Randy Lee Cutler

It has been a long, beautiful summer with lots of gardening, reading, thinking and research. Now it is time to move from interior speculation outward into the world.

Focusing on the curatorial theme of Food, the eleventh annual Visualeyez, festival of performance art takes place from 15–21 September 2010 in the downtown core of Edmonton, Alberta. I will be performing a new work called Ask Me about Salt. Here is a short description of the piece.

Framed as an improvised walk, this performance highlights our complex relationship with salt. The piece begins with a drawing of the sodium chloride chemical structure (NaCl) on the sidewalk using common table salt. This is followed by interactions with the public initiated through taste tests of different kinds of edible salt. Through these savory comparisons, I hope to enter into discussions about the use of salt in food and its related health issues. Depending on the direction of the exchange I may also talk about the harvesting of salt in China 8,000 years ago, the salt caravans (Azalai) practiced by Tuareg traders in the Sahara desert or its long history of use in rituals of purification, magical protection, and blessings.

After another year of teaching, writing, thinking and making I find myself in the garden again where I am able to refresh and regenerate. Ideas for new projects and courses come easily here as I watch the peas shoots flower or nibble on some arugula. Repurposing Ralph Waldo Emerson famous quote ‘in nature is perpetual youth,’ I am inspired by the flora and fauna. Even the skunks are keeping at bay.

Only two moths ago in April, as the last papers were being graded and final assignments submitted I was transferring my pea seedlings from indoors trays into the freshly prepared soil.  The arugula seeds went straight in the ground and have now made their way on to my dinner plate these past few evenings. As I eat the fruits of my labor I reflect on the year that has past and anticipate the year to come.

To celebrate Tate Modern’s 10th anniversary, the gallery will host No Soul For Sale – A Festival of Independents. The festival brings together over 70 of the world’s independent art spaces, non-profit organizations and artists’ collectives, from Shanghai to Rio de Janeiro, to take over the Turbine Hall with an eclectic mix of cutting-edge arts events, performances, music and film on 14-16 May 2010.

Invited by co-curator Alissa Firth-Eagland to submit a video or work via pdf as part of the Western Front: London Bureau, here is a sample of my contribution. Making Metaphors is a 5 page pdf that includes photographs and recipes for making a basic metaphor as well as one for mixed metaphors.

Randy Lee Cutler Loose Metaphor 2010

I think I solved it, with a little help of course.

Back in April I posted something about Michael Lin’s A Modest Veil, a 6,000-square-foot, hand-painted mural installed on the north facade of the Vancouver Art Gallery which occludes much of the classical architecture, surely a sign of authority and power if there ever was one. I knew there was a link between this work and Asterix, the French comic books written by René Goscinny and illustrated by Albert Uderzo but I could not find any direct information about it. Well Bruce Grenville the curator of this work has filled in a piece of the puzzle.  An essay by Vivian Rehberg in the exhibition catalogue offers a small morsel outlining the relationship. It appears I was offered a rogue clue with the suggestion that the floral pattern in Lin’s work was borrowed directly from the Asterix comic. But this didnt keep me off the trail for too long.

There is a clear link by way of the title of Lin’s mural, A Modest Veil.  You see in addition to this decorative public art work, the artist has a related project at the gallery where staff working with the public were asked to wear a t-shirt that references the French source. Alongside an image of brightly colored drapery, “a neatly scripted phrase [in French] penned by the narrator tells us that the curtain has been intentionally placed there to screen our eyes from a scene of excessive violence: Let us cast a modest veil over this deplorable and most unusual scene of violence.” So the title of the mural is drawn from an English translation of this phrase.

A modest veil screens both the explicit violence in the comic and the neoclassical facade of the Vancouver Art Gallery. Doubling the meaning, this gesture on the outside of the building has created an intriguing backdrop for the festivals, celebrations, demonstrations, vigils, etc. that are performed on this site. Instead of simply shielding the historical architecture, the modest veil also frames the often unconventional activities that are also staged in front of it.

I am scheduled to give a talk at the Vancouver Art Gallery On April 23 for their exhibition Visceral Bodies. I am quite excited about this. In fact my awareness of this show inspired me to design an Modern Art History course at ECU called Metaphorical Bodies. I have wanted to teach a class on metaphor for a while and this wants an excellent opportunity. I did inform my students on the first day that the title of the course might not fully capture the curriculum and that we would have to revisit it at the end of the course. At this point we have considered the general properties of metaphor, the operative trope of digestion in my own research, allegory, the visceral eye and the oral logics of the museum. This week we will be examining figurations as a framing metaphor in the work of Rosi Braidotti, Donna Haraway and of course visual examples in modern and contemporary art. Next week is our final reading and theme which looks at cannibalism and psychoanalytic identification.

I was hoping for the class to visit the exhibition at the VAG sooner rather than later but the Olympics made a journey to the gallery prohibitive. We will be checking out the show at the end of the month when things have settled down a bit in the city. Below are some examples of figurations of bodily (and visceral) forms.

Frida Kahlo The Little Deer 1946

Zhang Huan My New York 2002

(left, Michael Lin A Modest Veil 2010)

1. A friend told me something interesting about this public  artwork.  She said that the title of Michael Lin’s 6,000-square-foot, hand-painted mural, A Modest Veil is a reference to Asterix , a series of French comic books written by René Goscinny and illustrated by Albert Uderzo. According to her telling instead of visualizing a violent scene in a story the books would show a page with the same pattern as Lin’s mural. Goscinny would call this ruse ‘a modest veil.’ As hard as I try I can find no information coupling Lin’s work to the Asterix comics whether through the same imagery or the phrase ‘a modest veil’. And the Vancouver Art Gallery’s website only celebrates Lin’s use of patterns based on traditional Taiwanese textiles. Perhaps the idea of concealment in the Asterix series is doubled and therefore hidden in this art work where the floral motif/modest veil becomes a shroud for what can not or should not be represented.

While it sounds like apocrypha the telling may be instructive. What is particularly interesting in light of the city’s current festivities is that my friend  recounted this to me on the evening of February 12, after returning from demonstrating along with approximately 4,000 other people who assembled in front of Lin’s veil to protest the Vancouver Winter Olympics and poverty in the city. Here the mostly peaceful protesters gathered against the curtain of brightly colored Taiwanese designs and, perhaps, a visual metaphor for the unrepresentable.

(Click on this image and you can read the text on this protest banner which was a different event from the demonstration described above.)

2. The second strange thing is the news that a Sami (indigenous) shaman in Norway has suggested aboriginal people in B.C. might have cast an evil spell on the Nordic country’s Olympic athletes because of their opposition to Norwegian-owned fish farming operations in B.C.! Norwegian media have noted that several B.C. chiefs did stage a 29-hour hunger strike this week to protest the 29 Norwegian-owned fish farms in the Musgamagw Tsawataineuk Tribal Council’s territories, located in an Archipelago north of Vancouver. One of the hunger strikers Chief Bob Chamberlin has said, “If I did possess such a power, I don’t think I would be directing it at the Norwegian national sportsmen. I think I would direct it towards the fish farms.” Certainly a better and more efficient use of local magic. Perhaps a savvy journalist should interview Sumi the shapeshifting Olympic mascot to get the hidden scoop on this news item.

Downtown (above), Chinatown (below)

Spring has sprung, the grass is growing, the birds are in the air…

Strange Days in Vancouver, BC.

The world has descended upon us and while it appears to be superficially pretty, it really isn’t pretty at all. The city is under siege by the temporary autonomous zone of the IOC, VANOC and the corporate elite who drive through our barricaded streets on roads  reserved just for them. Meanwhile my regular bike route, along False Creek and past the Olympic Village, is now forbidden to all regular commuters for two months.  Terminal city has come down with a fever. Fans, local and visitors alike, happily walk through rainy streets and shop for mementos; official hockey sticks, red polyester mittens, commemorative pins and of course the trio of mascots Miga, Sumi and Quatchi.

Even as 1 billion is being spent on security, 300 million on the opening ceremonies and 120 million on the Whistler Nordic centre to name a few of the higher price tags,  $130,000 has been cut from sports programs and $110 million in facility grants, which are used for the physical upkeep of schools. It doesn’t make sense. City Hall recently has sent letters to 800 teachers warning of possible layoffs in May as the district tries to balance its 2010-11 budget. And of course there are the cuts to Arts funding in the province something like 85% – 92% through 2012.

As I write, I hear helicopters circling the city perhaps looking for rogues protesters, mapping crowds or simply enjoying the view from above and wonder whether we have lost the plot. Locally, Nationally, Globally. Don’t get me wrong. I am proud to be Canadian and generally happy here in lotus land. But the newly sprouting daffodils and irises portend something more eerie than an early west coast spring. A surreal quality wafts through the air bringing with it dancing sasquatch, snowsurfing sea bears and shapshifting thunderbirds.

CODE Dialogues – A one day symposium on the role of digital practices
Feb 6, 2010,  10:30- 7:00 PM
Emily Carr University
1399 Johnston Street
Vancouver BC

CODE Dialogues is part of a larger series of events that include exhibitions at Emily Carr University’s two campuses (Granville Island and Great Northern Way).  On Saturday February 6, 2010  from 5:30-7:00 PM I will be a moderating a panel called Organic Technologies. The speakers/artists include: Anais met det Ancxt, Joanna Berzowska, Galen Scorer, Jer Thorpe and Brendan Wypich

Learning from Vancouver – Exhibition and Symposium
The Western Front, 303 East 8th Avenue, Vancouver, BC

Learning from Vancouver includes an exhibition by Bik Van der Pol and a live conversation about Vancouver and its image. On Sunday January 31 I will be a respondent on the panel with Urban subjects, Am Johal + Fiona Jeffries. This keynote presentation is at 2:00 PM. My response is at 3:30 PM.