shirin neshat

iranian-born artist/videographer shirin neshat:

charleston

just got back from charleston where i went to paint a mural with the chART outdoor initative and gallery: AMAZING. with projects like this so much depends on the chemistry of the people involved, and the group of artists and organizers in charleston is so full of heart and soul (and southern hospitality at its finest) that it was definitely one of my favorite painting experiences. thanks so much to geoff and noel richardson at lava salon, my old friend ishmael, mollie howey, haley hobeika, patch whisky, ben sellers, sarah stewart, john pundt, anson cyr, and everyone else who made this project possible/awesome. check out the walls on alycia alley (just off savannah highway in west ashley) if you are around charleston.

also, mr. patch whisky is having a show at push in asheville that opens july 15, so go on and see him.

and finally, here's a video of geoff talking about the initative and also of me wiping paint off the wall then licking my finger.

vee speers

australian-born photographer (now living/working in paris) vee speers' collection, "birthday party":

this last one especially, a masterpiece.

art nurture asheville

june special: $20 off tuition for our "creative nurture" class if you refer a friend. class starts june 28th and is limited to 15, so hurry! www.artnurtureasheville.com

june studio stroll

photos from studio stroll in the river arts district this past weekend:

(all photos by chris yavelow.)

charles simic

"Clouds Gathering"

It seemed the kind of life we wanted.

Wild strawberries and cream in the morning.

Sunlight in every room.

The two of us walking by the sea naked.

Some evening, however, we found ourselves

Unsure of what comes next.

Like tragic actors in a theater on fire,

With birds circling over our heads,

The dark pines strangely still,

Each rock we stepped on bloodied by the sunset.

We were back on our terrace sipping wine.

Why always this hint of an unhappy ending?

Clouds of almost human appearance

Gathering on the horizon, but the rest lovely

With the air so mild and the sea untroubled.

The night suddenly upon us, a starless night.

You lighting a candle, carrying it naked

Into our bedroom and blowing it out quickly.

The dark pines and grasses strangely still.

Art Nurture Asheville and more

among other exciting projects, i have just launched a workshop series with my friend court mccracken under the name art nurture asheville. we will be teaching classes out of her studio in the river arts district's newly renovated hatchery building, and we will also be having some special events there: movie screenings, art lectures, happy hours. but we will be starting with two summer workshops: "creative nurture," a ten-week class (meets tuesdays) that will explore different creative practices and exercises to get your wheels turning. we will do some drawing, some writing, some more hands-on techniques, but our goal is to give you a good arsenal to draw from if you struggle with getting started, generating ideas, or maintaining momentum in your creative life.

the other workshop we'll be offering is a weekend-long exploration of the arts in asheville (called, as you would expect, "asheville art exploration.") we will visit some of the more innovative galleries downtown on friday for exhibit openings, and we have teamed up with the lazoom bus tours to offer access into a dozen artist studios on saturday morning. for the rest of the day we will have mini-workshops with artists in the river arts district where subjects will range from light sculptures to mural painting to toy-camera methods. on sunday, we will have a picnic at lake eden, the former grounds of the famous black mountain college, and talk about the history of the school, its key players, and the effects it has had on art in asheville and around the world.

for more info and to sign up for classes, visit our website: www.artnurtureasheville.com.

i'm putting the finishing touches on the gypsy queen cuisine lebanese food truck this week, pictures to come soon. and next week i leave to paint a wall in charleston as part of the chART outdoor intitative. painting + block party!

small drawings

new drawings from the past week:

RITES: a public performance

the performance finally happened on saturday--perfect weather, big crowd, friends and family and lots of color. here are the cream-of-the-crop photos from the event, shot by my friend colby rabon:

michael libramento, the composer

my friend steve spurgeon, who built the panels for the project + my dad, herschel

all in all, amazing.

citizen-times article

a great article in today's citizen-times that not only gives good coverage of the project but also gets to a deeper issue on public art--its value and its survival:

The right to 'Rites': Free art event reminds Asheville artists need our help

4:38 PM, May. 18, 2011 |

Molly Rose Freeman stands in front of her mural in the River Arts District. / Special to the Citizen-Times

Written by

Carol Motsinger

Garth Grimball leaps in front of a section of Freeman's mural on Riverside Drive.

IF YOU GO

What: “Rites: A public performance.”
When: 7-8 p.m. Saturday (Rain date is May 28).
Where: RiverLink Sculpture and Performance Plaza, 117 Riverside Drive.
Admission: Free, and be sure to bring blankets and chairs.

As you're speeding down the Smoky Park Bridge, I hope you've noticed the new, blushing beauty mark below in the River Arts District.

Local artist Molly Rose Freeman — who is a champion of the color that is her middle name — has been spending about the last month creating an amphitheater-shaped mural, blossoming with burst of pinks and reds, cooled by white accents, on Riverside Drive.

It's bright. It's bold, just like Freeman's idea, a vision she shares with Asheville dancer and choreographer Garth Grimball and musician Michael Libramento. This trio of talent is collaborating on “Rites: A public performance” 7-8 p.m. Saturday at the RiverLink Sculpture and Performance Plaza, 117 Riverside Drive.

Molly's mural will become the backdrop for a dance performance from Grimball, with the soundtrack provided live by Libramento.

The art event is really designed to be a community event, so naturally it's free. It's also a fitting price tag, since the $3,000 project was funded entirely by donations through a Kickstarter campaign online.

And Molly hopes it's really just the beginning of a series of free arts events from her and her artist colleagues.

“We have everything that we need to make these things happen,” Molly said Monday. “We need to have (art events) that are a free, or at least don't have a lot of commercial pressure and involvement, and utilize community resources, artists, businesses and ideas that are homegrown.”

This exaltation of collaboration, of community and public art reminds me of the role the Works Progress Administration played during this country's recovery from the Great Depression. Artists were funded by the government to produce projects, from murals to literature.

One of these artists was Jackson Pollock, the abstract expressionist painter credited with being one of the most electrifying artists of his generation.

Sorry to nerd out, but I have to prove to my parents that paying for an art history degree was not a complete waste (Hi, Mom!). Pollock and his fellow New York City game-changers are also credited with shifting the center of the art world to the United States, stealing the crown of contemporary art from our ancestors in the Old World.

I think it's fair to say that the art innovation of the '50s and '60s in the U.S. would not have flourished to the same degree if it wasn't for the government's investment through the WPA.

That's one of the reasons it's so disturbing that arts funding is being slashed during our modern economic troubles, still nowhere near the Great Depression's depths of unemployment.

If we don't support Asheville's next Pollock now, we will lose, practically speaking, a huge portion of our tourism appeal. And whimsically speaking, a pillar of our identity, culture and spirit.

“Rites,” a name identifying the event's spring theme, is a perfect name for the event and exactly the sort of thing that we have to continue to support, especially as Capitol Hill continues to eliminate important arts funding.

This is about something new, and it is a totally new use for the RiverLink park. A new, super-forward-thinking attraction to the River Arts District, an epicenter of the craft tradition of these mountains.

But it's ultimately a renewal and a reminder that public art is for the public, but it's a public that has to invest in the work and the artists to guarantee its survival.

This is the opinion of Citizen-Times staff writer Carol Motsinger, who writes an entertainment column every Friday for Take5. She can be reached at cmotsinger@CITIZEN-TIMES.com.