“A few people have donated their bodies to the project to be eaten by mushrooms.” – Jae Rhim Lee, visual artist/designer/researcher. College Art Association celebrated its 100th year with 5,000+ people gathered in downtown LA last Wednesday-Saturday for “the world’s best attended international art conference.”  The city’s convention center buzzed with art talk, escalators, ipads, coffee shakes — most of…

This past week, the McGuire Theater has been occupied with the unpacking, photographing, and re-rolling of many of the Cunningham backdrops.  The drops came to the Walker folded down and packed in portable touring -friendly hampers and bags (imagine a large sleeping bag in a small scrunch sack).  But now that they are here to stay, they are being rolled flat on long cardboard cylinders, to eliminate…

Like any run-of-the-mill church-basement folding chairs, the ones in our Lifelike show are stenciled to show ownership. “NFTH” reads the black-spraypainted ID on the backrest of Robert Therrien’s gigantic steel chairs. But what do they stand for? We’re told there’s a secret story about the letters’ personal significance to Therrien, but he’s not about to tell it. Mostly, the acronym just…

Chuck Close’s Big Self Portrait (1967-1968),which is featured in the Lifelike exhibition, also recently made a sojourn (in postcard form) to Nepal and India. His presence incited a few double-takes and queries from the locals –Who is this smoking guy? Do you worship him? Close said of his portraits in 1970, ”I am not trying to make facsimiles of photographs. Neither am I interested in the icon of the…

Tuesday saw the arrival of an enormous partner to Robert Therrien’s gigantic folding table and chairs: Jonathan Seliger’s sculpture of an 8-1/2-foot-tall quart carton of America’s Choice Vitamin D milk. After being uncrated in Cargill Lounge, the bronze-and-enamel piece made its way to the Hennepin Avenue side of the building, where it’ll mark an entrance to the exhibitionLifelike, which opens…

With only a week to go until Lifelike opens, more works are heading into a galleries. A look at the newest additions as they go into place: Alex Hay’s fiberglass Paper Bag (1968) stands nearly five feet tall, with Chuck Close’s Big Self Portrait (1967-1968) in the background. Photo: Gene Pittman A detail shot of the ever-fascinating(Old) No One – in Particular #6, Series 2, a sculpture by Evan Penny…

With only a week to go until Lifelike opens, more works are heading into a galleries. A look at the newest additions as they go into place: Alex Hay’s fiberglass Paper Bag (1968) stands nearly five feet tall, with Chuck Close’s Big Self Portrait (1967-1968) in the background. Photo: Gene Pittman A detail shot of the ever-fascinating(Old) No One – in Particular #6, Series 2, a sculpture by Evan Penny…

With the opening of  Lifelike just a week away, more and more works are arriving. Assistant registrar Jessica Rolland caught this juxtaposition in Receiving the other day: Ron Mueck’s Crouching Boy in Mirror (1999-2000) adjacent the (suddenly nervous-looking) man in Evan Penny’s Old (No One – in Particular #6, Series 2 (2005).

Monday saw the arrival of what surely must be one of the world’s largest card tables. In anticipation of the February 24 preview of the exhibition Lifelike, Robert Therrien’s sculptural table — measuring just under nine feet in height — arrived via semi-trailer with four folding chairs, all crated. Made from metal and fabric, the 2007 work was loaded in through the Walker’s Hennepin entrance and…