“On Clouds” @ Observatory, Brooklyn / SPWS Lecture 10/21/09

On Clouds

Observatory, Brooklyn
543 Union Street (at Nevins)
Through November 15th
featuring a Guest Lecture by SPWS on 10/21, 8pm!

In the first exhibition at Observatory, Brooklyn, on view through November 15th, James Walsh presents photos and prints in conjunction with an evening program of projections, performances, poetry, and other events by various artists throughout the run of the show.

James’ thoughtfully installed work includes a series of letterpress prints based on John Ruskin’s journals, paired with photographs of details of cloud-painting taken from dioramas in the American Museum of Natural History.  In both, he considers how recording the clouds is an act of both ‘objective’ study and ‘subjective’ projection.

In conjunction with his show, James has invited a number of artists to reflect on this theme (in forms as varied and elusive as the clouds themselves!). In the gallery, Jen Bervin presents a spread from her book a non-breaking space. A series of evening events has included a reading by Joshua Beckman (we were invited to bring pillows; Joshua read texts by himself and others as we lay outstretched, eyes on the ceiling); a lecture by Klara Hobza (a tour through modern cloud classification, with lots of pictures, and a summary of current cloud-making practice); and a slideshow of work by Pauline Curnier Jardin and Catriona Shaw (with excerpts of their work-in-progress, a cloud-opera).

SPWS is happy to be participating:
October 21st, 8pm:

“Taxonomy of Taxonomy of Clouds,” an SPWS lecture in conjunction with:
a performative lecture by Madeline Djerejian + screenings of videos by Celeste Fichter, Birgit Rathsmann, James Walsh and Lisa Young / $5 suggested donation

Haruspication

Haruspication: fortune telling (e.g. weather forecasting) using animal innards

From environmentalgraffitti.com:

Paul Smokov, an 84 year old cattle rancher from Steele, N.D., claims that he has forecasted the weather with 85% accuracy by observing the shape of pig spleens. The National Weather Service, with their millions in high tech equipment, is about 60% accurate.

Smokov may be the last pig spleen weather forecaster left in North America. The editor of the Old Farmer’s Almanac said the only other spleen reader she had come in contact with had died in Saskatchewan, Canada last year.

Smokov learned the subtle art of spleen reading from his parents, Ukranian immigrants who arrived in the US in the early 20th century. With weather being so important to farmers, and a decades long lack of electricity at the family ranch denying radio forecasts, the family kept the practice of spleen forecasting alive.

more info here and here