Swoon floats her boat in Los Angeles

Swoon is an oddly masculine word even though it conjures up images of fainting women (as they fall for a man's charms?) The 'Swoon' in this post is the prolific New York-based wheatpaste artist. Tonight was *her* first solo show (I only know she's a female cause of the photos I saw online) in Los Angeles, at the New Image Art Gallery.

Drown Your Boats If you wonder why she named her show "Drown Your Boats", it's because she's part of a (weird) group that have been called 'boat punks' who construct their own boats using salvaged materials and then sail them!? I saw lots of salvaged, weather-beaten wood panels in her show and also how she has incorporated her canoe pastime into her art - one of her canoes is the centerpiece of her LA show. Still weird!

I read that Swoon's canoe (no dirty jokes pleeease;) ) will leave Troy in upstate New York in August and be paddled to New York City over a period of weeks. Sounds like fun. Not! Once it arrives it will form part of an installation at Deitch Projects. I've never heard about the Dietch Gallery, but it hosted Swoon's first solo show in New York in 2005, along with a show with Steve Powers in 2005 . But the biggest discovery about Deitch Gallery I'm saving for my next blog.

Critical Beatdown I'll leave the details of Swoon's art to the 'Cool Hunting' blog where I found lots on info about her show:

"Over the last several years Swoon has been covering the doorways and walls of the streets of New York and other cities with her delightfully detailed wheat-paste cutouts that, over time, become part of the cityscape. Swoon says, her images “are an x-ray of the person and the place where they live and the things that have seen in a day, if there is a way to record that.” She has images of kids playing, pigeons flying, people talking all done in her lyrical style. One of the highlights of the show is an image of a lady (it could be a self-portrait), who has a spine made out of fish bones that turns into a mermaid’s tail and hair that conceals skulls. As with most of Swoon’s work, looking closely rewards the viewer with hidden details."