Cropped Will Cardini artwork

August 17th, 2009

Road Trippin’: ‘Bu’rque

Filed under: Art Shows — Tags: , , , , — William Cardini @ 7:38 am

As I’ve mentioned, I was in Albuquerque this past week was to install a sculpture for Dispersal/Return, a curated show of Land Arts of the American West alumni at the University of New Mexico Art Museum. Albuquerque is a pretty weird place: as my friend Ryan Henel put it, the city is the Baltimore of the southwest. I gotta say, I dig both places. Fortunately the University Art Museum is across historic Route 66 from the Frontier, a five-roomed New Mexican cuisine emporium. I feasted on fat breakfast burritos stuffed with green chilis. Glade and I brought a jar of chilis and a bag of Albuquerque tortillas back and had breakfest burritos yesterday morning, mmm hmm. Anyway, here’s a shot of the installation of the Cryptostructure in progress:

The sculpture is a pedestal with two TVs and PVC pipe on top that’s all wrapped in a blue tarp. Here’s the animation that’s playing on the TVs:

I bought a red light to shine on the Cryptostructure so that it’ll look more like my installation at MASS (see my previous post on this subject) but I won’t know if the curators decide to use it unless I go to the reception, which will be on September 24th. I don’t know for sure if I’ll be able to make it, but my fellow Landartians Li’l Bunny Krunk and the Dirty Monke will be performing there and then hosting their variety show Sunday School at the Petting Zoo in Albuquerque that Sunday. If I go, I’ll be sure to document and then share with y’all.

August 15th, 2009

Froghead Hangover at Domy Books in Austin

We just got back from our road trip to Albuquerque, Santa Fe, and Marfa Friday nite. It was a blast, I’ve planned 29388729075230 blog posts about it but we’ll see how many I actually get to. Glade and I just went to the Domy Books here in Austin, she dropped off a bunch of new cards and I dropped off five copies of Froghead Hangover (reviews here, here, and here). They’re two dollars, get them while you can!

The show that’s up at Domy right now is called Libres y Lokas, I think my buddy Anthony Romero would really dig it if he was still in town. I also got a really well-made local book called Observations & Daily Life by Haley McMichael, Important Comics by Dina L. Kelberman, and books of really kewl drawz by Lisa Hanawalt and Deth P. Sun.

August 14th, 2009

Siddhartha Obama

Filed under: Inspiration — Tags: , , — William Cardini @ 1:14 pm

This digital print, Siddhartha Obama, is a still from Kenneth Tin-Kin Hung’s video In G.O.D. We Trust, in which Hung mythologizes Obama’s struggles by depicting our President as an avatar of the deities of seven world religions. What’s amazing about this video is how much meaning and iconography Hung packs in to each frame.

Thanks Jak.

August 11th, 2009

Dispersal/Return

This week I’m in Albuquerque installing a Cryptostructure in the University of New Mexico Art Museum for Dispersal/Return, an exhibition that’s part of the LAND/ART symposium.


A Cryptostructure, from my installation Cryptostructures of the Urscape at MASS gallery back in 12/2008.

A little history: back in the Fall of 2004, I participated in Land Arts of the American West, a study-abroad program that (at that time) was between the University of New Mexico and the University of Texas. It was a six-week journey through the Southwest where we investigated the various ways that humans use and respond to the extremes of the landscape and made art that engaged with what we learned. The program continues to create opportunities like this for its alumni. I’ll have some photos to share with y’all when I get back.

August 7th, 2009

Folk #4

Filed under: Comics Criticism — Tags: — William Cardini @ 8:23 pm

I just got Folk #4 in the mail today, courtesy of the source of sci-fi mini-comic greatness, Tyler Stafford. This is the third issue of Folk that I’ve read, and they just keep getting better and better! Stafford’s storylines harken back to old-school sci-fi pulp stories but the art and layouts are informed by a twenty-first century cartoon aesthetic. According to the intro, Stafford’s computer is “on the fritz” so this issue is 11 x 17 sheets folded in half (I guess he draws the pages 8.5 x 11?). The larger art looks good, maybe Stafford should continue to make his comics this big.

Here’s a page that encapsulates the concept of the issue:

That page also showcases one of the aspects of Stafford’s comics that I dig the most, the way he blends his borderless scenes together while keeping the flow between them highly readable.

This next page, though, shows the most interesting thing about this comic, the way that Stafford portrays the experience of feeling someone else’s dream on tape:

I highly recommend this comic and I’m going to keep buying everything that Stafford puts out. You can buy Folk #4 here.

August 5th, 2009

GCPM Website

Filed under: Admin — Tags: , — William Cardini @ 11:47 am

I just threw up a website for the Gold County Paper Mill last nite, go check it out:

August 3rd, 2009

Vincent Collins

Filed under: Inspiration — Tags: — William Cardini @ 10:44 pm

I’m trying to work on animations for my installation for Dispersal/Return, but I just can’t concentrate.

Rhizome fairly recently posted a Vincent Collins animation, Fantasy, which I finally got around to watching tonite.

It’s an extremely mesmerizing video, and it’s similar in structure (objects melting into one another) to what I’m working on, so I decided to scour the internet for more about Vincent Collins. I found his myspace, he’s doing CGI animations now. His about me is incredible, here’s a quote:

Computers were available, but they cost a million dollars and you need a roomful of scientists to operate them. I swear to God.
I went to a demonstration of one of these machines, but they knew I couldn’t afford to buy their crummy system, so they kind of ignored me.
There were a couple of guys there that were phony as hell. Both of them had “Calvin Klein” embroidered on their shirts, as if it was their own goddam name, or something. One guy was the kind of a phony that has to give himself room when he talks. He kept saying he would buy two or three of these systems right away. What a goddam phony.

I also came across It Depends on your Perspective from Sesame Street, which was also animated by Vincent Collins.

I hadn’t thought about that animation in years but when I saw it again I instantly remembered how much I’d loved it when I was a kid.