line Project's video and performance art party called Press Play. The party will be in a raw retail space at the corner of 14th and Church on Saturday night from 7 to 10 pm. I'm co-hosting it with Project 4 Gallery. Music provided by the very talented band Aphrodizia.

Afterward, walk across the street to Viridian to Dissident Display's party at Viridian. They'll be showing the Feedback Series, colorfield videos created by Adrian Loving and Ayodamola Okunseinde. Adrian will also DJ and the Painted Lady Performance Project will make an appearance.

Several galleries will open shows that night. More on that later . . .

Colorfield Remix

Colorfield remix kicks off this month with lots of great events starting this week! Here's a primer on what it's all about.

The event honors the 1950s and 1960s Color Field visual art movement and the Washington Color School, which put Washington, DC on the art world map. ColorField.remix includes exhibitions, public art projects, artists' talks, lectures, children's programs, and special events honoring Color Field and Washington Color School painters as well as contemporary artists influenced by those movements. The project was conceived by The Kreeger Museum and is being held in partnership with Cultural Tourism DC, the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities and the Washington, DC Convention & Tourism Corporation.

What is Color Field painting?

Color Field painting, an abstract style that emerged in the 1950s following Abstract Expressionism, is characterized by canvases painted primarily with stripes, washes and fields of solid color. The first serious and critically acclaimed art movement to originate in the nation’s capital, Washington Color School was central to the larger Color Field movement. Its roots were with painters who showed their work at the Washington Gallery of Modern Art, a short-lived museum promoting contemporary art during the 1960s. Its 1965 “Washington Color Painters” show formalized recognition of the Washington Color School of painters “More than 40 years after that historic D.C. exhibition, their paintings reveal not just a shared passion for color but highly individualistic visions,” writes Jean Lawlor Cohen, guest co-curator at The Kreeger Museum. “They represent a moment when Washington heeded Willem de Kooning’s call for ‘hallelujah painting.’”

Among the best known Color Field artists are Leon Berkowitz, Helen Frankenthaler, Ellsworth Kelly, Robert Motherwell, Barnett Newman, Jules Olitski, Mark Rothko, Clyfford Still, Frank Stella and Alma Thomas and Larry Zox. Among the best known Washington Color School artists are Gene Davis, Thomas Downing, Morris Louis, Kenneth Noland, Howard Mehring and Paul Reed.

More information about the remix: www.washington.org/colorfieldremix

Barbara Probst

See Barbara Probst's latest show Exposures at G Fine Art. Just go. It's good. It's very good.

Opening reception
Saturday, April 7
6:30 to 8:30 pm
@ G Fine Art
1515 14th Street

MOMA exhibited her work last fall in their annual showcase of significant recent work in contemporary photography. Probst experiments with the temporality and point of view of the shot/counter-shot technique of film by presenting multiple photographs of one scene shot simultaneously with several cameras via a radio-controlled release system.

Notes about the artist from the G website:

Barbara Probst investigates the many ambiguities inherent to the photographic image. In her work the relationship of the photographic instant to reality is intensified in two distinct ways whereby the captured moment acquires an almost unsettling quality: on the one hand, Barbara Probst abandons the single-eye gaze of the camera and divides it into various points of view. On the other, she multiplies and diversifies the short moment of the shot. Thanks to a radio-controlled release system she can simultaneously trigger the shutters of several cameras pointed at the same event or subject from different angles and various distances. The depictions of each specific instant generated by this method constitute a series. The relationship of single shots to one another within a series is not determined by a common unifying principle or any stylistic markers. There is no formal proximity and no overall theme to tie the works together. Yet the photographs are bound by a tighter but still elusive link, namely the one and only moment of an exposure which is their very subject.

The Pink Line Project

Please go to
The Pink Line Project

for an invitation to the coolest party in town!

Press Play
April 14
7 - 10 pm
@ corner of 14th and Church

On the lam in Costa Rica . . . continued

Iona looks a little nervous as we go airborne in the tiny prop plane from San Jose to Nosara.

Last year, everyone kept mixing me up with the Victoria's Secret model when we were out in the water. I like to pretend it wasn't because she and I wore this same rashguard.

My mantra this summer.

Watching the sunset was a daily activity.

Maybe I am taking this pink thing a little too far, but I have got to get one of these cute bicycles . . . with the basket. And maybe I'll add some pink streamers for the handle bars.

Andrew Jacob is a surfer artist who paints little wave scenes on found driftwood and then nails them on the posts at all the beach accesses. I saw one at Blew Dogs and asked the bartender where I could buy one. He pulled it off the wall, extricated the nail, and handed it to me. Best souvenir ever!

Flip flops sum up summer.