Emery C. Martin

Death, Destruction, and the Weather Coming Up Next, is now traveling to Nantes, France to be screened in the, Juste à côté de L.A. : CalArts Video, 2005-2007, a collection of video art coming out of CalArts between 2005-2007, curated by Audrey J. Chan.  I will be on hand for the screening in Nantes which is tonight.  Details and press release below.

The Contrechamp series presents a carte blanche to Audrey Chan, American artist and writer, currently in residence at l’école régionale des beaux-arts de Nantes (Nantes School of Art). As a parallel program to her exhibition at the school’s gallery, “Notes Toward an Exhibition”, she is presenting a program of videos made by young artists who studied at California Institute of the Arts (CalArts), where video is employed as a fluid medium that engages with such practices as performance, painting, sculpture, writing, socio-political critique, and racial and gender deconstruction. Program duration: ~60 minutes + discussion with the artist.

PROGRAM
CamLab (Anna Mayer & Jemima Wyman), Critical Field Craft: Apex Cryptophores, 2007
Audrey Chan, Untitled: Soliloquy in Blue, 2005
Bianca D’Amico, Moneyshot, 2006
Trulee Hall, For Snowball, 2005
John Hogan, Give Thanks, 2004/5
Elana Mann, Embroid, Embroil, 2007
Emery C. Martin, Death, Destruction, and the Weather Coming Up Next, 2006
Theresa Masangkay, May Your Days Be, 2007; Untitled: Hollywood Hills Forest Lawn, 2007
Akosua Adoma Owusu, Revealing Roots, 2007/8

Contrechamp is a monthly program dedicated to art, film, and video, organized by artists Patrick Bernier, Christine Laquet, Olive Martin, and Stéphane Pauvret.

http://www.lecinematographe.com/programme/films/contrechamp_mai09.html

I just read Clay Shirky’s essay/post, “The Failure of #amazonfail,” which discusses the failure of the twitter-activism of #amazonfail.  Rather interesting piece surrounding the whole amazon adult content tagging debacle.  However, what struck me was the potential that Twitter’s constrainted limited communication system could be designed perfectly for ill informed reactionary positions.  So, here are my quick reactionary thoughts in response to Shirky.  Also, more updates in general hopefully coming soon.

The specificity of this amazon instance aside I think one very interesting aspect of the essay is the potential embedded reactionary nature of things like Twitter and what it means for activism.  The framework of twitter is built to provide an outlet for instant communication to a large mass of people on any errant thought.  You have to do this in 140 characters or less so you are likely not going to be filling your tweet with every nuance or potential detail that maybe needed to really address the topic or thought at hand.  This framework can hence close down conversations that need to be had before we all begin pounding out another 140 characters on our keyboards of activism that will hopefully assail a stunning blow to the “them.”  So, is Twitter simply a tool for short sighted reactionary positions?  No not necessarily but it sure can be conducive to them.  Do we need to place warnings such as “Tweet Responsibly,” “Think Before You Tweet,” or maybe “Don’t Drink and Tweet.”  Not sure, but the idea that the designed limitations of a communication system can be directly conducive to uninformed reactionary thought is interesting to say the least.  At least to me that is.

The Exchange Rate: 2008 book is now available for purchase in soft cover or as a free downloadable PDF.  I was very happy to see that the book is using a Creative Commons license and to see my screenshot from GTA make the cut.  The book looks great, thanks to Roman Jaster who did the design work for it.  The book includes the original copies of all the performance scripts and descriptions about them, the documentation of the performances, an essay by Claire Ruud, and a interview of Elana Mann about the project.  All in all it is 144 pages long, pretty hefty.  The official description of the book is below and you can purchase or download a copy here at http://www.lulu.com/content/5656529, enjoy.

“This book documents an international performance exchange organized by artist Elana Mann in response to the 2008 US presidential election. Thirty-eight artists living in sixteen different countries participated in the project. With the aid of the project website exchangerate2008.com, participating artists produced, exchanged, and interpreted performance directions related to the election campaign. Artists include: Adam Overton, Aiste Ptakauske, Ana Fernandez , Bruce Conkle, CamLab, Chan & Mann, Danielle Adair, Dorit Cypis, Elana Mann, Emery Martin, Eric Lindley, Ernesto Salmeron, Eva Jung, Jason Kunke, Jean Pierre Lapeyre, Julie Lequin, Karen Atkinson, Kelly Kleinschrodt, Kevin Jamieson, Liz Glynn, Lora Ivanova, Luchezar Boyadjiev, Maile Colbert, Marc Lewis, Marssares, Melissa Wyman, Michael Lazar, Pablo Rasgado, REP, Rui Costa, Sara Roberts , Sibyl O’Malley, Søren Thilo Funder, Stine Marie Jacobsen,Vincent Ramos, Zackary Drucker. Designed by Roman Jaster.”

“OURS: Democracy in the Age of Branding” made it as one of Art Forum’s Critics’ Pick.  A nice thing to see happen for the show.  A small excerpt below.

“’OURS: Democracy in the Age of Branding’” takes the rhetoric underlying US military campaigns in Iraq and elsewhere as its starting point and emphasizes the global dissemination of American ideologies through the lens of consumer culture. Curated by Carin Kuoni (with Marisa Olson organizing its Web component), the project goes beyond the traditional exhibition format to incorporate lectures, panels, workshops, and other related events.”

You can read the short article here http://www.artforum.com/archive/id=21917 (they do make you sign in to read).