ART FOR HUMANS GALLERY CHINATOWN
AN ART FOR HUMANS PRODUCTION
LOCATION
945 Chung King Road
Los Angeles, California 90012
ON THE WEB
www.artforhumans.com
www.myspace.com/artforhumans
PROJECT DATES
MAY 15-SEPTEMBER 30, 2007
HOURS OF OPERATION (JUNE 1-SEPTEMBER 29)*
12-6 WEDNESDAY THROUGH SATURDAY
EVENING HOURS UNTIL 10PM FRIDAY THROUGH SATURDAY
*AFH Gallery Chinatown will hold its inaugural receptions over the weekend of June 1 (June 1+2). From May 18-June 1, we will keep regular business hours, but would prefer our guests make appointments for gallery visits.
LEAD ARTIST
Paul McLean
CONTACT
GALLERY PHONE: 213.621.7685
GALLERY FAX: 213.621.7635
EMAIL: artforhumans@gmail.com
SUMMARY
ART FOR HUMANS GALLERY CHINATOWN will present a sequence of fine art arrays from May 18th through the end of September, featuring contemporary artists in Traditional and New Media. The AFH Gallery Chinatown program will include exhibitions, installations, presentations, performances, online projects, demonstrations and art talks. The calendar for the AFH Gallery program will be dynamic, fluid and rich, designed to animate the art space over the course of the project life. Our patrons will be able to follow the unfolding of our exhibit/event sequence via a web interface (the AFH Calendar) designed by Nashville-based artist and programmer Greg Thornton. The online AFH Calendar will be launched concurrent with the opening of the gallery. AFH Gallery will offer innovative solutions for the integration of digital/New Media into the traditional gallery presentation format. AFH Gallery Chinatown will test the parameters of the normative retail art gallery model, functioning as a multi-use/-disciplinary/-media contemporary art nexus. Content will migrate from AFH Gallery’s virtual environment to the Chinatown gallery and back to virtual environment. Artwork exhibited in the gallery will be documented and “re-hung” in the retail space of AFH Gallery online. We will provide a variety of traditional professional gallery services for our clients, facilitating art handling, installation and transportation of purchases or commissions. AFH Gallery Chinatown will provide additional expert art services available to both experienced and nascent collectors, whether their concerns are collection design or presentation design. AFH will also offer site-specific artwork, which can be remixed for either residential or commercial display. Inquiries for environmental installations (New Media, especially), both temporary and permanent will be welcomed. Finally, AFH Gallery Chinatown will offer consultation services to artists, galleries and institutions interested in improving the integration of New and Traditional Media in their practice and presentation formats/strategies.
CONCEPT
In Fall 2006, AFH Lead Artist Paul McLean published a massively refurbished version of his website, artforhumans.com, which has been online since 2002. One of the central projects for this most recent iteration of artforhumans.com is a series of exhibits published in a site subsection entitled AFH Gallery. The inaugural exhibit round for the updated AFH website features a collection of ten online presentations by accomplished and emerging international artists from diverse creative backgrounds in New and Traditional Media. This round of exhibits is entitled “HUM 10 + 1” and is available for viewing now at artforhumans.com.
In his original concept statement for AFH Gallery artist submissions, and in communications with prospective and accepted artists, McLean indicated his desire to migrate the exhibits created for AFH Gallery online to “brick and mortar” venues. Artists were encouraged to conceive of projects with this in mind. To review the text for AFH Gallery submissions, visit www.artforhumans.com and click on the “Call for Submissions” button.
In May of 2007, AFH Gallery will take up residence in Los Angeles’ historic Chinatown, one of the city’s burgeoning contemporary art districts. The following is McLean’s Lead Artist Statement for ART FOR HUMANS GALLERY CHINATOWN.
Lead Artist’s Statement
A brief bio: I’ve been exhibiting for over 20 years now, in galleries, museums, foundations, universities and alternative art spaces. I usually characterize what I do as multi-media/multi-disciplinary art, or 4D art, utilizing traditional and new media. I’ve done innovative work in digital print and animation, photography, installation, video (projected, monitor- and web-based) and more. The foundation of everything I do as an artist is painting and drawing. I have done much work as Lead Artist of collectives. I’m very much dedicated to community art. I’ve also worked in many art-related, arts advocate roles: writing, hosting radio shows, teaching, consulting and lecturing. Recently, I’ve been exploring online communities such as My Space, You Tube and Flickr, with an eye to incorporating their networks into a new model for an artist-driven retail art gallery business and multi-use facility.
ART FOR HUMANS GALLERY CHINATOWN will be the latest project in a sequence of productions that evolve from an applied 4D Aesthetic. Documentation of previous 4D productions is on view in the various AFH websites linked to artforhumans.com. I’m often asked what 4D art is, and, after a couple of decades of practice, I still don’t have a simple answer, yet. I don’t feel bad about that, though, because as far as I can tell, no one else does either. I recently linked (March AFH Links) to a book online titled The Fourth Dimension Explained, assembled by Henry Manning. It’s 278 pages long or so. Wikipedia has a neat summary and list of sources. There are a few art historians who specialize in 4D (Dalrymple Henderson, UT Austin) comes to mind, but by and large, the convergence of disciplines defining and discussing 4D pretty much encompasses most of the Western Civ’s Humanities and Sciences. Probably the most common short answer to the question of “What is 4D?” is “time,” or “time relative to the movement of an object in space,” or something along those lines. I think that the answer is vastly more complex and interesting, especially when one factors in the contributions to the discussion by artists (like the DaDa & Futurist camps), fiction authors (like Faulkner), spiritualists, and mathematicians (like Gregori Perelman)… It seems to me that 4D as a phenomenon is not only animated, but also reflexive and indicative of meta-form, to venture a few descriptive anecdotal qualities. In fact, I suspect that the apparatus of enlightened reason may be inherently handicapped when it comes to pinning down 4D, like a butterfly on velvet in a frame on the wall.
That said, every 4D production I have undertaken has been an exercise in better understanding the practical applications and distinguishing features or facets of 4D, and ART FOR HUMANS CHINATOWN will be no different. I look forward to sharing everything I know on the subject with anyone who enters the gallery and is willing to listen to my hopelessly confusing riffs. Hopefully, though, because our medium is art – and I believe art is one of the most valuable tools for exploring 4D – our guests at AFHG CHINATOWN will have the opportunity to experience 4D, rather than only addressing it in the context of intellectual examination and translation.
In AFH Gallery online, through “HUM 10 + 1,” we as a collective delved into the virtual architecture of 4D, using the hypercube unfolded as a geometric reference. Some notions we started with proved utile and applicable, and others ultimately were abandoned. The abstract structure I proposed in the early stages of the project – imagining an architectural housing for our virtual expressions – were superseded by the needs of specific artworks in the virtual presentation. It was my curatorial mindset that determined that when deciding whether to cling to a pre-existing format or service the vision or work of artist, I opted for the latter direction. A correlate of this conflict resolution choice evolved into a helpful discussion among the artists & myself about what computer-/web-based art would not replace: the art opening (the community aspect of the art experience), collecting (art as owned/loved treasure), the relationship (involving craftsmanship and improving skill) between the artist and his body of work, the sense of value associated with the art object (and the materials required to make one), the value of art history as a gradient scale made of relevant points, the heroic gesture of the artist, the command of one’s medium for expressive purposes and so on. Conversations with Glenn Goldberg, Curtis Stage, John Guider, Christian Mœller and others in our crew were incredibly important to this thread of appreciation. These issues, and their relevance to notions of meaning, beauty, truth and other out-of-favor aesthetic anchors, will remain in play as we migrate to AFH Gallery Chinatown.
In my AFH Gallery Online Call for Submissions, I encouraged artists to explore my artwork posted throughout the AFH family of sites in order to get a sense of my preferences on such things as:
level of finish
design ingenuity
cohesiveness
conceptual depth and focus
narrative power
image impact
aesthetics
formal quality
… and so on …
I again encourage you to do so, especially if you’re interested in submitting proposals to me for installations/projects. For the next four months or so, we’ll have an opportunity to present pertinent, powerful artwork to the artsies of LA (& those on holiday here). I intend to make the most of it.
Let me try to explain my vision for the Chinatown project. Our architecture is a white cube, more or less. It is a cube with three exhibit walls, in its unaffected state. The floor is concrete, the south side is mostly glass, and the ceiling is high (14’). Two doorways open into the room. As with the online project, we’ll rely on the unfolded hypercube construct as a reference, in order to visualize a sequence of actions for the actual space. All installations, therefore, will be thought of as cells in a progressive cinematic movement. Each sequence of installations in a quadrant (the north wall, for instance) will be viewed as a set, with a start and finish, and each element of the installation in that quadrant will be considered a temporal state of that set. Each state will be documented, and may be animated at the end of the project, creating a relative set (not actual), which has its own characteristics. Maybe this indicates something to the reader about a certain aspect of constrained continuity approaching freedom. The first notation is 2D (cells in a film), consisting of points in a linear series. The second is 3D (set/temporal state + documentation), with the wall functioning as one plane imprinting another (the camera lens, or rather the film/sensor) with a result: the output – prints can be stacked one on the other, for example, indicating that the characteristics become more dynamic and complex here. There is a wall and there is a reflected wall and there is an expressed wall in 3D. The last notation is 4D (animated, relative, generated but meta-). My digital dictionary defines “meta-“ as a prefix, meaning “later, behind, beyond, transcending, encompassing, change, transformation, higher, more developed, used in chemical names.” These are clues mapping 4D nature, which in turn maps the simpler dimensional nature(s). To wit, we can project the animated projection of the wall evolution in its sequence of states on the wall. If one believes that this act of projection, this projection, is an actuality, just as the wall is an actuality, in exactly that way, then the tremendous trans-natural force of 4D can be approached. When the art object components are considered within this context, synthesis is not the achievement derived from a face-off between thesis and antithesis. What I propose is a transthesis. In short, we can think of the individual artworks as theses (short unstressed syllables) objectified specifically, which when combined evidence a relativity that is itself synthetic, a poetic form. For our exhibit purposes (in the manner in which the artwork is exhibited), this form is indicated. The next phase, the transthetic 4D phase, suggests the transamination (to borrow & reformat a term from biochemistry) and transanimation of the art and the exhibit of the art. Then, the art of the exhibit takes on a very special sort of meaning, similar to a conversion environment, or medium, in which the artist/exhibitor functions as the force that energizes the transamination/transanimation, and the viewer/artist/exhibit functions as the reaction or receiver, or remainder. I suggest that we have a few gallery “quadrants,” each of which has its own characteristics, some of which share characteristics.
My production plan for ART FOR HUMANS GALLERY CHINATOWN goes something like this. I will map the quadrants of the space in general terms. A diagram will be posted on the web. I will execute an ongoing series of installations of my own work in those quadrants, to demonstrate the 4D approach, and of course, to engage in a meaningful artistic expression. I have invited a number of accomplished and so-called media, emerging and alt.- artists to produce and display art in the gallery. We will feature the HUM 10 + 1 artists/artworks, in keeping with the original concept for the project. I will also consider proposals by artists whose works/ideas/practices will succeed in the art space and within the conceptual context. My overarching principle as a Lead Artist is that the exhibiting artist and artwork must be well served and respected in the endeavor. In the real world of production I sometimes fail, but I will do my best. With that in mind, here are some guidelines, by quadrant, that interested artists should view as suggestions. There are many artists out there more proficient in many areas of expertise than I am, and I encourage them to propose improvements on our schematics, whenever that would be helpful to the production. -PJM
Outer
Performative works outside the space, with audio/visual documentation, especially works conceived of for Chinatown and LA; web-based works that relate directly to the temporal states in the gallery
Windows/Door (Interior/Exterior Surfaces)
Digital Print treatments for glass
West Wall
North Wall
East Wall
Paintings; drawings; digital prints; vinyl; dimensional wall art; collage; photography (this is not an exhaustive nor an hierarchical listing
Floor
Sculpture (wood, metal, plastic, etc); vinyl
Space Between the Floor and Ceiling
Objects; translucencies
Ceiling
Vinyl
Other
• 13” x 19” Digital prints for output/presentation in gallery catalog
• Audio works for output and/or installation in the gallery
• Moving images for output and/or projection/installation in the gallery
• Performance in the space (Audio, AV, Dance, Theater, Poetry)
• Websites built for presentation in the gallery or as adjuncts to the gallery
• Adjunct (brick and mortar) galleries in other places, connected via web to AFHGC or by other means
• Art talks, slide presentations, etc.
Notes on Guidelines
Dear artsies, please keep in mind that ART FOR HUMANS GALLERY CHINATOWN will be operated as a retail art business and simultaneously as a multi-use/-disciplinary/-media experimental art space for the duration of the project. These two modalities will sometimes be suspended in tenuous balance, probably. The needs of the artist and artwork will be met, if at all possible. If we take on an installation of your work, as I said above, we will do everything we can to ensure that your creative is cared for properly and respected.
That said, I offer the following disclaimer. Your consideration will be much appreciated, while the staff, our clients, other artists and I negotiate and navigate the demanding transprocess of integrating seemingly divergent concerns – sales and presentation. Based on my extensive experience with complex multi-media/-disciplinary production, I feel certain that we will encounter moments that are difficult, but - with the right attitude and logistical resources – soluble, or at the very least, acceptable. AFHGC will function as a temporary exhibit room, which provides a certain latitude and play, but our goal is to make the operation flow like Siddhartha’s river. -PJM
Submitting Proposals/Artworks
• Mailed submissions
o Please submit still or moving images/audio on CD or DVD; slide packages will be accepted, but digital files are preferred; still images should be in jpeg format & under 2MB; audio should be in MP3 format or otherwise professionally produced; moving image pieces (animations/video/films) and performance reels should be 3-5 minute samples in Quicktime format
o Materials will only be returned if there is adequate postage & SASE
• Drop-in submissions are OK (your consideration is vital), but not preferred; packages will not be reviewed with the artist present
• Collectives and performance troupes should designate a Lead Artist to represent them in dealings with the gallery
• URL/website review is encouraged (please consider our attention spans & time constraints)
• Please do not include any original artwork in any submission package
• Please include a brief bio, artist statement and CV
• Review the gallery specs on the AFH My Space Blog before putting together your proposal
• Email questions to art@artforhumans.com
Logistical Guidelines/Considerations for Artists/Buyers
• All accepted art delivered to the gallery must be ready for presentation; professional standards apply
• Artists are responsible for insurance on their work, as well as transportation of the work to and from the gallery; AFH can recommend LA Packing, Crating & Transport for most art handling tasks determined to be beyond the scope of the gallery staff’s business
• Artists traveling to LA to attend an exhibit of their art will be responsible for their own transportation and lodging, unless prior considerations have been made by the parties
• If artworks require special consideration for installation, the artist will be expected to be on site to oversee/install; professional assistance will be available, either in-house or on a contract basis
• Artwork for sale at AFH Gallery Chinatown will generally be sold on a 35/65 split (majority to the artist, in consideration of the conditions outlined above), excepting digital prints/media produced in-house, which will be sold on a 50/50 split
• Shipping costs for sold work will be paid by the buyer
• Artists will must agree to reserve work exhibited at AFHG for three months after its de-installation
• Arrangements by exhibiting artists must be made for removal of artwork after de-installation; artwork will not be stored at the gallery
• Other issues are open to discussion; policies will be settled on as we adapt to circumstances; we will make every effort to accommodate reasonable requests and concerns put forth by artists and clients
Other Client Services
ART FOR HUMANS will offer consultancy to artists, collectors, galleries and institutions, especially with regards to the integration of New and Traditional Media residential, commercial, presentation or institutional environments. Professional art services can be arranged through AFH. We will consider inquiries for the commission of temporary (event)/permanent environmental installations by AFH-affiliated artists. Please contact us if you have any other questions.
EXHIBIT PROGRAM
We move into the gallery on May 15. We will install informal exhibits in the gallery space from May 18 through June 1. These installations will allow us to test the logistics of the space and hopefully provide interested artsies with an idea of our designs, approach and infrastructure. I will mostly be presenting my own work during this phase of the production. However, proposals for very short-term (1 or 2 days duration) object-based arrays and screenings by LA-based artists will be considered.
On the weekend of June 1st, AFHGC will feature screenings of Joe Hiscott’s “Business As Usual,” “NOPPE,” “Photo Compilation” and related art/documentation, including a special limited edition print commemorating the occasion. For the rest of the production, we’ll be presenting “anchor shows” by featured artists like Glenn Goldberg, John Guider, Erin O’Hara, & the other HUM 10 + 1 artists. These exhibits will only be on view for 1 or, in one or two instances, 2 weeks. We will also be producing solo and collective installations by artists based in the US and abroad, as weeklong features. The short-run exhibit approach will be counterbalanced by our documentation of the art while it is on view in the gallery. We will migrate images of the art to our web galleries, where clients may purchase pieces up to 3 months after their de-installation. The online documentation of AFHGC will be maintained in perpetuity (at least in web terms).
On weekend evenings and some Thursdays, AFHGC will present screenings by accomplished US-based and international video & audio (& AV) artists between 6 & 8PM (Thursdays) & 8 & 10PM (Fridays, Saturdays). Out of consideration for our neighbors, sound components will be set at appropriate levels for these events. An online calendar at artforhumans.com will be the primary means for our patrons to stay updated on happenings and installations at the Chinatown venue. Throughout the project run, AFHGC will accept proposal submissions from artists interested in participating in the production. Sundays through Tuesdays will initially be made available for additions to our regular programming. Performance-based artists will be encouraged to utilize these days/evenings for their productions, though such works are certainly not restricted to those timeframes.
Installations that require computers, projectors, monitors, DVD or audio players or other electronic gear (basically anything that needs power to function properly) will need to be tested in the space prior to the exhibit. The artist(s) will be responsible for making arrangements to do so. Although AFHGC will be equipped to effectively present New Media, whenever possible artists will be encouraged to consider their own gear as first choice when installing. This does not apply to artists sending media for screening or inclusion in our gallery catalog projects.
I recognize that the approach I describe above is a bit unorthodox, relative to most retail galleries. If you have any questions about our program, please contact us. -PJM
CALLS FOR SUBMISSIONS/NARRATIVES
The following are themed invitational exhibits planned for the AFHGH production run (exhibit dates TBA).
“Art Handler”
CONCEPT: Open invitation to all working art handlers in the Greater LA area to exhibit their original artworks of at ART FOR HUMANS GALLERY CHINATOWN. Art Handlers: You will be expected to hang your own pieces. Normal submission guidelines apply. Response will determine number of gallery dates made available for the show(s).
“Moving Earth”
CONCEPT: (See HUM 10 + 1 Exhibit 10 at AFH Gallery online & submission guidelines at the AFH My Space page). Accepted submissions must be printed by the artist & mailed/delivered to the gallery on the deadline date TBA.
“Stop F***ing Praying for the Apocalypse!!”
CONCEPT: (See AFH FRIEND COLLECTIVE Gallery online & submission guidelines at the AFH My Space page). Accepted submissions must be printed by the artist & mailed/delivered to the gallery on the deadline date TBA.
AV
CONCEPT: AFHGC will present a complex multi-media/multi-disciplinary series of events, installations and projects featuring dynamic collaborations between audio and visual artists
OTHER THEMES CURRENTLY UNDER CONSIDERATION
“New Orleans, Before and After Katrina;” “Unseen War;” “Car Culture;” “New School Illustration;” “Dynamic Symmetry;” “Tensegrity;” “Bigger than Life;” and “Old School Drawing”
OTHER OPPORTUNITIES FOR CREATIVE PROFESSIONALS:
Curators are encouraged to pitch show concepts/rosters to AFHGC. To be seriously considered, any such proposal must be cogently organized prior to the submission of the proposal.
AFHGC Lead Artist Paul McLean is in the process of assembling actors for a gallery-related project. If interested, please inquire. The concept involves improvisation, method, some on-camera work, live performance and a working knowledge of the “art world”/contemporary artist stereotypes.
Contemporary and Classic Dance and Movement artists are strongly encouraged to pitch on-site performance concepts to AFHGC. Our willingness to accommodate strong proposals will be guided by our great respect for your art.
Musicians, audio/sound artists are encouraged to submit demos for review by AFHGC. Specify your area of interest:
o Performance at evening program
o Collaboration with visual artist(s)
o Reception ambient/drone/environment
o Use of space for sound sculpture installation
o Found sound/environmental installation
o Inclusion in the AFHGC audio catalog
o Other
Architects are encouraged to inquire about collaborations with gallery-affiliated artists for on- & off-site projects.
Graphic design and other printed-page professionals are encouraged to pitch concepts for artist books, posters, flyers, logos, catalogs and experimental works