Okay, it’s time: we need more celebrities, stars, creatives, content creators, athletes, entertainers, museum directors, gallerists, artists (although many of you are involved) to start speaking out. What are you doing here? Have you not noticed ICE terrorizing the cities you live and work in? Are you not paying attention to Venezuela, Iran, Palestine, Syria, the USA, Greenland, civil liberties, women’s rights, property rights, AI, job markets, inflation, the loss of arts funding, the takeover of cultural institutions… but don’t worry, we wore pins at the Golden Globes. Where is Chalamet, Swift, Beyonce (and I love her, but c’mon, we need you), Leonardo, Emma Stone, Gracie Abrams, a Kardashian, a social media influencer that you undoubtedly follow who tries on 10 pairs of jeans from Reformation or some shit in one Reel while quickly editing the shots of them in their underwear so you catch a glimpse and stay tuned in… the Golden Globes had those moments of biting the hand of Bari Weiss’ universe whilst wearing Dior on her network and giving Paramount + some extra cash to empower their censorship goals. It didn’t feel like a revolution. It’s a resignation.
I don’t know, I’m listing off people who actually haven’t said anything of meaning on the state of the world while simultaneously taking up a lot of fucking space in the world. How can you not… like to say something. But your ass is on the line a little. You have billions, what happens if you say some real shit about politics (not artistic metaphors, but some real shit) and say, you know, “Fuck ICE.”? What happens? You lose a few million? One less Malibu mansion for Chris Martin? It is absolutely a volatile time, and the loudest people are Massive Attack (bless them), Ed O’Brien from Radiohead (waiting on his bandmates to catch on) and Kneecap. Emma Watson said some small little thing in support of gender rights and got shat on by the Harry Potter demon. But it was at least something. We got Magid Eye saying more than celebrities, and he seems out of breath saying it on his pondering walks. What is going on?
I think we need to ask and demand more of the privileged artist class. I think we don’t need a Taylor Swift wedding list and planning mood boards right now. She should know better. Escapism is one thing, but when escapism becomes the opiate of the masses like the soma’s in Brave New World, we need to reconsider what it is we are committing our time to. The Golden Globes, not that I put a lot at stake watching movie stars in tuxedos and gowns, was just a banal tragedy, even with the biggest film of the year, One Battle After Another, sort of hitting the nail on the head at the moment. But you wouldn’t really hear or see a celebrity really stick their neck out and fucking make a call to arms. A little pin on your lapel isn’t going to do it. Sorry, grow a pair. Risk something. Please.
The art world… I do see artists trying to engage, trying to show some vigor and anger toward the state of the world, and there has been some absolutely powerful works and sharing by what I could say is mostly my graffiti follows on social media. Icy & Sot, Patrick Martinez, to name a few. But the show that just has been an absolute brilliant addition to the cultural pantheon and lexicon of protest and understanding art and history, has to be Monuments at MOCA in Los Angeles. Co-organized by MOCA and The Brick, and co-curated by Hamza Walker, Bennett Simpson, Kara Walker and others, Monuments not only looks at the ways public monuments shape national identity and memory, but what happens when those identities and memories are honoring those who enforced and empowered the enslavement of others?
And it's a sparse show, letting you walk around, consider, feel the immensity of history in front of you. With contemporary artists creating work in response to these Confederate sculptures that once stood in public spaces of the south for 100 years or more, you get this almost echoing of creative contrasts in each room. Here are these bronze behemoths, carefully crafted by artists in their time, and you have to think and understand that this is what an artist was commissioned and obliged to make: honoring people and moments that championed and participated in heinous acts, but also works that literally seemed to have stood the test of time as a reminder of what alternate histories could have looked like had the south won.
And you start to wonder how much of public monument making is about alternate histories. What place in town squares, around universities, in public parks, these (mostly white) men and what sort of past they come to represent and how much in the moment they were made were they intended to hold some other truth? It’s a blisteringly brutal experience in MOCA, because you are confronted by the actual sculptures and monuments that once rose in public spaces. The show brings together a moment of history that bleeds into the contemporary moment. It’s confronting, it’s telling a story, it’s putting its fucking ass on the line for us to understand the past and where we come from and how much the losers have told the winning story.
I left the show thinking… this. We need more of this. This is risky. This is powerful. Can others please follow? And I can’t wait to see Bad Bunny at the Super Bowl, by the way… maybe fireworks will come…
And thus begins a little 3 Dot mid-month breakdown of other shows to consider… I have been asking friends if they have seen the Peter Doig show at the Serpentine in Hyde Park, so someone please give me a shout on that one… obviously you know my feelings on the Eggleston show at Zwirner… a few people have told me the Cato show at Saatchi Yates in London is a banger, and I love his works and wish to have seen it… we wrote about Nieves Gonzalez at T292 in Rome, and I love this direction for the Spanish artist, really blending history and uber-contemporary in the works… some of those Nicolas Party works at Karma look really strong, including the massive pile of dead fish…
I will say this… a lot of people will be talking about the Sayre Gomez show at David Kordansky that opens this week… the recreation model he made of downtown LA’s massive graffiti tower looks magnificent… also, Glenn Hardy Jr at Charlie James, along with Israel Campos, are strong showing to start the year from the Chinatown gallery… Farley Aguilar at Night Gallery, another strong showing… and what is going to really get the critical attention will be Amoako Boafo’s I Bring Home with Me at Roberts Projects… we have a very busy weekend ahead…
FOG Art Fair in San Francisco is coming next week, where The Unibrow will be featuring a series of spray-painted covers of Issue 01 by cover artist Barry McGee, sold exclusively at the Park Life shop in the fair… a little token of our gratitude to the city that started us all…
Text by Evan Pricco
