Ai Weiwei at the Des Moines Art Center

AI WEIWEI IS NEVER SORRY

World renowned artist and Chinese dissident Ai Weiwei has released the above picture commemorating the Chinese New Year for download onto your computer. Some might think it seems strange that an artist would just give away his work, but the image itself explains why he is giving it away.

The mirrored figures seem to represent a dualism, two inherently alike but contrasting images each loaded with considerable symbolism that represent new and old culture. The left figure appears to be self portrait while the right looks like the iconic portrait of Chairman Mao.  Other important symbolic features I notice the open laptop and Twitter bird, a video camera, a cell phone, and the web character "@", all of which seem to represent the artist's Twitter and online activities which he uses to promote his visual arts and provoke Chinese Officials.  His Instagram alone is an online exhibit of his digital photo art that is both shocking and subtle.  Ai Weiwei likes sharing his work with the online community frequently and fervently, thus the New Years present. Thanks Ai Weiwei, you're a swell dude.

Another symbol in the above image I find particularly interesting is the number of sunflower seeds scattered in the negative space around both figures.  These represent a massive project currently on display at the Tate Museum called "Sunflower Seeds".  This work consists of 100 MILLION hand painted, ceramic sunflower seeds that Ai Weiwei filmed himself walking on.  

A portion, something like 250,000, of the seeds are currently on display at the Des Moines Art Center in a conical pile, Ai Weiwei foot prints intact.

http://www.desmoinesartcenter.org/webres/File/NEWS/NEWS_jfm_2013_web.pdf

The symbolism of his art is indebted to censorship and he takes full advantage of that fact by making thought provoking visual art to represent free artistic expression.  This of course gets him thrown into jail from time to time in China but he is still a very respected artist there who was even commissioned as a consultant for design of the Olympic Stadium. His world art fame achieved considerable exposure last year when a documentary about his career and views titled "Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry" won a Sundance Film Festival prize.  The film is now streaming on NetFlix.  Check out the pile of his work while it is still in Des Moines. Even though it is a quaint preview into this impressive artist's career it still speaks of the energy and power which his work possesses.

The Country Mice 2/18

Twister - The Country Mice

By namesake alone this band immediately seems to belong to Iowa's scene, but so does their foreboding countrified rock.  At times The Country Mice sound like those strung out guitar solos Neil Young still plays, but other times the group presents a sharp, youthful abandonment, not unlike Sonic Youth recordings (including the wall of guitars).  The tricked out guitars are often overdriven, sometimes fuzzy enough to make your hair stand, or float by, crowded with reverb like a canyon concert. At times they are dripping with Spaghetti Western swagger (and maybe pre-Republican Convention Eastwood worship).  Overall, their simplicity and delivery displays their skillfulness and love of Americana Rock.

Jason Rueger (a native of KS) and company gradually formed The Country Mice in Brooklyn over a span of about two years and put out their first full-length album shortly after in 2011 titled "Twister".  It shows the whole spectrum of rock The Country Mice are capable of - a range that can be trippy, but toes a line between Son Volt and Deer Tick at most times.

On February 18, 9:30pm at the Vaudeville Mews doors open for The Country Mice and opener, Brenton Dean a Des Moines singer/songwriter.

Free Energy (and friends)

Free Energy and Friends at the Gaslamp

To promote the releasing of Love Sign, their second studio album, Free Energy is delivering their brand of over-driven power-pop to a venue near you.  Slinging good vibes last night, the band played DSM's Gaslamp and well before the show was over the crowd was grinning and grooving along, some brave souls even jumped on stage for the finale.

Free energy is a quintet stationed in Philadelphia, but founded by the Wells brothers of Red Wing, MN; one on lead guitar, the other on bass.  The Wells bros got their start playing at clubs in the Twin Cities before adding other members to the band in 2008, which included Paul Sprangers on lead vocals (whose voice and vitality seems like the prefect match for Scott Wells' sweet, sleek licks that zap like lightning) and cow-bell-crashing drummer, Nicholas Shuminsky.

In 2010 Free Energy put out their first studio album with a little help from LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy, who not only produced the album, but who also helped promote it merely by way of his clout in the music business.  Free Energy managed to get plenty of well deserved attention, including an 8.1 review rating of Stuck on Nothing by Pitchfork, thereby making them hipster GOLD.  The first track from the album "Free Energy" is, by definition, a clarion call for all those interested in being infected by their catchy tracks.  (It is so hooky you'll think an angler has caught you.)


Openers for Free Energy last night were Des Moines' very own Derek Lambert and the Prairie Fires (FREE DOWNLOAD), who played the Gaslamp for the first time (hopefully not the last) followed by Baby Boys, a quirky MPLS trio that featured pre made beats, lush hollow-body guitars sounds, and a standing drummer who maybe should have tried out as a marching band baton twirler...

This Tuesday Free Energy will play another show in Iowa, this time free show at Grinnell College in Gardner Lounge.