Jen Bekman Gallery blog

I Give Good Link (Monday Edition)

Sand No. 98 (2006/10) by Gregory Krum | 18" x 13" | Archival Pigment Print

A few treasures from the Internet to get you through the week:

The Frick has a bowling alley!

Check out the installations and paintings by Jacob Dahlgreen.

I just have to post this- Jeffrey Deitch after getting a bloody nose at the Shepard Fairey (yawn) swan song Deitch opening- the video. I think a little blood helps butch up a pink suit.

Dave Harper is killing it with awesome clips for Best Link Ever at Art Fag City. This week is good but nothing beats this!

Donald Judd library online! All I know is intern Casey G. spent the better part of a night on this site.

Reverse volume bowls by Mischer Traxler are the perfect thing to add to my odd fruit/vegetable mold collection. (not kidding)

Flying Spaghetti Monster or Spaghetti Cat?

Mamma Andersson at Zwirner. Go see it.

Great new Darren Almond photogravures at Crown Point Press. They are not on the site just yet, but you can catch a glimpse in the new Artforum.

William Powhida is giving a lecture on Surviving the Art World Using the Art of Sorcery on May 14.

Nina Berman in the Wall Street Journal

A photograph by Jen Bekman Gallery artist Nina Berman is featured in the Wall Street Journal today as part of an article titled "The Whitney Biennial Lightens Up". Kelly Crow writes, "The country's pre-eminent survey of new American art has a reputation for focusing on angry or anxious young things. But the latest edition, opening Feb. 25 at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, aims to be something else: fun."

About Nina's work Kelly writes:

The biennial doesn't abandon politics altogether, but Mr. Bonami says he went looking for art that reflects the American psyche about war without being "bombastic." New York photographer Nina Berman is showing a series about the postwar daily life of former Marine Sgt. Ty Ziegel, who was severely disfigured in a car bomb in Iraq but returned home and married his fiancée, Renee Kline."

You can read the full article, which features a slideshow as well as profiles of Charles Ray and Aurel Schmidt, online or in today's print edition. More information about The Whitney Biennial: 2010 is available at the Whitney's website.

Nina Berman Interview on PBS Art Beat

Ty With Gun by Nina Berman from Marine Wedding

Jen Bekman Gallery artist Nina Berman spoke with Mike Melia of PBS' Art Beat to discuss her work, particularly the series Marine Wedding, which will be exhibited at the upcoming 2010 Whitney Biennial. In the article, Associate Curator of the Biennial Gary Carrion-Murayari says of Berman's work:

You come away with a real emotional connection to the individual she is depicting. Anybody could take a picture of someone who is disfigured and make a shocking image. These go beyond that and get to the emotional experience of soldiers.

PBS' site also features an audio interview with Nina. Click HERE to read the full text and to hear Mike and Nina's conversation about her exceptional bodies of work, Purple Hearts, Homeland and Marine Wedding.

Reminder: 20x200 at the Brooklyn Museum this Saturday!

Last week we wrote about our upcoming 20x200 print giveaway at Brooklyn Museum's Target First Saturday, and we wanted to send you a quick reminder to cancel all your other plans, because it's happening this Saturday from 6 to 8 p.m.! All 200 8"x10" prints from Valerie Hegarty's gorgeous forthcoming edition, First Harvest in the Wilderness with Pileated Woodpecker are packed, our brand new 20x200 banner has arrived, and we’re uhhh…still brainstorming on our apparel. We hope you’ll join us for what is sure to be an awesome evening full of talks, music, film, dancing and art.

Ms. Jen Bekman will be speaking, exclusively to 1stfans, about 20x200 and JBP's approach to supporting artists. So, after you've started or renewed your 1stfans membership (and picked up Valerie's print!), join us for a talk!

We’ll be giving away 10”x8” prints by artist Valerie Hegarty to new and renewing 1stfans members and Ms. Jen Bekman herself will be speaking to an intimate group of 1stfans at a meetup. Meetups are an opportunity for 1stfans to interact exclusively with the Museum’s staff, its collections, artists, and other members every month at Target First Saturdays.

Bierstadt with Holes, 2007 by Valerie Hegarty

20×200 has been collaborating with 1stfans founders, Shelley Bernstein and Will Cary, and artist Valerie Hegarty over the last few months to produce this unique benefit edition. For the first time ever, collectors will be able to pick up a print in person and become a 1stfans member all for the ridiculously affordable cost of $20! 1stfans is the Brooklyn Museums’s socially networked membership. Valerie Hegarty and 20×200 have donated the prints for this event.

If you can’t make it to the event, you’ll have another chance to pick up one of Valerie’s prints plus the 1stfans membership. We’ll release the prints in two larger sizes, 14”x11” and 20”x16,” the following week on 20×200. Every print from Valerie’s edition will include a one-year membership to 1stfans and the proceeds from the print will benefit the Brooklyn Museum as well. The prints are gorgeous and we think they’ll go fast, make sure you’re signed up for Jen’s newsletter to get first dibs on one!

Target First Saturday at the Brooklyn Museum
Saturday, February 6th, 2010 | 6:00 - 8:30 p.m.
Jen's talk | 8:00 - 8:30 p.m.
Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn, NY

Joe Holmes in The Year in Pictures

Danziger Projects (James Desk) from Workspaces by Joseph O. Holmes

JBG artist and 20x200 edition-maker Joseph O. Holmes has been included in the upcoming show The Year in Pictures at Danziger Projects, opening this Thursday. The show, which has been put on annually since 2007, is curated from work that has been featured in the last year on the popular Year in Pictures blog of gallery owner James Danziger.

Danziger writes,

The 15 contemporary photographers featured in the show represent 9 different countries – Saudi Arabia, Korea, Denmark, Britain, Mexico, Japan, France, Canada, and the U.S.. Over half have work I had originally only seen via the internet, evidencing the well-known power of the web as a connector, and what is sometimes taken for granted – the web's unrivalled capacity as a transmitter of photographic images.

Earlier this year, Joe and Danziger crossed paths when Joe was working on his Workspace series, candidly documenting the unique spaces in which people do their work.

About the series, Joe writes,

Because I document a space exactly as I find it, never arranged for the camera, the Workspace project is necessarily a spontaneous process. I can't, for example, call ahead and explain what I'm after without inviting the destruction of what I hope to capture. Lately I've been finding workspaces by walking in off the street with camera and tripod and simply asking (though "simply asking" doesn't quite convey the complex dance of explanation, skepticism, persuasion, and fascination that goes back and forth). What I end up capturing, then, turns out to be the work that was interrupted to answer the door.

Danziger responded, "As I like both my workspace and Joe's work, I was happy to co-operate and now his picture (above) is about to be all that remains as a visual record of where I've sat for the last five years, often writing this blog!"

Congratulations to Joe and to Danziger Projects on the show, which we cannot wait to see!

You can view the full Workspace series on Joe's website and grab limited-edition prints on 20x200. Keep your eyes peeled because we'll be opening a solo-show of Joe's work later this year at Jen Bekman Gallery.

The Year in Pictures
Danziger Projects
Opening reception: January 21, 6-8 p.m.
534 West 24th Street
New York, New York 10011 USA

Featuring: Jowhara AlSaud, Chan-Hyo Bae, Thomas Bangsted, Mandy Corrado, Stephen Gill, Joseph Holmes, Alejandra Laviada, Greg Miller, David Schoerner, Patrick Smith, Tommy Ton, Scout Tufankjian, Oliver Warden, Katherine Wolkoff and Tsukasa Yokozawa.

West Nineteenth Street (Yellow Dress) by Joseph O. Holmes

Hot Shots! Nina Berman + Curtis Mann Named 2010 Whitney Biennial Artists!

Marine Wedding by Nina Berman

Jen Bekman Gallery is pleased to announce that represented artist and 2007 Hot Shot Nina Berman and 2005 Hot Shot Curtis Mann have been selected as 2010 Whitney Biennial artists.

Berman's first solo show with Jen Bekman Gallery in 2007, Purple Hearts, the ground-breaking work that placed Berman in the Biennial, received international attention and acclaim. In a review for The New York Times, critic Holland Cotter proclaimed, "the images add up to a complex and desolating anti-war statement.” Purple Hearts received a tremendous response both locally and internationally. The gallery presented Berman's second exhibition, Homeland, in October 2008.

Both Berman and Mann have released editions on Jen Bekman Projects' online print program, 20x200.

The 2010 Whitney Biennial is being curated by Francesco Bonami, in collaboration with the Whitney’s Gary Carrion-Murayari, who will be associate curator. This will be the 75th in the series of Whitney Annual and Biennial exhibitions, inaugurated in 1932 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney. The show—which is scaled back to exhibit just 55 artists at only one location in 2010—opens to the public on February 25th and runs through May 30th.

Tree Tops, from the series Somewhere in Israel by Curtis Mann

[caption id="attachment_3668" align="aligncenter" width="500" caption="G.I. Goat by Nina Berman"][/caption]
G.I. Goat by Nina Berman

Come see us at PULSE Miami!

Exterior 1 by Sarah McKenzie

In Miami? Come visit us at the PULSE Miami Contemporary Art Fair. We'll be featuring paintings by Sarah McKenzie and also have work by Ian Baguskas, Mara Bodis Wollner, Christian Chaize, Beth Dow, Joseph O. Holmes, Gregory Krum, Holly Lynton, Carrie Marill, Brad Moore, Hosang Park, Colleen Plumb, Jason Polan, Kent Rogowski and Carlo Van de Roer on view. The fair opens with a VIP preview at 10 a.m. on Thursday, December 3rd and remains open through Sunday, December 6th, 2009 at 7:00 p.m. Please come visit us!

Location: Booth I-107.
On View: December 3 - 6, 2009

PULSE Miami
Booth I-107
The Ice Palace
1400 North Miami Avenue
Miami, FL 33136

Hope to see you there!

Holly Lynton in LA

Tunnel by Holly Lynton

If you find yourself in LA this Friday, November 13th, consider yourself lucky! You'll have a much easier time bidding on a photograph by Holly Lynton than us New Yorkers! Kopeikin Gallery will be hosting a silent and live auction as a benefit for the Larchmont Charter School, featuring 100 photographs starting at 70% of their retail value. The auction will also include work by Hey, Hot Shot! contenders Alex Leme, Katie Shapiro and Annie Musselman. You can view the auction catalogue here, and visit the gallery for complete benefit information.

Larchmont Charter School Benefit Auction
Kopeikin Gallery
8810 Melrose Avenue
Los Angeles, CA

Tickets to the auction are $25, $30 at the door
To order: call Wendy at (323) 664-8034 or email desk@kopeikingallery.com

Speaking of auctions, don't forget that Holly is also participating in SF Camerawork's annual auction along with five fellow JBG artists, Nina Berman, Christine Callahan, Holly Lynton, Joe Holmes and Colleen Plumb. The catalogue is available for online preview and the exhibition viewing will begin today, Tuesday, November 10th. The auction will commence Saturday, December 5th at 1 p.m. More details are available here.

Start your bidding!

Catching Up With Kate Bingaman-Burt

Cover image of Kate's book!

As if truly catching up with the industrious Kate Bingaman-Burt is really possible! Kate is always involved in multiple projects while planning and scheming her next wonderful art adventure. In fact, she is working on mixtape drawings that will be on view at Jen Bekman Gallery at the end of this month! The lovely lady is truly an inspiration.

Her book Obsessive Consumption: What Did You Buy Today? which chronicles her decade of daily consumption is now up on Amazon. Sadly it has not yet been released for pre-orders. Still, it is pretty exciting to see and anticipate! I am marking the release date, March 31, 2010 in my calendar! Congrats, Kate!

More immediately, Kate's work will be exhibited in three shows in three cities opening this Friday.
Choose your city for complete exhibition details:
New York
Austin
St. Louis

Want more Kate? Visit her site: Obsessive Consumption and view her editions, I Bought All of These, Drawings from July 2009 and Plattsmouth, Nebraska, Carts #1 on 20x200.

The Impossible Project Inspires Polaroid To Re-launch Instant Cameras

Thank you. That is all.

Taken from The Impossible Project website:

We are pleased to herewith announce a history-making cooperation between Polaroid and The Impossible Project:
As we have created quite some buzz about Analog Instant Photography over the past 12 months, the Polaroid licensee - The Summit Global Group - now can't resist any longer and announced at a press conference on October 13th in Hong Kong where they will re-launch some of the most famous Polaroid Instant Cameras.
Therefore they are commissioning The Impossible Project to develop and produce a limited edition of Polaroid branded Instant Films in the middle of 2010.
The Impossible Project is proud and excited that its ambitions and all the relentless work that has already been invested are now becoming the foundation for Polaroid's comeback as a producer of Instant Cameras.
Large-scale production and worldwide sale of The Impossible Project's new integral film materials under its own brand will already start in the beginning of 2010 - with a brand new black and white instant film with the first color films to follow in the course of the year.