Michael 
Matthew Brinkley showed drawings and found objects from around his apartment. Ricardo offered feedback for the participants’ second critique. Their prompt was to make something that responded to New York City as a subject, site, or context.
Lu Cao presents her work.
We dropped in on one of Pablo Huelgera’s public programming talks at MoMA.
Stephanie Pereira hosted us for a nearly two hour info session that covered the core issues in running a successful kickstarter campaign: be clear about what you are doing, set awesome but convincing/reasonable goals, tell a story, make your rewards engaging, communicate well with your community/fans/friends/mom, etc. Our extended conversation really explored how these are good practices for any kind of application (grant, residency, etc.)
Afterwards we visited Lower East Side galleries. Risa Needleman gave the New York Arts Practicum a walkthrough of the “Furniture” show at Invisible Exports.
Three great visits in two days to Jill Magid, Mark Tribe and Brody Condon’s studios.
Jill Magid told us the incredible story of her research trip to Texas where she happened to witness a capitol hill shooting. She showed us the model for her show that is up currently at Yvon Lambert in Paris, which is based off of police video and 911 audio tapes of another shooting in Texas.
Mark Tribe talked to the participants about how he came to be an artist, the difference between running an organization and making art, and his projects of the last few years.
Brody Condon gave the participants the opportunity to ask him any question they wanted. Faced with that total freedom/control, the participants were a bit like deer in the headlights. After a good long silence, Brody launched into a presentation of the mechanics of making projects, passing around the production binder for his most recent project. And then we sat and watched the full, gorgeous video itself.
Sara Greenberger Rafferty led Critique/Seminar on Tuesday. She was fresh from a residency at Ox-Bow where she co-taught a class on artistic labor with Michelle Grabner. We started the session with some beers and a short free writing exercise about artistic labor. After reading aloud and discussing some of the participants thoughts on artistic labor, Sara introduced the plan for the evening: we were making a collaborative edition.
We each drew numbers to form the order of our assembly line. Each person got to make one move, one decision, and then pass the piece on to the next person. A flurry of materials and making and two hours later we had 20 or so pieces. As Sara noted, we are often accustomed to working with very specialized and specific tools and materials. Letting go of that specialization, and taking some risks with unfamiliar materials and quick decisions can often be inspiring or invigorating.
Friday was a day of contrasts. After seeing David Horvitz’s “Let Us Keep Our Own Noon” at the Kitchen last week, we went to Christian Marclay’s “The Clock” at high noon. In the film, everything speeds at the start of each hour, and even more so at noon.
We slowed down after noon, with a picnic in Central Park with Andy Bichlbaum of The Yes Men. We spent a couple of hours in Central Park talking about how he became a media activist, discussed the planning of Yes Men actions, and the transition to the Yes Labs. Andy insisted that he was not an artist, and only ‘pretends’ to be one for funding, but was mischievously gleeful that The Yes Men appears on the final page of a recent Contemporary Art textbook.
Afterwards, we went to the Metropolitan Museum to look at Renaissance painting, and had a conversation about how these objects from a different time and place relate to contemporary art.
We had our first critique on Tuesday, with Practicum Mentor Jen Liu as our guest critic. Jen started off by telling the participants about her installation up in Chelsea at Dawn Kasper’s space, and the work that was on the walls (and in her computer) for her upcoming shows in Copenhagen.
The critique was on the participants first assignment: recreate a recent work. The challenge is that without access to their school facilities, the participants had to make use of the city as a resource. This exercise was focused on process, and I have been encouraging the participants to think about the whole practicum as a place to transform and transition their process into one that can function outside of the school-space. Correspondingly, I am encouraging them to not worry about producing finished products: this is a place of experimentation and growth.
Jen Liu talks about her installation at Dawn Kasper’s space before leading our first New York Arts Practicum critique
Jen Liu talks about her current body of work before leading the first critique
Jen Liu discusses Tatiana Leshkina’s work in the first critique of the New York Arts Practicum
More from critique: Lu Cao experiments with projecting on a painting
More from critique: Chris Beers hangs hammocks in Bushwick
Friday we visited Lize Mogel‘s apartment studio/office in Fort Greene, and then headed to Chelsea. Lize discussed maps, institutional power, and the role of the artist seeking change. As preparation for our trip to Chelsea, Lize showed the participants her Economy of the Art World diagrams.
Sobered a bit, we set off for Chelsea. First we went to Postmasters, where Magda Sawon talked to us about Holly Zausner’s show. We checked in on David Horvitz’s Life. Drawing. at the Kitchen; the participants will be doing a drawing session with David (who is a Mentor int he program) next week, and David requested they see the piece before the session. We popped in at David Zwirner to discuss different types of galleries, and the ways that galleries are becoming memorials for dead objects in much the same way museums already have been (Gagosian was closed for installation, so couldn’t go there…) We stopped in at Bitforms, where Steve Sacks showed us new work in their project space. After stopping by Printed Matter, we headed up to Stadium where curator Artie Veirkant, and Assistant Director Lauren Christiansen walked us through their In Post show.
Lize Mogel shows New York Arts Practicum participants maps of power before we head to Chelsea
Excellent visit with Magda Sawon at Postmasters
Curator talk from Artie Vierkant at Stadium. He is standing in front of a Chris Coy sculpture.
The New York Arts Practicum is coming to the end of week 2. Everyone has been working in their apprenticeships with their mentor artists. The participants are currently working on their first pieces for critique next week with Jen Liu.
Last week as part of our orientation, we visited MoMA, shared a meal, shared work in a Pecha Kucha, went to openings in Chelsea, took a street art walk through Chelsea, Soho, LES, and Bushwick led by Matt Levy, visited Open Studios at Eyebeam, and had a curators talk from Amanda McDonald Crowley at her show Our Haus at the Austrian Cultural Forum.
This week we had seminar with Trevor Paglen, who showed us work, and lead us in a conversation, we had a seminar with Penelope Umbrico, who showed us new work, and talked about appropriation. Tomorrow we will have a studio visit with Lize Mogel, head to Chelsea for galleries, and end the day with a curators talk from Artie Vierkant at Stadium, NY.
Some documentation is below:
Matt Levy points out the hand painting on this Clownsoldier wheatpaste
Participants explore this narrative object by Time’s Up in the Our Haus exhibition
Penelope Umbrico shows participants mockups for planned work on her computer