Abandoned my billburg backyard (a rare occasion on a rainy Sunday) to make the hike uptown to investigate the Whitney Biennial yesterday. In the moments I wasn't distracted by a giddy post-Sweetwater mood, muscle twitching yoga pain (first time in 6 months) and watching people knock fur coats into hanging installations, I think I was able to absorb a thing or two. I felt a bit exhausted with some of the art about art stuff, just somewhat drained on closed-circuit and flighty nods to movements or notions past. Such art specimen are typically cited as "deceptively simple...deceptively this and that". I'm all for deceptive mechanisms to reveal some concealed honesty, but they can't be totally dull, unexciting or look like Santa Barbara ocean front art fair finds. I got wrapped up in some devastating/beautiful photo journalistic works, Schmit's mythological minotaur decaying with modern vices, and some really subtle and thoughtful films that used fiction as relevant metaphor. There was one dual projected reel with a 20 second delay between side-by-side frames, the slower projection coming through in ethereal blurs like memory lapses and disconnected thoughts. I found the technique simple yet intense in its portrayal of a fabricated tale of amnesia and the fragmenting mind of an old man. Contemplating re-visit, just avoid Sundays...
