24 Jun 06 by roberta fallon
roberta fallon artworks
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signing books in Philadelphia. They'd just given a talk about their projects at a conference on the creative economy. I write about art and the camera has become a major tool for me as a writer and artist.
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25 Jun 06 05:00
hi john-paul, thanks for the comment. yes it was the smithson floating island pix you saw. we loved it and we love to go with out cameras and then share about what we've seen and about what we think of course. christo and jeanne-claude are indeed great at marketing their works...and that is why tthey were asked to speak. but they're also great showmen and tell amazing stories about their process--which sometimes goes on for 20 years--while they talk with committees and get the needed approvals at all levels of government. they said they have no sponsors in the business sense. they take out loans from the bank, use their own money and sell Christo's drawiings to make the millions they need to do things like the gates and their wrappings. the conference on the creative economy, which libby and i spoke at, on a panel about technological innovation, was not that interesting to me otherwise. cheers!
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25 Jun 06 05:00
Hello Roberta... many thanks for posting on Art Process. I know you're in no need of yet another forum to participate on, so I do appreciate you're helping us out here.
A couple of things came to mind on reading your comment. I seem to remember reading a piece by you (or Libby) on Artblog where you were describing a show in NY, and an artist (was it Smithson?) had built a crazy artificial island and it was being towed around in the water by a tug in front of Manhatten. I found photos you made on the spot so fresh, almost taking you by surprise and a welcome rendition of that artist's great action.
Secondly, many (many) years ago at the National College of Art and Design in Dublin where I studied, I attended a lecture given by Christo and Jeanne-Claude. The overwhelming impression I took away then was the genius for marketing, a business approach to leveraging multinational financial sponsorship unparalleled by any other artist.
Is that what they call the "creative economy" in your reference? What was your impression of the conference?
Sarah Sze Looking
photo of a man looking at a new Public Art Fund piece by Sarah Sze in Central Park, New York. Sze, who works with ephemeral materials like toothpicks, cotton balls and c-clamps it all together found a way to sink her work beneath the ground encased in an armature that looks like the corner of a building that's been sunk into the ground. Marvelous. One of my very favorite things is to photograph people looking at art. To me it refreshes my hope that art is indeed meaningful to people at a time when many things are just curiosities.