parties

Artist Cory Arcangel, who you may know best for having hacked Super Mario Bros. to create a meditative cloudscape free of crusading plumbers, is gearing up for a solo show at the Whitney next year. In the meantime, he’ll join the likes of Claire Danes, Lily Donaldson, and Jessica Stam in hosting the museum’s Studio Party on October 26. Like any good host, he’s whipped up some treats for the guests. Arcangel has created “HP Photosmart C3180 All-In-One Test (Forward and Back Again)” (at right, click image to enlarge) a print that will be given to the first 50 people who purchase Artist Sponsor ($500) tickets to the party. “There are certain parts of our technological lives which tend to come and go without ever having the chance to be archived,” says Arcangel. “My print for the Whitney is inspired by these missed opportunities.” The work consists of the test pattern that his printer (an HP Photosmart C3180) initiates automatically when a new ink cartridge is inserted. The pattern is printed twice, once upside down, on a sheet of letter-sized paper. “To make the edition, ink cartridges had to be taken out and inserted into my C3180 100 times thus forcing the test pattern to print twice for each print,” he adds. “In the future when printers have different, or no test patterns—or even when there are no more printers—it is my hope that these prints will serve as a reminder of how far we have come and at the same time what little progress has been made.”

Chuck Close and AOL CEO Tim Armstrong with artists selected to participate in AOL’s new Project on Creativity

Rare is the 25-year-old who can say that Chuck Close attended his or her birthday party (not to mention created works especially for the festivities), but then, AOL is no ordinary twentysomething. The indefatigable Internet company made Close the guest of honor last night as it celebrated its silver anniversary at the mesh-covered, SANAA-designed New Museum in New York City. The museum’s window-walled top floor was lined with a new series of portraits by Close, who AOL commissioned to aim his mega-Polaroid at innovators and creative visionaries including the Dalai Lama, director Gus Van Sant, artist Kara Walker, and himself (at right). Look for the photos to appear in a forthcoming AOL media campaign.

The bash—where we spotted artist Will Cotton, Kate and Andy Spade, and the perpetually impeccable Glenn O’Brien, among many others jostling for drinks from gentleman bartenders in shiny silver suspenders—doubled as a launch party for AOL’s Project on Creativity. Conceptualized with Partners & Spade, the broad-based initiative will include collaborations between AOL and Close on exclusive content, a program that will award $25,000 scholarships to 25 young people in creative fields, and a conference focusing on creativity and technology. “I’m very excited to be collaborating with AOL on this project,” said Close. “Since Tim [Armstrong, AOL chairman and CEO] joined the team, they have been rapidly evolving and intelligently investing in the global creative community.” One such investment was on display last night as AOL unveiled a new crop of 41 artworks—among them a “scribble scratch” scrabbled by Wolff Olins and photographer James Wojcik‘s mouthwatering strawberry—that will appear behind the company’s logo on the AOL homepage. Learn more about the artists and their artworks here.

Previously on UnBeige:

(Photos: Sara Scamarcia)

Remember the quintet of artist- and architect-designed covers of T: The New York Times Style Magazine in celebration of its fifth anniversary? Architect and exhibition designer Ico Migliore transformed the five special T logos—created by Frank Gehry, Jenny Holzer, Jeff Koons, Doug and Mike Starn, and Francesco Vezzoli—into giant playing cards for a T party at the Bulgari Hotel in Milan during the city’s fashion week. The evening was hosted by Janet L. Robinson, president and CEO of The New York Times Company; T magazine editor Stefano Tonchi, and Vezzoli, whose own T (at left) riffs on Man Ray‘s iconic “Tears” photo. Guests such as Tomas Maier, Frida Giannini, Neil Barrett, and Giambattisa Valli tried not to interpret the giant houses of cards as a metaphor for the media industry. Click “continued…” for an overhead shot that smacks of Alice in Wonderland—if Wonderland was full of gentlemen in expertly tailored suits.

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Usually, we at UnBeige devote September 10th to celebrating the birthday of Georges Bataille (he would be 112 this year), but this year we’ll dispense with the eye-shaped gâteau to take part in Fashion’s Night Out, a Vogue-sponsored global initiative “to promote retail, restore consumer confidence, and celebrate fashion.” Surely Bataille, who had much to say about consumption and festivals, would have approved.

“It was an idea that was generated during the [fall] Paris collections in response to the tidal wave of negativity and uncertainty that Anna Wintour perceived among people in the industry and among her colleagues in retail,” explains Sally Singer, Vogue‘s director of fashion news and features. “She called a meeting of all the major editors of Vogue—for all the major editions of Vogue around the world, of which there are about a dozen—and said, ‘Let’s get people out and about, and if not shopping, then at least enjoying the pleasure of stores.’”

Stateside, the Fashion’s Night Out fun will also usher in Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week, which will pause the opening-day Bryant Park action to allow for celebrations at stores throughout the city. The list of participating designers and retailers is vast, but among the events we’re most looking forward to is the bash at Barneys, where Simon Doonan and his team have lined up events including a book signing with Ruben and Isabel Toledo, trunk shows from Barbara Tfank and Zero + Maria Cornejo, and appearances by Narciso Rodriguez, Thom Browne, and Jonathan Adler, who Doonan promises will actually be throwing pots in the store (live-action potting!). A few blocks away, Assouline is keeping its sublime bookstore at the Plaza open late, serving champagne, The American Fashion Cookbook, and a scavenger hunt based around the tasty tome. Down in Soho, Michael Kors has recruited Billy Norwich to draw caricatures of guests, while famed photographer Arthur Elgort will be snapping away at the Dior flagship on Fifth Avenue. Smile and say “Galliano!”

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Fresh from their collaboration with author Neil Gaiman at Comic-Con, the gothic fragrance mavens at Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab are gearing up for their next ghoulish meeting of the minds. On the afternoon of August 23, Black Phoenix teams with illustrator Gris Grimley for a party at Dark Delicacies in Burbank to celebrate the launch of Tales of Death and Dementia (Atheneum), a new book that matches the spine-tingling tales of Edgar Allen Poe (in this, his 200th anniversary year) with Grimley’s darkly whimsical drawings. Original artwork from the book will be on display and for sale, along with silkscreened event posters and t-shirts. Partygoers will also be treated to the debut of Black Phoenix’s new line of scents inspired by Grimly’s illustrations of Poe’s prose. The four fragrances are under wraps for now, but we’re hoping that “The Telltale Heart” has inspired a chilling chypre.

As if proximity to Rhode Island School of Design president John Maeda wasn’t reason enough to visit Providence, RISD has announced who will receive honorary degrees at its 2009 commencement on Saturday, May 30. This year’s crop of “exceptional individuals who have made groundbreaking contributions to the world of art and design” are entrepreneur/Flickr co-founder Caterina Fake, Apple designer Jonathan Ive, former RISD president Roger Mandle, writer and creativity expert Sir Ken Robinson, and sculptor Betty Woodman. Held outdoors, RISD’s always festive commencement ceremony is open to the public, which means that anyone is welcome to soak up Robinson’s commencement address and admire the graduates’ unique twist on traditional caps, gowns, pomp, and circumstance. It’s also customary for the honorary degree recipients to give a speech, and who knows, Ive just might shower the crowd in free iPod nanos. (Hey, with Maeda presiding, anything can happen.)

Planning to attend the UnBeige/D-Crit party this Wednesday evening? Listen up! To best accommodate the overwhelming response to our party announcement of last week, the mediabistro event wizards have just arranged to move the bash several blocks north from Highbar to Amalia, the 8,000-square-foot restaurant and lounge located at 204 West 55th Street. And really, what better venue than one with “old world baroque elements” (Chinoiserie! Black Murano glass chandeliers! Backlit mosaic tile! Just close your eyes and pretend that Marcel Wanders is involved) to appreciate the clean-lined ingenuity of American design?

From 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. on the ides of April, UnBeige and D-Crit (the new MFA program in Design Criticism at the School of Visual Arts) will celebrate the publication of American Design by Russell Flinchum, design historian extraordinaire. Part of the Museum of Modern Art Design series, the book traces the development of American design from the work of early American machinists through mid-century “design for modern living” to the branded, consumer-oriented design of the present day. Care to join us? RSVP here. We promise book signing, drink specials, and complimentary hors d’oeuvres shaped like Bertoia chairs (or at least they will appear to be after a few drink specials!).

The ides of April isn’t just for income taxes anymore. We cordially invite you to ditch that mound of receipts labelled “Misc,” file an extension, and join us at Highbar in Manhattan for a celebration of American design, by which we mean both design that is American and a new book on the subject. UnBeige and D-Crit (the new MFA program in Design Criticism at the School of Visual Arts) are hosting a party next Wednesday evening to celebrate the publication of American Design by Russell Flinchum, design historian extraordinaire. The book, part of the Museum of Modern Art Design series, traces the development of American design from the work of early American machinists through mid-century “design for modern living” to the branded, consumer-oriented design of the present day. Care to join us? RSVP here. We promise book signing, drink specials, and complimentary hors d’oeuvres shaped like Bertoia chairs (or at least they will appear as such after a few drink specials!).

(Photos, left to right: The Carlton on Madison Avenue, Michael Weschler)

On the wrong coast (or lacking the requisite Academy Award nomination) to make it inside the Stephen Shadley-designed Architectural Digest green room? Why not spend Oscar night with David Rockwell, who designed the sets for Sunday’s gala awards show? Or at least in a hotel suite he designed. The Rockwell-designed Carlton on Madison Avenue is offering UnBeige readers a special Oscar night rate of $199, which includes “gourmet popcorn” from the hotel’s in-house haute barnyard restaurant, Country. And you’ll be in good company: we hear that Cindy Allen, the delightful editor-in-chief of Interior Design magazine, is hosting a private Academy Awards viewing party in Country’s Rockwell-designed “Champagne Lounge,” where guests such as set designer Stefan Beckman, interior designer Vicente Wolf, and fashion designer-cum-architecture buffs Angel Sanchez and Yeohlee Tang will be eating up Rockwell’s sets on screen while snacking on the aforementioned popcorn, taleggio grilled cheese diamonds, and coconut truffle lollipops. To reserve a room for Oscar night at the specially designed rate, contact the Carlton at 800-601-8500.

One hundred years ago next Friday, F. T. Marinetti and his speed-loving Italian chums stood “on the world’s summit” to “launch once again [their] insolent challenge to the stars!” That is, they published “The Futurist Manifesto” on the front page of Le Figaro, kicking off the avant-garde movement to the bedfuddlement of the “gangrene of professors, archaeologists, tour guides, and antiquaries” that they so despised. The Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles isn’t about to let this milestone anniversary pass without the quirky celebration it deserves.

On Friday, February 20, Otis will host “Futurism + 100,” an evening of music, poetry readings, short films, and art. Attendees, who are advised to wear Futurist attire (i.e., red, black, or white), can sip Futurist cocktails (“Polibibita” Negronis) while listening to readings of parolibere poems and newly translated Marinetti writings. A Futurist DJ set will feature the remixed music and voices of the movement’s principal figures, while a screening of the short film Amor Pedestre promises a love story told by focusing solely on the characters’ feet. Once you’re good and punchy, catch the premiere of “1080 Punch-ups,” an interactive video installation by Alessandro Marianantoni and Gianluca Rizzo, projected on the “punch-card” facade of the Otis campus main building (constructed in 1962 for IBM’s West Coast headquarters).

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