Installation shots of
Death Row Picnic
In the front room,
The Last Supper,
lead sculptures of food trays presented on Ikea
shelves based on the last supper menus of
prisoners executed in the California penal system: 1999-present. Donald Judd plus Ikea equals an interior design
of confinement for us all. There are food trays from 12 convicts, but thirteen people attended the last supper. Who's the
thirteenth diner. It's you, art viewer, you who completes the work! Just kidding. It's Jesus
In the project room, Philip Zimmerman's
To The Nth Degree,
an electric chair sculpture with so much lethal current coursing
through we had to build a wall to protect ourselves from it.
Disconcerting how easily gallery exhibition space is transformed into a
space of confinement. It's almost as if galleries and prisons had
something in common besides the ubiquitous concrete floors, the plain
walls, the controlled access to light and the outdoors, the restricted hours of
access to the public. I often feel a prisoner of my gallery.
Shadow World—
Chris Corrente, Bass & Vocals, David Borengasser, Guitar, Tucker Bennett: Drums—came through with a dark, slashing performance at the Death Row Picnic Barbecue, possibly the most ironic barbeque ever. Guerrero Gallery hosted their own inebriated opening, transforming the normally sedate lane between the galleries into a block party.
Opening July 14th, 2-5pm, with a barbeque inspired
by "last supper" menus collected by artist Richard Kamler.
—classic American summer leisure
with a culinary glimpse into the minds of people on the edge of the void....
Opening will include a live music performance by "Shadow World".
Death Row Picnic will also feature a July 27th performance
of The Electric Chaircut by
Nelson Loskamp.
Social justice and culinary aesthetics get blended in Death Row Picnic, the summer show at Steven Wolf Fine Arts. The gallery will present sculptures of last-supper food trays by artist and prison-rights advocate Richard Kamler. The blunt, lead objects consist of a dark, materialist finality leavened only by their cartoony realism.
In the project room, Philip Zimmerman will install The Nth Degree, a large, electric-chair-inspired sculpture with a voltage current so lethal it must be fenced off from the public at all times. It's a chance to see the alchemical melodrama of an artist who rarely shows in public.
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| 12000 volts course through this functional electric chair. |
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Zimmerman incorporates vintage objects, such as this silver US Army medallion, into his sculptures.
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The'nth' Degree:
This [17th century]chair was always uncomfortable. It was designed that way - to impress, signal status and invoke authority. In pursuit
of this original intention, To The 'Nth' Degree, with emphasis on the
decorative and dysfunctional, the artist has arrived at the logical
conclusion - and a beautiful one at that! -Philip Zimmerman
The Electric Chaircut by
Nelson Loskamp.
Loskamp has been doing
Chaircuts since the late 1980s. He wires his scissors and clippers for sound. While the sitter, strapped down and blindfolded, undergoes a conventional styling, the room is filled with the amplified twangs and slags of loskamp's equipment, as he works his way around the sitter's head.
The artists answer questions about their work:
Richard Kamler
SWFA: Are you worried that your work might seem hurtful towards the victims of death row inmates?
Kamler: No. Much of my work is an effort to create a context for
communication to occur, a common ground between victims, and/or their
family members, and perpetrators, and/or their families, to occur. The
Table of Voices, (1995) currently on Alcatraz Island, where it's been
since January 2012, was an early effort at restorative justice; the
voices of victims and the voices of the perpetrators, real voices, real
time trying for a common ground. Is it possible to communicate from this
distance? From this place of pain? I do feel enormous sympathy for
anyone who has lost a loved one to violence. I try to imagine how I
might feel. Anger, pain, sorrow, shock. Maybe a longing for revenge? I know that some victims do feel offended by some of my work and
I'm sorry for that.
SWFA: Is there a precedent for these last supper trays in American sculpture?
Kamler:As far as I know there is no precedent for this work, for these "last
meal trays" in American sculpture. Institutions no longer make
available last meal requests and haven't for 20 years, and I don't know
of any artists that have this obsession.
SWFA: Where do you draw the line between art and social justice?
Kamler: I use art to explore themes of social justice, like a Ven Diagram. The
overlap, the line, is nice and messy. Vaclav Havel suggested that the
artist must "come to the table," be there with the economists and
politicians etc, as an advocate for the imagination, for the role of
art in looking at and questioning social justice issues...and, perhaps,
suggesting directions in which to move.
SWFA: Can art illustrate or advocate for a set of values or must it always question them?
Kamler: It can do both. Its value for me is its changeability. It must
challenge, be emotionally satisfying and aesthetically resonant. And the
soap-box is always available.
SWFA: What would you request for your last meal?
Kamler: Comfort food. A veggie burrito, picante. no sour cream. I'm pretty sure I would order it, but not eat it.
Biography:
Long time artist/activist/curator Richard
Kamler has been making issue-driven art since 1976. His first major
installation, "Out of Holocaust," was a full size reconstructed
section of one of the barracks from the Auschwitz Death Camp. Since that time
his public installations, sound pieces, actions, events, drawings and public
presentations have dealt with a series of social issues and environmental
considerations and have been exhibited in galleries and museums
internationally. He was formerly chair of the art department at the University
of San Francisco.
http://www.richardkamler.org/
Philip Zimmerman
SWFA: How can this work be read other than politically?
Zimmerman: Think, "Decoration!" and then understand every act of art-making is political.
SWFA: What motivates you to work if you don't show a lot?
Zimmerman: Worked as a little tyke with no concept of showing other than
to Mom & Dad - guess that is how I am programed to operate: work
without a lot of reward and a minimum of encouragement. I do have a
very small circle of friends that provide the necessary level of "Atta
Boy!" Virtually every artist has to do work in the trenches. The last
twenty years has been my time there. Would be nice if that changed.
SWFA: Is this a one off or are you attracted by death?
Zimmerman: Always have done work around death: born on Memorial Day
- but still trying to see that mysterious little spark of life.
Working in the dark makes that little spark more vibrant, more
precious. Think about it like going to the movies or dreaming at night
or our tiny, tiny eyeball of a planet spinning there in that massive
death-dark. Gotta have one to see the other. For the most part I am a
happy guy. But take a look around my website, www.pzebulon.com and make your own call.
SWFA: What would you request for your last meal?
Zimmerman:
Firing Squad - Glass of cold water and a wad of cotton.
Gallows - Couple of brewskis and a wad of cotton.
Gas Chamber - A glass of water, a cyanide capsule and a wad of cotton served on a clean cotton tablecloth.
Lethal Injection - Watermelon.
Beheading (in Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia) - Fresh Bing cherries and a wad of cotton.
SWFA: Are you afraid of confined spaces.
Zimmerman: Yes
SWFA: I notice your email address is zekemede. Who is that?
Zimmerman:
A relatively friendly, albeit shy and surprisingly normal guy.
SWFA: Well then who is Zebulon?
Zimmerman: Zebulon materialized in New York around 1985. He was and
is an avatar of a man named Philip Zimmerman. He had a 1978 blue and
white ford F150 4 x 4 pick-up that he parked on the streets of the East
Village for the latter part of the 1980's where it took a real beating.
In order to obtain a commercial license the name "ZEB 647 E 11th" was
applied in white vinyl lettering to the blue doors of his truck.
Biography:
Philip Zimmerman grew up in Oregon, where he went to art school and played in a punk rock band called Randy and The Randies.
In the 1980s he moved to the East Village, when precocious young
galleries and AIDS exploded on the scene. He worked with people like
David Wojnarowicz. His stints included New York MOMA (as a guard) and exhibitions
at Artists Space and several East Village galleries including the now
mythic Fashion Moda and Civilian Warfare. He has exhibited in
Portland and San Francisco since the 1990s.
http://pzebulon.com/
