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Beyond the Art World
by Ben DavisNov. 19, 2010
I do not like the term "art world." It’s a useful term, of course, a kind of shorthand for something like "the professional sphere of the visual arts." "The art world thinks. . ." "Art-world concerns. . ." Etcetera. But the truth is, art is not a world unto itself. Art is part of the world. And that fact has to be a fundamental starting point for everything.
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Oct. 8, 2010
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Aug. 19, 2010
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KURT LIVES
by Ben Davis
Letter from Seattle: Failing to attain Nirvana at the Seattle Art Museum.
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Aug. 4, 2010
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Mar. 26, 2010
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MINOR MIRACLESby Ben Davis
Jessica Jackson Hutchins looks for a way out.
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Mar. 10, 2010
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IT’S NOT THE SIZE. . .by Ben Davis
Scoring Jeff Koons’ "Skin Fruit" vs. Shaq’s "Size Does Matter."
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Feb. 19, 2009
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X OUTby Ben Davis
The lesson’s of X-Initiative’s final show, "Bring Your Own Art."
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Feb. 3, 2010
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WHITNEY WATCHby Ben Davis
A defensive self-abasement marks the spirit of the 2010 Whitney Biennial.
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Jan. 7, 2010
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PHOTOS FOR TINOby Ben Davis
The erotics of Tino Sehgal’s photo ban.
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Dec. 11, 2009
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LOST IN MIAMIby Ben Davis
Wandering through Art Basel Miami Beach 2009.
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Nov. 5, 2009
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LOST IN TIMEby Ben Davis
Josh Gosfield imagines the life of completely made-up French pop star "Gigi Gaston."
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Oct. 23, 2009
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LIGHT TOUCHby Ben Davis
Rafael Lozano-Hemmer represents the future of art -- but what kind of future is it?
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Sept. 18, 2009
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SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED
by Ben Davis
Caragh Thuring’s end-of-painting paintings at Simon Preston.
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Aug. 7, 2009
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THE MUSEUM BUBBLEby Ben Davis
Who’s to blame for the pain of the non-profit art world?
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July 28, 2009
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BACON, HALF-BAKED
by Ben Davis
Why philosopher Gilles Deleuze’s book on Francis Bacon is so much tamer than Francis Bacon’s work itself.
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July 20, 2009
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IRANIAN ART NOWby Ben Davis
"Iran Inside Out" at the Chelsea Art Museum.
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June 10, 2009
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BIENNALE DEGREE ZEROby Ben Davis
Daniel Birnbaum’s "Making Worlds" is a Type 0 Biennale.
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May 22, 2009
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FAIREY TALES
by Ben Davis
The myth and reality of Shepard Fairey’s preppy Pop anti-authoritarianism.
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Apr. 30, 2009
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ANIMAL SPIRITSby Ben Davis The strengths and limits of Adel Abdessemed’s nihilistic guerrilla art.
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Apr. 17, 2009
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JESUS COMPLEXby Ben Davis The New Museum Triennial fails as a portrait of a generation -- but succeeds as an essay on the "naughty oughties."
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Mar. 24, 2009
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HE’S THE SHITby Ben Davis Italian conceptualist Piero Manzoni was more of a professional than he seems.
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Mar. 13, 2009
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THE TWITTER ESTHETICby Ben Davis The art fair experience finds the form of writing proper to it.
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Feb. 23, 2009
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PSYCO-SOCIAL STILL-LIFEby Ben Davis Ruud van Empel’s "Souvenir" series shows how history troubles our fantasies.
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Dec. 30, 2008
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THE 2008 REVUEby Walter Robinson and Ben Davis "Fly high, fall hard," a motto for the times.
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Nov. 20, 2008
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OH YES THEY DID!by Ben Davis The Yes Men and Friends take on the New York Times.
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Nov. 11, 2008
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DEAD HEATby Ben Davis Berlinde de Bruyckere riffs on the wretchedness of life.
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Sept. 19, 2008
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THE CHINA PRICEby Ben Davis Stalking the elusive Chinese collector at ShContemporary.
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Sept. 5, 2008
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ESTHETIC POLITICS?by Ben Davis The idea that art is a model for politics is the biggest art-critical boondoggle around.
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Aug. 28, 2008
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TWO FRIDASby Ben Davis Frida Kahlo’s surreal Socialist Realism.
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July 31, 2008
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UP PERISCOPEby Ben Davis The unlikely tale of Scope Hamptons ‘08.
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July 25, 2008
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NATURAL FACTSby Ben Davis "After Nature" shows it’s easier to turn apocalypse into a motif than it is to imagine it sincerely.
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July 14, 2008
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THE IRAQI CENTURY OF ARTby Ben Davis Mohammed al Hamadany’s Night of Fire and 100 years of struggle by Iraqi artists.
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June 18, 2008
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BUILDING BLOCKSby Ben Davis David Byrne’s Playing the Building: Once in a lifetime experience, or road to nowhere?
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May 23, 2008
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FIRE AND ICEby Ben Davis Sexual dysfunction and environmental consciousness at the Reykjavik Arts Festival in Iceland.
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May 9, 2008
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THE BILLY PAPPAS PROBLEMby Ben Davis Julie Checkoway’s documentary Waiting for Hockney raises questions about the sociology of art.
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Apr. 11, 2008
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ART IN FLUXby Ben Davis Flux Factory’s final show marks the end of an era.
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Mar. 13, 2008
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CAI GUO-KILLERby Ben Davis In the basement with Chinese art star Cai Guo-Qiang.
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Mar. 7, 2008
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RAVE ONby Ben Davis A "rave review" for the Whitney’s 2008 biennial.
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Feb. 15, 2008
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THE BLING GAMEby Ben Davis Say hello to Luis Gispert’s little friend.
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Jan. 24, 2008
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GATEWAY TO NOWHEREby Ben Davis Do-Ho Suh’s Reflection and art’s power to forget.
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Dec. 24, 2007
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MIAMI POST MORTEMby Ben Davis The "social unconscious" in Art Basel Miami Beach and beyond.
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Dec. 4, 2007
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WESTERN PROMISESby Ben Davis Piotr Uklanski’s ""Western"" Summer Love.
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Nov. 19, 2007
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DISASTER TEAMby Ben Davis The beauty of drowning Africans in Isaac Julien and Russell Maliphant’s "Cast No Shadow."
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Nov. 12, 2007
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GUY SMILEYby Ben Davis Yue Minjun, human logo.
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Oct. 26, 2007
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THE CONTRA IRAN AFFAIRby Ben Davis Shirana Shahbazi’s new work reacts against images of Iran, in a veiled way.
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Sept. 27, 2007
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MAN AND SUPERMANby Ben Davis Shaun El C. Leonardo, budding superartist.
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Aug. 24, 2007
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ART CLASSby Ben Davis Marx, "a new theory of the market," art and politics.
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Aug. 1, 2007
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FAIR FLIP-FLOPSby Ben Davis Commerce and/or personality at the third Scope Hamptons.
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July 20, 2007
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GLOBALIZED FEMINISMby Ben Davis Can Miwa Yanagi dismantle the master’s house with the master’s tools?
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July 17, 2007
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REPLY TO STORRby Ben Davis The Venice Biennale, Africa and the "borrowed kettle."
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June 13, 2007
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POWER PLAYby Ben Davis Tom Friedman’s aluminum foil sculptures are portraits of Aby Rosen as a "fun" guy.
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May 16, 2007
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HOLLOW LAUGHERby Ben Davis David Godbold answers the question: Why isn’t postmodern art funnier?
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May 11, 2007
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PINAULT AND CO.by Ben Davis A glorious romance with power in "Sequence 1" at the Palazzo Grassi in Venice.
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Apr. 17, 2007
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IRANIAN EVOLUTIONby Ben Davis A secret politics in Abbas Kiarostami’s photos and videos.
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Feb. 26, 2007
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LA LA LAND
by Ben Davis L.A. Art challenges New York on its own turf.
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Feb. 23, 2007
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ARTNET NEWS
Questions surround the patron behind the Venice Biennale’s African exhibition.
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Feb. 14, 2007
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NET WORTH
by Ben Davis
The dilemmas of science-as-art in curator Marisa Olson’s "Networked Nature."
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Dec. 18, 2006
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MORE ON MIAMI
by Ben Davis
A report on the Ink, Flow, Bridge, Aqua, DiVA, Pulse, NADA, Photo Miami and Scope art fairs.
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Nov. 8, 2006
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MINNESOTA VICE
by Ben Davis
Angela Strassheim’s tortured photos of suburbia.
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Oct. 25, 2006
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CULTURAL KARAOKE
by Ben Davis
Nikki S. Lee’s "conceptual documentary" A.K.A. Nikki S. Lee.
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Oct. 13, 2006
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CRAZY QUILTS
by Ben Davis
Ai Kijima’s fabric collages bring Pop extravagance to a traditional form.
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Sept. 20, 2006
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DREAM FACTORY
by Ben Davis
Art and ads from director Michel Gondry.
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Aug. 30, 2006
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GLASS HOUSES
by Ben Davis
The art world lessons of Toledo, Ohio.
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Aug. 3, 2006
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DOWN TEMPO
by Ben Davis
The hidden history of the Bauhaus in Marianne Brandt’s photomontages.
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July 20, 2006
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SCOPE HAMPERED?
by Ben Davis
The second go-round for the Scope franchise in the Hamptons.
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June 15, 2006
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REFLECTED GLORY
by Ben Davis
The tortured journey of James Lee Byars fills six galleries in New York.
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June 7, 2006
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MOMENT IN THE SUN
by Ben Davis
Circa ’06 in San Juan, the first commercial art fair in the Caribbean.
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May 31, 2006
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RETRO ACTIVITIES
by Ben Davis
Marco Boggio Sella, Vadis Turner and Michael Bell-Smith take on the past.
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May 4, 2006
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INANE ASYLUM
by Ben Davis
Wooloo Productions offers up an immigrant "Survivor" as art in "AsylumNYC."
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Apr. 21, 2006
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THIRTEEN UNEASY PIECES
by Ben Davis
Chinese video art at P.S.1’s "The Thirteen: Chinese Video Now."
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Mar. 20, 2006
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TWILIGHT OF THE TEEN IDOLS
by Ben Davis
Masturbating jocks and cheerleaders, courtesy Brock Enright and Ivan Hürzeler.
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Mar. 10, 2006
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THE ARMORY BOWL
by Ben Davis
Reading the semiotics of the Armory Show 2006, Mar. 9-13, 2006.
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Feb. 24, 2006
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LOOK AGAIN
by Ben Davis
Photography in New York -- the AIPAD photo show, Tracey Moffatt, Jacques-Henri Lartigue, Christopher Williams and Florian Maier-Aichen.
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Feb. 10, 2006
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RETURN FIRE
by Ben Davis
New images of art from Iraq in New York.
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Jan. 25, 2006
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WHITNEY WATCH
by Ben Davis
Whitney Biennial curators past and present talk around the 2006 installment. |
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Jan. 24, 2006
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TECHNICAL KNOCK-OUTS
by Ben Davis
Dorkbot, "Breaking and Entering" at PaceWildenstein, "Superlowrez" at vertexList, "Dewanatron" at Pierogi.
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Dec. 16, 2005
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Pop Life
by Ben Davis
0100101110101101.ORG proves Europe kicks butt.
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Nov. 2, 2005
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We Are Duchampians
by Ben Davis
"The Imagery of Chess Revisited" at the Noguchi Museum.
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Oct. 12, 2005
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Photo New York
by Ben Davis
A report from the 2nd annual photo fair in Manhattan.
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Sept. 27, 2005
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Knock Out
by Ben Davis
The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s "A Knock at the Door"
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Aug. 26, 2005
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August Company
by Ben Davis
The end of the summer at three shows in Williamsburg.
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Aug. 17, 2005
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Signs of the Times
by Ben Davis
Steve Powers and the Dreamland Artist Club at Coney Island.
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Un-Hampered
by Ben Davis
The Scope Hamptons contemporary art fair in Southampton.
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July 12, 2005
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Letter Love
by Ben Davis
O.K. Harris documents the career of Don Celender.
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Visible Flaws
by Ben Davis
Art theorist W.J.T. Mitchell's What Do Pictures Want?
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June 7, 2005
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A FUTURE PRESENT
by Ben Davis
D. Dominick Lombardi puts his mark on the apocalypse.
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May 23, 2005
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THE WILDER BUNCH
by Ben Davis
The artists associated with legendary L.A. dealer Nicholas Wilder.
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