You don’t just live with art, you live in art.
May 29, 2015 10:42 PM Subscribe
In Seattle, Xenia is not only a "one bedroom in Eastlake", it's an Airbnb art installation you can rent for a $100 a night.
It just needs an UberClowncar to get you to it from the airport.
(I like the idea and the execution and I'm serious about the Clowncar.)
posted by notyou at 11:20 PM on May 29, 2015 [1 favorite]
(I like the idea and the execution and I'm serious about the Clowncar.)
posted by notyou at 11:20 PM on May 29, 2015 [1 favorite]
In the kitchen cabinets, there are four ceramic plates and mugs by Natalie Riha. They stain with every use. You have the option of using them or not, depending on whether you find the evidence of other guests' food gross. I do find the stains a little gross, but also a little comforting, like certain degrees of sharing with other people always feel to me: fulfilling and not unfrightening.
A guest pays $100 a night to sleep on a sofa cushion, and the host can't be bothered to do dishes. The economy in Seattle is getting ridiculous.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 11:25 PM on May 29, 2015 [8 favorites]
A guest pays $100 a night to sleep on a sofa cushion, and the host can't be bothered to do dishes. The economy in Seattle is getting ridiculous.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 11:25 PM on May 29, 2015 [8 favorites]
Greg Nog: "A small wood sculpture by Colleen Brown is the key chain for the condo keys. It is soft and fat—the opposite of a hotel key card—and inordinately ergonomically pleasing. It's such an irregular shape that you can't describe it in words"
Did H.P. Lovecraft write this?
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 1:40 AM on May 30, 2015 [7 favorites]
Did H.P. Lovecraft write this?
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 1:40 AM on May 30, 2015 [7 favorites]
The way this is written is tiresome, but also a great capsule review of everything that's completely boring and rage inducing about the seattle art scene.
Basically, that the most popular thing here is quirky, zany, magic-pixie-dream-girl-y stuff performed in a laid back care-not manner with a straight face as if it's something to be taken Quite Seriously.
This extends outside of sculptural or other physical art in to the actual personas and styles of artists themselves, and acknowledging it at all is the most uncool thing you can do.
I don't know, maybe i just need therapy or a break from it or something but i'm really fucking tired of how seriously people take being silly and non-serious here. I think i've had about my limit of silly/whimsical/weird for the sake of weird being the cool thing without any other content. So it's weird, now what? It's like a cake made entirely out of frosting.
The fact that this gets a ton of airtime but stuff like people painting building doorways and putting up signs advertising them as efficiency apartments doesn't just bugs me. It's only silly absurd shit that puts its big boy pants on that ever gets attention here. The silly shit openly thumbing it's nose isn't cool for anything but a quick chuckle among friends.
*And to be clear, i am a silly weird person who loves being silly and weird for the sake of being silly and weird, but i'm silly and weird about being silly and weird. Apparently it has to be something nonchalant or serious or it's not cool.
posted by emptythought at 4:23 AM on May 30, 2015 [13 favorites]
Basically, that the most popular thing here is quirky, zany, magic-pixie-dream-girl-y stuff performed in a laid back care-not manner with a straight face as if it's something to be taken Quite Seriously.
This extends outside of sculptural or other physical art in to the actual personas and styles of artists themselves, and acknowledging it at all is the most uncool thing you can do.
I don't know, maybe i just need therapy or a break from it or something but i'm really fucking tired of how seriously people take being silly and non-serious here. I think i've had about my limit of silly/whimsical/weird for the sake of weird being the cool thing without any other content. So it's weird, now what? It's like a cake made entirely out of frosting.
The fact that this gets a ton of airtime but stuff like people painting building doorways and putting up signs advertising them as efficiency apartments doesn't just bugs me. It's only silly absurd shit that puts its big boy pants on that ever gets attention here. The silly shit openly thumbing it's nose isn't cool for anything but a quick chuckle among friends.
*And to be clear, i am a silly weird person who loves being silly and weird for the sake of being silly and weird, but i'm silly and weird about being silly and weird. Apparently it has to be something nonchalant or serious or it's not cool.
posted by emptythought at 4:23 AM on May 30, 2015 [13 favorites]
Joakim Ziegler: Did H.P. Lovecraft write this?
Nope. Harlan Ellison.
posted by Smart Dalek at 5:34 AM on May 30, 2015
Nope. Harlan Ellison.
posted by Smart Dalek at 5:34 AM on May 30, 2015
emptythought, I'm right there with you... But I'm also totally over the whole circus arts thing and burlesque thing, so maybe I just need to leave Seattle.
posted by palomar at 8:22 AM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by palomar at 8:22 AM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
"They gave me a travel folder about Greece the other day, it said that, er - correct me if this is true, Donald - it said that Greece is the only country where the word for stranger or foreigner is the same as the word for guest: xenos, as in xenophobia, a fear and hatred of guests. Oh the mountains look on Marathon, and Marathon looks on the sea; and I look up at the Parthenon, and the Greeks look down on me."
At The Drop of a Hat, Flanders and Swann
posted by howfar at 9:23 AM on May 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
At The Drop of a Hat, Flanders and Swann
posted by howfar at 9:23 AM on May 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
A cake made out of frosting is a "tub", and if you eat it you become...well, my installation awaits.
posted by maxwelton at 12:27 PM on May 30, 2015
posted by maxwelton at 12:27 PM on May 30, 2015
That's not a rusted-out '84 Ford F-150 up on blocks on my front lawn with a dog chained to the bumper. It's art.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 2:25 PM on May 30, 2015
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 2:25 PM on May 30, 2015
one day later, you acquire a light, barely detectable stutter
three weeks later, adjectives and adverbs begin to slip frustratingly from memory
two months later, you all but lose the power of language
by the end of one year, you have become the Wooden Shape
posted by threeants at 3:29 PM on May 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
three weeks later, adjectives and adverbs begin to slip frustratingly from memory
two months later, you all but lose the power of language
by the end of one year, you have become the Wooden Shape
posted by threeants at 3:29 PM on May 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
This isn't an art installation. This is some shitty sitcom's art director telling the set decorator to make an "art installation," and it's for the next scene that's shooting after lunch. It's so cynical and throwaway that it's really pissing me off.
posted by queensissy at 6:50 PM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by queensissy at 6:50 PM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
Yeah I'm a little bit disappointed that the "art installation" is just some quirky interior decorating. I was hoping for, I don't know, a full-room dinosaur diorama or something. Now I would pay for that.
posted by no mind at 8:55 PM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by no mind at 8:55 PM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
It's actually performance art.
Which you perform when you enter your credit card number.
posted by aaronetc at 8:10 PM on May 31, 2015
Which you perform when you enter your credit card number.
posted by aaronetc at 8:10 PM on May 31, 2015
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Fascinating idea, hilariously bad article (where are the photos of all these interesting things?).
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 10:56 PM on May 29, 2015 [4 favorites]