Footnotesto Sweethearts with Williams in 1967.Williams's text for the book on the col­ Roth laborations ofRoth and Richard Hamilton (see note 6) is a testament to the strength of conti:nuedfrompage 110 Williams's feelings for Roth.Roth also knew , , , and . 6. See Dieter Roth and Richard Hamilton, Collaborations: Relations-Confrontcitions, history, one collected from the edges of the artist's (and our) exis­ with an introduction by Vicente Todolf, and texts by Etienne Lullin and Emmett tence, stuff rejected and then reclaimed that denies the binary of Williams, London, Edition Hansjorg Mayer; Porto, Fundavao de Serralves, 2003. extraordinary art and ordinary junk. 7.Roth often collaborated with other artists in this way: for a time, Hamilton sent him Roth's near total enmeshing of art and life is best represented by a proof from each of his editions, which Roth would overwork; and in 1970, he and the the compelling Solo Scenes, a multipart video simultaneously playing German artist and architect Stefan Wewerka would each finish drawings begun by the other. It was also with the Viennese Aclionists that Roth first began publicly perform­ on a vast wall of 128 monitors, in which he recorded his everyday ing music (though he had a keen interest early on in avant-garde music). He was to reg­ activities in his home and studio over the course of his final year ularly incorporate sound components in his work, including musical instruments and (1997-98). If ever there were a work to interrogate the myth of the recordings he made with other artists and with his children. artist, Solo Scenes, shown at P.S. I, is the one to do it. This piece at 8."SNOW" was eventually published as the 11th volume of Roth's Collected Works, a total of 26 books of a projected 40, many of them cheap offset facsimiles of unique once plays on our voyeuristic fascination with the artist, ill but still artist's books, issued by Edition HansjiirgMayer in Stuttgart beginning in 1969. working, and shatters his life irretrievably. The work is impossible to 9.Roth 1'ime,p. 95. read coherently or comprehensively; forever in motion, it makes us 10.For this show and its dating to 1970 rather than 1960, as frequently published, sec aware of the fact that we never see the whole, regardless of how many Dirk Dobke, "Staple Cheese (A Race)," in ibid., pp. 130-31. screens there are or how long we look at them. In the end, as in so 11.Dieter Roth, 1984, p. 9. An alternate version of the story is found in an interview with Roth, in Roth and Hamilton, Collaborations, p. 36: "I was completely fascinated much of Roth's work, we are confronted with transience extended and hypnotised by Bellmer. And I did things like him and Tinguely .... And then I over expanses of time, an ongoing denouement. □ found when I had made, let's say, a drawing, and even made objects with motors in them like Tinguely, and I found it could not go in a show under my name. Everybody 1.The only other significant museum exhibition of Roth's work in the U.S.was at the would recognize 'Whow, this is Tinguely, this is Bellmer.' And then I thought, well you Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art in 1984; it was accompanied by a catalogue with pour something over it to ... to cover the traces of your thought and of your ownwork. essays by Mary Jane Jacob and Ann Goldstein (Dieter Roth, Chicago, Museum of And I poured sour milk over these objects. And this was the way I discovered that sour Contemporary Art, 1984).The show was drawnfrom the collection of Ira Wool, the fore­ milk could give me satisfaction." most collector ofRoth's work in this country. 12.The title both refers to Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and to the 2. See Bernadette Walter, "diter rot," in Dirk Dobke and Bernadette Walter, Roth Tiine: fact that 30 examples of the work were cast with birdseed and mounted outdoors, to be A Dieter Roth Retrospective, ed. by Theodora Vischer and Bernadette Walter, New pecked at until they disappearnd. York, Museum of ; Baden, Lars Millier Publishers, 2004, p.42. "Roth 1'ime: DieterA Roth Retro5pective" opened at the Schaulager [May 25- 3.For the Icelandic meanings, see Dirk Dobke et al., Dieter Roth: Books + Multiples, Sept.16, 2003/, and traveled to the Museum Ludwig, Cologne [Oct. JO, 2003-Jan. 11, London, Edition Hansjorg Mayer, 2004, p.128. 2004/ and the Museum of ModernArt and P.S. I ConternpormyArt Center in (/1teens, 4.Much of the information about Roth's career is derived from Roth 1'i1ne;see especially New York [Mar. 12-June 7, 2004/. ft was accomvanied by ct 304-vage catalogue, edited pp. 76-105 for the years 1960-70. For Roth's early work, see also Dirk Dobke and Laszlo by the head curator of the show, Theodora Visclter, with texts by Dirk Dobke and Glozer,Dieter Roth: Uni,quePieces, London, New York, Edition HansjorgMayer, 2002. BernadetteWalter. 5.Roth never participated formally in events, though he maintained close rela­ tions with Williams and other Fluxus artists th1·oughout his lifetime, even producing Author: John T Paoletti is professor of art history at Wesleya:n University.

ACA Galleries ...... 25 Flintridge Foundation ...... 58 Marlborough Gallery ...... 14-15, 7 4 Saatchi Gallery ...... ••...... 38 Affordable Art Fair ...... 76 Forum Gallery ...... 17 McCoy Inc., Jason ...... 29 Sams, Ann G ...... 149 Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Fountain Gallery ...... 90 McKee Gallery ...... 46 San Francisco ArtInstitute ...... 147 Art, The ...... 77 Frieze Art Fair ...... 78 McKenzie Fine Art ...... 77 Shapolsky Gallery, Anita ...... 83 Anderson O'Brien Fine Art ...... 72 Gagosian Gallery ....34 , Cover 4 Meislin Gallery, Andrea ...... 68 Sheppard Gallery, Allen ...... 56 Art Forum Berlin ...... 84 Galerie de Bellefeuille ...... 16 Miller Gallery, Robert ...... Cover 2 SnydeITTJan Galleries ...... 82 Art Services ...... 146, 148-149 Galerie Lelong ...... 12 ...... 147 Modem Postcard Sotheby's ...... 21 Baczek Fine Arts, William ...... 71 Graham & Sons. James ...... 40 Mott Community College ...... 147 Spanierman Gallery ...... 47 Bespoke Gallery ...... 70 Gray Gallery, Richard ...... 36 Museum of Modern Art, The .... 42 Sperone Westwater ...... 7 Boca Raton Museum of Art ...... 75 Greek Council/Organization of National Academy School of Fine Steele Gallery, Robert ...... 88 Bulgari ...... 32 Promotion of Greek Culture ...30, 79 Arts ...... 144 ...... 88 Stendhal Ga lery, Maya ...... 69 California View Fine Arts ..... 81 Hartioun Naumann Fine Art, Francis ...... 44 l Campbell Gallery,Charles ...... 70 Hazan Gallery, Cheryl ...... 89 Summer Books ...... 86-87 Nelson Gallery, Emil ...... 89 Carberry Gallery, Valerie ...... 26 Hoffman Gallery, Nancy ...... 89 Sun Valley Center for the Arts .....90 Neuhoff Gallery ...... 20 Castelli, Leo ...... 10 Hoffman Gallery, Rhona ...... 77 Tagore Gallery, Sundaram ...... 54 New York Galleries ...... 66 Cheim & Read ...... 2 Islip Art Museum ...... 90 Taipei Fene Arts Museum ...... 84 Northern Kentucky Universety ....144 ie Clark Gallery, Garth ...... 28 Jackson Fine Art, Charlotte ...... 41 ie O'Melveny Gallery, Don ...... 59 Tremaine Foundation, The Emily Cohan Gallery, James ...... 6 Jacobson Howard Gallery ...... 11 � Orlando Museum of Art ...... 85 Hall ...... 74 Contemporary Art Museum Johnson Gallery, J...... 73 University of Hartford/Joseloff Kasmin Gallery, Paul ...... 5 PaceeWildenstein ...... 1 Saint Louis ...... 88 Gallery ...... 76 rJJ Cooper Gallery, Paula ...... 4 Kerrigan Campbell ...... 89 Paris Photo ...... 82 University of Pettsburgh ...... 90 Cowles Gallery,Charles ...... 18 Kidd Gallery, Robert ...... 73 Patrick, Robert ...... 149 ie Virginia Commonwealth Cristea Gallery, Alan ...... 68 Kidder Smith Gallery ...... 22 Peters Gallery, Gerald ....52 tT1 University ...... 145 Crown Point Press ...... 46 Knoedler & Co...... Cover 3 Peyton Wright Fine Art ...... 23 Werner, Michael ...... 8-9 Cuningham Gallery, Betty ...... 19 Levy Gallery, Richard ...... 24 Photo New York .91 � Davis Gallery, John ...... 76 LewAllen Contemporary ...... 31 Plane Space ...... •••...... 77 Yares Gallery, Riva ...... 27 DFN Gallery ...... 67 Lust, Herbert ...... 88 Praxis Galleries .....•...... 75 Zabriskie Gallery ...... 40 FIACe...... 80 M.Y.Art Prospects ...... 76 Rodgers, Paul/9W .....•...... 83 Zoubok Gallery, Pavel .....72 rJJ Fishere-Landau Center for Art ...... 71 Marinoff, Elaine ...... 56 Ross Gallery, Arthur . .85 Zwirner & Wirth ...... 13

Vol. 92, No. 8 (Scplcmber)Arlin J\mericais publiSh('d n1011thlyexe<'pt C(11nbin('(I June/Julyby fkJ.lll Art Publications lncor,K1ratctl, 675 Bro;id\\�dy, New York, N.Y. 10012. Tel: (212) !;141-2800.f\1x: (212) 1).11-286."i. C<)llkntsC opyrightO 2004 by Ari it1America, and ma!' oot he re11ro�foced . i in .an�· manner or form wiUKJul permission,ISSN: (I004-:J214. The O)linions eX]ircsSC4:I "lssursin &.Comment ary; apart from the edi1or's comments, are those of the writers themsch·t-s and not nctessarily Ihose of this 111agaiirie. Not responsible forunsolic ted mam1scripts or phot�raphs Ari in America is indexed in the Rcmleri;' Guidetu Periodical Lilrrolure and the Art lnde;r.Articles are abstrncledand indexed i11 /JI/A (available on-line lhrough Dialog and Qut--std) ;iml 111 Hi.storicu, AbSlr(1CISftntV or Am.,.ri,:(t: /li.,;tvry('1«.l 1,iff. Ra(:k\ '()lumes of Art in Amerir(iMe a\ailahlc on microfo::he from Bdl & Howell, AU. 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Box 37003, Boone, Iowa fi00:17.000:1,orcfl.11 (t.oll-tr('e)1-.S00-92i>-Mll9. 01.11side tht! U. S., tall (515) 216-6052. ro�LMA�'TER: Send addresschanges to AllT IN A.\lf:RICA,P.O. Box 3700l,:a Hoone, Iowa 50017-QOroa: , and allow six wet:ksfor change. Hudson River School-style land­ bers come off as much too scapes painted in oil on graffiti­ refined-more, perhaps, than any covered public walls-her "New of them might like to admit. York Beautification Project." Here, -Sarah Valdez she embellished the spiritual read­ er's booth with tarot cards and Howardena Pindell representations of chakras on pale blue walls. A suburban Joe at Sragow might consider this good, "realis­ Howardena Pindell's first show in tic" . The psychic was New York in a decade included obviously quite pleased with her nearly three dozen small works on revamped stand, and Harvey paper or papyrus-collages, prints signed one wall, "Love, Ellen." and drawings-ranging in date Nicole Eisenman brings her from 1968 to the present, with customary first-rate painting and more than half from the past sev­ Craig Costello and Nathan Smith: Shoot the Freak, 2004, enamel on metal; smartass humor to the mysteri­ eral years. Most consist of count­ in "Dreamland Artist Club" at Coney Island. ously titled "Skin the Wire" less punched-out and notated game. Her sign shows a couple paper dots arranged in abstract, of ruddy-cheeked country bump­ high-relief compositions within ugly duckling to world-famous, aspects of queer culture and bad kins brandishing a pitchfork and scale-setting grids of various pro­ wildly successful beauty queen­ taste. -Barbara Pollack an ax at a wire, personified with portions, which have been either is the real theme underlying most eyeballs and lacerated, sore­ sectored by string or hand-drawn. of Waters's oeuvre. But in looking "Dreamland Artist Club" looking skin. A cow and a pig Pindell first startedworking with at these methodically arranged watch the chase disdainfully grids and dots in the 70s, as was and sedately framed photo works, at Coney Island from a grassy knoll. Likely to fly demonstrated in such pieces as it is easy to forget that Waters For "The Dreamland Artist Club," over the heads of Coney Island the tutti-frutti Untitled #28(19 74), started out as an aficionado of a public-artintervention funcled by regulars is the humor underlying with an undulating, speckled truly transgressive imagery. Creative Time at Coney Island, Toland Grinnell's sign. Known ground terraced in strips of col­ Fortunately, some of his early, graffiti artist Steve Powers s,elect­ for his tongue-in-cheek, stop-at­ laged paper, or Prism #2 (1973), rarely seen short films were ed 33 artists whom he saw as nothing constructions, Grinnell's in which drawn-on dots are partly included in "Change of Life." His bringing something like street cul­ lot was the "Dime Toss." True enmeshed in the handmade debut, Hag in Black Leather ture to the artworld. Yet his dream to form, he constructed a busy, paper surface. There were also Jacket (1964), shot in grainy team-a remarkably rowdy rounch, over-designed sign of 24 differ­ interesting earlier drawings with black-and-white 16mm and rough­ by gallery standards-makes only ent-sized circles bearing num­ handwritten words or slashes ly edited, tells the storyof an inter­ the tiniest dent on the eye-assault­ bers and texts, among them accumulated in graph-paper racial couple who courtat a ing, perhaps impenetrably s,eedy, his interlocking TG initials. quadrants. garbage dump and are married by milieu of Coney Island's dilapidat­ Accustomed to making his mark Pindell is enormously inventive a Ku Klux Klansman. Almost as ed amusement park. Locating the in 24-karat gold, Grinnell proves with the consciously limited vocab­ poorly edited, Eat Your Makeup artworks (mostly signage for rides with his sign, boringly painted ulary that situates her work in a (1967) shows a band of stylish and games) proves challen�iing, black on gray, to be the worst minimalist tradition of serial anti-fashionistas forcing scantily even with a map, though theiy are at slumming, hands down. theme-and-variations. At the same clad Twiggy types to model them­ relatively conspicuous for th,eir For his part, Powers perfectly time, the abundance of the dots selves to death while Waters's esthetic and/or conceptual sophis­ grooves with the atmosphere. signals a very unminimalist favorite star, the late, great Divine, tication. (Half of them remain on With years of experience graffiti­ excess feeling all the more profli­ falls into a daydream and imag­ more or less permanent display tagging "ESPO" on walls-it gate for the constraints imposed. ines himself as Jackie Kennedy in after their initial installation over stands for Exterior Surface Untitled #32 (2003-04) is a telling a truly tasteless and funny remake the summer.) Painting Operation-he has a example. Glued to a white ground of the Zapruder footage of the JFK Jack Pierson's project is tl1e knack for invigorating public sectored in green thread is a veri­ assassination. prettiest. Taking advantage of the visuals. He repainted the cars of table profusion of dots in two Waters's self-deprecating sunlight, bold black letters sl1im­ the "Cyclone" roller coaster to sizes, either printed with numbers humor and sawy appreciation of mer against a hot-pink back­ pop like a candy bar wrapper and arrows in blue and black (larg­ his own place in popular culture ground of iridescent disks for a and also made new, crisply er), or painted a solid red (small­ were evidenced here by a three­ game pensively titled "Someday." designed signs for the "Eldorado er). Pindell dusted the work with a sided, full-scale photo tableau of a Brooklyn-based artists Crai�l Auto Skooter" bumper cars sensuous layer of fine powder at kitsch-filled room in the director's Costello and Nathan Smith con­ ("Bump your ass off," reads one the end. Festively colored, the own apartment created by his tribute a mural-size sign for "Shoot text, alongside an illustration of a work recalls an after-partyfloor, longtime set designer Vince the Freak," a game that entails fir­ donkey's rear end). with the confetti-like dots clumping Peranio. As well as demonstrating ing paintballs at a live human tar­ Yet "The Dreamland Artist Club" in drifts over the surface. the filmmaker's obsessive eye for get lurking behind a chain-link mostly shoots itself in the foot. Out Pindell uses open-bite etching pop trash, it was also a hilarious fence in a refuse-strewn gravel pit. of their element, most of its mem- in her prints (there were a few on send-up of conventional, serious­ The sign's aggressive black-and­ minded museum re-creations. white lettering stands out agiainst Over the years, Waters's a red background with multicol­ John Waters: Puke in the Cinema, 1998, two of 10 chromogenic prints, 5 by 7 inches each; at the New Museum. style-the triumph of "rude" over ored polka dots-likely more legi­ "good"-has become popular­ ble and nicely designed than ized, even cuddly. This evolution whatever preceded it. But is it is due in part to Waters's taming such a radical departure from, of the more edgy aspects of his say, the old sign for "Dunk the filmmaking. But it is also the Creep" a few booths down? result of an American public that Some artists strove to blend in, has learned, in no small part others did not. The most respect­ through watching his films, to ful intrusion came from Ellen relax and enjoy at least some Harvey,known for her little

132 September 2004 view, including those in which dots struation and thousands of con­ and happy at last. represent stars, numbers galax­ tacts at the site of the most Eschewing the gritty ies, and arrows the continual absorbent part of a woman's body anger of Sue Coe and the expansion of the universe), and before turning its attention to street cynicism of Robbie the technique appears, too, at tiny Halliburton's opportunities in Iraq. Conal, Bag reaches an scale, in dots that are punched out Elsewhere, Coven offers Procter audience she has primed of already etched sheets. The & Gamble a drawing with a with laughter. miniature number or arrow creat­ woman's face in place of repro­ -Edward Leffingwell ed by this technique is surrounded ductive organs, "giving a face to by a haze of ink, a linear ambigui­ the genitalia," and enumerates the ty enhancing the sense that the instances of the firm's use of ani­ Helen Altman mal testing. at DCKT artist intends to undermine clarity I in one way or another. A storyboard for Bechtel begins For her first New York solo Pindell has related the grids and with the corporate logo, proceeds show, "Smoke Signal," numbers to memories of her through drawings of an orgy and FortWorth-based artist father, who was a mathematician, concludes as a sated participant Helen Altman presented a and the dots to history (in segre­ licks the logo. NIMH lists mental small selection of her gation-era restaurants, for exam­ disorders prevalent in the U.S., unusual works-12 "torch ple, red dots painted on dishware and Eli Lilly appears as an octo­ drawings" and three quilt- and utensils designated use by pus, an idea nixed as "confusing ed "moving blankets." To black people). It is not necessary and unsettling" by the manufactur­ make the former pieces, to know this in order to sense that er of Prozac. Reimagined as the Altman soaks sheets of these works, which so effectively suicide of a depressed teen, the cotton paper in water for inhabit a territory of secret codes revised plan addresses "the hours or sometimes and broken rules, are somehow depressive, Christian youth we Alex Bag: Rush Limbaugh, 2004, graphite on days; then, using the paper, 22 by 19½ inches; at Elizabeth Dee. connected to highly personal want." The adjacent wall is given flame of a propane torch meanings. -Faye Hirsch to drawings of Michael Jackson as one would a paint- and Rush Limbaugh. With his chil­ brush, she delicately, and swiftly, printed on canvas, which Altman dren masked as Spider-Man, sears images of various creatures subsequently applies to a pack­ Jackson is wrapped in the twin (a rooster, two mules, a rearing ing blanket using a thermal serpents of the caduceus-one of horse, among others) onto the transfer technique. The top­ them a double helix-promoting damp paper. This unforgiving tech­ stitching is professionally applied trust in Monsanto, deliverers of nique, open to chance and ruin­ at a quilting factory. Calling Agent Orange, Bovine Growth the pictures must be completed in attention to the framing edge of Hormone and aspartame, for under 10 minutes so as not to the composition, all three quilts "changing the global food market ignite-results in sharp, elegant on view here were bordered with forever." Limbaugh's body is a renderings. a narrow strip of solid-colored pentagram, crowned by horns and Hung unframed, these stark cloth. But Gulls (2003, 78 by 109 a burning candle, surrounded by works covered an entire wall of inches) and Horse (2002, 128 by an aura depicting OxyContin, a the gallery(they average in size 134 inches) also had broad, highly addictive narcotic famously around 24 by 20 inches). Each irregular rectangular swatches of used by Limbaugh himself, who animal is shown completely isolat­ patterned fabric placed along says, "Try it today, need ii tomor­ ed, without context or even a hori­ one edge. row, cherish it always, and then zon line, while the siennas, ochers Like Ark, her 1992-95 work con­ simply enter an exclusive inpatient and blacks of the scorches make sisting of an 11-foot-tall mound of detoxification facility." The remain­ for forms that pop out from the store-bought faux burning logs ing wall is covered with a wallpa­ bare backgrounds. They hover that emit an electrical glow like perlike series of repeated images like sad, inadequate specters of firelight, Altman continues to in ink, ornamented by scrolls in their real-life alternates on the explore our human compulsion to Alex Bag red and featuring drawings of empty white ground. Altman manufacture nature, and the hanged witches, palmistry and wields her torch with great dexteri­ inevitable feeling of nostalgia that at Elizabeth Dee physiognomy studies. ty, varying the shape and size of follows our unavoidable failure. Seriously engaged with grudges Screened large in a darkened her stroke-Standing Polar Bear -Jessica Ostrower to bare, Alex Bag conjured gallery, Bag's video loop sent up (2002) appears composed of the multifaceted installation the enthusiasm of television blotches rather than the velvety "Coven Services for Consumer advertisements, one of them pro­ strokes found in Panda or Duck Helen Altman: Panda, 2003, torch Mesmerism, Product Sorcery, and moting Jessica Lynch's "I Am a (both 2003), the polar bear's soft, drawing on paper, 23 ½ by 22 ¼ inches; the Necromantic Reimagination of Soldier Too," starring Bag as sagging underbelly a bouquet of at DCKT. Consumption," a fantasy PR firm Lynch, praising Halliburton's pres­ chocolaty and tawny brown in the service of big science, cor­ ence in Iraq: "Halliburton will be splotches. porate whores and media luminar­ here every step of the way, mak­ The vulnerability, both in ies. Papering the gallery space ing bad things good." For Eli Lilly, method and display, of the torch with tear sheets, notes and draw­ Bag is the Wicked Witch, observ­ drawings contrasts with the ings, Bag offered an abundance of ing that "Prozac has made us all inherent durability of Altman's Research and Development ideas so much happier. I'm Eli Lilly. moving blankets. In making the for clients on one of three char­ Trust me with your child's mind." latter works, Altman frequently treuse-painted walls. Among Between commercials, a recur­ uses found photographic images much else, she provides rently startled audience viewed of animals, but this time set amid Halliburtonwith a new approach the infamous phosphorescent natural scenery-on view here to the promotion of tampons and chartreuse of the Paris Hilton sex were a horse, dog and a flock of pads high in toxic dioxin. Coven video, an enthusiastic icon of con­ seagulls. The photos are then Servicesclocks 38 years of men- spicuous consumption, filthy rich scanned into a computer and