To Blog or not to Blog

I thought I would write about the art I've been seeing in NY, but seeing so much art has made me want to stop spending time writing and reading blogs. I went to the Pierpont Morgan museum and saw handwritten manuscripts by Dickens (meticulously planned) and the Brontes (very tiny tiny writing about the kingdom of Gondor).

And I was knocked over by an incredible line drawing by someone I'd never heard of that I wish I'd made. Writing about art is nice, but writing like I want to write- writing that just says "Oh, it was so cool!" is not. Translations of admiration for a certain piece of art can't be communicated by utilitarian language- the best form of communication for enthusiasm about art is another art form. Maybe if I was a really inspired essay writer I could do it, but I'm not, and so I'll make some art,and in the meantime a shout out should do it. The shout out seems like the appropriate form: it precedes the work of art, expresses gratitude, and is louder than a dedication. So. A shout out to the Brontes! A shout out to Hoefnagel!

A shout out to the Piepont Morgan Library, and a big fat shout out to the people at Pace Editions, who were so freaking nice!

That I can write about, because the love wasn't so visual, or planted so deep- it was tail-wagging brain love. Pace Editions is the print shop for the Pace Gallery, and we went to see it because the people at the Pace Gallery are so fabulously classy and kind that they invited my mom and Druck, who run a printmaking studio, to come see the way they print editions for people like Chuck Close. The Pace printers were great fun- they paused their work to answer technical questions and show us the fabulous art that was hung all over the room and they let us poke a plate by Tara Donovan, who printed a pile of rubber bands to great effect- her rubber band compositions look fantastic: they look like drawings by Martin Ramirez.



They told us about some subtle little Terry Winters- looking prints that looked full of little bubbles- they were very beautiful, and it turns out they were made by Tara Donovan mixing bubble stuff with acid and transferring them with a straw to the plate.


Printmakers, if you haven't met any, are fantastic people. They are the artists you want to meet- I've been seeing previews for Art School Confidential all over the place, and in the manner of the great art school stereotype narrator, when I was in art school the stereotypes ran like this: painters are self absorbed and mean, sculptors are dumb, performance artists are crazy, ceramicists are fun and stoned and printmakers are....awesome. They're funny, down to earth, smart, work well in groups. Their very art form means they have to play well with others. Mine means I gas up a room and listen to whatever is in my own head for more hours than is good for me. Thus the damned blog. But I'm done now.