I googled art and humor and after a few clicks around the web, I found a clip of Charles Atlas’ ‘Rainer Variations’. Charles was a visiting lecturer at SFAI when I was in grad school, when the grad lecture series was under the direction of Renee Green. He was funny! I’m glad I was reminded of his video work. Take a peek at the 30 second clip at this link: http://www.vdb.org/titles/rainer-variations

I like being funny. I like making people laugh. Can laughing be a part of the sophisticated gallery world? I mean, really gut wrenching humor, not like, giggles. Can a comedic film win an Oscar? I mean, really, is there room for humor or is it marginalized to popular culture?

still from Addams Family Values, 1993

Last Supper, Anthony Goicolea, 1999, color C-print, 40″ x 77″, ed. 1-5

still from Moonrise Kingdom, 2012

http://www-tc.pbs.org/s3/pbs.videoportal-prod.cdn/media/swf/PBSPlayer.swf

Watch The Little Mermaid from San Francisco Ballet on PBS. See more from Great Performances.

There’s been some recent hubub regarding Chicago Cardinal Francis George’s comments where we compared a gay pride parade to a KKK march. I’ve already made such similar connections, but mainly through visual aesthetic cues, and not for his reasons, which focus on the disruption of the Catholic Church. Here is his defense from The Archdiocese of Chicago:

The Chicago Gay Pride Parade has been organized and attended for many years without interfering with the worship of God in a Catholic church. When the 2012 Parade organizers announced a time and route change this year, it was apparent that the Parade would interfere with divine worship in a Catholic parish on the new route. When the pastor’s request for reconsideration of the plans was ignored, the organizers invited an obvious comparison to other groups who have historically attempted to stifle the religious freedom of the Catholic Church. One such organization is the Ku Klux Klan which, well into the 1940′s, paraded through American cities not only to interfere with Catholic worship but also to demonstrate that Catholics stand outside of the American consensus. It is not a precedent anyone should want to emulate.

It is terribly wrong and sinful that gays and lesbians have been harassed and subjected to psychological and even physical harm. These tragedies can be addressed, however, without disturbing the organized and orderly public worship of God in a country that claims to be free. I am grateful that all parties concerned resolved this problem by moving the Parade’s start time so as not to conflict with the celebration of Mass that Sunday.

I’m so happy to announce that I’m having my first solo show ever! The show will be at Steven Wolf Fine Arts in San Francisco, January 7 to February 18. Steven is one of the coolest guys ever, I mean, check out the show description he wrote:

Jeffrey Augustine Songco risks being accused of massive over-sharing with his first solo exhibition, Public Displays of Affection. Displaying extraordinary powers of negative capability, Songco constructs a world in which his two great passions, Queerdom and the Catholic Church, not only peacefully coexist but thrive on each other. Songco constructs his art from objects and images that go both ways, as it were, such as Peace Poles, spears of wood with uplifting slogans that began to show up in the yards of liberal churches in the 1980s.

Like a sex-crazed sleuth searching for the gay Da Vinci code, Songco turns those phrases and the phallic forms they were painted on against their original intention to illuminate their queer subtext. In Body Shots, an ordinary table of jello shot containers such as might be found at a college fraternity party is transformed into a tabernacle for what appears to be the artist’s seed. And in Scumbags, a series of surrealistic sculptures dramatically presented as luxury objects, Songco makes the case that balloon animals aren’t the only forms you can make from over-the-counter latex.

Here’s a clip of the ladies talking about the campaign:

If you don’t know the Academy Award winning scene, you should watch it immediately:

Art Practical and the Asian Contemporary Arts Consortium (ACAC) are pleased to announce the finalists for the ACAC Writing Fellowship. They are: Michele Carlson, Liz Glass, Joshua Kim, Charlotte Miller, Jeffrey Songco, and Ellen Tani. The finalists will submit shotgun reviews for the November 17 issue of Art Practical, and the recipient of the fellowship will be announced on November 18.

While the Bay Area has a diverse and vibrant visual arts scene, there is little visibility for critical dialogue that contextualizes issues in Asian contemporary art. By providing a platform for emerging writers, the Asian Contemporary Arts Consortium Writing Fellowship (ACAC Fellow) aims to promote and encourage critical thinking and writing on contemporary Asian art practices and discourses, with a particular emphasis on the events and exhibitions in the San Francisco Bay Area. The Bay Area visual arts community positions itself within a global context; this fellowship will encourage the recipient to examine where the intersections lie between artists of Asian descent living and working in the Bay Area, those living and working internationally, and artists of non-Asian descent living in Asia. Therefore, while priority will be given to exhibitions and events in the San Francisco Bay Area, the Fellow will not be restricted solely to coverage of this region.

My application was very crazy. Applicants were asked to submit two writing samples and a letter of interest. My material was littered with humor and confessions. I have this feeling that they’re giving me a chance because I bring a light-hearted and superficial take on something that is quite complicated. Identifying artwork as ‘Asian’ is so strange, but I’m willing to take on the challenge. We’ll see how it goes!

In other news, another one of my posts is up on Hyperallergic. The Top 10 Art World Figures I’d Like to F***. I can’t take all the credit for the post because Hrag, the creator of the blog, suggested the topic to me. After it was published, I sent him a thank you because it was so great to get my neurotic voice out there. Couple that with my fellowship finalist announcement, and I’m just going gaga over an audience actually liking my text! It’s Crazy. I’ve got a billion pages of journaling if anyone wants to read it!

From Hyperallergic:

SAN FRANCISCO — After Ugo Nonis was eliminated from the first episode of this season’s Work of Art: The Next Great Artist, I didn’t see the point of watching the show anymore. The hottest dude just got kicked off and the only reason I watch television is because everyone on it is pretty. And now that Christopher Meloni is no longer on Law and Order: SVU, I have no idea what to do with my life.

With all this extra time to daydream about the perfect relationship, I’ve composed a list of the top 10 art world figures I’d like to do the nasty with. Some are expected, some are not. Some are for social climbing purposes, some are not. But really, all are for love.

10. Matthew Barney

OMG, the classic pale male Yale. How could I not want to sleep with a former footballer and J.Crew model? I don’t care what his art is or isn’t about, but it oozes creamy liquid and his actors are always doing creepy things in sexy places and it always makes my privates tingle. My crazy old art professor from undergrad once said that a great first date takes place at a haunted house or a museum. Why? Because it’s filled with dead things and your physiological reaction to these things — dilated pupils, rapid heart rate, sweating — are the same things that occur when you’re in love. I also heard that Barney was in a fraternity during his college days. I was, too, and it’s no secret that a fraternity house is the gayest place on Earth. Matty, I’m whenever you’re ready, bro.

Continuing reading on Hyperallergic…

Sidenote: I had a new post up on Art21 Blog yesterday about my daily life. Check out!

Praxis Makes Perfect // Drifting: My Day Job