Viva Las Vegas
Steven Wynn and his Bellagio Resort and Art Gallery are faux-gilded tributes to the great
American pastimes of extravagance and co-opted icons. So if you're a culture-jamming art gang
dubbed "Together We Can Defeat Capitalism," why not set your sights on Las Vegas's most
pretentious developer and culture czar? Just don't be surprised if you end up in court.
From Together We Can Defeat Capitalism
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Lit à Go-Go
Are you in Europe or Europe bound? Catch part of the
Literature Express tour, a six week lit fest on wheels with over
100 European writers of all sorts travelling on a single train to
19 major cities. The final destination is Berlin's
Friedrichstrasse station on July 17th, where a festival will be
followed by a book fair in Bebelplatz. (Bebelplatz was the site
of the 1933 Nazi book burning.) The tour is intended to
examine the idea of European identity and to use the media to
stimulate discussion and "reclaim public places for literature." From Arts Wire Current
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Conflict Irresolution
Is online art a revolutionary medium or a media-hyped flash in the pan? That's where
"Three Degrees of Separation," an "adversial collaboration" between artists Janet Cohen,
Keith Frank and Jon Ippolito, begins. The trio enact their conflict on- and off-line, visually as well as
verbally, embracing divergent viewpoints represented visually in contrasting colors: those colors available
for printing (seen in a dialogue/debate staged on printed fragments of text and image on the gallery walls)
are contrasted with those available for online reproduction (where agreement yields overlapping, blended
color). But color and repro are only metaphors; the real, mediagenic point is conflict and competition.
Online and at Sandra Gering Gallery, 476 Broome Street,
New York City, through July 30.
From Adversarial Collaborations
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Artery: The AIDS-Arts Forum
No matter what the media might suggest, the pandemic is heating up —
at least for those who can't afford expensive drugs. This new site — edited and produced by
MediaChannel's own Robert Atkins — examines art about AIDS past and present,
from community endeavors to the work of choreographer Bill T. Jones, who was excoriated by
The New Yorker for using nonprofessional, terminally ill dancers onstage. There's even an
international people's timeline that chronicles this two-decades-old nightmare.
From Artery: The AIDS-Arts Forum
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Another One Bites the Dust
Ironically, as high tech and telecommunications-based art
finally begins to have an impact on the art world, the dozen or
so American research facilities/incubators that nurture it are
struggling harder than ever to keep their doors open. Paul
Allen just closed Interval Research Corporation, which was
founded in 1992, with several artists on the payroll. The reason
is unclear, but it probably wasn't financial, given Allen's role as
co-founder of Microsoft. From Arts Wire Current
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Governmentality
At Hanover's Expo 2000, an exhibition entitled "Governmentality: Art in Conflict with the International Hyperbourgeoisie and the National Petty Bourgeoisie" boasts one of the best titles — and worst subtitles — ever. Inspired by many artists' discomfort with showing in Austria since the recent right-wing electoral victories there, Governmentality is a 23-artist melange of the goofily politicized and the politically correct: From photos of the anti-WTO demo in Seattle by Allan Sekula to a telephone-booth installation by Songül Boyraz where listeners get an earful about visibilty and cultural aggression. At Alte Kestner Gesellschaft, Warmbüchenstraße 16; Hanover; through July 30. From Governmentality
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I R Us
Artist Donald Rodney died from sickle-cell anemia in 1998, and his friends completed his last work,
"Autoicon." This automated Web piece offers "live" presence, a "body" of medical data, and the ability
to generate new art in Rodney's spirit. It touches more than superficially on all the hot-button issues
of the day: digital creativity and new media, artificial intelligence and racism, ethics and memorialization.
From Institute of International Visual Arts
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AS THE MEDIA WATCH THE WORLD, WE WATCH THE
MEDIA.
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