James already wrote about one of these, but here are my favorite things I’ve seen lately in Chelsea.

David S. Allee, Garage Driving, 2006, Chromogenic Print, 50 × 60 inches

David S. Allee, Cross Lands at Morgan Lehman (already closed)

Disturbing but gorgeous large-format prints of American civilization’s battle for space of cars and humans.

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Installation view of When The Revolution Comes at Kathleen Cullen

This is a great show of primarily politically-oriented art curated by Michael St. John.

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Josedgardo Granados, Commute 8

There are some beautiful works on paper by this artist in the project space at Kathleen Cullen.

[The installation view is by me. The rest are from the galleries’ websites.]

“concrete liberty hurdles” at Madison Square Garden
August 31, 2004
photo by James Wagner

From today’s New York Times:

City Fights Efforts to Release 2004 Convention Arrest Records

Faced with lawsuits from hundreds of people arrested during the 2004 Republican National Convention, the Bloomberg administration is fighting to keep secret a vast array of records, testimony and videotapes collected that week.

The city contends the materials could be embarrassing to people who were arrested, disclose police intelligence, or reveal environmental conditions that may hurt commercial development on the West Side waterfront or be useful to terrorists.

In addition, the city lawyers said that medical reports from police officers who complained of getting sick after working at a temporary holding pen were “unreliable” and “likely to contain misinformation.”

They’re just throwing out excuses hoping one will stick. Given that a huge number of people were arrested just for walking down neighborhood streets at the wrong time (many of them not protesters), the city has big payouts coming. Perhaps someone can ask Bloomberg to donate some of his money instead of making the taxpayers of New York pay for his attempt to cozy up to the Republicans and their convention.

Nancy Baker
Waiting For My Prince, 2006
Oil on Wood Panel
36 × 36 inches

Nancy Baker, who is represented by Winkleman / Plus Ultra Gallery, is the newest artist to sign up for my ArtCat hosting service. Click on her name or the image to see her new website.

Leave it to an Indian-owned phone store to have the best holiday window on my block.

I can’t quite put my finger on it, but something about this disturbs me.

The Seminole Tribe of Florida is buying the Hard Rock business,
including its massive collection of rock ‘n’ roll memorabilia, in a $965 million deal with British casino and hotel company Rank Group PLC, the tribe announced Thursday.

Seminole Tribe of Fla. buying Hard Rock – Yahoo! News

John Smith
The Girl Chewing Gum, 1976
12mins
Black & White 16mm

The more I see of older art works, the more I worry that very few things are truly new. The latest incident? When I saw John Smith’s Girl Chewing Gum (1976) in Artists Space’s In the Poem About Love You Don’t Write The Word Love. One watches a street scene and listens to a voice appearing to direct the action on the screen. It doesn’t hurt that he sounds a bit like a Monty Python narrator.

I had never heard of this piece when I first saw Noah Klersfeld’s work Pay Roll. Todd Gibson describes it here. Maybe it doesn’t really matter, since I knew nothing of John Smith’s work, and probably Todd and Mr. Klersfeld didn’t either.

luxonline has a page describing the work and a short video excerpt.

Related: 2003 interview with John Smith in Millenium Film Journal.

[image above from luxonline]

Last week we visited Gasser & Grunert to see Ann Craven’s show of moon paintings. Here are a few shots paired with a real moon photo taken on our block.

Via Blentwell.com’s podcast I found this great mix by Don Rimini. Here is their description:

Don Rimini – Absolutely Dangerous

Wow this is some shit right here! Don Rimini stalks les rues de Paris in search of freshly tweaked beats. And with a DJ bag filled with butter cuts from Lily Allen, Uffie, Does it Offend you, 2 live crew and others this set is certain to get your ass werkin’ An awesome blend of electro, techno, booty & bastard pop!

Download (55MB, 1 hour)

Joshua Johnson’s excellent blog has been a little quiet of late, as he was preparing for a solo exhibition in Williamsburg. It opens tomorrow night at Riviera. We plan to drop by and see his new paintings.

[image grabbed from Riviera’s website]

Dark (Davis), 2006
Acrylic and paper on digital print
24 × 27 inches

I really love James Hyde‘s work. You really can’t tell, without standing up close to this and looking at it from different angles, which part is painted and which is part of the digital print. The “(Davis)” in the title refers to Stuart Davis.

This is one of a couple of works by James Hyde in The Thaw, the second exhibition at Lital Mehr’s new gallery on 18th Street.