The Walker’s Cargill Lounge is currently altered by a site-specific installation by artist Chris Larson, part of The Spectacular of Vernacular. Looming and curious, the nature of the piece invites viewers to contemplate its function. Certainly there are common inquiries that arise. And there are remarks that run in similar sentiments to one another. Artist-specified solitary experiences monitored by…

Okay, look out you current tenant artworks, there’s a new absentee landlord in town, me. And I’m not going for rent control. Sure, the trustees left a security deposit of the permanent collection but I want to clean house, reward troublemakers, and invite crashers.  Aren’t all curators landlords who allow fine art to live together in a sublet for a while and be uneasy roommates? Or is it closer to a…

Last week the Walker announced its acquisition of a comprehensive collection of some 150 works from the Merce Cunningham Dance Company: set pieces, costumes, painted drops, and props, created over several decades by artists such as Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, Andy Warhol, Frank Stella, and John Cage, Cunningham’s longtime partner. As director Olga Viso notes, “The acquisition of these works is…

Longtime blog readers may recall a 2006 interview with assistant curator for Performing Arts Michèle Steinwald– who was then the Walker’s new program manager – in which she mentioned modeling a dress made of meat, a work titled Vanitas: Flesh Dress for an Anorectic Albino by artist Jana Sterbak. That artwork, also part of the Walker’s collection, is currently on view in the new exhibition Midnight…

My first thought was, Huh, this doesn’t smell as much as I thought it would. But then, it’s cooking or decomposing that creates the aroma – 60 pounds of fresh, raw meat[1], as it turns out, is more of a visual spectacle. Especially so when laid out on a table in the Walker’s basement photography studio, having already been tenderized and in the process of being assembled into a dress.  Vanitas: Flesh Dress…

Over the years, Sol LeWitt developed relationships with a cadre of assistants that he trusted to create his wall drawings — or more precisely, to carry out his legendary instructions for making them. Among them are Sachi Cho and Chip Allen, who cane to the Walker last November to install three wall drawings in the Walker collection; they’re part of the exhibition Sol LeWitt: 2D+3D, on view through…

After a recent visit to the Walker,  Kari Adelaide Razdow, an EdD candidate in Interdisciplinary Studies atColumbia University’s Teachers College/Department of Arts and Humanities, wrote the commentary below.   In his book Towards a Philosophy of Photography, media philosopher Vilém Flusser emphasizes how “the significance of images is magical,” and that “the magical nature of images must be taken into…

Professors, writers, artists, curators, and graduate students exchanging their ideas about contemporary art and culture at this year’s College Art Association conferencein New York, lent some insight and reflection on the progress of this ever-in-the-making collection catalogue that the Walker Art Center is in the midst of producing. My session itinerary included presentations related to digital…

Artist Aaron Spangler recounts his inspiration for the carved and painted basswood sculptures currently featured in the exhibition The Spectacular of Vernacular. Spangler, whose work is shown at theGalerie Michael Janssen in Berlin and at Horton Gallery in New York City, lives 20 miles outside of Park Rapids, Minnesota, on 150 acres of land. “These three sculptures came into focus while I was digging…