ghost vomit

A maiden will I die

2011-12-19T06:46:00.000-08:00

Possible Press

2011-12-04T14:38:00.000-08:00

I contributed a piece of writing to the new issue of Possible Press, curated by Michelle Grabner. The Suburban will host the Chicago launch on Saturday, December 17, 7-9pm, in conjunction with Diego Leclery's Polar project.

The Supermale (for Doug)

2011-12-03T08:51:00.000-08:00

Planned escape

2011-12-03T08:49:00.000-08:00

I'm reading these signs of the infidel hates me (after K. Killian)

2011-11-08T16:32:00.000-08:00

Topple the Table of Correspondences

2011-11-07T22:30:00.000-08:00

I have a show opening on November 13th at 2nd Floor Projects in San Francisco. For more information, go here. A limited edition broadside will be produced on the occasion of the exhibition, and will include an essay by Scott Treleaven. Much love and thanks to Kevin Killian and Margaret Tedesco for bringing me out to the West Coast.

So they do not drown (for Mark)

2011-09-08T05:12:00.000-07:00

Gas...telephone...one hundred thousand rubles

2011-09-07T22:49:00.000-07:00

Young Werther versus The Immoralist

2011-09-07T22:48:00.000-07:00

Liam vomiting ectoplasm

2011-09-07T22:45:00.000-07:00

Minotaur

2011-09-07T22:43:00.000-07:00

Caravaggio/Goliath

2011-09-07T22:42:00.000-07:00

Scatology 2

2011-09-07T22:40:00.000-07:00

Intimacies

2011-09-05T12:57:00.000-07:00

I will be exhibiting a new video, Ritual Action, May 25, 2011, which I made in collaboration with Tom Daws in a group show at Gallery 400. Thanks to Lorelei Stewart and John Neff for including us in the show. Information below:

Intimacies
Curated by John Neff and Lorelei Stewart
September 9-October 22, 2011
Reception: Friday, September 9, 5-8 pm

Elijah Burgher/Tom Daws | LaToya Ruby Frazier | Desirée Holman | Leigh Ledare | Laurel Nakadate | Michael Sirianni

In the six artists’ works in Intimacies the camera is an active agent in the creation of social events, not just a recording instrument in the hands of an autonomous documentarian. The primarily photographic and video works, some of which include painting and sculptural elements, focus on charged interpersonal encounters. Beyond serving as indices of such encounters, the included artworks reveal the reconfigured effects of such exchanges, disclosing the complexity of authorship, agency, and viewership in today’s world.

PEOPLE DON'T LIKE TO READ ART

2011-07-07T14:01:00.000-07:00

I will have some sigil drawings in "PEOPLE DON'T LIKE TO READ ART" at Western Exhibitions in Chicago. Thanks to Scott Speh for including me in the exhibition. Information below.

Western Exhibitions will present the group show, “People Don’t Like to Read Art” in both Gallery 1 and 2, opening with a public reception on Saturday, July 9 from 6 to 9pm.

The title of the show takes its name from a 2009 drawing (not in this show) by Deb Sokolow that humorously reflects on some viewers’ aversion to reading text in visual art works. While the use of text in contemporary art is fairly commonplace, many of artists in this show move beyond the use of single words and phrases (though examples of this kind of work will be in the show) by working with paragraphs, lists, fully-formed narratives and book formats, asking viewers to take the time to actively read the work.

The show includes works from several gallery artists: Nicholas Frank’s framed book pages from his ongoing biography, Adriane Herman’s vinyl appliqués of found to-do lists, John Parot’s paintings and drawings wryly reflecting on modern gay life, a currency collage from Mark Wagner, and narrative drawings by both Joe Hardesty and Deb Sokolow.

Also included in this survey of works that incorporate the act of reading are several non-gallery artists who work in a variety of media, including painting, drawing, video, artists’ books, printmaking and collage, and hail from points in and outside of Chicago. We’ll be showing an artist book produced in collaboration with The Present Group from Rebecca Blakley (Oakland, CA); drawings and collages by Elijah Burgher (Chicago); sculpture by Simon Evans (Berlin); watercolors by Cat Glennon (Brooklyn); text drawings byMeg Hitchcock (New York); video and printmaking by Rachel Foster (San Francisco); drawings by David Leggett (Chicago); artist book/novel by Andy Moore (Chicago); collage/photos by Kirsten Stoltmann (Los Angeles); and artist books by Angie Waller (New York).

B-B-B-BAD

2011-06-20T17:12:00.000-07:00

B-B-B-BAD
... an exhibition with attitudes.

June 30 - August 15

Anna Kustera Gallery
520 West 21st Street NYC

Opening Reception: Thursday June 30, 6-9pm

Featuring:
Adam Axel, Mattia Biagi, Keith Boadwee, Matt Borruso, Charles Browning, Elijah Burgher, Luke Butler, Wayne Coe, Steve Davis, Peter Eide, Scott Ewalt, Glen Fogel, Jonah Freeman, Martha Friedman, Paul Gabrielli, John Wayne Gacy, Joe Graham-Felsen, Gregory Green, Adam Helms, Lisa Kirk, Kristian Kozul, Scooter LaForge, Wes Lang, Karine Laval, Patrick Lee, Michael Magnan, Paul McCarthy, Adam McEwen, Bob Mizer, John Ensor Parker, Luc Sante, Ryan Schneider, Jeff Shagawat, Tara Sinn, Hank Willis Thomas, Wolfgang Tillmans, John Waters, Karlheinz Weinberger, Eric Yahnker

Curated by: Doug McClemont & Billy Miller

Info:
http://www.annakustera.com/
(212) 989-0082

Chromaticism

2011-06-17T09:01:00.000-07:00

I have several sigil drawings in "Chromaticism" at NOMA Gallery in San Francisco. Info below.

Chromaticism

June 17th-July 23rd
Opening Friday, June 17th, 6-8pm

Elijah Burgher
James Chronister
Richard Kent Howie
Cybele Lyle

Curated by Liz Wing

NOMA Gallery
80 Maiden Lane, 3rd floor
San Francisco, CA 94108
Wednesday-Saturday, 11am-6pm and by appointment
t: 415 391 0200
info@nomagallery.com

God told me to do it (for Stanimir)

2011-06-02T16:03:00.000-07:00

Mictlantecuhtli

2011-05-28T11:48:00.000-07:00

Look over, sir, my almanack, and cross out my ill-days

2011-05-28T10:20:00.001-07:00

The emerald tablet, smashed

2011-05-27T16:24:00.000-07:00

Dead pine, Little Mountain

2011-05-05T12:30:00.000-07:00

Dead child buried in the snow

2011-05-05T12:29:00.000-07:00

The thief's journal

2011-05-05T12:04:00.000-07:00

Rhymes with dead

2011-05-05T12:02:00.000-07:00

K48 no. 8: ABRAK48DABRA

2011-04-28T20:47:00.000-07:00

Hey all, I have a drawing in the new issue of K48, which also includes work by a number of folks that I greatly admire--Scott Treleaven, Paul P., David Benjamin Sherry, Scooter LaForge, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Light Asylum, and Teengirl Fantasy, just to name a few. I feel incredibly grateful to Scott Hug for asking me to submit a drawing to the issue. K48 is a labor of love for Mr. Hug, and it shows. You can order a copy here.

Notes on drawing

2011-04-20T11:50:00.000-07:00

-Pattern recognition -- cooling of chaos into form -- Chaos as Id, "the It," primordial soup -- form as false mastery, language as primal technology --- dead trees: "close reading" of chaos -- attempt to render, master an object that resists imposition of form, explication of language

-Driver's view/passenger's view -- sideways attention: the margins of one's field of vision -- what is left behind, cast off, waste products of the focus required for main activity -- temporality, palimpsest, motion study, net -- overlaps, adjacent placements, more or less randomly generated, photographic slice, "word and image dust" (WSB2)

-World/pin-head/cut/virus/ghost of a flea -- sun-through-forest canopy/camouflage/broken alphabet/death-by-hanging

-Pulverize language to liberate new meaning -- from other side, emblematize repression of discursive frame (caption, series, chain of explanation) -- writing by other means

-To be everything/to rule everything -- control/no control --- elevation/ground -- all fours/upright on two legs -- Forrest Bess/Frank Stella

--Dead child buried in the snow

Friedrich the friendly ghost (negligence is violence too version)

2011-04-05T20:10:00.000-07:00

Friedrich the friendly ghost (battle enhancer version)

2011-04-05T14:51:00.000-07:00

Friedrich the friendly ghost (i'm sorry i'm an asshole version)

2011-04-05T14:47:00.000-07:00

Friedrich the friendly ghost (headless version)

2011-04-05T14:45:00.000-07:00

T-shirt for Imperfect Articles

2011-03-22T07:35:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Noah Singer and Mike Andrews for asking me to do a t-shirt for their project, Imperfect Articles. The shirt is based on this drawing and can be ordered here.

Queer Spirits

2011-03-16T12:12:00.000-07:00

I have a group of drawings in AA Bronson and Peter Hobbs' forthcoming publication, Queer Spirits, which will be published by Creative Time. Copies can be pre-ordered here.

AA Bronson, a New York-based artist best known for his 25 years with the artists’ collective General Idea, has spent a lifetime queering the cultural world. Here he joins up with Toronto-based artist and academic Peter Hobbs to spin a tale in images and words of five performances, all titled Invocation of the Queer Spirits. From 2008 to 2010 Bronson and Hobbs brought together small groups of men—in Banff, New Orleans, Winnipeg, Manhattan, and Fire Island—in a secret group ritual that was different every time and yet always the same. Invoking the “queer” and marginalized histories of each site, the men performed something that Bronson has characterized as “a hybrid between group therapy, ceremonial magic, a séance, a circle jerk, and a quilting bee.” This book explores each site in five chapters of photographic images, primarily by AA Bronson, together with a brilliant and often humorous reflection on queer animals, forest rangers, shamanism, and park sex by Peter Hobbs. A group of drawings by Chicago artist Elijah Burgher completes the volume.

Imperfect Articles at Volta NY 2011

2011-02-24T22:53:00.000-08:00

I will have a t-shirt and a batch of drawings from the past six months with Imperfect Articles at Volta NY the first weekend of March. Thanks to Mike Andrews and Noah Singer for asking me to do the shirt with them and taking my work.

Puking up ghosts (Liam)

2011-02-23T12:55:00.000-08:00

Rex Nemorensis 3

2011-02-08T14:58:00.000-08:00

Music for Torching

2011-02-01T10:22:00.000-08:00

Really kind piece of writing about my work here. Thanks to Adam Draper. His blog, Music for Torching, is really amazing--lots of fantastic writing on the occult and his other enthusiasms. I'll be spending quite a bit of time digging there...

Rex Nemorensis 2

2011-01-18T12:06:00.001-08:00

Blake's Lucifer

2011-01-18T12:04:00.002-08:00

None of all the things in the world would injure him

2011-01-07T09:25:00.000-08:00

The sexual life of savages

2011-01-07T09:24:00.001-08:00

Shitting devils

2011-01-02T16:52:00.000-08:00

Roots & Culture: A Certain Ratio

2011-01-02T16:49:00.000-08:00

I will have a number of sigil drawings in "A Certain Ratio" at Roots & Culture. The exhibition opens on January 8th. The other artists are Ryan Fenchel, Jonah Groeneboer, Shane Huffman, and Erin Zona. Big thanks to Eric May for including me in the show.

K48 issue no. 8 Kickstarter

2011-01-02T16:41:00.000-08:00

Scott Hug is raising funds for K48 issue no. 8: ABRAK48DABRA on Kickstarter. To pledge funds, go here. I'll have a drawing published in the issue, about which I'm terribly excited.

Self Publish, Be Happy: A Visual Meditation for the New Year by Scott Treleaven

2011-01-02T16:33:00.000-08:00

Thanks to Scott for including one of my drawings in this.

Saint Sleazy

2010-12-18T15:01:00.000-08:00

The precious green notebook, erased

2010-12-01T11:45:00.000-08:00

Proverbs of hell, pt. 2

2010-11-30T15:24:00.000-08:00

Drive your cart and your plow over the bones of the dead

2010-11-23T15:01:00.001-08:00

The most sublime act is to set another before you

2010-11-23T15:00:00.000-08:00

The fox condemns the trap, not himself

2010-11-23T14:59:00.001-08:00

Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires

2010-11-23T14:58:00.001-08:00

Expect poison from the standing water

2010-11-23T14:57:00.000-08:00

Anal Swastika (Recruiter version)

2010-11-11T11:58:00.000-08:00

The precious green notebook I lost in 2004

2010-11-04T15:48:00.000-07:00

Your Last Chance

2010-11-04T10:38:00.000-07:00

I will have a handful of sigil drawings at Billy Miller's Straight to Hell outpost at the NY Art Book Fair this coming weekend. More info here.

HAVE SEX WITH GHOSTS

2010-11-04T10:33:00.000-07:00

I caved and started a tumblr blog, HAVE SEX WITH GHOSTS. Ghost Vomit's brother, maybe. Paintings, videos, dust jackets, etcetera.

Self-portrait as Kevin Killian embracing the tomb of Erasmus

2010-10-21T14:49:00.001-07:00

Anal Swastika (Killer Bees version)

2010-10-20T13:33:00.000-07:00

Some ruins 2

2010-10-14T23:29:00.000-07:00

Some ruins

2010-10-13T21:13:00.000-07:00

A hex on the living death culture pact

2010-10-04T16:34:00.000-07:00

The devil, probably

2010-09-16T14:25:00.001-07:00

The ghost's hands

2010-09-07T14:26:00.001-07:00

Loki's unfunny jokes

2010-09-07T14:25:00.001-07:00

Matthew's riddle

2010-08-20T10:38:00.001-07:00

I AM THE SUN

2010-08-20T10:37:00.001-07:00

I say Liars, Liars, Liars (After D. Tibet)

2010-08-18T12:38:00.000-07:00

Why can't we all just walk away? (After D. Tibet)

2010-08-18T12:36:00.000-07:00

Notes on the Application of Magick to Visual Art

2010-08-18T12:34:00.001-07:00

-All too often, we make art in the same zombie-like slumber in which we go to our day jobs--joylessly, dutifully and unquestioningly. We should instead be sorcerers or witches when we make art. Not insatiable and unthinking, but willful, self-reflective, and focused on the changes we want to see occur in ourselves and our circumstances. We should conceive of art much as Aleister Crowley defined magick: "the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will."

-Whenever we create an artwork, we should have precise ends in mind, whether the desired result is inciting passion, changing minds, or simply paying the rent. The part that counts as magick is not only the alteration of reality, but also the precise determination of one's intentions. Occult literature is full of cautionary tales of muddy intentions and tragically backfired spells.

-Even if we doubt the efficacy of magick, suspending one's disbelief and conceiving of art as having magickal effects induces a heightened sense of responsibility. Your audience may not see the corners that have been cut, but the gods most certainly will. An artwork, after all, is the sum total of a series of decisions an artist has made. Magick asks that each decision count.

-It is a common complaint that art is overly commercialized, professionalized, or otherwise embedded in systems anathema to our most cherished notions of what art is or should be. William S. Burroughs reminds us of art's provenance in magic and ritual--cult as opposed to culture: "all art is originally magical in origin...and by magical I mean intended to produce very definite results." Asking what spell an artwork is casting dispels much of the monetary and media glare that obscures the meaning of so much art nowadays.

-Nearly all magickal undertakings begin with a banishing, which prepares a ritual space for magickal work by casting out unwanted influences. While certainly indispensible when setting up a studio, it might also be helpful to inundate your local arts district with bonfires of sage before any substantial work is begun at large. In fact something more extreme may be in order. While preparing a ritual space, the four cardinal points are sometimes invoked by imagining angels or other higher beings protecting the space of the ritual. Imagine, perhaps, four figures of rage and exorcism: David Wojnarowicz to the North, Valerie Solanas to the South, Diamanda Galas to the East, and Pier Paolo Pasolini to the West, spitting face-melting wrath, icy attitude, rotten blood and bad breath to fend off the demonic agents of apathy, disinformation, and bigotry lurking in the corners.

-The century-long experiment of modernism, with its on-going collective process of reduction and purification, could be thought of as an elaborate banishing from art of traditional formal constructs and the cultural values they express. Think, for instance, of Alexander Rodchenko's monochromes, and their declared intent of concluding the historical narrative of painting so that artists' energies might be redirected from the easel to the construction of a new society. Likewise, Ad Reinhardt's "Art as Art" manifesto consists in a litany of negations, banishing received notions about art from his practice and, symbolically, from the future of art.

-The preparation of ritual space has analogues in the creation of individual works of art and the organization of a studio. The four corners of a two-dimensional rectangular surface, for instance, can be thought of as requiring banishing or can be coordinated with the cardinal points. Likewise, temple furniture--altar, circle, dagger, wand, cup, robe, etc.--can provide metaphors for thinking about the tools required for the practice of different mediums.

-In Book Four, Crowley's major work on the theory and practice of magick, he outlines the various operations of sorcery as roughly consisting in evocation, consecration, divination, fascination, love and hate, destruction, creation, dissolution, and invocation. Any one or combination of these operations can be used by an artist to focus his/her process of creation and his/her intentions for a given artwork's effect on its viewers. The operation of divination, "in which a live spirit is made to control operations of the hand or brain of the Magician," can enhance methods for relinquishing egoistic control of results or utilizing chance in the studio. On the other hand, works of fascination, "such as operations of invisibility, and transformations of the apparent form of the person or thing concerned," relate to artworks that willfully distort or enhance viewers' perceptions. Additional occult processes and abilities should be amended to Crowley's list as possible aesthetic goals, such as clairvoyance or the traditional shamanic task of healing.

-Works of destruction in magick, otherwise known as "magickal attack," are frequently taboo for contemporary practitioners of the occult. Their analogues in art, however, are often valued positively: critique, political commitment, satire, irony, etc. Given the sheer scale and force of the opposition--the economic, social, political, and ecological quagmires transpiring globally--artists would do well to train themselves in some of the darker arts. And politically-minded occultists should look to visual artists for the candor and aggression with which they have confronted various figures of power and agents of control over the course of the last century.

-Magick and art compel or repel belief in equally forceful manners. You either "get it" or you don't. There's no arguing or convincing otherwise on either side. The rare change-of-mind has the force of a revelation or epiphany, and takes the form of a conversion.

Who's Yr Shaman? Exhibition Catalog

2010-08-18T12:30:00.000-07:00

A catalog was produced for WHO'S YR SHAMAN at Johalla Projects. Info below.

WHO’S YR SHAMAN? exhibition catalog now available for $10. Featuring essays by Melissa Marinaro, Elijah Burgher, Ivan Lozano. Catalog design by Terence Hannum. 24 pages, full color, total steal!

Please email melissamarinaro@gmail.com for more details.

I got away, I got away

2010-08-10T10:48:00.000-07:00

I got away

2010-08-10T10:47:00.001-07:00

Who's Yr Shaman?

2010-08-10T10:46:00.000-07:00

I will have a couple of drawings in "Who's Yr Shaman?" at Johalla Projects in Chicago. The show was curated by Melissa Marinaro, and features work by Sara Fagala, Terence Hannum, Chad Harrison, Ivan Lozano, Adam Ludwig and Rebecca Walz. It opens August 13th. For more information, go here.

The sorrows of young ________

2010-07-28T09:44:00.000-07:00

Murderer

2010-07-28T09:42:00.000-07:00

Orpheus Rex

2010-07-28T09:41:00.001-07:00

I'm casting you out (after J. Balance)

2010-07-28T09:39:00.000-07:00

Secret Beach #2

2010-07-07T19:54:00.000-07:00

Liam Warfield interviewed me for the second issue of his zine, Secret Beach. I haven't seen it yet, and I might sound like a blathering idiot--we split a large bottle of cheap wine while talking. He is an excellent writer, though, and I trust he shaped my verbiage into something comprehensible. Also featured in the issue are Gay Liberation Network's Andy Thayer and the long-running, witchy no wave group, ONO. Liam also has a blog called Secret Beach, and plays really wonderful music sometimes. He decamped for Berlin weeks after I met him--sadly for me, no doubt quite happily for him. I'm not sure where one can find issues of the zine other than at Quimby's in Chicago, but they are certainly floating around somewhere out in the world...

Of the Main Types of the Operations of Magick Art

2010-07-07T19:31:00.000-07:00

From Aleister Crowley's Book Four:

The operations of Magick Art are difficult to classify, as they merge into each other, owing to the essential unity of their method and result. We may mention:
1. Operations such as evocation, in which a live spirit is brought from dead matter.
2. Consecrations of talismans in which a live spirit is bound into "dead" matter and vivifies the same.
3. Works of divination, in which a live spirit is made to control operations of the hand or brain of the Magician. Such works are accordingly most dangerous, to be used only be advanced Magicians, and then with great care.
4. Works of fascination, such as operations of invisibility, and transformations of the apparent form of the person or thing concerned. This consists almost altogether in distracting the attention, or disturbing the judgment, of the person whom it is wished to deceive. There are, however, "real" transformations of the Adept himself which are very useful. See The Book of the Dead for methods. The assumption of God-forms can be carried to the point of actual transformation.
5. Works of Love and Hate, which are also performed (as a rule) by a fascination. These works are too easy, and rarely useful. They have a nasty trick of recoiling on the Magician.
6. Works of destruction, which may be done in many different ways. One may fascinate and bend to one's Will a person who has of his own right the power to destroy. One may employ spirits or talismans. The more powerful Magicians of the last few centuries have employed books. [...]
7. Works of creation and dissolution, and the higher invocations.

Galerie Dennis Cooper presents ...

2010-07-07T19:18:00.000-07:00

Dennis Cooper featured some of my work on his blog, DC's. I'm really excited, because I have been reading his novels since I was eighteen, and count him amongst my very favorite authors. To see the post, go here.

No irreversible sentences 3

2010-06-28T11:41:00.000-07:00

Harry Smith 3

2010-06-28T11:38:00.000-07:00

Harry Smith 2

2010-06-28T11:35:00.000-07:00

No irreversible sentences 2

2010-06-23T12:22:00.001-07:00

TROLL: NEW WORK PRESENTED BY CTRL+W33D

2010-06-23T12:20:00.000-07:00

I will have a couple of drawings in Troll, an exhibition at Envoy Enterprises organized by the good folks behind CTRL+W33D. Description below.

CTRL+W33D PRESENTS NEW WORK BY JACOB MEEHAN, BRAD TROEMEL, KARI ALTMANN, ANDREW LAUMANN, MICHAEL MAGNAN, PATRICK DYER, DYLAN REECE, CHRIS UDEMEZUE, SCOTT HUG, BEN SCHUMACHER, CODY CRITCHELOE, MATT LIFSON, JARROD BECK, ELIJAH BURGHER, DANIEL LEYVA, LAZARO RODRIGUEZ, BEN AQUA, DA SUL KIM, TRAVESS SMALLEY, MARK SPALDING, KRISTIN SMALLWOOD, IVAN LOZANO, KHALID AL GHARABALLI, SHAWN MAXIMO, BORNA SAMMAK, FATIMA AL QADIRI, JASON VILLEGAS, PAUL CUPO, VENUS JAZMIN SOTO, ADAM RADOKOVICH AND ANTHONY THORNTON

AT ENVOY ENTERPRISES, JULY 1-15

"Trolling is a game about identity deception, albeit one that is played without the consent of most of the players. The troll attempts to pass as a legitimate participant, sharing the group's common interests and concerns; the newsgroups members, if they are cognizant of trolls and other identity deceptions, attempt to both distinguish real from trolling postings, and upon judging a poster a troll, make the offending poster leave the group. Their success at the former depends on how well they—and the troll—understand identity cues; their success at the latter depends on whether the troll's enjoyment is sufficiently diminished or outweighed by the costs imposed by the group." - Judith S. Donath, "Identity and Deception in the Virtual Community", 1999

"Troll as gay slang is amongst the lexicon of the cant Polari used in the gay subculture in Britain which has become more mainstream with transcontinental travel and online communication. As a Polari word, troll can mean ‘to walk effeminately’, or ‘to walk, seeking sex’. Trolling can be used almost interchangeably with cruising and like much of Polari usage was probably meant to disguise what was being talked about because being gay was and still is taboo and discussing gay sex in any public area can be risky." - Paul Baker, "Polari - The Lost Language of Gay Men", 2002

TROLL is a group exhibition instigated by CTRL+W33D to examine the act of trolling as a sexual, cultural, and ethical practice. To troll is to sift through image and text, filtering and re-contextualizing subject-significant objects; it is baiting and malicious comment made behind the anonymity of the Web, soliciting argument for the purpose of breakdown and chaos; to troll is sexual practice, to cruise for sex, to seek partners anonymous or otherwise.

In the gallery setting, CTRL+W33D seek to exhibit works that examine various aspects and functions of the act of trolling and their influence on physical work, using trolling's threefold definition not as exclusive to the internet, but as a lens with which to view three fundamental methodologies, each in turn consumptive, productive, and destructive.

No irreversible sentences 1

2010-06-23T12:16:00.000-07:00

Are you a Zombie or a Witch?

2010-06-19T18:28:00.000-07:00

I wrote an essay on Scott Treleaven for the new issue of C Magazine, titled "Are you a Zombie or a Witch?" My essay accompanies an artist project he created for the issue. I admire Scott greatly, and feel honored to have had the opportunity to write about his work.

Engender Trouble

2010-06-18T15:00:00.000-07:00

I will have a couple of drawings in "Engender Trouble" at Iceberg in Chicago. It is an exhibition of two new videos by Doug Ischar, "come lontano" and "CB," the latter in collaboration with his partner, Tom Daws, accompanied by a small exhibition curated by Doug of works by Erin Leland, Michael Sirianni, and myself. Description from the press release of Doug's exceptional videos below.

New work by Doug Ischar, Doug Ischar/Tom Daws and an exhibition of new work by Elijah Burgher, Erin Leland and Michael Sirianni

‘come lontano’

come lontano (2010) is a perverse historical romance in which two lives are exposed, inter-mixed, doused with sentiment, and – hopefully - redeemed. The work revolves around a central ‘couple’ - Pier Paolo Pasolini and Maria Callas. There is a third main character, an ambiguous villain made of steel, glass and rubber. Each member of our central couple has her/his own external distractions which impinge – to varying degrees - on their brief, ecstatic encounter. This encounter was in fact a cinematic collaboration; it’s product the film Medea (1969)

come lontano is a formal experiment in which cinematic tropes serve as organizing devices for a work which anxiously seeks to distinguish itself from post-modern precedent. It hates with all its heart the notion of appropriation. It prefers theft, seduction, and passion - even if the theft is aggravated, the seduction botched, the passion unrequited. One might view the come lontano as a meager analog to Pasolini’s masterpiece, Salo, in which the pleasures of the masters – in this case the filmmaker – are taken to monstrous extremes for which no apology is offered, no acquittal sought.

come lontano is a heartfelt homage to two singular artists whose utterly different lives, personas, and politics intersected briefly in the production of one radiant film, leaving them forever changed. (NTSC; 22 minutes) World premier.

‘CB’

CB (2010) is an experimental bio-pic: its heroine, Charlotte Brontë. A collaboration between Doug Ischar and Tom Daws, CB was commissioned by the Laumeier Museum, St. Louis, for their inaugural Nightlight series; it premiered in St. Louis on June 11th.

The film was inspired by a 1976 audio recording of a séance with Charlotte Brontë, of which the film makes ample use. But the séance audio is merely the tip of the affective iceberg as its heroine turns out to have an emotional – not to mention intellectual – life of epic proportions. Her searing letters – another primary element in the video – throw the eerie platitudes of the séance into razor-sharp relief and disclose a 19th century woman whose brief life was both an artistic triumph and a relentless battle against grief, loss, and despair. Her dark moments – confided in her letters – drove the film far beyond the initial ambitions of its makers. ‘CB’ uses footage from a 1947 Hollywood production of Jane Eyre – co-staring a very young Elizabeth Taylor (un-credited) – to augment enactments of scenes inspired by the ambiguous nature – both conversation with the dead and univocal performance - of the séance audio. Staring Erin Leland, Charlotte Geissler, Jalyn Mosely, and Gwendolyn Geisler; cinematography by Mike Gibisser; concept, research, editing and direction by Doug Ischar and Tom Daws. (high-definition video; 16.5 minutes) Chicago premier.

Prayers for Children, Issue Two: Ugly Ducklings Come Home

2010-06-18T14:43:00.000-07:00

I submitted a group of drawings to the second issue of Prayers for Children, "Ugly Ducklings Come Home." Take a look here. Thanks to Greg and Jody for inviting me to contribute.

The morning after the night of the hunter

2010-06-16T12:35:00.000-07:00

The busy bee has no time for sorrow (After W. Blake)

2010-06-16T12:29:00.000-07:00

Who is going to take care of him if I don't? (After W. Curtis)

2010-06-16T12:28:00.001-07:00

If I can't have you, I can love you just the same (After B. Dee)

2010-06-16T12:27:00.000-07:00

Harry Smith

2010-06-16T12:26:00.000-07:00

The rule of thirds

2010-06-03T09:39:00.000-07:00

Show at Shane Campbell Gallery

2010-05-12T08:35:00.000-07:00

Here are some belated installation shots of the show at Shane Campbell Gallery in Oak Park, IL, which was up mid-winter through early spring:

Look back/don't look back (for Jody)

2010-05-11T14:51:00.001-07:00

Look back/don't look back (failure)

2010-05-11T14:50:00.000-07:00

Ostia (Leo)

2010-05-05T07:30:00.001-07:00