Contents for May 12th, 2025
CONTENTS (please click on the links or scroll down for complete information on each post):
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1. Nancy Andrews, FF Alumn, at Reel Pizza Cinerama, Bar Harbor, ME, May 11-14
2. Chris DAZE Ellis, Martin Wong, FF Alumns, at Museum of the City of New York, Manhattan, May 14
3. Alice Eve Cohen, Aaron Landsman, Asia Stewart, FF Alumns, named Saltonstall Fellows 2025
4. Miao Jiaxin, FF Alumn, at Grace Exhibition Space, Manhattan, May 16
5. Coco Fusco, FF Alumn, at MACBA, Barcelona, Spain, May 23, 2025-January 11, 2026
6. Paulette Richards, FF Alumn, publishes new soundtrack
7. Harley Spiller, Barbara Kruger, Micki Watanabe Spiller, FF Alumns, now online at LaPresse.ca
8. Penny Arcade, FF Alumn, at Giorno Poetry Systems, Manhattan, May 15, and more
9. Devora Newmark, FF Alumn, spring news
10. Barbara Rosenthal, FF Alumn, at Lafayette Restaurant, Manhattan, May 21
11. Anya Liftig, FF Alumn, new publication
12. Peter Baren, FF Alumn, at Theatre l’Horizon & Mille Plateaux, La Rochelle, France, May 16-17 and more
13. John Jesurun, FF Alumn, at Apartment 1, Manhattan, May 27-30, June 20-24
14. Jay Critchley, FF Alumn, at Motta Field, Provincetown, MA, April 14, and more
15. Paul Zelevansky, FF Alumn, now online at https://vimeo.com/544676726
16. Christo & Jeanne Claude, FF Alumns, now online at NYTimes.com
17. Sur Rodney Sur, Jack Waters, Martha Wilson, Charles Yuen, FF Alumns, at Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation, Manhattan, June 4
18. Carole Naggar, FF Board Member, at Yoho Artists Open Studios, Yonkers, May 17-18
19. Julia Scher, FF Alumn, now online at Youtube.com
20. Johanna Went, FF Alumn, at The Box, Los Angeles, CA, opening May 17
21. Mark Bloch, FF ALumn, now online at WhitehotMagazine.com
22. Allan Wexler, FF Alumn, now online at NYTimes.com
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1. Nancy Andrews, FF Alumn, at Reel Pizza Cinerama, Bar Harbor, ME, May 11-14
“Eccentric Films” celebrates Nancy Andrews’ imaginative, unconventional legacy
BAR HARBOR—An extraordinary, four-night film series showcasing the unique artistic vision and experimental storytelling techniques of College of the Atlantic T.A. Cox Chair in Studio Arts Nancy Andrews is set for Reel Pizza Cinerama May 11-14, nightly at 7 p.m. Tickets are $6 for students, $8 for adults, on sale at https://reelpizza.com May 8.
Eccentric Films of Nancy Andrews spans a diverse selection of works dating from 1995-2025, including early works and genre-defying films that have earned Andrews recognition at film festivals and film series worldwide. Each night features a live Q&A session with Andrews, where she will discuss her creative process and the themes explored in her films.
The screenings are a celebration of Andrews’ retirement from COA. This is the first time a number of these films that originated on 16mm will be shown in new digital 4k transfers. Tickets go on sale May 8.
Andrews is a visionary filmmaker whose works have garnered critical acclaim for their experimental narratives, imaginative visual storytelling, and fearless exploration of unconventional themes. Andrews’ work explores the boundaries between reality and imagination, the personal and the universal, and the inner psychological landscapes and external forces that shape human experience. Through her unique blend of film, animation, puppetry, music, and visual art, she crafts hybrid worlds that are both whimsical and profound.
Andrews’ films have been featured at prestigious festivals around the world and have won numerous awards including a John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, Gotham Award, and Ellis-Beauregard Foundation Fellowship in Visual Arts. The Museum of Modern Art has collected six of her experimental films and her work is in the collections of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Films to be Screened:
Sunday May 11, 7 p.m.
I Like Tomorrow (2021, 11 min.)
Written, directed and produced by Nancy Andrews and Jennifer Reeder
Captain Regina Lamb (Michole Briana White) confronts an awkward love triangle between her past, present, and future selves in an isolated space station where she might be orbiting for years.
The Strange Eyes of Dr. Myes (2015, 76 min.)
Directed by Nancy Andrews, written by Nancy Andrews and Jennifer Reeder
After a near-death experience, Dr. Myes (Michole Briana White), researcher in the science of perception, attempts to graft animal senses to the brain to revolutionize human consciousness. She must face the consequences when she uses her own body and mind as a research tool and transforms herself into a creature with super senses.
Monday, May 12, 7 p.m.
Woods Marm (1996, 30 min.)
The Woods Marm is Hermione Pine, a hobby entomologist and botanist, “It would take a lively grasshopper to escape Miss Pine.” The story unfolds in the Great Northern Forest under giant pines as the diminutive Woods Marm leaves the city, makes her home in the trunk of a tree, and discovers some things about life.
Hedwig Page, Seaside Librarian (1998, 35 min.)
Hedwig Page was born with an uncanny knowledge of cataloguing. She could recite Dewey Decimal categories before she could read and she could read before all else. She obviously pities, but does not excuse, your ignorance of the holdings of the library. Hedwig is the personification of applied skill, a Delphi of learning. And, Hedwig Page has some problems. This is the story of renowned librarian, collector and inventor, Hedwig Page. The piece chronicles the life of a retired librarian, past and present.
Tuesday May 13, 7 p.n.
The Ima Plume Trilogy (98 minutes total)
Including Monkeys and Lumps, The Dreamless Sleep, and The Haunted Camera
Monkeys and Lumps (2003, 38 min.)
This film is a hybrid of drawn animation, live action, and puppetry. The central theme is the unknown, or “other,” and our efforts as individual humans to understand our place and relationship with the unknowable. There are several subjects woven into the film. These are: facial expressions of human and non-human primates; space training and missions of chimpanzees; human study of monkeys (symbolized by the image of Jane Goodall); interactions between humans and animals (taken from news reports); lumps—organisms that wash up on beaches that fit no known life forms (also called globsters)—and extraterrestrials.
The Dreamless Sleep (2004, 30 min.)
A hybrid of drawn animation, live-action, and puppetry, The Dreamless Sleep includes brief biographies of historical figures like Else Bosselman, who drew underwater creatures as described by William Beebe from the windows of the bathysphere, and Christine the Astonishing, a medieval woman mystic. The film is based on a series of interviews with Ima Plume.
The Haunted Camera (2006, 30 min.)
Ima Plume is a chalk-talk specialist or public illustrator who draws before small audiences. Her chalk talks are represented in the hand-drawn animation segments. An homage to film noir, it explores Ima Plume’s investigation of her own death. Ima, public illustrator, grapples with trying to express things that might not be seen or drawn, including spirits, electronic voice phenomena, and studies of animal locomotion. The film combines chalk and drawn animation, puppetry, and live action. It is both fiction and documentary. Inspiration for the content and style is taken from pioneers of film, vaudeville, photography, and spiritualism.
Wednesday, May 14, 7 p.m.
Live sound night. Aaron Jonah Lewis ’05, COA music professor Jonathan Henderson, Danielle Byrd ’05 , and Nancy Andrews perform live music and sound effects for the following films:
Flower (2025, 4 min.)
Accompaniment with four radios
She Had Some Work Done (2025, 3 min.)
Accompaniment with drums, electric guitar, and electric bass
An Epic Falling Between the Cracks (1996, 20 min.)
Black and white puppet animation with electric guitar, electric bass, keyboard, and sound effects. An Epic Falling Between the Cracks presents the voyages of Frances Coco and her dog sidekick, Lemuel, as related by a documentary filmmaker through film, animation, monologue, and song. Frances, an 18-inch puppet, leaves the comfort of her shoe box bed and sets off on a series of adventures, including to remote locations in outer space and underwater. It’s a space age, existential, Nanook of the North.
The Reach of An Arm (2000, 30 min.)
Music, song, and sound effects featuring virtuoso banjo and fiddle player Aaron Jonah Lewis ’05 and bass by Jonathan Henderson.. Peculiarity and Frank Goodin (portrayed by puppets) seek their fortune during the westward movement of the 1800s. Peculiarity has seen the promise of a better life: “The trouble with you, Frank, is that you shot half your brain off. This is your chance to get rich.” So they set out in their homemade wagon.
Nancy Andrews (she/her)
Thomas A. Cox Chair in Studio Arts
College of the Atlantic
nancyandrews.net
https://thestrangeeyesofdrmyes.wordpress.com
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2. Chris DAZE Ellis, Martin Wong, FF Alumns, at Museum of the City of New York, Manhattan, May 14
Please visit this link:
Thank you.
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3. Alice Eve Cohen, Aaron Landsman, Asia Stewart, FF Alumns, named Saltonstall Fellows 2025
Please visit this link:
https://www.saltonstall.org/residencies/2025-juried-fellows/
Thank you.
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4. Miao Jiaxin, FF Alumn, at Grace Exhibition Space, Manhattan, May 16
Join us for the last events of the Spring 2025 season!
May 16, 2025
“Laughter-Rage in Action” Closing Night
There will be an outdoor performance in the front courtyard beginning at 6:00 PM, followed by indoor performances starting at 8:00 PM.
6:00-7:00PM
Front courtyard performance by: Preach R. Sun
GES doors open at 7:30PM
Performances start at 8:00PM
Featuring performances by:
Joseph Ravens
Meadow Le’Elle
Cities Unexpected Field
Miao Jiaxin
Closing night tickets: https://www.zeffy.com/en-US/ticketing/sp25-closing-night?mc_cid=2176019abd&mc_eid=ebe4d79b4b
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5. Coco Fusco, FF Alumn, at MACBA, Barcelona, Spain, May 23, 2025-January 11, 2026
Please visit this link:
https://www.macba.cat/en/exhibitions/coco-fusco-i-learned-to-swim-on-dry-land
Thank you.
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6. Paulette Richards, FF Alumn, publishes new soundtrack
The dream I’m most excited about at present is my new “Soul Songs: Remembrance, Resilience, Resistance” soundtrack EP. I recorded the songs in this playlist for a trilogy of puppet films that explore African Americans’ experience of forced labor in the United States. You can obtain a copy by contributing to the Indiegogo campaign I have launched to support the newest film in the trilogy, “Men and Mules.” This project examines the treatment of convicts leased to Atlanta area quarries in the early twentieth century.
Please share the campaign link with anyone in your circle who is interested in the abolition of forced labor and mass incarceration:
https://www.indiegogo.com/project/preview/f32d08b4
Many thanks,
Paulette
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7. Harley Spiller, Barbara Kruger, Micki Watanabe Spiller, FF Alumns, now online at LaPresse.ca
Please visit this link:
Merci beaucoup!
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8. Penny Arcade, FF Alumn, at Giorno Poetry Systems, Manhattan, May 15, and more
Thursday,
May 15, 2025
222 Bowery, NYC
Doors: 6:30pm
Event: 7pm
Free
RSVP required: https://withfriends.co/event/23362249/penny_arcade_channels_the_influence_of_ira_cohen
Limited capacity
Ira Cohen absolutely participated in everything that is considered alternative post-1950. He was a pivotal figure in the last great bohemia that existed. Each time I ended a phone conversation with him, I would remind him that if he died before me I would be grateful every day of my life for knowing him and for having spent time with his incredible mind.
Ira immersed himself in world cultures, spiritually, artistically, anthropologically and in every art form save painting. He created intergenerational and international coalitions, always totally inclusive, queer as fuck yet he remained the outsider.
His knowledge was encyclopedic. I used him like you use google. He had a library of ten thousand books and he had read them all and retained all their knowledge. Ira had shoplifted all of those books. He said shoplifting is an ability all poets should develop.
When I complained that academic gatekeepers were erasing his influence from history he would laugh and chide me: “Remember Penny, a non-psychedelic can never enlighten a psychedelic.” When he died, The New York Times gave him a huge obituary as did The Guardian. They love a dead queer. Fuck them.
– Penny Arcade
This night of readings and remembrances celebrates Ira’s lasting influence on those who most closely felt it. Lakshmi Cohen, Bonny Finberg, Allan Graubard, Louise Landes-Levi, Yuko Otomo, Danny Rosen, and Robert Yarra read poems and share memories. Wayne Lopes plays guitar. And photographs by (and of) Ira play as a slideshow.
Copies of the new book A Certain Kind of Wizard: Treasures from the Vaults of Ira Cohen (Lithic Press, 2025) will be available for sale.
Note: this event is the second part of a two-day celebration, which begins the previous evening, with many of the same participants. Please join for first part as well:
Wednesday, May 14, 7pm
Bowery Poetry Club
308 Bowery, NYC
Free
Poet, photographer, filmmaker, publisher, and dauntless world traveler, Ira Cohen (1935 – 2011, USA) catalyzed creative scenes in New York, Tangier, Kathmandu, Amsterdam, and wherever else he happened to alight in his wanderings. His friends and collaborators included Jack Smith, Angus MacLise, Julian Beck, Judith Malina, William Burroughs, Gregory Corso, Vali Myers, Brion Gysin, Paul Bowles, Charles Henri Ford, and others.
Penny Arcade (b. 1950, USA), aka Susana Ventura, is an internationally respected performer, poet, writer, and a cultural icon of artistic resistance. Penny is the author of over 16 full-length performance plays, as well as hundreds of solo performance art pieces. For over 30 years she has brought East Village performance to international mainstream audiences.
Biographies for all other participants are available by clicking the “more…” link above.
With special thanks to the Golda Foundation.
Giorno Poetry Systems is generously supported by the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Westridge Foundation, I.A. O’Shaughnessy Foundation, Keith Haring Foundation, Fundación Almine y Bernard Ruiz- Picasso, Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation, Jenni Crain Foundation, Aurora Music Foundation, Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Galerie Almine Rech, kurimanzutto, the GPS Advisory Council, and Club 222 members.
Giorno Poetry Systems
222 Bowery
New York, NY 10012
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9. Devora Newmark, FF Alumn, spring news
We hope you are well. We’re writing to share some exciting updates on our work and invite you to be a part of that.
On Monday, May 12, we’re launching Home Ground Lab: a creative research and storytelling initiative based at Clark University’s Integration and Belonging Hub.
Why Home Ground Lab?
Over the past several years, we’ve been conducting research at the intersection of displacement, housing, trauma, and aesthetics. Again and again, we’ve seen how people—especially in shelters, encampments, and transitional spaces—create moments of beauty that support dignity, memory, and agency.
We realized this work needed a home. A place where stories, practices, and research could live alongside one another—and where new collaborations could grow.
Home Ground Lab is that space. We’re here to make the case for beauty in the places the world forgot.
Our first public offering: The Beauty Praxis Practice Guide
We created this 7-day guide in response to a growing sense of collective unraveling—especially in the wake of Trump’s #StopWorkOrder, the rollback of civil rights, and the targeted dismantling of aid, housing, and education infrastructures.
It’s designed for people navigating burnout, rupture, or reentry. Each day blends story, reflection, and sensory-based practice.
We specifically made it for:
Displaced humanitarian workers wondering where to go next
Activists and organizers trying to stay human in the face of erasure
Anyone asking, “How do I keep going?”
You can get early access to the guide by subscribing here
Could you help us with our launch?
Between now and Monday, May 12: Follow us on LinkedIn → so we don’t launch with two followers
On Monday, May 12:
Reshare our launch post (we’ll send it your way!)
Comment or reflect on the post—every bit of engagement helps spread the word
We are so grateful to you. For the conversations, collaborations, and belief that this work matters.
Here’s to building something beautiful—together.
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10. Barbara Rosenthal, FF Alumn, at Lafayette Restaurant, Manhattan, May 21
Barbara Rosenthal, FF Alumn, has donated a piece to the Center for Book Arts (CBA) for auction at the 2025 Benefit Dinner to be held Wednesday, May 21 at Lafayette (French) Restaurant, 380 Lafayette St. Tickets start at $600 with discounts for students, artists, pairs and tables. If you would like to request a discounted student or artist ticket, please email rebecca@centerforbookarts.org.
Barbara Rosenthal’s piece is “Pocketful of Poesy,” one of an edition of 10. The opening bid is $1500.
Here is more info about the piece, which comes on enclosed printed sheet, along with two dozen paper works and show announcement postcards, in a plastic string-bound pouch.
POCKETFUL OF POESY BARBARA ROSENTHAL
DELUXE OBJECT; “EDITION” OF 10 VARIATIONS; 6” x 8” x 1.”
Homo Futurus ™ Editions; https://eMediaLoft.org 2003. $1500, signed.
Denim, cotton thread, steel grippers, acrylic paint, rubber stamp ink, card stock, paper, xeroxes.
A hand-sewn, blue denim pouch, titled with hand-stenciled, bright yellow letters, each “pocket” is filled with small colored cards bearing the artist’s poetic lines, insights, enigmatic phrases and photographs, as well as a few of her short stories, poems, journal entries and personally designed and xeroxed post-cards, some of which are from her exhibitions, performances and screenings since 1976. Her name is stamped on the pouch with the red rubber stamp familiar to gallery-goers in NY, periodically appearing on street posters around the city, and as her signature in visitors’ books. Purchaser can add more material to pocket as desired.
Artist’s Statement:
Pocketful Of Poesy is an outgrowth of my habit of saving scraps. The idea itself is a pun on “posey/poesy,” from the singing game about the bubonic plague in 14th century England, when children filled their pockets with flowers to mitigate the stench of rotting corpses in the street. The denim comes from actual clothing I wore out. The grippers and thread come from the sewing box I took from my mother’s drawer after she died in 1983. Some of the cards were left over from post-card editions I no longer send out, and some were announcements left over after presentations. The writings were reformatted in various ways for publication.
I’ve made other pieces from what is essentially garbage: Old Address Book, for example, was editioned from a defunct address book I was about to throw out, but couldn’t part with, and Scrap Paper Sculptures and Bookmarks were both made from paper-cutter scraps. My winter blankets and some of my clothing are made from cloth scraps, but this is the first non-utilitarian scrap art I’ve made from cloth, and my first cloth book.
I had a cloth book when I was a child, containing activities like shoe-lacing, ribbon-tying and grippering, and I managed to find a similar one for my children when they were young. Both those books likely had something to do with creating this piece, but both had sewn bindings, and were more “booklike” than Pocketful Of Poesy. However, although I list this small edition with my objects because its unique presence calls attention to itself without a viewer’s even knowing there are contents, I consider any contained collection of separate pages, bound or unbound, except what is obviously a manuscript meant to be presented differently at a later date, a book, or at least a book-work, and if it is created by an artist, then, an artist’s book.
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11. Anya Liftig, FF Alumn, new publication
Dear Friend,
I am excited to announce the publication of my first artist book, REJECTION/AMBITION: A 25 Year Performance. It is both a performance document and text work in its own right and I would love to share it with you. It is currently available to purchase for $25 on my website and at Quimby’s Chicago and Passages Bookstore in Portland. More physical bookstore locations will be coming soon. If you live overseas and would like the book, reply to this email and I will set up a special shipping link for you.
Here is some info about the book:
Published: April 2025
Press: Renous River Press
Designer: Alexis Almada
Size: 10 x 4 inches, 112 pages, paperback
Price: $25
Culled from 25 years of her copious collection of rejection letters, interdisciplinary artist Anya Liftig’s REJECTION/AMBITION is an artist book that can be read both forward and backward. Read from the Ambition side, it is clear-eyed in its determination for artistic recognition. Read from the Rejection side, it is a text about failure, mistakes, and confusion. Sure to delight and console, Liftig’s work is unique in its vulnerability, humor, and heartbreak. This performance work was also written about by the artist in the book “The Art Life”.
Anya Liftig is a performance artist and writer. Her first book, the memoir Holler Rat, was published by Abrams Press in August 2023. Called “a searing debut” by Publishers Weekly and cited by Jo Ann Beard as a new influence in her writing, Holler Rat was a USA Today Bestseller. Liftig’s artworks have been exhibited at TATE Modern, MOMA, Queens Museum, Movement Research, Performer Stammtisch Berlin, Performance Space London, and many other venues around the world. As a dancer and actress. Liftig’s work has been published and written about in the New York Times Magazine, BOMB, The Wall Street Journal, Vogue Italia, PAJ, New York, Theater Magazine, and many others. Her experimental film and video work has been screened in festivals in Canada, Greece, UK, Holland, France, and many other countries. Her essays have been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and noted in Best American Non-Fiction. She is a Connecticut Council for the Arts Emerging Arts Fellow in Creative Writing, a recipient of a Franklin Furnace Award, and fellowships at MacDowell, Kimmel Harding Nelson, VCCA, Atlantic Center for the Arts and Yaddo.
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12. Peter Baren, FF Alumn, at Theatre l’Horizon & Mille Plateaux, La Rochelle, France, May 16-17 and more
2 performances in May coming up:
PARADOXAL Festival. AMBIGUITY.
16- 17th of May in La Rochelle France in Theatre l’Horizon and Mille Plateaux / Centre Choreografique National.
Information and programme: https://www.l-horizon.fr/programme/festival-paradoxal-2025
Riga Performance festival STARPTELPA. Riga Latvia. MORE-THAN-HUMAN.
27th of May – 1st of June. Zuzeum and K.K. Fon Stricka Villa.
Information and programme: https://www.rigaperformancefestival.com
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13. John Jesurun, FF Alumn, at Apartment 1, Manhattan, May 27-30, June 20-24
LETTER OF INTENT
BY JOHN JESURUN
WITH: ASTA HANSEN.BEN FORSTER
CLAIRE BUCKINGHAM.DAN KUAN PEEPLES
LIGHTING: JEFF NASH
MAY 27-30
JUNE 20-24
7PM
Limited seating. Reservations: https://www.apartment1.org/projects
LETTER OF INTENT ~ written, directed and designed by John Jesurun. Staged in an intimate apartment setting. Jesurun’s cast navigates the clandestine personas of four operatives working from the confines of an anonymous West Village maisonette. They negotiate a verbal and perceptual minefield of enciphered meanings and interpretations that leave them implicated in the dismantling of their own actuality.
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14. Jay Critchley, FF Alumn, at Motta Field, Provincetown, MA, April 14, and more
Grace Gouveia Smoking Bomb, in Provincetown Magazine ( https://www.jaycritchley.com/motta-field.html) was an ephemeral public art intervention and event honoring this Portuguese immigrant poet and activist. A line from her poem was inscribed on the town’s athletic field with white chalk before its redevelopment, each line measured 18′ high x 16′ wide, reading: Arise, beloved town, and shout your will that dares defy… The words were viewable from the top of the neighboring
Provincetown Pilgrim Monument at 372′ high. There was a saxaphone playing in the cavernous tower and dancers and poetry.
Jay Critchley
Founder & Director
Provincetown Community Compact
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15. Paul Zelevansky, FF Alumn, now online at https://vimeo.com/544676726
TO THE GREAT BLANKNESS
MAILING LIST:
A video from May 2021:
I thought the songs, images and sentiments needed a new airing:
“Taking stock of what I have and what I haven’’t…”
PZ, MAY 5, 2025
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16. Christo & Jeanne Claude, FF Alumns, now online at NYTimes.com
Please visit this link:
Thank you.
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17. Sur Rodney Sur, Jack Waters, Martha Wilson, Charles Yuen, FF Alumns, at Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation, Manhattan, June 4
Looking forward to the upcoming 2025 CPAL (Center for the Preservation of Artists’ Legacies) Annual Conference, REPRESENT – PRESERVE – SUSTAIN, taking place in one month: June 2-4, 2025, at The Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation on the LES.
ARTIST COLLECTIVES – FORMATION AND LEGACY
This panel will take place from 11:35am-12:45pm on Day 3, June 4 – SUSTAIN.
Day 3 defines the importance of creating and maintaining practice through collective efforts. Platforms prominent artists’ individual approaches to legacy as well as the gallerist’s role in sustaining these efforts.
Moderator:
Martha Wilson – artist – Founding Director Emerita, Franklin Furnace
Panelists:
Sur Rodney Sur – Fluxus artists – Writer, Curator, Archivist, Co-Executor of the Geoffrey Hendricks Estate
Jack Waters, ABC No Rio
Charles Yuen, Co-Founder, Godzilla
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18. Carole Naggar, FF Board Member, at Yoho Artists Open Studios, Yonkers, May 17-18
Dear friends and chers amis,
I hope you can join the 70 artists of our Yoho building ( and myself in studio #503) next weekend for our yearly open doors event!
Making art, looking at art is increasingly important in our troubled times.
and- it will be a fun event with music, food and drinks.
If you drive: there is parking in the yard.
If you don’t: there will be a shuttle at the Yonkers Metro North station.
A bientôt,
Carole
11am-5pm May 17-18, 540 and 378 Nepperthan Ave. Yonkers NY 10701 www.yohoartists.org
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19. Julia Scher, FF Alumn, now online at Youtube.com
Please visit these links:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=XjXekSCoAUc
Thank you.
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20. Johanna Went, FF Alumn, at The Box, Los Angeles, CA, opening May 17
OPENING
BURN ME!
FEATURING JOHN JOYCE, NASTYA KLYCHKOVA, LEE LOZANO, ROBERT MALLARY, DAMON MCCARTHY, PAUL MCCARTHY, JASON RHOADES, JASMINE RUDOLPH, MOLLY TIERNEY, SEAN TOWNLEY, JOHANNA WENT, AND MORE!
MAY 17 – JULY 5, 2025
OPENING RECEPTION
MAY 17, 2025, 5-8PM
805 TRACTION AVE. LOS ANGELES, CA 90013
Burn Me! is an exhibition that encapsulates the lived experience of much of the Los Angeles community. The personal disasters many of us are living through each day after the Eaton and Pacific Palisades Fires, compounded with the radical rightwing political actions currently being enforced by the White House and President Trump motivated us to show the visual and physical turmoil of the moment. We will present this in two main spheres of work: pieces that survived the Fires and political works addressing the compromised state of our union. Even if you haven’t lost your home during the two massive fires in Southern California in early January of 2025, doesn’t mean you don’t feel the massive devastation it has had on the art community of Los Angeles. We are all living this compounded experience.
In working on this press release I can’t avoid a first-person point of view as the deeply personal nature of this show can’t be exercised. This show started when we found the art works left standing on our properties in Altadena, where our homes burned down. The heat and smoke left a patina on some of the bronzes, while others warped and melted so much that they became different works; all embodying the devastation of this reality. Two matching bronze works, Small Santa Butt Plug, belonging to me and my brother Damon McCarthy, were found deep in the debris of our homes and studios that used to be.
The title of the exhibition, Burn Me!, comes from a Wally Hedrick painting owned by the McCarthy family that was lost in the Eaton Fire. This painting was a strong political protest work of an American Flag with bold black text stating “Burn Me!.” Wally Hedrick (1928-2003), who is co-represented by The Box LA and Parker Gallery, was an adamant political artist based in the Bay Area. This work was dated 1990, a time when George Bush Senior was newly elected and bringing in the conservative reign that now blankets America. Another important early work of Hedrick’s lost in the Eaton Fire, a companion piece to Burn Me!, was also of an American flag, with the word Peace (1953) on it, made a year before Jasper Johns’ Flag (1954-55). The sadness of these losses runs alongside the verdant anger that we feel in the political fraught we live in today full of rising authoritarianism, state violence, patriarchy, censorship, and collective resistance.
Burn Me! inspired how this exhibition, curated by Paul McCarthy, Molly Tierney and I, came to be. We all lost our homes, many precious artworks and are working to revitalize our lives, while also being faced with how to grow and create in a culture being squashed by the political state, we are surrounded by fire loss and political oligarchy. The collapse of these two worlds cannot be separated especially amongst artists and humans, like us, who are constantly fighting against the conservative right. These expressions are not seen more clearly than in a new video work by my father, Paul McCarthy, titled NPP1P2, WAR PIG, Drawing Session (2025). A video using AI to create a constantly morphing figure of the Artist on his hands and knees making a large drawing, transforming into various mutilated military captains, pigs, creatures, artists.
The exhibition will include many pieces that have survived the blaze, some directly affected by the fire, like a melted Perfect World Park Bench (2001) and damaged Perfect World Swing Set (2001) by Jason Rhoades, and a collaborative work by Molly Tierney and John Joyce left on Tierney’s property, Untitled Tableau (2016-2025). These works will be shown alongside politically charged works that are both historical, like a Robert Mallary from 1960 with cardboard drenched in fiberglass in the shape of the continental United States, to a recent work of Sean Townley, Fasces with Plow (2024) directly addressing the absentee government that surrounds us.
One historical work present will be a Lee Lozano drawing, I got fucked in the ass by ConEdison (1962) and was likely referencing a controversy in New York involving a possible nuclear plant. The title of this work eerily similar connotation to the lawsuits being taken against Southern California Edison for their possible fault in the Eaton Fire. The reality of Americans being the victims of irresponsible utility companies and large corporations, has spanned decades of our lives. The faults of this reality cannot be understanded.
As we were developing this exhibition, Johanna Went serendipitously got in touch with me about a new series of embroidered works she and Jasmine Rudolph had started titled Rage Craft (2025), that were a natural fit for the exhibition. These 10 x 10 inch works began when Trump came into office and the images have been inspired by various fucked up situations in our political and cultural world. They are by far the most colorful works in the exhibition, but they represent the sad and awful realities presented with a coating of dark humor.
The objects in the gallery are presented to invite, process and engage the viewer. The visceral gothic quality of this exhibit is deliberate. Facing the harmful experiences of these times is not easy. But there is hope that by experiencing and better understanding these spaces via objects and videos we can graduate, comfort and empower our own realities.
-Mara McCarthy
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21. Mark Bloch, FF ALumn, now online at WhitehotMagazine.com
Please visit this link:
Hi I have an article in the current pages of Whitehot Magazine on line. It is here https://whitehotmagazine.com/articles/iii-divinity-at-picture-theory/6992x
The article is about Amanda Mehl, an artist who creates imaginary worlds and it focuses on the history of such activity. Her exhibition was at Pictures Theorgy, a gallery on W. 28th Street in New York.
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22. Allan Wexler, FF Alumn, now online at NYTimes.com
Please visit this link:
Thank you.
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Goings On for Artists is compiled weekly by Rohan Subramaniam, Archive Intern, Summer/Fall/Winter 2024/2025
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