ART THAT WAS
A countdown of the top 10 shows of 2005
Friday, December 30, 2005 - Times-Picayune
By By Doug MacCash, Arts writer

Should old exhibits be forgot,

And never brought to mind?

Or should old exhibits be recalled,

for auld lang syne?

For auld lang syne, my dear,

For auld lang syne,

We'll take a look at 2005,

For auld lang syne!

Before Hurricane Katrina, Contemporary Arts Center curator David Rubin described New Orleans as "Paris in the 1920s," a cauldron of Bohemian creativity. But August's storm and flood tipped the pot. Artists are scattered, some institutions are still closed, galleries hang on by threads, and, as artist Roland Golden put it, 'People say, 'My god, I'm not in the mood for art right now.' "

Katrina was our Vesuvius. We're her little ashen mummies. But before we stagger blindly onward into 2006, let's play art archaeologist and dig out the top 10 exhibits of 2005.

10. The 2005 New Orleans Triennial: A Southern Perspective on Prints. This eclectic exhibit at the New Orleans Museum of Art in August remained interesting despite the fact that guest curator Marilyn Kushner of the Brooklyn Museum of Art so loosely defined the term "print" that one was tempted to believe she considers conventional printmaking as boring as the rest of us do.

9. TOXIC ART. Artist Jeffrey Holmes receives special accolades for decorating a pile of demolition debris on the St. Claude Avenue neutral ground in September, thereby producing the first post-Katrina art exhibit. The politically charged display so irritated passing National Guardsmen that the argumentative -- and inebriated -- artist was hauled off to the hoosegow. Right on! (note from Jeffrey and Andrea - Jeffrey WAS NOT intoxicated, he had been asleep for the 8 hours prior to his arrest. Also, the Toxic Art exhibit was created by Jeffrey Holmes AND Andrea Garland).

8. Culture of Queer: A Tribute to J.B. Harter was an unexpectedly successful consciousness-raising group exhibit -- such shows typically produce winces rather than raise consciousness -- at the Contemporary Arts Center in July. It plugged perfectly into pop culture's current fascination with all things homosexual. The show was anchored -- and, honestly, almost dragged under -- by the earnest yet equivocal erotic paintings by Burton Harter.

7. Hydrio-taphia. Barrister's Gallery continued to have the inside track on outré art in 2005 with group exhibits such as this one in February, in which artists designed their own funeral urns. Pre and post-K, Barrister's was 2005's most interesting, least reverent, most relevant gallery.

6. Spirit of Place: Art of Acadiana. Ogden Museum of Southern Art curator David Houston served up a feast of Cajun country contemporary art in May, sans the usual clichés, cher.

5. Lakeside Mall Christmas display. Holiday designer Frank Evans' gently satiric Christmas railroad village at Lakeside mall, with its blue tarp roofs and teeny duct-taped refrigerators, became a front-page sensation in November when humorless shoppers whined -- unsuccessfully -- for its removal. Bringing controversy to the burbs puts this vernacular masterpiece in the top 10.

4. Circle Dance. Crescent City master and MacArthur genius John T. Scott's much deserved career-to-date retrospective at the New Orleans Museum of Art in May remained a triumph despite the overabundant art being packed as tightly as sardines without the olive oil.

3. 64 Degrees. The playfulness of visual punster Steve Maklansky's arrangement of 64 well-known photos from NOMA's collection put the snap back in these stale chestnuts in January. Another post-modern clinic by the curatorial maven.

2. Walter Inglis Anderson: Everything I See is Strange and New. The Ogden kicked off 2005 with this gorgeously engaging collection of works by the Van Gogh of the Gulf Coast, Walter Anderson (1903-1965), a mad genius who weathered Hurricane Betsy on a barrier island. The Ogden's outstanding show takes on added poignancy in retrospect, since much of Anderson's beloved Ocean Springs, Miss., was ruined by Katrina and many of the artist's irreplaceable linoleum printing blocks were damaged.

1. Signs of Katrina. The right time/right place/right idea aspect of Jonathan Traviesa's outdoor exhibit made it 2005's best show, bar none. Traviesa, who rode out the flood in Mid-City, reproduced his poignant Katrina airlift photos on those annoying -- now illegal -- plastic roadside signs, planted at the exact sites where he took the pictures. By mid-November it was already hard to believe that such life-and-death events took place in our midst. Traviesa reminded us anew. Compassionate Katrina conceptualism. Bravo!