Mingwei invites you to take a flower as you leave the museum provided that you agree to his terms: on the way to wherever you are going next, you will make a detour and give the flower to a stranger.

The rose-filled tabletop helps to facilitate the actual work of art: the giving of a gift that takes place beyond the walls of the museum.  Consistent with his artistic practice, you become a participant in Mingwei’s art, which relies on trust, generosity and human interaction.

The Moving Garden at the end of the day when flowers are out an about on the streets of New York.

When only a few roses remain in the table top and the arrangement might look a little thin and straggly, that this means that the flowers are out on the move in the streets of New York working their magic. Initially our plan was to use orchids, but since orchid farms in the metropolitan area felt the effects of Hurricane Irene, you’ll find roses at the table while we monitor the situation.

Collection Pyramid, 2001. Installed in the 5th Floor Elevator Lobby

Take the elevator to the fifth floor and when the doors open, you’ll find yourself in a small exhibition entitled Black Lincoln for Dooky Chase. There, you can contribute all of your unwanted pennies to Collection Pyramid, (2011), a sculpture in the making by Clean Penny Service (CPS), a performance duo formed in 2009 by artists Mike Smith and Lizzie Wright. Once the transparent pyramid is filled, it will be sealed, and the piece will be complete.

And take a look at those pennies in your pocket. Have any of them lost their shine?

CPS will be performing at Target First Saturday at the Brooklyn Museum on July 2 from 6 to 8 p.m. The duo’s mission is to clean a dirty penny (I’m sure they’d be willing to do more than one) for each passerby, using “natural” methods whenever possible, free of charge. Stop by with your penny at the South Entrance!

Come get your penny cleaned by Clean Penny Service at Target First Saturday on July 2, 2011.

Mickalene Thomas (American, born 1971). A Little Taste Outside of Love, 2007. Acrylic, enamel and rhinestones on wood panel, Overall: 108 x 144 in. (274.3 x 365.8 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Giulia Borghese and Designated Purchase Fund, 2008.7a-c. © Mickalene Thomas

It’s also a smart tongue-in-cheek riff on the familiar tradition of depicting the nude—woman of course—in the history of western art. In this work, Thomas explores the idea of self-representation. By making an African American woman the subject of the painting she recasts traditional depictions in European paintings of black women as maids and servants.  (If you are familiar with art history, think about Edouard Manet’s Olympia, which shows a pale courtesan reclining on white sheets with a maid of African descent offering a bouquet of flowers from an admirer.) In A Little Taste Thomas also tweaks European taste for “oriental” themes by removing the nude female body from the sexualized space of the harem and inserting it into an interior that makes reference to taste of the 1970s—the decade in which the artist was born.

You can see the influence of the 70s and the black power movement in the luxuriantly patterned textiles and the woman’s Afro hairdo.  Informing Thomas’s painting are her mother’s photographs from the 70s,  Blaxploitation movies, and images of iconic black women.  I like the interior setting which has a big personality.  The patchwork of swatches rendered in gaudy and sometimes clashing patterns suggests a room that is filled with spacial ambiguities. All of the sparkling multicolored rhinestones applied to the surface heighten the decorative qualities of the piece, pushing the glitz factor beyond conventional good taste. Here, Thomas has forged an innovative pictorial language that draws on tradition to create something new and very contemporary. I’m proud that she’s a Brooklyn artist!!!

Terence Koh (born China, 1977). Untitled (Vitrines), 2006. Mixed media, variable. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Peres Projects, Inc., 2008.34.

The piece is part of a larger body of monochrome work in which Koh explores the meanings of white in different cultures, ranging from purity to mourning. With its investigation of temporality and allusions to eventual death, the Brooklyn Museum’s glass stack provides an introspective counterpoint to Koh’s flamboyant public persona. (See his website) Sex and death are themes that run obsessively throughout all aspects of his work.

As part of Performa 09, Koh will be at the Brooklyn Museum on November 7^th for Target First Saturday to perform Saaqiou. At 9:30 p.m., he will be performing and DJing in the Rubin Pavillion, incorporating the Rodin sculptures.

Seher Shah (Pakistani, b. 1975). Interior Courtyard 2, 2007. Graphite pencil on white, medium weight, wove paper, 80 x 120 in. (203.2 x 304.8 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Purchase gift of Dr. Margaret Hammerschlag and gift of Donald T. Johnson, by exchange, 2008.4. © Seher Shah. Photograph courtesy of Bose Pacia, New York.

Part of her “Jihad Pop” series, the layered imagery merges private imagery, iconic Islamic spaces, and universal geometric forms. Seher’s visit provided a wonderful opportunity to hear her insightful−and impromptu—comments about the piece.

Valerie Hegarty (American, born 1967). Fallen Bierstadt, 2007. Foamcore, paint, paper, glue, gel medium, canvas, wire, and wood. Gift of Campari, USA , 2008.9a–b. Photo courtesy Matt Verzola via Flickr. All Rights Reserved.

Hanging off kilter in 21: Selections of Contemporary Art from the Brooklyn Museum is Valerie Hegarty’s Fallen Bierstadt (2007). Looking like a charred painting that’s disintegrating, one corner of the ornate gold frame appears to lift off the wall while the lower half of the canvas and frame appear to have crumbled into pieces of debris that lie in small piles on the floor. What appears to be a painting is in reality a highly illusionistic facsimile crafted by Hegarty out of ordinary materials including paper, foam core, and wood.

Bridal Veil Falls, Yosemite, about 1871-73. Oil on canvas, 36 1/8 x 26 3/8 in. (91.7 x 67.0 cm.). Purchased with funds from the North Carolina Art Society (Robert F. Phifer Bequest) and various donors, by exchange, 87.9

Fallen Bierstadt refers to a painting entitled Bridal Veil Falls, Yosemite (in the collection of the North Carolina Museum of Art) by Albert Bierstadt, the renowned 19th century American landscape painter. I was gratified to learn that Hegarty, who lives across the street from the Museum, has frequently visited American Identities on the 5th floor where our own examples of Bierstadt’s paintings can be found. The title, Fallen Bierstadt, seems to refer both to the physical appearance of the piece and to the end of a heroic tradition of landscape painting. By mimicking the high degree of illusionism found in Bierstadt’s paintings, Hegarty’s fabricated object reveals her own skill as virtuoso.

While Patrick Amsellem and I were installing the exhibition, we invited Hegarty to place the debris on the floor as she wished and the placement was documented by our conservation department so that we can replicate it whenever the work is on view at the museum.