Never, ever go to MoMA on a day when one wants to use the coat check. There was a 20+ minute line, and that was for the “members” line.

I look at several photo blogs, but Mica Scalin’s Hello? is the first video blog I’ve seen. She has some older entries on the video art fair DIVA.

I’m intriuged by the courses in modern and contemporary art at MoMA. The member price of $130 is quite good. Does anyone have an opinion on them? James and I might consider taking one, since neither of us have any art history background.

Alternatively, if some of my readers could help me come up with a good reading list on art history, I would really appreciate it. Any period is fine as long as it’s a good text on the subject.

Joe is now part of the collection of the Wadsworth Atheneum, according to Artnet.

Collectors Janice and Mickey Cartin have given the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Conn., a group of 104 photographs ranging in date from 1949 to 1983 by 12 contemporary artists: Roger Ballen, Zarina Bhimji, Edward Burtynsky, Frank Breuer, Lucinda Devlin, Olafur Eliasson, Esko Männikkö, Arnold Odermatt, Lorraine OÂ’Grady, Joe Ovelman, Collier Schorr and Chris Verene. A selection of the acquisition goes on view at the museum in “Old Masters/New Directions: A Decade of Collecting,” Aug. 6-Dec. 18, 2005.

For more on Joe, visit his website.

Updated: James pointed out that the range 1949-1983 doesn’t make much sense when we’re talking about the work of Joe Ovelman (or Collier Schorr and Chris Verene).

A photograph of a celebrity is a thing, not a picture.

– Rachel Harrison

Improv Everywhere’s latest action, titled Look Up More at Union Square. [photo from the site]

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Via Wooster Collective, we learn than an artist know as Banksy dressed as a British pensioner and installed work in several New York museums. The piece above was at the Museum of Modern Art for three days before being removed. [photos from Wooster Collective site]

There is also a NY Times article on Banksy’s adventures, with a slide show!

We had a good day in Chelsea on Saturday. I told a gallerist that we had seen no duds that day, and she handed me a pink highlighter to “mark my calendar!”

The shows:

Richard Aldrich, Kamrooz Aram, Amy Granat and Van Hanos at Oliver Kamm 5BE. The installation in the front mixing film/sound work (using scratched film) by Granat, combined with collage/works on paper and sculpture by Aldrich, is one of my favorite rooms in months. The combination of paintings and works on paper by Aram and Hanos in the “main” room is also wonderful.

Nancy de Holl and Kalup Linzy at Taxter & Spengemann. de Holl does photos (printed in a way similar to iris prints) of still lifes that are so brilliantly lit and arranged that I was sure they had paint on top of the photos. Linzy has several videos in the back that had us watching for a while, laughing much of the time. I think he is one to watch. We first saw his work in an Andrew Guenther-curated show at Capsule (see James).

Robert Gober at Matthew Marks. As James said, I felt like I was in church, but this time I mean it in a good way.

Marjetica Potrč at Max Protetch. Her drawings (including wall drawings) commenting on the social aspects — for good and evil — of architecture, are moving and beautiful to look at. Just ignore what the NY Times had to say. I think they were disappointed that there are no sculptures in this show.

Marjetica Potrč, The English Garden, 2005 (detail)

Marjetica Potrč, The English Garden, 2005 (installation view)

Stranger Town at Dinter Fine Art. This Taylor McKimens-curated show of “eight successful artists who have each risen to prominence in areas outside the walls of the established art world” includes musicians, successful commercial graphic artists, and lots of good drawing plus some video.

Ben Jones at Foxy Production. Ben is a member of Paper Rad, and this is his first solo show. I think the solo format has provided him with a chance to show the formalist/conceptual aspects of his work in a way that’s rather difficult when doing the collaborative shows. I look forward to the future solo shows by other members at Foxy.

Ben Jones, Kay Nine’s Lament (2005)
DVD, Commodore 64, and sculpture

Ben Jones, Dog Face (2005)
acrylic on canvas

Lastly, I loved the Mary Heilman show at 303 Gallery, but didn’t like the “no photos allowed!” policy or the fact they don’t send out e-mail announcements. They have decent images on their web site of individual works, but sometimes one wants to show the interesting placement of two images. Check out the image of Heaven on the site. That’s the one everyone sees and says, “Is that one of her paintings?”

The last time I put up a photo from a Foxy Production Paper Rad show, I used my phone cam. Here is another, from Ben Jones’s excellent solo show at the gallery. That’s the gallery’s lovely and talented Michael Gillespie in the photo with Face Maker (2005).