These are the last few days to view Detour at SPACES Gallery, presenting the work of five artists rerouted by an obstruction. Prior to the exhibit's opening, the artists met to discuss their practices and share their areas of comfort and discomfort. By the end of the evening, each was assigned an obstacle by his or her peers. Their challenge was to create work for the exhibit while dealing with the assigned obstacle, all the while paired with a documentarian who would provide "color commentary" on the process. OhioAuthority arts writer and critic Eleanor LeBeau was asked to participate; this is the second in a series of her blogs - originally published on SPACES' website - documenting the experience of artist Arzu Ozkal. Detour closes July 16.

THE ENDURANCE PERFORMANCE: DAY FOUR

9:29 a.m.

I email James Luna, who lives in SoCal.

HELP! Please send advice about my upcoming performance score/script and possible live performance.

[Addendum 05.11.10:  Did you notice how fear prevented me from seeing beyond my own navel? And, most importantly, I’m not focusing on Arzu’s process. Pedagogical moment # 17.]

9:54 a.m.

As promised, Arzu sends her morning email:

Good morning! 

I got some rope yesterday; will try a few things today. Will let you know how it goes. :)

Arzu

10:12 a.m.

I email Arzu to ask what she intends to do with the rope. 

11:47 a.m.

Arzu responds by email:

Hi Eleanor, 

Lygia Clark's performance is an inspiration: Lygia Clark "Propositions," 1966-1968.

Will write more tonight.

12:27 p.m.

Luna responds. The minimalist, as always, but right on point:

ELB

The moment you stand up and turn to the audience you are performing.

Communication can take many forms if you are not a public speaker. You can prerecord your statement, you can write it out, you can hand out notes or pass one around. Whisper to each one: Don't do Bob, Bob did it.....

Think about how you would like to be communicated to. 

Be yourself. 

I have no idea as to subject. That is between you and the artist.

Mr. Luna

11:52 p.m.

All day I’ve been wondering how the work of Brazilian artist Lygia Clark (1920-1988) might influence “Love At First Si/ght/te.” The trajectory of her oeuvre in one sentence: She transitioned from Constructivist painting to sculpture to relational art (for lack of a better word) and finally to what has been called “therapy.” 

She is not a household name in the U.S. (how many female visual artists are?), but very much respected in the art world. Maybe Clark is not well known because her entire oeuvre thwarts fetishization of the object and thus presents major curatorial challenges. “She attempted to escape both the notion of artist as ‘genius,’ and the supremacy granted to the object which implicitly forces the viewer into a role of passive contemplation,” Juan Vincente Aliaga notes in a 1998 issue of frieze. 

After 1965, she labeled all of her works “propositions”: a set of rules created by the artist, using easy-to-find props, that are activated (or “made”) by others. The propositions only exist in the “now” and cannot be documented or sold or exhibited post-activation. You should also know that many of Clark’s propositions emphasize non-visual experience (auditory, kinetic, haptic, olfactory) and attempt to collapse the mind/body duality. Said another way, the maker of a proposition may have an experience that compels him/her to reconsider the way s/he’s been taught to think about the body/self. I don’t know for sure. I’ve never made a proposition. I’m only imagining. Indeed, Clark, like Arzu, is binary terrorist who collapses dichotomies: mind/body; intellect/senses; objective/subjective; author/spectator; object/spectator and so on.

What does Arzu plan to do with the rope and elastic bands? Is she using other props that she’s not telling me about? Clark’s propositions require the makers to wear plastic boiler suits and Mobius-strip handcuffs. 

Is Arzu’s last email a proposition for you and me, the spectators? She’s set some parameters (or rules) - the performance’s title and Lygia Clark, for example -and now I use what I think I know so far about “Love At First Si/ght/te” to produce color commentary about Arzu’s artistic process. 

Am I not making my own “Love At First Si/ght/te”?

Image: Lygia Clark, Sensory Masks, 1967

If you couldn't score tickets to tonight's Lady Gaga show at The Q, you can head downtown anyway and inhale some of her cast-off glitter at FORTRESS Nightclub. The "Filthy Glamour Party" will feature special DJ sets by Semi Precious Weapons as well as Gaga's DJ and "very close personal friend" Lady Starlight. 

Gaga has acknowledged Starlight (for the sake of simplicity, we'll do away with the honorifics; our apologies if either Lady actually is landed gentry), an influential figure in the New York City club scene since the early 2000s, as a welcoming presence in the world she's come to dominate. "My friends that I made downtown in New York really welcomed me into this society of freakish kids that band together. I was actually talking to ... Lady Starlight today, and I just said, without you guys, I wouldn't be where I am today, for sure," said Gaga in the July 8 issue of Rolling Stone.

Also appearing will be FORTRESS house DJ Kosher Kuts. Doors at 9; the event is free until 11pm and $10 after. 21 & over.

Rage on, little monsters!

In the pantheon of iconic males,  one thing seems constant: a motorcycle. From Brando's wild ride to McQueen's high-flying escape to Fonda's easy riding, there are certain movie moments of machismo that every boy and man lives vicariously though, hoping to one day emulate. Sometimes, these captains of cool ride closer to home. 

My father's first two-wheeled motoring experiences were not born to be wild, but born of necessity, as he bought for a pittance and repaired a lengthy list of Vespa and Lambretta scooters as a young man in Dublin. He later graduated to motorcycles, which became a vehicle for marriage. He and my mother honeymooned throughout Europe on a fresh out-of-the-box 1977 Suzuki GS400. 

Years later, my brother, who has long channeled a Knievel-esque kindred spirit, got his first yearning for two-wheeled automation. It started innocently enough with a moped, and now, more than a decade later, has grown to a Honda CBR600, which has been modified so that each ride closely approximates the act of willingly mounting oneself on an ICBM. 

Perhaps it was pictures of my father atop his 1970 Lambretta GP150 near the Arc De Triomphe, too many viewings of Quadrophenia or a fear of launching myself into a tree, but vintage scooters, not motorcycles, have literally been more my speed for years. More important, riding and restoring scooters (read: tinkering and asking for lots of help from people more mechanically inclined) has brought me many new friends, and given my father, brother and I even more to talk about. It was my younger brother who taught me how to first ride, and he's helped me with more than a few scooter building projects. 

However, always lingering in the back of my head was the call to step up to motorcycles. Nearly all the riders I know and respect, including my brother, insisted that the Motorcycle Safety Foundation Basic Rider Course was a necessity. I tend to default to experts. 

After years of riding with a temporary permit, this past weekend, I took the three-day MSF course offered by Liberty Harley-Davidson in Boston Heights. The first day consisted of four hours of classroom instruction, while the second and third days, Saturday and Sunday, from 8 am to 4 pm, put the class on bikes – really fun Buell Blasts, to be more precise. 

Proving that cool is not discriminatory, the class brought together a diverse group of men and women, young and old, novices and experienced riders looking for a refresher course. I took the course with three friends. On the morning of the first day, in a hilarious combination of first day jitters and unfamiliarity, I stalled my bike roughly half a dozen times.  

By the end of the second day, I was comfortable with controlled emergency braking, tight cornering, the dreaded double U-turn in a box, swerve avoidance techniques and more skills I'd never have developed on my own. In short, I became more confident as a rider. More over, I was more in touch with my abilities, aware of my threshold, and more prepared for the open road than I'd ever been. The instructors, Joe Pletikapich and Kevin Shorie, were fantastic, not only in their patience throughout the exercises, but also in their ability to explain and demonstrate the skills required. They were encouraging and any nugget – of which there were many – of rider wisdom that they shared was much appreciated. I passed the riding exam with flying colors, and I had a great time with friends. My clutch hand is a bit sore, but my only regret is not having taken the course sooner. 

I fear maturity is rearing its sensible head. I think looking cool while riding starts with knowing how to ride safely. Anybody can hop on a bike, shift into gear and roll the throttle, but proper technique begins with expert instruction and supervised, dedicated skill development. The fun part is putting those skills to practice. The best part is having an avenue of enjoyment that requires all your thought and attention. I think the honeymoon just started.

Last night at around 9:30 p.m., it took LeBron James about 15 seconds (much as Stan VanGundy had predicted) to answer the question that's been swirling around him for weeks, though in reality it had dogged him since the day he was drafted by Cleveland in 2003. I heard the news on the radio as I drove through downtown, watching crowds of Clevelanders get the news they'd been waiting, and dreading, to hear.

Annoying as it's been to hear about LeBronathon, LeBromageddon, LeBranukkah day in and day out - the circus has been nothing if not rich territory for wordsmiths - that's not really what got under my skin and remains there still. The notion - no, the assumption - that James would leave Cleveland has been a popular trope in the national media since before the Cavs flamed out of the playoffs, and even before the 2009-2010 regular season drew to a close. Not one person outside of Cleveland, and many of them inside the city limits, behaved as if this city had a chance in hell of holding on to a superstar in his prime.

That's what really gets me.

Yesterday an article about the brouhaha ran on Deadspin, the family-unfriendly title of which embodied the rising rage that Cleveland began to feel sometime around Tuesday when the masturbatory ESPN "special" was announced. And yet, the writer couldn't help but reach into his bag of tired clichés and state that "It's Cleveland. It blows."

My instinct, as it always is, was to jump into the fray and defend the city that I choose to live in. (As in, within the city limits. Not Bath Township.) Before I could click the comment button, however, I realized that the energy I waste defending this city to morons is no different than the energy wasted by the good people of Cleveland who got tricked into waving signs of support under the noses of millionaires who could have cared less.

Because, how dare LeBron James: He, or someone in his circle, moved what could have taken place in an airport hotel conference room and played it out in downtown Cleveland, inviting Pat Riley and every other grinning fool with championship rings in his eyes to trample through our heart in pursuit of their own glory. 

Diehard fans - of James, the Cavs, the city or all of the above - wasted their time wooing a superstar that may never have intended to give them so much as a fighting chance. Their reward was to get dumped on national television in spectacular fashion, long after the Cavs had a hope in hell of doing anything but embarking on yet another year of dreaded rebuilding. This was all so Team LeBron and ESPN could mount one of the largest celebrations of ego ever seen, and we are talking about a sport that once fielded Michael Jordan.

This has been a manipulation of the highest order, and it's time for us to redirect our energies. The man-hours spent on the "crisis" of keeping James in Cleveland could have done much more spent at our schools and community centers, or for that matter at home with our families. An hour spent having a beer with a good friend in a local restaurant or watering hole would have been time and money better spent.

It's been said many times in the last few weeks, but there are still thousands of gallons of oil polluting our shores, killing our wildlife and sapping our citizens of the ability to make a living. There are people in your neighborhood - I don't care where you live - choosing between buying groceries or paying the electric bill. We have so much work to do, and we've already wasted so much time.

The reality check is that not everyone in Cleveland cares about the Cavs, James, basketball in general or sports at all. These people will not, in the coming weeks, be under the impression that something cataclysmic has happened to the city. They will go on with their lives. It would behoove everyone else to take a cue from that sort of behavior.

As for James, I wish him well, or at least good luck navigating the fickle embrace of an ever-more fickle cheering section. Passionate fandom is quickly becoming a thing of the past. That, whether the King likes it or not, is a monster of his own creation.

Yesterday afternoon, it appeared that LeBron James had finally spoken - via Twitter, that is. Long notably absent from the by-turns useful and annoying service, James finally claimed his handle, King James, announcing that he was at long last "in the building." As of late Tuesday evening, James' account bore the "verified account" badge that Twitter bestows on celebrities, corporations and other high-profile accounts that are ripe for impersonation. No word on whether or not he follows his own elbow.

Celebrity Twittering is a weird phenomenon. For one thing, there's a reason some people have publicists. (The Hills' Spencer Pratt and Courtney Love are the first examples that come to mind.) For others, it's a humanizing touch - a way to interact with fans that's easy and entirely voluntary. Here in Cleveland, Josh Cribbs and Shaquille O'Neal have both built faithful Twitter followings, the latter even using the site to send followers on scavenger hunts for autographed shoes. So, the King is in good company.

When I clicked "follow" on James' Twitter page yesterday morning, he had yet to send even one message and had already racked up north of 65,000 followers. By nightfall it was hovering around 157,000 - still a long way from O'Neal's impressive 2.9 million, though one imagines he'll catch up. It will be interesting to see how James, who manages to be ubiquitous yet private, interacts with his legions of fans (and haters...on the Internet, there's no one who doesn't have them). Particularly his adoring, mercurial, devoted, fair-weather Cleveland fan base.

Cavs fans, who at this point are simply bracing to have their hearts broken, may take comfort in the fact that James' Twitter bio says "King of Akron." The words they most long to hear, however, will take far fewer than Twitter's 140 characters: "I'm staying."