Detail of The Rabbicorn Story by Bryn Oh. Photo by PJ Trenton.

EDIT (1-17): The cat is FINALLY out of the bag! Bryn has launched a crowd-sourcing fund, and Peter Greenaway was the first donor – covering 6 months of tier! Won’t you join him in being her patron? Click here!

I’ve been stewing on this one a while, and had planned to make a lengthy, hopefully thought-provoking post, but lack of time and recent developments have prompted to make this short and sweet (which might be to the readers’ benefit).

Linden Lab needs to do more to support and preserve virtual art.

Detail of The Rabbicorn Story by Bryn Oh. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Now, before I explain, let me make the disclaimer that these are my views and not necessarily those of Prim Perfect’s. My views not as a writer about a virtual world some see as a game, but as a ‘real life’ (whatever that is) art historian, curator, and arts administrator.

I think the Lab has made an excellent start on this through the foundation of the Linden Endowment for the Arts (LEA), whereby they have turned over 20 sims to a community board for the purpose of art. This is great.

Detail of The Rabbicorn Story by Bryn Oh. Photo by PJ Trenton.

But I don’t think this is enough. We are losing some amazing work. We all know this. Bettina Tizzy wrote about this well before my time at her NPIRL blog. And I have for a very long time felt strongly that it would be in the best interest of everyone if Linden Lab created some kind of programme – a Foundation or something – to try and archive some of this work.

Don’t ask me exactly how this would work, though I have some ideas. Obviously it would be limited; should be decided by committee (like the LEA); and there should be some grant application process for getting in. It should NOT be for commercial sims, as lovely as some builds are. I wouldn’t exclude artists who sell work to try to support themselves; but rather businesses whose primary function is commercial. So, for example, NEMO would have been the kind of place eligible.

Detail of The Rabbicorn Story by Bryn Oh. Photo by PJ Trenton.

So I’ve been thinking about this, chatting about it with friends and colleagues, and thought I’d ultimately put together some more concrete ideas. But just this week, Bryn Oh made a post related to the recent closing of Immersiva, in which she announced that she and sim partner Kiana Writer (of Madpea) wrote a sponsorship request to Linden Lab after their patron, Dusan Writer vanished from the grid (my choice of words). I haven’t asked Bryn directly about this, but word on the virtual street is they logged in to find the sim gone, and their things returned. And this while Bryn was in the midst of crafting her machinima project on the Rabbicorn Cycle (I’ve posted pictures of one of the installations throughout this piece). What a panicked night that must have been! (And Bryn, please correct me if the rumourmill has this wrong).

The request for sponsorship was declined by Linden Lab… and this may surprise some, but I think that was the right decision. As Bryn herself said, it would have set a problematic precedent, and as well, I think it would have been unfair to the many other talented artists who pay for their studios and galleries.

Detail of The Rabbicorn Story by Bryn Oh. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Yet if Linden Lab had a programme like I suggest, artist could apply when unfortunate circumstances like these arise; or even be nominated by the community. I said as much in a comment on Bryn’s blog, to which she replied:

You are right Rowan and I think LL should give a lifetime achievement region each year to a deserving person with the first one being given to AM Radio. Considering that their own collect the crystals game thing uses a dozen sims that alone would be 12 years of awards. What I would be happy with is a public statement by Linden Labs saying that should Second Life ever need to close, they will allow residents to leave with our inventories so that we may go settle on another grid. I think just the peace of mind that would create for residents would spur both the economy and creativity.

Extremely crucial points, and part of why I am so concerned about the conservation of this work. Yes, I realise that a good and viable solution is to simply go to another grid. But there are two problems with that: there is still a very active arts community in Second Life (and I mean more than artists, but collectors and good ol’ fashioned art-lovers too); and moving to another grid doesn’t help the work that has already been crafted in SL.

Detail of The Rabbicorn Story by Bryn Oh. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Now, I would very much be in favour, as a temporary solution, of Bryn making use of one of those 20 LEA sims. However, those have already been promised to artists who made project proposals for them. And lest anyone think Bryn feels she is somehow outside of that, let me quote another comment: ‘Unfortunately I am part of the LEA committee so it would look pretty shady for me to get any LEA land.’

She is a fair and humble person, and I don’t think her asking the Lindens for support makes her any less so. It is what artists have to do in this day and age–ask, sometimes beg, for patronage. Especially the great ones. And I think Bryn’s work is tops, and I know I’m not alone in saying that. And I’m glad she made the request, even if I think having it granted would have been unfair, because it opens up this conversation in a way that is vital to so many.

Detail of The Rabbicorn Story by Bryn Oh. Photo by PJ Trenton.

What do you think? Should Linden Lab do more to not just support, but preserve art in Second Life? Should they work to create a foundation for it, make ‘gifts-in-kind’ grants to artists (a tax write off for them!) Should they create a ‘National Gallery’ of Second Life.

I mean, it’s just disc space, isn’t it?

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The Dresden Gallery, closed 20 December 2011. Photo by PJ Trenton.

The Dresden Gallery is the reason I am here. One night, only a smidge over two years ago, I was bored. My old flatmate asked if I had ever tried Second Life, and I responded with the somewhat derisive declination that I now dread hearing. But that one night, being so dreadfully bored, with nothing on television, I thought I’d check it out. It’s no secret that I am an ‘actual’ art historian as well as a ‘virtual’ one, and I was intrigued by the art and academic possibilities. I knew some Universities were using it, and I knew there was an active art community, so after some strategic googling to make sure it would be worth my while (and yes, that it was free), I figured why not.

Long story short: from what I think was Help Island (though I wasn’t paying enough attention to be sure), and after sorting out my fantastic ‘Girl Next Door’ look, I took a tp to the Dresden Gallery.

Self-portrait: Rowan, Cetus, about 3 hours old. Eesh.

Looking back, I now know it was laggy as hell, that things weren’t rezzing, and that the build was already a bit dated. But to my new virtual eyes, it was simply stunning. A whole art gallery, based on a REAL art gallery. THIS must be what Second Life is for. How many other galleries were there? Was there a virtual Tate? A Met? (Sadly, we know the answer to this, but that night I held every hope).

I thought it was incredibly cool that I could get an audio guide, and wander to see the collection of this actual gallery in a city I’d never had the chance to visit. I admit, the textures look a bit dated to my eye now, but that first night, I marvelled at how it had all been done. And though I kept falling through the floor and got trapped behind walls, it didn’t stop my excitement as I wandered. After exploring a bit, I decided to check out the outside, which was incredibly impressive.

First picture, first friend.

And it was the first place I flew. Badly.

I wobbled about, getting a feel for it, then I saw another avatar standing by the welcome sign. I dropped out of the sky, and met my first friend, Stephen Petrovic. He was a lovely gentleman who is still a good friend. From him, I learned of Cetus (where I went and met my second friend, Ragamuffin Kips, and the rest as they say is history). Stephen and Raga offered me a kind and helpful welcome (and it was certainly not due to my looks that night, as you can see), and introduced me to art in the virtual world. I was taken.

Dresden Courtyard, tonight.

I also remember seeing the lecture theatre at the Dresden that night, and wondering if I might give a talk in there some day. I never did, though I’ve been privileged to do so in other wonderful places. I knew I’d like to be involved in virtual museums, and ultimately was part of the roller coaster that was the (now sadly defunct) Frank Lloyd Wright Virtual Museum. But in the process of learning the ropes, meeting new people, and beginning to write for Prim Perfect, I was seduced by the cutting edge aspect of virtual art. I turned away from these traditional manifestations of ‘real’ art, to focus my writing on what I saw to be an incredible – and overlooked – creative medium.

In the process, I turned my back on the Dresden.

Reminscing at the Lecture Theatre tonight.

Now, I do not mean to suggest that we avatars failed the Dresden. Their closure is simply more of a completion of a project (you can read the details in Saffia’s post on the closure.) And yes, this post could be a more journalistic endeavour which talked about the history of the project, the people involved, etc. But I wanted to share something personal here, because my Dresden is someone else’s Alien Isles or NEMO (and let’s not even get started on AM Radio’s sims). We can feel the loss of this beauty, this art, keenly, but often not until after it is gone.

In fact, when Saffia told me the Dresden news last week, I’m not even sure in my busyness it even registered very much. I think I commented that it was sad, but I can see that it might be time for them to move on, then very quickly got on to other things. It wasn’t until tonight, when I happened to be online for a moment, that a message came through ArchVirtual that the gallery was closing today.

I rushed over.

The majestic Dresden, already coming apart.

Already, it seemed, the place was being dismantled, judging from a hole in the front façade. I went inside to see if the exhibits were up, and was pleased to see I hadn’t missed them. I saw a sign for their special exhibit on Canaletto, which I had come to see not too long ago with PJ Trenton. I remember he had impressed me by saying Canaletto was his favourite painter when we first met almost two years ago; and then more recently, I went to see the Canaletto exhibit at the National Gallery, London, and wished the whole time he could have been there to see it. So we came the Dresden together, to share the experience of looking at this painter we both loved… an example of one of the more magic aspects of Second Life for me.

The Canaletto Exhibit. Photo by PJ Trenton.

As I wandered tonight and gazed upon the old masters, I was reminded that copies of them could be purchased. Possibly the only place in Second Life I approve of such a practice, since it is tantamount to selling a postcard in the museum shop. I then thought, what a perfect (if a bit silly) Christmas gift for PJ, to get him a Canaletto on the night the Dresden closed. I’m such a sap. (Wait, did that message say the region was restarting?) Now if only I could find my way back to the special exhibitions gallery…

The region will restart in 3 minutes…

Aha! Better hurry… of COURSE the lag is kicking in too. Must be the reason for the restart. I wade through the treacle, and pause to take a picture of the lovely green gallery I am in.

Last call in the Green Galleries.

The region will restart in 2 minutes…

Hmm, I’m pretty sure I’m headed the wrong direction, but I think I can loop back around and head to the Canaletto gallery. What lag!

The region will restart in 1 minute…

Ugh, I can’t tp closer to the destination? Oh well, I’ll just come back after reboot.

Wait. What if there is no after reboot? It dawns on me that perhaps, just perhaps, this is it. This is the Dresden closing. I feel surprisingly panicked, and truly unexpectedly upset. Wait!! I want to finish seeing it just one more time!

The region will restart in 45 seconds…

Is the exhibit around this corner?

The Dresden Gallery. Photo by PJ Trenton.

The region will restart in 30 seconds…

Even if I get there, I won’t have time to buy anything…

The region will restart in 15 seconds…

Ok, I should tp home and hope it is still there when I come back. Surely I’m overreacting.

You have been logged out of Second Life… etc. I never was fast enough.

I wait 10 minutes, then log back in. I am home, in the loft.

I teleport to the Dresden. I try 5 times…

Teleport failed.
Unable to find teleport destination. The destination may be temporarily unavailable or no longer exists. Please try again in a few minutes.

The Dresden Gallery is closed.

Logged out. 4.33 pm SLT.

If you missed seeing the Dresden one last time, or at all, please visit PJ’s beautiful Dresden Gallery flickr set. One of PJ’s passions is documenting some of Second Life’s best builds, and he will often rush out to capture a place he hears is about to close. Make sure to look at the rest of his sets to see some amazing places that are now sadly gone… and others that are luckily still around.

Haveit Neox at his LEA installation 'Second Libations'. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Yesterday was my 2nd rez day. I came to Second Life largely to check out the art, so to celebrate, I decided I’d take PJ Trenton along to see the current LEA full sim art series installation Second Libations by Haveit Neox. I’m always guaranteed great photos when PJ is around, and the company isn’t too shabby either!

I’d seen a selection from this installation at the UWA in SL, some rather rustic and exotic looking centaurs, but that didn’t prepare me for the massive Pyramid at the landing of this build, a snowy digital screen marking its entrance. The story unfolds as one enters:

The great cosmic storm swept up the last of Earth’s water molecules. On the lifeless planet, the only remaining intelligence flickers on computer screens. In the absence of human maintenance, bot scripters, bot artists, and bot teachers scramble to rescue their resources before the impending threat of blackout.

Like the sorcerer’s apprentice, they begin flooding their world by rezzing buckets of virtual water, in the hope of rehydrating their users. Their strategy appears to be failing. Not having been programmed for an unforeseen event of this magnitude, the bots plea for your solution in securing their virtual world.

The Second Libations await your offering. Your participation in the ritual is eagerly anticipated.

The story cinematically unfolds as you descend inside the pyramid. Photo by PJ Trenton.

The work grips you from the start, and not just that – after passing through a strange welcoming party, an initiation of sorts, you are provided with ‘Bot’ costumes (which look much more like exotic sentinels from another era) to wear so that you may be part of the story you are about to explore. Being able to immerse oneself in this fashion is in my opinion utilizing the very best aspects of virtual creation, and I wondered why I hadn’t seen much of Haveit’s work before this.

Exploring the work in Bot costume. Photo by PJ Trenton.

I looked up his profile, which resulted in my only disappointment of the evening: his rezday is today, the 8th of December, and he is just two as well! This avatar, crafted just a day after mine, has surpassed me so far in building skill I felt ashamed. But I also felt an odd kinship, and so I reached out…

Rowan Derryth: Hello there, Happy Rez day! I’m just a day older than you… and your build here at the UWA is putting me to shame. This is incredible.
Haveit Neox: Rowan…. This is the first time someone has wished me a happy Rez Day…. And thank you for your comment!
Rowan Derryth: Oh, my pleasure! Well I was just looking at your profile and noticed that. This exhibit is really wonderful..  I love it. Is this your first build of this size?
Haveit Neox: No, actually I’ve built up two sims. But this is the first time I had to do it within a 2 month frame. I went into high gear.

High gear indeed! His hard work shows in the beautifully detailed build which incorporates rich textures, mostly of his own crafting. He has also mastered some of the more clever tricks in virtual building, such as the illusion of reflections and mirrors.

Binary Mirror. Photo by PJ Trenton.

As we explore, the work brings to mind two other artistic works quite strongly. First, these technological problems are cleverly rendered in a more ancient, exotic aesthetic, which reminds me very much of the film (and arguably better TV series) Stargate. Secondly, one cannot help but compare this work with that of Bryn Oh. Haveit explores our relationship with technology through the narrative of an imagined post-human world, where bots are struggling with their own burgeoning humanity in the face of their potential destruction, and in doing so presents a utopic/dystopic vision for our contemplation. The irony of doing so in a virtual space is one I love, and is one of my favourite aspects of Bryn’s work too.

I asked Haveit if he had a moment to come by and chat with us about his work, to which he kindly obliged. As you can see from the first image above, he looks rather a dashing Spaniard, and to my eye more than a little like Velazquez. He thankfully appreciated that observation. After exchanging pleasantries, I shared with him my thoughts on Stargate (he was thankfully pleased with that comparison) and his kinship with Bryn Oh:

Rowan Derryth: Have people compared you to Bryn?
Haveit Neox: No, but I sure love her work.
Rowan Derryth: PJ and I have been talking about some of the similarities… And I mean that as a compliment, not that you are being a copyist!
Haveit Neox: I am flattered! I really admire Bryn’s work.
Rowan Derryth: You have a wonderful narrative going on. I’m sorry to say I never saw your work before your UWA piece [a selection from this installation is part of the finale competition].
Haveit Neox: I appreciate hearing that! The UWA has been a real important force for me… With the monthly competitions, it was an incentive to work in a concentrated manner. And I was exposed to other artists and their work at UWA. Before that, SL was like a desert… it was very hard work to find other artists.

Haveit's beautiful take on Da Vinci's Vitruvian man. Photo by PJ Trenton.

As I have already expressed, the narrative aspect of his work is quite thought-provoking. One of the other ideas that rattled around my brain while exploring was the kinship this work had to Renaissance art, particularly in the exploration of principles of Humanism, and was gratified to see Haveit’s own exquisite version of Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man, pictured above. Throughout the story, the bots are searching for a way to return water to Earth and bring back their human caretakers. Through the process of scanning countless texts in the Librarynth (my personal favourite part of the build), one Bot in particular is puzzled by the incorporation of new human words like ‘maybe’ into their thoughts, and strange electrical impulses – feelings – that are beyond logical comprehension.

Finding your way to the heart of the Librarynth reveals a treasure trove of tales contributed to the artist. Photo by PJ Trenton.

In fact, the tales in the Librarynth (and found elsewhere as well) are not solely by Haveit. He put out a call for stories to include in the work, which he then cleverly turned into the texts, and can even be found paving the many spiral stairs in the build. I love the collaborative aspect of this. But the overall theme is all Haveit’s, and I asked him where the story came from:

“I wanted to compose a story that tied in directly with SL… because I am so involved with this virtual world. There are aspects of it that feel real to me. And then I learned about bots… intriguing things I hadn’t known before. I’ve been watching films about just that too… ” He then shared with me a link for a short video about a perceptual psychology experiment that inspired him, which I shall share below. “It was a real enjoyable film that is an eye opener about what the brain perceives as being real via a simple demonstration.”

Taking all of this into consideration, I wondered how tied his physical artistic practice (as an oil painter and ceramicist) was to his virtual one. I asked him about this, which led to a nice rezday chat about our SL origins:

Rowan Derryth: I saw in your profile that you do oil and ceramics in RL… do you feel like that informs your work here?
Haveit Neox: Yes… as a matter of fact, some of my real life artworks are brought into SL as textures. The kind of curly kew designs on the stairs I’m standing on for instance is taken off a ceramic panel I made… I make large sculpted ceramic panels, glaze them, then paint an oil painting in a central cartouche.
Rowan Derryth: Oh! lovely! So what brought you to SL?
Haveit Neox: My family (he laughs). They said, we know a place you can build big things.

Make certain to pan out and look at that strange tower you descend. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Rowan Derryth: Ahhh, That’s an unusual answer.
Haveit Neox: Yes, I had no idea about Internet games. Never had any interest. But when they told me this is a place I could build whatever I imagined, I was sold.
Rowan Derryth: That must have been a bit of a learning curve!
Haveit Neox: I still have a lot to learn about the building tools. But with a basic knowledge, you can really do anything. It might just take a little longer.
Rowan Derryth: Well you’ve definitely trumped me in 2 years.
Haveit Neox: Then I made friends, which has been about the best part of my SL experience. That was also unexpected.
Rowan Derryth: (smiles) Yes, that is the best part. I logged in to check out the art scene, and was lucky to meet nice people my very first night. One was the artist I wrote my first article about.

Centaur in the Scripter's Web Tower. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Haveit Neox: Really? Your first night when you joined SL?
Rowan Derryth: Yeah.. I had done a little research… So from the welcome island I took a teleport to the Dresden Art Gallery… met a nice guy who directed me to visit Cetus, where I met Ragamuffin Kips.
Haveit Neox: Wow… on your first day you saw Cetus. That’s quite an introduction!
Rowan Derryth: It WAS. It kept me coming back. But then it was the typical noob stuff too, naked Brazilian guys. (grins playfully)
Haveit Neox: ha ha! Wow, what a great way to get into SL
Rowan Derryth: I was very lucky. But enough about me… How long did it take you to get any installations up?
Haveit Neox: This installation? I had two months… or do you mean first builds in SL?
Rowan Derryth: First builds
Haveit Neox: I think it was the first day. Someone showed me a couple things about the Edit button, and I was on my way. I kind of take to it like a duck to water. I’ve been building 3d cities in gardens since I was a kid.

Water Bearer. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Rowan Derryth: How did you get the LEA opportunity?
Haveit Neox: The LEA… I got that by a miracle! I submitted, having heard about it thru UWA… and composed my idea. But I didn’t think I had the slightest chance of getting accepted. It’s hard for me to believe I’m standing in the exhibit now, that it really happened.
Rowan Derryth: They are smart cookies… I’m glad they did.  I am SO impressed… and I’m not easily impressed!

Intricately crafted flies show Haveit's attention to detail. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Haveit Neox: (laughs) Thank you! AND, I’m getting such a kick out of seeing that you both put on the bot costume.
Rowan Derryth: (laughs) Of COURSE. It’s pretty cool
Haveit Neox: Thank you!
PJ Trenton: (coming out of his photographic reverie) I asked her if I looked foolish before you arrived (winks)
Haveit Neox: ha ha ha!!!
Rowan Derryth: And also it helped us find each other in the Librarynth
PJ Trenton: true
Rowan Derryth: We could lead tour groups!
Haveit Neox: Yes! instead of looking for the carnation in the lapel, you search for the three story high umbrellas (laughs) That’s great for tour groups.
Rowan Derryth: I told PJ that after this we needed to find some nightclub with fashionistas and party in these.
Haveit Neox: I hope you start a trend.

I’m certain Haveit has started his own trend of fantastic immersive artwork. Lucky for us, he is already at work on his next piece, so keep your eyes and ears open. Meanwhile, do not miss seeing Second Libations, which is open through the month of December. Here are some more images PJ took along the way, and do take a moment to look at his complete flickr set. But whatever you do, make sure to take time to see this beautiful and thoughtful exhibit before it closes – and WEAR THE BOT COSTUME!

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Revolt of the Mannequins by Silene Christensen. Photo by PJ Trenton.

The notorious British art dealer/patron Charles Saatchi wrote a piece for Saturday’s Guardian entitled The Hideousness of the Art World. Aside from the disturbing conclusion that I think I may have just become a fan of Saatchi (the man who launched Damien Hirst on the world; my love/hate affair with Hirst’s work is long-standing), I found the article to be revealing, by way of contrast, as to one of the reasons I am a fan of virtual art.

I miss writing about art in SL, the business of ‘first’ life has taken me away, I hope only temporarily. But Saatchi’s article has moved me to break my needful silence, and as well gave me an excuse to share some of my favourite selections from the UWA 3D Art Challenge finale, which I am privileged to judge (along with many others including our intrepid editor Saffia).

Venustrap by claudia222 Jewel. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Saatchi’s article begins “Even a show-off like me finds this new, super-rich art-buying crowd vulgar and depressingly shallow,” an observation born not just out of his years of being at the centre of the contemporary art market, but specifically out of his recent experience attending this year’s Venice Biennale. Venice’s biannual ‘world’s fair of art’ has a special place in my own heart, as it is where I first learned to love contemporary art back in 1990, at a tender young age, after I was blown away by Jenny Holzer‘s display in the American pavilion (the first woman to show there). I’ve only experienced it one other time since (1993, in which another favourite, Nam Jun Paik, represented America, and I saw an incredible installation by Peter Greenaway, who as we know has been so wise as to recognise the machinima as a cutting edge New Media artform, and was himself a fellow UWA judge for the machinima competition). If I had the means, I’d certainly go every chance I had.

However I’m certainly not in Saatchi’s league, and could probably stumble through guileless of the tragic display he witnesses there:

Being an art buyer these days is comprehensively and indisputably vulgar. It is the sport of the Eurotrashy, Hedge-fundy, Hamptonites; of trendy oligarchs and oiligarchs; and of art dealers with masturbatory levels of self-regard… Venice is now firmly on the calendar of this new art world, alongside St Barts at Christmas and St Tropez in August, in a giddy round of glamour-filled socialising, from one swanky party to another…

Do any of these people actually enjoy looking at art? Or do they simply enjoy having easily recognised, big-brand name pictures, bought ostentatiously in auction rooms at eye-catching prices, to decorate their several homes, floating and otherwise, in an instant demonstration of drop-dead coolth and wealth.

Without deconstructing the inherent irony in his rant (as he has certainly played his part in crafting that scene), it made me think about the virtual art world, and our own version of the Biennale: the UWA 3D Art Challenge. Well, ok, that might be a stretch, but it IS the place where we may see the widest range of virtual art, and, in my opinion, some of the very best. In fact, with perhaps the exception of AM Radio, all of the greatest virtual artists who come to mind have participated, some of them regularly. I’ve had the pleasure of being a judge for the final award these past two years, and it was NOT an easy task.

Paranormal Frottage by Misprint Thursday. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Like Venice, one can wander the UWA and see some of the freshest and most innovative contemporary art – in fact, art which would be very difficult if not impossible to display at the Biennale. Art so cutting-edge that most of those vulgar art buyers wouldn’t even know of its existence. They wouldn’t deign to. Forget about the taboo of Second Life: the art at the UWA isn’t for sale. And even if it was, the reproductive nature of virtual art (not to mention the economic system of SL) makes the market for it ‘virtually’ non-existent. And I say this as an avid collector of it myself. How would these people display this work? How would it hold it’s financial value, particularly when it lacks both potential rarity and physical accessibility?

One + Four Timeboards by L1aura Loire. Photo by PJ Trenton.

This has a bang on affect for virtual artists, of course, for whom creation can only ever be a labour of love, and if they are very lucky, might pay tier. Some have tried to tackle this via selling limited edition versions, usually of rezzed repros of their physical world work (something which for me isn’t actually virtual art anyway), or creating books of their work to be sold (often at too high cost). The only artists I know who are actually self-supporting in SL are those who have commercial sides to their businesses, or those who have external funding for their work. And here lies one of the key problems in giving credibility to virtual art: what market there is for it is unstable at best. Because the sad truth is, to quote a Jenny Holzer Truism, ‘Money creates taste.’ Or rather, perhaps, it drives it.

Believe me, I HATE what I’m saying here. I do, in fact, have a lofty dreamy goal that I will some day curate a very serious exhibit on virtual art in a very serious institution. I’ve thought long and hard about how to do it, and had conversations with some of my readers, no doubt. And I’m certainly not the first to try it, we know it’s already been done.

In Dreams by Blue Tsuki. Photo by PJ Trenton.

But to get back to the original point, the failed art market of Second Life actually has a wonderful byproduct: a space in which art is created and enjoyed truly for its own sake. We immerse ourselves in the beauty and strangeness of these creations not for investment purposes, but because we derive pleasure from it, whether that is sensual or intellectual. The UWA is by no means the only place to see this; it exists across the grid in every beautiful build (really labours of love) from landscapes like Alirium (who of course also sell their fantastical plants) to cities like New Babbage.

The Superheroes Breakfast by Typote Beck. Photo by PJ Trenton.

I don’t mean to suggest that we have crafted some kind of artistic utopia; SL is plagued with galleries of very poor ‘art’, run by owners who don’t know the first thing about curation or the art world (sadly, we seem to get group notices from these folks ALL THE TIME). But there is a way in which we avoid one of the key problems Saatchi points out:

Few people in contemporary art demonstrate much curiosity. The majority spend their days blathering on, rather than trying to work out why one artist is more interesting than another, or why one picture works and another doesn’t.

Now it could be argued that I am, in fact, blathering on. But I can tell you I do spend a lot of my time considering why some artists are more interesting than others, and why some virtual art ‘works’ and other is utter crap. Close friends can verify this, but I often don’t discuss what I think is crap in print. I’m not a brave enough critic. Instead, I choose to write about what moves me and what I see to be important work.

Theatre of War by Miso Susanowa. Photo by PJ Trenton.

But in SL, curiosity drives us. We explore these worlds as a pastime, and the artists who build immersive installations provide spaces for our curiosity to frolic. For me, the very best virtual art engages multiple senses (smell and taste are of course not yet possible, which in some ways might be a blessing!). I do include touch here because, although we often think of this work as being non-physical, we in fact must interact with our computers to access it, and in some cases our dexterity is engaged to experience work.

The Suicide Forest Infested by Harpias by Rebeca Bashly. Photo by PJ Trenton.

In many ways, though, this works the same way as visiting a gallery or museum. The work is physical, but we do not usually smell or taste it; and we usually don’t touch it either. In fact, virtual art is even MORE interactive–we can ‘touch’ is and be part of the work. And we don’t have to worry about caretaking and conservation in the same manner as physical work (although virtual works opens whole new problems in these areas). One of the machinima from the UWA challenge that I absolutely loved played upon these ideas was ‘Artwashers’ by 2sense Productions.

By introducing us to the fictive cleaners at the UWA, the parody cleverly highlights how such a space is so much less complicated that a real museum, allowing the administrative energy to be focused on creativity and education. And that freedom to focus on the creative work has created a wonderful, happy accident. When I interviewed the UWA in SL founder and director Jayjay Zifanwe (Jay Jay Jegathesan, Manager of the School of Physics, University of Western Australia) at last year’s SL8B Prim Perfect stage, I asked him, ‘Do you realise the amazing collection of virtual art you are building? Have you thought about what you will do with it?’ He replied that it hadn’t at all been his goal to create a collection, but rather to simply drive creativity; that he wasn’t a curator. However, I could see FreeWee Ling, the UWA curator (and winner of last year’s challenge), nodding her head along. Jayjay’s wonderful idea and lofty goals have this incredible byproduct of an unintentional but incredible collection of virtual art. What’s to be done with it? We’ve got some ideas… watch this space. As well, I’ll be interviewing Jayjay at the Christmas Expo this coming Friday, so do come along as I’m sure we’ll chat about this!

Shattered by Gingered Alsop. Photo by PJ Trenton.

There is so much more I could say on this, but I’d rather bring this oversimplified ramble to a close by simply stating that the final awards ceremony for this year’s UWA Challenge will be a week from today (Sunday the 11th) at 6am SLT. Meanwhile, you can visit the finale exhibition and see the winners from this year’s monthly competitions, direct slurls can be found here. The images in this post are of some of the works that I have selected for my top 10 in the overall and unscripted categories. But I’ll close with a slideshow that includes some others, taken by the talented PJ Trenton (you can see the full set more clearly at his flickr.)

The Inventor, created by Colin Fizgig.

Last night I took a journey with a group of rather extraordinary people, following the trail of a rather odd inventor who seemed rather uncertain about the direction he was headed. You see, it seems that while working in his lab, he discovered a glowing hole, and, like a white rabbit, it beckoned him through… we followed…

But in fact, it wasn’t this fictional inventor leading us, but a virtual one… The Path we followed was one begun by Bryn Oh.

Bryn Oh leads us down 'The Path': (in background, left to right) Maya Paris, Scottius Polke, PJ Trenton, Marcus Inkpen, Quan Lavender, Rose Borchovski, Rowan Derryth, and Desdemona Enfield.

The Path is an unique new exhibit opening today (14 October) at 2pm SLT and sponsored by the Linden Endowment for the Arts (LEA). Curated by Bryn, the series of installations is based on the concept of “The Exquisite Corpse”, a creative game played amongst the Surrealists in the 1920s and 30s in which one person starts a narrative text (or drawing), then passes it along to the next only partially revealed, for their continuation. In its text form, the game was originally called “Consequences”, however the Surrealists adopted the new name for it based on a phrase from their first game: Le cadavre exquis boira le vin nouveau. (The exquisite corpse will drink the new wine.)

'Cadavre Exquis' by Man Ray, Joan Miró, Max Morise and Yves Tanguy

The Path narrative was crafted in this fashion, as Bryn explains:

I invited eight artists whose work I admire, some have worked in SL for ages and are well known, while others less so but equally talented.  Each artist was invited to stand on a coloured box and once all were ready I rezzed a chart which listed the sequence of scenes in a narrative by colour.  Not sure if the Surrealists cared about the random start but it seemed like a good idea.

In fact, ideas of chance and randomness were at the very heart of Surrealism as well as Dada, roughly the precedent movement in which many Surrealists such as André Breton (who was amongst the first to play “The Exquisite Corpse”), Marcel Duchamp, and Tristan Tzara also participated.

Bryn’s experiment was slightly more controlled in that each artist was able to read the entirety of the previous contributor’s idea. As well, random chance turned to fate: the first artist in the sequence was in fact Bryn herself. As such, she began the tale of the strange Inventor (created by Colin Fizgig and, one cannot help notice, remarkably resembling Dalí) and his unusual journey.

Experiments go awry in Scottius Polke's contribution to the tale.

Joining her in crafting the tale are some of the very best narrative artists on the grid (or anywhere, in my opinion). In their random order, they fell:

Beginning with Bryn, and ending with Rose – is that enough to let your imagination run wild?

Rose Borchovski's surreal conclusion would make Dalí proud.

I couldn’t wait to see the results, and Bryn very kindly allowed me, PJ Trenton, and fellow blogger Quan Lavender to tag along on last night’s artist walkthrough (you can read Quan’s account and see her lovely pics here). It was, as expected, a rather hallucinogenic adventure with many fun twists, turns, and surprises… and I do not wish to spoil those here! But as Bryn has stated on her blog:  “We did a walk through last night and the variety was wonderful. I really think this may be something people talk about for a long time. I personally couldn’t pick my favourite scene last night as each excelled in some area or another. And that to me is a very good sign.”

Detail of the Inventor's lab by Bryn Oh, which kicks off the tale.

I wondered if the other artists felt pleased or daunted that Bryn was up first, and so asked them…

“Some of us are grateful she went first,” smiled the otterific Scottius Polke.

I laughed, “She is a master of narrative…”

“Oh no I am not really,” said Bryn with her usual humility.

Marcus Inkpen chimed in, “She’s a great way to set the mood and tone and all. Yeah- me likes.” Then, Rose Borchovski added, “I think what was great was that she chose such a great variety of artists and brought us all to a happy and constructive end, it was a very nice and good experience.”

Marcus Inkpen's dizzying corridor shows his usual mastery in fantastical building.

One of the things I MUST comment on, however, is that these installations are not merely visual: one of the most impressive aspects of The Path is the sound. Each work has an auditory component, many of which were designed by the artists themselves, such as the eerie tones in Marcus Inkpen’s maze-like corridor. As well, Douglas Story and Desdemona Enfield have again joined forces to make an interactive media piece, which includes a track from an excellent voice actor which really enriches the effect. Make certain to have your sounds on for a truly immersive experience.

Our motley crew wanders through Douglas Story & Desdemona Enfield's installation.

The artists have done a wonderful job with the continuity of the tale, while at the same time each build bears their own unique artistic signature, complete with references to their more familiar work. Rose has included a Susa in her piece, while Scottius’ chemicals and purple goo harken to his builds like mushROOM and Lunamaruna. Maya’s is full of quirky surprises as usual, and claudia222′s is made from the rich golden organic textures seen in recent works like her Burn2 piece Sacrifice.

claudia222 Jewel added a more primitive-looking scene that is full of secrets to explore.

Outside of the sheer fantastic builds, I was just as impressed listening to these artists, who obviously have a great deal of admiration for each other, collaborate. As they were putting on the finishing touches, they were asking each other for objects/details which would make the overall story more cohesive; sharing feedback, ideas, praise, and the excitement was infectious.

While wandering The Path with those that created it, it didn’t escape me that for all my past wishes that I could have been at the gatherings of this or that group of dead artists, that I was perhaps walking amidst the new greats… certainly not dead, and yet… living? Yes, even if pixellated.

Swinging with Rose, Scottius, and claudia222 in Maya Paris' subconscious trip.

This is an exhibition not to be missed, and amongst the first of many to be sponsored by the LEA (for more on their exciting plans, see this post).  Try to make the 2pm opening Friday to catch the artists and chat with them yourself. This is contemporary art at its best – taking a seed from the past, and reinventing it in a medium so cutting edge, the art world isn’t even aware of its importance yet.

Which is of course what Dada and Surrealism did as well. Go see The Path and enjoy art history in the making.

Curator and mastermind Bryn Oh.

Special thanks to PJ Trenton for the photographs.

“Well it was weird,” Bryn told me, “someone contacted me from Vogue a few months ago, but it was so informal I didnt really think it was the real Vogue, thought it was SL Vogue or something.” But a Facebook friend informed her today that indeed, she was mentioned in an article on virtual art in Second Life.

Bryn has translated the article rather roughly at her blog, but it gives one the idea of what the article says, and is worth a look.  She also has an opening of her newest exhibit tomorrow, and all the information is posted there as well.

Two other must see art exhibits are Maya Paris’ new exhibit Crash Bang Trollop (the name is as entertaining as the art) at MetaLES; and while the next UWA art challenge isn’t completely installed, there are already a few mesh pieces on display, including a breathtaking ‘marble’ by Pumpkin Tripsa. At just three prims, the stunning level of detail shows the power of mesh, especially when compared with some of the figural prim sculptures displayed nearby.

Pumpkin Tripsa, 'Water', mesh sculpture. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Curator FreeWee Ling says there is more mesh art on the way, so make sure to have a viewer that is enabled when you go over this month!

Glyph Graves' 'Faceted Existence' Photo by PJ Trenton.

I’ve just come from an historic new exhibit from one of the great pioneers of virtual art, Glyph Graves. His new exhibit, Composition in Realities features several of his interactive sculptures across the barren landscape of the Art Screamer sim. But the groundbreaking part was the performance Glyph gave – a piece he cleverly calls ‘Faceted Existence’ whereby he has programmed an interface (a very appropriate term here) with his Kinect which rendered his face in three dimensions, real time, utilising some 2500 prims.

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Glyph wrote the code and the interface with the advice of master coders Desdemona Enfield (who often works with Douglas Story on immersive works like ‘Dynafleur’) and Miki Gymnast. While people have been hacking and experimenting with Kinects almost since the day they came on the market, this work is to my knowledge (and to Glyph’s) the first art piece to fully embrace this new technology and make it work in world. The result does not necessarily equal the aesthetic beauty of Glyph’s other sculptural works, however it was definitely in the realm of ‘cool’ as we watched Glyph’s actual face come to life in moving, flashing prims. ColeMarie Soleil got a sneak preview of the exhibit, and made a very short machinima of the work which she has graciously let me post for you here:

For me, Glyph is at the forefront of creating art which truly exists within variable reality, a term coined by digital art pioneer Roy Ascott, which I have come to prefer. In the introductory note to the exhibit, Glyph states:

The majority of the pieces here use real-time elements of the physical world, and combine them to create an SL existence. 

You could call this an Augmented Virtual Reality Installation or a Composite Reality Installation.

Or simply an Art installation.

This is a new type of exhibition:
It does something other than cross the RL/SL boundaries
It ignores them.

It chooses to place the art created here not as a thing separate, a category known as “virtual art,” but as a work that says this is just a new tendril from a body of human endeavour that we call art.

Also included in this exhibit are other of Glyph’s sculptures which combine avatar interaction with real-time data to created pieces which shift and change. In a manner of speaking, Glyph plays electronic god through his art, and the result is fascinating and rather beautiful. These works include his award-winning ‘Antarctica’, ‘Forest of Water’, and the exquisite ‘Sabrinaa’s River’, made in memory of his dear friend Sabrinaa Nightfire who was lost to cancer earlier this year.

The exhibit is sponsored by SL art patrons Zachh Cale, Chestnut Rau and Amase Levasseur. Future performances of Faceted Reality will be announced via the various art groups such as Art & Artist Network, but the sim is open for exploration any other time. Don’t miss this!

UPDATE: Dividni Shostakovich of Split Screen has also made an interesting blog post on this which gets a bit more into the technical aspects, worth a read!

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See more of PJ Trenton’s photos of this exhibit at flickr.

Works by Klimt, Hopper, and Pollock are amongst the many popular modern artists being flogged.

Since my early days in SL, I’ve often wondered how businesses (‘galleries’) got away with selling what I call ‘rezzed repros’ – reproductions of real life art work for which they did not have rights. The other night, my annoyance with this came to a head when I discovered such a place listed in the Second Life Destination Guide.

I’ve written a rather detailed blog post about it all, some of which is excerpted here. As the original post is certainly laden with both my own opinion and particulars about the individuals involved, I didn’t think it fair to write it under the aegis of Prim Perfect. However, our editor thought it might be a subject of interest to our readers, as creative content, DMCA, and copyright law are all part of this issue, and are murky areas for many of us.

Why is selling rezzed repros so wrong? Surely Second Life should be a place where you can hang the painting of your dreams on your living room wall!

Well, up to a point.

No one is going to stop you from uploading your favourite Picasso or Klimt and placing it on a prim (or a nice frame made by your favourite designer) in your virtual home. But if you were to try and sell these in your shop, you would not only be in violation of Linden Labs Terms of Service – but it would be illegal. Business owners who do this knowingly (and many do it in ignorance) are exploiting a very grey area of copyright law: the use of reproductions of original material.

The first part is easy: copyright law varies from country to country, but in general (in Europe and North America), if a work is older than ‘the author’s date of death plus 70 years’, it is considered in the Public Domain. If not, it is subject to copyright. For example, Rothko died in 1970, Picasso in 1973; elementary math tells us that these artists have not been dead 70 years, so their works are still clearly copyrightable.

Picasso is one of the many 'not dead very long' artists being sold inworld. Also, the cut-in-half 'Las Meninas' as a carpet made me cringe.

The next, more puzzling question is whether a photograph that is a faithful representation of an original work that is OUT of copyright (in the public domain), falls under the same copyright as the original, or whether it is considered a new work of art. It is a conundrum that is at the heart of wikimedia and creative commons debates. Some museums allow their artworks to be photographed (the British Museum and the V&A immediately come to mind), at which point the photo is yours to use (and sell) to your heart’s content. Most of these, however, are little more than poorly lit snapshots. Other museums do not allow photography, and rely on reproduction fees for income (The National Gallery London, the Tate, and the Getty come to mind). And the debate here is, how can they charge for a work that is out of copyright?

What you pay is not for copyright, but rather a licensing fee to use their own reproduction of the image. By disallowing photography in the museum, they ensure that the only proper images come from them. But in the age of scanners and digital photographs, beautiful DYI repros can easily be made and put on the web. And personally, I’m a fan – I use them for educational purposes. Which falls under Fair Use.

Waterhouse may be long dead, but Tate Britain still owns the reproduction rights to many of the works seen for sale here.

Let’s talk about that term for just a second – and I must make a disclaimer, I am no copyright expert. I’m simply someone who has to deal with this professionally on a regular basis. According to this rather good explanation of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA, something many content creators are familiar with, and if you aren’t, you NEED to be):

The Fair Use provision of the Copyright Act basically allows reproduction and other uses of copyrighted works under certain conditions for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship or research.

A GOOD example of a place in SL which is showing – and selling – virtual work lawfully is the Dresden Gallery, a wonderful virtual recreation of the actual Dresden Gallery made in partnership with the Dresden University of Technology. The works on display are Old Masters, and as well from their own collection. Some are available for purchase, which is really a donation to help keep the project going – not a private money-making scheme. In fact, I cannot even display the lovely images of the Dresden I asked PJ Trenton to shoot for me, as they require permission of the gallery due to copyright. The Dresden informs all visitors via notecard:

© 2009: The idea, works of art, shop articles and buildings as well as their virtual reproductions are the property of the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden and may not be copied, duplicated or otherwise used, in whole or in part, in real life or in the virtual world without permission. www.skd-dresden.de 

Rezzing a reproduction and making a profit from it without reproduction rights is clearly against the Terms of Service. Section 4.4 states:

Intellectual property infringement on the Service is a violation of this Terms of Service, and you agree not to engage in such infringement.

Featuring such a place in the SL Destination Guide is shocking, infuriating, and disappointing – particularly in light of all the other wonderful virtual art out there!

As DCMA complaints need to be filed by the copyright owner, it is unlikely anything will be done from that side (although I do personally know several curators who would be interested to know that paintings in their collection are being exploited). So what can we do? Educate people, as it may be the case that many violations are made innocently. And for those who persist? How about if we stop giving them our lindens. As I said above, if you MUST have that Raphael gracing your virtual palazzo, why not just pay $10L and do it yourself, rather than pay $150L to someone selling it illegally?

Here is another suggestion. Why not buy some original art made by your fellow community members? There are so many wonderful virtual artists in SL, why not become a virtual art collector? There is something for every taste:

• Love Classical or Renaissance art? Pumpkin Tripsa’s sculptures are stellar.
• A fan of the Pre-Raphaelites? Check out the sensuous art of Eliza Wierwight, or in a slightly darker manner, Ariel Brearly and Fingers Scintilla.
• Love Impressionism? PJ Trenton’s abstract photographs evoke the same rich colours and textures, and Soror Nishi’s trees evoke their spirit.
• Is Pop Art your thing? You need have the clever comics of Chrome Underwood on your walls, or perhaps something by Botgirl Questi.
• Love Surrealism? Explore the strange works of Scottius Polke, or invest in a wonderful sculpture by Anley Piers or Cherry Manga.
• Wild about Abstract Expressionism? Check out Gracie Kendal and Filthy Fluno.
• Want something unlike anything in the real world? The breadth of choices available will astound you.

We’ve all seen rather dubious practices of all kinds, when it comes to intellectual property. It is disappointing, however, when Linden Labs so easily lets something like this fall through the cracks. Here’s hoping the situation will be rectified, and not repeated.

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Special thanks to PJ Trenton for research and image assistance.

FlowerDrum by Eliza Wierwight at Split Screen. Photo by PJ Trenton.

I am often thinking (and debating people) about the best way to display art in SL – how to walk the balance between using virtual space to its full effect without forgetting the essential elements to good curation in terms of displaying and viewing work (do NOT get me started on the distracting practice hanging work in mid air, or on a transparent wall). The current exhibits at Split Screen are both excellent examples of how to do this well: purpose built spaces which work perfectly for the objects they display.

According to curator and owner Dividni Shostakovich”The Split Screen Installation Space is place where artists and builders develop and exhibit large installations.  Two artists use the space for two months, and then other artists take over.  The space is meant for large builds that utilize the possibilities of Second Life as an artistic or immersive medium, such as works that are impossible in real life.” I’ve been meaning to write about this space for some time, as the shows are regularly quite impressive, and I’ve seen some incredible builds here by the likes of Maya Paris, Oberon Onmura, and Misprint Thursday. The current exhibits do not disappoint either.

Shattering a Monet at D.Construct by Douglas Story and Desdemona Enfield, at Split Screen. Photo by PJ Trenton.

D.Construct

D.Construct is another fun and clever creation from Douglas Story and Desdemona Enfield, creators of Ripple and Dynafleur among other things. I admit that I was VERY wary of this one when I saw a notice from Doug that said something like ‘come see Desde’s script destroy famous art’. Normally that might make an art historian like me cry, but I know Doug’s quirky sense of humour, and as well his respect for art (he is based in LA and always IMs me about the latest thing he saw at the Getty).

And it IS fun, the kind of exhibit you can play with for a while. Select a painting, then watch it ‘deconstruct’ into coin-like pieces which tumble and pile at your feet. I enjoyed the music as well, and although it seems a simple process, I know it takes the master scripting of someone like Desde to make it seem so straightforward. And you know, I’ve never been a massive fan of Monet, so watching his San Giorgio Maggiore at Dusk (1908) crumble to wee bits was pretty neat. I only ask one thing – please, Doug, go back and add titles and dates (rather than just ‘Monet Thumbnail’), so people can learn more about the images. I mean, if you are going to ‘destroy’ the work, at least give us the names!

FlowerDrum by Eliza Wierwight at Split Screen. Photo by PJ Trenton.

FlowerDrum
Eliza Wierwight’s builds are difficult to classify – immersive spaces that sit somewhere between art installation and artistic interior designs. FlowerDrum is no exception: a sensuous, exotic temple for the 21st century. It feels equal parts sacred space, memorial, art gallery and cocktail lounge. Definitely a space you want to spend time chilling out in. Luckily she has included several spots for meditation, napping, or cozying with a friend. The exotic build is inspired by the artists own journeys:

It follows vignettes of the Orient in my life, travelling as far back as being a small child, the toddler with blonde hair that villagers crowded to touch due to its novelty or rarity, in some provinces never seen before.

FlowerDrum by Eliza Wierwight at Split Screen. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Eliza – who often constructs sets for her own stunning photographs – seems to have designed the space with photographers in mind, as she obviously thinks very carefully how her objects are framed, and how one moves through the build to have constantly shifting views and compositions. Also, make sure your audio is on, for the music and sounds are equally exquisite, and suit the installation perfectly.

D.Construct and FlowerDrum are open now and on display for the next two months. See more of PJ Trenton’s photos of these works at his flickr set.

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As a bonus, I just popped by an opening of a small exhibit of works by Glyph Graves at Fruit Islands Art. Included are objects he simply had buried in his inventory and which are rarely seen; and as well a “Doorway” to the beautiful installation he made in memory of Sabrinaa Nightfire. Glyph wasn’t sure how long this would be open, so do take a moment to pop over soon.

RADIO DAYS opens Friday May 20th, 3-4 and 6-8pm SLT

Many of us were deeply saddened at AM Radio’s announcment that he would be closing his sims at IDIA within 6 months.To celebrate this incredible artist, RoHaus Art Gallery and Avalon Town (featured in the current issue of Prim Perfect) are sponsoring this exhibit in his honour!

Opening Friday, 20th May, 2011
European Cocktail Hour, 3pm SLT
Official Opening 6-8pm

RoHaus Slurl

This exhibit is comprised of several parts. At RoHaus, a series of vintage and specially comissioned works by the celebrated SL photographers Raven Haalan, PJ Trenton, and Stephen Venkman are on display, plus the first public showing of works by Rowan Derryth (yours truly).

Outside, an installation of AM’s exquisite creations, including rare objects and his own photographic works, has been co-curated by Derryth & Trenton. AM has himself lent a few rarities for this display, which has been arranged inside one of his cozy houses.

Upon seeing the exhibit going up, neighbours Amber Eyre and Bumble Parx decided to join in and mount AM exhibits as well. Landmarks for these displays will be at the gallery, but visitors can easily wander on over the old-fashioned way.

You can read a little more about the background of this exhibit at my personal blog.

We hope you can join us for this exciting event!

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Read more about AM Radio at the Prim perfect blog:

Ekphrasis: AM Radio Part I

Ekphrasis: AM Radio Part II

Sabrinaa Nightfire, photographed for the 1000+ Avatars project by Gracie Kendal

I keep telling artists they are “on the list.” The list is my ever growing roster of artists whose work inspires me, and about whom I am moved to write in this column. But as this is not my full-time job (I wish!), and time is finite, I can only do these as time allows – particularly because I put a lot of thought into them. And thought = time. And again, time is finite. And I think this sense of finite time is being felt with a deep, regretful poignancy today in the SL art world, for one of its brightest lights has passed from our virtual cosmos.

Last night, Debbie Berman, known to us as Sabrinaa Nightfire, lost her battle with cancer.

Her close friend and collaborator George Janick (Dr. Gary Zabel) wrote:

It is my sad task to tell you that our very dear friend Sabrinaa Nightfire passed away Sunday evening after a long struggle with cancer. She died at home in bed with her family present. Those of us who were close to her know how many lives she touched so deeply with her love and her art. There is no one who can ever replace her. We will have a memorial on her island of Erato, the place she loved best in Second life, at a date to be announced. Our hearts go out to her family and rl and sl friends.

Sabrinaa was on my list. And I will not pretend for a second that I knew her well, or was close with her. But I will say that my list is selective, and that means her work moved me. And how I wish I hadn’t let finite time runaway with my opportunity to talk to her more about her work. Regular readers know that these articles always include an interview. So here is what I have, a brief exchange from almost a year ago, back when I believed this would actually be a bi-weekly column:

Rowan Derryth: Hi there Sabrinaa!  Your installation at Enter is incredible!
Sabrinaa Nightfire: thank you so much, Rowan:)
Rowan Derryth: My pleasure! I’d really like to feature you in my Ekphrasis column… I’m trying not to ask too far ahead because I don’t want people to think I’ve forgotten them
Sabrinaa Nightfire: cool, thank you. I am honored.
Rowan Derryth: I’m scheduled about a month out now. But you are definitely on my list.
Sabrinaa Nightfire: no worries, just let me know when you are ready
Rowan Derryth: Great!  Also, I noticed in your profile you are from Florida… I was born and raised in Miami
Sabrinaa Nightfire: Oh, cool, I went to Miami last week… I love it there
Rowan Derryth: Aw, say hi to my mom I live in Scotland now
Sabrinaa Nightfire: Wow, cool, how do  you like it?
Rowan Derryth: Wonderful  It is very wet.
Sabrinaa Nightfire: I have never been there, but it is on my list
Rowan Derryth:
Sabrinaa Nightfire:

There it is, my one exchange with her. And what can we learn, besides the fact that I let time get the better of me? She was warm, gracious, friendly, humble, and she had a ‘list’ of her own that sadly got cut short far, far too early.

Bloom, by Sabrinaa Nightfire

As I barely knew her, I hesitated to write this, and hesitated even more in calling it an Ekphrasis. However I did promise she was on the list, and so here it is. I have no earth-shattering revelations to offer, and cannot fairly write this column in the manner I wish as my conversations with the artists are integral to my discussions of their work. Thus, I have only one thing to say about her work: it is full of life. Go and visit Bloom on Erato Caerleon (she was at the centre of this art collective), and you will see what I mean. Magnificent and wondrous flowers burst from the virtual soil, and it is difficult today to not see them as emblems of her own spirit. Only one work here speaks of her struggle: Stage 4, a simple platform with phrases that vocalize her thoughts of anger at having stage four cancer. The one that hit me the hardest was “I have a lot more art to make.” A pose ball with the text “I am SO Angry!” allows one to have a virtual tantrum – something that some might find theraputic today.

Stage 4, by Sabrinaa Nightfire

I am standing in Caerleon now amidst her outlandish, vibrant flowers, where compatriots (equally outlandish and vibrant) have been gathering throughout the day to create a memorial. You would think we were at the most elite of art openings to see the names gathered here, but these were simply her friends, those who she touched, influenced, and delighted with her work: Miso Susanowa, Scottius Polke, White Lebed, Apollo Reinard, Wizzy Gynoid, MommaLuv Skytower, Misprint Thursday, RAG Randt, Gracie Kendal, Solkide Auer, Betty Tureaud, Bettina Tizzy, Soror Nishi… and so many more, coming and going. All talking about her, remembering, sharing… when I arrived, it was just Miso and Gracie:

“I was telling Gracie, Sab was the first person to ask me for my work, and the first person here to arrange a showing for me. She was my art-mother here,” said Miso.

Friends gather to talk, laugh, and remember.

So many thoughts like that we shared, and fond memories of the way in which she challenged artists too:

“I so loved her super fun texture challenge,” remembered Bettina, Fairy Godmother of Not Possible In Real Life (NPIRL). ”Looking through my profile at goodies I have from her. That was one of the best concepts.” I asked her about it, and she shared:

Nine textures are provided by us. Participants create a work of art using these textures.
These are the rules:
1. You may only use these textures…no other textures are allowed. You may use any or all of the textures…or even just one of the nine.
2. The maximum size of your piece is 10x10x10 m.
3. You may use a maximum of 20 prims.

Then Bettina exclaimed, “Oooo! And then there was her One Prim Wonder Challenge! Another fab concept!”

“There was a no texture show too,” remembered Scottius, then with a grin he added, “I told her I am too addicted to textures, so she made me a judge.”

RAG Randt, Scottius Polke, SaveMe OHare, and Bryn Oh amidst Sabrinaa's work and memorial.

More arrive: Bryn Oh, Josina Burgess, Rose Borchovski. And then perhaps my favourite moment thus far… the notorious SaveMe Oh – in the guise of her twin SaveMe OhHare – descended upon us. [For those unfamiliar, SaveMe enjoys a form of performance art reminiscent of Futurist riots, in which she heckles her subject (an artist, a lecturer, an exhibit, what have you) incessantly (although, in fairness, I've found myself reluctantly agreeing with her caustic observations on occasion), and does not relent until she gets banned.] She immediately asked the crowd “Now who has to unban me here?” She then shared, “my last words to her: SaveMe Oh: when you unban me; SaveMe Oh: ?”

“Did she answer?” I wondered aloud.

“No,” said SaveMe.  This brought smiles and laughter, and then she shared a lovely video (she is also a rather interesting machinimatographer) which she shot using one of Sabrinaa’s works, which she has kindly allowed me to link to here:

Today she wouldn’t even try to be banned.

I was going to open this space for comments of those who knew her – and I still welcome them – but perhaps more appropriately, Soror Nishi, who shares Sabrinaa’s love of flowers, has already welcomed this at her blog, and so I encourage all to visit there: http://sorornishi.blogspot.com/2011/03/sabrinaa-nightfire.html

And for those who did not have the privilege of knowing her, take some time out to visit Erato Caerleon. You can also see more of her virtual life and work at her flickr photostream.

Even to those whose lives she touched only briefly, Sabrinaa Nightfire will be deeply missed. A comment from Gwen Carillon sums up the general view of her eloquently: “Sabrinaa was an artist in the true sense. She loved art enough to support it in others … not just her own work. She helped so many artists. She wasn’t afraid to take artistic risks, for her it was a love affair with art.  That was my impression. I didn’t know her well but she helped me and was always encouraging and positive.”

I am confident that like her flowers, she is somewhere blooming eternal.

Sabrinaa with dear friend Glyph Graves at the Enter exhibit opening. Photo by Sabrinaa Nightfire.

One day last fall, I had the vague notion that I might turn Ekphrasis into a podcast, really just a reading of the article that I would post here for those ‘on the go’ types. I know I enjoy a good podcast on my morning commute. However, in thinking on it, I realised quickly that an Ekphrasis podcast wouldn’t work very well if you couldn’t also see the images.

As such, I set to work on turning one Ekphrasis into… well, I’m a bit confused on the term here. I hesitate to call it a machinima, since it lacks realtime capture (it is comprised of stills). Let’s say it is a short documentary, an experiment of sorts. I am grateful to PJ Trenton for being my guinea pig, as well as collaborator. I’ll leave it to viewers to judge whether the original article, Ekphrasis:PJ Trenton (posted almost exactly a year ago) translates as well in this medium, but I will say one of the great benefits of this medium is the ability to show you even more of PJ’s beautiful work, including some of his RL photos. I’d love to make more of these, but only if this one isn’t seen as total rubbish!

And due to my severe Ekphrastic lapse, I shall have to come back with a vengeance. Keep your eyes peeled for a very special Ekphrasis in the next couple weeks that has been quite a while in the making. Meanwhile, I hope you enjoy this wee film.

I like the stories behind things… most of my creations have stories. -Eliza Wierwight

'Patience', 2010. Self-portrait by Eliza Wierwight

The 19th century British designer William Morris said: Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. The Utopian ideal Morris employed in developing the Arts & Crafts movement approached art and architecture with a holistic view – that is, a unified sense of design, where everything was in harmony.

E.W. Godwin, 'Sideboard', England 1867. Ebonised wood with silver-plated fittings with embossed Japanese leather paper. Collection, V&A, Museum no. CIRC.38:1-5-1953

Inspired by this, architect-designers like E.W. Godwin sought to design spaces that were not just artful, but were complete works of art: buildings, interiors, furnishings – even clothing – all crafted to work as an aesthetic whole. In Britain, this approach was called Aestheticism, and the writer Oscar Wilde took this idea to extremes in the preface to his gothic novel The Picture of Dorian Grey (1890) when he said “All art is quite useless.” By this, Wilde does not mean to deprecate art, but rather that for something to be art, it needs no other meaning or purpose; one should not look beyond a thing’s beauty, its surface – Art for Art’s Sake.

In Europe, this holistic approach was adopted by many of the forefathers of modern design – the Vienna Secessionists like Josef Hoffmann and Kolo Moser; and German architect-designers like Adolf Loos and Peter Behrens (who was himself a mentor to the ‘big three’: Gropius, Le Corbusier, and Mies van der Rohe), to name a few. There, a phrase was coined to describe this: gesamtkunstwerk, or, ‘a total work of art.’ This legacy was handed to subsequent design movements: The Bauhaus, De Stijl, the American Craftsman style, and so forth.

So, why start with this little design history lesson? Because this is what ran (very rapidly) through my mind when I first saw the work of Eliza Wierwight. When I say that Eliza is following the gesamtkunstwerk philosophy, I want readers to understand what I mean. In fact, I want Eliza to know what I mean too, because when I asked her about the above, it was a new concept to her, but she was delighted to learn more about it. Does her being unaware of this history make it any less relevant a lens to think about her work?  I don’t think so – because regardless of how she came to it, Eliza’s own philosophy very much matches those of the aforementioned greats. But before I get into that, a bit more about the artist herself.

'Her Shell', by Eliza Wierwight, October 2010

Eliza has been on my radar lately, and I’m sure I’m not alone in this.  I’d heard of her through the grapevine as an incredible builder, seen and chatted with her ‘around town’, and her Patron Gallery (which won the May round of the University of Western Australia’s Flagship Challenge) was the first featured gallery on Treet TV’s Metaverse Arts, hosted by Tricia Aferdita. She then went on to take the most awards at the final UWA Round for her extremely clever The Satirical Polemicist (more on that work in a minute).

Eliza came to Second Life a little over two-and-a-half years ago, and the fact that she began creating from the start shows in the level of skill and attention to detail in her work. Very early on she began associating with and learning from some of the best content creators around, particularly in terms of textures, including Cuwynne Deerhunter, Stephen Venkman, Baron Grayson, Keith Extraordinaire, Sextan Shepherd, Max Graff, and Kriss Lehmann.

Like many, she began creating because, as she looked around, she wasn’t seeing things that quite fit with her own sense of style. “I’m not saying that it doesn’t exist,” she clarified to me when we sat down to chat at her lush, tropical outdoor studio (which speaks to her RL Australian roots), “I’ve collected some exquisite things by other creators in my time in SL… but that’s why I started… not just because I love designing these micro designs, but also because when I first set up a place, I struggled to find things that I really liked.”

And this is the first thing you need to understand about Eliza’s work, which is extremely exciting to me and is what you will discover when you visit Patron: Eliza makes decorative art. Make no mistake that this is not diminutive; Eliza makes exquisite, artful decorative objects which, yes, are meant to adorn your virtual interiors, but do so like Lalique glass, or a Fabergé egg, or a Tiffany lamp, or Wedgwood China, or Baccarat Crystal. You get the idea.

Halloween Platinum Satsuma Style Ginger Jar, 2009

Her Patron catalogue is full of finely detailed and highly finished objects like table lamps, vases, artifacts, candles, and my personal favourites, highly unique ginger jars and ‘framed’ kimonos. (Godwin and his erstwhile artistic collaborator James McNeil Whistler would, I’m sure, fairly drool over these last items were they alive and virtual today!). But it doesn’t end there – she makes furnishings, and, of course architecture as well (don’t forget the gallery itself was a UWA finalist).  And yes, she does work on commission.

Eliza takes tremendous pride in her work, and that shows in her attention to detail. “I love Patron,” she tells me “I ‘walked’ around the Gallery yesterday, first time in ages that I wasn’t just flying in and dropping stuff then leaving… I forget all the little things I’ve done that make a whole.”

Patron Gallery. Photo by PJ Trenton.

The latest edition to her catalog is the stunning Ambassador Suite – a complete studio apartment which can be purchased on its own or with the bespoke furnishings that come as a separate pack. I’m not the only one who sees the connections between Eliza’s work and masters of modern design.  A friend and customer commented:

Toured your suite again. Just beautiful, you have exquisite taste and your dedication to detail is admirable. In RL I am an art furniture/cabinet maker so I understand getting every last detail perfect. And again, the spacious unconfined feeling is just amazing. What you’ve done with a box reminds me a bit of Louis Sullivan, box outside, expansion beyond the box inside. Bravo.

And without knowing these larger concepts of holistic design principals, Eliza naturally gets it. “I’ve designed everything for this suite… every stick of furniture, you name it… all for the  ‘environment’,” she explains while showing me around the incredible suite (do NOT call it a ‘skybox’!). And she’s got that detail thing down to – dare I say – an obsession? She tells me, “I decided I needed to make a doormat… I spent a whole day on a frikken doormat, because I know what I want to emulate, and I will keep at it until I’m happy.” She laughs, “it’s a beautiful doormat, the best!”

Eliza Wierwight's Ambassador Suite, photo courtesy of Patron Gallery.

The mat sits neatly in front of a gorgeous double door in the entry of the suite – a door which has no actual function except to serve conceptually, “to give a sense of security,” Eliza says. Art for art’s sake. The palette perfectly balances lights and darks, and the textures are rich, but broken my smooth minimalist planes, giving the overall affect of being lush but not overdone.

“A gesamtkunstwerk!!!” I exclaim like the design nerd I am.

Eliza laughs, “A whaty?!”

I explain, then go on to ramble a bit about the Arts & Crafts movement, spouting that “beautiful and useful” quote I mentioned at the outset, and I find her unaffected candor utterly charming:

Rowan Derryth: Have you read your William Morris?
Eliza Wierwight: No, I’m a peasant at most things. (laughs)
Rowan Derryth: (laughs) He said: “Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.”
Eliza Wierwight: Awwwww, I think I like him! I think I know his name from Antiques Roadshow, think they’d discuss him there ?
Rowan Derryth: (smiles) You DEFINITELY do. He is the design geek god. We worship at his altar.
Eliza Wierwight: There you go, I knew it was familiar!  I love that show, very relaxing and I LOVE provenance, it’s something I seek and highlight in-world.

In fact she often speaks to me about provenance, as she likes to acknowledge that she acquires many of the textures she uses from her creative circle.  A comment she made on her Flickr photostream to friend and fellow artist Stephen Venkman for the following artwork gives you an idea:

'Contemporary Leda', by Eliza Wierwight, July 2010

What a compilation scene this is, Venks. Kriss’s lightbeam, Sue’s chandelier (forgotten how exquisite this piece is), Igor made me the parquetry texture for a birthday present, the sculpture in the background is mine which I only just released at Patron and my lovely swan is a gift from the hugely talented Jon Haskell. Ohh and Gossy’s Queen Anne Chair. Pity the violin I’m holding is not seen in detail, it’s also an exquisitely executed creation. Ohh the prim corset, I made that too ~laughs~ Good times.

However in the end, she may appropriate objects and textures, but the images she creates are solely her aesthetic.  Her love of decorative objects is clear when viewing her 2D images and sculptural works; they are really just amplified objects d’arts. However, I would argue that more than just the ‘story’ that Eliza suggests in the quote that opens this Ekphrasis, she explores issues that are much deeper and more philosophical than mere narratives.

'Three Dresses Triptych' (Dresses II and III). Photo by PJ Trenton.

Her Three Dresses Triptych, for example, is a set of three ‘life-size’ glass domes which contain extraordinary dresses in unusual settings. Viewers can engage with them by sitting inside the cases and contemplating each dress and it’s environment, while perhaps even considering issues of femininity and display, fashion and art, like I did. Eliza’s note on this work confirms her exploration of feminine identities:

Symbolic – A woman’s potential journey symbolized by the veneer of the dresses (masks) we wear.  The trophies we acquire as we become trophies to society’s expectations and our inherent values reflected by both. The darkness of that undertow contained in the veneer of beauty. I both claim and deny these duties.

Becoming 'The Satirical Polemicist' at Eliza's current exhibit at Exposure Gallery in Avalon. Photo by Rowan Derryth.

Her UWA-winner The Satirical Polemicist also allows us to become part of the piece, as we transform into the dancing figure at the centre of this giant music box amidst a series of precariously spinning plates. How they stay aloft must be the magic of the jester – the artist herself – whose image gazes at us from the inside of the lid. Our dance apparently keeps these plates spinning, as when we finally decide to depart, the plates – printed with the word ‘LOVE’ – go flying into the air. The work then begs the question – who is the satirical polemicist? Is it the jester watching in her whimsical garb, or is it the dancer (you, the viewer) who causes the rupture of the spinning plates, to instigate the pieces of ‘love’ to fracture?

Eliza is now working a new series of thought-provoking works based on one of her favourite artists – Frida Kahlo.  I got a sneak peek at some of these pieces, and they are very exciting. I asked her:

Frida Kahlo, 'The Two Fridas', 1939. Oil on canvas, 68 x 68 in. (173 x 173 cm). Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City.

Rowan Derryth: Tell me – why Frida?
Eliza Wierwight: She resonates to me really strongly. The more I learn about her the more intrigued I am. Her work is iconic, [but] she is not all she was constantly portrayed as. A sexual predator for starters, though entirely submissive to Diego [Rivera, her husband, and a Mexican Muralist].
Rowan Derryth: She was a predator, or that is how she was portrayed?
Eliza Wierwight: She is portrayed as this victim predominantly – talented victim. Lots of religious overtones. Enigmatic woman.
Rowan Derryth: Do you think she portrayed herself that way though?
Eliza Wierwight: I have no idea at this point. In her personal life she was far from discreet.
Rowan Derryth: (nodding) I find her work very powerful – she shows us her wounds, but she also shows her strength.
Eliza Wierwight: Yes and that resonates too, though in a different way.

The works in progress are extraordinary, and really evoke the rich, sensuous, and at times violent images Kahlo for which she was known. Igor Ballyhoo, her close friend and sometimes collaborator, was also there looking at them with us, and when I commented on how impressed I was with her process (setting up the images, layering and making composites), he stoically said “Eliza has imagination.” Those simple words spoke volumes, especially from such a notoriously harsh critic as Igor. Not one to rush, she doesn’t expect them to be on view until the new year, but has given me permission to share with you one work, very clearly based on Kahlo’s “The Two Fridas”.

'The Two Elizas' (author's title), October 2010.

When I asked Eliza to describe her style to me, she offered me a challenge. “You’ll have to make up a name for the style for me Miss Rowan… goth, modern art style… contemporary goth with a hint of steampunk, damned if I know but it works!” Well, I cannot deny the surrealist quality to her work, and she does certainly embrace the dark, anachronistic aesthetic of both goth and steampunk culture. But the art historian cannot get away from the tradition she carries on with from those mentioned at the start of this article: the gesamtkunstwerk approach in unison with the beautiful, useful, and exotic objects she states.  In consideration of all that, there is only one name I can dub her style: Dark Aestheticism. We’ll see how she likes that.

Eliza’s current art exhibit can be seen at Exposure Gallery in Avalon for just a few more days, I highly recommend this fabulous show!  Her Decorative Art and Interiors are available at Patron Gallery.

New to Ekphrasis?  Catch up on the previous posts here:

• Ekphrasis: An Introduction
• Ekphrasis: Ragamuffin Kips
• Ekphrasis: PJ Trenton
• Ekphrasis: Chrome Underwood
• Ekphrasis: Glyph Graves
• Ekphrasis: Gracie Kendal
• Ekphrasis: Scottius Polke
• Ekphrasis Extra: Bursting the Susa Bubble
• Ekphrasis Extra: Tricia Aferdita & Metaverse Arts
• Ekphrasis: AM Radio (Part I)
• Ekphrasis: AM Radio (Part II)

The Tesla Room in the Submarine City. Photo by PJ Trenton.

I am experiencing for the first time something I know, sadly, many readers have gone through: watching a favourite sim close.

Sextan Shepherd has announced that his amazingly beautiful build Nemo will officially close on October 29th. I was priviledged to write about Nemo for Prim Perfect Magazine a couple months ago (Issue 27, August 2010, page 104), and get to know the talented builder. So when I heard the rumours last week, I contacted Sextan: “Nemo is closing?! SAD!”

“No, no, no..” he assured me, “not sad! If Nemo closes… it’s for something else to get born… Consider that Nemo was just a training… so I will make something much improved.”

Ok, that IS rather exciting… I admit that I can’t wait to see what this romantic visionary will come up with next. He gave me a few hints which I promised not to divulge, but I can say that the new place will be rich with mystery and highly interactive!

Detail of Sextan's Celestial Clock. Photo by PJ Trenton.

But improving on Nemo is a bit hard to imagine. It is simply stunning, full of rich textures and fine attention to detail.  If you haven’t been, you simply must go… NOW.  And if you have been, there are several new areas that have gone up recently – particularly in the city in the sky, Alnitak.

Plus, the whole place is certainly worth a second, third – or sadly last – look.

Nemo II. Photo by PJ Trenton.

See more of PJ Trenton’s stunning photos of Nemo at his flickr set.

I try to tackle a problem of representing something, and solve it. And I end up going too far. - AM Radio

'Inner Structure' by AM Radio, 2010.

In the first part of this interview, AM and I talked about his artistic training, and his creative philosophy.  But we had such a long and fascinating conversation, I decided to split this Ekphrasis into two parts, lest my readers give me a virtual smack.  Some of what we talked about was in repsonse to a 2008 interview with Amy Freelunch of  Arthole Radio, and I highly recommend it particularly for his discussion of the more technical aspects of building in SL. But there were several interesting points from that interview that I was curious to ask AM about, namely his views on SL as a creative medium, and how he now sees his work as a collaborative effort with his patrons:

Rowan Derryth: In your interview with Amy, you were lauding SL for being a place that anyone could use, in terms of creativity, that there was a level playing field… you didn’t have to work for pixar to make content and that other virtual worlds were making a mistake in being more specialized, technically. Do you still think that?

AM Radio: I do.

'Bookstacks in the Attic', an incredible composition shot by PJ Trenton at 'The Refuge and the Expansion' in 2009.

Rowan Derryth: I was intrigued in your discussion with Amy when you mentioned how your audience has shaped what you have been doing here. That now you think about what they will be looking for, especially in terms of photography.  Is that still true?

AM Radio: I would expand it and say users are looking for ways to be creative, together. SL imagery allows that. I have attempted to take it further by providing more literal cooperative experience of creativity. That was the driver behind the graffiti project on the box cars, and the idea of my Burning Life build.

Rowan Derryth: I was thinking about that, the box cars [at Surface]. I am very interested in collaborative work, and find it intriguing that you think in those terms. Except you are collaborating largely with people you’ve never met; never will meet. Even here in SL.

AM Radio: As well I am also attempting to undersand griefing, which is itself much like a sort of performance graffiti. I think, as with collaboration, graffiti is an attempt to understand where the boundaries are of what one can and cannot do, both physically, and psychologically.

Rowan Derryth: Ah, interesting! Do you not think, with griefing though, there is a negative spirit to it?

AM Radio: Some would say that about graffiti as well.

Rowan Derryth: I mean, I suppose from a certain perspective one could say that about graffitti – yes – although it, I think is more a critique. I can think of some ‘artists’ who really function as griefers here. I think they try to capture the spirit of Dada. But fail. Do you get griefed here?

AM Radio: Rarely.

Rowan Derryth: I imagine you to be like Switzerland. (both laugh) So do you think griefing is a form of artistic expression then?

AM Radio: Not unless intentionally so… I don’t advocate griefing, and never would, what I am saying is there is parallels between finding the boundaries of creativity and the boundaries of expected behavior. They are both an exploration of what one can and cannot do.

AM Radio's Burlington Northern. Photo by PJ Trenton.

There is no doubt, however, that there is an extremely performative aspect to a lot of SL art, and AM has really taken an innovative approach to thinking about his visitors as collaborate users.  In fact I’ve noticed, looking at his flickrstream, AM seems to use his builds as a photo studio, a staging ground for his sublimely surreal landscape photomontages.  For example, the last time I went to Superdyne, I noticed there was a ladder with a pot of paint at the top, and a photo of the sky floating above it. I couldn’t seem to climb it really (probably just my noob-like dexterity), and there weren’t any poses.  However, shortly thereafter, ‘The Ladder and a Floating Sky’ appeared on his flickr stream.

'The Ladder and a Floating Sky' by AM Radio, composed at Superdyne.

But he lets us play too,  for example, via the incredible poses on the rusty train at The Far Away.  And while these sites are designed so that anyone can take an awesome photo, I grabbed my favourite partner-in-crime PJ Trenton to work his photographic magic with me.  As we wandered and posed and basically basked in the golden glory of the light, I asked PJ what brings him back to AM’s installations over and over.

Collaborating with AM at The Far Away, photo by PJ Trenton.

“They are the most realistic things I’ve seen in SL.  I can photograph them for hours.  For me… they were truly the first realistic landscapes I had come across in SL, and they were grounded in a reality that is pretty much at the opposite spectrum from modern technology, and by extension…SL. Rusted locomotives… windmills… violins… radio waves.  And, they are landscapes that are close to my experience…wheatfields…snow covered landscapes.  But thinking more about it… there is something about the other elements he incorporates that transcends the reality of a wheatfield, or the ginormous tree he had suspended over the highway.  I  think one of the things that appeals to me most is that he has recreated an era long gone with the textures he uses the items he builds: old microscopes, the gas station with the old pumps, the simple farmhouse with the pump,  those fabulous cars, the romance of the rails, those boxcars… Nostalgia.”

Being Super-Human at the Far Away, photo by PJ Trenton.

I agree, but also marvel in that for the hyper-reality of these builds, they are also decidedly surreal – these are ‘normal’ spaces, but filled with strangely beautiful and mysterious elements: violins, for example, scattered on a frozen pond.  And the poses make us superhuman: PJ tows the rusty steam engine while I float above, a heroic, spiritual light bursting forth from my chest.  The interaction with his work makes one feel something other, a calm yet somehow transcendent divine. Sublime.

Feeling Sublime at The Far Away, photo by PJ Trenton.

When I first visited these spaces, I did in fact think of other artists who were interested in the sublime, namely the Romantics: Turner, Constable, Friedrich.  Many others have seen the American artist Andrew Wyeth in the golden tones of AM’s work.  In the comments to part I of this Ekphrasis, Elegia Underwood astutely observed: “For myself, the works evoke the surreal realities of Andrew Wyeth’s paintings. Held by the light over the old locomotive (or radiating the light in a moment of ecstasy, depending how one sees it) reminds me of ‘Christina’ alone in a vast field, the farmhouse far away… that moment of /intimate/ solitude that draws the viewer in & haunts her, even after she has gone away & left the vision behind.”

Andrew Wyeth, "Christina's World', 1948. Tempera on gessoed panel. Collection: Museum of Modern Art, New York.

The viewer can be critically important in informing artists on what they might be showing us.  In fact there is a whole school of art history that says the artist is actually irrelevant to the meaning of the work, for meaning is manifested between the interaction of subject and audience. After all, the artist is likely no longer there to inform us.  However many of us want to understand the human context and vision behind a work (clearly I do).  AM talked to Amy Freelunch about the Wyeth reference, saying that Wyeth was actually not an influence, and I was curious to know who was, and if my own observations hit the mark at all:

Caspar David Friedrich, 'Wanderer above the Sea of Fog' (1818). 94.8 × 74.8 cm, Kunsthalle Hamburg. Also AM's profile picture.

Whistler, 'Arrangement in Black and Grey: The Artist's Mother', 1871. Oil on canvas. Collection, Museé D'Orsay, Paris.

AM Radio: Oh yes. At MassArt, I was at the MFA daily. I probably could not remove the influence of Sargent, Whistler, Monet, Van Gogh, not to mention Caravaggio. And oh anything in the [Isabella Stewart] Gardner Museum.  You see?  It’s impossible to pin it down.

Self-Portrait in the Whistleresque Chair.

With regard to light, to make it a cause capable of producing the sublime, it must be attended with some circumstances, besides its bare faculty of showing other objects. Mere light is too common a thing to make a strong impression on the mind, and without a strong impression nothing can be sublime. But such a light as that of the sun, immediately exerted on the eye, as it overpowers the sense, is a very great idea. Light of an inferior strength to this, if it moves with great celerity, has the same power; for lightning is certainly productive of grandeur, which it owes chiefly to the extreme velocity of its motion. A quick transition from light to darkness, or from darkness to light, has yet a greater effect. - Edmund Burke

'Overcoming Imagined Gravitational Forces' by AM Radio, 2010.

—

Right, shameless – but relevant! – self-promotion time.  Last night I was delighted to open the RoHaus Collection in Avalon, which I intend to be a kind of small museum of my growing private collection.  At first my plan was for it to be totally non-commercial, but after hanging the gorgeous works, I realised that perhaps that was unfair to the artists, as well as visitors who might wish to own these virtual masterpieces for themselves (ah, the copiable beauty of Virtual Art), so I offered everyone the chance to come and set their work for sale if they wished.  What is particularly exciting about this is that AM has brought into world several new pieces for sale, including the above work, and the stunning Iphigenia at Aulis watches the sail to Troy seen in the first part of this article (IM me for details!).  All of the ‘Ekphrased’ artists are represented here, and I hope you’ll visit to see their genius first-hand, and to continue supporting their amazing work.

The New Justice League? DJ Skott Westland, Rowan Derryth, Miso Susanowa, Ragamuffin Kips, Scottius Polke, Glyph Graves, PJ Trenton, and AM Radio at the opening of RoHaus. Photo by PJ Trenton.

–

New to Ekphrasis?  Catch up on the previous posts here:

• Ekphrasis: An Introduction
• Ekphrasis: Ragamuffin Kips
• Ekphrasis: PJ Trenton
• Ekphrasis: Chrome Underwood
• Ekphrasis: Glyph Graves
• Ekphrasis: Gracie Kendal
• Ekphrasis: Scottius Polke
• Ekphrasis Extra: Bursting the Susa Bubble
• Ekphrasis Extra: Tricia Aferdita & Metaverse Arts

I suppose what I most want to do is share ideas; or share what I see, and wonder if it is what others see. - AM Radio

The Last Line, self-portrait by AM Radio, July 2010

I’ve come to a conclusion.  For me, AM Radio, has joined the diverse ranks of  Jenny Holzer, Yinka Shonibare, and Andy Goldsworthy in my catalogue of ‘favourite living artists’. Upon seeing his work for the first time, I had the same thunderstruck awe I had seeing theirs, and his oeuvre continues to amaze me.  That said, I shall try very, very hard to be thoughtful as ever here, and not become a saddo fangirl.

My regular readers know that I am interested in art that traverses the boundaries between RL and SL.  With AM Radio, there is no boundary.  His work in Second Life is so very like his ‘real world’ work, and I actually feel disingenuous even trying to make a distinction, particularly on work of this calibre, because doing so implies that SL art is somehow different (possibly inferior), to work done in ‘reality’.  In fact, when browsing AM’s flickr photostream, it is often difficult to tell which of his images are real, which are digital constructions, and which are SL photos.  His visual worlds blend almost seamlessly.

The Little Shapes of Synaesthesia, February 2010.

Take for example his diagrams series, the result of a sketching programme he wrote that ‘allows for a more complex, dynamic brushes’ than Photoshop can facilitate. This series is comprised of digital drawings made entirely from technical diagrams and scientific illustrations. His stunning Iphigenia at Aulis watches the sail to Troy is a composite of these drawings and actual photographs he took.  His flickr commentary explains the process, and asks us to engage with the work:  ”The three shots were taken with the camera pointed straight up at a typical mid-western thunderstorm, stirring over. These were the same section of sky, seconds apart. I see alot of faces and figures in the swirls. I noted some of them. Do you see what I see?”

'Iphigenia at Aulis watches the sail to Troy', May 2010. Digital photomontage.

In Second Life, AM’s vision has manifested some of the most visited, most loved sims on the grid.  If you have yet stood in the ethereal, golden light of the aptly named installations The Quiet or The Far Away, waste no more time reading here.  GO. NOW. Then come back and read more.

Perhaps ironically, it was to ‘The Quiet’ that AM took me to have our little chat, sitting in the warm glow of a wood-burning stove in a cozy cabin set in a snowy landscape.  And even though it is a virtual landscape, I couldn’t help but don a sweater over my summery top, between the enveloping atmosphere of AM’s winterscape and his own frosty breath, an attribute of his avatar’s iconography.  The artist is very tall, a fact only accentuated by his other attributes: the greatcoat, scarf, gloves and stovepipe hat – simply adorned with a strip of wheat and two feathers – that are his trademarks.  His statuesque appearance may in fact be somewhat daunting, but I assure you he is one of the most genuine, down-to-earth individuals I’ve had the pleasure of talking to in SL.  He’s also been around for a while, since 2006, so many readers may be familiar with both his artistic work and his background.  But for those who aren’t, he told me a little bit about his early artistic development.

AM Radio's 'The Quiet'. Photo by PJ Trenton.

'The Quiet', 2008. This sketch inspired the SL installation.

The Far Away, by AM Radio. Photo by PJ Trenton.

An AM Radio radio. Photo by PJ Trenton.

'Living off the Land; Into the Sky', self-portrait by AM Radio, 2010

Rowan Derryth: What would you consider your most successful work, in terms of what you have wanted to do?

AM Radio: I do not link the two as a required pair. My favorite work is perhaps my most unsuccessful. I called it Husk Reboot.  It took ideas of the first Husk build, which was the desert, and made it water.  But I think this sim we’re on, The Quiet is closer to what I want from my work and is the most successful in terms of everything we chatted about today. Also I do like to have fun. I have created I think 14 different cars and the airplane… the more left brain interests I suppose.

Rowan Derryth: I went to Superdyne earlier and picked up the roadster you have there [Note: at time of publication, AM has already changed this build - sneaky!]. I am curious though: why the sports car and the sewing machine?  I have my thoughts, but want to hear yours first.

AM Radio: Well the car was part of SL6B, part of a build called 1000 Heroes. At the time though I was interested in graphic novels and comic book styles. And so I wanted to build something that evoked that.  So there’s that. The sewing machine actually goes back to ideas I was fiddling with. The idea then was to be somewhat surreal but imply some intention that seems nearly logical.

Rowan Derryth: Which was?

AM Radio: Simply sewing fabric together.

An early concept of the sewing machine at Superdyne. Photo by AM Radio.

Rowan Derryth: But the relationship between the car and the sewing machine?

AM Radio: Well what’s your take on it as a viewer?

Rowan Derryth: Ok. Well, two machines… one masculine, one feminine, both related to speed, yes? One stationary, one in movement.

AM Radio: Interesting

Rowan Derryth: But the stationary sewing machine crafts an object here which is in movement, and overtakes… It also looks like a huge starter flag.  I don’t think it is a feminist commentary, but I found the juxtaposition interesting.

AM Radio: I can’t say I had any intention other than those were the items that seemed to fit. The space absolutely lacks the idea of refuge, and thats more intentional than the juxtapostion of the objects there.

Rowan Derryth: (nods and grins) I like my interpretation though.

AM Radio: I do to. It’s interesting though my thoughts went the other way. A sewing machine, an industrial item, robotic almost, masculine in appearance as a machine. The car is the opposite, smooth, tapered. I hadn’t thought about it until you mentioned the genders. It is an interesting take on it.

Rowan Derryth: Perhaps in that there is a balance of both. It is historical too though… for the period you are evoking, those objects would have definitely been used by particular genders, generally speaking.

Contemplating Superdyne. Photo by Rowan Derryth.

Rowan Derryth: So what are you working on now?

AM Radio: Well, my work at IBM is cyclical.  I have the good fortune of working on some high profile  museums, non-profits and socially important projects.  I am currently engrossed in coding/programming on a large public data analytics project.  For good or bad, I find very little difference in creating art, or creating code. So its holding my attention at the moment. As for SL, I recently recreated Husk Reboot, and it’s in my picks. I added a new, large element to build. So I have been tinkering with that build when I am in world.

Rowan Derryth: Is that The Ferry?

AM Radio: Yes

Rowan Derryth: I find your vision fascinating.

AM Radio: How do you mean?

Rowan Derryth: Hmm. Well, on the surface, I suppose I mean what you create.  I’m a city girl, right?  The midwest made me a little stir crazy. The expanses of corn fields, the farms… pretty things to photograph, but not really my thing.. I escaped to Chicago a lot… But you transform these things into such alluring objects here.

AM Radio: The objects and spaces are the water and its up to the visitor to swim… Riffing on keats again. I should setup a shock treatment every time I say it.

Husk Reboot, now being reworked at 'The Ferry'. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Rowan Derryth: So… you must know how beloved your work is here… What do YOU think it is people respond to?

AM Radio: That’s a huge question.

Rowan Derryth: (grins) Take your time.

AM Radio: Can a prosecutor lie to a witness? (laughs)

Rowan Derryth: You can try.

AM Radio: Well there’s an academic bit here and more of a human aspect.

Rowan Derryth: Tell me more about the academic bit?

AM Radio: I had been recommended a book by a philosophy professor… The Visual Elements of Landscape. I think it’s worth reading if you’re going to be building a virtual world, and want to understand ideas of what compels people to move through a space as well as dwell. Jakle describes it in his book as Refuge and Prospect. (I later even named a sim The Refuge and The Prospect). The primary idea is that modern people, and maybe that’s a capital M, I don’t know, are in a constant state of tourism. As they drive, as they shop, as they are born, as they die. There is a constant judgement of the quality of not only the experience but the physical surrounding. The book breaks down the elements of a satisfying experience. The key part being refuge, or places to dwell. The requirement is that the place provide safety, or the idea of safety as well as a vista of potential prospects of other places of refuge. Basically we’re looking for strategic vantage points. The noise and confinement of many spaces in virtual worlds provide neither. I believe this is a basic first response to these spaces. The element of safety.

Rowan Derryth: I wonder what an AM Radio residential sim would look like?

AM Radio: Does a society, especially an ever ephemeral idea of a society as in virtual worlds need residential sims? On those spaces are the users still not in tourist role?

Rowan Derryth: Yes, most definitely.  And what need do they [residential sims] then fulfill?

AM Radio: Refuge. Safety. And a vantage point to the rest of SL.

'What Mary Does After Flying Away', 2008, by AM Radio

I feel like, in SL as in RL, a bunch of pretty buildings are only buildings unless you can bring people together and make friends and have fun. - Tricia Aferdita

Tricia Aferdita. Photo by PJ Trenton.

While I started this column to profile artists who were breaking new ground in Second Life, I’ve broken my own mould a little with these ‘Extra’ articles, having felt compelled to talk about the recent outstanding and controversial work of Rose Borchovski.  So before I return you to your regularly scheduled programming (with an Ekphrasis I am VERY excited about, I might add), I want to introduce – or re-acquaint you, as the case may be – to someone I had the pleasure of meeting early on, whose work in the SL art world I greatly admire.

Tricia Aferdita is the ideal arts patron. An artist herself, Tricia understands both the needs of the artists as well as learned the skills required to effectively organise an exhibit and run a gallery. An easy conversationalist with a charming and fun demeanour, Tricia is the tireless and graceful hostess of Avalon, wearing the caps of Town Manager, Arts Curator, and Events Director simultaneously. And is, of course, owner of the Tricia Aferdita Gallery. She is much loved in the SL art scene, and her petite, stunningly pixie form houses seemingly limitless energy as well as a cunning mind that has organised and planned a number of exhibits and events with the greatest of ease.  All of these factors make her the perfect person to produce and present the programme Metaverse Arts, a brand new show covering the art and artists of the virtual worlds, produced by Treet TV and Prim Perfect Productions.

Metaverse Arts premieres on Treet TV tomorrow (July 10th) at 2pm.

I caught up with Tricia at her gallery in Avalon, where she had a chat with me about her life in the SL art world.

Intuitions, Tricia's first art gallery in SL

Intuitions Gallery at Cetus

The Tricia Aferdita Gallery in Avalon today. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Avalon Arts District. Photo by PJ Trenton.

The Avalon 'Fur Ball' was one of the many successful charity events Tricia has organised.

Tree at Dusk, March 2010. Watercolour.

Red Fox, August 2009. Egg Tempera.

Tricia Aferdita: Yeah, she’s another very active artist in SL.

Rowan Derryth: (grins, thinking of Winter) That should be a scream.

Tricia Aferdita: She’s very energetic. (smiles)

Rowan Derryth: (laughing) Um, I take it this show is PG? (winks)

Tricia Aferdita: Hah, yes - mostly anyway. Don’t want to detract from the art (laughs).

Rowan Derryth: No, nor surpress a personality like Winter’s.

Tricia Aferdita: But the conversation that winter and I have is very interesting and she is willing to share some personal struggles.

The Labyrinth Theatre in Avalon, where Metaverse Arts will be taped. Photo by PJ Trenton.

Rowan Derryth: I really can’t wait to see it. I think that is a fantastic first guest, and after the runthrough Saffia said you were a pro, and she thinks you will be stellar. What will the format be like?

After a brief SL/Ekphrasis hiatus for RL European travel adventures, what a palaver of a week I’ve come back to!  First the whole announcement of the M Linden debacle; and most recently, the depressing news of Maxwell Graf’s deletion of LagNMoor in protest to Linden Lab’s gross neglect of content theft issues.  But in between these events was another hubbub which I’m sure most readers are now familiar: the removal of certain artworks at the SL7B celebration for inappropriate content.

"The Kiss", by Rose Borchovski, 2010. The artwork (and artist) were banned from SL7B for alleged nude content.

I don’t wish to rehash the fallout here, but the call and response has been rather interesting.  I was particularly intrigued (and a little excited) with yesterday’s entry of filmmaker Peter Greenaway into the debate, whose work I’ve been a fan of since I was a teen.  [For full background on the incident, as well as a slew of comments of varied opinions, I recommend New World Notes' reportage.]  But I’d like to just take a little space to talk about the one aspect of this that few have really discussed: the artwork itself.

I admit that when I first heard the news of what was happening, I felt rather apathetic. I hadn’t seen either of the banned works, although Scottius Polke and Saffia Widdershins had brought me up to speed on the debate. I assumed, as many have, that it was some lovely artist stirring the pot.  As so many have said, the rules were clear, and they knew the deal, and it is LL’s right to remove offensive content.  Although when I heard that one of the offending pieces was Misprint Thursday’s inclusion of a nude Barbie Doll, I WAS admittedly baffled (I mean, don’t kids see them naked all the time, anyway?  It isn’t as if she had attachments – I hope!).

Then I received an IM from the University of Western Australia’s Jayjay Zifanwe asking me if I knew the other banned work, Rose Borchovski’s Susa piece, “The Kiss”, and what I thought of it.  When I told him I wasn’t familiar yet, Jayjay informed me the work was up at the UWA sim, and invited me over for a look.  ”Oh!” I said, when I saw it, “It’s those pseudo-humanoid androgynes that creeped out PJ (Trenton) and I when we saw them a couple months ago.”  I laughed, remembering, then decided I better really look this time, because I admit, I wasn’t as impressed in that first instance.

Detail of "The Kiss" mural, and the offending figures.

My next thought, upon looking at the mural of the 13 androgynous figures which is at the heart of this piece was: “These are NUDE?  They are barely human.”  I suppose they have fledgling breasts.  But they are closer to shirtless boys… are males not allowed to be shirtless in a PG sim?  I thought it was only women’s breasts we’re paranoid about. Honestly, there was nothing offensive that I saw in these images, they are just a little disturbing.

In her response to Linden Labs, Borchovski said this about her work:

The story of Susa is a sweet but savage story, told in image and text, sound and installation. It is about our dark inside, but also shows how vulnerable and lonely we all can be. My art shows a naked body, but it is not about nudity or sex.

The figures, which are part of a larger narrative that is told through several other installations, are called Susas (her other works, which I’ve only had glimpses of through reading up on this controversy, are worthy of their own discussion). But studying “The Kiss” on its own, without knowledge of the others, I noticed something rather glaring about it, and which gave me pause in consideration of the SL7B ban.  Indulge me a moment?

"The Kiss" detail from above.

“The Kiss” is constructed in a diorama-like space, on the roof of which we find a long table with overturned chairs, the distraught face of a Susa etched on the bottom of each.  On first impact, it is clear that this is a scene of a shocking, perhaps even violent incident. A pool of wine – or is it blood? – is smeared ominously on the table. The rest of the space is barren of anything else save a lifeless tree, and a single lamp and sheaf of paper -upon which is a short text – upon the table.

Detail of underside of a chair.

Below, we find the recorded memory of what clearly occurred above: upon the wall is the mural of Susas, five on the left and six on the right wearing various expressions of shock and horror; flanking two at centre who are engaged in an uncomfortable kiss. A chalice tumbles into our space, spilling more wine/blood, even as droplets fall like rose petals from the space above.  A single lamp burns on the floor, next to scattered pages on which is written the tale of what has occurred (there are also voices narrating the tale, adding quite a haunting atmosphere).

The allegory of the Susas.

The tale begins with the Susas making the declaration “We need a religion | Something to believe, a leader, wise and strong.” Susa one is chosen, “the source from which they all sprung”, and all seemed well, “but Susa Two kept sighing not at all at ease.”  Then:

Two was jealous of the attention One got
And betrayed her with a single kiss
There was a rumble in the sky
And the sun disappeared
One spoke soft. “why, oh why
Do you commit an act like this”
…
Two shrugged her shoulders
and turned all pale
I don’t feel like a Susa
I’m a person of my own.
My name is Judith now
Leave me alone!

It doesn’t take a biblical scholar to see the relation to the story of Judas’ betrayal; nor any great leap to make the connection between the names Judas and Judith.  Does Susa Two – Judith now – make her betrayal out of jealousy?  Or out of a desire to be her own person, to burst out of the Susa Bubble?  It is also worth considering that the name Judith does NOT relate to Judas, but rather is the feminine of Judah; and in terms of biblical significance, references an old testament heroine.

Artemisia Gentileschi. Judith and Maidservent with the Head of Holofernes 1625. Oil on canvas, 6' 1/2" x 4'7" (1.84 x 1.41 m). The Detroit Institute of Arts Gift of Leslie H. Green.

A beautiful jewish widow, Judith infiltrated the conquering Holofernes’ camp by gaining his trust (possibly by seduction), and, being granted access to his tent while in a drunken stupor, she neatly removed his head and, with her maid, returned to her own people, having slain the tyrant.  Judith betrayed Holofernes for her people’s freedom; this Judith seems to be doing the same, breaking the ‘friendship’ here for her own independence, perhaps paving the way for the others.

Need more evidence of the biblical correllary?  That table on the roof obviously connects to the Last Supper, as to the composition of the figures (thirteen, the same number as Christ and the twelve apostles) reference conventional representations of that scene.  And there is more: the grail, the blood of Christ, nails, a barren tree – just so much iconography in this space.

The Chalice

In short, I was obviously fascinated by Borchovski’s work.  And I also couldn’t help but draw connections between the Susas and the even more disturbing conjoined mannequins – seemingly failed genetic experiments – of the contemporary British artists Jake and Dinos Chapman.  My mind whirled making connections between art, religion, science, clones, bodies, avatars… Second Life.

And at the end of this mental journey, I thought, this is EXACTLY the kind of work I would want to see at an event which, rather than being a mere ‘Birthday Party’ as some have suggested, should be a showcase for the achievements of this particular Virtual World.  It is thought-provoking, and yes, sensational, but that should be celebrated, not banned.  But this is just my opinion, and I know this work won’t appeal to many.

But after viewing “The Kiss”, I had to ask: although nudity was the ostensible reason this work was banned, one has to wonder to what extent the decision was influenced not just by this, but by the challenging and controversial nature of this work – and its relationship to and critique of Christian motif, with its powerful and sophisticated use of Christian iconography in a new and, quite frankly, disturbing context. This element should not be ignored, and I haven’t seen ANYONE talking about it (point it out if I missed it in the sea of commentary).

"The Kiss"

At which point we have to ask – what is truly being silenced here?  A lot of the criticism at the moment seems to be centred around what people are claiming of Rose Borchovski, the artist herself, that she is something of a firecracker; that she is attention-seeking – and these are the most moderate of the terms being bandied about. But that is neither here nor there to me when the work she produces is this captivating – it speaks for itself.  And say what you will, I think one of the final comments in her response to Linden Labs is spot on:

The worst part of censorship is not that which is censored, but the climate of self-censorship it imposes on all artists. Art is about having a voice. Art is about thinking differently and about thinking from fresh perspectives. When artists are not allowed to have a voice, culture is not allowed to progress.

Was this work censored?  I’m still not sure, to be honest.  I hope not.  But I shall thank the Lindens for one thing – making me pay attention to an artist I mistakenly dismissed.  Now, excuse me while I go explore the rest of this fascinating body of work.

New to Ekphrasis?  Catch up on the previous posts here:

• Ekphrasis: An Introduction
• Ekphrasis: Ragamuffin Kips
• Ekphrasis: PJ Trenton
• Ekphrasis: Chrome Underwood
• Ekphrasis: Glyph Graves
• Ekphrasis: Gracie Kendal
• Ekphrasis: Scottius Polke

I like creating one impression upon contact – you see this very colourful world, very fantastic – but as you look deeper, you see that things aren’t quite as they seem. - Scottius Polke

Few artists have merged the RL/SL boundaries as well as Scottius Polke.  While his SL work is based on his RL art objects and illustrations, rather than simply rezzing them, he transforms them into things which can only exist in a virtual medium. This includes his own identity, for Scottius Polke is an otter.

Like Glyph Graves‘ incredible anatomical avatar, Scottius’ otterhood is a whimsical presentation of his artistic nature, and one which I have seen result in endless puns and playful banter at social gatherings (otterly wonderful, etc.).  The only time I have seen him as anything other than an otter, he arrived as a book, pages flapping about as he hit the dance floor… and oh the hilarity that ensued (‘the otter is turning over a new leaf’, ‘well, it was overdue’, etc.).  His joyful presence extends to the objects – toys really – he creates and gives away to friends and patrons: decorative mold, bubble pipes, etc.

Scottius took me on a grand tour of his work – a massive undertaking considering that he exhibits all over the grid.  Now, I’m a big believer in the old adage ‘When in Rome…’.  I like to get to know other cultures from the inside, if I can.  So what to do when I had the wonderful opportunity to interview this incredibly artistic, if tiny, otter?  When in Rome…

Self-portrait as a ferret.

“You gone tiny!” exclaimed the otter.

“Indeed!  And I’ve learned a ton already… when tiny, don’t try to put on human glasses, or sit on human chairs.  Scary!”

He nodded, “Oh it can be painful… poses in general… stretchy, like this…” and he took on a pose that transformed him into something horribly grotesque which doesn’t bear describing.  I shuddered and suggested we proceed with caution.

The first stop we made on the ‘Tour de Otter’ was a recent installation called ‘Street Birdies’ at the Vista Hermosa Art Center, for an exhibit titled Comic Relief. “For some reason they thought I would fit in, it baffles me why,” Scottius explained with a straight face (a difficult task for an otter).  He gestured to his piece, which looked almost like a diorama of a road, stretching into the distance, with two rather large birds (well, they looked quite large in my ferret form) hopping about. He approached somewhat cautiously, suggesting we perhaps take a ride on the bird’s backs. ”As you can see, this is a very serious piece… full of pathos.”

“Definitely… grim, even. One ponders the consequences of the rash action you suggest,” I observed, nervously.

“Yes there is a rather ominous poseball there,” he pointed to the hovering orb, “and believe me it is even grimmer for tinies.”

“Ah, yes,” I nodded, thinking back to the grotesque pose he showed me earlier.

“However let us first approach the birdies,” he said softly, taking mincing steps forward.

As I approached the birds they began hopping rather manically, and what might have been cute from a human vantage, suddenly becomes very threatening indeed. “Whoa!  Um, from this view, they are kind of scary.”

“They get a bit agitated,” he smiled, getting closer.

“I see it now, this is about you facing your own mortality,” I observed somewhat wryly.

“Yes that’s it,” he grinned.

“And the possibility of being roadkill,” I smirked. In fact this is prophetic, as when one decides to try to ‘play in the street’ (the instructions on the pose ball), one suddenly finds themselves to be roadkill, and pecked at by the (manic) birds, who seem pleased: “Mmmmmmmm Roadkill!”

“Try riding one,” dared Scottius, ”gets them a bit miffed but even more fun.”  Indeed they did start hopping around even more furiously… and yes, it was quite fun!

Tinies hitch a dangerous ride.

After the near-death experience of riding the birds, I was feeling more philosophical, and began my interview in earnest.

RD: I’ve noticed that, in addition to the amazing whimsical quality of your work, it also deals with space, and size… perception… in a brilliant way. When you stand on the threshold of mushROOM, it looks normal, then you walk in and realise the scale. Is there some kind of social message in there?  About wanting people to experience the world from your vantage?
Scottius Polke: I think it has more to do with play than a message…playing with scale, playing with perspective, letting people see things in a different light. In some ways that what art is in general, taking bits and pieces of the common world, and rearranging them in a way that gives them new meaning.
RD: Tell me a little about your RL work, and it’s connection with this work, if you may?
Scottius Polke: Well I have two main areas of rl work: one is illustrative such as this, and the other is collage/assemblage.
RD: Are these textures hand-drawn?
Scottius Polke: Yes
Rowan Derryth: They are fab.
Scottius Polke: Thanks!  This came from my idle sketches, drawings I would do at the end of an evening, not thinking of anything in particular. I had wondered what it would be like to take that world of doodles and move it into this realm, but somehow still preserve the feeling.
RD: Did you come to SL to do that, or did it happen after you were here?
Scottius Polke: It happened after I was here. I had no idea what this place could offer. I started by scanning photos of some of my collages… maybe we can head to my gallery now?  That will give some perspective regarding how I got started here.

A rezzed version of the RL 'Midnight Mechanism' (left), and the SL version (right) with movable parts.

Scottius Polke: This is the first piece I translated into sl format, or taking advantage of sl’s 3d and scripting abilities.
RD: Did you know anything about scripting before you came here?
Scottius Polke: Not really. I know a little html and css, but barely.  And I also have help with some of the more complex scripts. The rotation script here is a very easy and accessible script to find.
RD: So the RL piece is assemblage?
Scottius Polke: Yes all made of pieces of junk that I collected, as well as one of those evening doodles (smiles). The middle glass piece is an ashtray, and some of the boxes are venetian blind holders. I first translated about 8 of my rl pieces in this manner and showed them at Zachh Cale’s project Z gallery which was at the old Cetus District.
RD: Then… ?
Scottius Polke: I started assembling things in RL with SL in mind, and moved more to using the pieces, scanning or shooting them and putting them together on photoshop and in here.  This piece is a good example.
RD: Ah, which brings me to my question I ask everyone: how did SL change your RL work?
Scottius Polke: Well the obvious is that I could play with more visual and animation effects, as well as repetition.
Rowan Derryth: Do you find, I wonder, that you are better able to manifest what you imagine here?
Scottius Polke: Well I believe so…I dont think I can ever match the textures that can be had in the RL.  But I can easily execute things here that would be extraordinarily difficult to out there. Can play with scale on a massive level - like our friend mushROOM (smiles).  mushROOM wouldnt be possible without thousands of dollars and a team of artists.  Shall we go over there now?

We teleported over to mushROOM so I could chat with him a little more while flinging each other about on crumpled balls of paper.

Having a (paper) ball at mushROOM.

RD: What is your favourite thing in this room?
Scottius Polke: (grins) Well… come this way. I have a certain affection for the mushroom itself,  but I notice when I come here the thing I do most is play with the paper.
RD: OK!!  Something new! I’ve been here so many times and never caught that one!
Scottius Polke: I love the crinkle sound, so very satisfying. You can also pick them up and chuck them, and then sit on them.
RD: Oh, fun! (we both take a seat and start tossing each other around)
Scottius Polke: Demolition paper!
RD: (laughing) Amazing!  (flinging Scottius across the room) This is SO FUN. I thought bouncing on the bed was my favourite thing, but now I’m torn.
Scottius Polke: No pun intended eh?
RD: No, actually. I’m not that clever. (laughs) How did mushROOM come about?
Scottius Polke: Well the seed was planted during a conversation with Zachh Cale. He was fascinated by the drawing in that first piece of mine and was wondering if I might do anything more along those lines.  I got to thinking about my sketchbooks, looking at the drawings, seeing how they would fit in this world. That rotating octopus above us was really my first attempt.  As far as the setting… as I usually draw in my bedroom, it was the most obvious choice for me, a place that seems to pop up in my drawings.  It’s the place where all the critters pop up, in a way.
RD: (smiles) Your world must be a fascinating place. Trying to imagine your house.
Scottius Polke: Oh it is far less interesting a place as this, rather ordinary really.
RD: So now the other question I like to ask – your influences?
Scottius Polke: Well I could get into Cornell and Rauschenberg! I threw them into my bio as influences, for good measure.
RD: GOOD! Because I was TOTALLY thinking of Joseph Cornell (smiles).

Joseph Cornell (American, 1903-1972) 'Taglioni's Jewel Casket' 1940. Wood box covered with velvet containing three rows of four glass cubes resting in slots on blue glass, glass necklace, jewelry fragments, and red, blue, and clear glass chips, 4 3/4 x 11 7/8 x 8 1/4" (12 x 30.2 x 21 cm). Collection: MoMA, New York, Gift of James Thrall Soby 474.1953

Scottius Polke: I was influenced by Cornell via a wonderful teacher. She taught a collage and mixed media class.  I also had the pleasure of seeing a Cornell/Duchamp exhibit in Houston years back.
RD: That must have been an amazing show.
Scottius Polke: Yes indeed, two very different men. Cornell never fit tidily into any one movement.

The same could easily be said about Scottius. His work might be called installation or illustration, real or virtual, playful or grotesque. While much of the work he is best known for are large scale installations, it must be said at the outset that Scottius has created some rather wonderful – and easily collectible – sculptural assemblages, which are available at his gallery.

'Luz Terrenial', 2009, prim assemblage

His immersive landscapes are certainly about fun.  In fact, Scottius’ work is often described in terms that evoke childhood play: Dr Seuss, cartoons, playdough.  In my early days I frequented mushROOM, and took everyone I met there to jump on the bed and fly through the air with ameobas. Scottius shows us humans his scientifically weird world from a tiny’s view, literally, and the desk and bookshelf there is one of my favourite places for a nice long chat (sitting next to books with titles like ‘A Mushroom with a View’ and ‘Breaking the Mold’).

Self-portrait of the author at mushROOM, on the shelf (again).

More recently, when a few of us went to preview his latest installation, Lunamaruna, we found ourselves enchanted not by another room, but an entire village capped by a fuchia sky. My fellow arts blogger, (the hysterical) Thirza Ember was amongst the rabble-rousers, and in her review she explained this surreal setting wonderfully, so I’m going to steal from her with her permission: “If you put Lost, Portmerion, and Play-Doh in a blender, turned it on for about an hour, then threw it away and called in Scottius Polke to make something fun, fresh, and interesting, you’d have Lunamaruna.”

Lunamaruna

However, this statement, from Scottius’ artist biography, makes clear the extremely thoughtful and rather intellectual ideaologies which underpin his work:

Relationships between disparate ideas such as order vs. anarchy, innocence vs. corruption, nature vs. the machine are often found in these pieces.  However, he places little moral judgment upon either side of these opposing forces in the work.  Rather, the art explores the dynamic that arises when these unlike forces are combined.

Indeed the most fascinating aspects of Scottius’ work are its dichotomies. For example, although his work is most certainly about play, I think there is also something much deeper, and sometimes slightly darker, going on. As I said, they are trips down the rabbit hole, in the same manner that Lewis Carroll’s Wonderland is full of both fantastical and grotesque encounters. For me, and perhaps this might be a bit too revealing, one word comes to mind when walking into one of Scottius’ vivid landscapes: trippy. At mushROOM, I not only bounced and flew, but I also sat and had many a philosophical chat on the desk, taking me back to late night post-rave discussions of my misspent youth, often had in the glow of blacklights and lava lamps.

As if to reinforce this point, Scottius tells me, “Basically almost all these are the products of me drawing and turning off my conscious mind.”

“Maybe you should have been a white rabbit?” I query only half-joking.

Scottius laughs, and dons his Cutea Benelli original: “Or the Mad Otter?”

Scottius Polke at mushROOM, by Rowan Derryth. 'Mad Otter' outfit by Cutea Benelli.

Psychedelic references aside, a visit to one of these installations is truly a liminal journey, taking the viewer betwixt worlds, to places that are neither here nor there. Scottius presses this liminality further at Lunamaruna via transport in a rather bumpy shuttlepod, which just barely lands at the top of a long path leading down into the village.  The ultra-chromatic landscape is full of things to explore and discover: trees to sit under and cuddle with a friend, a relaxing fountain on which to nap, and, quite beautifully, three fuschia ‘mantra’rays flying through the sky, on whom one can not just ride, but meditate.  However, as one explores, the sense that something has gone horribly awry in this seemingly bright and peaceful village begins to pervade. Rooms have been ransacked, and there are even some very suspect bones – I think human – found in various places.

'Mantarays are for meditative purposes only'

For example, when I jumped off the back of the flying ‘mantra’ray I was meditating on, I landed in a pond with an extremely sinister fish, which in my trepidation I had to query Scottius about.

“Yeah it’s Max… kind of an angler hybrid, one of the first things I made for the build.”

“He’s sinister,” I observe calmly, watching him swim slowly about.

“Well maybe not sinister, just a bit creepy,” he said, defending his creation.  And then we both looked at the crashed shuttlepod on the banks, which clearly overshot the entrance landing, and the pile of bones at the bottom of the pond. “Though he may have eaten one of the ex-inhabitants.”

“Um, with the bones and crashed pod?  Sinister.”

Scottius laughed, “He was just hungry… and opportunity fell in his lap.”

Max, with something (or someone) still stuck in his teeth.

I looked at him an observed “Glyph Graves has these floating heads that get right up in your face and are quite disturbing.  He thinks they are cute.  Sometimes you guys love your whacked creations too much.”

Scottius gave me a toothy grin, “We are a bit warped.”

If you enjoy Scottius Polke’s warped creations as much as I do, make sure to join his group, where he’ll keep you posted on his prolific activities… and also make sure to check out his newest creations: wandering crocodiles (*shudder*) which are available for purchase at Lunamaruna.  Also visit his Cafe Press store, where you too can have an Amoeba Wall Clock to ensure that, unlike the White Rabbit, you aren’t late for your next important date.

New to Ekphrasis?  Catch up on the previous posts here:

• Ekphrasis: An Introduction
• Ekphrasis: Ragamuffin Kips
• Ekphrasis: PJ Trenton
• Ekphrasis: Chrome Underwood
• Ekphrasis: Glyph Graves
• Ekphrasis: Gracie Kendal

My art, in whichever medium, is based on spontaneity and change.
- Gracie Kendal

Faces of Gracie, by Rowan Derryth.

Gracie Kendal appears on the Designing Worlds show
at 2pm SLT Tuesday 6th April.
Click here for more details.

In 1971, in the early days of feminism, the Art Historian Linda Nochlin wrote a groundbreaking essay titled ‘Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?’, which considers the problematic question of ‘greatness’ and artistic genius against the historical roles of women, and the ways in which their position in society precluded them from seriously pursuing art careers.  Nochlin’s article not only challenged the way (male-dominated) art history had been written, but also questioned attempts by female scholars to ‘re-insert’ women artists who seemed to have gotten ‘lost’ in the art historical canon – artists such as Artemesia Gentileschi and Rosa Bonheur, for example.  What this rather short essay managed to do was open up the entire art historical discipline for review and debate, actually enabling a re-thinking of the way we view women artists, and consequently opening the door for their future inclusion and success.

So with that rather erudite introduction, I come to my point.  In my SL youth, I was very disturbed to find I was asking myself the question ‘Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists in SL?’  Or, more specifically – and with apologies to my gender – I realized that all the work I’d seen that truly blew me away was by men.  I found this rather disheartening, and yes, I was convinced that I needed to look around more!  Since then, I am happy to report that I’ve found plenty of women artists (and let’s avoid the questions of RL/SL gender swaps just now) whose work fits my manifesto – not just resonates but rezzed; not just rezzed but resonates – that will be featured in upcoming articles.

But the FIRST great woman SL artist I found, who brought relief to my worried young SL heart, was Gracie Kendal.

'I Sing the Body Electric', 2009

Now, I will admit that I kind of hate the fact that the first woman I write about is being set up in the framework of a feminist question.  I think one of the amazing things about SL is that it provides us the opportunity to transcend these questions.  But Kendal’s work does in fact deal with issues of gender and identity, so I cannot be too much of an apologist for this lens.

Gracie, whose RL name is Kris Schomaker, has been showing her paintings successfully in SL for three and a half years, but it is her recent work ‘The Gracie Kendal Project: A Conversation with my Avatar’, which has kicked off a flurry of interest.  I asked to meet Gracie in her studio, because on a prior recon I had noticed a poster of a Jeff Koons‘ work there… and I’m always fascinated when artists I love are inspired by artists I can’t stand (see my Ekphrasis on Ragamuffin Kips and his enjoyment of Barnett Newman). What followed was a rather irreverent conversation in which we soundly trash some of contemporary art’s luminaries.  Well, I do at least:

Gracie's studio, with offending bunny at centre.

RD: So if you’ve read the column, you know… I like to talk to people about their influences, etc., and I know you are an art historian too, so this should be fun… BUT I came to visit your studio when you weren’t here, and I was APPALLED…
Gracie: (grinning and laughing) uh oh
RD: (pointing at a poster of Jeff Koons’ “Rabbit”, 1986) EXPLAIN YOURSELF!
Gracie: (laughing hysterically)
RD: (peering at the the image to its left) And next to poor Jasper Johns!
Gracie: (still laughing) It’s a poster… let me show ya (she moves over some of her paintings so I can see the bottom, which says “Jasper Johns to Jeff Koons: Four Decades of Art from the Broad Collections“) It’s part of the wall, but yea.. I totally hear ya… (laughs some more)
RD: So you can’t get rid of it? Generic ‘artist loft decor’?
Gracie: Yeah.. it’s part of the texture… although mirroring that wall is Warhol’s Marilyn.
RD: Yes, I noticed that. So… here I was thinking these are somehow your artistic influences, and I didn’t quite get it.
Gracie: (still laughing) Noooooooooo

Chatting with Gracie in her studio.

RD: Koons is the artist I LOVE to loathe. He’s a f*cking moron when he speaks.
Gracie: Yeah, him and Hirst… although some of Hirst’s work is beautiful… the butterflies… oh my god!
RD: Now with Hirst it is a love/hate thing.  I hate that I am intrigued by his work.
Gracie: Yes exactly.
RD: Do you know the work of Tracy Emin?
Gracie: (smiling) Of course.
(We blurt simultaneously here) Gracie: LOVE her work. RD: HATE HER (then crack up)
Gracie: She is intriguing too and so wild… and crazy…. I don’t know… and so in your face
RD: Ugh, her manky ‘Bed‘?
Gracie: (laughing) Well yeah… but who else would have the guts to do that?  And ‘Everyone I’ve Ever Slept With’? LOVE that. (Author’s note: this work was sadly destroyed in the famous Saatchi warehouse fire, even I can’t be happy about that) I thought about doing a similar piece with names from SL.
RD: I just find her SOOOO self-indulgent, and not in an interesting way
Gracie: (laughs) Yeah, well that is true. I guess a love/hate thing too.
RD: Now, THIS is interesting (gesturing at posters from her recent performance at the Eostara Gallery {see below})  You both are dealing with similar issues, biography, but what you are doing is SO MUCH MORE INTERESTING.  So… let’s pick apart this Emin/Gracie thing a bit.  You both are using very personal biography. She draws on personal trauma quite a bit, but she basically just takes her diary and throws it on the wall. I went to a retropective of her work in Edinburgh last year, I thought ‘GO see… THEN judge’. My favourite work… she had little slides set up (actual slides, not projected) of her paintings from art school… the ones she burned. They were SO MUCH better than the rest of her work. And the work itself was interesting, in terms of being about loss, and misguidance. (grins) But I thought most of the rest was crap.
Gracie: (laughs)

Black Pearl Beach, 2009

RD: When I first saw your paintings a couple months ago at Exposure Gallery, I liked them, but I was also struggling with this idea of artists rezzing RL work and not changing or working it in world… I still struggle with it, even though I own one of yours, and have it in my house.
Gracie: Ahhh… why do you struggle?
RD: Hmmm… good question… no one really asks that! Most often, they happily agree!
Gracie: (laughs) Seriously… it’s a great debate.
RD: Yes, well, I think that… I can see that it is a way to promote your work, get it to be known. But… hmm… Ok, first of all, I think prob 90% of what gets rezzed is garbage. So many who say ‘Oh, I think I’ll be an artist today’.
Gracie: (smiling) Yes I agree, anyone can be an artist. Well its roleplaying I think.
RD: (Same with ‘I think I’ll open a gallery’ without knowing the FIRST thing about being a Curator.)
Gracie: (laughs) Yeah.
RD: (grins) Man, this article is going to get me in trouble. And… if I may…
Gracie: you may…
RD: Your paintings here, I KNOW they are large RL.
Gracie: umm, you do?
RD: I’ve seen pics of you working on them… they can be in scale here or not…
Gracie: Well some of them are small in RL though so it depends… some are only like 24×24 inches and I really enlarge them here. I’d love to go bigger in RL …but no space or car to transport.
RD: Interesting. So in a way you DO manipulate them here.  SL allows you to do things with them you aren’t able to.
Gracie: Yeah… it does. I used to also show just details of my work here and sell them as paintings in themselves. I don’t do that anymore though. I like the idea that if it’s available here, it’s available in RL too.
RD: Well, I certainly see a lot of grey areas in my ‘struggle’.  And I see paintings that I LOVE, and am happy to have found.  BUT I have to say… that I’m most interested in work that really USES SL… whether in build, photography, prim manipulation, etc.
Gracie: Oh yea, I understand… and that is what is cutting edge about SL. Especially for the real art world.

Gracie’s most recent body of work is, in fact, all about using SL as a medium. How she came to it is an interesting tale. She had been studying for a Masters degree in Art History and had been deciding whether to write a thesis about Frida Kahlo, Cindy Sherman, or even the intriguing analysis ‘Comparing Second Life Art Community to Paris of the 20s and NY of the 50s’. But, as she had been an artist for over 12 years, she realized that her passion truly lie in the making, and decided to switch to a studio focus. “It was THE best decision of my life.”  She was also able to continue as a practicing art historian, teaching as an adjunct at a local Junior college.  “That is probably what I am going to do when I graduate, go back to teaching. Anything to stay immersed in art… It’s my love.”  Her students will be lucky as, in my view, the best art historians are also practitioners.

When Kris submitted her portfolio to enter her program, she included images of her showing work in Second Life.  However, when she began showing her painting in critique, she “didn’t get as positive feedback from them…. It was ok.. but very critical…”, as she was being compared to modern era Abstract Expressionists such as Pollock.

'One: Number 31', 1950 by Jackson Pollock (American, 1912-1956) 1950. Oil and enamel paint on canvas, 8' 10" x 17' 5 5/8" (269.5 x 530.8 cm). Museum of Modern Art, Sidney and Harriet Janis Collection Fund (by exchange). © 2010 Pollock-Krasner Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

As I said to Gracie, she is GREAT at that style of painting, and people don’t often understand the skill involved with it (and Gracie has updated the technique by using things like hair dryers to move her paint, rather than just Pollock’s brushes and sticks), but her professors were correct that it isn’t really cutting edge.  She agreed, and knew she had to do something to bring her work ‘into the 21st cenury’:

“I met with my professor a couple times, who suggested I delve deeper into SL. So the next critique, I had a cut out of Gracie on a collage piece I was doing. I had ideas of bringing SL into my artwork. That was a year and a half ago, and since then my paintings ARE more contemporary, especially with the outlining I’m doing.  The project though… well I had an idea to do a piece that had 50 1×1 foot wood squares with cut outs of different avatars on them. I was going to call them the ’50 Most Beautiful People’ a spoof on People magazine dealing with identity in SL. So the idea was already spinning around up there.  People started getting more interested in SL: what it was, and who I was in it. My professor gave me tons of amazing ideas… thinking about the idea of what an artist is, what an avatar is, the idea of beauty here… etc.”

“I don’t remember an exact moment but a few months ago, I started realizing I need to put myself more into my art.  My paintings are kind of detached in that aspect I think… I put myself into them…but not in the same way. I started to ask myself why I am here in SL, what all this means, asking myself who I am… and I have not a clue.  I have been dealing with personal issues, of weight, anxiety, loneliness, for a while now and it came to a forefront 2 years ago when I had a panic attack. It scared the hell out of me, and my life changed. So I’ve started to look inwards. Trying to figure myself out. I think I realized, I could do that with art, especially thinking of SL as a tool to do that, which is what I’ve been doing for the last 3 and a half years. I got into SL because I was suffocating in RL.  SL allowed me to breath.”

Gracie is being creative in addressing issues which I think many struggle with, and brave enough to fess up about it too.  On Nov. 1st last year, she started the blog which, through a series of side-by-side RL and SL images, compares her life with Gracie’s, and converses with her too, so we are privy to Kris’ inner dialogue in a way that separates her identity into two selves.  As readers, we begin to forget that these two people are actually the same person… then when we remember this fact, the narrative become equal parts amusing and melancholic.

In some ways, the narrative is as we expect: the artist, in her real world anxiety and self-consciousness, is envious of Gracie’s world, with her ‘perfect’ body, wealth, and vibrant social life.  Gracie seems to embody all Kris wishes she had.  If the story ended there, it might be somewhat cliché.  But what is truly fascinating is the way in which we see Gracie being jealous of Kris, too.  One of my favourite panels expresses Gracie’s own disembodied angst at not being able to experience the real world, in particular, the rain falling on her skin.  (Her lament ‘I can’t feel anything’ becomes even more complex when the viewer notices that what Gracie sees out her studio window is a pre-9-11 view of the New York City skyline, the World Trade Center standing prominently in her line of sight.)

Thus the co-dependent nature of this relationship is cleverly expressed.  The ways in which they need each other (for there obviously can be no Gracie without Kris) are eloquently conveyed, and in fact Gracie’s dependence becomes more pronounced as time goes on, with the phrase ‘Kris! Where are you? I need you!’ used with increased frequency.

As an outsider reading this, I began to wonder if this was a way for Kris to reclaim power from her Gracie identity; a reminder that although she may be the virtual manifestation of Kris’ own desires, Gracie ultimately IS Kris, and cannot exist without her. I asked her about this:

“Oh yeah… I think so… even though Gracie has a lot of influence over Kris… Kris is definitely showing her power more I think.  Hmm… not sure that comes across right.  I think Gracie and Kris are struggling right now… maybe it’s a power struggle, I don’t know… they are finding their places within each other maybe. I think they both wish they were the other, and they are both questioning why that is.  And are yet to answer that question.”

One cannot help but consider that in addition to dealing with issues of identity and power, that she is also addressing body issues that are particularly keen for women (and if fact, these issues are at the heart of the art of two of her self-confessed biggest influences, Cindy Sherman and Barbara Kruger).  In looking at her work, I wondered how men might respond to what she is doing:

RD: When I interviewed Glyph Graves, he said ‘I don’t hold with the notion of girl’s art and boy’s art;  I think that silly.’  I agree with him in general, and would certainly say that applies to work based in the formal.  But some work, often more conceptual work, definitely deals with issues of gender.  Barbara Kruger is a case in point (as is Emin, I am loathe to say).  Your work deals with more universal ideas of identity, but gender is a huge part of it.  Clearly men also have body issues, but I wonder, do you think men ‘get’ your work as much as perhaps a woman might?
Gracie: Oh wow, great quote…I would actually say yes, they do get it… Men seem to be just more “quiet” about it I guess. I mean if you look at the avatars in SL, do you see many overweight male avatars?
RD: No, not often.
Gracie: I think in RL there are many more magazines about women, promoting the “ideal” image.
RD: That’s what I was wondering… clearly they can relate, but do they think about it as much?
Gracie: Yeah they can relate, because my project is not just about weight and body image, but life in general. Even though it’s a very personal project… about me… I think both men and women go through this type of process of finding themselves… for men, I think it shows in what they just call “Mid-life crisis” maybe?
RD: (laughs) Fast cars, faster women (or men)?
Gracie: (laughs) Yep, so true. (pauses) I’m afraid of what they will think of me after this.
RD: Well, me too… We’ll stick together.
Gracie: Even though its personal…  it’s very universal. And I do agree with Glyph… Yes, women have had a hard time, and yes, we still do in some respects… I used to teach a women in art course… and I believe it needs to be taught because of the history of women artists weren’t really known until the 70s… I think there is still the old school curators, gallery owners who hinder women’s work… but… I believe now especially in this postmodern era… that there are just as great women artists as men, and just as crappy women artists as men.
RD: You might be happy to learn that I am leading off your article talking about Linda Nochlin.
Gracie: (laughs) Nice, that’s great!
RD: She opened the door.
Gracie: Absolutely.
RD: You love the Guerilla Girls, don’t you?
Gracie: Oh yeah, absolutely! I did a talk on them in school and invited them to talk, but it didn’t work out.
RD: Aw, that’s too bad. I actually have a theory that Nochlin is one of them. And maybe Kruger.
Gracie: (laughs) I wouldn’t doubt it.
RD: I want that to be true, anyway.

In much the same experimental and performative manner as the Guerilla Girls, recently, Kris/Gracie pushed her fascinating experiment even further by attempting to switch places.  For the week or so leading up to March 6th, Kris went through a physical makeover to make herself more like Gracie, including wardrobe, cutting and dying her hair, and even piercing her nose.

Meanwhile, Gracie’s transformation was displayed in a performance piece at the Eostara Gallery on the 6th.  The piece, which was conceived as a collaboration with the Vaneeesa Blaylock Company of Second Life, involved 16 avatars: 4 Gracie’s, 4 Kris’, and 4 each of two transformative states inbetween.  Three different outfits were chosen and worn by each set, with the fourth set being nude (save for some wicked black heels).  The avatars then stood in a grid, the piece inspired by the performances arranged by the RL artist Vanessa Beecroft, and in fact the work is titled like a Beecroft as well: ‘VB15 Gracie/Kris’. As Gracie states: “I wanted to introduce my avatar based on my RL self and talk about body image by showing the difference between our realistic selves and our virtual selves.”  She filmed this experience, and the final cut will appear on her project blog.  The work is powerful and to my mind extremely successful.

'VB15 Gracie/Kris'

However the experiment, for Kris, did not have it’s expected or desired result: “The transformation for Kris to become Gracie… I would call for lack of a better term a ‘failure’… it was definitely not how I expected it to turn out. I think I expected I’d feel like Gracie… I’d feel more comfortable with who I am… but I wasn’t.. I was even more uncomfortable because I became something I’m not… well in a way… it was more because I put on this ‘costume’ and that doesn’t change a person. Gracie is pretty confident…or has been for a long time now… although she seems to be in a slump too. But that is because of who Kris is… I don’t know… it’s so complex. (laughs) I think the real purpose for both is to find a balance.”

This is an intriguing statement, as I think this artist has struck a balance that perhaps she cannot yet see herself.  There is balance in the co-dependent relationship between these two evident in the ‘Project’ pieces.  But there is also balance in the way each identity works as an artist.  Kris uses Gracie as a creative character in her own personal narrative to explore identity issues.  But by the same token, Gracie uses Kris’ RL art, appropriating it and transforming it into something new.  Perhaps the best example of this is the massive, 250 prim sculpture she built for the Step Up sim a few months ago, which has just been reinstalled outside the Designing Worlds studio at Northpoint (along with a wonderful exhibit of the rest of her work).  “Making Connections” is a series of 4-5 smaller sculptures textured with both her own painting and other patterns she likes (and she re-textures them at will), which she arranges in a site specific manner.  I watched her install the work, and was reminded of the way in which artists like Andy Goldsworthy respond to their environment as they work.

'Making Connections' towering outside the Designing Worlds studio.

Gracie Kendal is becoming a force to be reckoned with in the SL art world, with her work being shown at every turn.  She will also be participating in the ‘Ambiguity of Identity’ exhibit at Caerleon Island alongside artists working with similar issues such as Artistide Dupres, Sabrinaa Nightfire, Botgirl Questi, and Chrome Underwood.  In addition to her exhibit at Northpoint, there currently is a wonderful display of her paintings at the Noetic Gallery in Avalon. And if that isn’t all, Gracie/Kris was just chosen as one of the faces of Second Life itself. She was selected as one of only 9 people in the “SL Faces, A campaign to find a few good avatars” competition, and will be seen in Second Life advertisements aimed to dispel the ‘fat old man in the basement’ myth.  I for one cannot think of a better, more intriguing, and more beautiful representative for this, in either world.

New to Ekphrasis?  Catch up on the previous posts here:

• Ekphrasis: An Introduction
• Ekphrasis: Ragamuffin Kips
• Ekphrasis: PJ Trenton
• Ekphrasis: Chrome Underwood
• Ekphrasis: Glyph Graves

I have often referred to myself as a photoshoplifter, a kleptographer, or even (depending on my mood), a scan artist. Everything was fair game, nothing was sacred, the world was infinitely malleable. I was a kid in a candy shop. – Chrome Underwood

Chrome Surfing. By Rowan Derryth.

Chrome Underwood is, to me, visual punk rock.  Not in a Jamie Reid sense, although Chrome’s work does evoke some the DIY aesthetic (as he himself noted above) that made Reid’s album covers for the Sex Pistols so iconic.  But his work – and his very persona, which is so much a part of his work – evoke a thoughtful yet irreverent attitude (whether in the controlled chaos of his canvases, or the philosophical pop of his comics) that smacks of intellectual anarchy.

In a way, there are two Chromes (at least… could be more).  There is the Chrome who makes extraordinary abstract digital paintings that he brings into SL.  This Chrome walks the line of my own requisites for the kind of art I want to talk about here, as it is rezzed, but then not worked in SL.  They are, however, only extant in the digital realm, crafted in Photoshop.  Then there is the Chrome who is himself a work of art – the rather sexy, shining-haired philosopher who is but one of several characters – all played by the artist formerly called Chrome (couldn’t resist) for the Lichtenstein-like comics he stages and shoots in SL.

Final frame of 'Decartes Wheels' (2010).

In all his incarnations, Chrome is a motorcycle enthusiast… but as this makes for a rather noisy environment, we rode on down to the beach at Bundoran Reef, West of Ireland, and did a little surfing while we chatted.  I started off by recanting to him the opening of this article, as I’d written it after studying his work, and I was curious if, in his view, I was off the mark.  His reaction?  “I LOVE MYSELF!  I want my autograph.”  Then, after we were done cracking up, he gave me the kindest compliment:

Chrome: That in itself says more about my work than I’ve been able to say for fifteen years… maybe that’s all you need!

RD: (laughing and blushing) The End.

Chrome: Yes!!!!  Love it.

RD: Well, there IS more…

Once I composed myself, I wanted to know more about his ‘paintings’ first.  I asked him about his background as an artist before he came to SL.

Chrome: I began as a young, starry-eyed artist in Manhattan in the seventies; large, graphic, pop art canvases of motorcycles, trucks, bicycles… anything with wheels on it…. but, truth be told, I was also living in the fast lane during those years, and it wasn’t long before my wheels went off the track.  I was resurrected as a designer/illustrator which then led to a college professorship, which gave me the time to get back to my art. I was working in mixed-media back then, assembling collages based on snapshots of tv programming which I would then paint back into…work which, though derived from technology, was still analog. Then one day I sat in down at a Macintosh computer, opened Adobe Photoshop and the lights went on… I realized that this was the tool I had been moving toward, and had been looking for without even knowing it.

Works like 'Seven Eleven' (2009), which combine his digital canvases with SL photography, reveal Chrome's early work as a pop artist.

Chrome: From that point on, my work was exclusively digital, and involved the sampling (I prefer to call it recycling) of visual elements from the world around me; things I found emotionally stimulating, things which may have included my own past paintings and drawings, or even those of the past masters; my photos of abandoned cars and trucks rusting in the sand and sun of the Mojave Desert; commercial graphics, technical illustrations or grafitti. Literally anything that I found tasty went into the mix, and voila!  A souffle!

Andy Warhol was once asked by a reporter why he had become a filmmaker. Deadpan Andy replied, “Because it’s easy. All you have to do is push this button.” That kinda sums up my art; I’ve always been too lazy, too impatient to learn how to paint. I’ve just turned that to my advantage. Laziness is the mother of invention, ya know.

RD: (laughing) Mmhmm… but while it may be the mother of invention, you are clearly anything but lazy.  I wonder what Warhol would have thought of this kind of work… I think he would have loved it (and he was anything but lazy, and a great liar).  But the art fangirl MUST ask… TELL me you met Warhol back in the day?

Chrome: Wish I could; I was there long after the party ended at The Factory, and he was living a much quieter and more secluded life by then.

RD: Damn!

Chrome: There were a few well-known artists I would see regularly in Max’s Kansas City, but I wouldnt say that I hung out with them.

RD: (slightly wide-eyed) Who else inspires you?  I see some colour field painting in your canvases…

Chrome: Wow. Hard to limit it to any particular group… Kandinsky, Rauschenberg, de Kooning, Klee… on and on…

RD: Good group. When I first saw your work, I was intrigued by your reference to Picabia… you include the text ‘Picabia 1913′ in a couple of your works…

'Cameo', (2006)

Chrome: (smiling) Yeah, I do honor the masters by quoting them in my work.

RD: Why that lift, though?

Chrome: Ok….. he just happened to be lying around the kitchen the day that I made that particular souffle.  Coulda been Turner, who knows?

RD: (laughing) I HATE that answer!

Chrome: (grinning) Ok lemme try again… It may take me a few days to research, but I know I can come up with something more profound.

RD: I suppose it was acceptable that he was lying around the kitchen… but here I was thinking deeply about his mechanical portraits, like that of Steiglitz… and how your work deals with visual identity. Perils of being an art historian.  But I think the association is still there, I’m sticking with it.

Here, This Is Stieglitz Here, 1915 Francis Picabia (French, 1879–1953) Pen, brush and ink, and cut and pasted printed papers on paperboard; 29 7/8 x 20 in. (75.9 x 50.8 cm) Alfred Stieglitz Collection, 1949 (49.70.14) © 2010 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris

Chrome: Well, if you think of it as  intellectual anarchy, that is what you are left with.  I really don’t think about what I do… but then, Jimi Hendrix didn’t think much while he was playing Voodoo Chile.

RD: Fancy yourself Hendrix, eh?

Chrome: I don’t fancy myself to be anywhere near him, but I’ve always said that if I could paint the way he played guitar I would be one happy artist. It’s about the sheer joy and passion one experiences in creating something that touches some deeper part of the soul. I’ve also said that it’s a lot more fun to make art than it is to try to define it. I wish I could say something more profound, but I’m just the guy who makes the stuff.

It is fascinating to me, though, that your first reference to my art  was to compare it with punk rock… you couldn’t have come any closer, because I almost think of it that way myself, knowing how intensely, almost sexually, pleasurable it was to play drums in a rock band… I expected nothing less from making art.

With that I suggested we go ride some of the pipes swelling behind us for a bit.  It somehow seemed appropriate.  We cut up the surf for a while, then relaxed on our boards again.

I of course wanted to know more about how he was using SL as a medium, and I knew that he had taken part in several prestigious conferences on art in virtual worlds, such as the SIGGRAPH conference as well as round tables and forums on virtual art in SL.  As if reading my mind, he began talking about how he came to the digital work in SL:

Chrome: One more thing about the digital work… I was pretty much dismissed by colleagues in the art community, except for a few other brave souls, when I went digital. They said it was not real painting, that it was ‘push button art’.  So I set out to prove that you could actually squeeze your soul through the keyboard and come out with something as passionate, poetic, and profound as any physical work.

RD: And what is your relationship with Graham Nash?

Chrome: I met him at a digital art conference early on in the digital era; we both had an intense interest in the potential for digital media and had a pretty lively discussion about it. He’s a serious photographer as well as a rock star, and has since founded Nash Editions, a giclee printing house in Los Angeles, where my limited edition prints are produced.

Metaverse (2004)

RD: So how did you get to SL?

Chrome: Ironically, I had just about given up the idea of making it as an artist because of the low level of interest in digital art, and decided to become a writer several years ago.

RD: Really?!

Chrome: Yes, I wrote for about three years, contributing almost daily to three different blogs and a nearly completed memoir.  Then one day I was asked to join a team that was building a virtual college campus in Second Life, and as I explored this new world, it began to revive my interest in art. Xander Ruttan, owner of the Cetus Art Gallery, offered me my first exhibit, and since then it’s been like a roller coaster ride.  Kind of funny, I had to come into a digital world to launch my digital art career.

RD: How did you become a comic book artist?

Chrome: I had been a fan of Botgirl Questi’s comics, all based in SL, and one day we began to discuss the possibility of working on a comic book together. Although the comic book thing never panned out, the discussion led to other ideas and we wound up forming the virtual band, Cherrybomb.  Don’t ask.

RD: (laughs) Yeah, right.  But go on… tell me more about the comics, how they developed?

Chrome: Well, since that discussion I was intrigued by the idea of doing a comic book, and so began experimenting with the medium. I saw it as a way to merge my writing with my art, which might enable me to explore new ideas in a completely different way. I initially developed the three characters – Chrome, Juliette and Vanilla – to fit narratives for a graphic novel that had been germinating in my head… but… umm,  I had to learn how to actually make a comic strip first, so I launched my webcomic, mojozone, and as one strip followed another the characters began to develop their own distinct personalities in that process.  It turned out to be much more fun than I expected and in some ways, it felt like a more personal medium to me than my digital paintings. When I had my first show of my comic strips at Pirats Omega Gallery in SL, for instance, I actually had butterflies in my stomach… I felt I was somehow exposing parts of myself that I don’t normally expose. I had never had that feeling when showing my paintings.

'Wonderland', 2010

Chrome: One thing interesting (at least to me) is that in my paintings I explore the far reaches of visual complexity by pushing Photoshop to its limits. Yet, when I began the comics with every intention of using those tools to create a dramatic new comic form, I found that I just couldn’t do it; that somehow the image had to stand on its own merits as part of the story, and as part of the overall visual impact of the page, just as a painting would. As a result…. I completely abandoned the idea of any photo-retouching in the comics. They are all just as they would appear in SL.

RD: That is interesting… something similar came up when I interviewed PJ Trenton,  you both want your images to appear ‘through the lens’, not retouched… very Ansel Adams.  And particularly surprising for you considering your role as a ‘scan artist’.  Where do you see these works going?

Chrome: Not sure where it is going, actually, but it seems to be headed in a direction where I finally get to express my irreverence toward certain assumptions and pretensions of the intelligentsia, in a loving and humorous way.

'Jukebox' 2010

RD: Well, there are two things I find fascinating about your work, particularly the comics.  The identity issue, which is a huge underpinning aspect of SL as a whole… I know you are working in the Ambiguity of Identity Project with several well-known SL artists, and that it is a project of the Virtual Art Initiative.  I am fascinated by the whimsical yet melancholy way your characters explore this issue – and of course that they are all ‘played by the same person, making them slightly schizophrenic.  Do you identify with your alts?

Chrome: I came into this as a working artist, but I’ve become a kind of movie director… for me a lot of times, when I’m working… my avatars are simply the people I’ve cast for a particular scene; they are actors in my movie. That is how I look at this identity thing; I put words in their mouth, put them in various settings, and let them find their way through it… in that sense, they are individual actors, separate characters; I’m not emotionally invested in them while we’re working. At other times, I consider them to be individual works of art; they have been crafted and refined over several years.

RD: The second thing that intrigues me is the layers, and overlapping, of some many visual and verbal texts in all of your work.

Chrome: Yeah, that opening paragraph you read me touches on something I haven’t seen before, and that is the overlapping, intertwining and cross-pollenation of art, music and writing… in the post-digital age… Botgirl and I have talked about this at length….. you seem to have done that almost effortlessly in that one paragraph, tying together graphic design, fine art, punk rock, comic books, and philosophy. This is what the future is about when it comes to all media, imho. Not many people understand that yet.

RD: Thank you, but I guess that is why I picked Reid as a comparative example.  His work did that.  The photocopy aesthetic.  I love the lack of pretension to it, as well.

Chrome: Exactly… the one thing I always loved about Warhol was the idea of factory-produced art… it was more fun that way, more down to earth.

RD: Well, like Rubens

Chrome: Well, yes, but without all of the aristocratic interference.

RD: Can’t speak to the fun for Rubens, but there were lots of saucy naked chicks.

Chrome: (laughing) Yep,  got me there.

RD: Same in the Factory, though.   They were just MUCH thinner.

Chrome: Yeah, kinda sad, actually; women should have some meat on their bones.

And with those sage words, we enjoyed some more surf, and more philosophy and tales of youthful antics that should probably not be printed here.  Find our more about at his main website, and catch up on his comic here.  His blog is also well worth a read, and aptly titled ‘Chrome never sleeps.’  I believe it.

New to Ekphrasis?  Catch up on the previous posts here:

• Ekphrasis: An Introduction
• Ekphrasis: Ragamuffin Kips
• Ekphrasis: PJ Trenton

Whether one likes or dislikes something is pretty much irrelevant… the importance is in the seeing. - PJ Trenton

PJ Trenton by Rowan Derryth

I’ve heard PJ Trenton referred to as ‘the National Geographic photographer of SL’ (and although perhaps less dangerous here, I have heard tales of him being hit by planes, and  ‘bombed’, while on location). Anyone who had seen his stunning images in Prim Perfect Magazine, the Primgraph, or on Designing Worlds, can easily see how he gets this reputation.

The Mosque at Al Andalus by PJ Trenton

Not to mention that he is the artist who brings the popular comic ‘The Quest for the Golden Prim’ to life.  But if you think his talent surfaces in merely the representative, then think again.

In fact, ‘surfaces’ is just the word I would use to describe the works in his new show ‘The Luminous Lens’ that just opened at the Tricia Aferdita Gallery in Avalon.  These abstract photographs are large surfaces of luminosity which seem to have more in common with paintings than traditional photographs.  Trenton explores some of the most vivid locations in SL, then manages to transform them, through his lens, into studies in light, colour, and texture that puts the Impressionists to shame.

Abstract 1 (Sentient Sketch), SL photo, 2010

An avid photographer in RL, Trenton began playing with the SL camera not long after joining over three years ago. Like many others, he got his start rezzing his RL works, but soon wanted to explore what could be done in SL.  “The first exhibit I ever did I called ‘Urban Squall‘.  These were all black and white images shot in a handful of grungy urban environments.”  He smiles, reminiscing, “I decorated the gallery to match the exhibit, with a run down taxi, for example.”  He seems amused by his early experiment, but I can’t help but note that even in his early days, he was carefully considering the ways in which he could document the visual narrative of the spaces he explored.

An early work from Trenton's 'Urban Squall' series.

Trenton has also been a gallery owner and graphic designer since his early days, and currently owns Exposure Gallery (managed by the arts community force of nature herself, Tricia Aferdita) and Render Design in Avalon.  But these days Trenton is kept unbelievably busy by his work for the aforementioned Prim Perfect Publications.  To get an idea of what the whirlwind life of an in-demand photographer was like, as well as what inspires him, he took me on a tour of some of his favourite places.

“Shooting for the magazines helped me understand what one could do here artistically, but more importantly I realized that what I really am here is a historian,” he muses as we survey the dystopian landscape of INSILICO, a perfect place to ponder the ephemeral transience of Second Life.  “I’m documenting, and in some cases preserving the memory of places which no longer exist.  Because I shoot for the magazines, I take a LOT of photos.  I like the idea that these places are somehow archived.”

One of the denizens of INSILICO as captured by Trenton. I recommend seeing the whole series here.

While wandering the stunning community of Winterfell I asked him whether he felt that SL has affected his RL work.  He explained that because he is a photographer, he saw himself using the SL camera in the same way he might use his RL one.  However, this was not without its difficulties.  “You have to understand the limitations here and  find a way to push it and make it work for you.  I think the images in this show really achieve that… and you can actually create images that are much more like a painting than a photo… I think that is the really neat thing about this show, that I have to explain to people that these are photographs, not paintings.”

We finally visited the incredible AM Radio sims, including The Far Away, and I wondered, as I itched to take out my own camera and start shooting in the golden light, what of his various subjects he liked to shoot the most.  “Impromptu shots of people… to be out with my friends and take their picture and give it to them as total surprise…. I think that is where the greatest reward is.  People don’t expect it, and I love the reactions.”  He smiled and slipped me a photograph.

The author gazes at the artist at work, unaware that she is the subject of his own photographic gaze. By PJ Trenton.

As I gazed appreciatively at the unexpected gift, he continued, “I think what it boils down to is that everything I shoot, I shoot for my friends, whether it is to accompany assignments written for the magazines, or to hang as an exhibition in a friend’s gallery.  I’m not sure it really matters what the subject is, but that the end result is something I’m proud to share.  I mean, people put their faith in me, so I think it is very important to deliver on that.  I suppose that is why I struggle with the idea that I am an ‘artist’ here, and not just a designer/photojournalist. I don’t see it as my career, it isn’t all I do, unlike so many of my friends who are full-time working artists.”

Looking at the image in my hand, and having seen his work for this new exhibition, I was extremely amused to hear how he struggled with the notion that he was an ‘artist’.  Trenton has a natural eye for composition and tonality that I would happily put on par with a host of expert photographers, from Ansel Adams to Annie Liebovitz to Minor White.  These new abstract works show his mastery with his lens, that he can arrange the mundane into fields of colour and light that capture the beauty and strangeness of our virtual world.

Being something of a shutterbug myself, we ended up spending more time in photographic contemplation during our travels  than in discussion. So we decided to retire for a rather delectable coffee in the Café des Artistes in Paris 1900, where our meandering chat on his work, art in general, and criticism, had us considering an interesting experiment.

Only one thing had been bothering me since I saw the preview of Trenton’s show – the fact that he had given them the non-descriptive titles of Abstract 1, Abstract 2, etc. I asked him about this decision, to which he casually commented, “Titles of artworks are kind of neither here nor there.”  While the off-handedness made me smile, it also raised my art historical hackles, as my brain ran through a million challenges to his statement.  The conversation continued:

He considered my words, then looked at me keenly, wondering aloud how I might title his new photographs. He was curious to see what I would name them, and how that might help him to consider his work in a broader context. And I admit I was thrilled to have the chance to spend some time thinking about these gorgeous works, so I accepted his challenge.  After all, it isn’t every day that an artist actually gives a crap about an art critic’s opinion!

So I ventured to Tricia Aferdita’s Avalon Gallery, and began looking, and considering.  What did these works say to me, what did I see?  What did they reference?  I made my list, with more than a little anxiety.  Then, rather than handing it over, we tested the experiment: could he, with just the title, figure out which work I was naming?  It was a fun game, and he had about a 75% success rate.  But ultimately, he liked what I came up with, and so I’ve been honoured to be able to give my own subtitles to his work.  Here are a few samples of what I came up with, and why…

I titled the poster piece, Abstract 1, ‘Sentient Sketch’ (see above), simply because of the sketchy quality of the vigorous line, and because it has a very strong vitality to it, as if it were alive.  Also, I love alliteration, as may become clear.

Abstract 12 (ChloroForms)

However ChloroForms was the first title I came up with, and the only one I told PJ about, as we were hatching this scheme.  I think he was a bit non-plussed, and said “You mean it will make people pass out?”  Then I explained the capitol ‘F’, and that I thought of it because the green was like chlorophyll, but they were forms.  “Clever,” was his response, which gave me hope.

Two others came to me very easily, and I think need no further explanation than that which my titles offer, other than in the case of the first, I’m a bit of a Victorian, and in the latter, I liked that the image referenced the medium:

Abstract 10 (Absinthe Haze)

Abtract 11 (Aperture)

I’ll mention one more here because I found the exchange intriguing when PJ and I played our title game.  Apres Auvers was the first I gave him to guess, and he answered correctly almost right off.  I asked him how he knew, and he replied “Well, it seems a very specific title, exacting, and I think that image is very specific as well.”  So he saw it as appropriate for a completely different reason than I chose it, which I very much liked.

Abstract 13 (Apres Auvers)

My reason?  The work for me so clearly reminded me of Van Gogh’s Wheatfield with Crows, painted at Auvers.

For punctual readers, The Luminous Lens opens at 7pm SLT tonight, just after the time of posting this, and runs through April.  And all this Ekphrasis fun of mine aside, I have to agree with Trenton: the importance is in the seeing.  And you must see these works, for they are nothing short of stunning.
–
UPDATE: The little experiment of PJ letting me title his works transformed into a full-blown exhibition catalogue, which was launched as a book in SL and is available as a PDF on Calameo.  Take a look, and if you’d like a copy of the book, you can IM either one of us in world.

To me, the art is actually in doing. The work that results, is essentially residue. It’s evidence of the creative act, of the art. - Ragamuffin Kips

Ragamuffin Kips in front of his work 'The Looking Glass'

What better place to meet a kilt-wearing, Samurai sword-wielding Neko artist than the beach of Emvee, Cuba?

Well, when you see the artwork of Ragamuffin Kips (real life Anthony Jacob), the locale makes sense.  The glorious light and rich textures of this community correlate very well with the images Kips creates. His pieces are intensely coloured, creamy pastels that he makes in RL, then rezzes and works further with layers and prim light.  The images themselves are very organic, evocative of dense jungles, or perhaps even dusty galaxies, with titles such as ‘The Jungle Line’, ‘Totem’ and ‘In Deepest Dreams’ that reveal the artist’s vision. The overall effect is a series of glowing dreamscapes of light and colour, the kinds of images one can easily sit and gaze at for a long, peaceful while.

'Ivy with Blue Sky', 2009. Pastel on paper, rezzed and primworked.

He told me a bit about his work while we sipped sangria to the strains of salsa drifting in on the breeze.  It was a fascinating conversation that ranged from thoughts on technique to existentialism, AM Radio, and Barnett Newman, and I think it bears repeating in it’s raw form here.

Derryth: Have you always made abstract works?

Kips: Mostly, yes, I became interested in abstraction as a young artist because I was interested in expressing emotions… when I’m working in RL, I work with the idea of setting my hands free to create. I don’t “think”, or try not to think, about composition or figure or form. My goal is to simply let my hands move, and allow the chalk or crayon to simply trace, or record that movement.

This is something that I feel is interesting in terms of SL art, since one isn’t touching anything in physical space but there’s a tactile sense to the work here. The new stuff I’ve been doing is concerned with exploring the margins, the space between the two worlds.

Derryth: How so?

Kips: Wow, it’s mostly an impulse, I guess, sort of a desire to bridge the space, connect the worlds kinda.

'Landfal' 2009, a collaborative piece between himself and friend and artist Lifecloud Waivrider. Hand drawn by both in pastels, rezzed and primworked.

Derryth: Is this new since [your earlier SL] paintings?

Kips: Well, what I’m talking about is the new stuff I’ve been doing with the imbedded prims and multiple surfaces.  My thought there, in retrospect, has been to try to create a surface that transitions my rl work into virtual space. The 2-D photograph of the drawing sort of dragged into virtual space using elements of both, if that makes any sense.

Derryth: Do you find that, knowing now that you may rez a drawing, that it affects your work in RL? Does it change the way you think about it I mean, thinking about how you might work it here?

Kips: Yeah, because I’m thinking now in terms of creating in the new space. The challenge for me has been to remain true to the act of creating the work rather than focusing on the end result. From past experience, that never works. As soon as I begin thinking in terms of product, the process is lost and the work is no longer free to move much.

Derryth: Ah, interesting.  But… it seems to have extended the act of creating. It begins in RL, then extends to SL.

Kips: Yeah, I’m coming to the new work with the idea of immersing it in virtual space naturally, the same way I’ve immersed myself here.. It’s an ongoing process, and I’m not really sure where it will take me. I’m just acting on an urge at this point. Since art, for me, has always come from my hands, I have to reconcile this problem of creating something that expresses that in this space. Sort of trying to push my hands into Second Life and draw here.

Derryth: So are there two processes then? You create in RL, and try not to think about SL. Then you bring it to SL, and work again?

Kips: Well, when I’m drawing in rl now, I have in my head this idea that I’ll be adding prims and multiple levels to the drawing, so as I draw, these objects and levels already exist in the work since I imagine them there. In a weird way, the creation flows in both directions.

Derryth: Ah, that is what I meant earlier, when I wondered if SL has affected your work.

Kips: Yes, in The Looking Glass, that was the first time it really came to me… in that drawing, I saw the two worlds fusing… They don’t exist entirely in either world. That’s the kinda cool thing to me, they have a foot in each.

'The Looking Glass', 2009. Pastel on paper, rezzed and primworked.

Derryth: And do you think they exist, then?

Kips: Yes, absolutely, but to me, the question is less important since the art is in the creation.  Not to get too philosophical, sorry…

Derryth: No apology necessary for that!

Kips: I guess you could say, they sort of ask the viewer to stretch her or his imagination from one world into the other a bit. The line between the “realities” becomes blurred.

Derryth: How long have you been making art here in SL?

Kips: Well, I began photographing my drawings and showing them here about two years ago. It was my main reason for coming here. But I realized a few months back that I was actually more interested in using virtual space as a medium and exploring its properties. I began seeing AM Radio, and Bryn Oh, and others.

Derryth: AM Radio is amazing.

Kips: Well, the first time I saw, The Far Away, just like almost everyone else, I was stunned… it was a revelation to me, nothing short of that. After thinking about why this affected me so strongly, I realized that it has something to do with the presence that he’s able to create, the feeling, the energy.  Hard to explain, and I don’t truly know how that relates directly to my work. All I can say is it gave me a sense of the possible.

Derryth: I think it relates well to your work because you are both able to capture an amazing sense of atmosphere… I want to walk through your paintings… dream in them.

Kips: Yes, thank you, that’s a wonderful compliment. I do feel a sense of depth in them that the RL drawings can’t have on their own.

'Left of Harper', 2009. Pastel on paper, rezzed and primworked.

Derryth: Which RL artists inspire you?

Kips: The Abstract Expressionists mostly… Barnett Newman, Pollock, Gottlieb, Rothko, and the rest.  The Modernists, and their ideas on mystery, the sublime, primitivism. Before the postmodern age… (laughs) these artists still had an idea of universal understanding and the collective consciousness that I find appealing.

Derryth: Ha! Down with postmodernism! (winks)

Kips: (laughs) It’s impossible to discredit or overcome a movement that refuses to assert anything.

Derryth: An excellent point!

Kips: I wish I could write about my own art like Newman did…not that my work’s on par with Newman’s. (laughs).  He’s one of those guys that you read and see his work and it affects you in a very profound way. Anyone who’s ever stood in front of one of those f*cking things, if they’re at all awake, can’t help but be shaken a little.

Derryth: Wow, strong statement, I like it!

Kips: You know that his works have been assaulted in museums? Twice, I think.

Derryth: Ah, but he isn’t alone in that, people are mental.

Kips: Well, Newman’s are abstractions, simple color fields and “zipps.” What could move someone to react that way to them? I know, in a sense, because I have stood there in front of them… pretty amazing.

Barnett Newman (American, 1905–1970) 'Concord', 1949. Oil and masking tape on canvas 89 3/4 x 53 5/8 in. (228 x 136.2 cm). Collection: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, George A. Hearn Fund, 1968 (68.178) © Barnett Newman Foundation

Derryth: I find it fascinating that you have that response, because he doesn’t do it for me.

Kips: Well, it’s not anger for me, but Newman’s work expands into the world in the same way that I would like for my works to. It affects the space around it. To me anyway.

Derryth: Your work does that for me more than Newman’s.

Kips: Let me give you a quote, just a sec… (shuffles through his virtual notebook) “The basis of an aesthetic act is the pure idea. But the pure idea is, of necessity, an aesthetic act. Here then is the epistemological paradox that is the artist’s problem. Not space cutting nor space building, not construction nor Fauvist deconstruction; not the pure line, straight and narrow, nor the tortured line, distorted and humiliating; not the accurate eye, all fingers, nor the wild eye of dream, winking; but the idea-complex that makes contact with mystery — of life, of men, of nature, of the hard, black chaos that is death, or the grayer, softer chaos that is tragedy. For it is only the pure idea that has meaning. Everything else has everything else.” This is Newman’s writing.

Derryth: What year, do you know?

Kips: Hmmmm, no, I don’t know. Shouldn’t be hard to find out, though.

Derryth: (consults her iPhone) 1947.  Excerpted from “The Ideographic Picture,” Betty Parsons Gallery, NY, Jan 20 – Feb 8, 1947.  Good ol’ Google.

Kips: Ahhh, excellent! (laughs) Where would we be without it??

Where indeed, with so much rich inspiration at our fingertips.  And Kips’ work is also just a click away… his new art exhibit “Prims on Paper” just opened at Nantucket Square, and he also has a display of work that just opened at Pirats’ La Manufacture, alongside others such as Chrome Underwood and Filthy Fluno. And after a long time of being represented by the Red Star Gallery in Bay City, Kips finally decided to open his own studio up beneath his living quarters, a converted dockside warehouse in Avalon.  The building itself is worth a look if you like conversions, and the vivid colour of Kips’ work is strong enough to make a statement against the rich red brick walls.

Kips' primworked art on display in his stunning new studio in Avalon.

My only criticism of Kips work is that he has set the price of his work far below its value, to my eye.  I highly recommend collectors to add his work to their collections before this unassuming Neko understands just how good – and how rare – his work is.

First, it isn’t just rezzed, but resonates.  For me, it must speak somehow.  The message may not be coherent, it may just be one of the senses, but the work has something to say beyond just the figural, the representative.  I may not even like the work, visually (as in, “I wouldn’t hang it in my house”), but I am objective enough to recognize and respect what it tries to do.

Second, it doesn’t just resonate, but is rezzed.  While it is lovely to see what a fine photographer or painter someone is in RL, in SL, I want to see someone really use the medium at their disposal.  This isn’t to say that I would thumb my nose at RL work brought into SL, but then do something different with it… shape it, work prim light into it, or use it as a catalyst for the exploration of these two strange worlds somehow.  Examples that immediately come to mind in this regard are the Gracie Kendal Project; Scottius Polke’s recent whimsical installation mushROOM; and the stunning landscapes such as The Far Away built by AM Radio for the IDIA exhibition and installation sim for artists-in-residence, hosted by the Institute for DIgital Intermedia Arts at Ball State University (the light here is addictive for photo enthusiasts).

Self-portrait of the author at mushROOM, on the shelf (again).

And with that, a brief note on photography in SL.  Taking a picture with your SL camera is of course using the SL medium, so here I look for something beyond a snapshot, but rather artists who really have an eye for composition, light, colour.  I may be biased, but in this category, our own Prim Perfect photographers PJ Trenton, Raven Haalan, and Twisted Lemon are top examples.

With that, I hope to introduce our readers to artists that they may enjoy, as well as add to their personal collection to make their own homes Palaces of Art.