Engineer's Daughter

aboveground animation: 3d-form

Jacolby Satterwhite

This week's find from the archives is an online-only exhibition courtesy of the New Museum:

“3D-Form” is a presentation of four experimental animations selected from the archive Aboveground Animation for the New Museum’s monthly series First Look: New Art Online. Featured artists include Barry Doupé, Kathleen Daniel, Ryan Whittier Hale, and Jacolby Satterwhite. Beyond Pixar, Adult Swim, or the default avatars of video games, these works explore possibilities for 3-D human forms. Their casts of improbable people are hatched out of personal history or emotion—through a longing for intimacy or an uncertainty for the future. Experimental and short-form, all the works were made to be viewed across various screening contexts, from the cinema to the gallery to the browser, and yet their structure reflects a sophistication with a range of digital media and programs, from Maya to 3D Studio Max.

Take some time and watch all four animations, though I admit I'm particularly fond of the one by Jacolby Satterwhite.

stop & go 3-D

Tal Rosner

Johan Rijpma

Wade Shotter & Yukfoo

Sarah Klein, an amazing artist herself, also puts together film programs of the best in contemporary stop-motion animation.  Her latest, Stop & Go 3-D, has been making the rounds over the past year and screening in venues like the Exploratorium and Interface Gallery:

Strobing effects, afterimages, anaglyphic experiments, optical elements and three-dimensional spoofs are all part of the show...Several of the animations in the program require the audience to wear red/cyan-colored glasses to fully appreciate the work.

Check out Klein's site for a sample of the program and to see where another showing might be popping up soon.

See also:

• Sarah Klein
• Stop & Go

miscellany 02.21.13

PIKI at Swarm Gallery, part of the Sound Salon series

Through February 23 - Taraneh Hemami: Resistance at The Luggage Store

Bradford Nordeen, Chris E. Vargas, Mariah Garnett at SFMOMA, Dirty Looks NYC: Yesterday Once More film program

Dr. Yacine Badian Kouyate at Museum of the African Diaspora, The Manuscripts of Timbuktu film screening and discussion

Through February 24 - Alicia Escott: And the Crowd Rushed Together, Trying to Keep Warm at Interface Gallery

Pablo Helguera lecture at the San Francisco Art Institute

agenda 01.23.13

Thursday, January 24:

• David O'Brien, Andrew Benson + Tamara Albaitis in Pixilated Drift at Johansson Projects
• Grale Live: The Saddest Music in the World: Tenth Anniversary Celebration at the Pacific Film Archive
• How to Move a Mountain at Southern Exposure
• Troller, Thousand Foot Whale Claw, Chasms, Black Jeans, Believe at The Lab
• SIX: UC Berkeley First Year MFA Exhibition at Worth Ryder Art Gallery
• That's what I figure: Four Bay Area Image Makers at Kondos Gallery
• John-Mark Ikeda at Spare Change Artist Space
• 6 Women Poets at Meridian Gallery
• Strange Sinema 60 at Oddball Films
• The Walkmen, Father John Misty at The Fillmore
• Autumn Sky, Jonah Matranga, Sentinel at Red House Studios
• Ken Stringfellow (Posies, Big Star) plus The Maldives and Will Sprott at Brick & Mortar Music Hall

Friday, January 25:

• Paul Kos: Allegories and Metaphors at the San Francisco Art Institute
• Object Oriented: Janiszewska, Lorch-Miller, Pitt at Royal NoneSuch Gallery
• Stillsuit / Styrofoam Sanchez / Little Debbie / V.E X. Xanaxax at Life Changing Ministries
• Adam Friedman: Space and Time, and Other Mysterious Aggregations at Eleanor Harwood Gallery
• Friday Nights @ OMCA Launch
• San Francisco Dump Artist in Residence Exhibitions: Work by Michael Damm, Julia Goodman and Jeff Hantman
• Happiness Is... at Montalvo Arts Center Project Space Gallery
• Carnal Cartoons at Oddball Films
• The Walkmen, Father John Misty at The Fillmore
• Blackalicious at The New Parish

Saturday, January 26:

• Molly Springfield, The Marginalia Archive at Steven Wolf Fine Arts
• Stop/Motion at Interface Gallery
• Wovenhand at Bottom of the Hill

Monday, January 28:

• You Are Not A Loan: A Benefit for Strike Debt Bay Area at the Roxie Theatre

Tuesday, January 29:

• San Francisco Dump Artist in Residence Artist Talk: Michael Damm, Julia Goodman and Jeff Hantman
• Detective, Tall Sheep, JAJA at Hotel Utah

Wednesday, January 30:

• Silence and Rudolf de Crignis / MATRIX 245 at the Berkeley Art Museum
• Take Me Away at the San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery
• Bill Berkson and Stephanie Young: Poetry Reading in the Gallery at Brian Gross Fine Art
• Local Natives at The Fox

agenda 01.16.13

Thursday, January 17:

• Mission Community Market
• SJMADE Mini Mart at the San Jose Museum of Art
• Comedy Drawing School at Eli Ridgway Gallery
• Rene Hell, Jefre Cantu-Ledesma + Paul Clipson, Vallens at The Lab
• Dennis Parlante and Matt Gonzalez in Conversation at Meridian Gallery
• The Statues Walked -- What Really Happened on Easter Island, presented by Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo at the Cowell Theater
• End of the Reel: An Oddball Memoriam 2012 at Oddball Films

Friday, January 18:

• The Bensons: Jason Benson and Mark Benson at Royal NoneSuch Gallery
• Thinking Like the Universe at Hatch Gallery
• Taraneh Hemami at the Luggage Store Gallery
• Doron Fishman + Film and Video Selections at The Lab
• Pretty Blue Presents: HotTub DJ set, Unstoppable Death Machines, Laughters and Believe in Oakland
• TWO YEARS HERE: our 2nd Anniversary Group Show at Incline Gallery
• Exhibition: Remembering is Everything at Alter Space
• Artist Talk and Book Signing: Gabriele Stabile & Juliet Linderman, Refugee Hotel at Gallery Carte Blanche
• Portholes to the Past at Oddball Films
• The 13th Annual Edwardian Ball & World’s Faire presents “The Doubtful Guest” at the Regency Ballroom
• Ty Segall, White Fence, Nick Waterhouse at The Fillmore
• Tycho, Christopher Willits at The Independent

Saturday, January 19:

• Sasha Darling's and The BellJar Girls Trunk Show
• Lab Winter Benefit w/ Mike Donovan (Sic Alps), Waxy Tombs, Tainted Pussy, Rheal 'Tea + Dia Dear
• "The Witching Hour" Sequinsomnia Burlesque Show Premier
• Rednecks & Aztecs at 1:AM Gallery
• Claire Fontaine at Queen's Nails
• Punch Card at Catharine Clark Gallery
• Small Gems: Winter Group Show at Crown Point Press
• Periodic Calendar at Electric Works
• Yo La Tengo at Amoeba Records
• Pinback, Judgement Day at Bimbo's 365 Club
• Tycho, Doombird at The Independent
• Temple Saturdays featuring Revolvr

Sunday, January 20:

• Zach Watkins + A Magic Whistle + Protoghost at The Night Light

Monday, January 21:

• S.T.D.W.T.F., Straight Crimes, Surf Shit, John Brothers Piano Company & Exit Bag at RCA
• Quicksand, Title Fight at the Regency Ballroom

Tuesday, January 22:

• Slime City #16 at Radio

Wednesday, January 23:

• SIX: 2013 First Year MFA Exhibition at Worth Ryder Art Gallery
• Claire Fontaine in Conversation with Jason E. Smith at the Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts
• Are We There Yet? at The Rock Bar
• Mandebrot & Skyy, Matthew Dryhurst, Brandon Nickell, Paul Clipson at The Lab

agenda 12.12.12

Thursday, December 13:

• Women, Art, and Technology: An Uneasy Access? at the Performance Art Institute
• Kala “Artists’ Annual” Exhibition and Opening
• Thrill Jockey Records 20th Anniversary Show at The Independent

Friday, December 14:

• Marine Hugonnier and Taha Belal "Disrupt" Opening Reception at Highlight Gallery
• SF Cinematheque Year End Party Fundraiser + Auction at Incline Gallery and the Roxie
• Points of Departure: Trivial Pursuit: A nomadic talk series curated by Zoë Taleporos and Pablo Guardiola at Royal Nonesuch Gallery
• The Mountain Goats at The Fillmore
• Psychic TV, Lumerians, King Dude, Youth Code at the Uptown

Saturday, December 15:

• Record Weasels Record $wap at Brownstar Studios
• Small Art Show at Warehouse 416
• Chris Ballantyne, Michael Light at Hosfelt Gallery
• Artist Talk with Colpa Press’s Luca Antonucci & Carissa Potter at Kala
• Art Hack Day: Lethal Software Exhibit & Holiday Party at GAFFTA
• Mago with Dohee Lee at Meridian Gallery
• Psychic TV, Lumerians, King Dude, Youth Code at the Uptown
• No Way Back with Optimo, Conor, and Solar at Monarch

Sunday, December 16:

• Flowers at Artists' Television Access

Monday, December 17:

• Dee Dee and Brandon play songs from Dum Dum Girls and The Crocodiles at the Rickshaw Stop
• KMEL Holiday House of Soul with The Weeknd at the Warfield

Tuesday, December 18:

• There's a Song In My Heart: a Holiday Party for Visual Aid at Varnish Fine Art
• Sunn O))) at Mezzanine

Wednesday, December 19:

• Fuzz with Ty Segall & Charlie Mootheart at the Hemlock Tavern
• Psychic Ills, Wymond Miles at Bottom of the Hill

agenda 12.05.12

Thursday, December 6:

• Publication Studio Printing On-Demand at The Popular Workshop
• To Be Determined #2 at new nothing cinema
• Poolside, Blackbird Blackbird, DJ Kele of Bloc Party at the Rickshaw Stop

Friday, December 7:

• Dis/Order: Juried Annual 2013 at Pro Arts
• MFA in Event Planning at Rise Above Graphics
• Mission Holiday Block Party
• MacArthur B Arthur's Final Exhibition: The Home Show
• TALKIES Holiday Show at Lost Weekend Video
• Destroy// 11 dancers + Ava Mendoza, Dominic Cramp, Mike Guarino, Leyya Tawil at Joe Goode Performance Group
• Point of No Return at Southern Exposure
• Cathy Cunningham-Little and Amy M. Ho at Chandra Cerrito Contemporary
• RE@DS: Sam Sax at the Berkeley Art Museum
• Quartet San Francisco Plays the Music of Raymond Scott at the Berkeley Art Museum
• MadC at 1:AM Gallery
• Jack White, The Shins, Metric, Two Door Cinema Club, Of Monsters and Men, The Gaslight Anthem at the Oakland Arena
• White Lung, Turbo Fruits, CCR Headcleaner at Bottom of the Hill
• Low End Theory SF at 1015 Folsom

Saturday, December 8:

• PrettyBluePresents: ReligiousGirls, MTNS (Seattle), Laughters, Believe at Purple Haus
• Everything Is Terrible Holiday Special West at ABCO Art Space
• Misfit Toy Factory at Root Division
• M83, Passion Pit, Tegan and Sara, The Killers, Grouplove, Imagine Dragons at the Oakland Arena
• The Polyphonic Spree at Slim's
• John Prine, Justin Townes Earle at the Warfield
• Dispirit//Thrones//Bädr Vogu//Crypt Keeper at 1530 E. 12th St.

Sunday, December 9:

• Points of Departure: Trivial Pursuit at Royal Nonesuch Gallery
• Meshell Ndegeocello, Con Brio at the Great American Music Hall

Monday, December 10:

• Tom Grrrl / Bitter Fruit / Pig DNA / S.B.S.M. at Menage Twat
• White Cloud + Freak Heat Waves + Means Streets + Chief at The Hidden Temple
• David Bazan, Stagnant Pools at the Independent

Tuesday, December 11:

• Jaberi & Deutsch, the Spencer Owen Consortium, Makeunder at the Night Light

Wednesday, December 12:

• Take Off: Kota Ezawa, Kenneth Goldsmith at Kadist SF

jillian mcdonald

Jillian Mcdonald

Jillian Mcdonald

Jillian Mcdonald

From Macdonald's site:

In Scotland, I cast fifty local residents, creating costumes on location in response to the landscape, traditional highland dress, and music. Oral folklore and local legends - both real and imagined, and the haunting romanticism of the landscape figure prominently. The camera reveals mossy glens, barley fields, heathered mountains, fairy knolls, rainbows, woodland creatures, animated avatars, and apparitions.
Masked animal characters appear frequently in horror - at once anonymous, uncanny, hybrid, terrifying, and disarmingly naïve.

See also:

• Glenfiddich Artist in Residency Program and OCAD University Announce Canadian Winner, 2012

agenda 11.28.12

My picks for the next week:

Thursday, November 29:

• Artist Talk & Reading for A WELL STIRS
• First Look Dinner at Headlands Center for the Arts
• Somewhere in the Fold at The Popular Workshop
• Lecture by David Goldblatt at SFMOMA
• Strange Sinema 58: Bizarre Cinema Histories at Oddball Films
• Mission Creek Oakland Presents: Believe, Teenage Sweater, and LESSONS! at the Uptown

Friday, November 30:

• Queer Punks in Conversation at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
• Happy Hour/Closing Reception for X Libris at Root Division
• 2012 Annual Holiday Sale at Creativity Explored
• Fairy Tale Frenzy at Oddball Films
• Duane Pitre, Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, Jesse Sparhawk, and Zachary James Watkins at The Lab

Saturday, December 1:

• Mark Baugh-Sasaki artist talk at Krowswork
• Matt Connors :: Ian McDonald :: Gregory Lind at [ 2nd floor projects ]
• Come Out & Play SF Festival at SOMArts
• Johansson Projects presents Rachel Kaye and Opal Dust featuring Casey Watson
• Taro Hattori, James Sansing at Swarm Gallery
• The Bay Brewed at Public Works
• Simian Mobile Disco at Mezzanine

Sunday, December 2:

• E@RLY: Ikue Mori with Ken Ueno at the Berkeley Art Museum
• Koinonia Experimental Music Festival at the Subterranean Arthouse
• Jonathan Richman at the Great American Music Hall

Monday, December 3:

• No Babies , Ni-Hao! (Japan) and T.I.T.S. + DJ Paul Paul at the Knockout
• Death Grips at Slim's

Tuesday, December 4:

• Werner Herzog at CCA
• The News at SOMArts

Wednesday, December 5:

• The Babies, Twin Steps, Younger Lovers, Wet Spots at 1-2-3-4 Go! Records
• San Francisco Olympians Festival III: Titans vs. Olympians
• Opening Reception for In Formation at the Berkeley Central Arts Passage
• Sufjan Stevens at the Great American Music Hall

What did I miss?  Let me know in the comments!

the artist is present

Walking around MOMA one evening on a trip to New York many years ago I came upon a large black-and-white projection of a beautiful young woman brushing her hair, hard.  As her strokes became more maniacal and visibly painful she chanted, "Art must be beautiful, artist must be beautiful," over and over again.  This, of course, was Marina Abramović in one of her early performance pieces, and suffice it to say I was riveted.  I did not fly to NYC to gaze into her eyes during her spring 2010 retrospective at MOMA (though I often kept the museum's "MarinaCam" open in a browser at work to watch the proceedings from afar), but thanks to Matthew Akers's recent documentary about that exhibit and Abramović's preparations for it I almost feel like I was there.  The film also gives an overview of Abramović's four decades of boundary-pushing performance art including her extensive collaboration with her one-time partner Ulay that laid bare the best and worst of male/female relationships.  Their first tentative interactions after years apart forms one of the most genuinely moving parts of the doc.  I have no doubt that the image-conscious Abramović got final say on everything Akers reveals on camera, and some of the editing and effects are distractingly slick.  I was gobsmacked by the raw power of Abramović's work all over again though, and the emotion written all over the faces of those who sat across from her during her three-month endurance test in the MOMA atrium cannot be denied. 

See also:

• Marina Abramović: The Artist Is Present
• SF Film Society Cinema