Eric Clapton | Mac Rennack

[Hair of the dog: Eric Clapton in performance with New Orleans music legend Mac Rebennack.]

While My Guitar Gently Weeps

[Eric Clapton featured in a performance of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" at the 2002 memorial concert for musician|composer George Harrison, on the occasion of the sixty-fourth birthday of Mr. Clapton, born 30 March 1945.]

[nb: Due to a copyright dispute, the original video isn't presently online. Instead, we present a live version of "I shot the Sheriff" featuring Mr. Clapton sporting a sick pair of jams and performing a def solo at the five-minute mark of the song.]

Pirkle Jones 1914–2009

[article reprinted in full from the Marin Independent Journal. Thanks to MFC in Silver Lake for forwarding the sadnews.]

Black Panthers’ photographer Pirkle Jones dies at 95
By Paul Liberatore
Posted: 03/19/2009 03:50:11 PM PDT

Celebrated Marin photographer Pirkle Jones, a colleague of Ansel Adams and Dorothea Lange whose photographs of the Black Panthers caused a furor when they were exhibited at San Francisco’s de Young Museum in 1968, died March 15 at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in San Rafael. He was 95.

Mr. Jones, who chronicled the people, politics and landscapes of Northern California for more than 60 years, died two days after breaking a hip in a fall at his Mill Valley home.

For 40 years, he and his wife lived in an architecturally stunning redwood-and-glass house that Mr. Jones had built on the edge of Mount Tamalpais State Park in the 1960s.

He said the Panther exhibit, which was almost canceled due to unfavorable publicity but ended being seen by more than 100,000 people, was among the most important events of his life, and was all the more significant because it was undertaken in collaboration with his wife, poet and photographer Ruth-Marion Baruch, who died in 1997.

For 28 years, Mr. Jones, who was once Ansel Adams’ assistant and was renowned for his exquisite black-and-white prints, taught photography at the San Francisco Art Institute, retiring in 1997.

As recently as this past December, he gave a guest lecture at the University of California at Santa Cruz. And earlier this year, he had his final show, “Looking for Mushrooms: Beat Poets, Hippies, Funk, Minimal Art, San Francisco 1955-68,” at Museum Ludwig in Cologne, Germany.

In 1956, Mr. Jones collaborated with Dorothea Lange, the great Depression-era photographer, on a photographic essay, “Death of a Valley,” which documented the final year of the Berryessa Valley before it was flooded for the Monticello Dam.

Turning his camera on another disappearing community, he documented Sausalito’s houseboat counterculture in the late ’60s and early ’70s in a series called “Gate 5.”

“Pirkle Jones’ photographs are just like John Steinbeck’s writing; they both capture the struggles of California’s coming of age and its emblem of freedom,” said the noted photographer Bruce Weber.

Born in 1914 into a large Shreveport, La., family, he said he got his unusual name from one Dr. Pirkle, the physician who delivered him.

“My parents ran out of names,” he said in a 2006 Independent Journal interview. “Too many kids in the family.”

Mr. Jones began taking pictures with a Kodak Brownie he bought when he was 17. After serving in the army during World War II, he enrolled in the new photography department’s first class at the California School of Fine Arts in San Francisco (now the San Francisco Art Institute) headed by Ansel Adams.

He met his wife there, a fellow student. They were married in 1949 at Adams’ home in Yosemite Valley.

In recent years, Mr. Jones was honored with retrospectives at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Berkeley Art Museum and the Marin Community Foundation, among other institutions. In 2003, the city of Mill Valley honored him with its Milley Award for achievement in the arts.

After the death of his wife, he established an archive and endowment in the Special Collections of the UC Santa Cruz Library. His longtime associate, Jennifer McFarland, heads the Pirkle Jones Foundation.

“He honored the working man,” said McFarland, a friend of 40 years. “The grape pickers, the migrant farm workers, the cattle herders. His subject matter ranged from the beauty of the California landscape to the politics of the Black Panthers.”

Mr. Jones once said that he wasn’t concerned about making a reputation through style alone. “If your are true to yourself,” he said, “you’ll be original.”

Mr. Pirkle leaves no direct survivors. A memorial celebration of his life is being planned.

[photo from google search for ‘Pirkle Jones.’ Caption: “A Black Panther demonstration on July 30, 1968, at the Alameda County Courthouse in Oakland during Huey P. Newton’s trial. Pirkle Jones/Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive”]

Le Grand Monde d'Andy Warhol

[From New York, online for a break from Spring Break, below notice of the Paris exhibition "The World of Andy Warhol. Wish we could all be there!]


Le Grand Palais
Paris, France

18 mars - 13 juillet 2009
Le Grand Monde d'Andy Warhol

March 18 Guardian Article
"Hidden depths: Paris exhibition aims to paint Warhol as a modern master – Largest ever display of artist's portraits looks beyond pop art label"

[Photo from the Guardian. Caption: "Ethel Scull 36 Times on display at the Andy Warhol exhibition, Grand Palais, Paris. Photograph: Yoan Valat/EPA"]

Spring Break 2009

The Data Stream will be on a brief hiatus for the next week or so. We extend thanks and best wishes to our readers.

[photograph from National Geographic. Caption: ""Hundreds of thousands of Hindus converge for Trichur Pooram, an annual festival in Kerala State." —From "India: Fifty Years of Independence," May 1997, National Geographic magazine. Photograph by Steve McCurry." Click to enlarge.]

Fabricating Rain

Transformer
1404 P Street, NW
Washington, DC 20005
202-483-1102

March 21- April 25, 2009
Julia Mandle
Fabrication of Blindness|Fabricating Rain

Opening | meet the artist
March 21, 2009, 2 pm)

"This installation and interactive, community-driven intervention, created by New York based artist Julia Mandle, seeks to mend wounds caused by America's abuse of civil rights at a turning point in our country's policy on the detention camps at Guantanamo Bay.

As America begins to negotiate the aftermath of actions in Guantanamo Bay, Julia seeks to connect the actions of dissenters with the voices of detainees through the launch of Fabricating Rain at Transformer. This creative action of hand-embroidering detainee-written narratives and poetry onto hoods made of U.S. military issue sandbags, will expand the Fabrication of Blindness installation at Transformer. Audiences are invited to participate in scheduled Fabricating Rain embroidery circles, or stop by during regular gallery hours to contribute to the installation. Embroidery takes approximately two hours."

[Text and image from Transformer website. Caption: Images by J Mandle and Kevin Rogers.]

Fabricating Rain Embroidery Circles: Thursdays and Saturdays, 2 – 6pm at Transformer.
Exhibition Hours: Wednesday – Saturday, 1 – 7pm & by appointment.

Yan Pei-Ming: YES!

Yan Pei-Ming: YES!
Walter and McBean Galleries
San Francisco Art Institute
800 Chestnut Street (San Francisco, CA 94133)
through May 23, 2009

“Having grown up in Shanghai during the Cultural Revolution of the 60s and 70s, felt the first flickers of the post–Mao Zedong reforms, and then moved to France in 1980, Yan Pei-Ming is an apt representative of a generation of global citizens who have at once weathered the alienating mutations of late-twentieth-century geopolitics and relevantly contributed to the ongoing globalization process ensuing upon them. Indeed, the fact that he has existed and worked at the crossroads of global struggle, both physical and spiritual, is what centrally informs his creative activities, generating a new and contemporary relevance for the historic medium of painting. Yan Pei-Ming: YES!—Yan’s West Coast premiere—brings together new and recent work that focuses and reflects on the pressing geopolitical issues and conflicts of our current moment.”

[Text from Art Institute electronic mailing. Image from the spring 2008 Codroipo, Itally Villa Manin Centre for Contemporary Art exhibition “God & Goods - Spirituality and Mass Confusion.” Capton: “Yan Pei-Ming, 100 American Dollars, 2007-2008, Watercolour on paper, 154 x 330 cm. Courtesy Galleria Massimo De Carlo, Milano. ©Yan Pei-Ming, ADAGP, 2008, France. Photo by André Morin.” Cross posted to Signal Fire, Provisions Library's blog.]

Turning of the Bones

Convergence Center for the Arts
6100 Canal Boulevard
New Orleans, LA

Home, New Orleans? presents
Turning of the Bones
A New Play
Written by Jan Villarrubia
Directed by Ashley Sparks

March 12-28, 2009
Thurs, Fri & Sat at 8pm
Saturday Matinee
March 28 at 2pm

"a quirky comedy with music that addresses the subtle racism that permeates Southern, white, middle and upper class homes employing black domestic workers."

Home, New Orleans? unites Xavier, Tulane, Dillard and New York University with local artists and high schools to explore pre-Katrina New Orleans as “home.” This year, Home, New Orleans? is focusing on four neighborhoods: the Seventh Ward, the Ninth Ward, Central City, and Lakeview.

[text and graphic from Art Spot Productions press release. Cross posted to Signal Fire, Provisions Library's blog.]

Pancake Breakfast

Alexander Gray Associates
526 W 26 St #1019
New York NY 10001
212 399 2636

Saturday, March 7, 2009
Pancake and syrup from 9:00–11:00 AM

On exhibit:
Ye Olde Candyass Muggery

"Carb up during the Armory weekend marathon. Join us for our second biennial pancake breakfast with Cary Leibowitz. Over two dozen new multiples by Cary Leibowitz, in the form of mugs, wine glasses and highballs, starting at $15.

Ye Olde Candyass Muggery multiples are also available for purchase online at Alexander Gray Associates online."

[text and photography from gallery electronic press release. Caption: "I Need to Start Seeing a Therapist, 2009, printing on ceramic."]

49 Stories

826 Valencia - The Pirate Store
826 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA

March 6 | 4–7 m
49 Stories


"Please join us for an evening of interactive storytelling as we launch “49 Stories,” the result of a collaboration between students from John O’Connell High School, new media artists JD Beltran + Scott Minneman, author Stephen Elliott, and 826 Valencia.

Student authors will read their work from this exciting new project, which
allows viewers to immerse themselves in stories throughout the 49-square-mile geography of San Francisco by interacting with a “story table” that fuses maps, text, images, and even the storytellers’ own voices.

The event is free to attend and promises to be an engaging and enlightening celebration of the art of storytelling. “49 Stories” will be exhibited at 826 Valencia from noon to 6 pm every day, from March 6th through March 20th."

[photo from Onomy Labs Web site. Best wishes to colleagues Scott and J.D.!]

Boris Vian | Ville d'Avray

[Reading L'écume des jours is a coming-of-age, rite of passage in francophone culture equivalent to one's first read in the United States of J.D. Sallinger's Catcher in the Rye. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the death of its author, writer|musician|composer Boris Vian. While essentially unknown in Anglophone circles, the anniversary is marked by a number of events in France, Quebec and other French-speaking countries. His birthplace Ville d'Avray kicks off a year of celebration later this month. During 2009, the Data Stream will feature additional posts recognizing this extraordinary literary figure.]

Toute l'année 2009 - Ville-d'Avray : La ville de naissance de Boris Vian fêtera son anniversaire : exposition, concerts, spectacles, rencontres, cinéma...

11 mars : Conférence en chansons par Olivier Nuc et J.P. Nataf

25 mars : Projection du Désordre à 20 ans et du court-métrage Le Piège, de Jacques Baratier, en présence du réalisateur


6 mai : montage-lecture de J'irai cracher sur vos tombes

en juin : expositions "Sculptures et Ojets interloquants" de Guénolé Azerthiope et "Le Vrai Boris"

6 et 7 juin : Cabaret musical Vian v'là Boris, par le Théâtre de l'Eveil

12, 13 et 14 juin : Festival Jazz à Vian, au domaine national de Saint-Cloud

23 et 24 juin : Conte de fées à l'usage des moyennes personnes, par le Théâtre Lumière

19 et 20 septembre : L'Auto-stoppeur, par la Compagnie Lorelei

du 15 au 25 octobre : Les Bâtisseurs d'empire et Le Goûter des généraux, par l'Atelier Théâtre Maison pour Tous de Ville d'Avray

21 novembre : Claude Abadie et son Tentet

* * *

More: Fond'action Boris Vian

[image from Wikipedia entry for Boris Vian.]

Glumping the pond with Dr. Seuss

On the occasion of the one hundred and fifth anniversary of the birth of Theodor Seuss Geisel, best known as "Dr. Seuss," we link to the essay, "The Secret Alchemy of Dr. Seuss" by Heinz Insu Fenkl

[graphic: cover of The Lorax, Seuss' eco-friendly 1971 book, the subject of Mr. Fenkl's essay.]