Wednesday Edition: Shaun Sundholm

Meme-o-licious Wednesday greetings, my collector friends! Today's edition by Shaun Sundholm is a nice follow-up to yesterday's paean to Jorge Colombo, currently the most meme-o-licious artist of all on the interwebs. Shaun's no slouch himself when it comes to internet fame — Untitled (Let's Get Lost) has been bookmarked, blogged, crushed-out on, tumblr'd, ffffound, favorited and otherwise adored approximately a gajillion and one times.

No stranger to some (ok, most... I mean all, um.. WHATever!) of these haunts myself, I've been familiar with — and fond of — Shaun's witty way with words and imagery for a while. It was no surprise to me when Ariel Aberg-Riger suggested his work in response to our little crowd-sourced curation query, sent out via Twitter a while back. And yes, it's true I love to browse images on the internet more than almost anyone I know, but... Come on, people! LET'S GET REAL, shall we?

You know how I say "live with art — it's good for you"? I really mean it, and not in the condescending, let's-help-the-great-unwashed-improve-themselves way that David Byrne referenced in a recent journal entry. I mean that it can make life more interesting, and happier. We can sort, collect and otherwise accumulate images on the internet, or our hard drives, till the end of time, but it's just not the same as having something that you love hanging on the wall in your home. (Or apartment or cube or office or yurt or igloo.)

As I said in GOOD magazine, back when this whole 20x200 thing was just a twinkle in my eye, "Buying the work of emerging artists is cool — it's nice to know that you're supporting someone who is probably struggling and dreaming of quitting his or her day job — and there's more: the wonderful feeling of living with art. Each thing you own frames your personal history and becomes anchored to the chapter of your life in which you acquired it."

Don't get me wrong, all this internet browsing is good too. I credit the wealth of imagery and information available on the internet with making me the curator that I am today. I've never been one to lock myself up in the library, sit still in a classroom or get lost in the stacks, but I can't tell you how many times a single image I've viewed on the internet has sent me down the rabbit hole, opening up whole new dimensions of the art world that I'd never seen before. And knowing that that'll happen again and again is awesome and exciting, for sure, but it's all so intentional. Serendipity isn't entirely impossible on the internet, but I still need to turn on the computer, fire up the browser, and go looking.

An image that I've ffffound will never be a presence in my peripheral vision, it won't greet me when I open my eyes in the morning and it won't ever have the chance to make its way into my psyche by its mere presence on the walls of my apartment. The art you live with works its magic on you all the time, whether you're aware of it or not. Let's Get Lost is exactly the type of voodoo that I want to get off your screens and onto your walls.