A few weeks back, I posted about an assignment for artists to describe their own dream group show.

I came up with one version of my own dream group show—it’s local, site-specific and combines numerous interests. I was so excited by all the projects and artists, the only way I could keep my presentation under the six-minute limit was to read out a script of only keywords, and that’s what I’ll include here. Enjoy! And consider coming up with one of your own—it’s a fantastic, liberating exercise.

1,000 Single Steps

For Jeremy Deller,

art isn’t about what you make
but what you make happen.

Inspiration.

Manchester Int’l Festival.
Manchester History.
Industrial Revolution.
Workshop of the World.
Birthplace of Socialism.
Textile Mills.
People’s History.
Tradition of Banner-making.
Participation.
Contemporary groups working with a banner maker.
Parade.
Absurdist.
Crown of french fries.

Even the emo teens.

Proposed Site: The Queens Way

Summer of public programming as grand opening.

• 3.5-mile portion of the abandoned Rockaway Rail Line
• community-led effort
• current status: feasibility studies

I am not a natural optimist.
Anxiety and rumination, humans’ natural states.
Exercise, surefire mood-elevation.
Importance of access to clean, green open space.
For Physical health.
For Psychological health.
A society where women can go for a run in their own neighborhoods without fear.
Improve quality of life for generations.

 

Artists and Projects

Susan O’Malley, Community Advice, 2012.

Classmate, friend.
Based in California.
Site-specific variation on project.
100 participants.
2 questions.
What advice would you give your 80-y-o self? 8?
Collaboration with printmaker.
Wood type posters
Posted in the community.

Carlos Cruz-Diez, Transchromie Mécanique 1965, 1965

Immersive phenomenological optical installations.
Like Eliasson, but earlier.
Like Turrell, but happier.
Commission:
Shadows underneath elevated tracks.
Transformed to spaces of light and color.

Michelangelo Pistoletto, Lunch Painting, 1965

Arte Povera.
Transition from gallery oriented art object to direct social engagement.
Seminal work.
Blue-chip artist.
Museum collections.
Do not touch.
Proposed exhibition copies as public sculptures.
Please touch.

Bob and Roberta Smith, The Art Party, 2011–ongoing

Artist mostly known for twee sign paintings on junk.
Recent years’ increasing activism.
Reaction to Tea Party.
Opposition to cuts in Art Education in UK.
Paintings, installations, videos, events.
Defense of accessibility of art education and therefore art.
Earnest.
Populist.
Art is not elitist.
Everything is made.

Agnes Denes, Isometric Systems in Isotropic Space—Map Projections, 1979

Proposed billboards.
Artist mostly famous for wheat field in Lower Manhattan.
Beautiful drawings of world maps.
Cube, pyramid, donut.
Love diagrams.
Queens demographics.
Always changing.
Always diverse.

Michael Jones McKean, The Rainbow: Certain Principles of Light and Shapes Between Forms, 2012

Bemis.
Artificial rainbow.
Water hoses.
Experiment.
Unpredictable results.
Depends on weather.
Ironic.
Makes it even better.

Fourth of July 2012: San Diego Pyrotechnic Accident

Not art.
Curatorial influence of Jenns Hoffmann.
Contemporary art alongside historic art and artifacts.
Contextualizes art practice in wider cultural production.
7,000 fireworks in less than 60 seconds.
Holiday ruined?
Or expectations exceeded.
Grand Finale.

—

Addendum:

I also recently learned about this other spectacular fun-but-relatively-safe disaster, which I love for the same reasons as the fireworks display: