Monday, March 26, 2007

In the future everyone will be famous for 15 minutes


Pascal Gielen eagerly signing a copy of his book "Een Omgeving voor Actuele Kunst" for Kris Motmans on 26 march 2004 in Gent, Belgium. I was a stakeholder and proof reader for this book and named this blog after it.

15 minutes of fame (or famous for 15 minutes) is an expression coined by the American artist Andy Warhol. It refers to the fleeting condition of celebrity that attaches to an object of media attention, then passes to some new object as soon as the public's attention span is exhausted. It is often used in reference to figures in the entertainment industry and other areas of popular culture.

Wednesday, March 07, 2007

100 Posts On Kawara is not Dead


Apart from using "Blogger" to 'blog', you can also use it to make art. In such a case "Blogger" is both the material used by the artist, as well as the platform where the artwork is presented.



On Kawara is a conceptual artist born in Japan in 1933. Since 1966 he has made a long series of "date paintings" (the "Today" series), which consist entirely of the date on which the painting was executed in simple white lettering set against a solid background. Other series of works include a series of postcards, "I Got Up At", rubber-stamped with the time he got up that morning, and a series of telegrams sent to various people bearing the message "I Am Still Alive".

As of 16 sep 2006 DDV is checking the obituaries in the newspaper every day to see if On Kawara is still alive.
He buys a copy of "De Standaard" newspaper and cuts out the page with the obituaries.

The newspaper page with the obituaries is pasted onto a memorial slab in the Bastard Art Gallery. Onto the page is stamped "On Kawara is not Dead" in red ink.
The names of the people listed in the obituaries are posted on a blog, along with a picture of the newspaper page every day.

As of today there are 100 posts on "On Kawara is not Dead".