bob nickas
McDermott & McGough's Oscar Wilde Tribute Skewers Our Troubled Present
Artist duo David McDermott and Peter McGough are famous for their willful resistance to modern technology and the relentless march of "progress." In a tribute to Oscar Wilde, the pair remembers an iconic figure still capable of whipping up controversy.
A Picasso Painting Could Get Auctioned Off for $140 Million in May
Does someone who buys a painting for $140 million simply take out their checkbook and ask for a pen? Do they swipe their American Express Centurion? Do armored cars from Brinks pull up in front of Christie's, laden with gold bars?
Komplaint Dept. - Manson vs. Mormon, and the Brides of Frankenstein
What's the connection between the Mormon Church's founder, Joseph Smith, and the geriatric but still notorious and imprisoned Charles Manson? There are lots of them.
Komplaint Dept. - Oswald and Dallas… Let Them See What They Have Done
The legend of Lee Harvey Oswald still looms large in Dallas.
Komplaint Dept. George W. Bush: Even the President of the United States Must Sometimes Have to Paint Naked
At least Bush is honest about his abilities, which is more than can be said for the "respectable" artists we're meant to take seriously.
Komplaint Dept. - Why I Want to Fuck Ronald Reagan, Part II
J.G. Ballard's short fiction, "Why I Want To Fuck Ronald Reagan," is a remarkable and remarkably prescient piece written in 1967, 13 years prior to Reagan's nomination as his party's candidate for president.
Komplaint Dept. - Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's Anna Wintour
"Pink is punk" reveals that the New York fashion industry and its sometime institutional handmaiden, the Costume Institute at the Met, its curators and the tacit captain of both ships, Anna Wintour, wouldn't know what punk is or was if it bit them on...
Komplaint Dept. Why. I Hate. Graffiti.
Have you noticed how lame graffiti in New York has become in 2013? Especially the one-liners you see more and more of, with their pseudophilosophy and visual impairment. Where exactly is the art? And what's the message?
Komplaint Dept. - It's After the End of the World
Most people wouldn't expect to find Sun Ra and Billy Pilgrim in the same room, but Bob Nickas got the two of them together to talk about the end of the world and why some people are upset the apocalypse hasn't come.
Komplaint Dept. - Long May Neil Young
On the occasion of Neil Young's recent resurgence—two new back-to-back albums with Crazy Horse, for which they are currently on tour, and his autobiography, 'Waging Heavy Peace,' marking his 67th birthday—I’d like to take a moment to consider one of...
Komplaint Dept. - Giving Up the Ghost: Andy Warhol Visits the Warhol Show at the Met
'Regarding Warhol: Sixty Artists, Fifty Years,' an exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, recently opened to some very negative reviews. The show is such a colossal disaster that another critical thrashing seems entirely pointless. The only...