Fine Art World News

identify yourself!

2009-03-30T09:58:00.000-07:00

i posted this a while back on my own blog. but i thought it would be interesting to expand the audience a bit and see what others had to say about it. how do you identify yourself?

it's so easy. once you DO your calling, it's so easy to just say, "i am a truckdriver." "i am a mechanic." "i am a teacher." "i am an artist."i know truckdrivers. they drive trucks and get a paycheck every week or two. mechanics too. i know some. they turn their wrenches, they get a paycheck. teachers are the same. they pass on knowledge and understanding, do what they do, get some meager compensation for it. they do it because they have the call. because they need to. and they get paid to.so many people identify themselves by what they do with the majority of their time, or by what they do to earn money. "i'm a barista." "i'm a cashier." people who dig in the earth looking for old stuff call themselves archeologists. folks who look after other folks and recommend medications and treat maladies and sign their name illegibly call themselves doctors. by this identification process, i am not an artist. i am an apparel buyer or a keeper of records. i am not an artist.there, i said it. i am not an artist. i make art, but i am not an artist. or maybe, we need to rethink our position on this whole identity thing. maybe people who drives trucks across this great wide country, delivering milk and fruit and potatoes and oreos to grocery stores, and spend their off hours sitting at old wooden benches under bright lights, moving tiny gears and springs inside the body of an old clock should call themselves horologists. maybe people who fix cars and trucks during the day and also play in bands in small, smoky, dark bars at night should call themselves musicians. maybe people who make coffee for other people on one of those kooky retail schedules and still manage to ride their bikes 300 miles a week, gutting out grueling climbs, rising at 5AM to simply get a ride in, should call themselves cyclists. maybe people who devolop planograms for apparel sections in retail stores, and track warranty claims, and make spread sheets to keep track of department budgets, and who also make pictures with things like paper and canvas and pencil and ink and paint and pain and tears and laughter, should call themselves artists.maybe we should identify ourselves with our callings rather than our occupations. someday, we could be lucky enough to identify ourselves with our occupation and our calling because they will be the same. live the dream, or die trying.

Salt Lake City Fine Arts Examiner: THE ART ASSASSIN: Entroducing qi peng's performance art as a critic...

2009-02-14T14:37:00.001-08:00

Salt Lake City Fine Arts Examiner: THE ART ASSASSIN: Entroducing qi peng's performance art as a critic...

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Call for Entries

2009-01-25T07:23:00.000-08:00

Dirty Show 10th Anniversary
The Greatest Erotic Art Show On Earth!
February 6 - 14 , 2009 • Detroit, USA

The Call for art is "Officially" Closed.
The Jury has poured through thousands of submissions sent in,
and we would like to thank everyone who participated in the Dirty Show 10th Anniversay Call for Art.

While the Call is Officially Closed, we never discourage artists from submitting
artwork, you may continue to send in submissions, all of the same guidelines
must be adhered to, and no guarantees are made.

The Dirty Show® X is your opportunity to be part of history.
We started ten years ago because it was what we wanted. None of us could have believed that the Dirty Show would have evolved into the gigantic international art exhibition that it is today. Not the amount of art displayed, or the multitudes of patrons, but the imagination and quality of the erotic works we hang on the walls. Participating artists continue to amaze and astound us with their vision. This year we are not only making the Dirty Show bigger, with added exhibit space and an expanded museum store, but we are planning simultaneous satellite Dirty Shows located all over the world. This will allow artists even more erotic opportunities, and help create a greater sense of community worldwide.

We hope to commemorate this show with a book, as well as additional on-line opportunities for artists to sell their work, and a “best of” tour.

This is THE show you want to be in.

In addition, this year we are offering over $1,000 in cash and prizes, including $500 for Best of Show (any category), as well prizes for Painting, Photography, Sculpture, New Media and All Around Dirtiest.

Please read and understand the submission process before sending.
If you have questions regarding the submission process email them HERE.
Do Not use the SUBMISSION EMAIL link below.

There is no jury fee for artwork submitted before Dec 15th 2008.

• Our Call for Submissions is open to Artists from anywhere in the world.
• Artists working in all media are invited to submit recent Erotica (created within the last two years).
• All artists must be at least 18 years of age.
• Artists should have documented/ signed model releases stating that their models are at least 18 years of age*.
• Content is totally up to you, as long as the submissions are EROTIC.
• All submissions must be of original design and personal execution.
• Art submitted to previous Dirty Shows will not be accepted.

SUBMISSIONS: Deadline: December 15, 2008
Please follow the submission guidelines set out below.
Failure to follow these basic guidelines may result in your work
being omitted from the selection process.

ALL SUBMISSIONS MUST BE SENT IN DIGITAL / EMAIL FORM.
SEND ALL SUBMISSIONS IN THE SAME (ONE) EMAIL.
DO NOT SEND MULTIPLE EMAILS.

• Artists may submit a maximum of four (4) pieces.

• Painting/Illustrations/Photography:
Submit no more than one (1) Digital photo/scan of each piece.

• Sculpture & Multi-Dimensional Art:
Submit no more than three (3) digital photos per piece.

• Film/Video:
3 stills and a brief description, or you may email a hosted link to a video file.

• Performance Art and Installations:
Email proposal, 100 words or less, or you may email a hosted link to a video file, (i.e. YouTube, etc.).

Submission Method EMAIL: Email All Submissions Here
(CLICK HERE WHEN READY TO SUBMIT)

Email must Include:
Artist’s Legal Name, AND Professional Name, if different.
Street Address, City, State, Postal Code.
Country, if non-U.S.
Telephone contact number.

For each piece submitted, include the following:
Title(s).
Medium.
Physical dimensions of piece(s).
Approximate price range.

Submission image requirements:
Digital photos/scans should be saved as
Jpegs, in RGB format (300kb files or less).

Images must be named in the following manner, the artist’s last name, a short title, and a number (i.e. “Jones_Naked_1.jpg”, “Jones_Legs_2.jpg, etc.)

Send image files as attachments in your email only, using the above email link.
Do Not send Compressed, Zipped or Stuffed folders.
Do Not send your submissions as a link to your website or image gallery.
Send all images in the same email.
Do not send submissions to any other Dirty Show email addresses, especially older ones from previous shows, many are inactive and your submissions will just get lost in the dead email bin.

Film/Video & Performance Submission Method:
Do not email a video file directly, only email a hosted link to your video file, (i.e. YouTube, etc.).

Selection and Notification of Acceptance:
December 20 through January 1, 2009. We will notify you, please do not email us inquiring as to the status of your submission(s).
Artists with works selected for the show will be notified, via email, phone, or by mail.
Upon acceptance, artists will receive registration information.
Over-sized pieces incur higher shipping rates; you may wish to consult your shipping carrier first before submitting.

Fees: There is no submission fee. Accepted artists will incur a single $15.00 registration fee (per artist, not per piece).
Accepted artists will receive complementary admission to the exhibition.

The Dirty Show retains a 30% commission on all sales made during the exhibition.
All art submitted and accepted to the show must be for sale.

How the work is judged.
Other than legal age requirements, nothing is censored, nothing is too filthy or too subtle. All art is considered, from the high to the low, from the biggest names to the first timers. We want to be taken into your world. We want to be impressed, amazed, enlightened, entranced, excited, astounded, humored or even repulsed —we love it all.

Like any art piece, we ask “Do we like it?” And even if we don’t like it, can we appreciate it, does it engage the viewer? The formula is 1) Eroticism, 2) Execution, 3) Originality, and 4) what we call the X Factor- the ever-changing and unexplainable something that makes a work special. We try to take everything into consideration, which works for the artist and in cases, can work against them. We consider traditional fine art nudes as well as edgier vanguard and outsider styles and judge accordingly. A realistic oil is going to be held to different standards that a folk art piece. We mix it up, and try to judge each piece on it’s own merits.

*Photographers should be prepared to provide signed, dated model releases for verification upon our request. Failure to provide these documents may result in your work being omitted from the selection process.

Personal information collected by us is never sold or traded.

don't worry about him. he'

2008-12-08T11:44:00.001-08:00

A Mindful Christmas

2008-12-03T16:57:00.001-08:00

It seems we're in a recession and we could all use a little assistance this year. I've been working with a very creative author, Barbara E. Kilikevicius. She's written an eBook called "A Mindful Christmas". It's been talked about on BookStorePeople.com and she has an interview on BlogTalkRadio.

This book offers great ideas and projects to make your holiday less about spending and more about creating... bringing the spirit of the season into your home. Visit her site for a free Holiday Blues Guide and a chance to read more about this amazing book.

Happy Holidays,

a new piece

2008-11-07T08:45:00.001-08:00

i just finished a new piece. i'll be bringing it along with me to the rocky mountain art fair. i'll be doing a demonsration of relief printmaking there next weekend, but most of the work i'll have on display will be of the monotype variety. still, it's a little window into my soul.

a new contributor with a new outlook

2008-11-07T08:25:00.000-08:00

i got an invititation from shadna to contribute to this blog. i suppose he is looking for some new perspectives and some insight into the minds of the artists he and his galleries represent. but for me, this was an incredibly difficult excercize to wrap my head around. i used to say that if i could use words as an effective means of communication, i wouldn't need to make the pictures i make. but that's sort of a cop out. now, i'm not going to give you a step by step process, pointing out each nuance of thought because that would rob you of some of the magic. you don't really WANT to know how a magician pulls off that perfect trick, do you? i didn't think so. but, it might be good to know just enough to make yourself even more curious.

so, when i was accepted to the inaugural show of a gallery to debut in brooklyn this weekend, i decided to take the opportunity to give both you and me a better understanding of what goes on in this more than slightly disturbed brain. aeonlogic gallery will be opening tomorrow at 4 malcolm x blvd in brooklyn, and feature not only work by artists, but also a statement of motivation to make the art. it's a bit of a rejection of photos of poop that seem to be altogether a bit too prevelent in the art world these days, and an attempt at a return to a more human approach to storytelling. i am not an expert in all things art-worldly by any means, and so if i am missing the point of poop photography, i apologize. but i do like what this gallery is trying to do. so when i was invited to participate, i accepted happily despite the fact that i would have to stretch beyond my comfort zone and try to make sense of my work for the benefit of the audience, if not for my own. below is an excerpt from my attempt at the logic behind my work. i hope i didn't give away too much of myself. i like to be a little mysterious...

I wish I were a storyteller. I wish I were articulate enough to bend the ears and capture the imaginations of those around me with my tales of life and love and legacy, to have my words flow from my lips like a mountain stream trickling around rocks and roots, collecting into a crystal clear mirrored pool in the valley.

I am not. There is this disconnect between my brain and my heart, between my brain and my soul. I have tremendous difficulty deciphering my own hopes and dreams, let alone spinning a yarn that will hold captive the minds of others.

But sometimes, things click. The pawls align, the gears engage, and an image flows from my hand like that stream from the mountaintop. Collecting its tributaries one after the other, building in volume and strength, becoming a powerful river until it pours onto paper like so much water into that lake in the valley. Often, I have to keep these images close by, constantly looking for that place in my mind or my heart or my soul where they might have come from. But they don’t seem to fit anywhere very neatly. They do, however fit in between. Between my heart and soul, between my heart and mind, between waking and dreams, between disappointment and regret, between life and death, between sin and redemption.

They narrate for me what my words could not; what my mind or heart or soul could not have done alone. They pull from all sources the shattered pieces and make them whole, to make available to the viewer that which sloshes around inside me like a whirlpool. When asked what my work is about, I used to say that if I had the words to describe it, I wouldn’t need to make the pictures to begin with. But that is a cheap cop out. It isn’t true. My work is about where people live. Not on the mountaintop, or the pool in the valley, but on the slopes. In between.

Maybe I am a storyteller…

Mark Phelan
6 November 2008

Albert Wang's Fav Lower East Gallery to Close!

2008-11-06T14:42:00.000-08:00

Circlegal Featured in Gavin's Underground

2008-10-23T14:41:00.000-07:00

We would like to congratulate Circlegal (Michelle Kurtz) on her interview on Gavin's Underground a popular blog about the art and music worlds of SLC.

Circlegal is represented by Iao PROJECTS and is the most prolific and poetic artist in our roster if not in Salt Lake City today. Her images are whimsical, socially aware, and conceptually stimulating. Think 1980's Pop Artist Keith Haring (image below) and you'll begin to understand the importance of her work in Utah. But, you don't have to take my word for it. Click Here to read the interview and view the works your self!

Iao PROJECTS Kilby Court Benefit Show | October 29th

2008-10-14T19:13:00.000-07:00

It's a Shoe-In | Ballet West's Point Shoe Art Competition

2008-10-08T14:25:00.000-07:00

In 2009 Ballet West will celebrate the 100th Anniversary of the Ballets Russes—the legendary dance company founded by Serge Diaghilev that first introduced the 20th century icons Igor Stravinsky, Pablo Picasso, Coco Chanel, and George Balanchine to the world stage. He threw together painters and choreographers; poets and composers and out of these unlikely collaborations sprang extraordinary ballets such as Afternoon of the Faun, Petrouchka, Firebird, Rite of Spring, Apollo, and Parade.

In the same spirit of collaboration and invitation that inspired Diaghilev at the start of the 20th century, Ballet West would like to reach out to the artistic community here in Utah to see what you have to offer now in the 21st century.

This is what we propose:

We would like to give you one pair of pointe shoes. And we would like you to give us back a piece of art.

The theme is "Brave New World". Every ballet in the 2008-2009 Ballet West season (with the exception of the Nutcracker) is new to Ballet West. The ballets travel from a magical island in the Caribbean to Japan to the Middle East to the mountainous terrain of the Caucasus to the perfumed salons of Paris.

You can do whatever you want with these shoes—including re-imagining or re-shaping them all together! Anything goes as long as the end result is [a] transportable and [b] non-perishable. We want to encourage you to explore all kinds of mediums and to push the
boundaries.

The shoes will be displayed in the lobby of the Capitol Theater during the run of each ballet, so the sooner that you, the artist, complete your piece, the more exposure it will get. In the end the shoes will be auctioned off at the Ballet West Fashion Show (May 30th) with all
proceeds going to Ballet West. What you, the artist, get in return is exposure to thousands of our audience, donors, and patrons—many of whom buy and collect art as well as have an avid interest in promoting the arts here in Utah and the careers of Utah artists. But it doesn't
stop there. Like Diaghilev, it is Artistic Director Adam Sklute's vision to work with Utahan artists on future ballets. That could mean commissioning a score, collaborating on a "site specific" work, or even a new full-length story ballet with costumes and sets designed by
a local artist. Anything can happen, but the first step is the shoes.

Please submit your sketches to this email address to submissions@balletwest.org as soon as possible so we can put together a list of artists to distribute the shoes to. Regrettably pairs of shoes are limited so we will be going with the most unique designs with the fastest execution.

Good luck and we look forward to seeing your work—

Jami Lynn Vienneau and Christopher Renstrom

Ballet West Ambassadors

337 Project | Urban Gallery |

2008-10-01T15:50:00.000-07:00

Ever since the 337 Project splashed down a year ago, Salt Lake City has been caught on a wave of contemporary art and expression. The 337 Project hopes to continue adding to the wave with it's latest exhibition "Urban Gallery".

Urban Gallery is a large outdoor exhibition focusing on the transformation of the urban landscape. The show will be unveiled this Friday at 7pm at the Neighborhood House (1050 w. 500 s.) with live music, food and entertainment.

Like all of the 337 Project events, this promises to be a big one.

Cheers,

Record Month for Iao Gallery Sites

2008-09-30T19:44:00.000-07:00

We broke 1,000 unique visitors to our site this month!

Just so you understand the significance of this, we started the year with an average of only 150 visitors per month and over the spring and summer increased that to an average of 600 visitors. This month we smoked our previous record of 800 visitors. It's a sign that we're moving in the right direction and surely gaining ground as an online presence.

Thanks to all of our wonderful artists, followers, patrons, and supporters. We'd love to hear from you on how to improve our pages for a more pleasant online viewing experience. Email your comments to me at shadna@gmail.com.

Cheers,

S

Damien Hirst - Creating a New Art Market

2008-09-17T08:30:00.000-07:00

This week is a historical week in the world of art as contemporary British artist Damien Hirst makes history by selling his art without a dealer!

The past two days Hirst has been selling his collection at Sotheby's. The collection was 223 works that ranged from small drawings to animals preserved in tanks of formaldehyde. The auction ended yesterday with a total of $200.7 million in sales greatly exceeding the auction house estimate of $177.6 million. This is also historic as this is the largest sale for a single-artist auction which was made in 1993 by a collection of 88 pieces by Picasso which sold for $20 million.

It goes to show how strong the art market is and the value of art as an investment in these economically hard times (for the US at any rate) where large US financial institutions are being bailed out, sold off, or liquidated. It seems that the art market once again triumphs and exceeds expectations.

I'd suggest that the most secure long term investment is Art. Not only financially but, emotionally as well. Nothing enriches your life like the ownership of fine works of art.

For more information on the art market I suggest this interactive report from last year by MSN Money called "Art Goes Boom!".

Cheers,

Shadna

qi peng as solo artist leaving Iao PROJECTS

2008-09-10T15:27:00.000-07:00

His work can be found at Ugallery in Scottsdale, AZ as well as his collaborative work with Michelle Kurtz (Circlegal) in the pair Kurtz + peng. He will be searching for solo gallery representation (apart from Ugallery) in other cities (or SLC) for his abstract paintings and photographs.

Thanks so much for supporting Iao PROJECTS and good luck!

take care, Albert

Bhutanese Spiritual Art Exhibition

2008-09-06T15:34:00.000-07:00

An interesting article regarding a touring exhibition of Bhutanese Tantric Buddhist Art. I'm especially drawn to the amazing culture and spiritual theology of the work and the area from which it comes. Perhaps you are too? It is currently being shown at the Rodin Gallery in NYC.

This article is featured on the New York Times website which you can visit by clicking here.

Namaste,

Shadna

SLC Weekly Article

2008-09-05T15:15:00.000-07:00

Thought you might be interested to read what Salt Lake City Weekly had to say about IAO PROJECTS. This is all due to the hard work of Albert Wang (Director of IAO PROJECTS). It's a great story and I hope you get a chance to read it. As we gain more media coverage I'll be posting those articles on our blog.

Cheers,

Shadna

Click Here for the full story...

Shadna Design Live!

2008-09-04T16:55:00.001-07:00

Grand news! I've finally finished construction on the latest addition to Iao-Gallery.com called Shadna Design!

This page is set up for our new web and graphic design wing. At this point it is representing my own work as a freelance designer however, as we grow I hope to make this a full department of the Iao Gallery family. We've already begun the process of finding additional artists/designers that will assist in this project. In fact it is my main vision to have sites that are created by or conceived by contemporary artists (both "known" and "un-known")

We are still in the early stages but, have come a long way since we began a month ago. The portfolio is growing rapidly and I'm hoping for the best as we move forward. The name may change and the field of specialty may grow however, the concept will remain the same. That concept is to create websites that are creative, asthetically appealing, and most importantly, affordable.

Visit the site today and refer the people you know that are looking for a website.

Cheers,

Shadna

Let's Swoon!

2008-08-13T15:25:00.000-07:00

Let's celebrate the positive street art and sense of community through New York's street artist Swoon. Along with Banksy, her quiet commentary about the nature of life and city living thrusts us into a higher consciousness.

Do check her work out!

Podcast for Families

2008-08-08T08:51:00.000-07:00

The Met releases another podcast for it's younger listeners "Aesop's Fables". A fantastic podcast that teaches the values of timeless morals in entertaining stories for all. So, grab a blanket, sit back, and enjoy some amazing journeys with your family or on your own.

Cheers,

Shadna

| Aesop's Fables (download) |

Past story time podcasts from The Met

| Peach Blossom Spring |

| Ananse the Spider |

Art Grave Robbers!

2008-08-07T07:59:00.001-07:00

Props to our personal favs:

Marcel Duchamp
Christopher Wool
Elaine Sturtevant
Richard Prince
Richard Pettibone
Douglas Gordon
and
Maurizio Cattelan

Thanks for robbing the art graves and giving back to the community... peace...

Van Gogh's Latest!

2008-07-30T10:15:00.000-07:00

A new work by Vincent Van Gogh was recently discovered beneath "Patch of Grass" using new techniques and technology to see below the existing painting. The piece discovered (see image above) is that of an unknown woman.

"Patch of Grass" was painted in France in 1887 and is currently owned by Kröller-Müller Museum.

This opens the door to discovering other hidden works by past artists and marks an exciting turn in the world of art!

Cheers,

Shadna

Sarah Lucas is our favorite anti-hero!

2008-07-28T10:29:00.000-07:00

Here is a wonderful link to Sarah Lucas' work collected at the Tate (click here).

I always dug her ability to combine throwaway jokes with a serious and geared interest in political and gender issues. Whether it's football (European) or food imagery, Lucas always represented to me the genius of a female artist.

Hope that you can relish her works seen in the links above.

The Russians strike again!

2008-07-23T06:47:00.000-07:00

Art shock troops mock Russian establishment

By Thomas Peter 24 minutes ago

Carrying bags of stolen groceries, Oleg Vorotnikov takes out the batteries of his mobile phone before entering the secret headquarters of his underground art collective on the outskirts of Moscow.

"This is to prevent the cops from listening in," said Vorotnikov, a 29-year-old art graduate, who with other politically conscious artists co-founded the Voina, or War, collective in 2007.

"Once a drunk artist introduced us to bystanders as 'Russia's main radical group' -- that's when I understood that we have to do something together," Vorotnikov said.

In a country where traditional opposition to the government has been dulled by public apathy and a diet of pro-Kremlin television news, these artists take a different approach: they poke fun at the establishment, and the more absurd the better.

They hunch over laptops in their headquarters -- a garage -- editing video of their latest piece of guerrilla street theater: an impromptu tea party in a police station.

For the lack of chairs they sit on chests of drawers and a TV set. Cameras, camcorders and books of poetry are scattered over the floor.

"We always do things that violate rules. We combine art and politics to achieve something new," said Kotyonok, a slightly built young woman who teaches physics at a Moscow university and who only gave her nickname, which means kitten.

"People watch us and are simply shocked."

Voina became a household name in the Russian blogger scene with a stunt intended as a wry commentary on the handover of power -- decried by opponents as undemocratic -- from former President Vladimir Putin to his successor, Dmitry Medvedev.

A day before the presidential election that Medvedev won by a landslide, five couples, including one heavily pregnant woman who gave birth four days later, secretly undressed in Moscow's Biological Museum.

With video cameras rolling, they had sex in front of a banner calling for copulation in support of "the bear cub-successor" - a pun on Medvedev's family name, which is derived from the Russian word for bear.

EVICTED

Blogs carrying photos and videos of the event shot to number one in Russian Internet rankings within 24 hours.

Some users called the participants "freaks," "sh--eaters" or "animals." One blogger suggested they should be shot. When the mother of the pregnant woman saw her having sex on television, she threw her out of home.

Voina said they had to leave their old headquarters under pressure from the authorities but few members have yet to face the full weight of the law for their activities.

The group is most vulnerable to the catch-all "hooliganism" charge that could lead to a short prison term, but only one member is currently facing prosecution for throwing cats during one performance.

Voina's actionist art draws on Moscow Conceptualism, a movement that started in the 1970 with performances subverting socialist ideology. Given the repressive nature of the Soviet state, these happenings had to take place secretly.

Only when state control over the arts receded during Mikhail Gorbachev's perestroika reforms in the 1980s could artists take their events into the public sphere.

In April 1991 members of a group around Anatoly Osmolovsky, a Russian artist, art theorist and curator, lay down on Red Square forming the word "khui," Russian for cock, with their naked bodies.

Voina members describe the happening as inspiring but add that it would be impossible today in an "authoritarian Russia" where, nevertheless, they have earned the respect of some in the mainstream art scene.

"In the '90s art fell under the influence of a society that was becoming more and more bourgeois: artists happily turned into conformists," said Andrei Yerofeyev, who until last month was head of modern art procurement at the state-run Tretyakov Gallery.

"Only in the last year a strain of protest art reappeared, one that takes a critical line, reflects, takes a step back and sometimes cynically, sometimes comically, describes what is going on in our society."

Back in the Voina headquarters the activists scramble around a laptop computer trying to improve the sound of their latest video to make it fit for Internet publication.

Shaky images, filmed with a hidden camera the day before Medvedev's inauguration, show the artists dishing out cream cakes and tea in a police station.

Watched by a stunned officer, they pin Medvedev's portrait to a wall. "We invite you to celebrate with us the inauguration of the new president," one activist can be heard saying.

Attempting to remove the intruders, the officer resorts to verbal abuse. "We have to fix the sound, you can't hear anything," said Kotyonok, twitching the dials on the video- editing software.

UNDERGROUND WAKE

In another piece of performance art, the group rigged up a table in a metro carriage, brought out food and vodka and held a wake for absurdist poet Dmitry Prigov.

They also marked international workers' day by going in to a McDonald's restaurant and throwing live cats at the counter staff. The idea, they said, was to help snap the workers out of the dull routine of menial labor.

Behind the bizarre stunts, the artists who make up Voina have a serious political agenda.

"If the authorities say 'we are building a strong state,' an artist should show that this is not the case. If they say 'we are improving the lives of the people,' an artist should show that this is a lie," said Vorotnikov over dinner, tearing off a hunk of the chicken he earlier stole from a supermarket.

But they say their work is also a journey of self-discovery, to see how far they can push their own boundaries as artists and radicals.

"We hate cops but if we just attacked them like that, they would jail us immediately. So we hide our hatred behind art so they can't get us and we achieve our aim quicker," said Kotyonok.

The authorities have dealt harshly with overtly political opposition but to date there has been no sign of a crackdown on Voina. Acting under the aegis of art protects them to a large extent, she said.

"We've had sex in public and are no longer scared of it. We've invaded a police station and are no longer scared of it. What else is there to scare us?," asked Kotyonok.

"Death we will deal with in the future. Soon we will be completely fearless."

(Editing by Sara Ledwith and Jon Boyle)

Great Video...

2008-07-08T09:59:00.000-07:00

This is a great video that I like and has been viewed nearly 5 Million times since it was released 2 weeks ago on YouTube... I think it's a great example of the human spirit and my favorite piece of video art so far this year... The artist is Matt Harding and it's amazing to see everywhere he went. You'll be surprised if you watch the whole thing...

Enjoy!