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April 1, 2012 – Review
Stanya Kahn’s “A Cave Walks into a Bar”
Sohrab Mohebbi
-Today my horoscope said the road to hell is paved with good intentions; does that mean that you are barking up the wrong tree? - I think it’s more like you are pissing in the playground.
From Arms are Overrated, Stanya Kahn, 2012
It is unclear where the impulse lies, but one often hears sporadic muted sounds of laughter in museums, galleries, and lecture rooms, implying that the laugher “gets” the point and meaning has reached its destination. That sudden moment of clarity when everything is resolved and the curtains of obscurities are lifted from perception is accompanied by a chuckle. One might say it is not the funniness of the joke, but the joy of “getting-it” that makes one laugh. Stanya Kahn’s recent work (all 2012) on view at Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects hints at the vulgar economics of jokes as proxies for exchange.
Arms are Overrated chronicles a day in the life of two crumbled pieces of paper in a common dudes-hanging-out situation—although the identities of the characters are left ambiguous. They visit the Old Zoo at Griffith Park with its horror movie monsters, go to a cemetery, get into a car crash and kill a biker, and …