Art Colony: Lots Of Things Like This

At last, I’m back to my duly appointed rounds in the art world. This week I took time out of my busy schedule of posing for statues and writing beautiful love poems, and went to see Lots of Things Like This at Apex Art . The show was curated by Dave Eggers of McSweeney’s and A Heart Breaking Work Of Staggering Genius fame, which is no small footnote to make. As a writer he’s good, but as an organizer and editor he’s phenomenal. He has an fantastic eye for mixing art and comedy, just like how I have an eye for the finer things in life like RingDings and smooth jazz music.

This exhibit is really freaking good. I mean it. Go and see this before it closes this weekend. I laughed out loud many times, which is not an easy thing to do in a gallery.

The exhibit features work from a wide variety of sources including Jean-Michel Basquiat, Leonard Cohen, R. Crumb, Henry Darger, Marcel Duchamp, David Shrigley, Shel Silverstein, and Kurt Vonnegut. Basically every artist that draws is in it. With a line up like that it seems pretty cool to start with, right? Well if you think that’s great, get this:

Here are the rules (also spelled “roolz” if you’re a 12 year old girl) for the exhibition: 1. It had to be an image 2. It had to have some words (referring to the image) and 3. It had to have a sense of humor.

Is your mind blown? Ok, I guess that’s not really mind blowing, but it’s still pretty cool. An exhibition with a sense of humor is something greatly lacking in the art world. There are about 150 pieces, some are really quick and funny, but some are large and take a while (and are funny).

In terms of art, I guess the works themselves are fine; a lot are pretty primitive and many are more cryptic than funny. I found the whole thing to be interesting none the less - more of an experiment about where humor and art intersect than an example of high art. In the end, that pretty much sums up Dave Eggers’ life. Everything is interesting, fairly humorous, and tinted with some sadness.

My point is that you definitely need to go see this show. My other point is that dreams do come true. My final point is that be careful when you throw glass in a house made out of stone because you could eventually step on it and get a big cut on your foot - and now you know the whole story.

LOTS OF THINGS LIKE THIS
291 Church Street
New York, NY 10013 USA
212 431 5270
April 2 - May 10, 2008

All photos courtesy of ASupremeNewYorkThing