Are we too early or are we too late? A question that haunts. So hard to be on time.

 

That freezing night in Manhattan, in the winter of 1992, going to the Kitchen to see the Transmission of Bill’s Agrippa. Excited to see the project debut at last. I had only consulted, as a friend—put a few key people in touch by fax, as I was still living in Tokyo at this time. But I felt I must be there, for the simultaneous birth and erasure of this book, an embrace and rejection of digital eternity. (Of course just the next morning, a bootleg appeared on Mindvox.)

At dinner later that night, I was explaining my new company to an editor of Omni: digital art-works released monthly on limited-edition LaserDisc, authenticated by hologram and delivered to your doorstep. He loved the idea, as did my investors in Japan, but had a question—what kind of hologram? I kissed a linen napkin and laid it next to his plate. A bright pink pout. He laughed and folded it into his pocket, “for the archives!”

I flew back the next day, JAL business class. That company lasted another three years. There have been others before and since, but that was a special time.

Are we too early, or too late?

Paloma Powers (née Paloma Li-Cruz) is a shapeshifting arts agitator with over 30 years of experience in the gray areas of experimental capitalism and aesthetic arbitrage. In her years on the International Color Council, she coined the term “greige”, and also consulted on the cult television show “VR.5”. She’s hard to meet face-to-face, but might give you a moment if you happen to be in the first class lounge of the Sharjah airport during the same serendipitous layover. She established her latest company, Paloma Powers, as a response to limited business models within a changing art world, to elevate the role and value of cultural workers, and to broaden the audiences and contexts for art. She will neither reveal her age nor Chinese Zodiac symbol, but will confirm that she is a Scorpio. http://www.palomapowers.com