thanks for visiting

Hey guys, here's the final segment of Jeff and my 'museum.' Jeff designed the concepts and I executed them in soppy satirical prose. So, I hope you guys enjoyed the whole trip through the virtual museum. Up next...LAB!

8.

Alright, my wonderful guests of this wonderful tour, we are arriving at the end! And endings are such fine, sweet things, aren’t they? Yes. Well, just this way. Yes, right around the corner. Ah, yes, here we are: the final display.

Well, it’s a video, but before we actually go in to view it, I’d like to break protocol and say a few things.

First off: the artist responsible for this – how should I say: evidence? – we’re about to witness is Jeffrey James Wilde. He is what some would call a provocateur, but not in any traditional sense of the word. He does not discover grand statements between the periods of a woman’s menstrual period or write words in bat shit. No, his modus operandi – if you will – is more the lack of any activity to bring provocation. Last summer – even – he removed the heads from celebrities in movies and showed them in a marathon in Chicago. And two years before that, he raced around in a car and recorded himself singing loudly over popular road songs. He called that piece “White Fuzz.” And my particular favorite, I think: JJ Wilde once hung a blank, four hundred foot long banner down the side of the Empire State Building for three months. People often said it was like seeing into the bones of the building, but – oh Jeffrey – he just waved away the notion. “It’s all about nothing,” – yes – that’s what he can always be counted on to say.

Second, I suppose then: the piece we are about to view. As I said before, it is a video, but a rather peculiar one at that. It does not depict an actual execution of a work, but instead shows the total meltdown of an idea Jeffrey tried to share – and forcibly so. You see, his idea was to remove all art from the museum for a month and have the vacancy be his exhibit. But – as you’ll soon witness – the Board Members of the Boho Coco Museum were none to pleased with this venture. There were the usual problems of storage, cost, movement, handling – all the boring parts of museum life, really. But JJ Wilde just didn’t want to take no for an answer. And before I give too much away, let me wave you onward. Go. Go and be brave; take a look. See the wild life of art on the brink.

The room is empty except for a large flat screen television across the way.

The video is in mid-duration. A man – JJ Wilde perhaps – is seen in black

blazer and beard and sun glasses, and is punching the curator Grace Madero

in the mouth. She buckles and collapses onto the marble floor of the Boho

Coco atrium. Other men in black pants rush the scene and tackle the violent

aggressor. Although there is no sound, he can be scene screaming and flailing.

In the distance, nicely dressed persons watch in disbelief and keep their distance.

Patrons of the museum calmly pass the disturbance, almost as if they had

expected it, and pay it little heed. Grace Madero rises from the marble, gathers

her bearings, then in a childish fit of revenge, pounces on the violent man and

begins to jab him in the face. The black panted men who had tackled the

aggressive man now turn their attention to Grace and pull her away. She

screams too. Her legs flail too. This is not behavior fitting a museum curator.

The video cuts and loops back to the beginning. The violent man is composed

now, stood opposite Grace. They shake hands and giggle. The nicely dressed

persons are near the too. They shake hands. Then something is said. The

bearded man pauses and stares away. He throws his arms in the air and shoves

an older, fine dressed gentleman. Black panted men come from nowhere and

stand on the outskirts of the scene. Grace says something to the violent man

and then he punches her in the mouth.

I know: quite wild, isn’t it? I swear, there was never any inclination that things would scale to such violence. I can say: I for one am not a very violent person. So what happened, I don’t know; it all seems very ridiculous. But there that goes a lamb goes a lion – or something; I think that’s an expression. Anyhow – I must say – I just think that video is a darling. It’s pure JJ Wilde: he wants one thing, but gets another. The funny part of the story is, for the rights and agreement to play the video, we told Mr. Wilde that we would not press charges. He loved the idea. Actually, once a year – just for fun – Wilde returns to the museum to reenact the scene with people dressed in gaudy costumes. He likes to consider himself the string-puller, I assure you. Ahh…maybe there is violence in us all. I think – yes – I do believe such is true.

Well, fine guests, I quite thank you for joining me on the special VIP tour of the Boho Coco Art Museum’s fine collection. I hope you did enjoy yourselves. And if there is anything to take away, I hope it is such that you realize the preciousness of all art, of all moments even. I wish the whole world was a museum, sometimes. I think it not fair that we only have these many walls to hang the mighty efforts of troubadours and forlorn dreamers. I think, however, that you too may have walls, wherever they may be. If I might be so bold – and I do try to stay away from being tacky – let me tell you: hang that which you deem to be true and dear to your heart on those walls. If this be metaphor, then so be it. I prefer to call it reality, however. It’s a simple view – I know – of reality, but with all this war and catastrophe and what-not, let us be simple. Let us be grand and indulgent. Let us – as some famous artist must have said somewhere – “be whatever.” Ahh…that is my tour. Fin. Done. Finito. It – really, I just can’t seem to stop myself – was a pleasure, I assure you. But now I must bid you all adieu. Fare thee well, live well, be well. I’m Grace Madero. Thanks. Ta.

more museum but can you dig it?

Hey chaps, here's another entry in Jeff and my 'museum' masterwork. Zounds!

7.

Come now, folks, we are almost at the end of our tour. Have you been enjoying yourselves? I think – yes, I think – that it has been resplendent. But, as all things, my good patrons, they end, don’t they? Well, come along. We have a real treat for you next.

Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you: Grumblecore. Yes, look around you, step into the room, watch a film clip our two, and put the headphones on in the meditation room. It’s a movement – oh I don’t know – that’s accepting of all kinds. Even if you hate it, you love it. Oh, but I’ve said too much already. Go on. Dive in.

There is a large room composed of tiny alcoves and short benches.
On the far wall a large screen showing waves and electro pulses and
a 1-2-3-4 countdown to a film; a projector hides from view, putting
image to sound to space. Other walls contain other movies clashing
and grooving to the facets of ugly people applying makeup to genitals
and simple looking dudes smashing pies into sidewalk café windows.
The alcoves, tiny black hideaways carved into the remaining two walls,
are full of headphones, ten or so per nook, covered with silver paint and
black speckle. The headphones posses groans and trembles, wails at
times, and more often than not, temper tantrums and childish rants. The
overall mood is a grumy slump of human experience. The movie is
not overarching, but it is sly. It shows one man stood in front of a bus
stop forcefully grumbling and giving looks of anger and dread to the
passersby. This could be any street. And in the center of the room,
written upon the floor, white letters read, “Who cares? Pro bono?
Enhh…” It is a dark piece of curtain-slung-world that exists like this;
the sound of the place is hushed annoyance.

Okay folks, had time? Yeah? Well, I think this installation is marvelous. To enter an entire universe proper, to be enveloped not just by the sight nor the sound, but – I like to believe – the very feel of what it must have been to be epicenter to an art movement. Yes, Grumblecore: this is it. Created by one simple mad man named D Diderson Diderono, it is a cause celebre of malaise and discontent. Diderono was a regular Joe, once upon a time. He was – in fact – a civil engineer for some years. Somewhere in his mid-thirties – although some dispute the time frame exactly – was when Diderono started making his art. The very first piece he came up with was an apple pie with a nail file in it. Apparently he gave it to his boss as a joke. He quit that same day. And then soon enough, his general prankish taste in art gave way to an overall disenchantment about the world at large. He started smacking people with cakes and started defecating on laws and began calling it his manifesto. And he gathered some followers on the way, oh boy did he. Great, wonderful, marvelous people who would go on to participate in other seminal moments in art history found themselves lured to the mystique and grandeur of Diderono. Oh, let’s see: there’s Gretchen Greco, founder of the Nameless Painters; Simon O, founder of the rock group Ain’t Nothing Been Happening Since the Dawn of Time; Gerard Uni, the now deceased man behind the parody of the Statue of Libery, the Statue of Disparity; and then we also have Nina McKone, the sad sweet girl behind the Ivory Wall installation in New Francisco and the Black Ball in Philsey. It was wonderful, a good time to be alive and to be artistic. A grand creative spark, oh yes. But, okay, you may be asking: what the hell does Grumblecore mean? I think it’s really all about letting loose in the face of domestication, of post-modernization, globalization, gentrification, lousy love, rat bastard politicians, and the academic defeat of the infantile curious mind. Grumblecore – for me at least – is very much these things and more. It’s a dirty t-shirt, it’s a pair of torn sneakers, it’s a cat left out on a cold porch with claws and alabaster. Oh geez, I do wax poetic when near these maniacs. No, folks, really, I like to come here and just listen to the groans and watch the old maniac at the bus stop. It is primitive and ephemeral. This – yes I say – is a force that needs a reckoning. It’s no wonder after getting sick of his art, Diderono jumped off a subway platform and hid as a train sped by him, nearly ripping his nose off. It’s no wonder he just disappeared into a hermit’s life and never came back. Most importantly, however, this movement, Diderono’s art, the creative community that broke bread with him, is founded on the ideal that modern day living is just the pits. It’s refreshing that these objects are here, that these people were on the warpath, for us. That we can take a deep breath – or not – and the world will still roll and the disillusion – the fact that yes, none of us are alone – will be there to meet it. The world is beautiful in its ugliness, glorious in its trash. Oh – I didn’t coin that phrase either. That’s from our man Diderono, ever-grump-poet that he was.

Well, I encourage you, take some more time, really listen, sit and be grumpy. Maybe grumble yourself. Be free, friends, be free.

the museum comes for you at midnight

Hey guys, here's the next part of Jeff and my collaborative writing effort, 'Museum.' Holy cow, Jeff picked some awesome material for me to base this piece on. Let's just say, don't read this if you're about to get into a wicked game of one-on-one self-pleasure. Ohhhhhh!

6.

Okay folks, our next piece is rather graphic, and I must say at this time all those who do not wish to view explicit sexual acts need leave. Don’t fret, I will come and notify you once this part of the tour is over. Thank you.

Alright, for those remaining, follow me. I have to admit, I’m impressed by how many of you chose to stay and view the next exhibit with me. What you’re about to see has gotten our Boho Coco Museum in some trouble. But art is ever defended by the Constitution. Simply arrive with open eyes and an open mind, that’s what I always say. Ah, here we are. The exhibit is just beyond these doors. I think you should go in there a moment without for a moment. Allow yourself to be affected by the work. Remember, open minds, open minds. Okay.

In a small room without windows, four projectors shine upon the walls.
They display moving images of elderly men and women performing
fellatio upon strange penises. The sounds of old clips of C-Span echo off
the walls. And although the room is very small, its ceiling appears to
stretch on forever. And though the elderly sexed people are spry, they
have wrinkles and they have blemishes. And although the penises pictured
are long and stiff, they are discolored and are un-profound. The voices of
senators and representatives haunt the establishment.

So, folks, how was the moment alone? Do you feel offended? You know, truthfully, I suppose this piece does offend me. It’s my least favorite in the entire museum. It seems cheap and obvious to me, but, as a good curator, I am above opinions and preferences when giving a tour. I can simply say that their acts of oral pleasure leaves me could. I think it could have been beautiful, but… Ahem! Excuse me; forgive me my tangent. I believe it obvious that the artist is seeking to assault the viewer, but perhaps you’ve all seen differently than I. And if you have – bravo – I commend you. I, however, cannot stomach this piece for much longer. Please step out with me now and I will explain more.

Okay: the artist who made the work was named Reginal Vlance. He was a contradiction of sorts. Vlance was known to be a provocateur, but he was also notoriously shy of the limelight. He considered himself a failure, but to attest to his prowess, he dubbed himself the “Senator of Sex.” So years went by and art was made, but his particular piece was not conceived until the timely passing of Vlance’s maternal grandmother. He decided that it would be appropriate – no, necessary – to pay the woman tribute. First he experimented with pictures of her nude body. The inactivity inherent in her frame startled him. Next, he composed statues of her form and dropped them from heights and blew them apart with dynamite, recording the process. But this too disconcerted Vlance. He felt pressed to forge onward. Then Vlance chanced upon a soundbite from a local politician. The man claimed to be a champion of the elderly, that he would grant them a voice in the body politic. This – Vlance decided – was exactly what he needed to do. To provide the elderly with motion, with movement, to animate them – if not for his dearly departed grandmother – then as tribute for the entire society of the aged. Vlance then took his sobriquet literally and filmed those four short pieces you just witnessed. Now, of course, you might say: “How does that exemplify honor and cherishment?”; “How is that tribute?”; “His own grandmother?” Well, folks, you’ll have to search me there. I find the whole affair in poor taste, but perhaps that’s what the artist had in mind. Perhaps that is all he had in mind. Perhaps he saw something sweet and beautiful in the fellations of the elderly pictured. Perhaps he simply wanted to arouse interest in the plight of the old and the feeble, to illustrate their remaining primacy, and to explore the dynamic of political exploitation of those who desperately need a voice. The elderly are to be respected – above all. They are to be watched and admired and listened to. Travesty in the room behind us you might say, but triumph for others. If you do not agree, simply wipe the slate of your mind clean. But I warn you, such things – ever in the realm of art – yet prove to be near impossible. Difficult for certain. Dangerous perhaps. It is true: the images haunt me; they will haunt me still.

Okay! Let’s go retrieve our other tour members and proceed on to the next exhibit. Follow me

the museum is in us all

Hey fellows, returning once more to the house that Boho built, here is the next addition of Jeff and my monumental epic to pomp and circumstance, "Museum." Come and stay with us; donate a little if you like; browse the store; speak with a docent; steal a work of art.

5.

Hey guys, can I get you to come this way? Cool. Watch your steps. Oh no, that’s alright. That piece is actually meant to be activated by kinetic atmosphere. It’s a wind sock, really. What? Ha. No, I’m kidding. Of course. Oh yes, it’s all sacred.

Oh well, really, here we are at our next exhibit. It’s titled “Not so important people live here,” and it’s a photographic show of small homes, rutted roads, countryside, and other elements of underdeveloped places – the forgotten states if you will. The states aren’t named, of course – that would be cruel – but if you just follow along the contours of the photographs, you might be able to figure out the region.

The first photograph is a beaten house foundation and a chimney

standing erect in a prairie scene. There is a kitchen sink left lying

in the center of the torn down house. The next picture is two lovers

holding hands and standing on a snowy bridge. The third picture

focuses on a giant tire in the middle of a creek. ‘No survivors,’ is

written upon its façade. The fourth picture features a blue house

stood beside a tree. The name on the address says ‘Wilson.’ More

pictures prominently display mountains and roads, crosses and

window latches, women with dirty mouths, children kicking gutters,

and errant men in search of hats. The finale picture shows a rope

swing dangling over a lake.

Yes, it is romantic, isn’t it? The elements of the compositions – those that are not so meager, those that inherit and invest in preconceptions – are full and vibrant. It’s a little point of pride, actually, but I lived in an area featured in one of these photographs. I can’t tell which one, but – well, it’s a secret I long to keep. That’s the point, people. Secrets, of course. The great American pastime. I like to look over these photos and imagine a million maids and elementary teachers and garbage men trouncing about the pace of their lives. Would that they would have known about their ghostly presence in our midst, eh folks? Also, pay attention to the levels of light in each photo. The dimmer the picture, the more remote the location. Yes, it’s easy to discern what the artist meant – isolation, loneliness, sameness, proximity – but let’s go one further: harmony. Is it that each picture is balanced, or is it balanced in what is missing? We have lovers, an ersatz tire, a candelabra, a gazebo, a waterfall. Human achievement, the endeavor of our struggle and the epic failure of our existence, written large here. It does not spell god, but it isn’t far off, is it? What’s missing, I asked earlier: well, are any of you there in the pictures? Imagine if you were. Would you be here now? Where would you be? Think on that, I think, and explore. I’ll be waiting.

the museum is still open

Hey fellows, here is the next installment in the 'museum' series. Hope you guys are digging it, and oh goodness, isn't that curator just a blowhard? And hey, did you guys go check out the Boho Coco literary zine yet? Don't miss out (or just come to our Domy Books show on August 30th at 8PM). Cool.

4.

Alright, guests, just this way. Next we have a series of paintings depicting the sordid drinking life of film icon Humphrey Bogart. …I think he was elegant, don’t you? Anyway, the artist who composed these pieces, Aretha Dere, had what you might call an obsession with good old Bogie. She wasn’t just a fan, she would say, she was a lover.

There are five paintings in all. A movie legend stalks the frame. His face

is prominent in the first four, but only his knuckles and a glass of scotch

are evident in the final. The colors are mostly black or white with hints of

blue. Some have red when alcohol is prominent. Bogie does not seem to

care that he has an audience. He is cool as a cucumber. And most assuredly

sad. Too sad perhaps.

Yeah, there’s not much to say about these pieces –at in my opinion. Some argue that the image of Bogie suggests the aegis of the 20^th Century. I say: blah blah blah. Listen – I know it is expected of me to defend art in all its glories, but I was never really a big Bogie fan to begin with. I mean: Casablanca; great film, sure. And the image of his haunted eyes in the first two paintings in this room: brilliant, sure. But the Maltese Falcon? Really? A bit much for me. Kind of like the third painting here. Too much bravado. Dere – however – would say not enough. She held a belief that Bogie was more than just an image of sliver on screen. His very potent smile – she would say – indicated the American will, the right to rise and decimate and conquer and win. She saw in him – a quintessential actor, no doubt – the potency of American virility. With the fourth painting – Bogie turning a blind eye to the shattering of his liquor bottle – she suggested that the American spirit has been abandoned. I mean, of course it has. I suppose that is my problem with such figurative material. Her handling of paint is deft, certainly, but the prosaic statement she supposes is a bit sub par. Of course, my opinion need not be yours. I beg you – I suppose I beg myself – be humble before such works of aching obviousness. Who knows?

There are stranger worlds out there still. Hell, I might go see Bogie on the big screen at the film festival next weekend. I don’t know. Who can say? I must says – however – that I do enjoy the final painting in this series. I find it bold. To simply show a hand reaching for alcohol – for an object of slow dissolution and destruction – is a difficult undertaking. Be brave: that’s ultimately what these images purport to say. It may be best to believe them sometimes. Please, pace around. Be enveloped by Bogie’s stare. Feel free to take a moment.

the next wing of the museum

Hey dirigibles, here is the next scintillating part of the 'museum' collab-writing effort between Jeff and myself. And if you have brown eyes, well then, you're already seeing the truth. Dig!

3.

This next room here – and notice that all the walls are brown – contains several artists from the ‘Brown Collective.’ The collective was a group of like minded artists that believed the color brown was an access point for truth – heaven, or so I like to say. And although the idea may sound ludicrous to you, our first artist here - Deacon George – found it to be transcendent beauty.

There stands a brown stick, natural in appearance, but artificial through

and through. It smells distinct and impartial. Its crooks are careful

and strategic. An eerie sense of otherworldly origin is evident. The

stick erects itself from the ground through sheer will. Atop the pointed

stick rests a brown eyeball. When walking around the stick the eye

follows. If one stares intently at the eye, tears may come.

George first posited the idea that if the eyes were the gateway to the soul, and if his were brown, that the color itself must be some indicator of truth. By utilizing this color – by creating things such as his stick here – George sought to commune with the truth. He would go around town painting brown mustaches on movie posters. I once read somewhere where he said he wished the sun was brown. It was this passion for the color brown that got the ball rolling for the collective. The truth as we know it is elusive, but here, George said, here is a touchstone for those hungry and eager. And he delivered that message to fellow artists and they, dutifully, followed.

Our next artist, Regina Gray Gray, was the first follower of George to expand upon his idea. Oh gosh, she was a wonderful damsel. She took the color brown – the search for truth – and simply ran with it. She broadened the scope of the entire collective.

There is a painting of brown border and brown interior. The only

noticeable difference is the hole punched in the center. It has the

shape of a fist. It is menacing. The great hung painting in the center

of the room is a grimace. The painting explores in truth and tone.

Glory in the tough, violent textures of thick oils.

Gray took George’s idea of brown’s representation of truth and juxtaposed the artist’s reach in her interpretation. If brown was the gateway, she boldly claimed, then to place it taut upon a pictorial frame and pierce it was to pierce the truth itself. What insights might we gain, she wondered. She punched the hole herself. Apparently – oh this is just such a great folksy art story – shortly after Gray’s father passed away, she created this piece. She wanted to touch the other side, reach beyond her mortal capabilities. She was not religious, no no, but out of desperation, she sought to achieve an utter act of humanity. This is a piece of twisted grief, here on display for you. I like to think of her, her suffering, as I gaze upon this beautiful canvas. Did she reach a new truth? Who can say? But Gray did consider this moment to be the actualization of the ‘Brown movement.’ From then on, she supplanted George as the main proponent of the brown idea of truth.

Which leads us next to Maxwell Barshoom. He was Gray’s first lover and contributed found objects that were brown or browned by their neglect.

A pair of loafers hang from the ceiling, suspended by wire. They

do not smell, but they do look worn. It is easy to imagine an artist

kicking curbs in them. It is easy to see them upon an average man’s

foot and removed with fury at day’s end. A brown bag rests underneath

the shoes. Half-eaten foods languish in the sack. It is oddly comfortable;

it is oddly familiar.

Barshoom titled the piece “home-sweet-home.” He felt that the shoes symbolized travel, and to travel into the truth – he said – one must be utterly prepared. The food in the brown bag acted as fuel and would – in his words – yield energy necessary to walk with the truth. It was an act of divinity in Barshoom’s mind. He did, in fact, wear the shoes on several occasions, the final being to a terribly wonderful discotheque that used to be nestled in the warehouse district. On that night, a famous comet soared in the overhead, blazing a trail in the sky. Barshoom took this to be portent and dove straight into the Bo River that very night. He did not die, but from then on he would wear only white shoes. Apparently his color perspective had changed. Funny enough, Gray called the man newly colorblind. He dropped out of the movement shortly after. There is a song – I believe – that goes something like the brown shoes don’t quite make it. Or shoes make the man?

Yes, next we see Karen Nederson. She was only in the collective for a few years – just a minor character really – but she did contribute a rather splendid idea to the language of the browns.

There is a large photograph of a voluptuous woman painted head to

toe with brown paint. She is nude. She is a goddess, a mother.

Her face is blank, eyes closed. Her hair is done up. Her feet are small

and lacking, but not beaten and used. Her arms are stretched out

towards the viewer asking something.

Nederson thought that if she painted herself in the truthful color of brown, she could be a vessel for the truth itself. She deemed that in her guise, she would be a fount of wisdom and of beauty. The paint, she exclaimed, must be applied only to a nude frame, for to stand in the shadow of the truth strips us all, as she would often say. Funny story, actually: she was arrested twice in the village for public nudity. Ah, what a crazy kid. But, like I said, she only stayed with the group for several years before proceeding towards racier aspects of the nude female form. I think she had a show recently, yes, at New Task Center for the Arts. I believe it was titled “Butterfly,” but was not too successful. But, c’est la vie, right?

Anyhow, that leads us to our final artist on display, the magnificent Ted Tigh. He was the last of the true brown artists. His was the most gallant concept of all.

Hung low from the high ceiling is an airplane wing. Alongside is a

picture of an entire aircraft painted over in brown. The entirety of the

subject is mesmerizing. At night, such a vessel could be confused

for a UFO. It was a UFO.

Tigh took Nederson’s concept of applying brown paint to a vessel and decided to adorn his plane with the hue. He thought of angels, I’m sure, and in painting his vehicle in the brown of truthful telling, he hoped to fly about as an emissary of the truth. Tigh was a marvelous dreamer – he also painted many bikes and cars brown – but one night, in his brown plane, he became lost. The story goes that he did not turn up for several days. When asked where he’d been, what happened, he replied in one word: heaven. Tigh extrapolated the journey of the color brown one step further to suggest that it is also a gateway to heaven. Some accused the man to be an opportunist and a liar, a manipulator and propagandist. But don’t worry, folks, I say forget that. Art is capable of all things. If Tigh said he went to heaven, then I believe he did. He was a wonderful man – and I would like to say – incapable of lying. Ahh, but well, the controversy surrounding Tigh’s disappearance was enough to disband the collective. It was with heavy hearts – I assure you – George and Gray gave up the pursuit of the color brown. When asked why, they simply replied that the truth had been sullied.

Well, that’s it, then, for this room. The five artists we feature can give you a well rounded idea towards the goals and functions of the “Brown Collective.” We hope – truly – that you do absorb as much as you can from these pieces. I mean, really, it’s a marvelous idea – hell, sometimes I want to paint my face blue, so there you go. Ha. But anyway, look around, I implore you. Forget that there is only one hue and delve into the varied world of these marvelous artists. True – yes, I know I know, ha ha, believe me I know – the color brown might have a more disgusting connotation, but these artists beg that you look beyond that, traverse and transcend truth with them. I promise you’ll be rewarded.

come back to the museum

Here's the next part of Jeff and my epic new collaborative writing piece, 'museum.' If you like this, please subscribe to our newsletter, "Hey, what's up Austin?" It's a favorite thing on Santa's list, also, it doesn't exist. Also, awesome reading at Book People, Dan Boehl. Also, I love your last name. Also, how's do you make it seem so easy? Alright, enough questions. Now some time for some serious farce.

2.

Next up on our tour – if you’ll just follow me this way; ah ah ah, watch out for that mike, ha ha ha – we come to an exquisite piece of summer flare. The artist’s name is Bob Biderson, and he hails from northeast Ohio. The summers there are particularly hot, but also, in the snap of a week or two, not hot at all. Bob’s piece here focuses on the aspects of summer that have been associated with barbecue grills and what not.

A bar b q grill sits near the left half of a white oval room. The grill

is marked with only a smudge of soot. It has three legs and a red round

head. A bag of charcoal briquettes rests alongside and remains un-

opened. Plastic knives are strewn around the piece in a circle. Plastic forks

are stuck standing up, jabbed into the floor. Beer cans hang from strings

from the ceiling and a huge slab of burger is nailed to a white wall. It

is fervent yet yields no scent.

Bob was interested in the visceral poetry of a summer barbecue. He wanted to show what family gatherings could conceal. The circular position of knives and forks suggests something of the occult – tools of the occult, as I kid from time to time – and might even suggest further a demonic rite of passage come summer grilling time. He obviously reinforces this iconography with the burger nailed to the wall. It is hung there like a tiny savior, not allowed to roast in its purpose, but to float forever above the housing of the grill, away from the flames that could prepare it into something edible and desirable. The unopened charcoal bag suggests the un-ripened fruit of sexual bliss the summer might prolong – it is hot after all, isn’t it folks? And the beer cans, daintily held aloft by the tiniest of strings, foretells the doom ever-present in the traditional barbecue gathering. They speak to the lust of the drunken escape – abandon, even – in spite of more harmonious roles of familial belonging and brotherhood.

As for Bob himself – what was the artist like? – well, he was a peculiar, fascinating sort. He was rumored to have shot soft-tipped arrows from his balcony at night and to have once chased his wife down – she driving in a car – across seven city blocks in the buff. He was educated at the New Lowman School of Art and Design, but dropped out in his final year to pursue cattle ranching. It remains to be seen what these eccentricities have added to his work; he is still an active artist and has plans to unveil his mysteriously titled, “Ox Head Bridge,” for us in the coming year. It is top-secret – as are all current commissions by Biderson – but is said to create a hunger so great that it can only be matched by the disgust it generates.

Yes, yes, really great, I know. Go ahead, peruse. Mind the plastic ware: some say it has a life of its own. Please, inspect the burger – oh especially the burger – and feel free to read the wording of the charcoal bag. Bob – being ever present-minded – wrote and decorated it himself.

please enter the museum

Hey, debuting a new collaborative writing project between Jeff Daily and myself, here is 'museum.' This is the first post of perhaps eight detailing a fictional tour through a fictional museum by a fictional curator. If we offend any of you, oh good gravy! Jeff wrote the descriptions of the art objects, and I've written the dialog of the curator. So goodsly goods then. Also, happy birthday to Jeff Daily, some eighty years old today. Hang in there, fella', you still got a long way to go (congratulations, bud!).

1.

Welcome. Welcome, one and all. My name is Grace Madero and I am the directorial curator at the Boho Coco Museum of Art. I will be giving you a guided tour today of our collection. Some say it is prestigious, but please, save all platitudes for the end of the tour. Also, please hold your questions as well. Thanks ever so much. Now, if you will, please follow me.

Real quickly: on our right here are our enormous elevators. They’re composed of construction materials left over from the previous Boho Coco Museum and tension wires that have been bathed in a mixture of blood, semen, and tears from about fifty or so world famous artists. Renee – oh I’m sure you know him – is among them. Yes. Yes, very special. They zip our art around the building as well, so you know, it’s a good deal for us. And also – just quickly – the Luba Lulu Collective outside of East Aulton fashioned these hulks, so I implore you to seek out their work. They’re really a swell bunch of lads. And, hey, if any of you are in need of some elevators – well… ha!

Continuing then. Here we come upon our first exhibit just around this temporary wall. If you look up, you’ll notice the ceiling is composed of green-tinted glass. It’s slanted as well, but that’s more of a functional question than anything else. The glass panels have been thrice blessed by Amazonian shaman. It is a piece unrelated the one we are about to view, but it’s not less glorious. Really, really lucky to have it.

Anyhow, the exhibit. Yes. Please, gather around. Take a look.

A microphone sits buried in feces, trapped under a tiny glass dome.

It is like the sound of silence. There are pictures of rock stars, the

ones who left behind beautiful corpses, adorning the white walls of

the gallery. Brian Jones stares like a prince. Jim Morrison, bearded,

looks like a mountain man. Janis Joplin grins after the most

wonderful shot of Southern Comfort imaginable. John Lennon

shines on behind oval spectacles. Darby Crash and Kurt Cobain

have the bloody raw punk scarred faces of sad angels. The cord

of the mic has been severed and left lifeless out from under the

dome. On the floor between the feces mic and the photograph

lined walls is a trail of muddy footprints and dollar bills. The air

is stale.

This exhibit was created by a young artist – well he died young – by the name of Arthere Remount. He made this piece in nineteen eighty seven. He called it his – what was it? – his piece de continence? He was actually in town when the museum purchased this piece. Somewhere amidst all the fecal matter tucked under the dome is a golden ring his father had given him upon graduating from the New School School of Art and Design. Yes. Really, really lucky to have this piece, and that piece of information, in the museum. I’ve been told the feces are meant to represent his time spent on the rock ‘n’ roll circuit. Apparently, he was a roadie for some bands. I’m not sure which ones in particular. He spent – oh let’s say five years – performing work of the roadie variety. Afterward – Arthere has often been documented saying – he would spend many sleepless nights with the scent of burning vapor in the air. Apparently the rock shows were fraught with wire snaps and electronic implosions. Instruments gone haywire and such.
His dilemma with this piece, as I’ve come to understand it, was that he did not want to glorify the rockers for dying. He only wanted their fetid sense of death – gone now some twenty, thirty, even forty years – to produce a mental sent for the image of the feces mic. Arthere did not even like rock music, or so he told me once. He was, really, he was a great man. This piece speaks to the struggle within each of us to be famous, but to struggle through endless mess to get there. Or perhaps, once there, to struggle with the world we become surrounded in. Yes, the Boho Coco is a lucky place for this. Please, approach the dome. Remember not to touch, however, ha ha.