Ann Goldstein's choice at MOCA

Stanley Brown


What a great chance to see the last 10 years of acquisition (and many donations) from upcoming Stedelijk Museum director (and her staff) and now still Moca curator here in LA.

First of all;I get a good feeling about it.
The dutch press said her taste is german (?) But I wouldn't say that.
There is a strong US mythological pop thing going on here.
Think Paul Thek, Mike Kelley; it's all quite edgy, dirty.
It doesn't mean it she will bring all that to Holland. This is very LA.
Very different from the more delicate NY art scene.
Only one terrible Albert Oelhen painting and a interesting photo work by Hanne Darboven.
Anyway; check it out;
(sorry for the bad pictures and some misspelled names)

Matthew Monahan

(??forgot the name of the artist-gift of Mike Kelley)

John Bock

Olof Falstrøm (? ) (The other Rio sweed)
(the other one is Jonas Ohlsson)

Jimmy Durham


Rachel Weinstein (...)

Forgot the name; but like it .
(it's not Kenny Sharf, but made me think about it)

Christian Marclay (A very good sound-video installation)
She should do a big show with him in SM. Think that would really go well in Amsterdam.
I think it's still a under estimated artist.


Weird erotic thiftstore-style painting by John Altoon (1925-1969). Gift of Mike Kelley

Robert Smithson (...) strange drawings...

Barbara Kruger + Mike Kelley

Albert Oelhen.


Sergey Jensen

Yurt in LA

After 9 days of traveling; From Tijuana I drove to San Fransico and from there with a camper across Nevada, Utah & Arizona. A distance like from Stockholm to Napoli and back, but with only a few villages in between.
Grumpy europeans like to say americans don't know what happens outside of their country and have no clue about the rest of the world. True or not; traveling across the overwhelming american landscape, it is quite refreshing and revealing for a euromind like mine; how Americans see things. Big off course.
But the bigness of the landscape is not man made. The wide perspective is a optimistic view. It is not romantic at all.
There is a lot of wilderness in this country. This wilderness means real danger.
Cellphones don't work in the dessert, for 4 days my cellphone didn't recieved any signal. This may sound ironic and silly; But when you see a sign ;next gas station 187 miles (250km). You better make a U-turn and fill up your tank. Something we europeans have no clue about. Holland is off course the contra-pole of the US landscape. 100% man made; No accidents, no danger, no problem.
I still need some time to digest all these landscapes.

And that's what I am doing now in a Yurt in LA.
I am staying in a yurt in the very mexican neighborehood Lincoln Heights. My friends have a house with a wonderful garden,yuccas, grapefruittrees, many pepertree's.
(these a californian peper tree's; it's not normal peper, but looks and smells like red peper ).
It's a small paradise, like there are so many in LA but you will only see them if you know people. Amazing view over the downtown area, and a small modern yurt. (If you don't know people here; it's difficult, not to say hostile)

I've stayed in a yurt in Holland before; but now it is strange to stay in one, and looking at the sealing and realize how much it looks like my piece in Tijuana;
Normally the inspiration comes before, not after.
How do you call that? When you (an artist) sees all kind of things that reminds you of something you've made.

Life under a big stone

I came across these strange navajo little houses in the Arizona dessert; By constructing a little wall around a corner of a big rock, the Navajo indians used the shadow being created by these massive stones. A bit like the insect habitats under rocks

Tijuana;kids & danger-paintings

On a previous trip to Mexico, I found in a friendly shop on a beach, postcards of little kids posing with dead bloody sharks.
I was a little shocked....
I thought about those images when I looked at these paintings in my Hotel lobby.
Innocent child posing with dangerous animal.

They're pretty obsessed with danger in this culture.
It's interesting to see how much hotel-lobby art tells you about its culture.

I've been told that all these kids have the same father. He is the owner of this hotel-casino where the museum has me staying. And he has his private zoo with elephants, tigers,etc.
All here in Tijuana!
This man was the previous mayor of Tijuana and has 23 kids (with 5 different wives).His name is

Hank Rhon.
But since he hasn't been re-elected two years ago, things have been getting really nasty in Tijuana; Drugs wars between the cartels.
A murder rate of 1021 last year. (Tijuana has 1.2 million inhabitants.)
Meaning that when he was in power he had control over the cartels. He had the power to keep it 'clean'.
(Amsterdam that is just a little smaller then Tijuana and Holland's murder city nr 1; 32 murders in 2008)

Mexican Sounds

A interesting band from Tijuana;
Nortec Pantoptica Orchestra

http://www.myspace.com/panopticaorchestra

and Mexican instituted of sounds; very popular, also on the other side (US)
http://www.myspace.com/mexicaninstituteofsound

Animated painting-Tijuana El Cubo

A few years ago I was invited by San Diego Museum for the show Animated Painting. Now this big show is in Tijuana.
The fysical distance between these two towns is around 50km. But the physological distance is enormous. Mexico is a second world country.
The US -Mexican border is a very big gap. So it makes sense.
The museum is a federal building that hosts everything cultural in Tijuana. Theater, library, imax theater and contemporary art. Mexico, like the US, is very state minded. Each of the 32 states has a lot of power. So this is not a state museum but a govermental institution. Mexico city dropped a big cultural institution called CECUT in Tijuana.
There is one well known art organization here called insite05.
Who has been doing great art-project related to the mexican/US border since 1992 . And invited artists like Arnoud Mik, Francis Alys, Amorales and many many others. A great institution that has set up very good projects. The curator who started this up is Carmen Cuenca.
Until a month she was the Director of the new wing to this museum. She just got fired before the opening of the show.
But Betti-Sue Hertz was the actual curator of this show that also includes;The Barnstormers, Sadie Benning, Jeremy Blake, Sebastián Díaz Morales, Kota Ezawa, Ruth Gómez, William Kentridge, Magali Lara, Ann Lislegaard, Takeshi Murata, Julian Opie, Qiu Anxiong y Robin Rhode.


Not one mouth cap against the mexican flew. Just a sombrero

julian Opie


Ann Lissegard

Sadie Benning

Robin Rhoad

Serge Onnen (better images here)

The Mexelent museum staff girls

pharmacy-paradise

Tijuana is a paradise for sick people. There are pharmacies on every street corner.
Not only the sizes of a MacDonald.
They even look like them.
From the inside they look like a Damien Hirst-discount store.

The reason of their existence is that most Americans don't have insurance and when you don't have insurance you pay full price for drugs.
Making it worth the trip to Mexico to buy medicine.
They load up their pick-up truck with cheap painkillers, viagra, etc.


But now, with the mexican flue & the cartel wars......
The gringos don't come no more.
Not even the sick gringos.
Sad for the sick gringo's sad for the mexicans.





There are also many dentists and plastic surgery-clinics.