ART OF THE OYLMPICS

MONICA BONVICINI

RUN(click)

                                                                                                                                                                           photo from Google image

Monica Bonvicini is an Italian born artist who now lives between Berlin and Los Angeles


I have been watching the Olympics while working on some glass fusion pieces.  I love sports, as my Father was a coach and I grew up with a variety of sports around me on tv, on the radio, or in person.   Perhaps it is the excitement, the physical skill and endurance...I am not certain, but  in the Olympics you have drama and excitement and skills all rolled up into one.  I started thinking about the art work and the amazing architecture that I was seeing.  When I pulled up the site on the art work, it seems as if each venue has a different artists work.  I thought it would be fun for us to look at that together.  I really like this first installation by Monica Bonvicini.   The use of words reminds me of Jenny Holtzer(click), an American artist.  I think we can assume this sculpture is outside the track and field area.  My brother ran track so it is dear to my heart as well.  I can still see him running his relays in my mind with his state championship team.  Run with the wind!

Georgia on My Mind/Southern Culture USA

Red Grooms/Installation

So this is the thought that began to formed in my mind as we were driving through Georgia...installation...Southern culture installation...

( Now if you are not familiar with the United States and the roads and regions then it needs a little explaining. First of all Georgia is a very long state and it takes a very long time to drive through on your way to somewhere else, so one's mind is bound to wander and take odd turns.) I began to think of the Southern culture and its images as an installation worthy of an art exhibition.

If you speak Southern the main nouns in your language are fried chicken, cornbread, greens, BBQ, boiled peanuts, and coke. That is just a start for there is also fat back, strap back molasses, and cracklings. Guns and baseball caps are important also if we are creating a scene...rocking chairs help, stuffed heads of deer and fowl...hence the importance of guns. Think old ford and chevy pickup trucks with gun racks on the back window...the installation is worthy of Red Grooms who does recreations of city scenes and people doing things with a sense of humor. I think the extremes of Southern culture would allow for a wonderful Grooms piece. See what you think?

Now it may just be me, but I don't think it is normal to see a stuffed fox displayed with an ad for hot pizza nor a stuffed mounted deer head with cookie dough mix. But that is just the oddity of some parts of county Southern culture.

One of the things that amazed me is how many kinds of BBQ sauce one can find in Southern stores..not two or three, but a whole isle of bottle after bottle of sauce...tomato based, vinegar based, mustard based, and on and on.