Suffer the Children

The opening of “NYC 1993” at the New Museum

February 2013 NEW YORK

I KNEW A MUSEUM SHOW ABOUT “NYC 1993” would be creepy, I just didn’t know what kind of creepy. When the nostalgia train hits a time when you were actually an adult, you palpably experience the constructedness of history. Younger colleagues… READ ON

DIARY

Rhonda Lieberman

December 2012

FROM THE SUBLIME TO THE RIDICULOUS:  “Matisse: In Search of True Painting” (Metropolitan Museum of Art, Dec. 4, 2012 – March 17, 2013); “The Steins Collect: Matisse, Picasso and the Parisian Avant-Garde” (Metropolitan Museum of … READ ON

SLANT

Rhonda Lieberman on Barbara Kruger’s “Remote Control”

September 2012

BARBARA KRUGER is an excellent close reader of the idiot box—formally, aesthetically, and politically. From 1985 to 1990, she wrote a column on television for Artforum called “Remote Control.” I must admit I dipped back into these texts… READ ON

IN PRINT September 2012 [TOC]

Projection Runway

The premiere of Marina Abramović The Artist Is Present

June 2012 NEW YORK

DEAR ARTFORUM DIARY,  On Thursday I was present at the latest mythologization of Marina Abramović at the Museum of Modern Art: a screening of Marina Abramović The Artist Is Present, the HBO doc chronicling the performance artiste as she … READ ON

DIARY

Venus Extravaganza

Sotheby’s Contemporary Art Evening Sale and “À Rebours”

May 2012 NEW YORK

DEAR ARTFORUM DIARY,  Back in the trenches with the 1 percent! On Wednesday, my beat started at the Sotheby’s Contemporary Art evening auction. A seasoned scribe prepared me: “There’s a press pit, so we’re kept separate from the … READ ON

DIARY

What’s Love Got to Do with It?

Courtney Love and The Pocket Guide to Politics

May 2012 NEW YORK

DEAR ARTFORUM DIARY, your brave correspondent spent May Day with the 1 percent.  In the trenches! First was the press preview for Courtney Love’s art show at Fred Torres Collaborations. Who doesn’t love celebrity vanity art? Especially… READ ON

DIARY

She’s Still Here. . . Damn It!

Sandra Bernhard’s holiday show

January 2012 NEW YORK

LAST WEDNESDAY, I attended the first of an “unprecedented eight” back-to-back holiday shows by Sandra Bernhard at Joe’s Pub. “So great to be back again and again and again,” the sassy celeb quipped of her return to the downtown … READ ON

DIARY

Taylor Made

The Elizabeth Taylor auctions at Christie’s

December 2011 NEW YORK

ELIZABETH TAYLOR has been a legend for so long she’s always been undead to anyone alive enough to read this. So the availability of her actual stuff—for mere millions and millions of bucks—is vaguely surreal. This week, I went to the … READ ON

DIARY

Power Play

Elmgreen & Dragset's Happy Days in the Art World

November 2011 NEW YORK

TUESDAY NIGHT, Performa 11 launched with the world premiere of Happy Days in the Art World, a play by Nordic performance artistes Elmgreen & Dragset, followed by a gala “live retrospective” (performance installations by the duo) plus … READ ON

DIARY

Class Act

Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster’s T.1912

April 2011 NEW YORK

LAST THURSDAY was the ninety-ninth anniversary of the crash of the Titanic. How did you observe it? At the Guggenheim, to commemorate the disaster, artist Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster staged T.1912, billed in detail as “a site-specific staged… READ ON

DIARY