That's what journalist Costas Salpas wrote about the show — then he and Klik Magazine libeled my art and me — and the show's curator — from MoMA — bullied and gaslit me out of suing Klik.
I competed and was selected for the 3rd Los Angeles Contemporary Annuale along with my boyfriend — Charles Field — with whom I was in a faithful relationship. My large-scale installation and Charles's large 2D piece were exhibited across from each other in one room of the museum, romantically. People lined up to enter and view my installation. It was a sensational hit, something any emerging artist would normally celebrate...However, at age 25, a recent CalArts MFA graduate — not a wealthy person — an emerging female artist with no one representing me — I was libeled in Klik Magazine in the article "L.A. Art" by Costas Salpas.
While Salpas called me "the star of the 3rd Annuale" and put my art on the article's cover, he lied in sleazy ways about my CalArts MFA Show, my LACE installation, and me, personally. The guest curator of the show was from the Museum of Modern Art. She angrily intimidated and gaslit me — an emerging artist — out of suing Klik. I would have immediately won. She was protecting herself and art institutions LACE and MoMA, with no concern for the damage to me, which has been long-term. I can assure everyone: That museum curator, and probably MoMA and LACE as well, would have sued Klik immediately if she had been the target of that sleazy libel. She went on to become the curator of the UBS Paine Webber Collection.
Meanwhile, many people — including numerous strangers in mainstream sports and entertainment — did notice the libel in Klik. And because I had been bullied out of suing and the libel stood, they did not realize it was lies.
My installation dealt with voyeurism and escapism, with trauma and transcendence. It was a monumental, minimalist representation of a row of booths one would find in an adult video store, and it included porn clips playing in Booth One, which people paid .25 cents to watch inside the booth. But I have nothing to do with the porn industry. I never did any research in any porn shop alone at night — one of the sleazy lies that Klik published about me. I am never wild. I am never promiscuous. There were no genitalia paintings or bondage instruments in my miminalist CalArts MFA Show — another obvious libel — there were no images at all other than twelve black and white text panels on red walls. And, Charles Field and I were in a serious relationship — and our straight, faithful, romantic relationship was also harmed by institutional narcissism and lies. The libel, the institutional cover-up, and the ongoing promotion of Klik's sleazy libel — have injured me and my family for decades.
Lastly, Klik's simultaneous promotion of me as "the star of the show" and libelous assassination of me, the MoMA curator bullying me out of suing, and the fact that the libel in Klik is promoted to this day — although those promoting it know it's libel — have irreparably injured a straight, Jewish, American female artist — who was not wealthy and had no one protecting me from abuses and corruption.
