We’ve been in Kansas City for nearly two months now. The Organic Art Factory itself is taking off in new directions. Most recently, we completed two commissioned paintings for the Fairmont Hotel in Chicago, and have begun work on a series of paintings entitled, The Air with Variations.
Cherries in Spring, 2010
Teaching is going well at the Kansas City Art Institute and the University of Missouri – Kansas City.
We’ve also been writing a column as Lilika Ruby entitled Art & Sexfor the online magazines, The Faster Times, and Ovi Magazine.
Marlene Dumas famously wrote,
“lf a Prostitute is a person /
who makes it a profession/
to gratify the lust of various persons /
for economical reasons or gain, /
where emotional involvement may /
or may not be present— /
Then it seems not so far removed /
from my definition of an artist.”
“31. If an artist uses the same form in a group of works, and changes the material, one would assume the artist’s concept involved the material.”
What does it mean to re-perform a drawing? Even if the original drawing was life-sized? How does involving the body – as a viewer, as opposed to a producer – change the experience with the artwork as object?
There is a sort of object-producer dichotomy in the drawing that is absent when we perform the action. Our bodies are object. Object twice-removed…When we do reperformances, we don’t claim authorship at all. We break free from the notion of authorship, so in a very real sense, Longo is still the author; we’re just allowing him to use our material, to use us as material.
Why Longo?
We were looking for: A portrait. A couple. An object that captured the idea of identity wrapped up in the exterior. Something to model Cash & Ruby on. Something that was already present in – already visually present in the art world – while at the same time, related to our cultural consciousness. Our awareness of ourselves during the 1980s in America. A man and a woman wearing business suits. Money. The notion of surface. Radical surface. A young Caucasian man and woman, well-dressed, attractive.
Transporting ourselves from the analog to the digital. Flattening everything. Giving it all the same value. That’s what happens with the composite. We don’t put ourselves into any sort of scene: it’s a completely clean, neutral space, a non-space, digital space. The original piece of work has all sorts of potential. Our reperformance is just one type of actualization that is available for Robert Longo’s original drawing.
This video by Circlesquare takes it to the next level.
Our object based work is represented in Kansas City by appointment only. You can contact us directly or visit our representative via her website at http://kimweinberger.com/
