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September 27-October 22, 2006 The Allen Priebe Gallery of The University of Wisconsin in Oshkosh Co-curated with Yael Lipschutz Susan Hamburger mines the traditionally female dominion of the home to unearth social and psychological dimensions of decorative objects. Her large and sensuously painted Truss canvases exhibit lavish, bound drapery that advertises seduction yet simmers with inner unease. The beauty and neuroticism of these tethered window treatments allude to the attraction of middle-class women to the endless project of beautifying their domestic surroundings. By contrast the Ongepatchket series depicts archetypes of interior design held up to the American woman as aesthetic models: ornate vases lie coquettishly aside lush velvet curtains in these nimbly painted canvases. That Ongepatchket is a Yiddish word meaning overly done or garish signals that these paintings are time capsules returning us to the home, and design aesthetic, of Hamburger’s immigrant grandmother. Thoug...

September 21 – October 29, 2006 Hampden and Central Galleries, University of Massachusetts, Amherst Victoria Calabro, Katherine Daniels, Marilla Palmer, Anna Pedersen Mark Power, Diana Puntar, Carol Salmanson, Gae Savannah This exhibition explores the refinement of attitudes and ideas in the formation of a current sculptural aesthetic. It presents a physical argument on the merit of accepting the concept of sophistication as a qualification of artistic talent. How does the look of one art work versus another determine our ability to judge its value? The title refers to a book by the anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss, which dictates how a certain degree of sophistication is necessary for wild men to raise themselves into a civilized situation, determined first by the use of language, especially in written forms, and second by whether or not food is cooked or consumed raw. In art history, the language of sculptural expression has altered radically from its prominent usage as a means of...

Poetry involves both conscious and unconscious processes. During writing, poets sometimes try to bypass consciousness, using drugs and dream. Khubla Khan was said to have emerged straight from the subconscious. Sometimes poets try to make their poems bypass the reader's consciousness. Here I'll look at a few reasons why they do this, the methods used, and their consequences. A feeling can have a greater impact if its cause is ineffable even though visceral, inexplicable reactions may not be a sign of depth and profundity. Some passages of music make the hairs raise on the back of our necks. Scientists played such music (actually by Pink Floyd) to chickens and discovered that their feathers rose at the same point. A feeling can have a greater impact if its cause is unknown. If an image is flashed too briefly for the conscious mind to appreciate, it can still influence us, and our rational mind finds it harder to resist its message - which is why subliminal advertising is banned ...

Introduction The distinction between poetry and prose has never worried me too much. The only people who need to worry are judges, editors and anthologists - if they get it "wrong" they'll receive lots of feedback and might not be asked to do the job again. Some people try to define poetry based on analysis of the text, often using unquantifiable terms like "density" and "intensity". Sound is frequently mentioned in these definitions. This approach faces several problems Such definitions tend to exclude accepted poetic genres - e.g. light verse, shaped poetry, poems like "The Red Wheelbarrow", or LANGUAGE poetry The definitions tend to stray into discussing Quality rather than Category issues, describing what a good poem should have rather than what a poem requires Borderline texts ("Found poetry", "Prose poetry") are difficult to handle Reader-centred approaches seem more useful. Rather than classifying texts as "po...

July 7-August 6, 2006 DABORA GALLERY 1080 Manahttan Avenue, between Dupont and Eagle Streets, Brooklyn NY, 718. 609.9629 Lynda Mahan: lynda@daboragallery.com URL: http://www.daboragallery.com Article Projects and Dabora Gallery are proud to exhibit “Peek” by Rebecca Hackemann, a storefront installation of the artist’s stereoscopes, which make certain participatory demands upon the viewer, to gaze into the twin eyeholes to see the art—and when facing the images contained inside, one is also called upon to read the messages that accompany them, putting together the separate elements of a complicated esthetic event that is both imagistic and linguistic at the same time. Each of the collages in her stereoscopes is part quandary and part parable. Rebecca Hackemann is a contemporary artist whose pieces stretch the definition of fine art black and white photography as language and formally as flat image on the wall. Photography and sculpture are combined into “photo based” work or optical scu...

To my mind, it seems obvious that it is important to have an international legal order and to foster strong international institutions that seek to advance the greater good of all humanity. As John F Kennedy said.... "We prefer world law, in the age of self-determination, to world war in the age of mass extermination." But, it appears that the UN is in a bit of a crisis. Major powers see it as a nuisance in the pursuit of their own agenda. Demonising the UN and tarnishing its image has become a popular sport for some. We cannot underestimate the important role of this world body. It may appear weak at times. But its will is only as strong as we allow it to be. As such, I decided to sign the following petition: "The heroes of the world community are not those who withdraw when difficulties ensue, not those who can envision neither the prospect of success nor the consequence of failure -- but those who stand the heat of battle, the fight for world peace through the U...

The Works of James Madison Secularism is a political value that needs to be continually reinforced. In a multi-cultural, multi-religious society such as Singapore, it is taken for granted. Secularism is so much a part of the substratum of politics here that one does not even consider the dangers of a non-secular theological state. One cannot be overly complacent about unholy alliance between the church and the state. Such alliances have never been spiritually fruitful and have always been instrumental in facilitating some form of tyranny or other... I was just reading some of the works of James Madison and came across the following. Its from an address by him to the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Virgia in 1785. Americans today are faced with the dangerous enchroachment of right wing religious groups into the political arena. This observation of James Madison from 221 years ago has not been proven wrong despite the passage of time. "What influence in fact have eccl...