Masao Mamamoto's Photographic Haiku
Masao Yamamoto is a famous Japanese photographer who successfully interperets his knowledge of existence through his photography. Yamamoto's images are simple, nostalgic, and elegant. They are suggestive and original, and can be preceived in many ways. He tells us, without explanation, about the human experience. Yamamoto exposes us to one of his influences: a Japanese calligrapher-poet named Ryokan. Yamamoto describes his respect for Ryokan's work by admiring his ability to "describe simply the movement of a leaf trembling as it falls" in one of his haikus. This poem can be interpreted in several ways. The falling leaf could be a metaphor for life, the ri...Read more
The Optimistic Life and Mind of Mark Warren Jacques
Portland, Oregon based artist Mark Warren Jacques makes cosmic, comic, orgasmic, and phsycedelic paintings with awesome titles like, “Saying Fuck it and Letting Go All Together.” In an Arrested Motion interview, Jacques describes his relationship to art. He says, “Sometimes life is pretty wearing on the soul and the body, so the work becomes a resting place. [...] Art is a place to get away from everything and to connect to myself, both in thought and in the action of making stuff.” His artwork certaintly acts as a “resting place” for viewers. The positive vibes resonating in his work are obvious; to lose oneself in o...Read more
Grid Lock
This week in photo-blogging, I will explore the thoughts of the summer. I am currently on a much needed summer vacation. I am on the East coast, so I thought it would be appropriate to find a local photography exhibition to write about. I found this series done by artist Keliy Anderson-Staely, entitled Off the Grid. The pieces document a kind of people who live as the title describes: "off the grid". I needed a vacation because over the summer semester, I wrote a lengthy philosophical essay on the subject of alienation. As I reflect on my argumentation, I draw a few conclusions, the most general of which is that a balance exists between technology (the benefits of knowledge an...Read more
Illiterate Opening This Friday: Down With The Sickness Too
Down With The Sickness Too infects Illiterate with a group of Denver's leading up-and-coming art misfits. Curated in conjunction with Travis Egedy, one of the founders and residents of Rhinoceropolis, a DIY breeding ground for radical young artists, this exhibit captures a unique segment of Denver's progressive cultural landscape.Including works in various media, the exhibition explores cohesion in chaos. The follow up exhibit to the Down With The Sickness show over a year ago, artists associated in various ways with a creative epicenter on the edge, express their transgressive reactions to the current order seen as contaminated and polluting, while simultaneously sharing in a collec...Read more
Bonus Ups! w/ Colin Ward
Two weeks ago I was sitting in relatively the same place, having coffee, and watching Mark Gonzales videos. I'm always watching these fucking videos. They're entertaining on a handful of levels, both skateboarding and non-skateboarding related. They are performance-based, in a sense. I had done this, however, for the better part of a two-hour span. I read threads and picked out newer videos to sift through, but it was getting me nowhere. Finally a friend of mine told me to look up his friend Colin's videos. I was familiar with Colin to some degree already. I had seen his band Phonebooks play in the past and actually knew one of the other members from my brief stint of living in Santa Fe, NM....Read more
filed under: art
tags: Colin Ward William Wegman Tony Oursler Video Youtube Paul Reubens PeeWee Herman
Tonight! Illiterate Film Night: Artist Series - An Even With The Group Show Artists
You've seen their artwork, now learn where it comes from! Starting tonight, each month the exhibiting artist(s) at Illiterate will take over one our Thursday Film Nights to present and discuss movies, segments and shorts in relation to their own work. Grab some popcorn, take a seat and take a look beyond the wall into the influences behind the art. Tonight at 8PM we start off the Film Night: Artist Series with Illiterate's four studio artists, Sander Lindeke, Katherine Rutter, David Coccagna and Andrew Hoffman who are currently exhibiting as part of the Group Show (Closing on Friday!). Oh and in case you're wondering, admission is FREE! ...Read more
Dmitri Obergfell//Zach Reini at Phillip J. Steele Gallery
Of the visual art world in Denver as of late, things have kept a similar face. Not to say that there have been stagnant or stale exhibitions or that everyone is doing the same thing, but it is apparent that many in the world of visual art have found themselves on the same page. That being said I must say two artists that have read the entireity of said book and are on pages far beyond the material most have at hand are Dmitri Obergfell and Zach Reini. Both are currently students at the Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design and are making leaps and bounds of progress in mixed media, paint, and installation art. Obergfell's portion of the show Huckleberry Hound has a fascinating effect to i...Read more
filed under: art
tags: Zach Reini Dmitri Obergfell Frank Stella Dan Flavin minimalism RMCAD
Tattoo's: Appropriate
Jean-Luc Moerman is a Belgium artist who is well known for his intricate line work which references tattoos and graffiti. I came across him looking at the Galerie Nichido exhibition. Obama covered in tribal tats definitely caught my eye. Moerman appropriates imagery, and adds an intricate layer of his linework to the bodies of the subjects appropriated. This is an interesting commentary on the social acceptance of these fierce looking styles, can they be commercialized? Perhaps. Moerman may also be commenting on the post-colonial issue of what is considered art (which must be difficult as a European). This is a complex position, and I find his work interesting and stylistically imp...Read more
Mr. Brian Taylor,
Now showing at San Fran based, Gallery 291, is Brian Taylor and his series of Gum Bichromate and Cyanotype photography on watercolor paper. The 19th century technique is labor intensive and not exactly instant gratification. Brian explains that first a layer of silver gelatin (which is light sensitive) is painted onto the surface of the paper. Then the paper is exposed for ten minutes the process produces a cyanotype, which is an entirely rich prussian blue monochrome image. Then a layer of gum bichromate is painted and the process is repeated. The image now has layer of green on top. The process is repeated another time and that layer is completes the image with a brown color. Before I put ...Read more
White Out Poster Show This Thursday!
At Illiterate you create and vote on new art. At Mountain Dew you create and vote on new flavors of a caffeinated beverage that will keep you up all night so you can make more new art. One of three teams competing in the cross country DEWmocracy Flavor Campaign, Team White Out is campaigning through Denver and coming to Illiterate to secure the creative constituency for their flavor. How? By hosting a black and white screen print show featuring an incredible lineup of illustrators and designers. The low-run series of prints will be on sale for $20 each with proceeds donated to a local arts charity. If that doesn't get you casting a ballot, what about a free live performance by Jos...Read more
