Today I celebrated International Women’s Day by taking part in artist Melissa Vogley Woods’ first drop-in workshop at the Riffe Gallery. Anyone familiar with Melissa’s work, from her videos (e.g Boxed) or her paintings (e.g. Consequences), would instantly know that these workshops would be messy, tantalizing, thoughtful and inspirational. Planned in coordination with the exhibition […]
I just proposed a so-called ‘First Year Seminar’ (a one credit class for Ohio State freshmen) on the topic of ‘Selfie Culture’. It will examine the history, art and politics of the selfie from ancient Rome to now and I will be discussing artists such as Cindy Sherman, David Hammons and Petra Cortright as well […]
As the M I N T collective prepares to leave their space on 42 W Jenkins and start a new chapter in their story, I asked the members to share their memories of the space so that I could post them on Minus Plato. As a new member I cannot possibly know the mix of […]
The 2012 exhibition Animal Spirits at the DESTE Slaughterhouse was inspired by the economist John Maynard Keyne’s concept of “animal spirits”: Here is the description of the exhibition on the DESTE website: Animal Spirits references a concept coined by the British economist John Maynard Keynes, who argued in his 1936 book, The General Theory of […]
March’s Artforum just landed and it contains the essay “Mounting Resistance” by Nasser Rabbat about new art in Beirut. One of the two solo shows in the Lebanese capital that Rabbat discusses in Randa Mirza’s “El-Zohra Was Not Born in a Day”. The exhibition comprises a series of dioramas that focus on the pre-Islamic myths […]
In their project The Rumors of the World, Lebanese artists Joana Hadjithomas and Khali Joreige investigate the abundance of spamming and scamming on the internet and the resulting questions of trust and the construction of identity in the post-internet world. In addition to installations of video works in which actors play the roles of the […]
In his essay about Cy Twombly, ‘The Wisdom of Art’, Roland Barthes introduces the Latin adjective rarus as a way of describing the dispersed elements of the artist’s canvases. In a lyrical moment in which Barthes recalls his own experience of the Mediterranean, Barthes pinpoints the sources for this Latin term in a passage from […]
After reading How to See a Work of Art in Total Darkness last year, I was excited to read Darby English’s new book 1971: A Year in the Life of Color. (Prof. English also happens to be delivering the Ludden Lecture at Ohio State this afternoon). Following the introduction, the first chapter of this study of […]
Another day, another project. Today I want to start sowing the seeds of the part of my current research project (provisionally titled: Myths of the Academy: Situating Classics for Contemporary Art) that examines visual artists who have been awarded the prestigious Rome Prize at the American Academy in Rome. What specifically interests me in this […]
I am proud to announce that I have recently joined the M I N T Collective in Columbus. Here is a description of the collective’s mission: M I N T is a collaborative, multidisciplinary space founded and operated by artists located in Columbus, Ohio. Abidingly fresh, adaptable, and dynamic, our mission at M I N […]