I met the brothers Cory and Eric Fraser jamming at a private function in Los Altos Hills and enjoyed their duo versions of Hendrix and Sinatra; they told me that in a former life they were signed to a major label deal in Spain playing as Cielo Ceniza.
Speaking of brother acts, Steve and Eric Cohen took me on a tour of Michael Heizer’s “Levitated Mass'” at LACMA. Here I am pretending to hold the rock for Eric while Steve steals his thunder.
Not exactly stealing Beckham’s thunder but I was pleased to see San Jose singer Jessica Johnson performing “Star Spangled Banner” at the San Jose Earthquakes Los Angeles Galaxy event. She plays tonight at Biscuits and Blues in SF, at Gilroy Garlic Festival on July 27 and San Jose Jazz Festival on August 11.
David Beckham, one of the most famous and successful and best-paid athletes of the 21st century, did lure me in to the local pitch recently. I live less than two miles from the stadium and cruised by on bike just about match time. Tickets were around $60 was my understanding but I budgeted $40 to see how I would do with “miracle tickets” and the gods. Oddly, a security guy (who I hope to never have to hire) walked me through a security gate, had me follow him into the tunnel, then took my sawbuck stealthily, like the old “statue of liberty play” or “fumble rooskie”. As someone who has put on about 150 ticketed events, I do make a study of how security is run at various venues but as far as I recall, this is only the second time I have snuck in so egregiously. (To be safe, I picked up a discarded stub when that opportunity presented itself, literally). The other time I recall sneaking into a venue is when the power went out at Slim’s and Mary Chapin Carpenter played by flashlight standing on the rear of club bar. I definitely got $20 out of my soccer experience and although I am unconvinced regarding Beckham’s legacy in the U.S. I dare see he has done more here than did Alan Birchenall.
Meanwhile I recall spending a fair amount of time chatting up the guy who was guarding Michael Heizer’s installation. His name is Thomas and he worked for a security contractor and had in fact studied art, although he didn’t seem very impressed by the piece. For whatever reason I shot his hands holding a scaled down version of the piece. Generally people seemed underwhelmed. I think of the Heizer as being mostly about the installation per se, the transport, and how that changed the environment even briefly as the piece slowly made its way to its repose. I was not familiar with Heizer before this, although in retrospect I recall something about his land art pieces, perhaps in a New York Times magazine story. Also, we had heard a similar story about installation of a very heavy Richard Serra at Oliver Ranch; and I put some time and energy in watching and pondering and talking up the installation of the Serra at Stanford — I saw it’s companion at LACMA, as well as work by Chris Burden, indigenous Oaxacans,
edit to add, November 6, an especially auspicious (election) day:
to keep my mind off the election results, I am re-reading Michael Kimmelman, “The Accidental Masterpiece: on the art of life and vice versa” and its passage on Michael Heizer, the chapter on minimalists “The Art of Pilgrimage” and hadn’t remembered apropos of “Elevated Mass” or is it “Levitated Mass” that Heizer was in Kimmelman. MK states that the artist’s father was an archeology professor, who wrote a book about ancients dragging boulders, so I affirm my position that for the LACMA piece, the installation is the piece, and what I saw is the residue of the piece (not unlike Kapoor “svayambh”), and I would suggest it is a tribute to his father. I texted Steve and Eric this a.m. thusly.
Also, tapping “kimmelman” and “heizer” into the searchers, yields this related article. see also, the olmecs, collosal heads et al. gives another meaning to what starts in vegas or outside vegas stays in vegas. there is also a related piece, Kimmelman/2005 tells us and the injuns confirm, in NYC, at IBM building.
Plastic Alto with Mark Weiss 