Nick Cave, Until (2016) installation view, MASS MoCA. Photo by James Prinz, courtesy of MASS MoCA. — Nick Cave, *Until* (2016) installation view, MASS MoCA. Photo by James Prinz, courtesy of MASS MoCA.

"Is there Racism in Heaven?"

Added on January 30, 2017 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

JG: How does the question, “Is there racism in heaven?” connect to the show’s title, Until?

NC: The title comes from the phrases “innocent until proven guilty” or “guilty until proven innocent.” Both are linked to police brutality in America. This morning, the Chicago crime stats came out for the month of October. Seventy-two people were shot and killed in October. Five hundred eighty-two people have been killed so far this year. I feel called to action, and I’m trying to find a way, as a visual artist with a specific sense of responsibility, to be proactive. How can I create a project that will reach hundreds of thousands of people and raise their level of consciousness about these issues?

Interview with Mary Reid Kelley on Hyperallergic

Added on October 27, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

MacArthur Fellow Mary Reid Kelley on Dismantling Sexual Taboos with Humor

Read the full text of the interview on Hyperallergic here.

In Mary Reid Kelley’s videos, bawdy characters, performed by the artist, bewitch with complex wordplay. Produced with Patrick Kelley, the videos are set inside a black-and-white world of bespoke props and costumes where ancient Greek mythology mingles with allusions to art history and popular culture alike. The cadence of the scripts, which are written in meter, slows down the spinning narratives, as they delve into gender iniquity and sexual taboos. Last month, Kelley was named a MacArthur Fellow for her cultural contributions, especially her cerebral commentary on women’s roles throughout history.

* * *

Jacquelyn Gleisner: Your process begins with extensive research. While you were working on “You Make Me Iliad” (2010), you read accounts from soldiers and medical officers about prostitutes during World War I. In this film and others, you focus on untold stories of female trauma and working conditions for women. What is important to you about writing and narrating stories from these perspectives?

Mary Reid Kelley: Most World War I material is about the soldier experience, and is from their perspective, but there is significant scholarship about women workers. We know that women drove ambulances. We know that women worked in huge numbers in munitions factories. Women have been interviewed about their work in munitions and nursing. Yet there is an enormous difference between these women and the women who did sex work, about whom there’s almost nothing. We didn’t lose those stories through carelessness. They were suppressed. The primary suppressors were the women themselves because the personal consequences of telling that story would have been enormous.

Read more

Mary Reid Kelley: We’re Wallowing Here in Your Disco Tent with High Line Art (High Line Channel 14, 14th Street Passage, on the High Line at West 14th Street) continues through November 2.

Mary Reid Kelley, "The Thong of Dionysus," 2015. HD video, black-and- white, sound; 9 minutes, 27 seconds. Courtesy of the artist, Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects and Fredericks & Freiser Gallery, New York

Places Within Us: Jesse Chun’s On Paper Series

Added on October 12, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

“When we say we are in a place, we make it seem like we are inside of a particular place, but those places are within us, too.”

— Jesse Chun

Art21, "New Kids on the Block" - Places Within Us: Jesse Chun's On Paper Series

Last month I met up with the Brooklyn-based artist Jesse Chun to talk about the work at her recent show, On Paper. In her recent show at the Spencer Brownstone Gallery in New York City, Chun exhibited three categories of works: landscapes, blueprints, and poetry. Each category begins with the appropriation of immigration paperwork and passports. The landscapes have been digitally manipulated, culled from imagery found inside passports from different countries, while the blueprints and poems result from editing and purging texts on immigration forms. Together the works visualize the collective transit of an increasingly mobile population.

You can read more about Chun's work here.

Dr. Moseley Answers Your Questions

Added on September 28, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

A belated update! Last month I wrote about the fictional character, Dr. Howard Moseley, who opines on securing gallery representation and the mysterious nature of creative expression.

Art in Embassies Exchange Description!

Added on May 27, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

I love this photo! The Art in Embassies website has updated my profile with information about our time last October.

Botswana's Dust

Added on April 15, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

I’m in a helicopter. Below me, the mouth of the Okavango Delta in Maun, Botswana. I see two giraffes, their tall silhouettes blending into the trees. A zeal of zebras emerges from the grass. Then hippos, elephants, and a field full of wildebeests come into view. Dust clouds follow the frantic hooves of a wildebeest running from the herd. Finally, I see three gray baboons moving slowly into the shade.

I wrote a personal essay about my time in Botswana last October through the Art in Embassies Program. I also wrote about a few of the frustrations and joys of creating a career as an artist.

http://www.arteidolia.com/botswana-dust-jacquelyn-gleisner/

Sculptures at the Molepolole College of Education in Molepolole, Botswana — Sculptures at the Molepolole College of Education in Molepolole, Botswana

Caitlin Berrigan's Unfinished State

Added on April 13, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

“I wanted to envision a different narrative for these unfinished projects outside of the micro-histories of conflict and capitalism in Lebanon,” said Caitlin Berrigan.

Today in the Art21 magazine, read my article about artist Caitlin Berrigan and her project Unfinished State, an exploration of science fiction and forgotten environments, complicated by present systems of power. This article was published on the 41st anniversary of the Lebanese Civil War.

http://blog.art21.org/2016/04/13/caitlin-berrigans-unfinished-state/

Caitlin Berrigan. Helicopter Pad, Rachid Karami International Fair Park, from Unfinished State, 2015. Postcard from series; 14.8 x 10 cm. Courtesy of the artist. © Caitlin Berrigan. — Caitlin Berrigan. Helicopter Pad, Rachid Karami International Fair Park, from *Unfinished State*, 2015. Postcard from series; 14.8 x 10 cm. Courtesy of the artist. © Caitlin Berrigan.

Purchase the book here.

New Sketchbook pages!

Added on April 1, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

Six new sketchbook pages... nearing the end of my moleskin sketchbook, the third book in the series.

The Worm

Added on March 19, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

The Worm

BY RALPH BERGENGREN

When the earth is turned in spring

The worms are fat as anything.

And birds come flying all around

To eat the worms right off the ground.

They like the worms just as much as I

Like bread and milk and apple pie.

And once, when I was very young,

I put a worm right on my tongue.

I didn't like the taste a bit,

And so I didn't swallow it.

But oh, it makes my Mother squirm

Because she thinks I ate that worm!

VCCA

Added on March 18, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

Over the last week I have been at VCCA for a residency. These images are sketches of an idea I am still developing to make a scribble and scrim of a painting on a window. All the pieces of paper in this installation are recycled from earlier works. On a bright day the sun creates a dramatic shadow drawing on the floor.

Virginia Center for the Creative Arts: http://www.vcca.com/main/index.php

Article in Air Botswana on Art in Embassies

Added on February 4, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

If you are flying with Air Botswana this month, be sure to check out the article on Art in Embassies in Peolwane magazine.

Pop Up Show in Rochester, NH

Added on February 2, 2016 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

Go check out one of my paintings in downtown Rochester, NH that has been installed in a vacant storefront window!

For more information, visit: http://www.rochestermfa.org

Guest Editor for the Art21 Magazine

Added on July 12, 2015 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

Hi Friends! I'm the guest editor for the Art21 magazine, focusing on sincerity as the theme for July and August 2015. You can read my letter from the editor at this link:

http://blog.art21.org/2015/07/06/letter-from-the-editor-jacquelyn-gleisner/#.VaLIgUIbt6k

"The Absurd Magic of Vincent Como"

Added on February 5, 2015 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

“I recognize the absurdity of making art,” Como explained. “It’s the same absurdity as existence. We are here for a finite period of time. What are we doing, and does it even matter?”

READ MORE from my interview with artist Vincent Como in Art21's "Magic" Issue:

http://blog.art21.org/2015/02/05/the-absurd-magic-of-vincent-como/#.VNPz2sbqZUQ

Vincent Como. Procession of Dust (Entropy, Ontology, and the Hubris of Mankind) 002, 2014. Frame, double-sided tape, dry pigment; 16 x 20 inches. Courtesy of the artist and MINUS SPACE, Brooklyn, NY, © Vincent Como. — Vincent Como. *Procession of Dust (Entropy, Ontology, and the Hubris of Mankind) 002*, 2014. Frame, double-sided tape, dry pigment; 16 x 20 inches. Courtesy of the artist and MINUS SPACE, Brooklyn, NY, © Vincent Como.

Image from Scott's recent performance “On the Impossibility of Freedom in a Country Founded on Slavery and Genocide” on October 7, 2014 in Brooklyn, New York.

Art21: New Kids on the Block | "The Demands of Dread Scott"

Added on November 4, 2014 by Jacquelyn Gleisner.

“I don’t think art by itself is a revolution,” Scott explained, “but I think that it can contribute to people more substantially and fundamentally seeing a different world.”

READ MORE from my interview with Brooklyn-based artist Dread Scott for Art21's "Revolution" Issue:
http://blog.art21.org/2014/11/04/the-demands-of-dread-scott/#.VFjK1P2nLA4