2006-01 Vital Source Mag – January 2006
Needles and Pins
By Evan Solochek The ballroom of Turner Hall is filled to capacity. Patrons can barely squeeze past one another to reach the next vendor’s table. The temperature outside is in the low teens, lower with wind-chill, a shockingly cold day even for mid-November 2005. It is the sort of bone-shattering weather that keeps people bundled up at home, unwilling to bear the elements for any reason. And yet, the ballroom of Turner Hall is filled to capacity – a testament to the resolve of people or, more specifically, to the people’s love of crafts. Art vs. Craft is one of Milwaukee’s premiere craft fairs, featuring over 100 artists from Milwaukee and beyond. Inspired by such fairs as I Heart Rummage in Seattle, Bazaar Bizarre in Boston and Chicago’s D.I.Y. Trunk Show, Milwaukee is riding the national independent design wave. All across America, as price-slashing megastores choke off the locally owned and operated businesses, an underground collective of artisans is taking a stand. With knitting needles and fabric swatches clenched in their fists, these crafters are refusing to succumb to the sterility of Big Retail and are, instead, embracing a world of consumer goods where each individual item is made with personal affection. “I think that the popularity of handmade hip goods has created an alternative to mass marketed goods and that has encouraged many creative types to get involved locally and nationally,” says Faythe Levine, founder and co-coordinator of Art vs. Craft, co-owner of Paper Boat Boutique & Gallery in Bay View and sole proprietor of Flying Fish Designs. “Art vs. Craft provides Milwaukee with a chance to view many different kinds of work. It also creates an exciting space for networking and sales, which in turn stimulates the arts community in a positive, fun way.” One-of-a-kind fun Fun is a key component of the scene. The personal touch of the designer makes each item unique, and that is precisely what drives most craft shoppers. Silk-screened and stenciled clothing, embroidered bags, reconstituted vintage wares and kitschy knickknacks when you buy from an independent designer you are not getting a mass-produced product. Having an item no one else owns fosters a truer, more individualized sense of ownership that also appeals to many. “Younger people are really concerned that their individuality will be swallowed up by mass consumerism,” says Amy Schoenecker, who sells reconstructed vintage clothing through her label Softly, Fiercely. “As a designer, I emphasize with that fear, and make pieces that are one-of-a-kind in order to revolt against the notion of a herd of sheep or mere followers.” The idea that these creations are functional works of art also allows the consumer to take pride in what he or she chooses to buy and wear, a rare thing today. There is something to be said for buying a one-of-a-kind piece you know was labored over with love, as opposed to pulling your size off the rack. At that point, what one buys becomes much more than just an […]
Jan 1st, 2006 by Vital Archives
Inner Space
By Eric Francis Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) Is there a room in your house suitable as a movie theater? I think there is, even if it’s a modest digital theater. This is the year of the Aquarius Odeon, to which the whole neighborhood can be invited regularly. It’s the spirit that counts more than anything, and the quality of what you present – make it weird, intellectual, retro and neo all at once. Given that your whole life has taken on this cinematic quality, Hollywood is the perfect decorating theme. This will help keep the dramas where they belong, on the screen rather than acted out in real life – unless you’ve been planning to audition for something, which I do recommend. Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20) Weird has been your middle name for a couple of years now, and you love it. You have the license to invent whatever you want and call it beautiful; if Andy Warhol got away with it, so can you. The essence is experimentation, fast changes and keeping what works. Going international would spark your imagination, and for some reason, African comes to mind. Dark colors, reds and browns – or pure white, not the usual blues and purples you’ve always loved so much. Keep it deep, and remember that all wealth comes from the Earth. Aries (March 20-April 19) You’re not the type to collect stuff, or even be particularly interested in it; but suddenly the material world means a lot more to you: material as in the textures of fabrics and colors of cloth that come to life in your fingers. This developing inner sensitivity seems to have become a passion, as if you’re seeing dark reds and browns for the first time in your life. Or like you never noticed the luxury of mahogany. Or food that you cook at home all afternoon. Will you ever go back to glass and chrome? Or Chinese take away? Let’s not ask. Taurus (April 19-May 20) Most of your renovation and redecoration is going to be psychological, so we might ask what constitutes the design equivalent of therapy. The answer starts with art, which needs to reflect the inner landscapes that have become so familiar recently. Choose pieces that represent who you are becoming, and images that depict feelings or settings you would like to make real. You’ve worked out your stuff’ enough to be feeling an unusual degree of dedication, passion and spiritual fire rising up. Keep it in sight, and look at it often. Gemini (May 20-June 21) For Gemini, the emphasis this year is on water, and a little goes a long way. You don’t want too much; it’s possible to use water for inspiration, or to drown emotionally. Balance is key. An aquarium would make a great addition to your home (invest in the best lighting you can get, so the plants will thrive), which will remind you of what the world of feelings is really about. At the same time, […]
Jan 1st, 2006 by Vital Archives
Of guns, gays and gas.
By Lefty McTighe In case you haven’t been paying attention, fellow Wisconsinites, your GOP-controlled State Legislature has been hard at work for you this past December, tackling the pivotal issues that truly matter most. In a political trifecta that pushes all sorts of emotional buttons, the Republican leadership in both the Senate and the Assembly will have closed out the 2005 calendar year with votes to allow citizens to carry concealed handguns, place a constitutional ban of gay marriage on the November 2006 ballot and end the automatic increase of the state gasoline tax. If you thought health care, education and job creation were important, well, you are clearly out of step with your lawmakers. You simply don’t share the values and priorities of those you have sent to Madison. Each of these GOP-sponsored initiatives tug at the heartstrings of the conservative base, mixing Republican catchphrases like ‘tax cuts,’ ‘gun rights,’ and ‘family values’ into one delectable brew served up to the narrow interests of the rabidly right wing. For the rest of us hoping to find a better job, a better school for our kids, or maybe even expanded health care coverage for our family, we will have to wait our turn until the important business of the state gets done first. But that’s not even the most troubling part of the story. For those of us rightfully outraged by the backward priorities of the Republican legislature, there is another group of folks who should be even more irate: those conservatives who genuinely care about concealed handguns, gay marriage and the gas tax. Because in truth, these bills fail to adequately solve the problems they claim to fix. These proposals have been shepherded through the Legislature by political flim-flam artists in the Republican leadership who have put their personal electoral success above sound public policy. Not only are they abdicating their responsibility to address real issues that matter to most voters – like health care, education and jobs – they have gleefully played on the worst fears of their conservative base, playing them for suckers and hoping to whip them into a panicked frenzy and send them flocking to the polls. Who benefits from this ploy? The GOP members of the Legislature and the Republican Party of Wisconsin in this November’s elections. GUNSThe new legislature-approved bill would allow those 21-years and older to carry a concealed gun once they pass a state sanctioned training program. For those who worried that there were not enough guns on the street, hand-wring no more – now it’s legal to walk around the neighborhood strapped. Of course, there are limits. Lots of them. According to the December 7 edition of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, these are the places where concealed guns would be prohibited: child care centers, domestic violence shelters, churches, hospitals and clinics, schools, college campuse, police stations, prisons, jails, courthouses, most sporting events, airports, taverns and restaurants where alcohol accounts for more than half of sales. Additionally, public facilities and private […]
Jan 1st, 2006 by Vital Archives
Amy X Neuburg
By Paul Snyder The audience at the Milwaukee Art Museum on January 7 will probably have no idea what to expect of Amy X Neuburg�s performance. That�s okay. She doesn�t either. �I�m very nervous,� she says. �But I thrive on that.� That evening, �The Metaphor,� a piece written by Neuburg for chamber ensemble, voice and live looping electronics, and commissioned and performed by Present Music, will have its national debut. The technology and looping, of course, pose no fears in the author. After all, she�s made a name for herself in the electronic music genre (though she prefers to call her stylings �avant-cabaret� ). Her solo live performances feature Neuburg and a stack of computers, building voice layer upon voice layer to create fully dimensional songs. The challenge with �The Metaphor� is going to be implementing this solo predilection for looping into an ensemble act. Now on top of countless loops of Neuburg, there will be countless loops of each individual player in the ensemble as well. Daunting as it sounds, she�s up for it. �It�s something new for me,� she says. �And I like that. I always want to challenge myself, and the ensemble asked me to compose this piece for them. There�s going to be a lot of high-tech sounds in addition to solo live-looping, but the thing with this is to get everyone looped simultaneously. When you can achieve that, six players end up sounding completely different. It�s immense.� It also demands a lot of precision. Neuburg says that she likes to let people know what�s going on in her shows, so she constructs her songs piece by piece on stage, which requires starting and stopping loops at exact moments, lest the entire song fall apart on the spot. This aspect is again made a bit more challenging by the addition of an ensemble, but Neuburg thanks her musical background for helping her work through it. �I notate everything,� she says. �Which is difficult sometimes, because I majored in voice, not composition, but you have to be so precise for the benefit of the other musicians. It�s not just a matter of starting a loop and stopping it � I write out exactly what I�m going to be doing.� A classically trained singer with a near four-octave vocal range, Neuburg received undergraduate degrees from Oberlin Conservatory (voice) and Oberlin College (linguistics), and an M.F.A. in Electronic Music from Mills College CCM. She started her professional music career as a member of the musical-theater group MAP, and then moved on to drumming for Amy X Neuburg & Men. Her last solo release, 2004�s Residue (Other Minds), received positive critical response. While Neuburg will incorporate some of her solo material into the show on the 7th, she says her new kick is working as a collaborator again, composing for ensembles. In addition to the Milwaukee performance, Neuburg also ventured to New York in December for a performance with three cellists. In March, she�ll take the spotlight at the San […]
Jan 1st, 2006 by Vital Archives
Revealing light
By Evan Solochek Bruce Nauman has spent his life and career bending artistic conventions, one of the few living artists successful at avoiding labels. And regardless of how one feels about the work itself, he is inarguably viewed as one of the most innovative living artists of our time. Recently, Nauman made the top 10 of the London Financial Times� �Top 100 Art World Movers and Shakers.� Born in Fort Wayne, Indiana in 1941, Bruce Nauman�s family followed his father�s job as an engineer for General Electric around the country. They landed in Milwaukee while Nauman was still a boy. He attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he began honing his renaissance approach to life and art, studying mathematics and philosophy, music and physics. Eventually, Nauman�s interests began to focus on what would bring him fame in later life, and in 1964 he graduated with a Bachelor�s Degree in Art. The following year, Nauman began work on his Master�s Degree at the University of California-Davis, where success found him quickly. In 1965, at the age of 24, he headlined his own gallery show and published his first art book, Pictures of Sculpture in a Room. Nauman originally studied painting, but felt limited in the medium�s ability to adequately subvert what he saw as artistic preconceptions and order, and quickly abandoned it. Entranced by the old neon beer signs he saw from the window of his first studio in San Francisco (a former grocery store), Nauman turned his attention to the light itself, using its stark but fluid form and motion to play with language, imagery and iconic symbols. And while he has successfully explored a wide variety of mediums from sculpture to video, it is his work with neon that has garnered the most widespread attention. With works like My Name As Though It Were Written on the Surface of the Moon (1968), in which he tackles the relationship between name and identity, and One Hundred Live and Die (1984), which bombards the viewer with the banalities of life and forces reevaluation, Nauman sits at the top of the art world. And while each piece has its own identity and message, an overreaching theme does exist. �Nauman makes artwork that doesn�t look like art,� says Joseph Ketner II, Chief Curator of the Milwaukee Art Museum. �He wants to make it in a non-traditional medium, and so he employs a commercial medium, neon signs.� While rebellion and non-traditional art is nothing new, one facet of Nauman�s work transcends conventional subversion. He doesn�t �make� any of it. Nauman designs his pieces on paper, then hands the plans over to a neon fabricator to construct. �It parodies this whole romantic notion of the artist hand being the supreme expression of humanity,� Ketner says. �This whole exhibit will contain no objects touched by Bruce Nauman.� This inevitably raises questions about basic artistic tenets. Can a man who never physically touches his own art be considered an artist? What�s more important, the vision or the […]
Jan 1st, 2006 by Vital Archives
