Jon Sasaki, ‘Flyguy triggering his own motion sensor’ (2010)

A flyguy (one of the familiar dancing inflatables that wave people into carwashes and fast food restaurants) has been moved into the gallery and hooked up to a motion sensor.

Click here to view a videoclip

‘Toronto’s Official Y2K Mascot, Autumn’ (2008)

With “2000″ emblazoned on his CN Tower-shaped body, an obsolete Y2K mascot sits contemplating his few, if any, prospects.

Click here to view a videoclip

‘Fireworks’ (2006)

Sputtering fireworks are thrust into a gallery display case, which, while containing the danger and violence, also highlights and reveals.

Click here to view a videoclip

‘Black Light Thrift Store’ (2007)

Intervention in a second hand store.

‘Jon Sasaki’s Best Friendship’ (2006 – ongoing)

The artist is offering his lifelong best-friendship.
Purchasers of a pendant are asked to break it in two, select either the “BE-FRI” half or the ”ST-END” half for themselves, and leave the other half with a gallery representative. The artist will then collect and wear his component as an official symbol of the newly formalized friendship.

The following pictures were taken at the Dia:Beacon, one of the Dia Art Foundation’s residencies in the state of New York. They have an impressive collection of iconic pieces of art, and each artist has their own room inside their wonderful building, the former Nabisco box printing facility built in 1929.

Here’s a very incomplete report, because it’s not allowed to take pictures there. These were taken from the hip by Anna.

Imi Knoebel, 24 Colors – for Blinky (1977) installation view

Walter De Maria, Silver Metres (1976)

John Chamberlain

Sol Lewitt

Dan Flavin

Andy Warhol

…more Knoebel

In my view, the best work in the collection was by Michael Heizer, for really competing with the overwhelmingly beautiful location.

Michael Heizer

Louise Bourgeois

Richard Serra

Leaving through the backyard…

Adam Cruces, ‘Vertigo’ (2008)

Check out his website for more nice videos, such as ‘Shane (After Jack Goldstein)’, a remake of Goldstein’s 1975 video.

‘Healing relaxation’

‘Air drums’

‘Floppy Disk’

‘Wanderers in the expanded field’ by ??? Joe Scanlan.

I saw Sexy Neighbors play live at The Charleston, NY, last Monday.
Below are three songs from their album ‘Dream Out’, which is currently growing on me…

Check them out!

Last Saturday the exhibition ‘2000 – 2010: A Retrospective’ by Simon Kentgens opened at Galerie Gallery.

The show runs until the end of this month and coming Friday, the 28th, during the Kunstweekend Charlois, we will have an altered exhibition and special activities at Galerie Gallery!

Anke, Anna & Bram in the bar-area

Every bar that night had to have the Champion’s League live on the big screen!

Marielle & Annika in & out the gallery

Theo H.

David & André

Jan, Marielle & Koot

Rachel & Esmé

Nikki, Willem, Machteld & Anna

Koot, Simon & Reinart

Emma & Simon

Gabrielle, Anna & Paoletta

Nikki brought his pencil

Koen, Naomi, Karina, Steven & Josh

Esmée Denters

Hedwig, Jan & André

Reinart tries to pull a small-scale art-theft

Centennial Society (Packard Jennings), ‘Walgreens coupons’

This coupon is made to be inserted in the Walgreens EasySaver Catalog available every month at Walgreens, a chain of superstores comparable to Walmart.

‘W.T.F.?’ (2008)

Sign to be used in combination with existing commercial sign and sandwich-signs.

‘Lottery tickets’

These lottery tickets were given out for free with other Lottery purchases or upon request from few of the culturally engaged stores in Oakland’s Lake Merritt and Temescal districts, and San Francisco’s Mission and Western Addition districts. Each district has its own ticket design and eight unique “prizes.” The intention is to transform an instant of personal focus into a moment of contemplation about the local environment, community, and culture. The tickets come in perforated strips of five tickets. Twelve thousand tickets are being given away through January.

Wesley Willis, view on Chicago

Wesley Willis (May 31, 1963 – August 21, 2003) was a busker, musician, comedian and artist from Chicago. A diagnosed chronic schizophrenic, he gained a sizable cult following in the 1990s after releasing several hundred songs of simple but unique music, with emphasis on his humorous, bizarre, and frequently obscene lyrics. In addition to his large body of solo musical work, Willis fronted the punk rock band the Wesley Willis Fiasco. He also produced hundreds of unusual colored ink-pen drawings, most of them of the Chicago skyline and CTA buses.

On August 21, 2003, Willis died due to complications from chronic myelogenous leukemia in Skokie, Illinois. He was 40 years old. A memorial service for him was held on August 27, in Chicago.

‘Cut the Mullet’

And here are some of Wesley Willis’s songs on famous people:

‘Alanis Morisette’

‘Kurt Cobain’

‘Jesus Christ’

‘Oprah Winfrey’

Stephen Wiltshire draws Rome from memory.

Stephen Wiltshire is a British man who was diagnosed as autistic when he was a child. He’s also been noted for his exacting memory, which allows him to recreate [in drawings] vast scenes he sees only once. This video shows his 16-foot-panorama of Rome after taking one helicopter ride above the city.

Musical intermezzo by Deerhoof

Nikki Koole on the keyboard…

Saturday April 3, Galerie Gallery: Opening of the exhibition by Nikki Koole. Pictures of the opening here!

Apartment building sculpture.

Julie, Jules, Nikki, Tonio and Miele.

A drawing

Lorelinde

Simon and Alexander.

Joost, Bart and Koos.

View on Tonio viewing all the people.

Proper documentation of the work will follow, ofcourse.

Nice ‘Old spice’ advert.

Last Sunday saw the opening of the brand new initiative Greylight Projects in Hoensbroek. The first exhibition there was ‘Sifres’, with work by Wouter Huis, Wineke Gartz, Thomas Bakker, Laurent Malherbe and Simon Kentgens.

Simon Kentgens

Laurent Malherbe

Wouter Huis

Wineke Gartz

Thomas Bakker

Unfortunately, I have no idea where I found this…

Pierre Ardouvin, ‘Les Quatre Saisons’ (2010)

Pierre Ardouvin is participating in WHAT’S THE POINT OF GIVING YOU ANY MORE ARTWORKS?

‘Soleil d’hiver’

‘La fin du monde’

Frederik van Simaey, excerpts from ‘Together we are one’.

Van Simaey’s work is on view from Friday 20hrs on until the 18th of April, during the exhibition ‘WHAT’S THE POINT OF GIVING YOU ANY MORE ARTWORKS?’

‘It’s about time’

‘Rainbow’

‘The sky is the limit’

Jack Falanga, Untitled (Fireworks) (Ongoing)

Jack Falanga will participate in ‘WHAT’S THE POINT OF GIVING YOU ANY MORE ARTWORKS?‘ !

Chris Finnegan, Untitled (2006)

Finnegan is an artist living and working in Dublin, Ireland.

All of these pictures were found on the “blog” of “unnecessary” quotation marks. Go “see” more yourself!

This is sped-up footage of mr. Nicholas White trapped in an elevator in the McGraw-Hill Building for 41 hours, after having a cigarette for lunch outside.

The story and some more facts about elevators, as featured in the New Yorker, here.

Barbra (Halstead) makes phone calls trying to locate a specific breed of a putty-colored dog, but can only describe it by its bark. (1993)

During the galvanisation process, metal atoms from a copper sulphate solution are deposited onto the objects by means of electrolysis. Just like during the etching process, four keys have been subject to the chemical process for an increasing period of time.

Driessens & Verstappen, ‘Morphoteque #13′ (2003)

Ferdinand ‘Postman’ Cheval’s ‘ideal castle’.

Cheval began the building in April 1879. He claimed that he had tripped on a stone and was inspired by its shape. He returned to the same spot the next day and started collecting stones.

For the next 33 years, during his daily mail route, Cheval carried stones from his delivery rounds and at home used them to build his Palais idéal, the Ideal Palace. First he carried the stones in his pockets, then a basket and eventually a wheelbarrow. He often worked at night, by the light of an oil lamp.

Cheval spent the first two decades building the outer walls. The Palace is a mix of different styles with inspirations from the Bible to Hindu mythology. Cheval bound the stones together with lime, mortar and cement.

More after the jump.

Just prior to his death, Cheval began to receive some recognition from luminaries like André Breton and Pablo Picasso. His work is commemorated in an essay by Anaïs Nin.

In 1969 André Malraux, the Minister of Culture, declared the Palace as a cultural landmark and had it officially protected. Cheval’s palace is open every day except Christmas Day and New Year’s Day.

Cheval may have been the inspiration for the character of Denny in Chuck Palahniuk’s 2001 novel Choke, who gathers a collection of stones which are eventually used, in similar fashion, to build his ‘dream home’.

Cheval also wanted to be buried in his palace. However, since that is illegal in France, he proceeded to spend eight more years building a mausoleum for himself in the cemetery of Hauterives. Cheval died on August 19, 1924, around a year after he had finished building it, and is buried there.

Antoine Stemerding, ‘Wat wil je doen?’  (2006)

An installation/intervention at Stichting KOP, Breda.

‘A perfect place to hide’ (2004)

A tree is stuck between the floor and the ceiling. In this tree is a wooden space, conceiled with screen doors. If you look into the space through a crack, you see pornographic imagery and sketches of the installation on the walls inside. In the transparent space above it are six plants and lights.

‘Onder andere omstandigheden’ (2008)

Sculpture.

‘Hotel Vue des Alpes’ is a fictional, hotel, accessable only through the internet. Visitors can log in to the website, book a room and walk around to enjoy the scenery. You can stay there for a few days (short stay only)… The view from the rooms is breathtaking!

It is a project by Monica Studer and Christoph van den Berg

‘Every version belongs to the myth’

Below is a selection of a few of the works.

Unfortunately, no good pictures were taken of ‘Writing room’ by Maria Barnas, so seeing just this picture from her publication should tell you that the room in question is in fact the room in the house in Frankfurt /Main where Goethe wrote his early works (such as Faust and Das leiden des jungen Werther). Barnas uses only half of the pictures to create a complete image.

Amalia Pica’s ‘Moon Golem’ is an intervention on NASA’s official photograph of the only monument on the moon; a sculpted figurine, flanked by a plaque which bears an inscription of the names of all then known astronauts and cosmonauts to have died while on moon missions.

Extra info.

Gareth Moore, ‘Map (from Uncertain Pilgrimage)’ (2006-2009)

‘The unmarked map  shows an area full of potential, a prospective adventure waiting to be penned or a scientific unknown on the edges of a topographic plane – it is a map to plot a plan with.’

I think they forgot to mention it’s also a pretty sad image.

Elizabeth Price, ‘TROPHY 2000-2009′

The name of each institution where the work was exhibited is engraved in the work.

‘Begun in 2000, TROPHY in 2009 reads as both a list of accomplishments and a catalogue of obligations.’

Felix Gmelin, ‘Farbtest, Die Rote Fahne II’ (2002)

On the left is the video Gmelin’s father shot, on the right is his own version. In his own version, the original ending is altered. ‘In the remake Gmelin introduces a significant change: no one emerges from the Stockholm city hall and no flag is hung from the balcony.’

Here you go, Frank.