Vested Histories: Shinique Smith

Painting has a romance with itself, and its history; fabric's attractions are always to someone else. An intrinsically disembodied medium, fabric connotes apparel. Yet what it suggests—nudity and erotic intimacy; the line in the sand between profanity and propriety—seems too loaded to be properly unpacked. Fabric seems to always ask "who?" As in: who wore it, owned it, discarded it, designed it, sweatshopped it, mass-marketed it­, knocked it off, etc­­. When fabric is used in the construction of an artwork, this whisper of "who" follows the work, disrupt the object's autonomy. In the case of artist Shinique Smith, whose sculptural work primarily comprises used clothing, re-configuration and re-contextualization are uncertain steps toward that autonomy.

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Bazaar Library

The street booksellers in the Village, some of whom defiantly sell their vast and varied selection right in front of the Barnes and Noble on Sixth Avenue, represent New York at its bibliophilic best. The printed works they sell represent their own secondary economy: big ticket fashion magazines, anthologies and art books are purchased at full price by those who can afford them, then get passed down at a cut rate to NYU and New School students via street sellers, who have an enviable overhead and unenviable climate control. This evening, The Bidoun Library Project, a newly-formed archive of Middle Eastern publications compiled by Bidoun magazine in conjunction with The New Museum's Museum as Hub program, has invited some of the Village's street booksellers to bring their words eastward and set up shop in front of The New Museum. On Friday, September 10, the Bidoun Library Project will also feature an audio-video presentation at the museum. Here, we speak to Bidoun Senior Editor Negar Azimi about the project.


AIMEE WALLESTON: How was the Bidoun Library Project conceived? What was the ultimate goal?

NEGAR AZIMI: Initially, the library was born of the instinct to simply get books we happen to love and that are often hard to find in the Middle East out there circulating: rare artist monographs, avant-garde magazines, children's books, comic books, zines—you name it. The Bidoun Library had its first outing in Abu Dhabi of all places, but has since taken on a life of its own, adapting to every new location and situation. Before New York, it has traveled to Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and Beirut. Next, it will move on to Cairo.

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In Basel: New Jerseyy State of Mind

The art world's upper echelon doesn't typically travel to Art Basel's yearly fair for boxing lessons. However, in the imminent bubble doom of 2008, learning how to dodge, weave and roll with the punches might not have been such a bad idea. For their first exhibition, in 2008, Basel's New Jerseyy art space opened a boxing gym. Curated by John Armleder and armed with a passel of his students, the gym held organized workouts and set up a few matches between artists. Since then, the space, founded by curator Daniel Baumann and artists Tobias Madison, Emanuel Rossetti, and graphic designer Dan Solbach, has presented shows that combine better-known contemporary artists—Cory Archangel recently partnered with the crew at No Soul for Sale at the Tate Modern—and community-based projects.
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No Rest for the Weary

What makes a painter paint? And what transforms the application of paint into a painting? Those questions, among other epistemologies, are at the nexus of Minnesota-born artist JJ PEET's current show of work, The Sunday Painter, at Miami Diet. PEET compares himself with contemporaries in the worlds of marketing and advertising, to determine that the identity of a painter is, historically, a radical act of self-definition. Being a contemporary painter means building an interior psychological structure that houses the belief in creative autonomy divorced from mass-produced commodity. In order for this interior structure to function, it must be assembled with a foundational conviction that if one commits the act of painting, viewers will eventually, for better or worse, look at it as product—even if it doesn't contain images of Coca Cola or celebrities.
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