Studio E.B.

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Four weeks until Inauguration Day. Please consider participating in and / or sharing @lastday.firstday. Here’s a selection of letter details from the 2016 edition, which materialized as a letter-sized book. ✍️🌞🇺🇸 Submission guidelines: 1. Write a letter to President Trump, dated for his last day in office (January 19). 
2. Write a letter to President Biden, dated for his first day (January 20). 
3. Submit letters to: [email protected] (if you prefer to create a physical letter, reach out via email for mailing info).
4. If inclined, send your letters. 
 – Letters are welcome from any person with any worldview, anywhere in the world. – Submissions can be anonymous. Participants must write both letters to be accepted. 
– Each letter should fit on one, 8.5 × 11 inch page. 
Send submission to [email protected] Submissions must arrive by January 20, 2021. Image descriptions: Various details of black and white, letter-sized reproductions of letters written in 2016 and 2017 for President Obama on his last day in office and President Trump on his first. Some are handwritten, some are typed, some are poetic, some are profanity-ridden. https://www.instagram.com/p/CJJhGnRl9IJ/?igshid=1ftgpzzawew88

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This residency explores art writing as an aspect of literature. Participants will contemplate and compose writing combining poetic potential and serious analysis.

Honored to be participating in the third iteration of the Critical Art Writing Ensemble at the Banff Centre!

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The Photographer & his Cut-offs, tin type photographed in 2009 by Nick Olson. Been thinking a lot lately about good time spent at @mildredslane, this grand and slow experiment in collaborative rhythms, domestic, improvised, and bug-bitten. (at Beach Lake, Pennsylvania)

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Creakers in Eras, a humanist sans-serif typeface designed by two Alberts (Boton & Hollenstein) and released in 1976 by the International Typeface Corporation. A curious feature, alongside the open bowls (see “a”), is the ever so slight right tilt that flirts with, but refuses italicization. It’s almost like the letterforms are just beginning to doze off. Eras has been used for the Caddyshack credits, on the video game Tekken Tag Tournament, and on Epson V39 flatbed scanners, the same used to make the boug photographs. Thank you @benjamincritton for the sharp, sleuthing eyes! Anyways, last weekend! See y’all tom! #creakers in #eras; #typeface #research; #openbowls & a good #tilt; #caddyshack, #tekken & #epson; #fonts, #fun & #forgettingthewords at #arivergallery; #closingweekend (at River Gallery)

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Maybe my favorite moment in the show is this corner. If you sit long enough in the naturally lit space, you’ll see the big panes of Cathedral City Grapefruit shift in hue as the sun moves throughout the day. Hey, did you know we’re closing the show this weekend? It’s been special to share the work with so many friends, old and new. I’ll be around on Sat and Sun so come find me in Echo Park among the squeezers, bougs, and yellows. #erikbenjamins is #forgettingthewords at #arivergallery in #echopark #losangeles; #art #exhibition, #finalweek, #closingtime; #cathedralcity #grapefruit, #naturallight, & #warm #gooey #centers; #bougainvillea, #poetry, #color; #laart (at River Gallery)

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Cathedral City Grapefruit is a special yellow that has been painstakingly color matched to my late grandfather’s citrus, the best tasting in the world. I made it to use as a tool in the toolbox, maybe printed in books, glowing on screens, highlighting design objects, or coating entire gallery walls. (at River Gallery)

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Opening a solo show at a very special gallery is amazing, but having friends and family that KEEP coming to these things, no matter how big or small, is even better. Thank you all so much. Hope to keep seeing faces, old and new, over the next few weeks. River is open every Saturday thru July 8. And I’m happy to swing by other days to show you around the yellow room, or as @_____wjg_____ called it, the “Church of E.B.” Don’t hesitate to holler! 💛 #erikbenjamins is #forgettingthewords at #arivergallery; #laart, #avoidingthebummerness, & #livingaloha (at River Gallery)

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Very honored to have a small mention in this great write up about Outpost Projects, which hosted Doing Easy this last fall!

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ArtAsiaPacific magazine is the leading English-language periodical covering contemporary art and culture from the Middle East and Asia-Pacific.

What does Wong Chuk Hang smell like? In 2017, Los Angeles-based artist and Spring resident ERIK BENJAMINS attempted to distill the olfactory notes of the district and its surrounding areas into a liquid soap that is “driven with aquatic notes and balanced out with some spice, some sweetness and some funk.” A few hours after I tried the soap for myself, the day it arrived from Los Angeles’ Institute for Art and Olfaction, where it was produced, I noticed that the scent was growing stronger, dominating my sensory environment and peripheries. Even on dry hands, the perfume of the soap was overpowering, steamy, and determined to be remembered.

Kind words from Ysabelle Chung on Spring Soap.

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Honored to have a copy of “Just...” on view among some inspiring titles at @meghangord’s spectacular project for @amkatz’s Bookshelves platform at @3307wwashingtonblvd. Meghan’s project facilitates an intimate space for reading to another. Tonight there’s a talk that will be moderated by @grantalexandra between Meghan and Amanda on collaboration, the driving force behind this special show. “Just...”, written in 2012 as a component of my MFA thesis, is an experimental dissertation that explores the possibilities and symptoms of the “Hungry Traveler”. You can DL the text in its entirety on my website. #booksbooksbooks; #librarygoals; #friendshipgoals; #3307wwashingtonblvd; #meghangordon & #amandakatz; #collaboration as #practice; #readingroom (at 3307 W Washington Blvd)

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Whirring down the Capuijnenstraat has been adapted for Volume 4 of Haunt Journal, a graduate student-run, peer-reviewed, open access journal from the Department of Art at the University of California, Irvine.

The issue can be purchased or downloaded for free in its entirety.

Whirring was first realized as a footnote intervention for the exhibition catalog of Gut Feelings, a show that opened at the beginning of this year at the Zuckerman Museum of Art in Kennesaw, GA. The project was first adapted into a jumbo-sized postcard for a two-person exhibition with Stef Halmos in downtown LA this past spring.

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Erik Benjamins In residence at the IAO ‘Spring Soap’ project, for Spring Workshop, Hong Kong Dates: October 9 – 31, 2017 – ABOUT THE RESIDENCY Local artist and writer…

In residence at the IAO for the month of October to finish up “Spring Soap” for Spring Workshop!

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Doing Easy, a group exhibition I organized, kicked into life this week. Installed as a gentle domestic intervention within a project space-as-home rental in the high desert, the show features some visual artists, designers, and writers that explore themes of the Home Place.

I'm still too close to it to make any sense of it all, but I think it's good. I hope you can come visit, be it for a half hour, or a weekend. It'll be up for half a year, so there's time to wade out into the Joshua Trees. Just don't forget to sign the guestbook.

Doing Easy includes contributions from Alex Reed, Ashley Eden Kessler, David Horvitz, Elisabeth Tonnard, Erik Benjamins, Janelle DolRayne, Jasper Morrison, Lauren Godfrey, Max Lamb, Norma Studio & Various Projects, Inc., Pico Iyer, Stef Halmos, Susan Barbour, & Yeb Wiersma.

Major on-the-ground thanks to Outpost Projects, Benjamin Critton, Heidi Korsavong, & Alex Reed.

There are postcards and soon there will be images. At year's end, there will be a beautiful publication about this show and the strong symptoms of Good Living...

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Gooey reds keeping me warm in the studio today. #freesmells & the #chongqing #hotpot #renao; #neon & #LED #sign; #lights & #lettering; #red #gooey #words

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Been working with some friends and heroes on something special for a home place in the Californian high desert — "Doing Easy," an exhibition on good living opens next month at @outpost_projects in Yucca Valley. More soon, but for now, a guestbook'd Joshua Tree. #doingeasy in the #highdesert; small-scaled #domestic #utopias; #home #place #exhibition w/ #artists, #designers, & #writers; #guestbook #goodies; #yuccavalley, #flamingoheights, & #joshuatree; the #host, the #guest, & #goodliving. (at Yucca Valley, California)

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I'm told that when passing thru the Pearly Gates, you're gifted a frosty pink @mcrowcompany candelabra. #heavenisreal & #mcrow is #proof (at 3.1 Phillip Lim)

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“A practice of good bookending is a practice of good hugging and it will boom under the influence of your participation.” The beautiful and unbound exhibition catalog for @norma.studio's #InSupportofBooks opens and closes with essays by myself and Laura Houseley of @modern_design_review. Our words, this catalog, other loot, and the killer bookends themselves will be available for looking, touching, and buying throughout the weekend at this year’s @sfartbookfair at @minnesotastreetproject. "Good Hugging" can also be digitally found at avoidingthebummerness dot com. #normastudio for #sfartbookfair #mvp; #goodhugging & #goodbookending; #unbound & #downtoclown (at Minnesota Street Project)