Culture Zohn: Ten Treasures of 2007

The Culture Zohn has had a year blessed by more artistic bounty than I could faithfully report. With all the caterwauling about our President and his philistine cronies, there has been an explosion of genius (perhaps it's due to the mothers after all!) that had me scurrying from LA to NY to Chicago to San Francisco to London in a frenzy of listmaking and I did not even attend one art fair. Those of you who have faithfully followed my exploits both past and present know that I have certainly had my favorites which bear no repetition here but I have often wished I could highlight just one more thing each week that was not only worthy but also special and that it would break my heart if you missed.

So my short list of wondrous favorites does not revisit anything I've already shared, and better yet, though the particular performance or exhibit may have passed, there is more where that came from in '08. Here then, the jewels that went unreported but not unnoticed:

1. Works and Process a performance series housed at the extraordinarily beautiful Frank Lloyd Wright theater in the basement of the Guggenheim Museum.

About two years ago, I began hearing about this eclectic, brilliantly curated series of performances that showcased the journey and not just the destination. I bought a subscription for my mother, since I was not in NY at the time and sent her as my guinea pig. Two weeks ago I finally caught up with the series (which has been expanded to include all kinds of performance art) for a presentation of Dada, Jazz and the Avant Garde, a musical slash visual program produced by Sara Rothenberg in conjunction with the engaging Foto exhibit upstairs (see item 2). Mary Sharp Cronson is the originator and primary funder and she has just brought Charles Fabius, Robert Wilson's former collaborator, on board and the coming season promises to be even more magical.

2. Foto, Modernity in Central Europe just upstairs at the Guggenheim an exhibition which originated at the National Gallery provides an instructive counterpoint to the Richard Prince show (which had dinner guests at a party I recently attended fulminating about the state of contemporary art) Here's a look at some of the between the wars (that's WWI and II, not Vietnam and Iraq) imagery that has inspired Prince and other artists (except for my favorite Butter/Mother joke which wasn't his to begin with) for its uncanny early overlays of collage, photography and words.

Dreamers [Trumende], 1928-29 Gelatin-silver print, 8 x 11 inches (21 x 29.2 cm) Gallery Kicken, Berlin Phyllis Umbehr/Gallery Kicken Berlin.

The exhibition closes on January 13th and you must try to see it; the catalogue would make a deserving present for anyone on your list who is interested in a lesser-sung moment in the history of photography.

3. History Matters, an evening-long lecture slash performance by Merce Cunningham and Company (including understudies) held at his historic Westbeth (aka Meatpacking) studio that presented vignettes from his previous work. Cunningham narrated from a wheelchair, but his lively, testy commentary reminded that the combination of performance and art was pioneered by this 88 yr old back when the juxtaposition was truly new. The company is now on tour in Europe and will be back in NY at Dia Beacon on January 12-13 and Stanford on January 25-6.

4. The sexy floating bed scene:

Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera c. 2007 Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera. All Rights Reserved.

from Romeo and Juliette at the Met with opera babe Anna Netrebko and Roberto Algana. Yes, it's true, she does straddle him in her white nightgown and sings like a dream whilst doing so. Performances of this are pretty much sold out though the live HD transmission of the performance this past weekend broke records. See something else at the Met in '08 even if you don't consider yourself an opera buff, as the singers eventually may be in the buff at the rate they are going. And while you are there, stop into the Gallery Met next door which has a charming exhibition pegged to the Hansel and Gretel production. John Currin's wicked modern stepmother was my favorite piece since it's how I imagine my stepchildren must think of me, alas.

5. The furniture collection of Pierre Paulin has just been anointed by the French Government, MoMA and Azzedine Alaia who will coproduce a new collection of this iconic seventies designer's work. In the meantime, check it out online here .

Pierre Paulin / F 574 - Le Chat chair / 1967 | Lenor Larsen / Momentum cover / 1967 / by ARTIFORT

Yes, I know, everything, including lava lamps has come back but weren't you kind of crazyhappy in the seventies before you had kids? This will remind you of the wild self you once were just by having it your living room.

6. The Maison de Verre by Dominque Vellay, a pictorial hommage to one of the greatest private houses I have ever been lucky enough to be in.

Rediscovered by Richard Rogers in the sixties and then home to his wife Ruthie's ob/gyn, I got a private tour from her in Paris a few years later (I know, it's hard to imagine being in stirrups in this sleek environment, but I'm thinking that's why her son Roo turned out to be so sophisticated.)

7. And another luscious look at a fantasy life Tony Duquette by Goodman and Wilkinson about the splendidly talented, march-to-his-own-drum designer/impresario.

You must be patient for this one; it has proved so wildly popular that the publisher is totally out of stock--but it's worth keeping after. I want the jewelry most of all, but wouldn't mind spending a night in the Dawnridge bed either. One of our Hollywood heroes.

8. Last year, the Metropolitan Museum of Art re-installed the Greco Roman galleries to much fanfare. But for my money (or rather Michael Rockefeller's), the most breathtaking gallery I've been in in a long time (and which would be touted as THE museum architectural space in any other new venue) is the central gallery for Melanesian art in the re-done Oceanic wing of the Met, capped, literally, by the ceiling from a ceremonial house of the Kwoma people of New Guinea.

More than 80 feet long and 30 feet wide, the ceiling is composed of more than 270 individual paintings, commissioned from a group of Kwoma master artists in the early 1970s. Fully installed for the first time, art and religion have met their most sacred space at the museum, an enthralling, soaring gallery which makes you HIGH!

9. Raising Sand, the perfectly incongruous combination of Robert Plant and Alison Kraus which has now found a permanent home in my CD player. I am one who saw Robert Plant many times (though not as many as the Celine Dion fan with a record of 62 numbing visits to Vegas) and Led Zeppelin when they were the basic soundtrack to my errant ways in the sixties. It's hard to imagine the rocker and the country girl making beautiful music but they indeed do. To listen to him underharmonize with her and to her gentle him is to be reminded that all men can be tamed, it just takes the right girl to do it.

10. Materials and Applications, Silver Lake, Los Angeles. About two years ago, wondrous strange constructions and projects began to sprout in a tiny space on Silver Lake Boulevard wedged between commercial buildings.

Giant parachute-like hangings, golden sprays, hidden tents, each time defining what it really means to make art--to assure that after you see it, you will never see the world the same way again. Each project is conceived and constructed by a different group of artists and volunteers help rig it up. Magical and worth a detour next time you're in LA.

Last year I received a complaint from a Los Angeles museum director about my year end list being NY-centric. I want to dedicate my list to Los Angeles in general (and which I have extensively covered this year) for having the Vision thing, for having attracted, stolen even, the most talented new crop of cultural leaders seen in one critical mass in a long time. '08 promises to be gargantuan in LA (a new building at LACMA, a new conductor at LA Phil). Look for my take on Redcat and the Watts Towers in the early part of the year.

Until, 08, then, fellow culture junkies, get out there and take a friend while you're at it.

Comments

[Semaj51]

Sorry, I must be a country-hick but nothing here really excited me. There seems too much of "its cultural for cultural sake". And as for Paulin's furniture -- furniture should be first and formost designed for comfort and use. The furniture of Paulin seems noting more than art objects.

[CintiBlue]

Patricia:

I always think I'm going to do a quick read of your blog, and then you link me to things that fascinate. The time flies by and then I need to log off and do other things.

Your site is one of the great examples of the power/pleasure of the WWW.

Thank you.