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Beer In Art #20: Robert Melee’s Beer Bottle Cap Mosaics

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I found yet another artist using discarded beer bits, in this case crowns — what most people call bottle caps — to create fine art. Robert Melee is an artist from New Jersey, who also maintains a studio in New York. The main piece for today is entitled Unrendered Quasi-Articulated Chic Substitution, and was completed in 2003. It’s made of enamel, plaster, beer bottle caps on wood, and is 48 1/2 inches in diameter.

He currently has an exhibition at Andrew Kreps Gallery in New York City. The exhibition also includes a few other beer bottle cap works, such as Anti-Disassembled Substitution.

Another art blog, Edward Winkelman, describes this work as follows.

Robert titles each of these works some sort of “substitution.” And although I’ve actually discussed what this means with him, I’m still not totally sure. Beer as a substitution for love? It’s a painful notion.

Edward Winkelman has one more Melee bottle work, Redefined Gradual Substitution.

This work described like so:

As noted, the circles are beer bottle caps sunk in plaster, and although they do reference the alcoholism, suburbia, and dysfunction explored in his photography and videos, here they obviously serve a formal function and reference Pop Art and Op Art, and eyes, and give Robert a recognizable, accessible vocabulary unit that lends the work a clunky elegance (I LOVE “clunky elegance”). Besides, polka dots have been hot for a while (think Damien Hirst or Sigmar Polke) and whenever a motif crops up in various artists’ work, it usually suggests a zeitgeist of some sort.

There’s one more bottle cap woth at the Kreps Gallery, which is a curtain of crowns entitled Substitute Anti Sucklucking Substitution.

From Wikipedia:

Robert Melee (born 1966) is an artist based in NYC and Asbury Park, New Jersey. Melee was born in New Jersey. He makes multimedia art – videos, installations, collages. – His work is often compared to that of John Waters and Andy Warhol due to its overt campness. He is also a painter. He attended the School of Visual Arts in New York from 1986 – 1990.

There’s not much else about Melee out there, though there a post about his public sculptures at School of Visual Arts’ Continuing Education Blog, a New York Times review, and a piece about an exhibition at the Milwaukee Art Museum.

 

Hard Liver Fest Fotos

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Yesterday, Brouwer’s Cafe in Seattle, Washington, held their 7th annual Hard Liver Barleywine Fest. I was fortunate enough to judge again this year, and it was yet another terrific festival. When the doors opened at 11:00 a.m., a line snaked up to the end of the block and Seattle’s best Belgian bar was filled to capacity with minutes of opening.

 

After Hard Liver judging, Tom Peters (from Monk’s Cafe in Philadelphia), Matt Bonney (co-owner of Brouwer’s) and Stephen Beaumont relax with a few more tasty beers.

 

For more photos from this year’s Hard Liver Barleywine Fest, visit the photo gallery.
 

46,948,952 People Can’t Be Wrong

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I just got into my hotel room in Seattle. I’m in town for the Hard Liver Barleywine Festival over at Brouwer’s, though I’ll first be attending a cheese and beer tasting courtesy of Alan Shapiro’s SBS Imports, and then a whisky tasting tonight.

Anyway, I came across an interesting little factoid in a magazine I was reading on the plane. I can’t verify its accuracy or its source, but it’s interesting all the same.

The “estimated number of drunk people in the world at any given moment” is 46,948,952, or nearly 47 million. With an estimated current world population, as I write this, of 6,894,222,276 or roughly 6.9 billion, that means a mere 0.68% of the world — less than 1 percent — is inebriated at any given time. That doesn’t sound like very many drunks in the world when expressed that way, now does it?

 

Dr. Bill Joins Stone

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According to the Stone Blog, as of Monday, Dr. Bill Sysak has joined Stone Brewing as the Beverage Coordinator of Stone Brewing World Bistro & Gardens.

dr-bill

Believe it or not, this is Dr. Bill’s first job in the beer industry, though he’s been involved in the beer world for quite some time. I profiled Dr. Bill a few years ago for an article on Beer Geeks I did for Beer Advocate magazine. He’s justly famous for the legendary beer-tasting marathon parties he threw a few times each year. Congrats, Bill.

The Lie That Won’t Go Away

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In a disappointing editorial in today’s San Francisco Chronicle entitled Liquor By Any Other Name, the lie that alcopops, malternatives, and FMBs contain spirits is once more trotted out in what appears to be wholesale propaganda rather than honest editorializing.

Last year, the California Board of Equalization apparently bowed to pressure from anti-alcohol groups and reclassified FMBs as spirits, despite the fact that they DO NOT contain spirits. I wrote about this deception last year when the BOE passed the new rules. At that time, Michael Scippa, advocacy director for the Marin Institute, was using the tactic of repeating a falsehood in the hopes that eventually people would take it as a fact. I won’t dignify it by repeating it here, but this was my response.

That’s not true, they are malt beverages with flavoring added. Distilled spirits are not added and it is not where their “alcoholic content” is derived from. They are most closely related to beer, which is precisely why they they are called flavored malt beverages and why they have been taxed like beer. Their alcohol content is likewise about the same as the average beer. They are fermented like beer and then chemical flavoring compounds are added, which give FMBs their distinctive sweet, fruity essence. Unlike attorney Scott Dickey’s assertions, which in fact are mischaracterizations, FMBs are exactly what their name suggests, no one has deceived anyone.

In the editorial, they state that revenues of $38 million were expected from the reclassification, but that only about $9,000 in taxes has been paid. Apparently, FMB manufacturers in response re-formulated their drinks to remove even the chemical essence of their spirits flavors and — probably, this is just a guess — used strictly chemical flavorings not derived in any way from their spirits. If the new law says, however ridiculously, that no spirits whatsoever can be in these drinks, then they did what any logical person would do, they removed them. But because this has nothing to with fairness, this has our editorialist up in arms. Here’s how they put it.

The manufacturers admit that they’re not paying the tax, and — get this — they don’t think they need to, because over the course of the last year they’ve managed to “alter” the drink formulas of thousands of these beverages so that they’re technically beers, not liquor.

Well, get this, they always were “technically beers” and no amount of wishing otherwise will change that fact. They never were “liquor,” only the BOE changed the definition so that the inclusion of any amount of “spirits” would reclassify them as “liquor” for purposes of taxation. That in no way magically converted them into a liquor. It’s in a sense the same way that a person with any African-American blood in them, no matter how distant, once made them classified as a black person in our more racist past. An ugly example, to be sure, but that’s exactly what the neo-prohibitionists are doing, making it seem as if a 5% a.b.v. FMB is the same as a bottle of 100 proof whisky just because it contains an infinitesimal amount of the essence of a spirit flavoring. And then the editorial has the audacity to call the FMB manufacturers “disingenuous, if not deceptive.” Oh, and just to illustrate how much they don’t understand this issue, there are about twelve manufacturers of FMBs, each making perhaps no more than a half-dozen brand extension flavors, nowhere near the “thousands” that the editorial asserts.

According to current law, the state has no right to look at the formula itself. The federal agency known as the TTB has that express function. But the editorial doesn’t like that fact, calling the alcohol industry “dangerous” — now who’s being disengenuous? — because, as they put it, the TTB “seems more interested in protecting so-called trade secrets than in helping the state of California regulate a dangerous industry.” Oh, now suddenly it’s about “regulating” the industry. See here I thought they were trying to extract taxes from the FMB manufacturers. Please.

So on Tuesday, the BOE voted 3-2 to request that FMB manufacturers hand over their formulas, even though the Feds have already reviewed and approved them. But the agenda is revealed in the editorial’s last sentence, naturally. “California’s congressional delegation needs to ask federal regulators why they’re siding with these manufacturers instead of public health and the state’s fiscal interest.” And just a paragraph before it was all about regulating the “dangerous” industry. Now, it’s about money. Oh, and the trumped up claim of “public health,” the slightly classier version of “it’s for the kids” argument that’s ubiquitous in the New Drys’ quiver of propaganda.

I’m pretty tired of these arguments, but here goes, again. Yes, California is in the throes of an economic crisis, just like most other states and our federal government, too. But that does not mean it’s appropriate to target one industry to foot the bill. If the state needs more money — and it does — then that burden should be shouldered by all of us, equally. Period. And the “public health” interest is supposedly all about not wanting underage kids to drink FMBs. Well, unless I missed something, it’s already illegal for them to do so, just like it’s illegal for people under 21 to drink beer, wine or liquor. This is an issue of enforcing current laws. Period. The New Drys’ stated agenda for raising the taxes on FMBs is to make them more expensive for teens to buy, which in their collective mind means that it will reduce consumption among our state’s youth. It’s a deeply flawed strategy, and punishes virtually everyone along the supply chain, from manufacturer to adult consumer.

In the end, for me the most troubling aspect of these propagandist editorials is that the reason most neo-prohibitionists want to remove alcohol from society is on moral grounds. That’s the root reason, though getting there is couched in the typical rhetoric of protecting children and society from harm. I could accept the moral arguments if I felt that the tactics used were themselves moral, but they’re not. It’s very hard for me to have someone lecture me about morals through propaganda that spreads lies and falsehoods to further a supposedly “moral” cause, freely using an “ends justify the means” approach. To me, that’s the very definition of disingenuous and deceptive.

 

Top Ten Tuesday: Top 10 Annoyances Of St. Patrick’s Day

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Unless you’re living under a rock, you no doubt know that today is St. Patrick’s Day, a national day in Ireland and a drinking day here in the United States of Alcohol, where almost every holiday has been stripped of whatever meaning it originally had and has been turned into a marketing opportunity for Hallmark cards and every other company that can tie its products into the holiday. This is especially true for the big alcohol companies, who rarely miss an opportunity to turn ready-made social functions where alcohol may or may not have played a traditional role into events that are almost solely about alcohol. Yes, that’s right, I’m a curmudgeon. And not just ’cause I’m old now. I’ve always been a curmudgeon. When I was a kid it was precocious, as a young adult I was merely annoying, but now my curmudgeonly ways are finally hitting their groove. Old people are expected to be cranky, but I’ve long perfected the art so I’ve had a grand head start. Lucky me.

So back to today. I have nothing against alcohol and holidays pleasantly mixing. Most require a drink just to tolerate the relatives. Alcohol is best when it’s a shared experience. That’s not it at all. What bugs me about the way holidays are marketed is that idea that they’re all about fun, nothing but fun, and nothing but alcohol, troughs and troughs of it. Halloween used to be for kids, now it’s the number one keg sales weekend of the year. And St. Patrick’s Day has to be one of the worst. We took the Irish predisposition for enjoying a drink now and again, and turned it into green beer day with everyone expected to drink until they vomit and the street runs green with it. In Ireland, it was originally a religious holiday celebrated with family dinners, akin to our Thanksgiving, but even there it’s become a big tourist industry with American-style partying in Dublin. So I tend to stay in on most of the big drinking holidays, preferring to drink modestly all the other nights of the year and leave the holidays for the rest of society to binge like they’ve been told to do. I guess all that spending is good for the economy, so who am I to complain. Just keep me the hell away from it. Tomorrow it will all be over and things can get back to normal drinking again. So this week, I thought I’d tackle the things that annoy me most about St. Patrick’s Day, given my disdain for the way its celebrated in America. Anyway, here’s List #10:
 

Top 10 Annoyances Of St. Patrick’s Day
 

Kelly Green Don’t get me wrong, green is a terrific color. It’s the color of hops. There are few sights more beautiful than a hopyard at harvest time. But Kelly green has to be one of the most garish and ugly expressions of green to ever get its own Pantone number. A little goes a long way and a lot, like the average St. Patrick’s Day party and my eyes start to hurt. And more curiously, blue was the color most associated with St. Patrick’s Day, until the “wearing of the green” took over, though originally it meant to wear a shamrock, before mutating into its present meaning of wearing all green.
Leprechauns Am I the only one a little creeped out by these “little people” who hoard gold, hide at the end of rainbows, and then wonder why everybody’s after them? Miniature old men with a love of shoes is not exactly my idea of cute and cuddly. In some mythologies, they’re demons who appear only every thousand years. Lucky charms, indeed.
What About All the Other Ethic Groups? I have absolutely nothing against the Irish or even Irish-Americans. Some of my best friends are Irish. I’d even let my daughter marry one … someday, not now; she’s only four. But all — alright, some — kidding aside, why did this one particular ethnicity get a major holiday and not the dozens of other immigrant groups who came to our shores as huddled masses, yearning to breathe free. Why isn’t Casmir Pulaski Day (it celebrates Polish-Americans) or St. George’s Day (the English) as big a holiday here. For that matter, virtually every hyphenated American has a day on which they celebrate their origins, why isn’t our general calendar rife with them? I know politics is essentially the answer to why it became a big holiday, but why haven’t we moved past such out-dated thinking? Either we celebrate all our diversity or none, anything else seems patently unfair.
That Music … I’m sure this is just me, and I can’t even remember the name of the song. When I was stationed in New York City, during the days surrounding St. Patrick’s Day, the Army Band I played in was called on to play at least a gazillion neighborhood St. Patrick’s Day parades, often two, three or four in a single day. And almost the whole time we’d play one single piece of music, over and over again. It was so bad, for me at least, that I’ve blocked it out and can’t even remember the name of it, but you’d know it immediately upon hearing it as a St. Patrick’s Day song. It’s not Danny Boy, it’s not the Washer Woman, though it’s at least somewhat similar to that. If anybody thinks they know this annoying song, keep it to yourself. No, I’m kidding. I do want to know what it is. It’s driving me fairly mad, actually, that I can’t come up with the name and so far no amount of searching has yielded the answer.
Parades After reading the last one, you already know how I feel about the parade music, but I’m no fan of St. Patrick’s Day parades, either. They’re not Irish at all, they’re an American invention. According to Wikipedia, “the world’s first St. Patrick’s Day parade was held in Boston in 1761, organized by the Charitable Society. The first recorded parade was New York City’s celebration which began on 18 March 1762 when Irish soldiers in the English military marched through the city with their music.” I’m not sure what the distinction is there, but that’s what it says. Either way, it was not a step forward in my opinion. And I like parades. I marched in more parades than almost anybody I know, from high school marching band, the Army Band, and the Wyomissing Band, a community band I spent summers with from age fourteen until I joined the Army. But St. Patrick’s Day parades just bug me. There’s no diversity, just a steady stream of green, with people marching for no better reason than the accident of their birth into one group instead of another. Oh, and you’ll find more obnoxious drunks at the average St. Patrick’s Day parade than any other I can think of.

Guinness & Other Dry Irish Stouts Guinness was a bridge beer for me, one of the ones that began my lifelong interest in better beer. So I have a special place for it in my heart. Unfortunately, Diageo doesn’t have the same reverence for it that I once did. There at least eleven different Guinness formulas being made around the world. But it’s hard to take any beer company seriously that takes an iconic brand and test markets Guinness Red and releases an “Extra Cold” version. Murphy’s, unfortunately, isn’t much better now that Heineken owns the Cork brewery. Beamish, also from Cork, was owned by Canadian Carling, but after the Scottish & Newcastle breakup, it will soon be owned by Heineken, too. But that aside, there are some fine Irish stouts being made here in the states. I’m lucky enough to live near one of the best brewers of Irish stouts; Denise Jones of Moylan’s. She makes terrific examples of the style, and has for years, both at Moylan’s and her previous gig at Third Street Aleworks.
Irish Beer Beyond the stouts, there’s precious little diversity to celebrate in Irish Beer. Harp is no great shakes, at least in my opinion, and apart from a few red or amber ales, there’s not much more that Ireland is traditionally known for. It’s my understanding that there are a few small Irish craft breweries making some good beer, but they’re obviously not too widespread yet, plus I’ve not yet had the pleasure to try any of them.
You’re NOT Irish They say that on St. Patrick’s Day, everybody is a little Irish. Hogwash, I say. The people who buy into this are not pretending to be Irish, they’re trying to get drunk and get laid, usually both. That’s the extent of most revelers “Irish-ness.” It’s frankly embarrassing to watch this ritual play out in bar after bar every March 17. I’ve got nothing against anyone who wants a one night stand, if that’s your thing, go for it. There’s not nearly enough love in the world, even the fake kind expressed in the drunken hook-up. But using a holiday as your excuse seems even more pathetic than the usual rationalizations.
Green Beer How this disgusting practice began is anyone’s guess. What I find particularly ironic about this is that the reason green is associated with Ireland has to do with the natural beauty of the Emerald Isle. So to celebrate that by adding a chemical dye into the Chicago River along with kegs of beer seems unnatural at best. I just don’t understand why anyone would want to adulterate the beautiful range of beer color with a putrid green.

I don’t know if it’s related at all, but the students at the University of Miami in Oxford, Ohio have been celebrating Green Beer Day since 1952. They even have their own website for Green Beer Day, though primarily to sell tchotchkes.

Bad Drunks I guess some people believe that acting Irish involves getting and/or being drunk. That Ireland is associated with drinking I won’t debate, certainly not among the writing class. But the way this plays out in bars, parade routes and blocked-off streets throughout America is some of the worst drunken examples of humanity that I’ve ever seen. All it does is provide ammunition for the New Drys to point at and use against responsible drinkers and try to further their agenda of a new prohibition. I’m a big fan of moderation and quite frankly St. Patrick’s Day is one of the most immoderate holidays of all. And I understand that all things in moderation includes moderation, too, meaning sometimes going crazy is not only okay, but downright necessary. But that should be an individual decision and made for personal reasons. It should not include just using a holiday as an excuse for binge drinking.

 

So enjoy yourself on St. Patrick’s Day. Here’s some more about the holiday, from Wikipedia, the History Channel and an interesting myth-busting article from Slate.

 

Also, if you have any ideas for future Top 10 lists you’d like to see, drop me a line.
 

Twitter Brew By 21st Amendment

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Twitter is headquartered in China Basin, the neighborhood in San Francisco that also holds the Giants Ballpark. It’s also where the brewpub 21st Amendment is located and the pair have teamed up to creat a tweet, er sweet, beer for Twitter.

From the press release:

Today, the 21st Amendment Brewery is brewing a special Twitter Brew for their neighbors in South Park at Twitter.com. “Spring Tweet” is a Spring-time ale, brewed with Barley and wheat malt with a subtle hop flavor and aroma and a very quaffable beer at a mere 5% alcohol by volume. The beer will be released on Monday April 6th.

“The Twitter community has been very supportive of the 21st Amendment and we really wanted to give something back to the community,” says Brewmaster and co-owner of the 21st Amendment Shaun O’Sullivan. The Twitter community has held many “Tweetups” at the 563 2nd Street location, across the street from the company’s headquarters in South Park. Tweetups are an opportunity for the Twitter community to meet up and come together in person, rather than over the 140 character limit on Twitter.

The 21st Amendment is active on Twitter and posts “tweets” at www.twitter.com/21stAmendment , and will be posting twitter updates and pictures throughout today’s brew of “Spring Tweet.” Search for #twitterbrew on the Twitter search at http://search.twitter.com/ . Twitter is supporting the brewing project, donating t-shirts and tweets to the 21st Amendment. “We even put out to the Twitter community a ‘name the Twitter brew’ contest and have received some excellent names and ideas for today’s brew,” says co-founder of the 21st Amendment, Nico Freccia.

 
You can also follow the me and the Brookston beer Bulletin on Twitter, too.
 

Bay Area Firkin Fest On Tap April 4

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One of the best and coolest new festivals in the Bay Area is the Firkin Gravity Festival, now in its sixth year. It will take place this year on April 4, beginning at 11:00 a.m. It’s a great opportunity to sample barrel-aged and cask beer from at least twenty California breweries. This is one you should definitely plan on attending. See you there.

 

 
4.4.2009

Bay Area Firkin Gravity Festival (6th annual)

Triple Rock Brewery, 1920 Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley, California
510.843.2739 [ website ]

 

Go See BEER WARS April 16

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There’s one month to go until the premiere of the new documentary film Beer Wars, opening in 440 movie theaters April 16. If you’re a craft beer lover, you should see the film, which is described as follows.

In America, size matters. The bigger you are, the more power you have, especially in the business world.

Director Anat Baron takes you on a no holds barred exploration of the U.S. beer industry that ultimately reveals the truth behind the label of your favorite beer. Told from an insider’s perspective, the film goes behind the scenes of the daily battles and all out wars that dominate one of America’s favorite industries.

Beer Wars begins as the corporate behemoths are being challenged by small, independent brewers who are shunning the status quo and creating innovative new beers. The story is told through 2 of these entrepreneurs — Sam and Rhonda — battling the might and tactics of Corporate America. We witness their struggle to achieve their American Dream in an industry dominated by powerful corporations unwilling to cede an inch.

This contemporary David and Goliath story is ultimately about keeping your integrity (and your family’s home) in the face of temptation. Beer Wars is a revealing and entertaining journey that provides unexpected and surprising turns and promises to change the world’s opinion on those infamous 99 bottles of beer on the wall.

If you’re like me, you probably want to see the movie and think you’ll get around to it as soon as it’s convenient. And ordinarily, I’d agree. It’s not really important when you see it. Except, this time it is important. If humanly possible, try to see Beer Wars on its opening day, April 16, and for the live show taking place at 8:00 p.m. ET, 7:00 p.m. CT, 6:00 p.m. MT and 8:00 p.m. PT.

 

 

Fathom and Ducks In A Row Entertainment present Beer Wars LIVE with Ben Stein, a one night event taking you inside the boardrooms and back rooms of the American beer industry. The event will feature the exclusive never-before-seen documentary Beer Wars, followed by a riveting live discussion led by Ben Stein with America’s leading independent brewers and experts.

Playing in movie theaters nationwide on Thursday, April 16th at 8pm ET / 7pm CT / 6pm MT / 8pm PT (tape delay), beer industry insiders will take you behind-the-scenes of their quest for the American Dream. Don’t miss out on this entertaining journey that will reveal the truth behind the label of your favorite beer!

If you’ve paid any attention before a film began, even before the trailers, perhaps you’ve noticed a new phenomenon that’s been happening at movie theaters for about two years. They’ve been showing live, one-night-only shows, things like opera performances from the Met, for example. Using a satellite feed, you could watch a live event while it’s happening on a giant movie screen. And that’s what Beer Wars Live will be. After the regular film, several of the people who were in the film, such as Sam Calagione, Charlie Papazian, Maureen Ogle and several more will have a lively discussion about the state of beer, interspersed with some additional short mini-films, stuff that you’ll only be able to see that night. It will be hosted by Ben “Bueller, Bueller” Stein.

But more importantly, to have a huge turnout, say 100,000 people all turn up to see the “beer” movie April 16, would send a very cool message. So far, the most they’ve gotten for anything is about 80,000. So to beat that record would make it newsworthy in and of itself, and would be great publicity for the craft beer industry. In 440 theaters, getting 100K would only involve 227 people per movie house, so it doesn’t sound too terribly difficult. I already know of quite a few people and breweries who are throwing after parties at nearby bars after the Beer Wars Live show concludes, so you can conceivably make a whole night of it. If you don’t know of one in your area, nobody’s stopping you from starting one. That’s what Facebook and Twitter are for.

So grab as many friends as you can, especially the ones who don’t currently drink craft beer, and drag them to one of the 440 theaters. Here’s a list of all the theaters, by state, where it will be showing. Just follow the screening instructions, which are simple enough. Find your closest theater, buy your tickets online, which you can do at at least five ways, depending on your theater.

As for the Bay Area, it’s showing in at least 17 theaters, so let’s fill ’em up. 227 times 17 is less than 4,000 people. How hard can that be?

The reason I’m convinced this could be a momentous event and we should strive to make it one, is because there has never been a better time to get bigger, widespread support for all the small, local and regional craft breweries. Yes, the big breweries create lots of jobs, too, but then so does Wal-Mart. The problem with supporting a large corporation is the that the money they take in does not stay in the local area, but is taken out of the local economy and ends up somewhere else, possibly even outside the country. With our economy on the skids, supporting small and local businesses has never been more important.

Beer Wars is nothing new. The war itself has been quietly raging for years and years. But only insiders have been aware of it and even fewer still have been willing to admit it and talk about it publicly. This film should blow the lid off of that and make honest debate at least possible. That would be a great first step in bringing more people over to the craft beer side. Just like Star Wars, the craft beer movement is the rebellion and we’re fighting the empire for galactic beer domination. Once enough people realize we’ve got Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia and the Ewoks on our side, how could anyone possibly continue to support the dark side?

Still not convinced. Watch the trailer. Let the fermentation be with you.