by Ann Klefstad, editor   October 8, 2007

This week we feature a Greg Watson poem, some great art from the north, and revisit the fascinating Monica Sheets Jerome Fellows project by way of an essay on competition by Michael Fallon.



Cheryl Reitan brings us news of Alison Aune, a vivid painter / bricoleuse who constructs artworks out of cracker wrappers, textile history, memory, and paint. Her show is coming up this month at the Duluth Art Institute.

Lightsey Darst saw Deborah Jinza Thayer’s new “Movement Architecture” at the Southern last week, and brings us her insights into this fascinating choreographer’s diverse and nearly unclassifiable work: this one composed of “verve and cringe, attraction and repulsion.”

Read Rich Horton’s piece on Mary Bue’s new release, “Boat Without Oars”—Horton, the editor of Rift magazine, always has his ear to the ground, listening for things that most don’t hear. Check out his words on Bue’s strong performance.

Michael Fallon was asked to write an essay for Monica Sheets’ fascinating piece for the Jerome Fellows exhibition. Monica, rather than doing a “piece” of her own, contributed a collection of work by some of the artists who applied to the grant program but were rejected (she invited all of the artists who had unsuccessfully applied; some chose not to participate). Then she asked Michael to write an essay on competition in the art world. Here it is—along with a reprise of his essay from last week on the plethora of lip service paid to “creativity” in the current popular culture.

Hannah Dentinger caught the show that cartoonist and painter Chris Monroe did at Starfire Screenprinting; it’s a lot of fun. Look for a children’s book (“Monkey With a Toolbelt”) from Monroe soon!

The main artist featured in this week's Some Assembly Required, Jon Nelson’s sampling of sampled music, is Australia's B'O'K, whose collage track, "Breaking Windows" is composed entirely of default Microsoft Windows sounds-- it is AMAZING. The featured artist at the SAR Blog is Swedish mashup artist DJ Cal.

What Light this week features Greg Watson’s “Memo,” a poem evoking the erasure and blurring of time and the materiality of memory with oblique precision.

We revisit Justin Rubin and John Merigliano’s “Pale Memory,” a fascinating multimedia look at a nearly lost poet of the early twentieth century, the young Samuel Rubinstein, an American Keats in a Lower East Side charity hospital.