art installment

Louise Bourgeois is at the MOCA. The 96 Parisian (and still alive!) could not make it to the greater L.A. herself, but her oeuvres d'art have been stirring about. Everything from spiders to adultery, to tapestry factories, a bad childhood and her father's mistress speaks through in her works and are the latest talk of the town.

I attended the "Members Only" advanced preview on Saturday for which we had exclusive Invite Only entrance, which was a cup of delight! Not merely to the winebar free-loader or the middle-aged trend monkey but for any abstract artist, curious cat, or lover of the surreal. Just a forwarning, many a phallus sprung to the ceiling, sculptures of huge bronze spiders entrapped a bed, and vaginal symbolism signified Bougeois' anxieties and her nightmarish growing up.

A mixture of latex on bronze covered the sexual ambiguities and social implications of the feminine and masculin identities and repeated throughout many of her pieces-"fillette" made a blunt statement to the girl-boy gender struggle. One resembled a 'pig-in-a-blanket' another 'two yams interfolded'. There were many marble egg-eye-tip pieces called "cumulus", which I perceive as another relationship & sexual working- one in particular backlit in red drew many a paf. Other than the french man that followed me around every single oeuvre, trying to engage me in conversation with...his eyes, two amateurs beside me said "It's too abstract, screw it" and moved on.

I personally enjoyed the charcoal house with legs drawing, the cast-iron leg sculptures hung from the ceiling (vastly overlooked), the "7 in a bed pink" fabric dolls and most of all, "Arch of Hysteria"- the gold torso hanging and bent in a backward thrust. I walked 180 'round this hot mess. The female as a house and vagina like in her "femme-maison" was powerfully suggestive of the patriarchal dominance and the role in which the female is confined to and appears in modern society.

Realize that this avant-garde art is not for everyone. If you choose to go just for kicks and giggles, make sure you don't creep on innocent art-admirers... we can see what you're looking at and it is most definitely not art for art's sake.

As you exit, be sure to check out Kippenberger's retrospective exhibit "the Problem Perspective" for faux-photos, the fake-log pipes and magnifying glass painting collection. Watch out for the rusty-looking car with it's lights on, and the shady man beside it who may or may not ask you (as he did I) whether "this is your car?" followed by "i'm going to have to write you up for this, you can't be parking here". Nice try creeper #2, but i'm two questions in and walking five steps out the door.

Allez, Kimberley


To the right is my own artwork. The inspiration? A man with a pipe -you never see this!- on campus reading his book. I could only think of Beard Papa and how much I hate that mascot. Seen is my anxiety toward said papa who needs a good beating from someone who cares. What the heck is a Beard Papa anyway and why would anyone choose to eat such a cream puff! I will never step foot in that eatery. EVER!