Art - The Canvas

Tomorrow at 6:30, David Choe will be at SFMOMA's Haus Atrium signing copies of his awesome street art coffee table book*:

This dynamic monograph captures the frenetic raw energy and gorgeous, intense work of gallery and street artist David Choe. From dropping out of art school to a stint in Japanese prison to representation by the Lazarides Gallery alongside Banksy, Choe's wild ride through the art world is represented by a major selection of images, and narrated throughout by Choe himself. Graffiti, murals, paintings, sketchbook pages, photographs, toys, t-shirts, collages, artwork created with blood, and more fill the kinetic pages — all annotated by the artist in a voice that matches the funny, frantic, daredevil nature of the work itself. Join us and meet as David Choe signs copies of his new book. (link)

The book's highlights include an entire page of iPhone sexts, a Korean bodega owner with a pitbull and a TEC-9, and matzo getting wasted off of Manischewitz.  You can buy the book for $45 tomorrow at SFMOMA or get it on Amazon $30.

* I know "coffee table book" can be insulting, but it's a hardcover book of street art, tits, iPhone text messages and blood.  What the fuck did you expect?

Previously on Uptown Almanac

• ANOTHER BADASS MOVIE AT THE ROXIE: Dirty Hands: The David Choe Feature Film

Unfortunately, the artist's face is in the frame.  Stop thinking this show is all about you, bro.

John Waters, Hollywood Smile Train, 2009. C-prints, edition of 5, 26 3/4 x 20 3/4 inches framed. Courtesy of Rena Bransten Gallery, San Francisco, CA

John Waters' fourth solo exhibition at Rena Bransten Gallery entitled, Rush, is now on view through July 10th. The exhibition, aptly titled after Rush liquid incense, the alkyl nitrites inhaled for recreational purposes (more commonly referred to as "whip-its" by the kids I roll with) gives you just that. 

Rush boasts a comical fiberglass mixed-media sculpture of Ike Turner forcing his puppet, a fur coat and pink dress clad Tina Turner to perform a sassy dance. Other memorable works are the film stills of Hollywood stars appropriated onto butts, poking fun at the filmie technique of Rear Projection (the works title) and appropriately finishing the sequence of photographs with "the end," a perfect double entendre! The piece, Hollywood Smile Train, is composed of images of Tom Cruise, Hitchcock, Meryl Streep, and other celebs with harelips, and not in that hot Joaquin Phoenix kind of way.

The exhibition also incorporates a series of photographs taken from the movie set of Pecker, the 1998 comedy written and directed by Waters about a young photographer plucked from Baltimore and promised to become a New York art star. The stills challenge the contemporary idea of the art worlds relationship with celebrity, its obsession with the next big thing, and the excitement and sadness it all incorporates. 

The exhibition is an insiders peek into the film and art world as seen by Waters, but manages to keep outsiders in on the joke too. The exhibition ends July 10th.

Lots of good art around the city this week bros.

Photo was taken by Ramona Wheelright.  I wish I knew who drew it because it's fucking rad.

You can go grab this piece (and others like it) at Fabric 8 on 22nd and Valencia.  The perfect gift for the cracked out dog lover in your life! (photo)

Lastly, this was found outside the 111 Minna.  It's likely cooler than anything you'll find in the gallery. (photo by Beej Weir)