“SITE” emerging artists show
Posted on April 20, 2008
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I have had three pieces accepted to a show featuring works from emerging artists in New York City. The show will open in Soho on May 8th. More details soon…
(c) Takashi Murakami @ Brooklyn Museum of Art, 4/5/08
Posted on April 9, 2008
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We headed over to the Murakami exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, just a couple days after the opening bash with a long VIP list and a performance by Kanye West, who is a Murakami fan. The show overall was very impressive, my only gripe was the militant guards going nuts about photographs. I was able to sneak a couple though, one of this pretty amazing anime-inspired sculpture.
The first thing we noticed is that Murakami is big. His work is physically huge and his art / commerce blend has turned into a mini-empire; with high profile collectors paying through the nose for his paintings on the top end, and easily accessible manufactured plastic pop art (with candy) on the low end. And somewhere in the middle are the works like bags for Louis Vuitton and an album cover design for Kanye West.
The album cover is a perfect illustration of Murakami’s reach: now due to the popularity of Kanye’s album, over a million people own Murakami reproductions… in the form of an album cover. The press is comparing him to Andy Warhol and even Walt Disney with his ambitious and prolific ‘factories’ churning out pop-art. I can’t think of a living and working visual artist (painter) with this kind of reach. With all that, the body of work in the show is also very fun. Worth a look for sure.
Matt & Kim: 4/5/08 @ Lulu’s, Brooklyn NY
Posted on April 6, 2008
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Matt and Kim are a twosome (boyfriend -girlfriend) band that can actually make a lot of noise, as we found out last Saturday. They are kind of like dork versions of the White Stripes. Actually, Kim really isn’t that dorky. The did a short surprise set; having already played a show earlier that night. They set up out on the floor amidst a mass of sweating, bearded and hairy geekmen, who were somehow convinced by Kim to all take their shirts off; they then proceeded to start moshing and dropping eachother on the ground while singing along to every song. Guys, you need more of a crowd before you stage dive! Or at least a more crowd more committed to getting slammed into and losing their drinks. Ouch.
But the set was fun nonethless. Musically, it’s Matt on a vintage synth (at least it sounded vintage; hard to tell because you could only see the band when they stood up between songs) and Kim pounding away on drums, Meg White style. Simple, 80′s synth and maybe a little punk influenced. I’m not a big fan of whining, nasally, dweeb sounding vocals, but they did an OK job. The girl no singy, apparently. A band named Robspierre something or other played before them and they were also high energy punkdorks.
Lulu’s (it might actually be renamed) is an interesting place. Patched together punk-style digs with cheap beer, a free hot dogs with every drink, and three levels of loudness with a balcony overlooking the main bar that has skee ball and Buck Hunter. And no cover charges as far as I can tell… and right at the end of our block, too.