d.e.n. contemporary

People are always telling me I have an interesting job. Maybe so. However, do I get to crochet wall hangings out of cassette tape? Do I get to wreak havoc with everyday objects from Home Depot? Do I get to fling my paint-​saturated body in front of a canvas so that there’s an shroud of Turin-​like outline, boobs n’all, looking like it’s trying to get out of the piece? In other words, do I make art for a living?
Nope.
No, I just wasn’t lucky enough to be born with a trust fund. I *did* got to art school for a while (after my b.a., and before my master’s in a more «serious» read «income-​generating» field) where I quickly found out that I probably couldn’t pay the rent by writing punk-​cabaret performance pieces and making large sculptures out of toast and egg shells. So sad.
BUT…now I know that when I want to get an envy fix, I can go to one of the fine galleries in Culver City… all of them every bit as good and far less pretentious than their counterparts in NYC, and bask in the unfettered creativity of others. In this case, it was Nicola Vruwink’s great «I Am Falling So Dance With Me» (it’s a requisite to title your shows with puzzling phrases that make the non-​art-​school-​people feel kinda dumb. There: now you know art school secret number one). Ms. Vruwink, of the aforementioned tape cassette crocheting, is able to create texture and mood with those objects we all look at and say: how the HELL am I going to transfer this to MP3 format?
I have about three kazillion cassettes, remnants of my day as a music maven in Boston. Some of them may even be good, I don’t remember (Meep Mieaw Band, anyone?). But now I’m getting out my knitting needles, dismantling the tape, and making some halter tops.
Thank you, art world.
Oh, and when I start felting things out of my cat’s shedded fur, I’m going to title the show: «Harry Connick Junior’s Q\uest for the Panopticon». Get it?