Some more photos I have from the amazing Dallas Aurora.
On Flora Street in front of the Nasher was a stunning, fun, and very popular installation/sculpture called Data Flow. It was made by Erik Glissmann, Scott Horn, and Nicole Cullum Horn. It was a walk-through complex of v-shaped troughs, fed by a constant flow of florescent yellow liquid and brightly lit by ultraviolet lights.
The artists describe the artwork as:
“Data Flow” reflects on the expansion of human consciousness in the digital era. For most of our history, our experiences have been limited to our immediate horizons, securing our sense of the world and our place in it. Digital technology has transformed that stability, shattering and expanding it a thousandfold – like a river divided by a thousand tiny waterfalls. Data Flow physically interprets this phenomenon; a single stream falls onto many planes, reaching its destination by a seemingly random multitude of paths.
“Fashion changes, but style endures.”
― Coco Chanel
Georg Herold, Dallas Contemporary (click to enlarge)
“One should either be a work of art, or wear a work of art.”
― Oscar Wilde
Georg Herold, Dallas Contemporary (click to enlarge)
Style is the answer to everything.
A fresh way to approach a dull or dangerous thing
To do a dull thing with style is preferable to doing a dangerous thing without it
To do a dangerous thing with style is what I call art
― Charles Bukowski
In 1966, Andy Dufresne escaped from Shawshank prison. All they found of him was a muddy set of prison clothes, a bar of soap, and an old rock hammer, damn near worn down to the nub. I remember thinking it would take a man six hundred years to tunnel through the wall with it. Old Andy did it in less than twenty. Oh, Andy loved geology. I imagine it appealed to his meticulous nature. An ice age here, million years of mountain building there. Geology is the study of pressure and time. That’s all it takes really, pressure, and time. That, and a big goddamn poster. Like I said, in prison a man will do most anything to keep his mind occupied. Turns out Andy’s favorite hobby was totin’ his wall out into the exercise yard, a handful at a time.
—-The Shawshank Redemption
The other day, after the really cool bike ride from the Dallas Contemporary, we all returned and hung out for a while, looking at the exhibits. There was some really good stuff… really good.
One special exhibit, off to one side, was Acceleration – a set from 35 artists run out to honor the 35th anniversary of the space. Walking through it, I came around a corner, looked at a sheetrock wall, and found one in particular that really spoke to me.
It was one of the coolest pieces of art/sculpture/exhibition I’ve ever seen.
A simple work by Bradly Brown, named “Escape Plan.” It was a heavy, sharp compass, mounted against the wall. An unseen force turned the compass slowly, and the sharp steel point was slowly digging its way through the wall.
“Escape Plan” by Bradly Brown, Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, Texas
The circle cut into the wall displayed a ragged edge where the spike had torn through the outer paper layer. When I looked closely, I could see that it had dug deep, almost through the drywall, and was digging deeper.’
“Escape Plan” by Bradly Brown, Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, Texas
I watched it going round and round, and talked to some other folks that walked up. I said, “it must have some sort of mechanism mounted inside the wall.”
Then, on a whim, I walked around until I reached the opposite side of the wall and was surprised when, there, I found the other end – the business end – an electric motor slowly turning a shaft that pierced the barrier – obviously turning the compass on the other side. It was set up as another part… a hidden part of the art. It would have been interesting to find the motor first – to see it moving and try to figure out what it was doing. You would never be able to guess.
The back side of “Escape Plan” by Bradly Brown, Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, Texas
I looked closely and saw that it was spring mounted – I assume pulling the mechanism through the wall… eventually.
First, let me tell a little story. It’s a story I’ve told too many times before, and if you know me, you’ve probably heard it more than once. But if I type it out here, maybe I can get it out of the way, and quit repeating myself.
When I first moved to Dallas, in 1981, I had no money (and I have no money now… how does that work?) and lived with some friends in Oak Cliff until I saved enough to get an apartment. I rode the bus down Sylvan and then across the Trinity River on Commerce into Downtown, where I worked in the Kirby Building (now converted into condominiums). The bus would go past the Belmont Hotel every day – I think it was abandoned at the time. It was a very nasty area in those years – if you stood on that corner very long you would probably get your throat cut.
I would tell people, “That Belmont property is so cool. Someone needs to buy it and fix it up. It sits up on a hill with a great view of downtown – wonderful Dallas Art Deco architecture. It’s a shame, somebody needs to do something.”
They would reply, “You are crazy. You’ll get your throat cut down there.”
Now, thirty years later, the Belmont is restored into a cute little boutique hotel, it boasts a famous restaurant, and the area around it is booming with cool hipness. I was thirty years ahead of my time… but then again, a stopped watch is right twice a day.
I decided to ride my vintage Technium instead of my commuter bike – in my constant efforts to keep the thing working I have rebuilt the rear wheel, lacing new spokes around a new hub and cassette and truing the thing – so I wanted to give it a try. I rode my bike to the train station for the ride downtown and, as always, right after I bought my ticket for the DART train at the Arapaho station, the train pulled in. You have to cross a street through a tunnel to get to the platform, so I usually miss my train and am therefore late for whatever I have planned. This time I hauled ass down the tunnel and caught it right as it was pulling out. The transit gods smiled on me that day.
There was a good bunch of bicyclists and we headed out from the Dallas Contemporary down to Commerce and across the river to the Belmont – following the bus route I remembered from thirty years ago. Along the side of the cliff up to the hotel three murals were painted. The first by Shepard Fairey (he’s best known for the Obama poster), the second by JM Rizzi, known as JMR, and the third by local artists Sour Grapes.
Bike tour group in front of the Belmont Hotel murals. (click to enlarge)
Shepard Fairey mural at the Belmont Hotel, Dallas, Texas.
Sour Grapes mural at the Belmont Hotel, Dallas, Texas.
Closeup of the Sour Grapes mural at the Belmont Hotel, Dallas, Texas. (click to enlarge)
One really cool part of the ride was that each stop had a talk by a docent – Erin Cluley from Dallas Contemporary who talked about the process of setting up the murals and getting the artists into town and working. I was particularly interested in how the out-of-town artists adapted their work to the more conservative attitudes here and what they thought of the city in general.
Erin Cluley, the docent giving a talk on the murals in front of the Belmont Hotel
From the Belmont, we went down the street and around the corner to Trinity Groves – a very interesting area of restaurant incubation. There were more murals by Shepard Fairey and JMR, plus some work by FAILE – a pair of Brooklyn based artists that had an amazing exhibition back at the Contemporary.
The murals from Trinity Groves.
Shepard Fairey mural at Trinity Groves.
FAILE mural at Trinity Groves.
FAILE uses the year 1986 in their work – the year of the Challenger Disaster.
Murals by FAILE and Shepard Fairey, Trinity Groves, Dallas, Texas.
Bike tour stopping to look at a mural by JMR. The Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge and Downtown Dallas in the background.
It was time to ride back to the Contemporary, where there are murals by Fairey and JMR.
Back at the Dallas Contemporary. (click to enlarge)
Shepard Fairey mural at the Dallas Contemporary.
JMR mural at the Dallas Contemporary.
The ride was a lot of fun and very educational – now I’m going to be looking for murals all over the city.
In downtown Dallas, across Main Street from the Joule Hotel – the hotel with the cool pool, a giant eye has appeared – like a monster from a horror movie – mysterious – it just sits there, thirty feet high… staring. The thing is a sculpture by Tony Tasset. It really is big… and pretty odd to look at – especially at night.
Giant Eye Sculpture, Main Street, Dallas, Texas (click to enlarge)
Giant Eye Sculpture, Main Street, Dallas, Texas (click to enlarge)
To get to the Carrollton Festival at the Switchyard I rode my bike to the Arapaho Red Line DART station – hung my bike on the transit hook and rode downtown (as always, I was a minute late, missed my train, and was twenty minutes late downtown – I need to cut that crap out), met a friend, and we then rode the Green line out to Carrollton. It would have been quicker to drive my car down Beltline (to get anywhere in Dallas you start out driving down Beltline Road) – but then I would have had to find a place to park, plus there is a lot of freedom and flexibility in having a bicycle. With a bicycle and a DART pass – I can go anywhere.
At any rate, heading back downtown, waiting for the train, I had the time to look around at the artwork on the Carrollton station. To my uneducated, ignorant, and untrained eye, DART has done an admirable job of adding artwork to its train stations – at least as far as a giant government bureaucracy can be expected to go. Maybe I should do some blog entries on some of my favorites….
At the Carrollton station – elevated high in the air (cool view from up there) over where I suppose the old switching yard might have been, I noticed all these little windows cut into the concrete pillars supporting the roof structure. In each window was an old photograph combined with, or framed by, pieces of found metal. It made for a series of interesting and entertaining collages. The time spent waiting for the train was reduced by me dashing up and down, looking into the little windows at the parade of aged faces and arranged fragments of history.
Later, at home, an internet search led me quickly to the artist, James Michael Starr. Although, he seems to be unhappy with the initial installation – everything seems to have worked out and his collages are there for the enjoyment of the unwashed masses. The bits of metal seem to be mostly artifacts that the artist was able to dig up around the area, now on display, high in the air… forever waiting for the next train.
Collage by James Michael Starr, Carrollton DART station.
Collage by James Michael Starr, Carrollton DART station.
Collage by James Michael Starr, Carrollton DART station.
Collage by James Michael Starr, Carrollton DART station.
Bill Chance 