Harvest moon.

Been busy lately. The Inde has been sending me on a bunch of assignments (most of them lame), Leo Fortuna has been occupying a lot of my time, and i had to attend one wedding and one funeral last week. R.I.P. Uncle Bus. On the up and up, i'm going to THEO'S this weekend!!! There will most definitely be a bunch of cool pics from there, i'm sure the leaves are sooo beautiful up in the mountains. Thought i'd post the press release for Leo Fortuna's current show. I wrote it, it just got edited by the curator a bit. Last Saturday, the night of our opening i actually sold a $900 drawing to a curator for the Tate!!! I'm also going to post the only semi-interesting picture i've taken lately. Amy has been sending me to a lot of sporting events... you'll see. Speaking of sporting events: GO YANKEES!!! Also, today is Ishmael and I's one and a half year anniversary. Probably not that significant, but we're going out to dinner tonight to celebrate regardless :)


Press Release
For Immediate Distribution

Title: From a Drawing Standpoint
Dates: September 29- October 29. Opening reception Saturday September 29th from 6-8 p.m.
Featuring Artists: Katherine Desjardins, Ricardo Lanzarini, Marco Maggi, Oscar Munoz, Renato Orara & Liliana Porter

Leo Fortuna Gallery is proud to present From a Drawing Standpoint, an independently curated group show featuring contemporary artworks that closely examine the concept of drawing. To magnify and reveal the medium's infinite facets, curator Ana Tiscornia chose six artists with individual approaches to drawing.
Katherine Desjardins' work is instantly familiar as a throwback to coloring books. Desjardins uses its language and imagery with a perverse twist, oftentimes employing irony to make social statements. Ricardo Lanzarini creates his own universe of miniscule busybody characters that reflect society at large. Lanzarini's characters appear to be detailed personalities up close, yet from afar they resemble a winding stream of curious events. Marco Maggi's pieces are complex systems vaguely reminiscent of codes, circuits, or constellations; they are intended to capture the viewer by means of their abstractions rather than their object references. Oscar Munoz's 30-minute digital video Re/Trato draws and redraws the same face as its features gradually evaporate, pointing to the ephemeral, and the apprehensiveness of self-representation. Renato Orara takes the simple act of drawing an object and pushes it to the extreme. Through countless layers of ballpoint ink on a given form, he dissolves its original meaning, leaving in its place a presence that is both immediate and intense. Liliana Porter's drawings combine humor and optimism to create poetics that function as metaphors of basic life situations while destabilizing our conventions. Using small figurines, she creates situations that challenge various concepts, such as reality and representation, right and wrong, here and there.

Upcoming exhibition:
Tuning
November 3 - November 26
Works by: Ana Tiscornia

422 1/2 Warren Street
Hudson, NY 12534
T: 518.697.7907
F: 518.751.1292
http://www.leofortuna.com/
Gallery Hours:Open daily 11:00am-5:00pm, except Tuesdays-Thursday, and by appointment


For some reason it's not letting me post pictures.... and i actually have to head out to another soccer game right now, ugh- so i'll post them another time. In addition to the soccer pics and Theo's pics, expect some Howe Caverns pics as well, i'm determined to get them off of Ish's camera!

Wonderland.

I rewrote the press release for Leo Fortuna today. Made it a lot shorter. Here it is:

Press Release
For Immediate Distribution

Title: Wonderland
Dates: Opening September 8, 6-8 p.m. until September 24, 2007
Artists: Roy Bautista, Natalia Porter, Ami Suma
Curator: Melissa Stafford

Leo Fortuna Gallery is proud to present, Wonderland, an independently curated group show featuring contemporary mixed media works that take us down the rabbit hole, into a dreamlike world rife with tortured beings, piles of playthings and puffy protectors of innocence. The term “Wonderland” describes a marvelous imaginary realm, which, because of our instinctual need to place faith in reality, usually features connections to the real world. We all have our own unique utopian visions of the Wonderlands in our heads, and this exhibition exposes three of them. Roy Bautista’s brutally honest drawings explore the concept of fear. His figures, often plagued by an overload of anxieties, are representative of fetishes; they are caught up in a particular emotional moment, often dwelling on or struggling with concepts like “love” and “death.” On the other end of the spectrum, Natalia Porter’s Wonderland is an “Island” of imagination she has created by disassociating objects with the values we’ve assigned to them. Toys are often seen purely for what they are and for what purpose they serve, but Porter changes this all by collecting plastic treasures like vibrantly-colored cars and balls, arranging them in a cluttered heap, drawing them on the computer, and bringing them to life again in the form of a digital print. Fantasy and reminisces of childhood are also largely present in the drawings of Ami Suma. Suma says her “Mr. Ball,” a hypothetical toy made of a plushy ball, with flexible hanging arms and a varying wardrobe, is meant to make you giggle and “remember your childhood, feeling disgusted, but liking something.” All three artists present conflicts of interest between reality and fantasy, trust and mistrust, in ways that take us out of our heads- to a place where anything and everything is possible.


422 1/2 Warren Street
Hudson, NY 12534
T: 518.697.7909
F: 518.751.1292
www.leofortuna.com
gallery@leofortuna.com
Gallery Hours:
Open daily 11:00am – 5:00pm, except Tuesdays-Thursday, and by appointment.

Not, by any means finalized, but still, it's something i've spent some hours on. I also made some business cards!!! My dad said the font is too small and he can't read them. He also has really bad eyesight and needs to see an optometrist, so really, i'm iffy about them but they're just preliminary. It's embarrassing when people ask for your business card and all you can do is write your name, number and E-mail address down on a piece of scrap paper. Also, GO SEE SUPERBAD- It's super awesome!

Evan: You changed your name to McLovin?

Seth: It doesn't even have a first name, it just says McLovin!

Evan: The guys either going think 'here's another guy with a fake ID', or 'here's McLovin, 25 year old Hawaiian organ donor.'

Fogell: I am McLovin.

Rainy day woman #2.

Today is the second gloomy, cold, drizzly day in a row. Perfect because The Inde hasn't given me any assignments in about a week and i can drink tomato soup and take naps at my own leisure, and not so perfect because i'm not making money. I could go strip frames for a couple hours, i'm just not feeling ambitious enough for that. On the up and up, i landed a job with Leo Fortuna Gallery on Warren St. in Hudson. My boss Adi is great, but i'm only getting $8 an hour because it's an "internship" and because he's running on a low budget- it's a brand new gallery. Sitting at a computer for hours on end each weekend can be pretty awful, but i'm learning a lot about: how galleries operate, various contemporary artists, strawberry banana smoothies from Nolita, etc. Basically, i've become really great friends with Adi's pit bull, Flower. Our next opening, "Wonderland," will be September 8th at 6 p.m. We'll be featuring mixed-media works by Roy Bautista, Natalia Porter and Ami Suma. Shameless plugging? Course it is! Come and buy some amazing art!
Lake George was great. Now that i'm older and probably more cynical, i've realized that EVERYTHING in Lake George costs money. Probably more than most of it is worth. Nonetheless, it's good to get away for a while and drink beers on boats. Two of my favorite things in one sweet little package. I posted the pics from my dad's camera on Facebook, but i have yet to deal with the ones i took on Ish's camera, so there are still more to come!

My birthday is actually coming up soon too. 22 here i come, woo. Feel free to give me either of these signed Daniel Johnston prints as a gift:

http://www.hihowareyou.com/ I would love you forever.

Aside from my birthday i'm excited about:

1. Heather's bridal shower, Sat. Aug. 25- my oldest friend, my first ever bridal shower.

2. Jonestown, Sat. Aug. 25- the first in a really really really ridiculously long like probably 10 years time. Beer, BBQ, jams, and drunken townies galore <3.

3. Yankees vs. Red Sox, Thurs. Aug. 30- my third game of the season, my second Yanks/Red Sox game ever. Buck Foston.

4. Columbia County Fair, Sun. Sept. 2- BIRTHADY CELEBRATION WITH BACON BROTHERS MOTHER FUCKERS!

5. Of Montreal at the Roseland Ballroom, Sat. Oct. 13- Me+Lauren+Of Montreal= parrrtayyy.

As for pictures, the only thing i've been taking as of late have been newspaper pics and pics of antiques. I'm guessing you'd rather look at the newspaper ones, huh?

I obviously didn't take this one, but i did ride in a motorized parachute while Kate was here. I went to take pics of Diane Valden flying with the crazy Mr. Fox for a story, and then they asked me if i wanted to go for a ride! We flew over my house and my dad came out on the porch, shirtless, and waved to us.

Here i am high up in the sky, above the treetops.

Oh yeah, i also got a weekend-long press pass to Falcon Ridge! Here's a night shot i took. Wasn't published, but i think it's pretty cool.

Alright, these last two made the front page. Also, i got to go to the courthouse last week and take pictures of a murderer! They put it on the front page too, but i don't think i want to put it up. Mainly because i don't want to die. Think i might be sending my dog wedding piece into Chronogram, but i'll keep all you thousands of readers/fans updated. I think it'd be nice to work for them... maybe when i have more free time. Haaah. Cheers.