Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Forgotten notes

A diagonal line circumnavigates the sphere and cuts through, ninja precise. No ordinary ginzu knife needed just clear plastic bags to contain the remnants.

Monday, May 21, 2007

A mission made impossible

Morning again, a double bargain as wheels touch land calmly. The beige odalisque so tightly bunned but redly aproned clasp their hands and bow in unison as pockets jangle loudly of pilfered cutlery dull to the touch. One of them cries accidently over spilt red wine that to her utter surprise fails to leave a blood stain. Magically it simply disappears as does the entire crew searching for the missing passengers.

Outside the atomic clock inside the peripatetic crocodile starts ticking uncharacteristically loudly and far too annoyingly. A stranger out of the blue fog intercedes to offer ground transportation as a means of improbable escape. Such timing is too fortuitous to dismiss despite its extravagance well beyond conventional exchange rates. But who is to complain? Not us, not yet anyway because that gasp for air will become necessary sooner than anticipated.

His vehicle like the drive in is somnambulant, its six cylinders preternaturally humming scary Broadway tunes. Finally time stands still long enough so that the Nehru jacket returns to vogue behind the marbled counter. Issey Miyake security speak into their sleeves opening Sesame Street to Ugly American tourism and Yellow journalism. Randolph Hearst conspires to outduel Charles Foster Kane but as usual Orson Wells is first to the table and last to leave.

Unbeknownst to anyone is the execution by firing squad that awaits in the form of a female Benedict Arnold.

Tuesday, March 27, 2007

REMAKE: The Sequel



As the weather warms up and thoughts turn green because of those magical words, "Pitchers and catchers", being spouted indiscriminately, the annual task that is the concomitant art exhibit for the upcoming Asian American Showcase (usually in April) invariably falls upon my lap with a flat thud. But the well from which fresh, new ideas-once so full, clear and crisp---now runs dry, and so it is only fitting that I find myself along with my cohort Chris Naka recycling the theme for this exhibit from a class I currently teach:

Henceforth the appropriately titled REMAKE: The Sequel of which, briefly and loosely, the description is as follows:

Can a copy of something be better than the original? Is it “just as good?” Nowadays Hollywood and mass media sanctions the remake by constantly churning out sequels. A case in point is the plethora of Asian cinema, animation and/or popular culture that is literally remade by Westerners and vice versa now inculcated into our collective consciousness so that each possesses its own life or identity. But critics and pundits often stigmatize that which is copied unfairly as “unoriginal”. To misquote the Iron Chef, "Which version reigns supreme?" This exhibit will ask selected artists to or who "remake" favorite pre-existing works or classics to spark new dialogue of what is authentic or real versus fake or bogus depends on the different facets of constant reinterpretation and redefinition.