Valhalla

This year’s Halloween tableau was like no other. The gilded hallways of Buddakan fed into a cavernous room with a massive table set for feasting. Each noble host perched beside or danced atop their table setting. We were their court.

The banquette table could be seen from above, but once you took the stairs you were heads lower than ghosts with bulbous, inflated skin, monsters with horned appendages that branched until they brushed the ceiling and reptilian creatures whose bodysuits were so seamless and consuming, it took me hours to recognize a friend.

Two particularly dashing royals were my friends Dylan Monroe, a zombie queen for the night, and Jessica Love, a lizard lady. They've both lent their looks to my paintings in the past and are part of the otherworldly, queer performance troupe, the Zand Collective.

My roommate Bonnie Burke, a talented photographer and a dead ringer as a dead rose, documented the evening. These are her photographs. More treats (and tricks) on her website and blog.

Getting ready. 

 

White Witch and Dead Rose

Susanne Bartsch's Halloween at Auntie Mame's

Table topping

In line for the bathroom

 Jessica Love

Picking Up The Pieces

It's been almost exactly a year since my last blog entry. But don't think it's just been sitting pretty. This wily word mass has been positioning itself to move into prime real-estate. It's currently unpacking boxes and hanging curtains in this new website, built by the talented illustrator Brian Foo, and can't wait to give tours and host friends at its new space.

I will be using this blog to share what I'm working on, give a heads up about exhibitions, gush about art that's sparked my interest and, of course, post the occasional dauntingly long narrative about a trip down a rabbit hole.

I started this blog when I first arrived in Berlin and had the traveler's fresh eye and insatiable appetite for exploring. However, since moving back to New York, I've been able to use some of what I learned. On my good days, I am able to see past a little of the fog of routine and assumption that works against openness, and approach this city with a healthy dose of wonder.

The problem is, after a stellar evening of dancing at the McKitterick Hotel, post-performance, when they've converted it into a hospital with mad scientists carrying out sex change operations and nurses administering liters of liquid latex, I've mostly spent the next morning curled up with an episode of True Blood, eating an oversized breakfast sandwich and, well, not writing about it. But that's no good. Because this is worth sharing:

Taken at Shhh!!! (a metamorphosis) hosted by Susanne Bartsch & The McKittrick Hotel

Let's get to it, then! Today is the opening reception of Sky is Falling at PPOW Gallery. I'm thrilled, because it includes a collaborative sculpture by Julie Heffernan and myself.

Julie Heffernan and Virginia Wagner, Picking Up The Pieces (Detail), Mixed Media, 2013

I started interning for Julie in 2007 after I wrote her a fan letter from Florence, where I was studying abroad. I would summarize what it said, but I don't have to because digital letters are forever:

"This semester I’ve been exploring the Medici Villas, Tivoli, Hadrian’s Villa, and the Palazzo Vecchio, and I can’t help associating these ancient estates with your work. I either picture your paintings on the walls or the walls as the settings of your elaborate portraits."

Since then, I've worked as her assistant and we've become good friends. She is a fiercely talented painter with an expansive imagination. Ten of her new paintings are up and not to be missed in Sky is Falling.

Julie Heffernan, Self Portrait on the Brink, oil on canvas, 54 x 66 inches, 2013

Sky Is Falling
PPOW Gallery
535 W22nd St, New York NY
October 17 - November 16
Opening Reception: Thursday October 17, 6-8pm