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Lobby of the Contemporary Jewish Museum
Thursday, October 21, 5-8 pm
Open to the public. Admission is free
Presented in conjunction with the Maira Kalman exhibition, PRIVATE PARTY is the third in a series of “Milton” events hosted at the museum.
Conceived and produced by Mills MFA graduate students with artistic coordinator Glen Helfand, PRIVATE PARTY explores the notion of borders and boundaries through the act of a celebration. PRIVATE PARTY refers to the notion of exclusive celebrity events and nightclubs with velvet ropes, political, the definition of territories, as well as to the question of whom a particular space belongs to and who belongs to the space.
Taking a subtle, light-handed approach, we will simply tape-off a rectangular area of the lobby floor in the Contemporary Jewish Museum to describe the territory for the Private Party. Within this space, a PRIVATE PARTY will take place documented by paparazzi. Partygoers will pass through a security checkpoint indicated by two stanchions as an x-ray-style image is projected onto the adjacent wall. A sign indicating the rules for conduct as defined by the museum will be posted.
While PRIVATE PARTY is open to the public, an invitation list of 100 VIPs has been created to highlight the importance of inclusion and exclusion in the defining of “private parties.” This symbolic list reflects the overlap between politics, art, money, media and celebrity including such names as Shimon Perez and Yasser Arafat; Apple’s Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook fame; artists Marlene Dumas, Matthew Barney and Andy Warhol; SF Moma director Neal Benezra and Mayor Gavin Newsom; as well as Chloe Veltman of the New York Times, and Art Forum’s Glen Helfand. The list will be published online and printed copies will be at the event. 100 copies of the printed invitation will be free for the taking at the event.
PRIVATE PARTY makes reference to Nicolas Bourriaud’s concept of relational aesthetics as “a way of considering the productive existence of the viewer of art, the space of participation that art can offer.” PRIVATE PARTY is a nod to the work of art-world luminaries such as Rikrit Tiravanija, and to Bay Area local Tom Marioni’s legendary “The Act of Drinking Beer with Friends is the Highest Form of Art” events.
