Anyone who’s chosen to live a creative lifestyle — not just artists — knows what it means to worry. Rather than gun for the safety of a monthly paycheck, most of us (this writer included) have to find a way to put food on the table, without sacrificing our proverbial souls.
Carren Jao
Carren is an art, architecture and design writer based in Manila and Los Angeles. Her work has been spotted on Core77, Dwell, Surface Asia and Fast Co.Design. You can find her online and on Twitter, @ccjao.
Posted inArt
The Gentle Tension of Abstraction
LOS ANGELES — Time slows within the work of Spanish painter Juan Usle. Though he fits stylistically within the realm of Abstract Expressionism, he shows us again that not all brush strokes need to jump off the canvas, as if caught in a nervous seizure, that there is something to be said for pace, time, and pausing to hear one’s own rhythm.
Posted inArt
Over 15,000 Attend Inaugural LA Art Book Fair
LOS ANGELES — Bookstore chains may slowly be dying out, but small publishing is alive and kicking … hard. At least, if the turnout at Printed Matter’s first LA Art Book Fair was any indication.
Posted inArt
Being Odie in a Garfield World
LOS ANGELES — Audaciously exuberant, Odie, the lovable dog from Jim Davis’s Garfield comics, was a yellow-furred dream come true for any child of the 1980s. It was also, interestingly, artist Jim Drain’s emotional North Star when it came to his latest solo exhibition, Drain Expressions, at Los Angeles’s Prism Gallery.
Posted inArt
Filmmaker Miranda July Finds Value (and Prices) in Everyday Objects
LOS ANGELES — It has always been a mystery to me how a signature Louis Vuitton bag can go for thousands of dollars while an impeccable knockoff (essentially the exact same bag) can go for mere hundreds. In the same way, a piece of art that can hardly be sold at the time of its creation can skyrocket at an auction decades later. Value, whether monetary or abstract, is a difficult quality to pin down, in regards to people, certainly, but surprisingly, for objects as well.
Posted inArt
Steeped in Tradition but Straining Toward the Future
MANILA, Philippines — There is a sweet dish in the Philippines called halo-halo, a rainbow of beans, fruits, and jellies mixed with ice and topped with ice cream. Literally translated, it means “mix-mix,” as if repetition were needed to reassert its delectable cacophony of flavors. Walking the halls of this year’s ManilART was a bit like working through a tall glass of halo-halo.
Posted inArt
Watching the Art Watchers
There is something about art that begs us to get closer, which is why museum guards often stride up to visitors with a warning: “Please don’t touch the artwork.” To many, guards can be a nuisance, but to San Francisco–based photographer Andy Freeberg, they are an inspiration.
Posted inArt
Skin Deep: Angelica Dass’s Human Pantone Photographs
Humanity’s almost laughable fascination with lighter or darker skins is scrutinized under the camera’s lens by Brazilian photographer Angelica Dass, who has taken over 150 photographs of men and women and matched them — using a 11×11 pixel swatch from their faces — with their corresponding Pantone color. The results are posted it on the Humanae tumblelog for all to see.
Posted inArt
The Cups of War
LOS ANGELES — Ceramist and former US Marine Ehren Tool is exhibiting 1,000 cups decorated with decals of soldiers’ photos and sculptural reliefs shaped like medals and bombs.
In his first solo exhibition, Ehren Tool: Production or Destruction, ceramist and former Marine Ehren Tool is exhibiting a thousand uniquely crafted cups decorated with ceramic decals of soldiers’ photos, propaganda and sculptural reliefs shaped like medals and bombs.
Posted inArt
Gay Life Portrayed in Traditional Chinese Paper-cuts
LOS ANGELES — Being different is never easy, more so when you live in an infamously restrictive and conservative Communist Chinese society. Born in a farming village of the Shaanxi province, Xiyadie (a nom de plume meaning “Butterfuly in Siberia”) turns traditional paper-cut art into colorful, risqué pieces dealing with gay love and life.
Posted inArt
Weaving Rainbows from Miles of Thread
LOS ANGELES — Everyone’s done it at some point — crank up the water on the hose on a sunny day just to see that wonderful prism of light. Now, Mexican-born artist Gabriel Dawe does us one better by bringing rainbows to life, one thread at a time.
Posted inOpinion
Getty Launches Pacific Standard Time Archive (Plus Advice for Artists Needing $$)
The Getty has launched a comprehensive Pacific Standard Time at the Getty Center archive online for art-lovers slash internet-junkies.