Do This
I'm going to do something I don't usually do, which is to use this space to tell you where to go. There are a few worthwhile shows closing this week that I haven't been able to review, as well as a promising event this weekend, and while I don't relish such bossiness, there is some satisfaction to there being enough good shows that one runs out of space to write about them.
First, there's Sean Duffy's Sorry Entertainer at Howard House (2017 Second Ave, 256-6399). Altered objects are pretty common these days, but Duffy's commentary is more trenchant than some. His point is the commercial fallout of the grunge years, with objects that use the era's sound and DIY aesthetic--and its subsequent grabbing by corporate soul-suckers--as a starting point. The mind-blower isThe Creature, a turntable surrounded by four casings that have been jury-rigged together with duct tape and zip ties. As a result each record is played by four needles, and the effect is a strange, perverted reverberation of something familiar; Duffy has chosen all monster-themed music, including Donovan's "Season of the Witch." Also, don't miss the hilarious and raucous guitar/chainsaw hybrid that you can actually play.
There's a lovely little show at SOIL called Ardent Labor (1317 E Pine St, 264-8061), which aside from having a handful of good pieces by people I know (Mandy Greer's decadent hand-sewn animals, Paul Margolis' documentation of wrapping a tree in wool out in the wild) features a few new (to me) artists with very, very cool work. Most notable: Peter Mundwiler's video project, in which he filmed five minutes of activity in UW's Red Square, and then re-created it with actors following detailed scripts. The films show side by side, and while the reenactment isn't perfect there's an uncanny echo that speaks to the gap between the natural and the created.
If you happen to be downtown, there are some excellent Eve Cohen sculptures in the windows at Mario's (1513 Sixth Ave), a swank clothing store. Cohen makes very strange little creatures out of fur and bone and other things, and we don't get to see them frequently enough.
Finally, have a rest at Respite, an installation/experiment by artists Julie Johnson, Claire Cowie, and Jean Hicks, who wanted to look into what it means to both take and offer respite in a city. It's not obvious: Really letting go is a much more intricate and structured proposition than you would think. In a pristine space in the Panama Hotel, you can give yourself a footbath, and then have a little lie-down on a cot, attended to, in a detached way, by the artists. These simple gestures open up a world of questions, including the possibility of privacy in a public space, and the impossibility of controlling every last variable, such as who, exactly, they are going to end up serving. At the Panama Hotel (605 1/2 S Main St); 11 am-6 pm, August 22-24.
