A youtube walk through of the opening by James Kalm.
Today my neighbor gave me a bowl of plums and peaches from trees in the yard. The plums are still all powdery which makes perfect sense, since they have nothing better to do while up in the trees than to pretend they are 19th century English judges who must come up with some sort of judicial opinion about the leaves surrounding them. Court is in session for several months as the situation ripens and the tension builds. Finally there is a verdict: “The court finds you to be - (insert a very long pause with audible silence) - blessedly guilty of photosynthesis”. The leaves are relieved but the trial has taken it’s toll. They will soon start falling from the trees.
“Recording conversations became a protest against forgetting. I wanted to have traces.”
—Hans Ulrich Obrist on how he started his renowned series of artist interviews, from The White Review’s two-part interview.
Having so much fun with #catvidfest today:
Today Minneapolis hosts the Internet Cat Video Festival, and the Walker Art Center is in full cat-vid mode.
Elevator, by David Sollie. Mixed media on canvas, 57” x 84”, 2009-11. Originally exhibited at 2010’s America’s Sweetheart! A Brief History of the Shackway Corporation at Bockley Gallery in Minneapolis, this image is intended to give hypothetical access to areas above and below the space in which it is hung.
Goodbye To a Wonderful Friend! Like countless others, I’m profoundly saddened to hear about the tragic and unexpected death of Suzy Greenberg, the artist and innovator who was also founder of SooVAC gallery in Minneapolis. My thoughts are with her friends and family members. Thank you, Suzy, for your kindness, friendship and encouragement through the years, and for the beautiful legacy you leave behind. I love and will miss you but your brilliant insights, humanity and tremendous competence will continue to be an inspiration.
8-Track Vacuum by David Sollie. Mixed media on canvas, 32” x 34”, 2010-12. This work has not yet been exhibited, but a slightly different version of it will be presented at the 2012 Gyumri Biennale of Contemporary Art in Gyumri, Armenia, along with other Shackway-related ephemera. The Biennale opens in mid-September, 2012. More information will follow. As mentioned previously, Mr. Sollie’s work has lately been an ongoing investigation into the history and culture of the Shackway corporation. The Shackway corporation was started just after the Second World War by Mr. Sollie’s grandfather, entrepreneur Bruce Milburn.
8-Track Vacuum is a work intended to showcase one of the Shackway Corporation’s approaches to industrial design. The approach can be summed up as “more is less” - in other words, one approach is to produce and sell beautiful empty promises. 8-Track Vacuum is a product that promises things like relief from domestic drudgery, ease of use and space-saving convenience, but what the consumer ends up with is a heavy and clunky machine whose greatest strength is it’s ability to consume D-cell batteries. If used as intended, the sound of the vacuum drowns out the sound of the the music being played. To compound matters, the reservoir for holding the dust and detritus being vacuumed isn’t properly separated from the tape-playing mechanism, so the toe-tapping usually comes to a grinding halt.
Like many Shackway products, it’s a kind of allegory. Another example of “more is less” design is the Shackway roto-fork, featured previously.
The Sinking of the Violet Drake Mixed media on canvas, 2012, 44 1/2” x 38”. This piece will be appearing in an a group exhibition called “Pot Luck” which opens at Bockley Gallery this Saturday, (August 11, 2012). The opening is from 6 until 9pm. Bockley Gallery is located at 2123 West 21st Street, Minneapolis, MN, 55405, right by Lake of the Isles. Bockley Gallery can also be visited at www.bockleygallery.com
As with other sinking ships I’ve portrayed, this one was made in memory of those who have been lost at Sea, with a special eye to those on ships bearing Shackway cargo. It is now public knowledge that everything wasn’t just fun and games at the Shackway Corporation. From the mid 1950’s into the early 1960’s, the company was involved in a kind of insurance fraud having to do with maritime shipments. There was man within the company (the Director of West Coast Operations) who took it upon himself to arrange for the transportation of all merchandise deemed unsalable. He would find the least seaworthy merchant vessels and pack them beyond capacity with shoddy and heavily-insured Shackway merchandise. Then he’d make arrangements for the ships to venture through the most dangerous of international waters, a favorite route passing around Cape Horn at the southern tip of South America. In this heartless manner, West Coast Operations became the most profitable arm of the entire Shackway organization. When my grandfather finally found out about this scheme countless ships had already been lost, and literally thousands of Shackway items had been scattered to the dimly lit storerooms of the ocean’s floor …
We’re excited to announce the first book by the Sandwich Bar Press is now officially out and available. (sandwichbarpress.com)
Minneapolis based Sandwich Bar Press is pleased to announce the publication of its first title, “There Exists an X, X is a Sandwich” by Joel K. Jensen. Available on Amazon.
How do we know when a sandwich is a sandwich? Can we distinguish sandwiches from non-sandwiches, even when we eat them? And how should we categorize hotdogs, gas-station crackers, burritos? Part detective story, and part seminar in deductive logic, There Exists an X examines the sandwich as object of art, existential interlocutor, and source of unexpected meaning. Jensen challenges the confidence with which we define the commonplace. Sharing historical knowledge and unexpected insights, this manifesto for nominological consistency illuminates the lunch counter with surprising rigor and alacrity. Think you know what a sandwich is? Prepare to be challenged!
A burrito is not a sandwich. A wrap is not a sandwich. A hot dog is not a sandwich. A person can call a hotdog a sandwich, and even if that person is understood, it’s still not a sandwich.
Joel K Jensen, PhD
