Newsday (Nassau Edition) from Hempstead, New York • 119

fy 4 TELEVISION Video Morsels Can Make Up A Meal on TV 7 6 A LIVE FROM Off is a show easy to like but is it art? The PBS series which begins its second season at 10 pm tonight on WNYC31 (stereo simulcast on WNYC-FM) and at the same time Sunday on WNET 13 claims to be an "electronic stage for but does this melange of video snippets qualify as art? Well if something stimulates you to consider whether art it is fair to conclude that it is If the question enters your mind you confirm that the answer is yes One may argue about who gets how much credit in "Alive from Off video a 40-second piece in the first show lists 11 persons in its credits but not about what it is If you saw any of last shows you know what to expect in this series of 10: productions that range in length from a few seconds to the fell half-hour of the show The common thread is video tape it is the canvas on which all the works are painted The show also qualifies as art according to a much more stringent requirement that of intent The networks and cable programers govern themselves by what the audience wants and therefore do not make art The material that appears on "Alive From Off has been made to satisfy its creators not the audience and it is JV REVIEW Drew Fetherston Feisty Architect: Controversial And Pleased About It By Leo Seligsohn TT IKE IT OR NOT the man has boldly re-JLi shaped skyline and on the eve of his 80th birthday still cutting up "Philip Johnson: A Self Portrait" WNET 13 at 9 tonight is an engrossing look at an American original The second part of 15-part "American series it builds quickly from a routine talking-head show into a sparkling engagement with a quirkily brilliant mind A peppy mischievous and entertaining fellow Johnson is probably his own best invention Like his steel glass and concrete structures he makes instant impact Impeccable assured and egotistical he fills the hour with bon mots self-congratulatory rhetoric and dazzling opinions If architecture discovered Philip Johnson central casting probably would have be playing Clifton Webb parts The interview is conducted by Rosamond Bernier writer art critic lecturer and longtime friend In typically whimsical fashion Johnson sets the tone by announcing that his first principal of architecture is: "Get the Later explaining the importance of artists builders planners and others he says "Architecture is much too important to leave to About himself: "I always like to be on the wrong side of everything Sometimes you have to be tangent to the world or go Recent evidence of the tangential approach is the startling elliptical office building at Third Avenue and 53rd Street in Manhattan The Johnson purpose Bernier tells us: "To sell office space in a building with the idea that every office is a comer office and no one office has more clout than any A pioneer in bringing the techniques of the Bauhaus to America Manhattan designs also include the New York State Theater at Lincoln Center and the AT building It seems that Johnson is never more serious than when joking His "sexy office in Houston the Penzoil Building is actually two office buildings one slightly taller than the other and built he says "within kissing distance of each The show frequently cuts away to bring us shots of such buildings from the air the ground or from inside We also see a model of one of most ambitious projects a plan to redesign Times Square around a flashy skeletal re-creation of the present 1 Times Square building with moving spotlights bouncing their beams off surrounding new buildings and into the sky His inspiration: Times Square as the emotional center of New York Turning 80 on July 8 Johnson is still full of beans "Life begins at he says brightly "Old age is the best period Seventy to eighty is the greatest done more work than I did in the preceding forty years and my best work in the past he says "Everybody hates me because Fm doing so much Tm now without doubt the leading architect nice to be so successful but the thing is you become the man to Modesty is not strong suit Nor is he averse to the quick putdown "I think if I see one more Henry Moore sculpture in front of one more Oxford College IT1 He also announces his disapproval of the way certain art is being displayed at the Museum of Modem Art which fee designed On the other hand he approves of the recent redesign of the museum and is quick to give credit where credit is due His famous glass house in Connecticut he reminds Bernier was the late Ludwig Mies van der idea What we never see is Johnson at work in the process of putting his ideas on paper or overseeing others who do But his descriptions of what he does no doubt are more eloquent "Architecture how you look at some monument in the distance like a piece of he says how thia piece of sculpture gets around you how you walk into it how you get out of it and how it influences As for his glass house he says simply "It turns the landscape into fi Performance artist Terry Dibble will be featured tonight on From Off Center that open the network evening news broadcasts Those techniques have been cheapened by overuse in music videos would not be out of place on MTV if the music were changed In feet the artists on "Alive from Off often have links to the music video business the theme song is by David Byrne of Talking Heads and Talking Heads documentarist Jonathan Demme Making has a piece in the seventh show The best piece in the first show is a nice marriage of video effects (by film maker Charles Atlas) and dance (choreography by Philippe Decoufie) that was originally mads for French television Set in a cabaret of the fantastic it uses video techniques to enhance the sinister flavor of the piece: The legs of dancers suddenly become transparent dancers seem to leave their own bodies behind as they move It is too long by the end it seems a parody all spastic gestures and nervous music but fun for a while If the chilly technical fere of the first show leaves you odd try the following "Sister Suzie a charming "doo-wopp and hymn to the power of movies written by Lee Breuer composed by Bob Telson and performed by the a cappeUa singing group 14 Karat Soul pretty it sounds good beautifully performed the technical work is unflawed thoughtfiil and evocative without taking itself too seriously In sum a serious work that is as pleasing as anything network television can offer In a word art Marvin Kitman on vacation art Does this make for some very self-indulgent work? Indeed it does Remember the "Saturday Night bit with Leonard Pinth-Gamell (Dan Aykroyd) as host of a show called "Bad Conceptual Some of "Alive From Off is painfully similar In show "These Are the would be my candidate for the Pinth-Gamell collection: a bunch of static shots of an actor bellowing a cliched code of conduct You get the point (also cliched) in the first few seconds the rest of the piece is padding Other pieces are interesting because they reveal an artist seduced by his or her medium in show is such: A performance of empty virtuosity with a computer The problem is that most of the techniques used in the piece are borrowed from mainstream television many of the effects wijl remind viewers of the graphics NEWSDAY MONDAY JUNE 30 1986 Part 11 9 ABC is planning a series of one-hour specials for the 1986- i that wil 87 season that will star among Tommy Lee Jones will play a priest who gets involved in a murder mystery in "Where the Dark Streets a CBS TV- movie to be aired next season Annette costars I Robert Vaughn who starred in The Man from is returning to series television as a regular next season on "The playing what NBC describes as "a mysterious gov-T eminent official in charge of future A-Team a -i-r ij others Burt Reynolds Diana Ross Dudley Moore and Emmanuel Lewis The network also will telecast a new Jim Henson Christmas special and the first "American Comedy Other upcoming projects on ABC include a special 1 with Carol Burnett' Whoopi Goldberg and Robin Williams a Perry Como Christmas show' and Film Institute and the perennial Academy-Award presentations Burt Reynolds to be In spectsl.