New Museum Day

After checking in we went back downtown on the R and got off at Prince Street. Ira wanted to take me to the New Museum to see Skin Fruit: Selections from the Dakis Joannou Collection, curated by Jeff Koons. The show caused a bit of controversy because Joannou is a trustee of the museum and that apparently crosses some sort of Chinese wall or something. Well, f&^% that, the show was terrific.

Highlights of the show were:

Touba Auerbach, Crumple VI, 2008—a simple painting of black dots on a white background. From a distance, you could see that the painting looked creased. Walking towards it, it starts to strobe and make your eyes squirm. Close up, the dots look perfectly regular, except in your peripheral field of vision, they're dancing around like they're about to eat your optic nerve.

Liza Lou, Super Sister, 1999—lifesize model of a '70s black power chick, done in elaborate beadwork. Best part was the fringe on her Levi's hot pants.

Tim Noble and Sue Webster, Masters of the Universe, 1998–2000—the artists as cro-magnons in lifelike 3-D. They were like your typical National Geographic representation, but with faces of individuals, so you got the feeling that these prehistoric people were people and not just abstractions.

If you like contemporary art, you could do worse then to look up these people, see what else they've done!

We took the Q uptown, had some Pellegrino and took a rest. Tonight we're going to try to see Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson a historical rock musical that Ira just saw and wants me to see. Unfortunately, it's sold out for the weekend, but we're on the waiting list. If we don't get in we're going to E. 6th Street for some Indian food.