Five Years of Bloggy Wisdom.

Maybe my jetlag is making me all goofy and euphoric, or perhaps it’s just the absolute joy of waking up in my own bed for the first time in almost a month, but I feel absolutely celebratory.

Happy 5 year blog-aversary to me!

That's right. I've been whinging for 5 whole years now. Click here to read my first, very whingey post titled: "France: Not all it's cracked up to be."

My first blog post was just dripping with disappointement in regards to France. Five years later my feelings for France aren't nearly as dramatic. What I feel now can only be described as... a light-hearted indifference.

But like I said then: At least the food is good.

How to Bang & Burn.

Hot on the heels of my guest post about "What I Learned From Running My Own Art Gallery", I figured this would be the a perfect moment to segway into telling you about my latest big project.

A few months ago I got the idea for a traveling, no-walls gallery while listening to an Art Heroes Radio podcast. Philip Huang was talking about how he opened a theatre in his spare bedroom because he couldn't find an affordable theatre where he could produce his one-man shows and performance works. I thought to myself: “Uhm, I should do that.”

My partner in crime, and fellow artist, Charlie Grosso and I have been wanting to work together on a project for about two years now. The idea of producing our own exhibitions and events seemed to fit the bill perfectly. Last month while I was in New York we decided to put our heads together and just do the thing. Less than six weeks ago we officially formed Baang & Burne Contemporary.

Our plan is simple yet ambitious: To produce 4-6 exhibition events a year in cities in the US and Europe. I say it’s ambitious because the goal is to pull off each event with a minimal budget while putting together a quality exhibition. The ‘Big-Picture’ goal of each event is to introduce each of the artists to possible new collectors in a new geographic region, or just a new group of people even in their own backyard. In other words, each event is not just about showing the work and adding a line to a CV, but about promoting increased future sales by engaging new audiences through relationship and community building.

Now here’s where it gets really exciting. Instead of using the traditional “pop-up” gallery that takes over a commercial space or store front for a limited time, we’re going to create a series of private “one night only” events with a much smaller cozy guest list of individuals. Most of the events will actually take place in a private home and will be by invitation only. Of course invitation only doesn’t mean exclusive. Anyone has the chance to be invited simply by getting onto our invite list.

Baang and Burne’s first event will take place in New York City on September 26th, 2010 with New York City artist Jane Zweibel. To say the least, we are excited! As usual more details will be forthcoming.

In my next post I’ll answer the question: “Who the hell are Baang and Burne?”

"Hey, Whatever Happened to the Art Shop?"

Unless you too happen to be an artist, most of you reading this might not know about Alyson Stanfield’s Art Biz Blog, but you should. And I'm not just saying that because last week I was the featured guest post writer.




Most of you know that back in 2008 I set up and shared a gallery space in my city with another artist. The whole experiment lasted about a year or so before I pulled the plug. If you want to hear my take on what I learned from the experience of running my own gallery, you should definitely head over.