Best in Show: 2011

This is my third annual round up of the best art shows of the year (see 2010 and 2009).

1 Mark Leckey at Printemps de Septembre

2 Friedrich Kunath at Whitecube Hoxton Square

3 Christoph Buchel's Piccadilly Community Centre

4 Thomas Hirschorn at the Swiss Pavillion at the Venice Biennale

5 Wolfgang Tilmans at Andrea Rosen (chosen by Beatrix Ruf)

6 The launch of French Riviera gallery culminating in the brilliant Les Televisions

7 Without Sanctuary (thought this was far more than exhibition and shouldnt really be judged in these confines)

8 Ostalgia at the New Museum (glimpse of Michael Schmidt U-NI-TY installationbelow)

9 Il Labirinto di Cristallo at Bubblebyte.org

10 The New Psychedelica at MU (I know I curated this but I was so pleased with the outcome and it was so important to me it would be ridiculous not to choose it. Still from Carlos Laszlo's film below)

New Psychedelica Editions

The limited edition prints by Paul B Davis (the top image which says Critical Space when you cross your eyes) and Yoshi Sodeoka are both now for sale on the MU website .

Its hard to see the detail on the site but both are beautifully produced numbers at a bargain price. Yoshi's image above is from the same film but the print is of a different still. Just wanted to give you the sensation.

MU TV

The New Psychedelica from stichting MU on Vimeo.

The New Psychedelica opening and me. For those who like TV.

A to Z of The New Psychedelica

For background on the show which opened at MU in Eindhoven last weekend, here is an A to Z of The New Pyschedelica

A Altered States (1980) directed by Ken Russell

B BYOB (Bring Your Own Beamer): byobworldwide.com

C Cassette Playa clothing: http://www.cassetteplaya.com/blog/

D Downloading.

E Everythingisterrible.com

F From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Steward Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the Rise of Digital Utopianism by Fred Turner (2006)

G Game Music: vgmusic.com

H Hologram City http://hologramcity.blogspot.com/

I Is the Internet Changing The Way You Think? Edited by John Brockman (2011)

J JG Ballard’s Collected Short Stories

K Kaleidoscopes.


L The Long Tail performance lecture by Mark Leckey

M Glitch Studies Manifesto

N Neon.

O Information Overload:

P Post Internet Art

Q Quivering images

R Rave Culture



S Super Mario Bros

T TechGnosis: Myth, Magic and Mysticism in the Age of Information by Erik Davis (1998)

U Uploading

V Videodrome (1983) directed by David Cronenberg.

W William Gibson ‘Pattern Recognition’ (2003)

X Ex-technology: oldcomputers.net

Y Yesterday’s internet culture: internetarchaeology.org

Z The Zeitgeist



(Images from top to bottom: Paul B Davis (Critical Space edition soon to be for sale at Mu.nl), Yoshi Sodeoka (video still) , Hey Hey Creative, Eric Mast (video still) )

The New Psychedelica opens April 8

The New Psychedelica opens in Eindhoven next weekend! I'll be taking photos of the install and opening and after party (where Rodaidh McDonald from XL, Dave MacLean from Django Django and The Oscillation are playing) but here's a little more info behind the show - a Q and A I did for anothermag.com.You can read the full list of artists here.

The images above are from some of the artists in the show (from top to bottom);
Rosa Menkman – Into the Tulgey Woods, 2011 Video still
Yoshi Sodeoka – Violet Dark Spring of the Numinous Orb, 2011 Video still
Daniel Swan – Comp 1 (0.00.00.08), 2011
Jeremy Shaw – This Transition Will Never End, 2008 Single channel video (still)