Tag: Tom Sanford
The Antidote//Claire Oliver
ICE ICE MAYBE / Never Can Say Goodbye
No Longer Empty is putting on a show called Never Can Say Goodbye at the (now defunct) flagship location of Tower Records at East 4th street and Broadway in money earnin’ Manhattan. I am excited to be collaborating with Brent Birnbaum in the show, as part of Ted Reiderer’s NEVER RECORDS installation.
Ted will be realizing a grand, multi-artist installation in which he will create a simulation of a long forgotten relic of the 20th Century: the record store. Ted’s project, called NEVER RECORDS, will include work and merch from a whole bunch of artists:
Richard Hambleton | Ted Riederer | Josh Shaddock | Stephanie Syjuko | Brent Birnbaum | Shane Caffrey | Nicholas Brooks | Ryan Sullivan | Doug McQueen | Allison Hester | James Rubio | Richard Barnes | Ted O’Sullivan/Rebecca Potts | Michelle Matson | Brendan Carney | Arturo Vega | Tom Sanford | Johnny T. Yerington | Chris Yerington | Jay Ivcevich
Where I come in is in collaboration with Brent Birnbaum. During the opening reception for the show, Brent will appear dressed as Vanilla Ice (c. 1990 of course) and do a performance which he calls ICE ICE MAYBE. The performance will resemble an “in store appearance,” where Brent will assume the character of Rob Van Winkle’s 1990’s cross-over hip hop villain/scapegoat Vanilla Ice, and he will autograph some ICE ICE MAYBE merchandise, which I had a hand in creating. I am not exactly sure whether or not he will spit some white-boy flava, but I guess there is a chance, depending on how “full of 8-ball” he is. Either way, I know for a fact that Brent has a full array of V.I.P. Posse dance moves.
For my part, I have made a couple of my poster paintings in support of Brent’s vanilla vision. One of the posters is to publicize the performance (pictured above) the other will be reproduced in 8X10 form and autographed for fans willing to wait in line and thus “participate” in Brent’s Rob Van Winkle re-awakening.
Never Can Say Goodbye will open on January 15th from 6-8PM, and be open for at least a month. No firm end date has been established as of now. The show will be in the old Tower Records location on the northeast corner of East 4th street & Broadway.
In addition to the artists participating in NEVER RECORDS, the following other artists are also contributing to Never Can Say Goodbye:
TOO BIG TO FAIL
Another group show: TOO BIG TO FAIL is curated by Dan Heidkamp and is at the new NADA Gallery Space at 395 Flatbush in downtown Brooklyn, USA.
ARTISTS: Erik PARKER, Liz MARKUS, Justin CRAUN, Mike DIANA, Daniel HEIDKAMP, Caitlin MCBRIDE, Kenny SCHARF, Brian FAUCETTE, Quentin CURRY, Erik WENDEL, Justin SAMPSON, Kadar BROCK, Allison SCHULNIK, Pedro BARBEITO, Alicia GIBSON, Tom SANFORD.
The show is sponsored by NADA and LaMontagne Gallery. N.A.D.A. (New Art Dealers Alliance) has procured a block of large vacant commercial storefronts at 395 Flatbush Ave in Downtown Brooklyn for exhibition purposes. This show will be (partly) installed and set up by Sunday October 18th to coincide with the “Nada County Affair” event, with an official opening the following Friday the October 23rd.
Studio Visit Tom Sanford
Tom Sanford painting “L&L Taxi (Motherless Brooklyn)”
Tom Sanford painting “L&L Taxi (Motherless Brooklyn)”
BROOKLYN, SEPTEMBER 28, 2009 — The Invisible Dog, a former belt factory in the Cobble Hill section of Brooklyn and the much loved home of the novelty gag of the 70s, the “INVISIBLE DOG,” will re-open on October 3 with an exhibition organized by NO LONGER EMPTY. NLE is a not for profit whose mission is to revive the numerous vacated storefronts and empty spaces throughout New York City. Many of the works presented in the exhibition reflect both the history of the space and the oxymoronic construct of the Invisible Dog: a fantasy, a legend, something born out of nothing. Artists have also been given the opportunity to work with the many trimmings, reels of fabric, leather and other materials left behind at the factory at the request of director, Lucien Zayan, who understood their future artistic value.
One of the featured artists, Tom Sanford, has created a site-specific (both location and subject matter) mural for the exhibition, called “L&L Taxi (Motherless Brooklyn)” based on Jonathan Lethem’s novel “Motherless Brooklyn” (1999). Sanford chose this subject matter because the Invisible Dog is located on the same block as the fictional L&L taxi / detective agency in Lethem’s novel (Bergen & Smith). The 12 x 22 ft mural imagines L&L in the present day, ten years after the story ends in the novel, with characters Lionel Essrog, Gilbert Coney, Loomis & Danny Fantl (left to right in the painting) still on Bergen street operating the L&L taxi service (no longer a detective agency) with a portrait of the departed Frank Minna on the wall in remembrance. The mural celebrates the history (albeit fictional) of Smith & Bergen, and honors one of Brooklyn’s many important contemporary authors.
Sanford claims that he “also decided to make the mural because I understand that actor Edward Norton in producing a film adaptation of “Motherless Brooklyn”. Norton will play Lionel Essrog, the orphan detective with a poetic case of Tourette syndrome from whose prospective Motherless Brooklyn is written. While Norton is a fine actor, he is nothing like how I imagine Lionel, and I thought I would take this opportunity to put my two cents in with regards to making the visual version of the characters of the book. A sort of one man insurgence against the Hollywood, the dominant force of visual imagination in our culture.”
Other artists in the exhibition include:
Thomas Bell, Ryan Brennan, Amanda Browder, Gina Czarneck, Jeanette Doyle, Richard Garet, Monika Grzymala, Guerra de la Paz (Alain Guerra & Neraldo de la Paz), Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Kaarina Kaikkonen, Sarah Modiano, Miguel Palma, José Parlá, Rey Parlá, Ian Rawlinson & Nick Crowe, Tom Sanford, Keith Schweitzer, Francesco Simeti, Alfred Steiner, Giuseppe Stampone, Giles Lyon, Steve deFrank.
NO LONGER EMPTY was conceived as a meeting point between art and the economic crisis. The organization seeks to provide a challenging platform to artists whose opportunities have been similarly curtailed by the economic ravages and to revitalize empty commercial spaces by creating more traffic, showing the sites filled with positive energy instead of bordered up shells. The organization also hopes to encourage the local business community of each area through the increased flow of visitors that these exhibitions will bring. A supporting program of events has been planned that will include band nights and performances.