so maybe i have a little chip on my shoulder when it comes to « institutions » that i deem as being « snobby. » i have never even entered the premises of the dhc/art foundation, and yet i KNOW it is one of « those » places. therefore, i was prepared and yes, expecting, today’s talk to be a kind of promotional thing,…look how wonderful we are, etc. etc. also i thought the talk would start on time because, obviously this sarah watson person was being paid to talk and well, her time is more important than the artists who have talked and waited patiently for the latecomers to get settled.

so yeah, i arrived late and because i knew i was going to be late i rode my bike like a maniac, and it was hot and muggy today, so i was hot and sweaty when i puffed into the room. and uh… sarah waited while i cooled down and got settled before starting.

dum dee dum dee…guess i was wrong about the « her time is more important thing… »

and then she began to talk. and she was talking about an artist who has greatly influenced my own practice and who…i kinda have an art crush on. like, basically, i think tehching hsieh is great. but you know what? so does she. in an honest and respectful way. sarah talked about her first experience of tehching from when she was in her twenties…and how he is the artist who keeps circling back into her thoughts. and how she has tried for five years to bring him here.

if you were an artist, you would want a curator like sarah watson. someone who knows your work inside out, and yet still doesn’t tell all, leaving plenty of room for you (the artist) to tell your tale when you give your artist talk: which will be at the dhc/art foundation on the 22 of october. check out their web for more details: www.dhc-art.org

but also, sarah watson is gracious. a gracious person who invites the audience’s thoughts and insights and questions. and she knows how to make you feel that what you said added something to the conversation (probably even if she could have said it better herself.)

so i learned a few things. number one revelation was that tehching was a person who obsessively documented his work. i had the notion he was doing his work in the moment and the only trace was one photo and his statement. period. wrong. more like one photo for every day…and he preserved his photos and his work, even managing to hang on to the « cage » he constructed for his one year of living in it. so it does look like tehching thought about the future when he was doing his actions in the present. hmmm. i will have to adjust my perception of his work now. because for me the document always presupposes a future audience. and if you say your work is about the present moment, about being in the present, then to me you can’t photograph or document it obsessively or else you are already thinking about the future.

probably projecting my own take on his work and now, sigh, i have to incorporate more of the artists vision. but i think i will still think he is great…