Art News

Hirst hopes to revolutionise art market with ‘Golden Calf’ - News, Art & Architecture - The Independent

a collection of previously unseen work by Damien Hirst that will be auctioned off this summer in a move that could revolutionise the sale of contemporary art.

A living artist has never before put a collection of brand new work straight on to the open market. Such pieces are usually sold through galleries and art dealers, usually to buyers who are known to them.

This method gives more control to the artist and opens up the sale to a much wider group of prospective buyers. Yesterday, art experts were predicting that the auction – the highlight of which is the gold calf, Hirst’s largest ever formaldehyde work – could mark a turning point in the way artists sell their work. Indeed, Hirst himself hinted that “the world’s changing – ultimately I need to see where this road leads”, adding that such an auction “[felt] like a natural evolution for contemporary art”.

GAAA! 12 million pounds to a single artist…how does Hirst get that market up so high? A true artrockstar, oh how I want to play these games…How about the goal of making the worlds most expensive piece of art…100 million dollars for the platinum skull covered in diamonds? Is it the fact that it’s produced by Hirst, the fact that it’s got material (diamonds and platinum) worth, or branding and marketing, a status symbol to own the most expensive and luxurious object…or is it as Tom Marioni has defined the artist as an individual “getting away with something”?

This is a quick once-around of “The Fantastic Solution to Global Warming and Other Conundrums” at Icthus Gallery in San Francisco. Thanks to Mark for the video.
The Fantastic Solution to Global Warming and Other Conundrums - Pete Ippel from Hypermodern - Pete Ippel on Vimeo.

The show is open until May 31st, 2008 so if you’re in the city, come by between 10am and 5pm weekdays. Or you can email me at pete @ hypermodern.net and schedule a special showing

I have been moving forward with my show installation bit by bit, and have been working on being diligent with my time while still having time to decompress and relax. Thank you for respecting my need to focus on myself a bit during this potentially stressful period.

I have keeping an old Chinese saying in mind, as excerpted from the Gold Mountain Monastery newsletter based here in San Francisco.

“I make my own destiny and seek my own fortune; fortune and misfortune are not predetermined but acquired by my own actions.”

The newsletter continues…

If we want to stop being muddled and attain understanding, we must first do our best to get rid of our bad habits and faults, for only then can our wisdom shine forth…

This day is already done,
And our lives are that much less.
We’re like a fish in an ever-shrinking pond.
What joy is there in this?
Great assembly!
We should be diligent and vigorous,
As if our own lives were at stake.
Only be mindful of impermanence,
And be careful not to be lax.

Moving forward, I do feel as though my artistic life is at stake at the moment, and I’m investing all my resources to make sure when the opening comes, I’m ready. Procrastination is a fault that I’m growing out of as I have more experience.

I’ve been handing out cards, getting photos ready, and making plans. I also just got a fortune cookie: “You believe in the goodness of mankind”. I do, and I’m excited to share in the joy more each day.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

“The Fantastic Solution to Global Warming and Other Conundrums” An art show by Pete Ippel
May 16-31, 2008
Opening Reception: Friday, May 16, 6-9 p.m. with DJ music and indoor-jumping photo souvenirs for guests. EDITORS: You, your reporters and photographers are welcome to cover the event.

Icthus Gallery
1769 15th Street (between Valencia and Guerrero), San Francisco, CA
Gallery hours, weekdays, 10 a.m. - 5 p.m.; weekends, by appointment
Admission, Free

View Larger Map

For more information, contact, Pete Ippel, artist
Phone, (415) 425-8863
E-mail, pete at hypermodern.net
Web site, http://www.hypermodern.net/archives/fsgw/

“The Fantastic Solution to Global Warming”, 40 x 60 inches (101 x 152 cm), gouache, ink, pencil, and watercolor on paper

SAN FRANCISCO, Monday, April 28, 2008 - The Fantastic Solution to Global Warming and other Conundrums is an exhibition of new artwork by San Francisco based artist and athlete Pete Ippel. In this collection of drawings, photographic prints, and videos he explores themes ranging from nuclear waste processing to the pairing of art and sport.

In Ippel’s brightly rendered, fantastical 2-D world, a box of lightning, some incandescent light bulbs, and a gigantic, biological-organic turbine are coupled with wind, tide, hydroelectric, nuclear, volcanic, solar, and geothermal power sources to sequester carbon dioxide. Under intense heat and pressure, in a star-powered fusion-cooker, diamonds are produced, thus solving the dilemmas of green house gases, vacant mines, and human rights issues associated with diamond mining.

The exhibition also highlights artifacts, photographic prints, and video informed by Ippel’s work as an athlete and a coach. After completing a successful collegiate track and field career as a high jumper in New York, Ippel made the move to San Francisco to pursue a Masters of Fine Art in the New Genres Department of the San Francisco Art institute.

It was here in the Bay Area, inspired by local artists Tony Labat and Tom Marioni, where Ippel began to craft projects that married his passion for jumping to his artistic practice.

“When I saw that Tony had devoted a year of his life to boxing, and Tom was drinking beer with friends in the name of art while making movement based drawing and prints I felt empowered,” said Ippel. “And I’ve been fortunate to spend time with both of them here in San Francisco. I really respect their work,” Ippel added.

“The Jump Series” grows out of the tradition of New Genres where actions are performed for the camera. The body of work is based on the premise that to push of one’s self off any surface and into the air by using the muscles in one’s legs and feet is a glorious and enjoyable act; essentially human flight. The modes of lift-off on display include skateboarding, high jumping, jumping off of architecture, leaping into panoramic scenes, jumping over objects, and choreographed jumps with other individuals. Ippel utilizes a tripod and a remote control or the camera’s self-timer to execute this body of performative photographs.

TSP Athletics, also on display, is a competitive vertical jumps team, social club, and acts as a collaborative vehicle to generate images of athletes in flight. It blurs boundaries between art and sport while acting as a vehicle to temper the shock of moving away from traditional competitive athletics.

“When you have something obscure like the high jump that has been your top priority for so many years, it’s foreign when it’s gone,” says Ippel. “Because I went directly to SFAI from Cornell, it was quite a challenge to no longer have the support of my team, nor be able to celebrate my athletic gifts in competition. I went through a real period of grief.” Ippel satiated his needs by creating a one-person team and traveling alone to meets a few times a year. “I made a uniform, started a website, and I kept in touch with my jumping peers. When I was at the meets after being away for so long, I started to see the beauty of the action and the camaraderie and wanted to capture it, and still keep it active in my life.”

The project has developed as an answer to what collegiate athletes do upon graduation to keep in touch, keep jumping, and make art.

Since its inception in 2004, TSP Athletics has grown to include former NCAA qualifiers and university record holders. Ippel’s plan is to produce limited-edition prints with participation by distinguished jumpers who are invited to be athletes-in-residence for TSP. In the frame of social sculpture these artists/athletes will each, contribute to the TSP Archive to add to its expanding collection of images and memorabilia.

ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Pete Ippel was born in Oak Park, Illinois, USA and has been surrounded by the arts since birth. He moved to Morris, Illinois in 1989 and started to participate in athletics rather than dance. After high school, Pete attended Cornell University where he earned a BA in psychology and a BFA in photo / digital art making. He continued to follow his sporting dreams in the high jump, which culminated in a school record leap of 7 feet 1/2 inch in 2001. In May 2004 he attained an MFA degree in the New Genres department of the San Francisco Art Institute. Presently Pete is a practicing artist whose work is in numerous private collections. He’s also the residence manager for the San Francisco Ballet, a fitness professional, coaches basketball and track at University High School, and still high jumps from time to time.

There is so much potential in the Casio Exilim EX-F1 for those interest in capturing athletic events, nature, and performance. Indeed it is a revolutionary camera, in that it doesn’t tout it’s mega-pixels but is a paradigm shift in camera features with a blazing frame rate.

A Camera for the Shot You Missed - New York Times

Pete Ippel utilizes a box of lightening, a gigantic biological-organic turbine, wind, tide, hydroelectric, nuclear, volcanic, solar, and geothermic power to sequester carbon dioxide and produce diamonds, thus solving the dilemma with the green house gas, carbon dioxide, vacant coal mines, and the problems with blood diamonds in Africa.

Materials: gouache, ink, pencil, watercolor
Dimensions: 40 x 60 inches (101 x 152 cm)

Pete_Ipp.jpg

Originally uploaded by hypermodern

Almost finished with The Fantastic Solution To Global Warming.

Today I was called by Dan Lauckner from C·T·V Southwestern Ontario, he found Obay.info and used the Whois database to get my contact information just like Jakub. There is a potential that he may call back Monday for more information.

I also received comments from the author of the blog “And She Knits Too”. She has a couple of posts one about the posters with images of the little girl.

She also reports that there is a phone number to call now 1-888-YOU-OBAY. In the comments of “And She Knits Too” there are a bunch of great theories about drug companies and propaganda and how drug laws are different there than in the USA.

Presently, I don’t know who made these signs.

The text on the sign reads:

My son used to have his own hopes and aspirations. Now he has mine. Thanks Obay!

The text on the bottle reads:

If they can’t see it your way, it’s time for Obay.

My interest is piqued, as I have received two emails asking about Obay Pills, the first on February 12, 2008 from a Canadian named Jakub which included the above photo. The second on February 13, was from a Toronto journalist named David Silverberg who wants an interview. I have already responded to both inquiries and am anticipating a response.

I have now done a few web searches, since then and there’s a lot of buzz about the project at Yahoo Answers and Above Top Secret.

I have endeavored to send an answer to the Yahoo Answers group, but because the question is over 5 days old it no longer is accepting direct posts. The question is still listed as “undecided”, and I have sent my answer to the customer service folks at Yahoo. Hopefully they will post my reply as listed below:

I interpret the bus stop poster “culture jam” presently in Canada as a parody ad campaign which critiques adults and calls for more active parenting. By using a pun, Obay and it’s relationship to obey a direct command, the group responsible wishes to show how drugs are no substitution for “present” adults responsible for child rearing. In addition the Obay Pills bring to mind how overly zealous parents can map their wishes onto the lives of their children, especially when they are making the medical decisions for their offspring. The ad seems to be in response to the drugging of youth and the increase in diagnosis of ADHD. Regarding who would fund such a campaign, I look to the ongoing war between the Church of Scientology and Psychiatry professionals, and will be interested to note who funded the campaign.

The project for which I am responsible: Obay “The Commodiphile’s online Marketplace” http://obay.info also comments on mental states and is the top Google hit and likely where people are getting the false notion that I created the Obay Pills Campaign. The following is the explanation of my intent with http://obay.info and a brief time line:

For certain individuals Ebay has become a lifestyle, an extreme use of the service where people are a slave to their auctions, so dependent on checking up that it interferes with daily functioning. According the DSM-IV, the manual for diagnosing psychological disorders, this would be a criterion for a type of obsessive-compulsive behavior. Commodiphilia, diagnosed as assigning value to valueless objects in the off chance that it may be worth something to another disparate individual, is an artist coined term that references both the commodity, and the sexual perversion of pedophilia. Obay.info critiques the mega-consumerist culture that surrounds Ebay, and is both a visual pun and a cautionary piece that succeeds when the user questions why they are so involved with buying and selling of the most mundane possessions.

October 2002, http://obay.info made live on Internet

May 2004 Artist talk and exhibition catalog “Buy Sell or Buy” at Pace University, New York, curated by Jillian Mcdonald

November 22, 2006 contacted by Intellectual Property Counsel
eBay Inc. to disable links and disclaim affiliation between Obay and eBay

December 2006 changes instituted to the satisfaction of Counsel.

January 2008 discovered citation to the artist coined term “commodophilia” [sic] in an exhibition catalog of artist residencies (Nicky Bird) Stills Edinburgh 2004 written by Iliyana Nedkova. http://www.stills.org/

Febuary 12, 2008 contacted by a curious Canadian about Obay.info’s affiliation with Obay pill posters.

February 12, 2008 web search provides multiple sightings in Canada of Obay pill posters. Postings on Yahoo answers and Above Top Secret

February 13, 2008 contacted by Toronto journalist David Silverberg through http://hypermodern.net asking if I am affiliated with Obay posters in Canada.

February 13, 2008 responded to curious Canadian and David Silverberg with the creator of obay.info Pete Ippel’s analysis of the Obay pill campaign. Also submitted answer to Yahoo Answers through their online help page, as the question was still “undecided” after 5 days yet closed to more answers.

I hope this clears up any questions you may have please contact me if you have any more.

Best wishes,
Pete Ippel
Artist and creator of Obay.info

Fun in the Sun: A mini Aqua musical inspired by Esther Williams and Bert Kaempfert from Hypermodern - Pete Ippel on Vimeo.
Directed by Pete Ippel http://www.hypermodern.net

Dancers: Leta Biasucci, Rebecca Rhodes Eline Malegue, Mitch Gill, Graham Maverick, and James Shee

Filmed by Nans Pierson

Music by Bert Kaempfert and Mitt Gabler “L-O-V-E”

Performed Saturday, January 26th at 100 Performances for the Hole (Notes Going Up and Down) for the Garage Biennale http://www.garagebiennale.com

I just was looking through the Audubon Magazine and was happy to find some images that really intrigued me. Clean graphic style, and lovely subject matter…Read more of the Audubon article about Charley Harper.

Frank Robinson is the director of the Johnson Museum of art at Cornell University, and recently when asked by Beth Saulnier “What is art?” he replied

…Art is about everything - love, hatred, sex, envy , generosity. It’s about God, about the lack of God. As you live, things just flow by; at the end of the day you’ve had 1000 experiences and not really appreciated any one of them. An artist stops and makes you appreciate life disappearing.

This was excerpted from the May / June issue of Cornell University Alumni Magazine.

This weekend was a memorable one, not only did I meet to help decide the future of SFAI, but I went to Sonoma county and learned how whine is made. I documented it with 35mm film, as well as my own memory. I really like the way the country looks up that way. Such a different feel than to here. I got to see some leaves change, and had a fire for the first time in a long time.

Thanks to Eric, Page, Paul and Kevin for a wonderful trip.

Free Memory II was a success, and went a lot faster this time, only 23 minutes. I am still looking for a job, and it’s getting really scary, because I don’t know if I’m going to make rent this month. I have to do a lot of searching for funds before Friday. Open studios was well attended I think, however, since I’m not a painter, I felt a bit out of place. Perhaps if I get my film developed and make some more big prints I’ll be ok. My work is strong, but I am not sure how many people actually looked at it at the open studios. I gave away some stickers, so maybe they looked at home.

Feels like network art is the wave of the future, but I need funds now.

mmmmm

Well, another Friday lecture down the tubes, I wonder if it’s a prerequisite to be an awful speaker if you’re being a visiting lecture. Tonight she was yawning to her own slides, AND THEY’RE HER SLIDES! It’s a damn good thing I’m becoming an artist, because I want to create change when I come back to SFAI, people will have fun, and the lecture is going to be SHORT, because I don’t want to waste grad student’s time.

In other news open studios is tomorrow, and I’m stoked.

In other, other news, I want to high jump so bad I can taste it, and I finally have a goal, I want to compete in the State Games of America in CT this summer. I’ve got a long way to go, as I’m a bit soft right now.

Gotta tone down the skating too, my left hip is getting funky from skating 6 miles a day to and from the studios…skate to stay young.

So I went to San Francisco Art Institute (from this point on SFAI) to see ANYA GALLACCIO talk. Finally something that didn’t suck. The last few speakers I’ve seen makes me wonder what I’m paying for and question why I didn’t stay home to pick the toe jam from under my nails. I have to say that she was at least a dynamic speaker. Her art…well, I’d say one thing, I’m not so much an art criticbut more of an art Cynic. Bottom line is, I have respect for her presence and her persona. That’s what’s selling her work (and most artists for that matter) dispite what she says about wanting to have an attachment to her viewer and place. She was from London at the right time, and rode the same conceptual train as Damien Hirst and the rest of those folks on the other side of the pond. I want to get that gig, having larger than life “art status” and work that is enjoyable. I just want to break even, set my own schedule, and be present for my kids and wife when I have ‘em. That’s what art is about for me, “artrockstardom” (a term I coined at my last year at Cornell University. Living it is doing it, and doing it now.