Sidewalk Catwalk: Meet the Mannequins

The Fashion Center opened, "Sidewalk Catwalk," its long-in-the-making summer public art exhibition, today, and I was on hand to see the unveiling of 32 mannequins dressed by superstar designers--including Kenneth Cole, Betsey Johnson, Isaac Mizrahi, Nicole Miller, Rebecca Taylor, and Donna Karan--and local fashion students. The mannequins will posed in the plazas of the Fashion District, along Broadway from 35 Street to 42nd Street in Manhattan, through September 3.

The project, meant to highlight New York's fashion industry, is brilliant in several ways:

1) It presented a real and compelling challenge that many of the designers probably hadn't faced before: creating "outfits" out of durable materials that could remain outside and stand up to the city elements all summer long (some designers were successful at that, incorporating a variety of materials from a parachute to bricks, but I foresee a sad fate for others' garments). Essentially, the mannequins became sculptures and the designers, many of whom often use visual arts to inspire their clothing collections, had to turn the tables and use their vision for clothing as the impetus for an artwork.

2) It's the kind of public art project that, when stumbled upon by the unsuspecting pedestrian, is likely to provoke wonder, curiosity, and awe, in the much same way that this Sarah Sze sculpture did for me in 2006.

3) The custom Ralph Pucci mannequins were the perfect muses for the designers, given their streamlined shapes, faceless figures, and their already well-established connection to the art world.

4) The juxtaposition and close proximity of the mannequins to Antony Gormley's much less commercial public exhibition, "Event Horizon"-- 31 sculptures of the artist naked, standing in Madison Square Park and peering somberly down from nearby rooftops-- makes me chuckle.

5) It's for a good cause. All of the mannequins will be auctioned to benefit Materials for the Arts.

Pictured above is Prabal Gurung's mannequin design-- now go see the rest!

Urban Love Daily Arts New York

Electric Heart (above) and Arty Heart (below, left), courtesy Christopher Frederick, via Urban Love Daily.

Nobody loves New York City like Christopher Frederick. Where most of us might just glimpse some gunk on the sidewalk or a smear on a window, this Brooklyn-based artist sees hearts--and he immortalizes them in photographs. His recently launched Web site, Urban Love Daily, is a collection of these images, and the clever combination of gritty and sweet is enough to make even the most surly city dweller crack a smile. Besides getting a daily dose of amore, you can also buy a copy of your favorite picture or upload your own heart image on the site. Here's what Chris had to say about the project:

1) Where did the idea for Urban Love Daily originate?

The heart photos began one day when I was walking around Chelsea and saw that someone drew a heart right on the crotch of a man in an underwear add on a bus stop shelter. It made me laugh so hard that I had to take a picture of it. I showed it to a friend who reminded me of a picture I took on the boardwalk of Coney Island years ago, of a Popsicle that was melting into the shape of a heart. Suddenly I started seeing hearts everywhere. Finally I broke out my good camera and began to hunt them down. To my surprise, the more I looked the more I saw. I knew the heart imagery would be too sentimental for the gallery scene, yet I wanted people to see these images because they really struck a chord with me. A blog was the natural solution. I think what compels me to keep taking them is that they are not typically saccharine. I search for hearts that feel smart or tough or raw.

2) What's your favorite find so far?

I tend to get most excited when I find hearts formed accidentally, like Electric Heart, where I literally almost stepped on a broken cord laying in the middle of the street before I realized it was strewn in the shape of a heart.

3) What is the coolest submission you've received?

My favorite so far is Beet, an accidental heart formed when a red beet touched a gold beet. I think they were in love. Poor root vegetables getting separated like that. I imagine the joy that filled the photographer when she suddenly saw a distinct blood red heart reveal itself in the midst of the daily task of cooking.

4) What makes NYC the ideal place to find these little expressions of "Urban Love?"

I'm in love with New York City. New York's motto is the famous Milton Glaser rebus I ♥ NY. It's a city of passionate people and tourists that catch the buzz. Because New York is so dense and encourages walking, there's pedestrian traffic everywhere, so there's a lot of opportunity to see the traces of the people who have passed by, from litter and graffiti to self-promotion, decoration, and lost treasures. Within all of that there are lots of hearts to be found. At the same time, the sheer volume of people and activity can be ironically isolating. It can be hard to make deep connections, to find romantic love. I think there's so much heart iconography in this city because we all long for love more than we feel it. It can take a daily reminder not to focus on the darker side and all the irritations that come along with being here, though I have a huge appreciation for the dark side of life. I guess that's why my imagery tends to be gritty and atypical of what one normally associates with a heart. I'm more interested in the complex realities of love than any romantic delusion.

5) So what is it that you love the most about this crazy, beautiful, lonely city?

Anything is possible in New York. If you name it, you can find it. Such abundance has really helped me define myself and choose how I want to see the world.

Want more? Connect with Urban Love Daily on Facebook.

How to Afford Art

Image courtesy of Charmingwall, from "Solo Show: The Hidden World Wakes," by Jordan Bent, running through Sept. 2.

In this economy, where even being gainfully employed is a feat, buying art can seem hopelessly out of reach. But you don't have to have a wallet that's busting at the seams to put something meaningful on your wall. This ARTINFO article, co-written by me, gives you the lowdown on how--and where--to start:

Tips for Novice Collectors
By Jacquelyn Lewis, Marisa Rindone, Reposted from ARTINFO.com

You love art, and you know what you like, but you don’t have a financier’s funds. So is it still possible to be a collector? The answer is an overwhelming yes. And if you have any spare cash, an economic downturn is an excellent time to buy. With fewer buyers in the market, there is actually a wider variety of interesting, affordable pieces available.

“A lot of galleries are working with their artists to try and meet this market need. Economic and political crisis always shakes things up and creates a more interesting dialogue,” says Helen Allen, executive director of the Pulse contemporary art fair, which runs annually in Miami and New York. “It’s a difficult time, but it’s a time when people can really think outside the box and be a little bit more creative in their outreach.”

The Art of the Risk

Invisible Exports’ Artist of the Month Club is one such nontraditional endeavor. The young, Lower East Side gallery offers a program in which members of the club get a dozen original, exclusive pieces for $2,400 a year. “You can sign up for a year’s subscription, and every month you get a new work,” explains Allen. The catch? Collectors won’t lay eyes on the purchased pieces until they arrive in their homes. “The club involves a wonderful element of chance," adds Risa Needleman, the gallery’s co-owner. "When you sign up, you know all the curators but none of the artists. You make a leap of faith, and a 12-piece collection is curated for you and dropped at your front door.” Essentially, subscribers have professionals begin their collection for them, with each piece costing only $200 (shipping and handling is included in the price of membership).

The World Beyond Chelsea

If you’d prefer to wander out on your own, however, “art fairs are a fantastic place to start,” Allen says. “They offer a level playing field. As a beginner, you can come in and see 30 or 100 or 200 galleries,” as well as take advantage of programming like a lecture or a demonstration that might be useful when you’re just beginning to learn your tastes. Pulse, which hits Miami December 3-6, offers a lot of lower price points. Art Forum Berlin stands out as a staple when it comes to finding great emerging work, as it features galleries under five years old. The fair runs September 24-27 this year.

Off-the-beaten-path galleries are also a likely place to find bargains, since they’re often committed to supporting newer artists. Galleries in lower Manhattan and Brooklyn may be slightly more accessible than those in Chelsea. Small art blogs and Web sites with the same aim, such as Etsy.com, are good places to look.

“It doesn’t have to cost $100,000 to be good,” says Rob Kalin, founder of Etsy, which offers hundreds of thousands of artworks and other handmade items, many with a price tag of less than $100. “Our big goal is to enable people to make a living making things. There are probably artists on the site whose work will be very collectible in 10 years, but it’s more about what art should be about: surrounding yourself with work that you want to see and experience in your everyday life. It’s great to know you’re supporting the artists too.”

Buy Direct

Of course, some of the best prices can be had by going straight to the source. Get to know the artist and you’re more likely to get a deal.

“Find art walks and open studio events in your area where you’ll have the chance to meet artists and buy directly from them,” says Cris McCall, director of the Hollywood, Calif.-based Tinlark gallery, which specializes in affordable art and offers lots of diminutive pieces.

She also recommends M.F.A. shows and school Web sites. “Graduating artists are affordable and keen to sell their work,” she says. “If you see a piece you like, call the school — they should be happy to pass along your information to the artist.”

Use Your Intuition

Tap into the sense you get about the person you’re purchasing a piece from, be it a gallerist or a painter. “Make sure you have an open line of communication,” says Allen. “If you don’t have a good feeling about it, that’s an indication that something’s not right.”

And don’t let the current economy influence your choices, Allen warns new collectors who aren’t necessarily familiar with the market. “Don’t try to buy for financial investment. The market is very fickle. It’s highly risky to be betting on a fourfold return. It’s more important to buy what you love.”

Here, some great places to start building your collection:

Invisible Exports’ Artist of the Month Club

The Artist of the Month Club "is a wonderful way to start a collection — or to add to a growing one — with the help of a dozen of the country's most plugged-in curators, a kind of dream team of art advisers. It's a perfect way to acquaint yourself with the work of great living artists, many just on the verge of real breakouts and others who have already received wide acclaim,” Needleman says. She adds that new collectors don’t have to wait until January to sign up; late subscribers can still join and receive the full 2009 collection.

Tinlark
6671 Sunset Blvd., Hollywood, Calif.

ARTINFO stumbled across this Hollywood gallery during last year’s Armory week at the satellite fair Red Dot. “Carefully curated, affordable art — that’s what I do,” gallery director Cris McCall told us, and she has the prices — starting at $25! — and selection to prove it. If you can’t make it to Hollywood, look for Tinlark online or at smaller art fairs.

Charmingwall
191 West Fourth Street, New York

This little gallery, standing alone amid the tattoo and novelty shops in New York’s West Village, offers a curated selection of quirky, open-edition prints that never go above $80 — and that includes framing and matting. How does Charmingwall maintain such affordable prices? The owners are in the boutique printing business, so production costs are minimal, and the gallery maintains personal relationships with all of its artists, who approve each print, according to gallery director Katie McClenahan. The prints are available online too, and the gallery has small monthly exhibitions of original art priced anywhere from $50 to a few thousand per work. “We’re trying to get up-and-coming artists out there and provide affordable art for the masses,” McClenahan says. Less than two years old, Charmingwall has already attracted media attention from the likes of New York magazine and DailyCandy.

(FYI: Charming Wall is opening a new gallery, Six by Six, featuring 6" x 6" original works of art, in October.)

Etsy

Rob Kalin dropped out of art school and founded Etsy in 2005. The result is an addictive online marketplace where you can buy anything from original artworks to handmade jewelry and clothing. According to Kalin, art is the third most popular category on the site and accounts for 10 percent of Etsy’s overall sales. “This is about the idea that art is a craft,” Kalin says. Etsy’s selection isn’t curated, so quality is hit or miss, and it can be time-consuming to page through its thousands of offerings. Still, the site features some great finds.

Tiny Showcase

True to its name, the four-year-old Web site Tiny Showcase showcases prints that are, well, tiny. You can sign up for its newsletter and snatch up a limited-edition piece each Tuesday for minimal dough — from around $20 to $100. But you have to be nimble — the works usually go within hours. Imagine covering an entire wall with these exquisite little pieces, all printed on archival paper in ink. And the best part is that a percentage from each work sold goes to a charity of the artist’s choice.

Quay Brothers Reminder

Still from Street of Crocodiles, via Gothamist.

I told you about the Quay Brothers coming to Parsons a while ago--and the exhibition has finally arrived! Get more info and check out this sweet photo gallery on Gothamist before you go.

The Girl Project: Five Questions for Kate Engelbrecht

Photo courtesy The Girl Project.

New York-based photographer Kate Engelbrecht is on a mission to empower teenage girls through pictures. She started The Girl Project, a national collection of photos taken by American girls ages 13 to 17, in 2008. Each participant gets a disposable Kodak camera to capture self portraits and anything else that matters in her life. Then she sends it back to Engelbrecht, who is including the most compelling of those on The Girl Project Web site and in an upcoming book and a traveling exhibition scheduled kick off in 2010. Some of the results are heartbreaking, some are uplifting, and others are hilarious--but all the images are surprising and touching.

I recently chatted with Engelbrecht via email:

1. How did the idea for The Girl Project come about?
I became really curious about how much I "knew" about teenage girls regardless of the fact that I didn't know any and had not been one myself for a long time.

2. What was your goal for the project?
In the beginning I set out to explore whether or not if what I knew, or thought I knew, was true. Today its less about a question; it has become my own little mini mission to help share girls' perspectives of themselves. My goal is to compile the images in a high-end photography book as well as a traveling exhibition.

3. What are some of your most favorite/interesting photographs you have received so far?
Hmm... thats difficult to answer. There are so many images. The most interesting to me (in general terms) are those that reveal something really personal... where the girl completely goes for it emotionally and puts herself out there.

4. How many girls have participated so far?
Around 800. I hope to have 5,000 by the end.

5. What is the most surprising thing you have discovered doing this project?
For certain it is how innocent these girls are. They are so much more real than the world unconsciously leads us to believe.

Note: If you're a teenage girl who wants to participate in The Girl Project, sign up here.

Graffiti Queens

Photo courtesy McCaig-Welles Gallery.

Women have always been an imperative part of the urban art scene, with legends like Claw Money and Fafi making their mark on cities around the world. And although the man is making it more and more difficult for artists of both sexes to put up their work in public places, these ladies have still found ways to stay relevant and continue creating compelling art. Claw Money has her eponymous, ultra cool fashion line , Fafi did a collaboration with MAC Cosmetics, designing some insanely awesome, drool-worthy makeup bags, and Swoon, one of my all time favorites (not technically a graffiti writer but the consummate street artist), has launched her Swimming Cities expeditions and is represented by Deitch Projects. One of the best things about all this is that these artists have managed to break into the commercial world without selling out.

I’m really excited that the art and fashion worlds are starting to recognize truly talented graffiti writers, especially women, so I’m super stoked for this upcoming exhibition at McCaig-Welles Gallery in Brooklyn. Queens Arrive: International All Female Graffiti Artists Exhibition runs April 10-May 3. Artists featured include Fafi, Claw Money, Klor, and a whole lot more. The works of Martha Cooper, who photographed NYC subway graffiti during its heyday in the 1970s and 80s, also will be part of the exhibition.

(Note: I originally wrote this post for bust.com, where it appeared first. What can I say? I gotta multitask these days!)

Ain't Your Granny's Embroidery

One thing I saw quite a bit of at this year's Armory Week fairs was embroidery. Embroidery, knitting, crochet, and other fiber crafts have, in recent years, busted out of the realm of grannies' parlors and into the cool girls' and boys' clubs. They've also gone even further, making their mark on serious contemporary art. Works like Alicia Ross' cross-stitched nudes (pictured above, at Black & White Gallery's booth at Pulse) create tension and dialogue between the traditional and avant-garde.

If you want to get in on the action, try your hand at embroidery for art-- Etsy has its "Embroidery as a Drawing and Narrative Tool" class coming up on March 29 at 3rd Ward in Brooklyn.

I'm also a fan of the group Knitta Please,"guerrilla knitters" who take fiber arts to the streets, tagging up city street furniture, poles, and anything else they can get their stitches on. You can get involved by contacting them through their Web site.

Life Imitates Art Imitates Life

All photos courtesy of Marc Lafia.

At the Pulse art fair on Saturday, I came across Marc Lafia, who was asking people to pose in front of various artworks in the booths. Turns out, Lafia is an artist himself, and he was photographing fair visitors who resembled people in paintings they happened to be walking past. Some of Lafia's subjects look remarkably similar to the portraits he paired them with, and the resulting images riff on identity and individuality. Check these out:

Reasons to Love Swoon

Detail from a Swoon paste-up in Brooklyn. Photo courtesy of Trois Tetes, via Flickr.

The artist Swoon is having a benefit party for her next project on March 14, and you should go. Why? Because Swoon is awesome. Why is she awesome? Well...

Because of the fragility and toughness of her paste-ups that linger around the city, getting better as they disappear, decaying exquisitely and suggesting layers of stories with each crack and peel. I love that her art is both unabashedly feminine and unapologetically raw.

Because of this honest, straightforward interview she did with SWINDLE a few years ago. When I first read it, I was just learning about street artists and had developed a particular fascination with women making their mark on the city. Since then I have come back to it again and again, not only for background on Swoon but because it makes me think about context, living with art, and overcoming failure.

Because she's really, really nice. I happened to be in the middle of interviewing Swoon just when the Great T-Mobile Blackout of 2008 struck, and she was very laid back and went waaay out of her way to make sure we cobbled together answers to my questions through email, texting, and what spotty cell service we could latch onto. All this while she was floating down the Hudson on a raft (See #5)!

Because Swoon manages to straddle the line between street artist and gallery artist without selling out or compromising her work. Her gallery exhibitions are as contextual and meaningful as her paste-ups. See? And I already showed you this.

Because of her boat projects. Swoon first gathered a group of artists and creative-type friends in 2006, made some rafts, and floated 800 miles on the Mississippi River-- giving art workshops along the way. Then in 2008, she took the idea a step further with a fleet of floating sculptures that carried 40 artists down the Hudson River. They stopped to perform music and a play about the imagined origins of the boats, written by the multidisciplinary artist Lisa D’Amour. I love the comparison Swoon made between the boats and her more stationary artworks when I interviewed her last year: "They are hugely different kinds of artwork, but they function in the same way, showing up where you might not expect them and speaking to the landscape they are in as well as to the people who see them. I try to create artwork that lives in a daily setting and has relevance outside of art institutions and doesn’t depend on them for context."

Next, Swoon and crew will navigate the Adriatic Sea from Slovenia to Venice, Italy on three intricately crafted vessels.They plan to crash the Venice Biennale in June, and that's where you come in. They need your help raising money to make it happen, so go to this auction, dance a little, listen to some music, and bid on some art if you can.

INFO:

• What: Benefit Silent Auction
  
• When: Saturday, March 14th--- 7:30pm - 10pm, Dance Party 9pm - 3am
• Where: Secret Project Robot--- 210 Kent Avenue, Brooklyn, NY (at Metropolitan)

Honey Space Turns One

Installation shot from Tiberius. Photo courtesy of Chadwick Tyler.

When Honey Space opened last year in New York's posh Chelsea district, the scrappy new art gallery raised more than a few eyebrows-- mostly because its founder, Thomas Beale (who is also an artist), announced it would run sans staff most days. Yes, Beale and the other artists who planned to show work at Honey Space were going to do the unheard of: They were simply going to trust visitors not to steal or vandalize the art. In fact, that was the whole point.

"This is kind of a radical idea for New York City, where we have such a security-conscious culture," Beale told me when I interviewed him on opening day for ARTINFO. "To do something where you put complete trust in people, and to see whether people end up respecting it or not, is a powerful idea."

A year later, Beale still thinks the idea is powerful, and, besides a few minor incidents (someone stole the guest book and Beale once discovered a confused man sleeping off his hangover behind one of the exhibits), people have generally behaved themselves.

Honey Space has hosted some amazing exhibitions by top-notch artists during the past year, including my personal favorite, this creepy-fabulous installation by Swoon and Tennessee Jane Watson. The current show, "Tiberius," a collection of haunting and achingly beautiful portraits by Chadwick Tyler (running through March 14), is also one of the best.

I recently caught up with Beale, who said Honey Space will most likely close within the next couple of months. The leaseholder, with whom Beale currently has a deal to use the warehouse space for free, is planning to develop the building. If you haven't checked out Honey Space yet, this might be your last chance to experience one of the most heartfelt, innovative arts endeavors in the city.

"I knew it wasn't going to last forever," Beale told me, chatting by phone a few weeks ago. "And that's okay. I still think it's one of the best things I've ever done."

For more information about Honey Space, also take a look at this article from The New York Times.