It's the NBA playoffs!

NOTE: On Wednesday, August 26, players for the Milwaukee Bucks sparked a widespread protest of the shootings in Kenosha, Wisc., among major league teams, resulting in the postponement of that day's NBA playoff and WNBA games, as well as several Major League Baseball games. The NHL followed suit the next day. Some NFL practice sessions also were canceled.

As of Friday, August 28, those leagues were planning to resume play, based on the players' decision that it would be more effective to continue to use the high-profile platform of their televised games to promote the cause of social justice and racial equality than to go on strike.

I stand in support of the protesters in placing the need for change above the desire for sports entertainment (see the Bucks players' statement here). The following content of this post remains as I originally wrote and published it on August 18. - DB.

LeBron James of the Los Angeles Lakers and Giannis Antetokounmpo of the Milwaukee Bucks are the two best players in the NBA, and their teams each topped their respective divisions going into this season's playoffs. Will they meet in a Finals series set in October for the first time ever?

Close readers of this blog will recall that, from time to time, I write about basketball, and I can't resist the opportunity to celebrate publicly the successful return this summer of the NBA inside its Florida bubble.

I've always liked this league for its solid leadership, respect for players, and willingness to adapt to change, and the coronavirus pandemic provided further support for that opinion. The league was the first at the pro level to announce a shutdown (following the even more impressive leadership of the Ivy League, which pulled the plug before anyone else in sports), and it has been the clear United States leader in figuring out how to come back safely.

With a severely shortened season, the NBA's eight-game-per-team "seeding" round proved to be a total blast, with terrific technical innovations, stunningly competitive games, and no COVID outbreaks. I only caught a few of those games, but they were all highly entertaining, due in part to the "virtual" fans shown live on mega-screens surrounding the courts (imagine a Zoom meeting on steroids) and in part to the virtual silence, which allowed the TV audience (not to mention players and coaches) to hear the on-court patter.

The culmination of this phase of action was a fabulous "play-in" game, the first of its kind ever in the league, in which Portland and Memphis battled to a last-minute victory by the Blazers, placing them first in line to confront the league-leading Lakers in the first round of the playoffs, which began this afternoon. Portland's late run to the final seed included three consecutive games in which its star player, Damian Lillard, averaged 51 points a game. That's right, averaged.

I should also mention the classy and effective way the league has handled the urgent issue of Black Lives Matter within the context of presenting entertainment in the form of professional basketball, by establishing a long list of slogan options for players to wear (or not wear) in place of their names on the backs of their uniforms. For the first week or so of games, these slogans appeared above the number with no player name shown at all, underlining the players' desire to place this issue above their own egos. Later, the players' names were added below the numbers, while the slogans remained in the top position (I don't know if this was planned or an afterthought - I will say that it helped me identify who was who on the court, so it may have come from popular demand).

I liked a lot of the slogans, and it was interesting to think about the choices each player made - for example, a younger, brasher guy might wear "I Am A Man," while a lot of the older guys opted for "Peace" or "Education Reform." "Black Lives Matter" and "Equality" seemed to be the most popular choices - with "Equality" appearing in several different languages on foreign players' jerseys (I observed and then confirmed Serbian, Latvian, Slovenian, German, and Italian among them).

Most interesting of all was "Group Economics," touted for the approved list and then worn by Grizzlies forward Anthony Tolliver, along with a couple of other players (and quite adequately explained here). This level of educational opportunity just doesn't normally come with major league sports, and I loved seeing it as part of every game.

Meanwhile, throughout the league, there are so many stars vying for a Finals ring that fans can rightly expect plenty of fierce competition and outstanding play in the weeks to come - with no risky travel, clear and strong controls in place, and what appears to be little likelihood of COVID-related issues (unlike, ahem, MLB).

My hat's off to the NBA, its administrators, coaches, and players for having the ability to pull this off together. And may the best team win.

Joe Testa-Secca at University of Tampa

Installation view of Modernism Reimagined: Joe Testa-Secca in Full Color

On a recent visit to the Tampa Bay region of Florida, I had the pleasure of seeing a strong retrospective exhibition of the work of 90-year-old Joe Testa-Secca at the University of Tampa's Scarfone/Hartley Gallery.

Guest critic John Caputo, an adjunct professor in UT's art department, contributes the following commentary on Modernism Reimagined: Joe Testa-Secca in Full Color, which remains on view through Feb. 22:

Well into the fourth decade of the reign of Postmodernism, one might ask, “Why would an exhibition boldly proclaiming Modernism Reimagined in its title engage us?” Beyond the twofold reply that the earlier “ism” (a term coined by the great Robert Hughes) dominated the 20th century, while also providing the rich inventions that continue to reverberate today, in the case of today’s offering the answer is uniquely personal.

The context is rooted squarely in a single individual, Joe Testa-Secca. As he enters the tenth decade of his life, with over sixty years of prodigious creative endeavor behind him, this individual’s career and legacy as an artist-teacher has loomed large in the annals of the visual arts in the greater Tampa Bay area.

Split Hairs - pencil 1968-9

Now a vital and expansive part of the greater cultural life of today’s major urban center, this was hardly the case in 1950, when the same young man graduated from the small and private University of Tampa. With an art major? Hardly! There was no such degree to be found in the equally sleepy town that lacked the significant colleges and art museums that abound in this urban center today.

In fact, the entire country at that precise mid-century year was barely on the cusp of unleashing upon the world New York City’s twin towers of Modernist  art movements, Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art. In these, America loudly announced that it would now lead the way in visual innovation, and when I first entered the present exhibition at his alma mater, it became immediately clear that their concerns are clearly at the core of Testa-Secca’s lifelong explorations.

Winged Duo - acrylic on canvas 1983

To achieve what he has, well chronicled and celebrated in this monographic show that features over 40 important works accompanied by a fully-illustrated catalogue (available for purchase through the University’s Gallery, here), was no small task. In fact, it was the artist himself who co-founded the Scarfone/Hartley Gallery, the first fully dedicated contemporary art space in Tampa. Testa-Secca gifted himself as well as the community by increasing access to now world-renowned contemporary artists through exhibitions by William Pachner and William Walmsley, among others.

One can see that he devoured the exciting and expansive ideas then emerging in the growing national obsession in the arts; this included the impact of an emerging art media that provided access to images and critical dialogue for those whose careers kept them physically away from the beckoning Mecca of Manhattan.

Among the hallmarks of Abstract Expressionism is an innate humanism grounded in the visceral reaction to the death and carnage of WWII and the challenging shocks of the Holocaust and the atomic bombing of Japan. Hence was birthed “The Age of Anxiety” that haunted our intellectuals and artists, counterpoint to the popular notion perpetrated in the sitcom Happy Days: '50s America as we would like to remember it.

White Bull - acrylic on Masonite 1968

What Ab-Ex gave us was an insistence on life in the form of the individual gesture that could be characterized as desperation for the impact an individual could have in a world that threatened to crush it. The apparent violence in the physical gestures of thrashing paint are paradoxically a plea for peace and meaning, ingesting the mess left behind by global conflict into an internalized cosmos that said “I act, therefore I matter.”

Testa-Secca’s reimagining seems to attempt to tame that wild energy by introducing geometric structures that act as architectural frames that interact with the more organic curvilinear forms that carry the action. This is tricky business, the very reason I admire this artist’s ability to navigate the dangers of applying a formulaic solution. Rather, the learned brilliance of his draftsman’s hand, filled with nuance and the knowledge that only comes with time and sensitivity might remind one of the fluid grace and discipline of the Olympic ice skater.

Ecstasy - mixed media on canvas 1975

These attributes are well seen in Ecstasy, a 1975 mixed media piece I particularly favored. As the artist plays a visual game of ‘hide and seek’ with various human bodies engaged in the private act of lovemaking, the handling is poetic in both physical mark making and the tone he brings to the subject. What can be a better answer to death than the act of making life?  I personally sensed the feeling of being nearly weightless as if the moment of ecstasy had momentarily taken me out of the heaviness of the world.

Not content to remain solely under the impact of Abstract Expressionism, Testa-Secca was perhaps even more influenced by the underlying elements of Pop Art. It is easy to be tempted into a snapshot memory of the movement, a bad idea that never occurred to this artist. Keying into the central elements of celebrity and its self-centered posturing, and matching this with the graphic strength that comes from the simplification of form that automatically follows photographic value structures, the painter instead stocks his canvases with multiple characters that preen with pride in their athletic perfection and ability to personify through facial expression and body gesture.

What grounds this series of images is the steady hand of a man who loves to draw, and draws well. He pushes himself, willing to chance failure as he experiments day after day, year after year. Artists who do so command this writer’s respect, for too many take the easy way out.

Testa-Secca was well aware of what he was doing, and summed up his efforts with these words: The drama of what you do with the space and how that works is what a painting really is. An artist is responsible for every inch of the canvas.

Shaman Five - mixed media 1976

The John & Mable Ringling Museum of Art

A detail of the Ringlings' home

If you find yourself within striking distance of Sarasota, Fla., any time soon, be sure to check out the Ringling Museum. Originally built as a lavish estate by John Ringling (of circus fame and robber-baron fortune) and his wife Mable, it was then donated to the local municipality in 1936 by the childless couple. The gorgeously lavish seaside site offers changing shows of contemporary art; a significant permanent collection of both circus art and fine art; free and guided tours of the Ringlings’ jazz-age, neo-Venetian villa; parklike gardens; and more.

My friend (and Florida native) John and I went there to see two shows in particular: One was a traveling collection of cutting-edge Chinese photography and video, titled Seeing the Unseen, which we found disappointing; the other is a new Ringling-curated contemporary group show titled Re:Purposed that was outstanding.

Li Wei, Mirror

Why were we disappointed by the Chinese contemporary work? Well, disappointment hinges on expectations, and I admit mine were a bit higher for this conglomeration that featured eight artists but was so narrow in scope as to seem almost a solo show. I’ll blame the curators, not the artists, for that, but it is certain that out of the vastness of the Chinese art scene there had to be more to work with that would have captured our attention. Instead, we moved on fairly quickly, our appreciation for the contemporary Chinese art world somewhat diminished.

Re:Purposed, on the other hand, provided a delightful overall experience and featured, for me, both old friends and new discoveries. The two best-known (and oldest) artists in the mix, Nick Cave and El Anatsui, do carry the show with conceptually sound, brilliantly colorful, exquisitely crafted pieces. But they also have some fine company, especially in the case of Aurora Robson, a Canadian collage assemblist with delicate sensibilities, wry wit, and 21^st-century wisdom.

Robson’s pair of works on paper with magazine cuttings and deftly drawn curlicues cleverly celebrates and subverts our ubiquitous advertising media and its unsubtle consumerist messages, while offering playful and meaningful alternatives. Another artist with a message, Alyce Santoro, presents tapestries and dresses made from woven magnetic tape (pulled out of old cassettes), working not just with the shiny material but with the vestiges of sound that they contain and which can still be pulled up by a tape head. I found this aspect of the weavings equally intriguing and creepy – visually, though, the work fell a little flat.

A Nick Cave Soundsuit

Daniel Rozin’s moving wall of fragmentary detritus is probably the most innovative piece in Re:Purposed – via computer technology and little mechanical motors, the work looks back at the viewers and makes a shadow image of the figures it sees. The interaction is a valid way of communicating that we are directly connected to the trash he’s tricked us into looking at.

Ringling curator Matthew McClendon gave a big space to Jill Sigman for a site-specific installation of a hut constructed out of stuff culled from local Sarasota trash (including some discarded Ringling signage). Colorful and unsurprisingly chaotic, the hut felt forced – too artificial to be truly engaging. Visitors showed their discomfort by hesitating to enter it (despite a clear entrance and no prohibitive warnings) until I broke the barrier and walked in. This lack of audience interaction is symptomatic of the sterile, churchlike environment that museums have cultivated, but it also speaks to an absence of excitement about the Sigman work presented here.

The other artists in the show (Matt Eskuche, Vanessa German, Emily Noelle Lambert, and Mac Premo) all are well represented by a good sampling of work that ranges from elegant glass reproductions of crushed cans to mechanical constructs. The show is augmented by a few items from the Ringling’s permanent collection, including a first-rate wall relief by Robert Rauschenberg and several Marcel Duchamp readymades.

Also on view at the Ringling is a permanent installation by James Turrell titled Joseph's Coat that is a super-flat 24-foot-square aperture in the ceiling of a courtyard, through which viewers can see the ever-changing sky above. Periodic nighttime LED shows designed by Turrell are the real event, but just to stand under the opening during the day and look up through it is a transcendent art experience well worth the effort.

Seeing the Unseen ended on Feb. 28; Re:Purposed will be on view daily through May 17.

Liu Bolin, Hiding in the City - Bird's Nest