MTAA Reference Resource

random friday post 11.06.09

M.River — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 19:08:00 GMT

Creative Commons and the Arts Meet Up

M.River — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 13:55:00 GMT

Creative Commons and the Arts Meet Up

Nov 18 at 7pm
The Open Planning Project (TOPP) HQ 148 Lafayette St
New York, NY 10013
212.796.4220

This month’s meetup will feature a panel on the topic of Creative Commons licensing and open culture as it applies to cultural institutions and the arts. We’ll take a look at some of the ways museums are opening up their content, and explore the limitations and rights restrictions they’re still having to contend with. We’ll also take a look at how artists are using CC licensing and working with CC materials.

7pm - Doors
7:15pm - Brief presentation from artists M.River & T.Whid of MTAA
7:30-8:30pm - Panel discussion, Q&A
8:30-10pm - Informal networking

Panel speakers include:

Fred Benenson of Creative Commons, Shelley Bernstein of the Brooklyn Museum, Steven Masur of Masur Law and Tim Whidden (T.Whid) from MTAA and more…

no sun

M.River — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:35:00 GMT

Killing time at MOMA last night before Brody Condon�s No Sun, I started to follow women across the permanent galleries. She seemed to be conducting her own audio guide to the collection. It was a semi public performance or she was having a breakdown. Not an over-the-top-kick-me-out-of-the-museum-breakdown but more of a here�s-the-facts public service announcement. Highlights? A Clyfford Still abstraction: �You see it�s just a bunch of dead cats. DEAD CATS.� Pollack�s drips �This is what painting are. You see this �smelly urine?� I followed at a safe distance, amazed at her dedication, imagination and strange theater craft.

Speaking of public service announcements at MOMA, I would like to suggest that when they play the museum is closing in 15 minutes announcements in the 6 or so languages at the end of the day; they conclude this long message with a brief whale or bird song.

halloween week - all souls’ day (day of the dead)

M.River — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 12:58:00 GMT

halloween week - sunday (new york city marathon/ all saints day)

M.River — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 12:50:00 GMT

halloween

M.River — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 16:18:00 GMT

halloween week - friday

M.River — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 11:47:00 GMT

halloween week - thursday

M.River — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 13:45:00 GMT

halloween week - wednesday

M.River — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 11:59:00 GMT

halloween week - tuesday

M.River — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:19:00 GMT

halloween week - monday

M.River — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:38:00 GMT

Two new art blogs

T.Whid — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 21:58:00 GMT

The art market downturn hasn’t harmed one area of the art world — art blogs!

Two new ones made it into my feed reader recently.

The first is Idiom. Published by art lovers, art bloggers and art collectors (just all around awesome art dudes) Barry Hoggard and James Wagner, the site promises “a local, engaged counterpoint to the prevailing discourse of contemporary art.” And so far, so good with longer form, thoughtful articles.

The second is Hyperallergic. It’s edited by the well-known art blogger Hrag Vartanian and published by someone I haven’t heard of named Veken Gueyikian (who looks to be a marketing dude). This one promises “a forum for serious and radical thinking about visual art.” Sounds good!

Looking forward to what these two new sites will have in store and wishing them well.

You Tunes at OTO

M.River — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 16:26:00 GMT

some photos from You Tunes at OTO last night on Flickr

Participants answer questions on a form, such as favorite superhero or cake. The You Tunes band (Preston Poe, Kyle Hester, David and Tara Gladden, Monica Hurtado and Clinton Wilkins) with about 1 min prep, played your song and burned it on CD. They asked Tim and I to kick it off by attempting to each do a song. Here are the awkward-but-fun results.

M.River Song by T.Whid
T.Whid’s Song By M.River

inaction painting at work

M.River — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 14:47:00 GMT

just to prove that it could be done � claw hammer 90 degrees to desk using only 2 sided tape for 48 hours

OTO Sat Oct 10 - �YouTunes�: a performance sound project

M.River — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 22:52:00 GMT

On October 10, 2009 from 7pm to 10pm, Over The Opening is pleased to present �YouTunes�: a performance sound project with Preston Poe and Kyle Hester.

YouTunes is a personalized song customization and distribution system. Poe and Hester invite you to participate by filling out a simple primarily multiple-choice form. Based on your answers, the artists will craft a custom-made song just for you.

�We�ll write, play, sing, record and burn a CD just for you on the spot- all for 99 centavos�

In an effort to compete with iTunes, the artists will be charging 99 cents per song. You bring a dollar bill and they will give you back your very own song burnt on CD and penny for your thoughts change. Choose your themes, rhythm, key phrases, and musical style, and they will match it to a carefully considered, spontaneous, personally crafted melody - with lyrics to boot!

Poe and Hester�s cache of musical YouTunes styles and instruments includes (but is not limited to) Theremin, electric �micro� pipe organ, washtub, fingerpickin� guitar, ukulele, various percussion instruments, and many other surprises.

Free beer and wine will be on hand as well as a variety of international culinary tastes that will appeal to one and all.

Over The Opening (OTO) - Once a month, from 7PM to 10PM, the artist collective MTAA convert their N6th St. Brooklyn studio into a venue for the presentation of time-based art.

OTO direction and map

some mtaa art likes for 10.03.09

M.River — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 21:25:00 GMT

NY Art Book Fair at PS1

A Voyage of Growth and Discovery - Mike Kelly and Mike Smith at the Sculpture Center

Jack Early at Southfirst

All About Greenpoint’s Rooftop Farms

T.Whid — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 16:30:00 GMT

This looks pretty cool, via press release no less (I (almost) never post PRs).

PIE IN THE SKY: All About Greenpoint’s Rooftop Farms
w/ Annie Novak

FREE LECTURE

MONDAY, Oct. 5, 7:30pm
PETE’S CANDY STORE
(709 Lorimer St., Brooklyn)

New York City is a Farmer’s Paradise! Just ask Annie Novak, one of the masterminds behind Greenpoint’s Rooftop Farms, a 6,000 square foot organic farm picture-esquely plopped on top of a warehouse overlooking midtown Manhattan. Her operation — founded in partnership with Ben Flanner, a neophyte to farming, and Goode Green, a green-roofing specialist — currently produces produce for a host of Brooklyn gourmandizers, including Anella and Marlow and Sons. They even run a farm stand featuring fresh picked produce every Sunday! Come hear how this urban Agronomist tells us the unlikely story of how she did it — and learn how you can too!

More on Rooftop Farms at the web site http://rooftopfarms.org/.

Vernacular Alien World Drawing Championship, Maryland

M.River — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 15:19:00 GMT

On September 25, 2009, people gathered in The Electronic Gallery at Salisbury University. In the gallery, two large sheets of paper had been tapped on the floor. Each sheet was divided into 4 horizontal sections.

As we sat on the floor, I explained that we were about to stage the world’s first Vernacular Alien World Drawing Championship.

I began by talking about the choice of aliens. Although most people would not say they have seen an alien, we all know what they look like. We may even have drawn one before. As an example, I image-searched Google for “aliens.”

I also explained that although we know what aliens look like, we don’t have examples of “vernacular aliens.” We then looked at a Google for “vernacular aliens.” At the time, it resulted only with images announcing the Vernacular Alien World Drawing Championship and other MTAA works.

I explained that they would be working together on two vernacular alien images using a modified exquisite corpse drawing method / game. We then looked at a few examples of exquisite corpses.

I promised them that they could make better “vernacular aliens” than some of the exquisite corpse examples. I told them that in the future, when people Googled “vernacular aliens,” their work would be seen.

The Vernacular Aliens Drawing Method

I divided the room into two teams (Team M.River and Team T.Whid) and selected 3 judges. I selected 2 team captions and had a coin toss to see which team would draw first. Team M.River won the toss and deferred to T.Whid. I explained that the team would need to self-organize into head, shoulders, knees and toes drawing groups and that they would have until the end of one song to complete their Vernacular Alien. I tossed 10 black Sharpies markers down on the paper and hit play on a YouTube video for David Bowie’s “Ziggy Stardust”.

Team M.River was up next with the same song playing.

After Team M.River finished, we then went to the bonus round. I read a list of ten things a Vernacular Alien might have or see in Salisbury, Maryland (UFO, phaser, death ray, robot dog sidekick, sammy the seagull, the moon, satellites, pizza, salty snacks, the duck decoy museum, and a walkie-talkie). Both teams had one song to fill in the background with these items. I divided the markers (5 per team) and hit play on the YouTube video for Klaatu’s “Calling Occupants Of Interplanetary Craft.”

After that, we hung up the drawings.

The judging round began with an open pro and con town hall-style review. We then had a vote by show of hands. Team M.River took it with a decisive 3-0 win.

We all clapped and cheered and then ate pizza.

Every so often, someone would ask what would become of the drawings. I said they would get mailed back to NYC where they would sit in the bottom of a flat file waiting some further use. The images of the drawings and the performance on the other hand will go onto the net and become the objects that define Vernacular Aliens.

More Vernacular Aliens images:
M.River’s Vernacular Aliens Flickr set
Jennifer Poe’s Vernacular Aliens Flickr set

Big MTAA thanks to Preston, Jennifer, Mieke, Dick and the students of Salisbury University.

Vernacular Alien World Drawing Championship

T.Whid — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 12:37:00 GMT

Vernacular Alien World Drawing Championship, Maryland

M.River posted photos from our (using ‘our’ loosely as M.River conducted this one on his own) participatory performance coinciding with our show 2Live at The Electronic Gallery at Salisbury University, MD.

Check ‘em out…

Also, lots more at Jennifer Poe’s Flickr set as well.

IPDC’s Documentation

M.River — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 00:20:00 GMT

IPDC Flicker Set
…more documentation soon.

Update
Here are 2 short quicktime clips
Teck Si-Fi Jam
Pet Sounds