All Over Albany

Applications open for street painting competition in Troy, and this year's Fence Show

Casey's AOA-sponsored entry in last year's competition.

The Troy River Street Festival -- one of our favorite local summer festivals -- is coming up June 16. And that means applications are now open for the annual street painting contest at the festival.

The competition includes space for 75 artists, a range of age-specific categories, to chalk designs on a panel of sidewalk along River Street. And there's $1,000 in prizes.

The entry fee is $15. And the competition does fill up -- so the earlier you apply, the better.

Fence
Speaking of arts and downtown Troy... the call for entries is now out for the annual Fence Show at the Arts Center of the Capital Region. The Fence Salon will open June 16. This year's juror, Jim Richard Wilson from the Opalka Gallery at the Sage Colleges, will select works from the salon for inclusion in the Fence Select show that opens July 27.

Yep, the Arts Center advertises on AOA.

More about that Marina Abramović/Rem Koolhaas project in Hudson

The Marina Abramović Institute for the Preservation of Performance Art.

OMA, the architecture firm that includes superstar architect Rem Koolhaas, has posted renderings of the project it's designing in Hudson for performance artist Marina Abramović. From OMA's site, about the Marina Abramović Institute for the Preservation of Performance Art (MAI):

The mission of the MAI is to cultivate new kinds of performance while functioning as a living archive, preserving and hosting performances of historic pieces. Abramovic plans to use the space as a laboratory for exploring time-based and immaterial art - including performance, dance, theater, film, video, opera, and music - through collaboration with practitioners in the realms of science, technology, and education. Working with the local Hudson community as well as schools and institutions from around the world, the MAI will host workshops, public lectures and festivals. As well as training artists, Abramovic also wants to train audiences in the mental and physical disciplines of creating and experiencing long-durational work. ...

The institute will be housed in a former theatre, which later became an indoor tennis court, then an antiques warehouse and market before falling into disrepair. Abramovic bought the theatre in 2007. OMA's design will enhance the existing structure to accommodate both the research and production of performance art. As a venue specifically created for long duration performances, OMA will also develop new types of furniture, lighting and other elements to facilitate the viewing of such works.

There are more renderings and designs on OMA's site (linked above)

The design project is being led by Koolhaas and Shohei Shigematsu, another partner in OMA. Here's a bit more about what Abramović has planned. [Art Info]

The project is expected to cost $15 million and could be open by 2014, though Abramović still has to raise the money. [AP/Washington Post] [WGXC] [NYT]

Earlier on AOA: Rem Koolhaas to design building in Hudson

image: OMA

Brian Dewan: Filmstrips at UAlbany (beep)

Could be both fun and weird, in the good way: Multimedia artist Brian Dewan will be showing a group of his "I-Can-See" filmstrips at UAlbany Friday. Where? In a classroom, of course. (beep)

From Jed Davis, who's helped organized the performance with WCDB and Eschatone Records:

Brian's "I-Can-See" filmstrips are hand-drawn and soundtracked to resemble 20th Century educational filmstrips, complete with "beeps" to indicate a frame advance. Subject matter ranges from over-the-top retellings of Aesop's fables to wry commentary on modern culture. ...

Brian, who lives in Catskill, has presented these filmstrips in New York City at the Whitney Museum, the New Museum of Contemporary Art, the Brooklyn Museum, Galapagos and Pierogi Gallery (which was decorated to resemble a mid-20th-Century classroom for the occasion), in the UK at Modern Art Oxford and the Royal College of Art, in Boston at the Museum of Fine Arts, and in Los Angeles at Post Gallery. As far as New York state is concerned, this will be the first time they've been shown north of NYC. (beep)

One of Dewan's hand-drawn film strips is embedded above. It's called "The King of Instruments" -- it's about the organ menace that threatens us all. It's funny. (beep)

Dewan is an artist/musician who's performed, collaborated, or create art for groups ranging from They Might Be Giants to the Blue Man Group to Neutral Milk Hotel. And he and his brother Leon have built a series of electrical musical instruments called, appropriately, Dewanatrons. (beep)

The show starts at 7 pm in Lecture Center 6 on the uptown UAlbany campus. It's free and open to the public.

(beep)

On Deck Saratoga

This could be fun: the Spring Street Gallery in Saratoga has a show lined up called "On Deck" -- it's a benefit for the Saratoga skate park. It opens this Saturday. From the blurbage:

... over 50 stupendous skateboard decks by 50 amazing artists who have donated their work for silent auction to benefit the newly-reopened Saratoga Skate Park. Works by Jeremy Fish, Daesha Devon Harris, Radical! and more, food and festivities galore! This is an ALL AGES event, auction prices start at just $25.

The opening reception is Saturday from 5-8 pm. The show will be up at the gallery through March 23

That design on the right a t-shirt design by Jeremy Fish -- the shirts will be on sale at the opening.

Earlier on AOA: A concrete vision of skateparks in the Capital Region?

S[around]OUND at The Troy Gasholder Building

Art + architecture+ music+ inflatables + projection = S[around]OUND

This sounds pretty cool. Art and architecture students from RPI's PIP(Production,Installation,Performance) class have collaborated on a performance art project that will be unveiled next month inside the Troy Gasholder building. S[around]OUND (Surround Sound) will combine art, architecture, animation, hybrid violin, computers and lifts to move the audience around inside the space.

We said it sounded cool.

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Conversations with photographers

This is good: Sebastien has started a series of conversations with local photographers.

The first person up is Justin Higgins, who lives in Schenectady. We don't think we've encountered his work before, but we're glad to know it now. And we enjoyed Sebastien's conversation with Justin about art, technique, and having a personal style.

We're looking forward to reading more.

photo: Justin Higgins

Interesting in 2011: Laura Glazer

"I can only really be myself..."

All this week we're highlighting some of the interesting people we've gotten to know over the past year.

Laura Glazer's voice has a breathy, tiny, childlike sweetness about it, but it's not the kind of voice you're used to hearing on the radio. Still, since 2003, she's been introducing the Capital Region to all kinds of fun and interesting music on her radio program Hello Pretty City.

A little over a year ago HPC moved from its morning slot on WRPI to Sunday nights at 8 on WEXT. With that move, Glazer pretty much doubled her audience, and in the last year we've noticed her hosting live shows, appearing with WEXT at shows like Larkfest and curating the music line-up for events like the Local Harvest Festival.

But we were first introduced to Laura through her wonderful photography. For the last few years she's been photographing Phillip Patterson's efforts to transcribe the entire King James Bible by hand -- a project that was featured in the The Wall Street Journal earlier this week.

In addition her fun pins and drawings, Albany wallpaper and other art projects help make the Capital Region a more fun place to live.

Laura came to the Capital Region about ten years ago after having lived in Virginia, New York City, Minneapolis, Texas and a number of other places, but she's made a home in Albany. As she preps for the first Hello Pretty City of 2012, we talked with her about music, art, Albany, pinball and the party at Sponge Bob's house.

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Interesting in 2011: Samson Contompasis

Living Walls Albany creator Samson Contompasis

All this week we'll be highlighting some of the interesting people we've gotten to know over the past year.

Drive around the city of Albany these days and you're likely to feel the influence of Samson Contompasis. He's the guy responsible for most of the large scale mural art that's been popping up on walls all over the city. He didn't paint it, but he made it happen.

It's likely you've heard of Samson before -- The Marketplace Gallery founder and operator is pretty well known on the Capital Region arts scene. But this past fall he brought the first Living Walls Conference to Albany. The event attracted internationally-renowned mural artists to Albany, and before they left, they transformed walls all over the city into public art. Some people like the work, others... not so much, but either way, it definitely got people talking. The conference also had workshops on sustainability and lectures, all of which Samson says were meant to create "an open dialogue between the people and city."

We caught up with Samson a few weeks ago while he was curating the mural art at Art Basel, an international art show in Miami.

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LOL at ALB

Perhaps not ROFLMAO, but definitely smile inducing.

No, the Joe Bruno bust isn't at Albany International right now. But there's other stuff to see -- and funnier.

If you're heading out of town, or delivering/picking someone up to/from ALB over the holidays, take a few minutes to stop up at the 3rd floor gallery to check out the LOL exhibit.

You might even want to just take a trip out to see it -- even if you're not going anywhere -- just for giggles.

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Dark Sky app funded, and other local Kickstarter projects

Dark Sky, the weather-just-ahead app from Troy-based web developers Jackadam (Jack Turner and Adam Grossman), reached its $35,000 goal on Kickstarter over the weekend. Its deadline was the end of this month -- and the project is still accepting funding through then.

Here are a few other local Kickstarter projects that caught our eye that are looking for funding -- or recently met their goal...

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LEGOmania at the Albany Institute

Legos + creativity at the Albany Institute

This weekend, fortified by turkey and stuffing, teams from all over the Capital Region competed in the Albany Institute of History and Art's first LEGO Building Challenge. Teams of LEGO-maniacs faced off on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Their mission: create Albany architecture from either the past, present or future.

We got to judge the contest on Sunday afternoon along with David Brickman, Jim Kambrich and Rebecca Angel Maxwell. We saw everything from an awesome model of the 1864 Saratoga Race Course, to a Village People concert at The Egg, to a futuristic hydroelectric power plant...

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John Crispin's Willard suitcase project

This is remarkable: photographer John Crispin is documenting suitcases -- and their contents -- from a long-closed state mental facility that have been preserved at the State Museum. He explains on his Kickstarter page:

In 1995, the New York State Museum was moving items out of the Willard Psychiatric Center in Willard, NY which was being closed by the State Office of Mental Health. It would eventually become a state-run drug rehabilitation center. Craig Williams and his staff became aware of an attic full of suitcases in the pathology lab building. The cases were put into storage when their owners were admitted to Willard sometime between 1910 and the 1960s. And since the facility was set up to help people with chronic mental illness, these folks never left. An exhibit of a small selection of the cases was produced by the Museum and was on display in Albany in 2003. It was very moving to read the stories of these people, and to see objects from their lives before they became residents of Willard.

I have been given the incredible opportunity to photograph these cases and their contents. To me, they open a small window into the lives of some of the people who lived at the facility.

He explains more in the video embedded above. His Kickstarter project has already reached its funding goal -- and then some.

Crispin has been posting some of the images from this project on a blog. The collections of items are beautiful in a way.

Crispin says on Kickstarter the State Museum has more than 400 suitcases in its collection. A handful of them were on display at the museum in 2004, and later became a traveling exhibit (exhibit website). There was also a book that came out of the exhibit, The Lives They Left Behind: Suitcases from a State Hospital Attic . [Village Voice] [USA Today]

(Thanks, Jess!)

Capital Comics Collective

After several attempts at networking with local artists, mostly of the painter and photographer varieties, cartoonist T.J. Kirsch still felt out of the place. The scenes just didn't feel right to him.

So he formed his own.

Fast forward four months and the Capital Comics Collective has not only become a place for local comic artists to meet like minded folks and develop ideas -- they've already managed to publish their first min-comics anthology.

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Small Batch Editions

"Poolside" by Sebastien Barre, one of the first prints available through Small Batch Editions.

Worth a look: Small Batch Editions, a startup business from local curator Melissa Stafford, which is aiming to put together new art buyers with up-and-coming photographers. As Melissa explained in an email:

The idea is something that has been building in my mind for at least 3 years now. In the course of working at the gallery in Hudson I often met a lot of people who fell in love with a photograph or painting, but were unable to afford it. I also met a lot of artists struggling to sell their work. Considering the economy these days and how limited most budgets are, I wanted to create an opportunity for both artists and buyers to have a meaningful exchange; by publishing special limited edition prints at more affordable prices I hope to grow the market for unrepresented photographers, increasing their visibility. At the same time, we as collectors get to discover new and exciting work and support the artists we love.

The initial lineup of photographers includes some local names you might recognize: Joe Putrock, Sebastien Barre, Holly Northrop.

Small Batch Editions hasn't officially launched yet. Melissa is currently running a Kickstarter campaign to raise money to cover some of the initial costs. Contributors will be able to pre-order prints and be eligible for other rewards. (And, as with all Kickstarter campaigns, the money is refunded if the goal isn't met.)

You might recognize Melissa's name from Carrie Haddad Photographs in Hudson, where she was the gallery's first director. Here's a little bit more about what prompted her to start Small Batch Editions...

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Wandering through Yaddo

On Sunday, for only the 5th time in its 111 year history, the mansion and private grounds at Yaddo were open to the public. About 1,400 people wandered the rooms where people such as Langston Hughes, Leonard Bernstein, Truman Capote, Eudora Welty, John Cheever and thousands of other artists gathered, ate, slept, held court and of course, created.

The house is gorgeous and filled with impressive antiques, but what we loved was being able to wander through a place where so many amazing and creative people have lived and worked. If there was ever a place we wished that walls could talk, this was it. We walked through the rooms imagining moments of inspiration, unguarded conversations and wondering what kinds of things might have happened in rooms full of so many creative people.

If you weren't one of the 1,400 who took the tour, here's the quick version...

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Living Walls in action

The Elk is still unnamed, but we're playing with Elke. Too on the nose?

Update: Check out Sebastien's account of getting his wall included. He also has photos from a bunch of other murals.

Last night we got to watch a little of the Living Walls project in action. And it was cool.

We caught muralists Broken Crow in the midst of putting up this giant Elk on the wall of a house on Spring Street in Albany.

The finished product, and some thoughts from Broken Crow, after the jump

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The Living Walls project

The first completed Living Walls mural was done by Gaia and Nanook. It's on Livingston Avenue between Broadway and North Pearl

Cities are living, breathing creatures. Like other living things, they thrive on positive reinforcement, growth and creativity. And sometimes they exhale the slow reek of decay. Samson Contompasis, owner and curator of the Marketplace Gallery, looks around Albany and sees beauty and possibilities everywhere. He wants to take decaying or barren vistas and make new life out of them, turning them into awe-inspiring pieces of art. So he's launched Living Walls, a public art project aimed at making Albany a bit more alive with art.

He's brought together a slew of mural artists, some local and some nationally regarded, to help create works of art around the city. The public art project will be accompanied by a lecture and workshop series that will run September 16 and 17.

You may have already seen the first completed wall, which is at 74 Livingston Avenue between Broadway and North Pearl Street. That one was done by the artistic team of Gaia and Nanook, who came up with the concept for the piece after touring Albany.

Samson loves to talk about the power of art, legal or illegal, massive or fleeting...

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Raising the Albany Barn

The former St. Joseph's Academy, future home of the Albany Barn.

Six years ago Capital Region residents Jeff Mirel and George Kansas decided to help raise money for victims of the tsunami in South Asia. A few weeks later they'd packed 2,000 people into the Palace Theater to see dozens of local artists and musicians, raising nearly $30,000.

Fast forward five years.

That successful Rock2Rebuild concert has spawned another effort: the Albany Barn. Organizers hope the project will be a creativity incubator that helps provide resources for artists, offer arts programming for the region, create educational opportunities for inner city kids, and acts as a catalyst to revitalize neighborhoods.

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"Then & Now" at Albany Center Gallery

Opening today at Albany Center Gallery: "Then & Now (Small Prints)" by Thom O'Connor.

The artist, a former UAlbany professor, is a photographer and accomplished print maker. From the blurbage (link added):

Thom O'Connor's work has been consistently praised and highly valued for its construction and thoughtfulness throughout his career. O'Connor is recognized internationally as a master of printmaking, and for his innovation and skill with new techniques. In an Albany Times Union article, author William Jaeger explains, "O'Connor's prints survive because they have unusual visual sensitivity, [and] show extraordinary craft. There is an undercurrent of drama that suggests, without delineation, a very human dimension to the works."

The show opens today and runs through September 10. There's a reception on August 12 at 5 pm.

Look for this Friday: "Forgive Our Trespasses," an exhibit opening this Friday at the Albany Barn, of urban exploration photos by Sebastien Barre, Paul Gallo and Darren Ketchum. There's a reception with the artists starting at 5 pm.

image: Thom O'Connor

Marks of Identity

Something to look for at Troy Night Out: "Marks of Identity" by William DeMichele at the Photo Center Gallery. From the blurbage:

For over 30 years, William DeMichele has been a Capital District professional photographer, and for the last 2 decades he has traveled 5 continents to document the colorful world of tattooing. his approach to photographing tattooed men and women is to use a formal studio setting and to concentrate on the person in front of the lens. "these are portraits of people with tattoos, not tattoos on people", DeMichele proclaims. the result in and intimate look at those who have made a commitment to literally wear their hearts on their sleeve.

The opening reception for is tonight. The exhibit runs through August 21.

photo: Bill DeMichele

"Pulp Fiction Paintings" at the Mandeville Gallery

Action! Sex! Intrigue!

Now open at the Mandeville Gallery at Union College: "Pulp Fiction Paintings
Selections from the Robert Lesser Collection." From the blurbage:

This exhibition contains 37 paintings from the Robert Lesser Collection of Pulp Fiction Art and is on loan from the New Britain Museum of American Art. ... The paintings, roughly 30" x 40", were done as covers to the "pulp fiction" genre of the 1930's and 1940's. The subject matter includes adventure, mystery, science fiction, war, and westerns. Tarzan and the Shadow are two protagonists that are well known today. ...

The influence of pulp fiction is vast, seen in the development of later forms of detective and science fiction literature, super heroes, and film noir. The hyper-American imagery was later taken up by the Pop Artists of the Sixties.

After buying his first painting of the Shadow Lesser says, "I began to realize, my God, for these little ten-cent pulps, they had magnificent oil paintings for the cover art. I was amazed how great some of it was, how well trained these artists were."

Here are a few images from the exhibit. Comments from the curator. And a recent review of works from the collection.

"Pulp Fiction Paintings" is on display until September 25. There are a few events associated with the exhibit, including movie marathons and a talk, "Pulp Fiction and the Modern Reader," by Skidmore's Janet Casey (September 15).

The Mandeville Gallery is in the Nott Memorial at Union.

images from the Robert Lesser Collection, via the Mandeville Gallery

Mitch Messmore: from Schenectady to Beirut and, eventually, back

Mitch Messmore takes the Capital Region art scene very seriously. The Schenectady native has spent the past several years championing local art and attempting to bolster the arts community through his work with various organizations. In 2007, back when cities started getting the art walk bug, he founded Art Night Schenectady. This was just after he became the chairman of the board of the Capital Region Initiative Supporting the Arts and just before he was named the executive director of the Upper Union Street BID. He's also been involved with Upstate Artists Guild, Existing Artists and the Schenectady Photographic Society, just to name a few.

In November of last year, Messmore moved temporarily to Beirut to be with his wife while she is there working on a SUNY research project. You might think that while he is living in the Middle East, Messmore's penchant for local art would have at least been put on the back burner, but the multi-media artist has remained as active and committed as ever, continuing to run Art Night Schenectady via Skype, email and phone with the help of a posse of volunteers.

Now, Messmore has launched Art Night Beirut as a sister organization to the one in his hometown. His exhibiting his abstract paintings at a Beirut gallery. And he's thinking about how to turn the Capital Region into the cultural hub of the Northeast...

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All Utopias Fell

Worth the bout of acrophobia.

We were out at MASS MoCA recently and finally had a chance to check out All Utopias Fell, Michael Oatman's outdoor installation there. We're glad we did. It's fun.

The installation is a collection of three elements. From the MASS MoCA blurbage:

The Shining is a 1970s-era 'satellite' that has crash-landed at MASS MoCA. This beautifully reflective, repurposed Airstream trailer - with large parachutes and active solar panels - is inspired by an earlier era of pulp aeronauts like Buck Rogers, Tom Swift and Tom Corbett: Space Cadet, as well as the works of Giotto, Jules Verne, NASA, and Chris Marker's 1962 film La Jetée. Visitors will be allowed to climb a staircase and enter into the craft where they will encounter The Library of the Sun. Hybridizing a domestic space, a laboratory and a library, it has the feel of a hermitage, where the occupant will 'be right back', only it is 30 years later. ... Once inside the craft, visitors will also be able to view Codex Solis, a massive field of photovoltaic (PVs) or solar panels. At 50kw, the field will generate 7% of the power consumed by MASS MoCA. In addition to this 230-foot long grid, mirrors are interspersed in the middle of the field, and suggest an absent text. The arrangement of mirrors and solar panels is based on a specific quote by an unnamed author, and will not be revealed by the artist; instead the public will be encouraged to spend time with the piece, watch the reflected sky, and solve the riddle as birds and planes, inverted, fly by.

The trailer is great. It's like something from an alternate reality, in which you could have gone camping in space during the 1960s -- and the owner of this particular trailer was a bit on the obsessive side. The inside is a meticulously constructed world, down to the jars of tomatoes.

All Utopias Fell is a seasonal exhibit. It's perched at the top of a few flights of metal stairs outside the old power plant for the factory that preceded the museum at the site. The exhibit is open through October.

After the jump: an interior pic, plus a few bonus pics.

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Canned Art on Delaware Avenue

They're almost too nice to throw trash in -- but you should throw your trash in them.

These new trash cans, which will soon be out in front of businesses on Delaware Ave in Albany, are part of a new collaboration between the Delaware Avenue Merchants Association and the Upstate Artists Guild.

Local artists painted all the cans, and each can has a theme based on the business in front of which it sits. Keith Picard, a Spectrum co-owner and a member of the DAMA, says it's just another way the merchants association is working to bring art to the street.

You can get a closer look at some of the cans after the jump.

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Sculpture in the Streets 2011 is kinetic

Looking for the George Rickey sculptures on the streets of Albany is a little like playing a giant game of Where's Waldo, or trying to find the toaster in the tree. Once you see them, you don't understand how you could have missed them, but at first they're oddly hard to spot.

The five moving metal sculptures are this year's edition of Albany's Sculpture in the Streets project. If something about them seems familiar, think about the Empire State Plaza -- there's been a Rickey sculpture on the ESP for years. There's also one on the RPI campus (where Rickey spent three years teaching in the architecture program), at the Albany Institute of History and Art and on the second floor at Albany International Airport.

Maybe it's the size or steel gray color that makes them blend into the background a bit -- another large metal object in the middle of a city. They kind of disappear into the landscape. But then the wind catches one and you find yourself standing in the street trying to figure out how it does that.

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