Meditating
Learning patience
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Androgyny
few artists have been able to unriddle the force of personality with the power that Romaine Brooks brought to her images. What has always captured my interest is how people have responded to her Self Portrait of 1923. It has never failed to engaged viewers and their impressions have ranged from absolute revulsion to admiration. I have often mused on this wondering if others are as intrigued by this particular image and why it grabs so many eyes.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Recent reviews of Hide and Seek show
in blogs and newspapers all seem to give it a thumbs up. Certainly it raises issues that are contemporary and well worth exploring concerning sexuality and gender. The whole area of "cross dressing" vs. fashion and style in the work of Romaine Brooks and other women of her circle needs a much closer look. We need to contextualize attire for women in regard to sexual politics, history and personal taste.
Sunday, November 21, 2010
Walt Whitman on Thanksgiving
Walt Whitman on Thanksgiving Thanksgiving is one of the few holidays I can celebrate without thinking about the rag-tag so-called religious know nothings with lint between their ears where brains should be. To say nothing of hearts filled with gratitude and compassion. So let's enjoy this little tale by that great gay American journalist, nurse and poet, Walt Whitman.
Romaine Brooks paintings
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Dickinson College - Professor's Book Lauded by Critics
Dickinson College - Professor's Book Lauded by Critics Here's yet another book that pulls no punches about Foster homosexuality. How refreshing the truth is.
Monday, November 15, 2010
The Night Before Thanksgiving by Sarah Orne Jewett
The Night Before Thanksgiving by Sarah Orne Jewett This is a soft and sentimental story but one I value because of what it tells us about acts of human kindness and what they mean in hard times. Reciprocity is so fundamental and so ill served in our uncivil society. Sarah Orne Jewett's little story should remind us all of timeless values.
Sunday, November 14, 2010
More Than You Know
Are things changing for women? What does it mean for women to give up the baby doll image and can't help loving that man of mine no matter how he screws me over. Mainly what that means for a woman artist is asserting herself despite the constant attempts to define what is female and what women are, do and want through a masculine lens.
A number of shows around New York City have gotten me to thinking about why we are still having this conversation? My own contributions to this on-going conversation can be found in Artinamericamagazineonline.com The latest being Hobbie and Joan Snyder. In the recent past women have been seen as handmaidens of culture but never creators in their own right. Many women have been famous for their sensibilities and being the power behind men, however, when it comes to be making a space of their own they are seen as aggressive, self-serving bitches. Are things changing? More Than You Know! Women are tired of crying for attention and have taken the bull by the horns. Body and soul are areas of exploration and the way women see these now has rocked the art world's boat and the stormy weather has resulted in a few break troughs but we still have a long, long way to go before any kind of equality is reached.
A number of shows around New York City have gotten me to thinking about why we are still having this conversation? My own contributions to this on-going conversation can be found in Artinamericamagazineonline.com The latest being Hobbie and Joan Snyder. In the recent past women have been seen as handmaidens of culture but never creators in their own right. Many women have been famous for their sensibilities and being the power behind men, however, when it comes to be making a space of their own they are seen as aggressive, self-serving bitches. Are things changing? More Than You Know! Women are tired of crying for attention and have taken the bull by the horns. Body and soul are areas of exploration and the way women see these now has rocked the art world's boat and the stormy weather has resulted in a few break troughs but we still have a long, long way to go before any kind of equality is reached.
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
Friday, October 29, 2010
Change of Scene
is good for the soul and brain. Left the Big Apple sick as a dog. Flew to Salt Lake on a fully loaded flight after getting up at 4 in the morning to get to Kennedy at 5 and get through security etc. for a 7:00 o'clock flight. Waited in the airport at S.L. bought a $12.50 spot of lunch--this for fruit yogurt and bottle of water! Captive buyers all of us. Worked on my Joan Snyder review. I really worthwhile show and not as uneven as in previous years. She has reached a new stage in her career and at 70 is mistress of her medium. Also, she has mellowed and the feminist rage and whine both have disapated and the result is a new sophistication and ease of application. No more cutting into the surface with a raw anger that in the past put viewers off. The colors are deeper, richer and more celebratory. So worth seeing and enjoying even when serious and sad. The fact that the New York centric school of Abstract Expressionism which inspired Snyder's work is long gone despite enjoying a momentary burp due to the MOMA's current show doesn't matter if one likes this sort of art.
Finally got on yet another jam-packed flight to San Jose where I was picked up by my oldest friend and we drove to Santa Cruz where I am posting from.
Finally got on yet another jam-packed flight to San Jose where I was picked up by my oldest friend and we drove to Santa Cruz where I am posting from.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Natalie Barney
Why can't we have really exciting and smart women running for office against each other instead of tea bag party witches and bimbos dressed up in designer clothes. Natalie Barney said, Today, people talk a great deal about modernism, about movement without sufficiently realizing that an acquired speed cannot be movement---movement, as has been proved, being born of relativity that one can no longer be aware of.
The speed at which these candidates have acquired viability on the national scene is truly frightening and a function of the right-wing demagogue's money that has been pumped into these female puppets. What boggles the mind is that so many voters actually believe that these faux representatives are really going to stand up for their mom and pop interests.
Just remember gender really doesn't matter when it comes to stupidity and greed. All of the women who have lend themselves to these enterprises have become wealthy celebrities and been more than willing to selll what little soul they may have had to start with to the highest bidder. I can only hope when people go into the voting booths that they will have the common sense to realize that if they vote these freaks in the'll have only themselves to blame for voting against their own best interests. Unfortunately, the rest of us will have to go along for the ride no matter.
The speed at which these candidates have acquired viability on the national scene is truly frightening and a function of the right-wing demagogue's money that has been pumped into these female puppets. What boggles the mind is that so many voters actually believe that these faux representatives are really going to stand up for their mom and pop interests.
Just remember gender really doesn't matter when it comes to stupidity and greed. All of the women who have lend themselves to these enterprises have become wealthy celebrities and been more than willing to selll what little soul they may have had to start with to the highest bidder. I can only hope when people go into the voting booths that they will have the common sense to realize that if they vote these freaks in the'll have only themselves to blame for voting against their own best interests. Unfortunately, the rest of us will have to go along for the ride no matter.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Frida Kahlo Biography - Biography.com
Frida Kahlo Biography - Biography.com Will be reviewing a new Frida book for HG&LR so look for it in the stores that carry the magazine. If they don't request it. Believe me it is worth a look and it's not because I write for it. There are a lot of provocative articles in it on a wide range of subjects, GLBTQ, politics, culture and a host of other interesting issues as well as poetry and book reviews. Check out the link on my http://www.cassandralanger.com/ site.
This writer's life
Have not blogged here for a while. Been running around to shows and writing for other venues so no time to just chat. The Shifting the Gaze show at the Jewish Museum is worth a look as I may have mentioned. Writing it was another story. Down with a touch of something so a bit of a push to concentrate on. Finishing the new Grant Wood book by Tripp which is a whole new view of Wood and his homosexual side that is long overdue, Then there's writing up the Jocelyn Hobbie review for Entre Nous at KS Art over on 73 Leonard Street. A quick trip on A.C.E. or #1 and weirdly engaging. A challenge to write up but well worth the effort because of the eerie eroticism of these canvases. Looking forward to several new shows and films that I want to catch. Later on next month Ca. and catching up with the coast and what's happening there.
Aside from that getting loose ends together for the Brooks ms. for my agent and working on the book platform. A writer's life and loving it.
Aside from that getting loose ends together for the Brooks ms. for my agent and working on the book platform. A writer's life and loving it.
More art blog sites
Seems every time I put in a google alert there are more and more Romaine Brooks paintings which is a good thing. I am so pleased to see that Romaine's work is still generating interest 30 years after her death. Her hey day was the turn of the century and through the mid-thirties. Yet somehow her paintings and drawings continue to attract new audiences and viewers who are captivated by her images. The latest come from <a href='http://newsodrome.com/art_news'>Newsodrome - Art News</a> where an image of Cocteau by her was posted. Brooks painted him before he became famous as a priest of avant-garde culture. She later discarded him because of his use of drugs and his connection with Dolly Wilde, Oscar's niece. She detested Cocteau because he aided Dolly in her addictions and she considered him a faux artist because he was to her mind superficial and more interested in celebrity than real art. Sounds familiarly like our own culture these days where celebrity trumps almost any other kind of achievement. Paris Hilton, give me a break!
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Romaine Brooks video
I wish I had the skills to do something like this but since I don't yet I am sharing this with all of you. If you are in NYC catch the show at the Guggenheim which showcases art between the wars. The conservative formulation very much describes Romaine Brooks' attitude and aspects of her art. Ken Silver did a splendid job with this exhibit.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Man or Fag or then some?
I suppose Tyler Clementi's brutal exposure and outting should come as no surprise in view of Carl Rove and all the others who use GLBTQ peoples in their ruthless climb to power in a society that sanctions homophobia and hate. Nonetheless, I am sad and disgusted and it brings up all the reasons it is not o.k. and not going to be o.k. until we as a society decide to REALLY, REALLY commit ourselves to doing something concrete about the inequities that are so blatant.
Manhood for Fags ( For Tyler and endless others: Oct 2, 2010)
Desire takes center stage
Steamy encounters
A boy’s own story
That is splashed
All over the internet
Reducing him to his explorations
His emerging sexuality
For a lark
Sanctioned by society
The state he lives in
All for a depraved thrill
Manhood for fags
Renouncing his life
he falls victim
As the heartbreaking
Details unfold
Society’s dirty laundry
Flapping in the wind
Like Tyler
A hazardous sadness
Hitting the enveloping waters
Under the George Washington bridge
Igniting them with the last
Of his luminous possibilities
The list is endless. As I complete my Grant Wood review, start on Frida and turn to Shifting the Gaze my mind rolls over the endless role call of victims. From the dead to the walking wounded and I weep. Nothing short of tears tells the heartbreaking story of a society so lacking in compassion, decency and the commitment to do the right thing by GLBTQs, to do the right thing about racism, reforming immigration, creating an even playing field for women as this long narrative of America's failure to live up to the promise of the founders. Isn't it time we really started to make it right!!!!
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Shifting the Gaze: Painting and Feminism
Just posted a small respite from the whirlwinds that seem to whip us all around. Getting back into the swing of all the on-going projects. Romaine Brooks, Barbara Hammer interview out just in time for her retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art. Everything you wanted to know and then some.
Got out early this morning to see The Jewish Museum's show. It was an interesting selection that included several men who considered themselves feminist males and did what they could to forward the cause of equality. Much appreciated at the time and now.
This exhibit attempts to position a number of feminist artists who were key to shifting the gaze at the time during the later seventies, eighties and beyond within the larger context of Abstract Expressionism, Pop and Minimal. There are works by Judy Chicago, Nicole Eisenman, Eva Hesse, Lee Krasner, Lee Lozano, Louise Nevelson, Louise Fishman, Joan Snyder, Miriam Schapiro, Nancy Spero and others. It is a good representation from the Museum's own collection augmented with loans. For my part I would have liked a more edgy selection but there were several cutting edge works by Hannah Wilke, Nancy Spero, Lee Lozano, and Ida Applebroog. I particularly recall Ida's Crimson Gardens which I had seen in 1987 and found shattering. It still is and holds up very well given the wars we are involved with currently. Hannah's Venus Pareve too stands the test of time as does Louise Fishman's Golem from 1981. Not all of these works qualify as feminist in my opinion, for example, Nicole Eisenman's Seder 2010 that seems to be more about queering than equality unless, of course, one considers what is going on with the GLBTQ communities as a part of the on-going feminist legacy. Certainly there are a lot of strong gay and bi-sexual women as well as feminists in this show which speaks well for it and today's politics.
It's worth a look and then some.
Got out early this morning to see The Jewish Museum's show. It was an interesting selection that included several men who considered themselves feminist males and did what they could to forward the cause of equality. Much appreciated at the time and now.
This exhibit attempts to position a number of feminist artists who were key to shifting the gaze at the time during the later seventies, eighties and beyond within the larger context of Abstract Expressionism, Pop and Minimal. There are works by Judy Chicago, Nicole Eisenman, Eva Hesse, Lee Krasner, Lee Lozano, Louise Nevelson, Louise Fishman, Joan Snyder, Miriam Schapiro, Nancy Spero and others. It is a good representation from the Museum's own collection augmented with loans. For my part I would have liked a more edgy selection but there were several cutting edge works by Hannah Wilke, Nancy Spero, Lee Lozano, and Ida Applebroog. I particularly recall Ida's Crimson Gardens which I had seen in 1987 and found shattering. It still is and holds up very well given the wars we are involved with currently. Hannah's Venus Pareve too stands the test of time as does Louise Fishman's Golem from 1981. Not all of these works qualify as feminist in my opinion, for example, Nicole Eisenman's Seder 2010 that seems to be more about queering than equality unless, of course, one considers what is going on with the GLBTQ communities as a part of the on-going feminist legacy. Certainly there are a lot of strong gay and bi-sexual women as well as feminists in this show which speaks well for it and today's politics.
It's worth a look and then some.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Sylvia Plath poem linked with Romaine Brooks?
"If the moon smiled, she would resemble you.
You leave the same impression
Of something beautiful, but annihilating."
Sylvia Plath
This was recently linked with Romaine Brooks' "The Crossing" by a blogger. I found it interesting because it would have been more appropriate to Brooks who cut off the relationship with Ida Rubinstein while Ida was still madly in love with her. Ida was Brooks' most inspiring muse and the subject of at least three of her most successful nudes.
You leave the same impression
Of something beautiful, but annihilating."
Sylvia Plath
This was recently linked with Romaine Brooks' "The Crossing" by a blogger. I found it interesting because it would have been more appropriate to Brooks who cut off the relationship with Ida Rubinstein while Ida was still madly in love with her. Ida was Brooks' most inspiring muse and the subject of at least three of her most successful nudes.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Prop 8 and other outrages
The constitution appears not to be worth the paper it is written on. You might as well use it for your butt for all the attention our politicians and judges pay to it. GLBT people are citizens of these United States of American, not second class citizens paying first class taxes to be treated as a separate group somehow outside the protections of the constitutions and our laws simply because "some" people don't like them. In America supposedly according to our propaganda we are all supposed to have freedom to pursue happiness. Why Gays people's getting married to the one they love should be any one's business but their own is beyond me.
Now after Judge Walker has handed down a sane and common sense ruling the hate mongers are still managing to violate the constitution and prevent these couples from getting married. Now I don't think marriage is such a great state of affairs but a lot of other people do despite the horrendous divorce rate and its impact on children and families. So why not let gay folks try it on for size and apply the same laws, rights and responsibilities to them as to other citizens? It's really simple. Instead a kind of draconian set of rules has been applied to gay couples throughout the nation. While other so called 3rd world nations have simply passed fair and equal rights for GLBT and Q folks our "great" and "enlightened" nation has yet to do so.
Frankly, it makes me ashamed to be an American because it so flies in the face of our founding philosophy.
And while I am raving how about just allowing every Muslim woman (and man) who wants to get out from under the total barbarity of Sharia law just immigrate--wouldn't that be enlightened. Then stop spending billions of dollars getting our boys and girls killed for nothing! We have to stop the fear mongering and really deal with the problem. Bombing the hell out of other people isn't the answer. Leaving them to stew in their own acidic juices might be interesting while trying to keep their poison in check simply by isolating them within their so-called borders. It is not the US's job to be a world policeman. It is up to a community of "civilized" nations to band together and do so. Stoning is not civilized, cutting off noses and ears and heads is not civilized, lashing is not civilized and preventing women and girls from advancing is not civilized. Isn't it about time we simply said so and meant it.
Now after Judge Walker has handed down a sane and common sense ruling the hate mongers are still managing to violate the constitution and prevent these couples from getting married. Now I don't think marriage is such a great state of affairs but a lot of other people do despite the horrendous divorce rate and its impact on children and families. So why not let gay folks try it on for size and apply the same laws, rights and responsibilities to them as to other citizens? It's really simple. Instead a kind of draconian set of rules has been applied to gay couples throughout the nation. While other so called 3rd world nations have simply passed fair and equal rights for GLBT and Q folks our "great" and "enlightened" nation has yet to do so.
Frankly, it makes me ashamed to be an American because it so flies in the face of our founding philosophy.
And while I am raving how about just allowing every Muslim woman (and man) who wants to get out from under the total barbarity of Sharia law just immigrate--wouldn't that be enlightened. Then stop spending billions of dollars getting our boys and girls killed for nothing! We have to stop the fear mongering and really deal with the problem. Bombing the hell out of other people isn't the answer. Leaving them to stew in their own acidic juices might be interesting while trying to keep their poison in check simply by isolating them within their so-called borders. It is not the US's job to be a world policeman. It is up to a community of "civilized" nations to band together and do so. Stoning is not civilized, cutting off noses and ears and heads is not civilized, lashing is not civilized and preventing women and girls from advancing is not civilized. Isn't it about time we simply said so and meant it.
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