I thought this was going to be the month the listing died, but here I am with a few minutes to spare and we’ll see what we can get done tonight. And I’ll see what occurs to me as I type this up, but a couple of highlights this month [...]
I thought this was going to be the month the listing died, but here I am with a few minutes to spare and we’ll see what we can get done tonight. And I’ll see what occurs to me as I type this up, but a couple of highlights this month [...]
Twist Gallery is celebrating its 3rd anniversary this month with what should be a good show by Angela Burks, a figurative painter on the faculty at MTSU. Francis Bacon comes to mind—in aspects of the compositions, not the painter’s personal behavior, which I can’t vouch for either way. Twist has [...]
It’s utter chaos. The first Saturday falls on the 4th of July! What will we do? Will people come to openings before checking out the fireworks? Can we have openings on the second Saturday? What about that first Thursday thing, positioned as a warmup to the downtown openings? Don’t worry [...]
I’m sending this out a little early so I could get word around about the Fugitive 60 Second video festival and the TCASK fundraiser.
I learned this week that Libby and Ken Rowe are leaving town this summer—Libby’s starting a new gig at University of Texas San [...]
Sam Dunson had a show last year at the Vanderbilt Divinity School with work that put a focus to the wilder style he’s taken on lately. I hope some of those pieces will be in this show (I’d like to see them again), and anything more recent will take us [...]
Last week the American Academy of Arts & Sciences announced their latest class of members. The Academy’s been around since 1780, and one of its core purposes is to recognize people by naming them as fellows of the Academy. There are about 4,000 now, plus 600 something foreign [...]
Stumbled across this interview with Cecil Taylor done in 1994, focusing on his poems and his engagement with poetry (and other art forms). It’s on the SUNY Buffalo Electronic Poetry Center website. As a student of Charles Olson and someone increasingly fixated on Cecil Taylor, I was so [...]
Last month, I missed the fact that Sisavanh Houghton is exhibiting in the small gallery at Tinney Contemporary, in addition to the show by Rachel McCampbell in the main room (which features a big sculpture in the middle that looks energetic and fun, maybe a little creepy in a way [...]
Yesterday Maria and I went to see the Godard movie playing at the Belcourt, Made in U.S.A. It was made in 1966 but never released in the US because of rights issues. It was made quickly, and does seem tossed off, a bunch of riffs barely [...] 
Cheekwood is opening several shows at once, and I’ll get to that in a minute, but I think the biggest news is that Nancy Saturn is closing American Artisan gallery on March 31. (BTW, this edition contains a lot of deep thoughts from me—I wouldn’t blame you for scrolling down [...]
This month we’ve got a few promising things coming up. Another group show at Estel with Lesley Patteron-Marx and Desi Minchillo, another installation from Lauren Kusso at Twist.
TSU Gallery is not listed this month, but they organized the panel discussion at Vandy on the 19th, [...]
Here's my review in this week's Scene of the current show at Rymer. Bunch of interesting stuff there recently, and I didn't even get a chance to write about Casey Pierce's paintings. Also, Rymer gallery director Herb Williams is in DC, having gotten a piece [...] OK everyone, wake up from your New Year’s naps. Art continues its irresistible advance and Gallery Crawl will occur this Saturday, bigger than ever. At least Twist will be bigger than ever.
I’ve only got information on a few things happening later in the month. With the [...]
I splurged this week and went to the Tuesday night performance of Tristan und Isolde at the Metropolitan Opera. Thanks to my father and the Saturday afternoon broadcasts, the Met was part of my childhood’s sonic background and I’m still attached to it. But outside of [...] Your country needs you. The economy sucks. Phil Bredesen is going to cut every budget he can find. Gas is cheap again, but no one can afford to go nowhere. But buck up. We’ve got a brand new President, and unlike the current one, it looks he will not be [...]
I’m sending out a late month update primarily in the interests of self-promotion, but will add a few other events to salve my conscience. The self-promotion part is that I’m playing a show this Saturday afternoon at noon at Twist. That’s right, noon. We’ve set up [...]
McCain wants to eat your brains.Again, I’m trying to get everything into one listing. I figure the last half of the month should be pretty slow with Thanksgiving week, and I’m going to be off doing things elsewhere much of the time. This weekend I’ll be getting a chance to hear Dr. Michael White, [...]
e in large parts the greatest hits of what I've seen in galleries for a couple of years. There's a Tara Donovan piece made from [...] 
responsible, or [...] 
I'm posting this a little late, but it covers the whole month so I suppose it's good to have it here for reference.
Joseph Whitt is making his presence felt at the Vanderbilt Fine Arts Gallery. First, there’s the current exhibit of the Warhol Polaroids the gallery was given [...]
Well everyone has been very busy and has something to offer for the beginning of the month. The [...]
This Saturday will be sad—the last opening for TAG as a stand alone gallery. The community has also gotten word from Daniel Lai that he won’t be reopening Dangenart. So that space will go dark for now, and we lose two important sources of interesting shows. Maybe someone comparable will [...]
Got a look at the Frist shows today. Lots of big, big paintings. Modern Baroque. Also, a nice set of drawings—I especially liked the work from Carol Prusa.
As always, if you have an email list of your own, feel free to forward this.
[...]
OK, this is late getting to the web, but for the sake of completeness and the things coming in the next few weeks (there’s some Frist Center opening on the 20th that didn’t quite make it in, but will get posted). This week features the triumphant return to town of [...]
If I can get my act together, I’m going to put together a long review of Erika Johnson’s piece at the Parthenon, but there’s some other things in the way of viewing notes I wanted to get out of my head.
I did a review of the Library’s [...]
Happy Beltane everyone. There’s a lot going on, so I’m not going to get deep into everything. The Zeitgeist photography show will no doubt be very interesting, like the painting show, and it includes some people I haven’t seen in a little while.
As always, if you have [...]
I think what I want, and what makes me happy,
but always discreetly, and as it is [...]
I’ve plugged the Faith Wilding lecture at least once before. Major figure. Go hear what she has to say. Maybe a bigger deal is the new Bob Durham show. His last show at Cumberland was really good, a lot of the images have stuck with me. He paints allusively, sometimes [...]
I’m just going to cover the first weekend things. There’s a bunch of stuff next week, and Faith Wilding is coming to talk at Watkins on the 17th.
I got word this week that Matt Mikulla has closed his gallery and studio in the Arcade. That’s really [...]
I’m just going to cover the first weekend things. There’s a bunch of stuff next week, and Faith Wilding is coming to talk at Watkins on the 17th.
I got word this week that Matt Mikulla has closed his gallery and studio in the Arcade. That’s [...]
Morning: Belcourt Community Meeting, 10-11:30. Back in 1999, when the Save the Belcourt process started, we held a big community forum at the Methodist church in the Village. 9 years later, and the Belcourt is operating as a non-profit, things are going really well [...]
Pretty busy for the middle of the month. Maybe the galleries not quite downtown are gravitating to the middle of the months to stay out of the first weekend rush. A couple of good group shows, particularly at Cumberland and Zeitgeist, which between the two of them feature a bunch [...]
I think writers as naïve as me are tempted to believe that if someone ever reads anything you wrote, then they read all of it, and track what you write from piece to piece—so you’d better not recycle an idea or phrase from one outing to the next. Or maybe [...]
I have a suspiciously small number of openings for events the rest of the month. That can mean only two things—I’m missing a bunch of stuff and/or I’m going to have a lot of stuff to get into the March 1 etc. listing.
Myself, I’m going to [...]
If you have time and energy to think about anything other than Super Tuesday, it is of course the beginning of the month, so there’s art openings to distract you from whatever scares or excites you most about the country’s political prospects. But do vote, if you haven’t already.
[...]I missed a bunch of stuff for this weekend, so let me pick up what I know I missed. And of course there’s a whole bunch of stuff coming up next weekend.
By the way, I’ve gotten notice that Jim Brooks is retiring as President at Watkins. On [...]
I’ve got a note [...]
Alcorn is coming to town on January 19 to play a show at Twist Gallery (thank you Beth and Caroline for hosting it). Susan makes stunning music, experimental, but melodic, and [...] 
David Lefkowitz does paintings of the built landscape, particularly what you associate [...]
It’s the beginning of the month, I’m a little late getting this out, so I’ll keep everything short. It looks like we’ve mostly got the first Saturday openings and then a few stragglers. Imagine this will be it for December, except for the inevitable “oops I forgot one” follow-up email. [...]
It was just about 15 months that TAG opened in its new space on 5th Avenue—really slick, street level space that you could picture in a much bigger city. In this space Jerry Dale McFadden carried on and evolved the gallery’s aesthetic—still working with artists with [...] Ruby Green?s current exhibit is a group show of ceramic sculpture selected by Rob McClurg and Dona Berotti. They did a similar show there a couple of years ago with artists working in glass, and there were several things where that stuck with me, especially Becky Wehmer?s application of baking [...]
There?s a lot coming up the next two weeks. I suppose its venues getting up shows that will run through December. This should be my final listing for November. And I?ll probably do a quick first weekend thing in December and then another one (maybe).
If someone wants to get [...]
Arthur Danto makes you want to write art criticism. His writing makes it obvious how looking at and thinking about art is a serious intellectual activity. Sure, hes smarter than you (at least thats the case for me), better read, but you think maybe you could write a review that [...]
The Gypsies themselves have no heroes. There are no myths of a great liberation, of the founding of the nation, of a promised land. They have no Romulus and Remus, no wandering, battling Aeneas. They have no monuments or shrines, no anthem, no ruins. And no Book. Apart from just [...]
Theres a lot going on, and Im sure I wont do justice to everything.
I have to say, the highlight for the next couple of weeks is seeing Erika Johnson get full art museum treatment at the Vanderbilt Fine Arts Gallery. Theyre featuring a piece of hers that she [...]
If youre in Murfreesboro, John Donovan is giving a talk at MTSU, 7 PM in the Todd Building. Donovan should be familiar to Nashville audiencesclay sculptures often using toy soldiers and tanks, covered in thick glazes that seem like dense metal, usually going for humorous menace.
If in [...]
So, what do thinkif its about art, it couldnt possibly be spam, right? Ill be testing that contention at the rate Im going with these supposed-to-be-twice-a-month missives that seem to come out every week. Additions this time around are Jeff Hand, the latest at Gallery One in Belle Meade, Off [...]
Maybe this will meet with more universal approval. I ran across this clip last summer around the time I saw the Piaf, bio-flic. More than anything on record, I thought this clip captured how great Piafs voice was. Listen to the way her voice rises up out of the male [...]
SooPlex had its last show last night. Associates of Mike’s and Julian’s from various places. Now Mike Calway-Fagen heads to Athens, Georgia, where he already has plans to open a space. And Julian Rogers goes to Brooklyn to give that a try—y’know, New York, just like I pictured it, tall [...]
I think really we’re talking about what’s coming up this weekend – I’m aware of two things and they should both be very good. It seems like I’m missing something that’s crossed my inbox, but I can’t find it right now.
August 17
SooPlex, “Dedicated to the Search for the [...]
This may the first in a series of reviews of shows that have closed by now. I think a saying that would cover this approach is “with miniscule readership comes miniscule responsibility.”
On Friday I went by Belmont’s gallery to see the show by Emily Holt and Delia Seigenthaler. It [...]
When you get to Iowa, and with any luck everyone will, go to the Des Moines Art Center. Wow. I kept seeing the signs in the airport for the Des Moines Art Center, which showed a fun statue (“Animal Pyramid” by Bruce Nauman) and I had a feeling [...]
Here's a 
