A piano makes a different kind of music in “Martin Creed: The Back Door,” at the Park Ave. Armory through August 7 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
THE BACK DOOR
Park Ave. Armory
643 Park Ave. between 66th & 67th Sts.
Through August 7, $15 (free with IDNYC card)
212-933-5812
www.armoryonpark.org
www.martincreed.com
UNDERSTANDING
Pier 6, Brooklyn Bridge Park
Through October 23, free, 6:00 am – 11:00 pm
www.publicartfund.org
understanding slideshow
Upon going through the front door of the Park Ave. Armory and entering the lobby to see “Martin Creed: The Back Door,” visitors are greeted by Creed’s recent music video “Understanding,” which features the multidisciplinary British artist playing multiple characters. “We were arguing / And I was saying, ‘I’m a victim’ / And you were saying, ‘I’m a victim’ / And I was saying, ‘I’m a victim,’” Creed sings to a bouncy pop tune. Meanwhile, to the right, a vertical white neon sculpture hangs from the ceiling, slowly turning, with the word “Other” on one side and “People” on the reverse. The pair of works serves as an excellent introduction to Creed, who over the course of his thirty-year career has worn numerous hats (and hairstyles), building an oeuvre that includes painting, sculpture, film, installation, music recordings, performance, and more that challenge the status quo and call into question political and social convention around the world. Given full rein in the first floor of the historic armory, Creed and big-time curators Tom Eccles and Hans-Ulrich Obrist have created a masterful display, emphasizing Creed’s wide diversity and whimsical nature. Doors and curtains open and close, lights go on and off, an object partially blocks entrance to a space, and a piano isn’t used quite as expected. A marching band leads a small procession, an abandoned bar invites curiosity, and short films show people puking, defecating, and, despite physical disabilities, crossing a New York City street without canes, crutches, walkers, or wheelchairs. One room is half-filled with balloons, while another features a wall of abstract portraits that call to mind the dignified paintings of military men that can be found throughout the armory; Creed’s sensibility so takes over that you might find yourself wondering whether certain of the military portraits aren’t pranks made by Creed. In the library, Creed has surreptitiously placed objects in the cabinets that display historical artifacts, exploring the very nature of labels and identification. Also in the library are small vitrines that contain exactly what their names explain they are or where they are: “Work No. 218: A sheet of paper crumpled into a ball,” “Work No. 158: Something on the left, just as you come in, not too high or low,” and “Work No. 74: As many 1″ squares as are necessary cut from 1″ masking tape and piled up, adhesive sides down, to form a 1″ cubic stack.”
Martin Creed’s “Work No. 2497: Half the air in a given space” allows visitors to play in a room half-filled with white balloons (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
In the Wade Thompson Drill Hall, Creed projects his “Mouth” series onto a massive screen, short videos of people (including his mother) chewing, followed by a surprise at the back of the hall that references, among other things, what eventually happens after one eats. In the bunkers to the side, eighteen of Creed’s videos are on constant loop in different spaces, including “Let Them In” and “Border Control,” which deal with immigration and basic human rights; “Flower Kicking,” in which a man kicks a plant as if it were a soccer ball; the romantic “You’re the One for Me,” in which Creed frolics on a beach and in the ocean; and “Fuck Off,” eighty-one seconds of Creed screaming the title words. “Martin Creed: The Back Door” is an endlessly inventive intervention that confirms once again that the armory is one of the city’s most unusual and exciting places to see exhibitions that can’t be held anywhere else. (On Thursday and Friday nights, the exhibition is open till 10:00, with a bar in one of the period rooms.)
Martin Creed asks for “Understanding” in Brooklyn Bridge Park (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
In a companion piece in Brooklyn Bridge Park, the Turner Prize-winning Creed, who was born in England, raised in Glasgow, and currently lives and works in London, has installed a giant revolving neon sign that very simply declares, “Understanding.” The ten-foot-tall letters, which sit atop a fifty-foot-long steel I-beam, spin around at varying speeds, sometimes coming to a brief stop, giving viewers a chance to reflect on the meaning of the word, whether seen frontward or backward. The kinetic sculpture, a project of the Public Art Fund, is visible from far away, mimicking an advertising sign, or can be viewed up close and personal, with steps that allow you to walk right up to it. As with most of Creed’s works, “Understanding” succeeds on numerous levels, particularly in a world torn apart by xenophobia, racism, hatred, and war. It is also the name of Creed’s most recent single and video, which, as noted above, can be seen in “The Back Door” (and here) and deals with victimhood. (“Understanding” can be found on Creed’s latest album, Thoughts Lined Up, which also includes such songs as “I’m Going to Do Something Soon,” “Everybody Needs Someone to Hate,” “Let’s Come to an Arrangement,” and “Difficult Thoughts.”) In addition, Lower Manhattan is visible through the letters and across the East River, where One World Trade Center has risen in the ashes of the Twin Towers. “Understanding” might seem somewhat quaint and obvious, but that’s part of the point, another thought-provoking work from an iconoclastic virtuoso who is finally getting his due.
“I feel my day is coming, it’s my time,” soul singer extraordinaire Sharon Jones is shown saying at the beginning of Barbara Kopple’s touching and intimate documentary, Miss Sharon Jones! But that was before the former wedding singer and Rikers Island corrections officer, who was born in 1958 in North Augusta, South Carolina, raised in Brooklyn, and later lived in Queens, was diagnosed in June 2013 with stage two pancreatic cancer. Jones, who has been called the female James Brown — she tells a story in the film about the time she met the Godfather of Soul — allows the Oscar-winning Kopple (Shut Up & Sing, Harlan County, USA) remarkable access as she cuts off her trademark locks and chooses a wig, undergoes painful chemotherapy, is cared for by her close friend and holistic nutritionist Megan Holken, and visits her old stomping grounds in Augusta, Georgia. Jones shares her thoughts about her future, feeling responsible for the financial well-being of her longtime band, the Dap-Kings. “First and foremost, we’re a family,” Daptone Records cofounder and saxophonist Neal Sugarman says. In fact, “family” is a word that pops up often in the film when people describe their relationship with Jones, who has never married and has no children. Among those who talk about Jones, her amazing talent, and her fight with cancer are her oncologist, Dr. James Leonardo; her manager, Alex Kadvan, who is with her every step of the way; her assistant manager Austen Holman, who tries not to break down on camera; Daptone Records cofounder and bassist Gabe Roth; guitarist Binky Griptite, who is up front about his financial troubles while the band is on hiatus; drummer Homer Steinweiss; and Dapettes Starr Duncan Lowe and Saundra Williams.
In December 2006, Lou Reed resurrected his 1973 masterwork, Berlin, a deeply dark and personal song cycle that was a critical and commercial flop upon its initial release but has grown in stature over the years. (As Reed sings on the album’s closer, “Sad Song”: “Just goes to show how wrong you can be.”) The superbly staged adaptation, directed by Academy Award nominee Julian Schnabel (Basquiat, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly), took place at Brooklyn’s intimate St. Ann’s Warehouse, featuring Rob Wasserman and longtime Reed sideman Fernando Saunders on bass, Tony “Thunder” Smith on drums, Rupert Christie on keyboards, and guitarist extraordinaire Steve Hunter, reunited with Lou for the first time in three decades. The band is joined onstage by backup singers Sharon Jones and Antony, the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, and a seven-piece orchestra (including cello, viola, flute, trumpet, clarinet, and flugel). Amid dreamlike video montages shot by Schnabel’s daughter, Lola, depicting Emmanuelle Seigner as the main character in Berlin, as well as experimental imagery by Alejandro Garmendia, Reed tells the impossibly bleak story of Caroline, a young mother whose life crashes and burns in a dangerously divided and debauched Germany. “It was very nice / It was paradise,” Reed sings on the opening title track, but it’s all downhill from there. “It was very nice / It was paradise” might also now serve as a kind of epitaph for one of the most important poets of the last fifty years. Berlin is being shown at Damrosch Park Bandshell at 10:30 on July 30, with headphones available. 
