Winnie Cooper

Leigh Ledare

Christina Aguilera Would Be Proud

From the Houston Imports forum:

This has nothing to do with the Hurricane. We had a resident who had an outstanding balance for over a month and no one could get ahold of her. The Bookkeeper went inside after so many tries to leave a note and this is what we found. The pictures do NO justice. There is suppose to be 2 cats living here but we cant find them (we think they’re dead somewhere inside the apartment-we contacted the SPCA). The place REEKS to say the leaks, i gagged non stop.

At least the person keeps their, “computer area” clean, they must be a Winnie Cooper devotee.

Robert Crumb

I’ve been getting into Philip K. Dick’s writing recently.  Awesome stuff.  The settings and people are really rooted in the ’60s, in the time he was writing, but the themes and theories are totally transcendental.  The interviews with him are especially fun to read (including the May 1980 interview with SLASH magazine where he talks about Darby Crash leaving The Germs and the interviewers are like “Huh?  You’re so old - how do you know about The Germs?” and it was because he was inviting teenagers over to his house to get high after his fourth wife left him).  Check out this wicked R. Crumb comix detailing Dick’s late-in-life religious experience.

Damien Hirst

Damien Hirst, 43, just made history - and a boatload of treasure  - with his two-day sale at Sotheby’s auction house in London.  He’s the first living artist to sell work directly through an auction house rather than a gallery*. Final figures (get ready to puke): 218 of 223 works sold for a total of $212,000,000 CAD.  10% goes to his manager, so subtract $21m CAD.  Sotheby’s took $30m CAD in buyer’s premiums (when you successfully bid at auction you’re charged a fee on top of the hammer price).  Production costs to make the 223 pieces are estimated to be around $50 million.  So Damien nets, before tax, $100 million.  And everybody knows the rich don’t pay tax.

Oh yeah, and the work?  This was about art after all, wasn’t it?  Sotheby’s made a pretty comprehensive website for the show, titled “Beautiful Inside My Head Forever”, but all that’s left after the feeding frenzy is this video.

*What’s the difference between selling at auction vs. the gallery?  The top commercial galleries have waiting lists and choose who to sell to.  You can be the richest dude in the world and not be able to buy the ‘best’ art.  It’s all secret deals - which means the people who are allowed to buy don’t even know how much the last guy paid; they could be paying twice as much but have to smile because it’s a ‘priviledge’ to be allowed to buy at all.  By auctioning the pieces off in public it’s totally transparent: everybody sees how much is paid and everybody gets a shot at buying.  Hirst’s gamble of democratizing the process could revolutionize the entire art world if other high-profile artists follow his act.

Jeremy Shaw

Local boy Jeremy Shaw has done pretty well for himself by making artwork about a) Drugs and b) North Vancouver.  He’s flying in from Berlin on Saturday night for his latest show This Transition Will Never End at Blanket Gallery, 758 Alexander St., 6-9pm.

*** I must add my apologies to my Winnie bros and sis for not showing up at the Bourbon finale.  I’ve been on heavy medication since I was 2 years old and this is what happens!!! ***

SWARM 2008

SWARM starts tonight!  The annual 3-day Art Crawl begins today and there are a tonnes of events to check out.  Check out the website for all the schedules. I know LES Gallery’s opening on Saturday night of Joey Haley’s new work (above) will be a highlight.

Shayne Ehman

Shayne just moved back to Vancouver and had a baby boy, Axl Owl Ehman. Go buy his drawings on Sept. 6 so he can keeping that baby bouncing! He also did the music on the Bangmaster Generals Warning project. Pretty wicked.

Daddy

Photo-collage anyone?  Javier Peres publishes the quarterly magazine DADDY to showcase his gallery’s artists, their friends and pop culture in general.

Pretty Ugly

A big trend in the art world right now is everything-but-the-kitchen-sink group shows curated by a guest organizer.  The concept is better than the finished result but some of the better ones, like “Who’s Afraid of Jasper Johns?” at Tony Shafrazi, “Jekyll Island” at Honor Fraser and “Pretty Ugly” at Maccarone & Gavin Brown’s Enterprise are fun to check out.

Gajin Fujita

Gajin Fujita is one of my favorite artists working in L.A. Check out more of his stuff here.