Bay Area Currents 2011

Another very proud announcement: I'm in this great group show at Pro Arts gallery in Oakland! HAY! The show is already up now, and I regret to announce that I will not be able to make it to the official opening on August 5th (due to my being at a residency on the beach in MEXICO!) but that's not to say you shouldn't go now, to the opening, or anytime before it closes on September 2nd! It's yet another chance to see my 16 minute video Liberaceón, the way it was meant to be seen: on a CRT monitor atop a pink triangle pedestal installed in a gallery. Go!

Exhibition: July 19 - September 2, 2011

Selections by Julio César Morales

Artists' Reception: Friday, August 5, 6 - 8 PM

Artists' Talk: Friday, September 2, 6 - 8 PM

Artists:
Matthew Cella

Pablo Cristi

Dana Hemenway

Julie Henson

Amy Ho

Emily Hoyt

Gregory Ito

Jeanne Lorenz

Cathy Lu

Fiamma Montezemolo

Francesca Pastine

Suzy Poling

Maggie Preston

Lisa Rybovich Cralle

Surabhi Saraf

Sunaura Taylor

Linda Trunzo

Chris E. Vargas

Residency Queens

Greg Youmans, my frequent "collaborator" (wink, wink) and I are mere hours away from embarking upon the first of the two residencies that we're proud to be participating in this Summer.


Our first residency the Golden Snail, will take place off the grid on US Forestry land in southern Oregon. We'll be in residence there; reading, writing, plotting & planning (the next season of Falling In Love...), as well as swimming, hiking, gazing at wildlife, eating outdoors & roasting food on a stick over an open flame, for exactly one week! We even bought a solar shower just for the occasion. This is the rustic cabin we'll be sleeping in or around...

Ludlam House in Brookings, Oregon (site of the Golden Snail residency)

From the Golden Snail blog:

"The Golden Snail Artist's Residency intends to create a space and the time to slow down and become reconnected with ones life work, self, nature and others whom are pursuing the same.
The term work in the above statement is completely defined by the individual participants and can include traditional artist's and arts related work such as writing, drawing and painting or playing music but is also extended to research, reading, meditation, hiking, swimming in a river or jumping in the sea, wallowing in the sun, writing letters, pickling, plant identification, yoga, walking, star gazing, cooking and much more..." 

Our second residency is the RADAR writers' lab in Akumal, Mexico for 10 days in August. As you can imagine both Greg and I are totally stoked on that one, too! More on that later. Now, off to the woods...

SF Gate review of Inarguably Uncertain: The 41st Annual UC Berkeley MFA Exhibition

Thoughtfully written by JD Beltran.

The show is already down but you can read the review HERE!

*The Elegance of Refusal* opening tomorrow!

I am thrilled to announce that I have work in this show which opens on Thursday! My two videos, Have You Ever Seen A Transsexual Before? (2010, 4 min) and Extraordinary Pregnancies (2010, 10 min) will screening during the duration of the opening among the work of many other artists whose work I love and respect! Hope to see you there.

Opening: Thursday June 23rd, 2011 5:30-7:30pm

The Elegance of Refusal
June 23rd - September 16th, 2011
Hours: Monday - Friday 8:30am to 5:30 pm

Gensler
2 Harrison Street, Suite 400
San Francisco, CA 94105

East Bay Express interview

...with li'l ol' me, conducted by the dear Toshio Meronek about my new project! I hope this entices you to come visit the UC Berkeley MFA opening show which opens next week! AHHHHHHH!

 

"Liberating Liberace: Oakland Filmmaker Chris Vargas Remixes the Life of a Gay Idol"

 in Ear Bud: The Bay Area Music blog, East Bay Express

"I Can Feel It But I Don't Get It" video program

Tonight! If you're in Boston, I'd like to encourage you to attend this finely currated video program in the Boston LGBT Film Fest, "I Can Feel It, But I Don't Get It"!

"It's Cool, I'm Good" by Stanya Kahn, 2010, 35:27 min, Los Angeles, USA

Wednesday, May 11 9:30pm

"I Can Feel It, But I Don't Get It" in The Boston LGBT Film Fest

Curated by Jeannie Simms
@ The BRATTLE THEATER Harvard Square

40 Brattle Street

Cambridge, MA

TIX $9.75
STUDENTS: $7.75 (bring ID)

A Program of videos at the Boston LGBT Film Festival
Curated by Jeannie Simms

These pieces, all influenced by histories of cinema and contemporary video art explore various seen and unseen forces: materials, logics and pressures that ambiguously ooze into the frame unspoken by unsettling means.

LUCAS MICHAEL'S "El Maragato Barometrica" is a quiet video, sans dialogue, shot in Uruguay on a cell phone camera that documents a flooded house, a truck, it's attached hose, men at work and a slow, unexplained labor process. The eye witness immediacy of the low end video suggests a moment of crisis and delay on the brink of containment or collapse. (Uruguay/USA)

STANYA KAHN'S "It's Cool, I'm Good" follows an androgynously bandaged character with mysteriously attained full-body injuries who speaks to the camera from a bed in a hospital, to strangers at a fast food picnic table, in the belly of a world full of contaminated water, pus filled wounds, littered streets and corporately engineered hot dogs. (Los Angeles, USA)

Flipping by photo after photo throughout the decades at a breakneck clip, the 1970's, 80's, 90's and 2000's provide a backdrop of embarrassing teen hairdos, social and familial tensions and various cheap photo technologies in ALLYSON MITCHELL'S "My Life in 5 Minutes." Master paradigms hover and lurk as the narrative glides and lingers through moments of assimilation and refutation amidst swirling colors and inventive lo-fi animated techniques.
(Toronto, Canada)

"Falling in Love with Chris and Greg: Episode 2 Road Trip! TV Special" by CHRIS VARGAS and GREG YOUMANS uses the iconic American Road Trip, a typically liberating and transcendent cinematic motif, in which a gay/trans couple drive from the west coast into the American heartland chafing and squirming more vigorously under the social, political and biological possibilites of marriage and pregnancy as they pummel toward Vegas--chomping high-fructose snacks, sweating and swapping Native American vocabs as they go. (San Francisco, USA)


-by Jeannie Simms

Buy TIX here:
http://brattlefilm.org/2011/05/11/i-can-feel-it-but-i-dont-get-it/

 

Inarguably Uncertian: The 41st Annual UC Berkeley Master of Fine Arts Graduate Exhibition

My graduate thesis show is nearing its grand opening! Which means I'm about to graduate and I have a fresh new video project to share with the world! Liberaceón, a three-channel video installation with a 16 minute narrative at its center wherein I perform as the late great showman himself, Liberace! For those of you who don't know, I have been working on this for the greater part of my last year in the UC Berkeley MFA program and it is a story very dear to my heart. In this project, I rescript portions of the late showman's biography in order to insert him into a queer history of radical AIDS/HIV activism, but that's all I'm going to say (for now). You must see it to believe it, and believe me, the story I weave is unbelievable. I invite you to attend the opening (May 20th), as well as the artist talks (May 22th) to see for yourself!

Liberaceón video still (2011, 16 minutes)

Also on exhibit are the works of my six other amazing, brilliant, talented, and supportive classmates: Corinna Nicole Brewer, Chun-Shan (Sandie) Yi, Narangkar Glover, Plinio Alberto Hernandez, Merav Tzur, and David Gregory Wallace. Come meet 'em!

  

I'm also tickled pink to be named someone to "watch for" in this Bay Citizen blog post by Aimee Le Duc, An Art Lover's Survival Guide to Student Exhibition Season. Thanks, Aimee. Who knew!

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Opening Reception

Friday, May 20th, 2011, 5:30-7:30pm

Inarguably Uncertain: The 41st Annual UC Berkeley Master of Fine Arts Graduate Exhibition

May 20, 2011 - June 26, 2011
Berkeley Art Museum, Museum Lobby
2626 Bancroft Way
Berkeley, CA 94720


Sunday, May 22, 2011, 3pm
Artists' Talks
Berkeley Art Museum, Gallery 6
2626 Bancroft Way

Berkeley, CA 94720

Thank You & Merci, Philly et Montréal

 ...for such a lovely screening and for the longest and most engaged Q+A in recorded herstory at Penn on Wednesday evening! But especially for promoting the event so incredibly well. What a turn-out! Congrats to the newly formed Rethinking Queer group for the write-up on the event in the Daily Pennsylvanian. This was their first event! Thanks for the memories...

 

Now we're finally in Monréal! We narrowly missed our own Homotopia screening tonight at 2110 Centre For Gender Advocacy, for which we were 30 minutes late due to our first scary small-plane flight out of New Haven being delayed thus missing our connection in Philly, and having to take a much later plane into Canada...plus customs. But the show must and did go on. Thanks for your patience, Canada. You are a kind people. And you have such awesome queer community centres...

Comin' atcha: East Coast & Canada

Psst, I've got some stuff to tell you. Eric and I are about to embark on a mini tour making two stops on the East Coast and three in Canada. That means if you are in Philly, Middletown CT, Montreal, Ottawa, or Kingston, Ontario we're coming your way!!! We're alternately screening both Criminal Queers and Homotopia--but not at the same events. See below for details...

 

Wednesday, March 30, 2011 @ 7:00pm

Criminal Queers at Penn

Philadelphia, PA

Fisher Bennet Hall 401

Facebook event

 Thursday, March 31, 2011 @ 6:00pm

Criminal Queers at Wesleyan

Shanklin 107, Middletown, CT

Wesleying event page

&

Sunday, April 3rd, 2011 @ 7:00pm

Criminal Queers at University in Kingston, Ontario CANADA

Facebook Event

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Friday, April 1, 2011 7:00pm

 Montreal, Quebéc CANADA

2110 Centre for Gender Advocacy

2110 Mackay (between Sherbrooke and Maisonneuve)

Facebook event 
&

Monday, April 4, 2011 7:00pm

University of Ottawa, Agora CANADA

Facebook event

Original Plumbing BLOG post #7: Irina, Nico & Scenes Unseen

You may or may not have noticed that I did not post my usual Sunday blog interview last week. Let me just give it to you like the 1990s group SNAP and say, around here: it's gettin, it's gettin, it's gettin kinda hectic! My MFA graduation date is less than 2 months away and while interviewing my friends in these posts about their wonderful projects has been inspiring, I am ready to go full force into my own work and head! Stay tuned for details on the opening of the 41st Annual UC Berkeley, Master of Fine Arts Graduate Exhibition. Til then, look what I got for you this week...

For my grand finale OP blog post I have closed the circle. Back to my roots of 8 weeks ago. I have returned to talk to Irina Contreras (remember all the way back to post #1 on The Miracle Bookmobile?). This time though, I talk with her and her other collaborator: Nico Dacumos. The two of them make delicious and social food together via Lubao's Supper Club, and they are currently putting together a performance event for the National Queer Arts Festival called, Scenes Unseen. It is a show about gender, sexuality, nationality and border crossing--of all kinds.

But don't take my word for it, read all about it: HERE!


Thanks again for reading and reposting these posts, people. It was a fun li'l weekly project, and I sincerely appreciate all the kind words I received about it. Did I ever tell you you're my hero?

Original Plumbing BLOG post #6: Onya's Taste In Men

I'm 3/4 through with this OP blog writing assignment. Phew! I can almost see the finish line. Another race with another finish line that has been happening parallel to this one is my upcoming UC Berkeley MFA thesis (group) show on May 20th! Can you believe it's happening so soon? I can't...

Last week, in the vein of prepping for and stressing about thesis shows I talked to my friend Onya Hogan-Finlay about hers, called "My Taste In Men" which is solo (not group) and taking place down in the Roski gallery at USC.

Read the blog post here: Onya's Taste In Men

If you're in LA, please do check it out! The Miracle Bookmobile (from my first OP post) will be parked and slinging books at the closing reception.

Transbiological Body Event at NYU

I wrote a small piece on my video Extraordinary Pregnancies for a special issue of Women & Performance: a journal of feminist theory themed "The Transbiological Body." This event celebrates the release! Go check out the performance and pick up a copy!

Wednesday, March 9, 6:30-8:30

NYU Department of Performance Studies

721 Broadway, 6th floor studio
New York, NY

At Bay II: Selections from the 2010 Murphy, Cadogan and Phelan Awards

Hey party people! So, I won this award last Summer from the San Francisco Foundation (SFF) called the Murphy, Cadogan and Phelan Fellowship. It's open to MFA students in between their first and second years of their grad program, chosen from select schools here in the Bay Area.  Well, wouldn't you know it: I was one of the recipients chosen from UC Berkeley!


The SFF usually funds a big show of all the award winning work but this year, due to lack of money they decided not to. But we students got together and decided we wanted a show anyway so we coordinated with the Worth Ryder Art Gallery on the UC Berleley campus and made it happen! It opens this week, see details below...

March 9-19, 2011 | Reception Wednesday, March 9, 4-7 PM

“At Bay II” presents selected works by recipients of the 2010 Murphy,
Cadogan and Phelan Fellowship Awards, granted by the San Francisco
Foundation to students transitioning from their first to their second year
of graduate study in the Visual Arts. In support of these exemplary student
artists, the Murphy, Cadogan and Phelan Fellowships in the Fine Arts offer
 multiple awards of $3,500 to graduate students for continued academic study.

510-642-4582

 artdept@berkeley.edu

 http://art.berkeley.edu

Gallery Hours: Tuesday-Saturday 12-5 PM

116 Kroeber Hall (corner of Bancroft Way and College Ave)

http://www.worthrydergallery.org

Original Plumbing BLOG post #5: Getting Nutty with Lex Vaughn

For this week's Sunday OP blog post I interview the US-turned-Canadian [dual] citizen, creative comic genius, and heart throb: LEX VAUGHN! I am certain I've gushed about ol' Lexxy once before on this here blog, but this time it's personal! She's a riot and a productive tour de force, and she took the time this week to talk to li'l ol' me. I'm so flattered I could cry...

Read it and weep along with me: HERE!

Original Plumbing BLOG post #4: The Joy of Jason Fritz Michael

This week for my OP blog post I chat with dear friend Jason Fritz Michael! If you've seen any of my movies or videos it's likely you've seen his performing talent in action. But he's so much more than an actor in my work...

Read about his many talents HERE!

Original Plumbing BLOG post #3: Wu Tsang

This week I posted an interview that's been in the making since I got this weekly blogging assignment! A post I've been very excited to share with the Original Plumbing fans and readers. It's an interview with LA based artist Wu Tsang about his his film & club WILDNESS and his blog CLASS.

Wu Tsang photo by Ren'yo Hwang

Read the post HERE!

Are you bi-QUEEROUS?

Want to see how Greg Youmans and I do in our interview with our friend and talented filmmaker/musician H.P. Mendoza in his New Camp blog series on queerious.com?! Read HERE!

drawing by Jason Fritz Michael

Original Plumbing BLOG post #2

This week on my OP blog day, I'm proud to present to you my dear friend and acclaimed poet, Mr. J. Ely Shipley. It was recently pointed out to me that my OP blog entries are "very adult" and this person didn't mean in the "adult entertainment" sort of way. Adult in the age, kinda way. And to that I say, that's great! If adult means talking to your talented queer friends in depth about their creative process, BRING IT ON! Look at me, I'm embracing my budding Queer Elder status.

What some adult reading material?! READ THIS!

Ely and Joey: Argyle Becomes Them

Criminal Queers **almost there!!**

Wow, it's going on 4 years now! 4 years ago that Eric and I shot the first scene for the Homotopia sequel Criminal Queers. I don't remember what or when exactly that was but it's sometime around now, 4 years ago. I'm writing today to say, it's almost done! I swear, I'm not just saying it this time. Yes, I know I've been declaring it almost done for 2 of the past 4 years, but this time it's really true. We have an amazing editor, Hokulani Beale and she is cutting it the F up! It's starting to look like a real movie. A good movie, in fact. One you'd be chompin' at the bit to see! And this Sunday, we're shooting the final scene of the movie. A mass prison break! If you want to come, check out the Facebook event and contact me directly to confirm. No messin' around. We need to be absolutely sure who can come because 1. we're going to feed you and 2. we need to make sure we have enough orange "County Jail" jump suits for you all. This is so very important, so please consider showing up and helping us make prison abolitionist, queer visual history!

Then! Ready or not, we're screening a cut of the movie at UCSC on February 28th, 2011 at 7-9 PM! Whoa, right?! The clock is tickin'! We got some work to do. But, if you're in Santa Cruz you should absolutely come. It's guaranteed to be something else!

Original Plumbing BLOG post #1

This week kicks off two months worth of my blogging for Original Plumbing! I'm thrilled about talking to all the people I plan to talk to, then posting it for you to read on the internet-but I'm not giving any secrets away just yet. I want you to be suprised!

For my first post I talk to two very special and committed people, Kelly Besser and Irina Contreras about The Miracle Bookmobile of LA and Oakland. Read the entire interview: HERE!