I liked the lights at the Whitney so much that I wanted to make a poster out of their image. This was not the original idea. I started working on the poster sometime in the winter of 2008 but forgot about it until now. I was looking at the photoshopped image of the lights, stripped of the brightness and warmth of their glow. I thought of using text to the illuminate the content, so I wrapped them around the remaining core/bulb of light. I needed more text outside the museum’s name so I pretended this was a poster for my own opening (har har). I used my birthday because I don’t want to put a deadline on my success (har har again).

I was streaming The Simpsons when this bad-ass song played as Bart was trying to teach Homer how to ride a bike (motorcycle). It’s called Mayonnaise and Marmalade by NRBQ. It has a Dylanesque, folksy sound combined with some homo-erotic Oedipal imagery.

NRBQ – Mayonnaise & Marmalade from http://cypressasianguy.vox.com/

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“It’s gonna take an airplane
To get me off the ground.
I don’t blame anyone who isn’t sticking around,
Cause when you stick around (when you stick around!)
People like to put things in the ground.
Now, in my
Evil empire I
Am going to be a star in the night sky
Above. “So you think this is love?”
Yes, I guess so,
At least something to make it from…

Dressed like a dream dreamt by Lola magazine,
Baby you were born to be seen.
And art’s just the start!
Now step inside the Widowmaker
And listen to your heart!
Always ‘the play’, never ‘the thing’…

(Submarines don’t mind spending their time in the ocean…)”

I’m always amazed by the emotional and intellectual honesty of children.  A small girl was fussing over a card game.  Her older sister said it was just a card game and her father reiterated the fact.  The small girl made clear the card game was irrelevant and that the card game was the method in which she felt slighted, in which she felt she was being overlooked and underappreciated.  Sir, I hope you listen to the words she speaks and encourage such honest outbursts.

In writing that last line I became extremely emotional, chocking up with tears.  Strange.  Physically uncontrollable.

Also:

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This more palatable version is missing the following lines:

“I wore the exact same clothes for five days;
the bail bondsman gave me a smile;
I was thinking of only my sins all the while.”

Anyways, they are playing on August 9th, 2009 here:

Williamsburg Waterfront
East River State Park, 90 Kent Ave.
Brooklyn, New York 11211
United States