Kelsey Bennett Photos!...Gawker Artists Print Shop Launch

Gawker Artists recently launched their online print shop! Produced by Society 6, the Giclée prints are printed on archival, acid free paper -- The quality is incredible!

My Work is available here:
Pie
Eyeballs

Cheap & Plastique @ Fountain Art Fair NYC

Fountain Art Fair is more than a white wall with carefully hung artwork. For one thing, it is on a boat, so you can't (really) use a level. Fountain is a space for splendor and spectacle. Cue some fantastic midnight mischief when a masked, befurred figure revved his chainsaw in the middle of the opening, silently menacing the display.

No artworks were harmed in the making of this moment.

Cheap & Plastique soldiered on, with artists Kelsey Bennett, Heather Morgan, Christine Navin and Nathan Wasserbauer making a charming debut at Fountain for the magazine.

The sights and sounds were overwhelming, from the expansive street art display to Jesus stripping down to the altogether. Drinks flowed and Miss Morgan achieved a new personal best in most hotdogs consumed in one day.

What is impossible to convey is the sound of the wind on the tent, the rolling of the waves, the laughter and noise of the crowd. Thank you to our hosts, our friends and our fellow exhibitors for making the boat rock!

Fountain Pt. I: Installed

The sun is shining and it is art fair season in New York. If you are in town March 3-6, please come to the Fountain Exhibit at the Chelsea Pier 66 on 26th St. Kelsey Bennett and Heather Morgan will be exhibiting there along with our comrades at Cheap & Plastique: publisher and photographer Christine Navin, and painter extraordinaire Nathan Wasserbauer.

The wind on the Hudson whipped the tent last night, our legs went wobbly beneath us, our fingers stiff and cold as the night wore away, but we got our show pretty much hung (thanks Alec!), and are very pleased with how it is coming together. A french fry celebration at Moonstruck we wish I had some Charlie Sheen to perk us up. Will have to settle for a mocha. Tonight we will finish things off with some mood lighting, some adjusting.

Tomorrow is our press day and Friday we are open to the public!

The Franco Piss Cup?

Help us name the 127 Hours Cocktail!!! We could stick with The Franco Piss Cup, but we wanna hear your ideas. Dare I say -- Urine for it?!

In the cocktail: Hendrick's gin, fresh lime, elderflower cordial, club soda, and yellow food coloring


Oh, you have what it takes to be the white swan, so spongy and light. But, cookie, let's see you as the black, unleash your crumbly terror! Our Golden Globes were as swinging as Ricky Gervais' pair. Cheers to a tasty Oscar season!

They Will Gutterally Charm the Hell Out of You!

If it's been a while since you've seen a band you're excited about, find out where
The Shining Twins are playing next and go!

Stumbled across the ethereal entrails of a white colt

What The Thunder Said...

What The Thunder Said, the title of gallery Lu Magnus' current exhibition, comes from T.S. Eliot's poem The Waste Land. As Lu Magnus puts it, "Not only does this fifth and final part of the poem (What The Thunder Said) delve into destruction and rebirth, it also makes us question what we all learned from the proceeding storm."

Starting with the black muff hat, at the opening of the exhibition last Friday the spectators were becoming one with the art.




Lu Magnus arrives on the Lower East Side with a vibrant HELL YES, promising us new talent and a thriving salon. The excitement of such a design brought an energetic coterie, despite the frigid night. We look forward to the future of the program at Lu Magnus.

Shot of the month...Bitch Club!

Bringing in 2011 with some tough soul, deep soul, and The Sweet Divines!

(New Year's Eve Soul party at The Bell House in Gowanus) They say "out with the old, in with the new", but soul never gets old.

Ms. Marva Witney, the headlining act for the evening and the opening act of 2011, brought us into the new year like we were being liberated by the words of a gospel preaching godmother of soul. "If you have trouble in your life, trouble with money, trouble with love, sometimes...you just got to sit down on it!" and sit down on it she did!...

From her throne, Soul Sister told us like it is...

She told us of her trials...

...and tribulations,

...her gratitude and her great, tough love.

Billy Prince (of The Precisions), earlier in the evening charmed the audience with his performance. A bouquet of roses and baby breath dwindled down over the course of a song as Prince, with deep sincerity and a heart melting smile, handed each flower to members of the audience . Another highlight of the evening was Witney and Prince's duet of It's a Man's World. I was gripping the stage!

The Sweet Divines (Below) warmed up this New Year's Night with their sparkle and deep, throaty soul. Keep track of The Sweet Divines! Join their mailing list! Because wherever they are more great soul is sure to follow.

The girl group with likeness to The Supremes and The Shangri-la's, have been the opening act to an impressive roster of soul performers. They open the show and then with their matching dresses (think fringe or sequins!), coordinated dance moves, and vocal brilliance they back up the headliner. Thank God! Because we cannot get enough!

and by the way ...

The Bell House has a great photo booth. Happy 2011 Pearl Divers!

Best Holiday Party of the Season!!!! Lite Brite Neon

We have not yet seen winter's first calendar day, months of darkness and cold stretch out before us with slushy streets and wind howling in the skyscraper canyons. At the Lite Brite Neon party, courtesy of the Brooklyn Guild and Textile Arts Center, the gaieties of the season were on full display. Several artists chiseled ice sculpture out front, a finely detailed owl and a working guitar with strings laid over frets of ice.


Inside, light, precious light. Lite Brite Neon installed neon lights of snowflakes in white and pale blue, and mistletoe. The neon cast a warm, ballroom glow over the wooden floors. Cupcake girls drifted through the crowd with trays of mini cakes in eggnog icing. The bar served a fragrant rum and pomegranate punch.

Then, a chorus swelled in song- the Brooklyn Ladies Choir. No strident glee club, their voices united in soft, clear loveliness. Drifting in their siren hymn, wondering at the impossible beauty of it, I felt this moment of divinity that is a woman's power. They soared through Dear Yoko, S.O.S., and A Place in the Sun.

It is enough to make us stop complaining about winter. Perhaps even for a whole week.

(Above: Ice guitar! complete with string and pick-ups. With the absence of the warm wooden body of a guitar, the sound was in fact icy cold -- like the high pitched sound of a holiday angel!)

Small Faces in Chelsea

On Saturday we strolled Chelsea, the one blessedly Santa-free location in Manhattan on the day of Santacon. On our way to see the Anselm Kiefer show at Gagosian, we ran into the "small faces" guy, Felix Morelo. Felix lives somewhere in that no man's land of East Willamsburg/Bushwick where one us keeps a painting studio. We first made his acquaintance at the Chinese takeout on Bushwick Avenue. A few weeks later the sidewalk in front of the studio had a block's length of small faces, drawn in chalk, greeting me by name.

Felix Morelo- artist, local eccentric, and drawer of small faces. And there he was in Chelsea on Saturday. He drew a line of small faces from 20th to 30th street along 10th Avenue, dragging himself on a milk crate as he drew his way down the street, cold hands covered in chalk. Each face is different, there are distinct characters in the rudimentary chalk visages. Some of them give a talk balloon shout-out to the passers-by who stop and talk to Felix while he works. "Hello, Thinley!", "Hello Heather!", they exclaim. The people we encountered passing the spontaneous exhibit all seemed to smile and wonder at the breadth of the display.

Cary Kwok's Obsession (Curated by Prabal Gurung)

Somewhere between ejaculation and elegance we find "Obsession". Who would have thought Audrey Hepburn's angelic face could so appropriately be paired with a semen splattered scrotum? The consistency in Kwok's style is what allows for such a union.

Attention to detail is a definitive quality of his work. When you go to the exhibit at The Flag Art Foundation look closely at the art and you will see how Kwok has beautifully and meticulously incorporated his signature into each piece of work...

The Factory @Party XPO

The DIY venue, Party XPO, still carries the eyeball scarring party store sign on the marquee, making it was easy to find amid the dark underbelly of the J train. Last night's organizers pulled out all the stops for a recreation of Warhol's Factory- the walls painted silver and black, giant mylar balloons flying overhead, seats for Beautiful People to lounge, a couple of sequined go-go girls, jerky in that 60's way. A giant, mad fish with glowing eye stared unblinking at us behind a staging area for the bands, who were all playing the Velvet Underground. The guests crowded in and completed the scene- the room was filled with bouffants and beatniks, metallic frocks and much eyeliner.

The Factory house band was played by Twin Guns, Madame Robot and the Lust Brigade, LoveStruck and Daddy Longlegs. The highlight for us was Twin Guns, we can't get enough of their 'verb drenched guitar. The Guns struck the perfect pose, deadpan and dark as the Undergound in their sunglasses and leather. They played some of our favorites, All Tomorrow's Parties and Here She Comes Now, with their trademark bad-assedness.