Mia Zapata, lead singer of The Gits

The Gits were a Seattle punk band led by the raw, blues-fueled voice of its lead singer Mia Zapata.  The band formed at Antioch College in Ohio where Zapata famously jumped on a table during a party and launched into Bessie Smith covers.  It's relayed as one of those college moments where,  if you were there, drunk or sober, you've never forgotten it. The Gits soon moved to Seattle where they found underground fame, a community of fellow punk rockers (like the girl band 7 Year Bitch) and became part of a Seattle scene garnering lots of media attention because of its burgeoning grunge scene.

The Gits found their loyal following and after two album releases and a planned North American tour, they were poised to make it big.  Atlantic Records was ready to sign them.  But on July 7, 1993, Mia Zapata left The Comet Tavern where she'd been hanging out with friends and while on her walk home, she was attacked.  Hours later, Zapata's body was found.  She'd been beaten, raped and murdered.  The tragedy struck the Seattle scene hard and mourners lined up for blocks at her wake.

A new documentary called The Gits will be screened Wednesday night at The Whistle Stop bar in South Park as a fundraiser for the San Diego Women's Film Festival.  The story is so tragic, but so much of the film charts the band's formation and rise that it doesn't feel like a downer.  There's a lot of concert footage, some rougher than others, but I kind of like the grainy, jumpy video.  It's well-matched to the grungy dive bars The Gits played in and to their punk sensibility.  Zapata is amazing to watch, if mostly because of her incredible voice.  She sounds like Lucinda Williams, if Williams left her guitar behind and just went balls out, punk-rock style.   The Gits screens at 9pm - The Whistle Stop is a good place to watch this kind of doc and all proceeds benefit the sixth year of the San Diego Women's Film Festival.  Oh, and Joan Jett and Kathleen Hanna of Bikini Kill are both in the film - they were big fans of The Gits.   This is one of those school night events that I like to recommend because it's unique in San Diego, the film and the venue are perfectly matched, and it's for a good cause. 

Three fried-egg sandwiches.

An omelet.

A bowl of grits.

Three slices of French toast.

Three chocolate chip pancakes.

Two cups of coffee.

Phelps burns 900-1100 calories per hour in a training session.

Breakfast of arts blogger:

Three cups of coffee.

Power bar.

Calories burned while blogging:  10-15, depending on topic.

San Diego has been the home to world renown artist Eleanor Antin for many years and now it's become a backdrop for her latest body of work.  A solo exhibtion at the San Diego Museum of Art titled Eleanor Antin:  Historical Takes, features over 50 large-scale tableaux photographs in which Antin reimagines and stages scenes from Roman and Greek history and mythology using contemporary actors and models.  Many of the photographs were shot in and around San Diego.  They are lavish, decadent scenes with Antin's wit and extensive research at play.  Take, for example, The Tourists (see below), a photograph in her Helen's Odyssey series.  On a rocky hillside (a recognizable southern California topography as a great stand-in), bloodied Trojan warriors lay scattered in the aftermath of battle. But amidst the savagry, a blonde and a brunette dressed in brightly colored dresses laugh and casually dismiss their surroundings. They carry straw handbags and wear modern sunglasses, perhaps headed to an afternoon of shopping after touring the carnage. In this work, as in many others in Historical Takes, Antin illustrates a corrupt society and the decline of civilization.  The slideshow below has more images from the exhibition.

Antin is a celebrated performance and installation artist, a filmmaker and a photographer.  Her extensive body of work has explored history, identity, gender, and her own Yiddish heritage.  Antin has often cast herself in various roles and narratives to explore her ideas.  She famously became Eleanora Antinova, a black ballerina in Sergei Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes, writing a fictional memoir for her ballerina persona and making numerous films starring Antinova.

Eleanor Antin:  Historical Takes will be on view at the San Diego Museum of Art through November 2nd.  Make sure to watch the multiple videos at the exhibit documenting the production of these photographs.  It's fascinating to watch what went into this body of work, with the shoots operating like a film set complete with Antin yelling "action" only to have her actors freeze in a tableaux.   

Best.Headline.Ever.  I wish it were mine but, alas, The Guardian gets all the fun.  An outdoor sculpture by American artist Paul McCarthy depicting house-size dog doo came loose from its moorings outside the Paul Klee Centre in Berne and proceeded to knock down power lines and break a window of a children's home.  Any child who happened to be in the room and saw giant inflatable dog poo crash through their window is likely traumatized and will either need years of therapy or become a provocative contemporary artist (or let's face it, both).  The work is titled "Complex Shit."

There is actually a San Diego connection here.  McCarthy is a sculptor and performance artist who lives in L.A., but in 1976 he performed a transgressive piece called Class Fool at UCSD.  He is also sometimes associated with Allen Kaprow, the late Happenings founder and Professor Emeritus in the Visual Arts Department at UCSD.  

The media is having fun with this story.  Another headline:  Paul McCarthy's Art is Complex Shit on the Runs. 

Shanghai. Photo by Dan Eckstein

I've got my sights set on China right now as I watch the Olympics every night.  I can't help but marvel at the venues, especially the aquatic center, otherwise known as the water cube.  This building is incredible, costing over $200 mil to build.   I've been searching around looking for more of a visual context to the Olympic venues and the images on television.  Documentary and fine arts photographer Dan Eckstein has a photographic essay on contemporary China that really fleshes things out.  Eckstein spent eight weeks there in 2006 documenting the changes happening throughout the vast country, from the cities to the rural villages.  His site is easy to navigate, allowing you to follow his journey by region, timeline, or topics.  In addition to his pictures, Eckstein writes short descriptions about many of photo sections, like this excerpt about bang bang workers:

Many of these migrant workers end up as part of what locals call the “Bang Bang Army”. This 100,000 plus army of laborers are identified by the bamboo poles (or bang bang in Chinese) that they use to carry heavy loads around the city. Due to the hilly topography of Chongqing, the bicycles used to transport goods in other Chinese cities have been abandoned and manual labor used instead. Bang bang workers are hired by everyone from business owners to tourists to move all sorts of goods from ships at the port into town or around the city. For their efforts a bang bang man will make an average of 20 Yuan ($2.50) for working a 12 hour day.

Bang Bang worker in Chongqing, Western China. Photo by Dan Eckstein

Another episode of the 4x4 Performance Series takes place Tuesday night at Bluefoot Bar and Lounge in South Park.  The series is simple but inspired.  Artists of all kinds have ten minutes on a 4 foot by 4 foot stage to perform an original work.  I've seen dancers creatively maximize every inch of that tiny stage, but actors, musicians, poets and writers are all invited to work within its limits.  Tomorrow night's performance has a gender bent:  it's all about the ladies! 

San Diego writer and columnist Aaryn Belfer

A mix of female artists --  dancers, a performance artist, and a singer-songwriter -- will perform for what is sure to be a packed crowd.   Also slated to saunter her way onto 4x4 is local writer and columnist for San Diego City Beat, Aaryn Belfer.  Full disclosure: Aaryn is a good friend.  But even if she wasn't my friend, I'd recommend that you go see her read.  She's fearless and funny and she's going to recount for the crowd one of those experiences that rarely emerges in mixed company.  Frankly, even in a gathering of the fairer sex, a story like this usually requires a liberal cocktail injection.  Not so for Aaryn, though I highly recommend it for the rest of you.  You'll laugh and wince and laugh some more.  See you there at 8pm.

Filmmaker Errol Morris has a fantastic website full of all kinds of good stuff.  While roaming around, I found this short.  Morris was asked to create an opening film for the 2002 Academy Awards to replace the host-driven dance number that normally kicks off the show.  Morris talked with close to 100 politicians, writers, artists and celebrities about movies -- their favorites and why, what they get from movies, etc.  He used his now famous interviewing method, which has him sitting out of sight in a curtained booth while his subject sits directly in front of the camera.  Morris calls this camera the "interrotron."  It has a screen displaying Morris and that's how he asks his follow-up questions and directs his subjects.   You can hear Morris asking questions in a lot of his films, and you can in this short as well.  He kind of barks his questions, and it's great to hear this passionate voice coming out of nowhere.  I wonder if the yelling, barking voice is just Morris' personality or an effect of being seperated from his subjects (you know, the same effect that causes some people to talk really loudly on a cell phone).  Anyway, this short features the late Susan Sontag, Laura Bush, Iggy Pop and Laurie Anderson, among others (when do you ever expect to see Laura Bush in a string of names with Susan Sontag, Iggy Pop, and Laurie Anderson. Weird).  

Isaac Hayes was one of a kind in voice, performance, and in his abilitiy to personify "cool."   These videos say it all.

I've been watching the Olympics this weekend and feeling that heady mix of patriotism, world curiosity, and the need to work out more.  I'm also a big fan of Sexy Beijing, the online video series hosted by Anna Sophie Loewenberg.  Loewenberg is a single woman living in Beijing, looking for love.  The series is Sex in the City inspired and Loewenberg is a amiable guide with cute glasses.  Her series is a perfect low-fi compliment to all the packaged and polished Beijing coverage we've been getting from the networks.  Here are some of my favorites:

I also like this one.  Loewenberg really nails the Carrie Bradshaw narration.

Yesterday was the anniversary of Frenchman Philippe Petit's 1974 tightrope walk across a cable suspended 110 stories above the ground.  The cable went between the World Trade Center towers, which were the tallest buildings in the world at that time.  He walked it without a safety net.  He wasn't wearing a harness of any kind to save him if he slipped.  Petit spent 45 minutes on that rope, carrying a balance bar and walking back and forth, kneeling down, and, at one moment, even lying down.  He toyed with the police, who stood on the edge of the roof, trying to coax him off the rope. Onlookers gathered on the street below, amazed and terrified by what they saw. The new documentary Man on Wire tells Petit's story by taking its cues from caper films, so you feel the tension and suspense leading up to Peiti's famous walk.  By the time we see him gliding on top of the world, we've already been treated to archival footage, artful reenactments, and interviews with Petit, who is an enthusiastic storyteller, to say the least. 

I really loved this documentary.  The director, James Marsh, did a great job of pulling together the material and made one courageous and wise choice:  never once is 9/11 mentioned in the film.  Marsh could have so easily included 9/11 commentary and remembrances to up the emotional investment of viewers, but he didn't.  He let the story of Petit and his obsession serve as an homage to the towers.  I promise you'll be swept up in this movie and left telling the story of Petit and his daring feat for days to come.