"Lately, I’ve been wondering if sitting quietly in a café, pretending to read a newspaper, and not writing is the most earnest expression in our age: no echoes of language, nothing to reblog, just pure unmitigated self sitting with self. I might, after a time of blank staring, find myself constructing sentences in my head, maybe a paragraph, simply letting the words roll around in my mind. I will not. I repeat. I will not write them down. They are my secret sentences, not yours."
—Andrew Simone (via Amanda Mooney)
Not doing enough of this as of late...
—Andrew Simone (via Amanda Mooney)
Not doing enough of this as of late...
Labels: Signs of Our Time
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
A New Take on the Mash Up
This struck me as very fresh. A mashup is, more often than not, the sampling of pre-existing media -- music, movies, even sport intervews-- to create something new. And yet in the case of the Adidas Originals Star Wars ad, the media being used here is entirely new footage shot specifically for the ad itself. What has been mashed up are the cultural narratives of these two iconic pop entities.
Conceived of by the boundary-defying minds over at Sid Lee and directed by new favorite director Nima Nourizadeh, the celebrity house party that has become an infamous element of Adidas' promotional materials is once again gettin' busy but this time with X-wing fighters buzzing the rooftops above.
This struck me as very fresh. A mashup is, more often than not, the sampling of pre-existing media -- music, movies, even sport intervews-- to create something new. And yet in the case of the Adidas Originals Star Wars ad, the media being used here is entirely new footage shot specifically for the ad itself. What has been mashed up are the cultural narratives of these two iconic pop entities.
Conceived of by the boundary-defying minds over at Sid Lee and directed by new favorite director Nima Nourizadeh, the celebrity house party that has become an infamous element of Adidas' promotional materials is once again gettin' busy but this time with X-wing fighters buzzing the rooftops above.
Labels: Signs of Our Time
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Chris Ware's Halloween Cover for New Yorker
This link is blazing across the internets like wild fire but thought it worth posting here: yet another timely and beautiful New Yorker cover by Chris Ware.
This link is blazing across the internets like wild fire but thought it worth posting here: yet another timely and beautiful New Yorker cover by Chris Ware.
Labels: graphic novels, illustration, Signs of Our Time
Monday, October 12, 2009
A Weird Random Thing
The calls start coming in on Thursday. Wrong numbers — or so it seems at first. All of them are from the United States. All of them looking for the same person: Tony Johnson. Upon answering the 3rd or 4th call, from Rhode Island, the voice on the other end is that of a frail and elderly woman and I ask her what specifically she is calling about. She reveals that she has received a letter in the mail from Citiwide Bank in Nevada with an enclosed cheque for $3853.00. In order to authorize the cheque, she was instructed to call the bank's claim manager Tony Johnson at the phone number provided.
"And that phone number once again is..." I ask, already knowing what she is going to say. She repeats back my own phone number.
"I'm sorry, but not only were you given the wrong number but I think that letter is a scam."
"I think you are right." She replies and we hang up.
And so it has continued. Around 6AM Pacific Time, my phone will start buzzing every 20 minutes or so for the rest of the day. 19 missed calls this morning from across the States: Arizona, California, Connecticut, New Jersey, Alabama, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, New York. I check my voicemail every few hours. It is always the same story repeated one after the other. I feel strangely voyeuristic, as though given a brief audio snapshot into the lives of people with whom I would otherwise never have crossed paths. I can only guess that I am connecting with America's most naive, perhaps her most desperate. Lots of older people; plenty of thick smalltown drawls; a man who asks for assistance "cuz I can't read so good"; another man who just keeps yelling "HELLO?" into my message box. I picture these people sitting in their homes, in their trailers perhaps, ubiquitous cliches of the American lower class inevitably flashing through my head as they cradle their phones against their shoulders, holding their cheques up in front of them like beacons of hope, convincing themselves that it is a sign from God, that in these desperate and trying times this is the break that they have been looking for.
At the same time, I picture "Tony Johnson", who to his credit must have put a fair amount of time and perhaps even a significant startup investment into this scam -- creating convincingly branded bank letterhead, envelopes and cheques; copywriting for all of the documents; acquisition of some form of database; and then the actual trans-American mail out -- I picture him sitting in his apartment, staring at his phone and wondering why the hell it hasn't started ringing. I wonder when he will discover the typo. I wonder if he has a boss.
Meanwhile, I am randomly caught in the middle of these two worlds. I call the police, mainly to assure that my connection to this mail fraud case is not going to result in swat teams smashing through my living room window. The officer assures me that she thinks I am safe. The phone company informs me that they are not able to block calls from the US. In fact, my only options are to block all calls or to get a new phone number, neither of which are all that appealing. So I decide to ride it out for a few more days in the hopes that the initial surge will die down. Afterall, how many dupes can there be in America?
The calls start coming in on Thursday. Wrong numbers — or so it seems at first. All of them are from the United States. All of them looking for the same person: Tony Johnson. Upon answering the 3rd or 4th call, from Rhode Island, the voice on the other end is that of a frail and elderly woman and I ask her what specifically she is calling about. She reveals that she has received a letter in the mail from Citiwide Bank in Nevada with an enclosed cheque for $3853.00. In order to authorize the cheque, she was instructed to call the bank's claim manager Tony Johnson at the phone number provided.
"And that phone number once again is..." I ask, already knowing what she is going to say. She repeats back my own phone number.
"I'm sorry, but not only were you given the wrong number but I think that letter is a scam."
"I think you are right." She replies and we hang up.
And so it has continued. Around 6AM Pacific Time, my phone will start buzzing every 20 minutes or so for the rest of the day. 19 missed calls this morning from across the States: Arizona, California, Connecticut, New Jersey, Alabama, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, New York. I check my voicemail every few hours. It is always the same story repeated one after the other. I feel strangely voyeuristic, as though given a brief audio snapshot into the lives of people with whom I would otherwise never have crossed paths. I can only guess that I am connecting with America's most naive, perhaps her most desperate. Lots of older people; plenty of thick smalltown drawls; a man who asks for assistance "cuz I can't read so good"; another man who just keeps yelling "HELLO?" into my message box. I picture these people sitting in their homes, in their trailers perhaps, ubiquitous cliches of the American lower class inevitably flashing through my head as they cradle their phones against their shoulders, holding their cheques up in front of them like beacons of hope, convincing themselves that it is a sign from God, that in these desperate and trying times this is the break that they have been looking for.
At the same time, I picture "Tony Johnson", who to his credit must have put a fair amount of time and perhaps even a significant startup investment into this scam -- creating convincingly branded bank letterhead, envelopes and cheques; copywriting for all of the documents; acquisition of some form of database; and then the actual trans-American mail out -- I picture him sitting in his apartment, staring at his phone and wondering why the hell it hasn't started ringing. I wonder when he will discover the typo. I wonder if he has a boss.
Meanwhile, I am randomly caught in the middle of these two worlds. I call the police, mainly to assure that my connection to this mail fraud case is not going to result in swat teams smashing through my living room window. The officer assures me that she thinks I am safe. The phone company informs me that they are not able to block calls from the US. In fact, my only options are to block all calls or to get a new phone number, neither of which are all that appealing. So I decide to ride it out for a few more days in the hopes that the initial surge will die down. Afterall, how many dupes can there be in America?
Labels: Signs of Our Time
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
The New York Times' River of News
In adapting new mediums, there is always a period where the shape of the old form is mirrored in the new form's space. For example, an early television ad looked like this. Radio had simply repositioned itself in front of a camera. It took years for advertisers to fully realize what could be achieved on the small screen. Nearly half a century later, the highly polished 30 second spot that those early sponsor announcements had evolved into would make the jump online with little change –aside from a taking advantage of more lenient regulations– when internet video came of age. Even today, the "best" viral ads still follow the tried and true format.
In a similar pattern, the online newspaper has always adapted the traditional layout of its printed cousin. The better rags have introduced interactive components and with the onset of blogging, there has been, for better or worse , the ability for reader comments. But the overall structure has remained intact. Meanwhile, sites such as Facebook, Friend Feed, Twitter and, of course, the all-powerful RSS feed have turned our mode of consuming information from categorized columns into a constantly updating flow.
Today, the New York Times, in what is being heralded by the likes of Jay Rosen (@jayrosen_nyu) and Dave Winer (@davewiner) as a watershed moment, introduces the Times Wire, an at-a-glance view of the paper's latest content, in reverse chronological order without any other weighting or sorting. As Winer states, "They're now presenting their news flow as a flow. Gone is the pretense that news on the Internet works like news on paper. Welcome to the NY Times river of news".
RSS has been with us for 10 years now. And unlike a number of other trends and technologies, it has survived and thrived and essentially become the backbone for the current information revolution. After a decade, one might ask of the NY Times shift in format "So what?" or "Why did it take so long?". Or, to the more discerning observer, it is a moment to make note: of both the validation of the new form and the prevailing relevance of one of the older forms' greatest champions.
In adapting new mediums, there is always a period where the shape of the old form is mirrored in the new form's space. For example, an early television ad looked like this. Radio had simply repositioned itself in front of a camera. It took years for advertisers to fully realize what could be achieved on the small screen. Nearly half a century later, the highly polished 30 second spot that those early sponsor announcements had evolved into would make the jump online with little change –aside from a taking advantage of more lenient regulations– when internet video came of age. Even today, the "best" viral ads still follow the tried and true format.
In a similar pattern, the online newspaper has always adapted the traditional layout of its printed cousin. The better rags have introduced interactive components and with the onset of blogging, there has been, for better or worse , the ability for reader comments. But the overall structure has remained intact. Meanwhile, sites such as Facebook, Friend Feed, Twitter and, of course, the all-powerful RSS feed have turned our mode of consuming information from categorized columns into a constantly updating flow.
Today, the New York Times, in what is being heralded by the likes of Jay Rosen (@jayrosen_nyu) and Dave Winer (@davewiner) as a watershed moment, introduces the Times Wire, an at-a-glance view of the paper's latest content, in reverse chronological order without any other weighting or sorting. As Winer states, "They're now presenting their news flow as a flow. Gone is the pretense that news on the Internet works like news on paper. Welcome to the NY Times river of news".
RSS has been with us for 10 years now. And unlike a number of other trends and technologies, it has survived and thrived and essentially become the backbone for the current information revolution. After a decade, one might ask of the NY Times shift in format "So what?" or "Why did it take so long?". Or, to the more discerning observer, it is a moment to make note: of both the validation of the new form and the prevailing relevance of one of the older forms' greatest champions.
Labels: NY Times, Signs of Our Time
Monday, February 09, 2009
Then and now...the CCTV Building in Beijing
"…the headquarters of CCTV, the Chinese television network, by Rem Koolhaas and Ole Scheeren, of the Office for Metropolitan Architecture—a building which I had thought was going to be a pretentious piece of structural exhibitionism—turned out to be a compelling and exciting piece of structural exhibitionism."
–Paul Goldberger, The New Yorker
"Word has it that the building is close to explosion. Whole thing pretty much toast, all in all."
–@DavidFeng
"…the headquarters of CCTV, the Chinese television network, by Rem Koolhaas and Ole Scheeren, of the Office for Metropolitan Architecture—a building which I had thought was going to be a pretentious piece of structural exhibitionism—turned out to be a compelling and exciting piece of structural exhibitionism."
–Paul Goldberger, The New Yorker
"Word has it that the building is close to explosion. Whole thing pretty much toast, all in all."
–@DavidFeng
Labels: Architecture, Disasters, Signs of Our Time, Then and Now
Tuesday, December 02, 2008
On Infrastructural Domesticity
"Whether or not this is even true – after all, I never think truth is the point in stories like this – ... the idea of appropriating a construction crane as a new form of domestic space – a kind of parasitic sub-structure attached to the very thing it's helped to construct ... is totally awesome;"
-BldgBlog
-BldgBlog
Labels: Architecture, Signs of Our Time
Tuesday, November 04, 2008
By the content of his character
""With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day."
-MLK
"It's the answer that led those who've been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.
It's been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this date in this election at this defining moment change has come to America."
-Barack Obama
""With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day."
-MLK
"It's the answer that led those who've been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.
It's been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this date in this election at this defining moment change has come to America."
-Barack Obama
Labels: Signs of Our Time, Sixties
Wednesday, July 09, 2008
On The New City..
"The amount of building becomes obscene without a blueprint. Each time you ask yourself, Do you have the right to do this much work on this scale if you don't have an opinion about what the world should be like? We really feel that. But is there time for a manifesto? I don't know."
--Rem Koolhaas
--Rem Koolhaas
Labels: Architecture, NY Times, Signs of Our Time
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Pixel Pointillism: The Art of William Betts
Stumbled upon a brilliant exhibit at the Yaletown Jennifer Kostuik Gallery during lunch break today. Texas based artist William Betts (whose website curiously bares an "iPhone Optimized" icon) taps into the Big Brother omnipresence of our modern world, taking webcam and surveillance video screencaps as his subject matter and, by exchanging pixels for pointillism, reinterpreting them in often abstract and beautiful ways.
Says Betts in his Artist Statement:
"Today we have so many layers between the individual and direct experience, it fundamentally changes how we see the world...I am intereseted in how far removed I can get from the subject and the painting itself and still make paintings."
Definitely worth seeing in person if you get the chance. The exhibit runs until June 8th.
Stumbled upon a brilliant exhibit at the Yaletown Jennifer Kostuik Gallery during lunch break today. Texas based artist William Betts (whose website curiously bares an "iPhone Optimized" icon) taps into the Big Brother omnipresence of our modern world, taking webcam and surveillance video screencaps as his subject matter and, by exchanging pixels for pointillism, reinterpreting them in often abstract and beautiful ways.
Says Betts in his Artist Statement:
"Today we have so many layers between the individual and direct experience, it fundamentally changes how we see the world...I am intereseted in how far removed I can get from the subject and the painting itself and still make paintings."
Definitely worth seeing in person if you get the chance. The exhibit runs until June 8th.
Labels: Art, Signs of Our Time, Vancouver Galleries
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Google Earth vs. The Bible
In one of the most blatant epoch incongruities since Spartacus's Rolex-wearing Roman, Australian artists, The Glue Society have rendered satellite photographs of various Biblical events as though seen via Google Earth. Awesome.
In one of the most blatant epoch incongruities since Spartacus's Rolex-wearing Roman, Australian artists, The Glue Society have rendered satellite photographs of various Biblical events as though seen via Google Earth. Awesome.
Labels: Art, Photography, Signs of Our Time
Monday, December 17, 2007
Rumours of my death have been greatly exaggerated
"In the form of cached Web sites, evacuated blogs, forgotten MySpace pages and abandoned Flickr feeds, ghosts frolic, beeping and flashing on autopilot. The jolly online zombies look the way they did the day they died, but the light left their eyes the last day their souls logged in."
--Virginia Hefferman, The Medium
"ok so this is my page for me and all the spooky things that happen to me don't think Iam crazy and don't think that I am makenig things up but for the true believers you can find alot of things here that you might find reasoureful of what not.so if your ready you can read my page and chill out...feel free to look around and have fun. "
--first and last entry on iamaloser.blogspot.com, June 18, 2002
"If you like a certain blog, make friends with the blogger, and then later they abandon their blog, and do not respond to emails, should you be worried? Contact the police? Make a missing persons report? Google their name and search for an obituary? What are you ethically obligated to do in this situation?"
from Dropping out of the blogosphere
"Most of these screenshots (many of which are annotated) were collected during the dotcom bust of 1999-2001, but I continue to add new victims to the rolls as they succomb to the forces of cyber-entropy."
-- Steve Baldwin, The Museum of Interactive Failure
"What would cause people to leave such a beautiful place?"
-- WebUrbanists.com's Urban Abandonments Parts I & II
"In the form of cached Web sites, evacuated blogs, forgotten MySpace pages and abandoned Flickr feeds, ghosts frolic, beeping and flashing on autopilot. The jolly online zombies look the way they did the day they died, but the light left their eyes the last day their souls logged in."
--Virginia Hefferman, The Medium
"ok so this is my page for me and all the spooky things that happen to me don't think Iam crazy and don't think that I am makenig things up but for the true believers you can find alot of things here that you might find reasoureful of what not.so if your ready you can read my page and chill out...feel free to look around and have fun. "
--first and last entry on iamaloser.blogspot.com, June 18, 2002
"If you like a certain blog, make friends with the blogger, and then later they abandon their blog, and do not respond to emails, should you be worried? Contact the police? Make a missing persons report? Google their name and search for an obituary? What are you ethically obligated to do in this situation?"
from Dropping out of the blogosphere
"Most of these screenshots (many of which are annotated) were collected during the dotcom bust of 1999-2001, but I continue to add new victims to the rolls as they succomb to the forces of cyber-entropy."
-- Steve Baldwin, The Museum of Interactive Failure
"What would cause people to leave such a beautiful place?"
-- WebUrbanists.com's Urban Abandonments Parts I & II
Labels: NY Times, Signs of Our Time
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
The clock at the centre of the world
In November of 2005 in Paris, a professional clockmaker named Jean-Baptiste Viot, was recruited by a group called UnterGunther for the purpose of restoring the clock in the Pantheon, the 18th-century architectural masterpiece that houses famous crypts including those of Voltaire and Hugo and was the site of Foucault's pendulum experiment.
UnterGunther are the restoration unit of a larger underground organization in Paris known as UX. I say "underground" in its most literal sense: formed in the 1980's, UX began as a group of students who threw parties in the tunnels below the city's Latin Quarter. But the group continued to grow -- today it numbers around 150 members -- and expand its focus to include subterrenean concerts, poetry readings and crypt restoration; all of this going unnoticed by the authorities until 2002 when police discovered an underground cinema, complete with bar and restaurant, under the Seine.
The clock in the Pantheon had been broken since the 1960's, and suffered from neglect by the state, and the group was concerned that if it were not fixed now, it would degenerate beyond repair. Sneaking into the building at night and setting up a workshop that included electricity and internet access, the group spent around a year working on the clock undetected by authorities. On October 10 2006, they presented the restored clock to Bernard Jeannot, curator of the Pantheon, who immediately pressed charges against the group for their trespassing and, presumably, the making of a complete ass out of him. The court case just wrapped up last week with UnterGunther cleared of any charges and rumour has it that they are working on a new secret project somewhere deep amid the shadows of the City of Lights.
In November of 2005 in Paris, a professional clockmaker named Jean-Baptiste Viot, was recruited by a group called UnterGunther for the purpose of restoring the clock in the Pantheon, the 18th-century architectural masterpiece that houses famous crypts including those of Voltaire and Hugo and was the site of Foucault's pendulum experiment.
UnterGunther are the restoration unit of a larger underground organization in Paris known as UX. I say "underground" in its most literal sense: formed in the 1980's, UX began as a group of students who threw parties in the tunnels below the city's Latin Quarter. But the group continued to grow -- today it numbers around 150 members -- and expand its focus to include subterrenean concerts, poetry readings and crypt restoration; all of this going unnoticed by the authorities until 2002 when police discovered an underground cinema, complete with bar and restaurant, under the Seine.
The clock in the Pantheon had been broken since the 1960's, and suffered from neglect by the state, and the group was concerned that if it were not fixed now, it would degenerate beyond repair. Sneaking into the building at night and setting up a workshop that included electricity and internet access, the group spent around a year working on the clock undetected by authorities. On October 10 2006, they presented the restored clock to Bernard Jeannot, curator of the Pantheon, who immediately pressed charges against the group for their trespassing and, presumably, the making of a complete ass out of him. The court case just wrapped up last week with UnterGunther cleared of any charges and rumour has it that they are working on a new secret project somewhere deep amid the shadows of the City of Lights.
Labels: Signs of Our Time, Street Level
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
Re:Read
“The idea is that one artist takes a hardcover from a book, tears out the pages and draws in one half (or half draws in both halves) of the binder/diptyque. In a nod to Ray Johnson, the two books are mailed (swapped) and each of these will be finished by the other.”
-from the intro to the Flickr group “The Library” by Alex Itin, the current artist-in-residence at the Institute for the Future of the Book.
“For the past five hundred years, humans have used print — the book and its various page-based cousins — to move ideas across time and space. Radio, cinema and television emerged in the last century and now, with the advent of computers, we are combining media to forge new forms of expression. For now, we use the word "book" broadly, even metaphorically, to talk about what has come before — and what might come next.”
-from the mission statement of The Institute for the Future of the Book
“The Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford in England is the only place you are likely to find an Ethernet port that looks like a book. Built into the ancient bookcases dominating the oldest wing of the 402-year-old library, the brown plastic ports share shelf space with handwritten catalogues of the university's medieval manuscripts and other materials. Some of the volumes are still chained to the shelves, a 17th-century innovation designed to discourage borrowing. But thanks to the Ethernet ports and the university's effort to digitize irreplaceable books like the catalogues -- which often contain the only clue to locating an obscure book or manuscript elsewhere in the vast library -- users of the Bodleian don't even need to take the books off the shelves. They can simply plug in their laptops, connect to the Internet, and view the pertinent pages online. In fact, anyone with a Web browser can read the catalogues, a privilege once restricted to those fortunate enough to be teaching or studying at Oxford.”
-from The Infinite Library by Wade Roush
“The Library Project's aim is simple: make it easier for people to find relevant books – specifically, books they wouldn't find any other way such as those that are out of print – while carefully respecting authors' and publishers' copyrights. Our ultimate goal is to work with publishers and libraries to create a comprehensive, searchable, virtual card catalog of all books in all languages that helps users discover new books and publishers discover new readers.”
-Google Book Search Library Project
“The idea is that one artist takes a hardcover from a book, tears out the pages and draws in one half (or half draws in both halves) of the binder/diptyque. In a nod to Ray Johnson, the two books are mailed (swapped) and each of these will be finished by the other.”
-from the intro to the Flickr group “The Library” by Alex Itin, the current artist-in-residence at the Institute for the Future of the Book.
“For the past five hundred years, humans have used print — the book and its various page-based cousins — to move ideas across time and space. Radio, cinema and television emerged in the last century and now, with the advent of computers, we are combining media to forge new forms of expression. For now, we use the word "book" broadly, even metaphorically, to talk about what has come before — and what might come next.”
-from the mission statement of The Institute for the Future of the Book
“The Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford in England is the only place you are likely to find an Ethernet port that looks like a book. Built into the ancient bookcases dominating the oldest wing of the 402-year-old library, the brown plastic ports share shelf space with handwritten catalogues of the university's medieval manuscripts and other materials. Some of the volumes are still chained to the shelves, a 17th-century innovation designed to discourage borrowing. But thanks to the Ethernet ports and the university's effort to digitize irreplaceable books like the catalogues -- which often contain the only clue to locating an obscure book or manuscript elsewhere in the vast library -- users of the Bodleian don't even need to take the books off the shelves. They can simply plug in their laptops, connect to the Internet, and view the pertinent pages online. In fact, anyone with a Web browser can read the catalogues, a privilege once restricted to those fortunate enough to be teaching or studying at Oxford.”
-from The Infinite Library by Wade Roush
“The Library Project's aim is simple: make it easier for people to find relevant books – specifically, books they wouldn't find any other way such as those that are out of print – while carefully respecting authors' and publishers' copyrights. Our ultimate goal is to work with publishers and libraries to create a comprehensive, searchable, virtual card catalog of all books in all languages that helps users discover new books and publishers discover new readers.”
-Google Book Search Library Project
Labels: Art, Literature, Signs of Our Time
Monday, October 22, 2007
A New Violent Conception of Life and History
"Today we give birth to a new violent conception of life and history, which exalts the battle against ... the toadies of false power, slaves to the global market. You wanted just a red carpet; we want a city entirely in vermilion..."
– Excerpts from the statement made by the Neo Futurist group Azionefuturista after they threw a bucket of dye into the Trevi Fountain on Friday colouring the water red.
“We will fight with all our might the fanatical, senseless and snobbish religion of the past, a religion encouraged by the vicious existence of museums. We rebel against that spineless worshipping of old canvases, old statues and old bric-a-brac, against everything which is filthy and worm-ridden and corroded by time. We consider the habitual contempt for everything which is young, new and burning with life to be unjust and even criminal.”
– Filippo Tommaso Marinetti
Manifesto of Futurism
February 20, 1909
“The art of Pio Diaz and Thyra Hilden is not aggressive and destructive, they do not demolish what cannot be replaced. Their art is a symbolic burn, their fire is an illusion...By projecting live burning flames on the Trevi Fountain and other famous architectural monuments, the artists interact with cultural icons and provide us with a statement to make us feel the power of destruction and consider the aggressiveness of culture.”
– Line Rosenvinge on artists Thyra Hilden & Pio Diaz who projected flames onto the Trevi fountain in 2005
“After gorging himself on various coloured foodstuff. Jubal Brown enters the Museum Of Modern Art in New York and projectile vomits blue over Composition in Red, White and Blue by Piet Mondrian.”
– Art Crimes
"Today we give birth to a new violent conception of life and history, which exalts the battle against ... the toadies of false power, slaves to the global market. You wanted just a red carpet; we want a city entirely in vermilion..."
– Excerpts from the statement made by the Neo Futurist group Azionefuturista after they threw a bucket of dye into the Trevi Fountain on Friday colouring the water red.
“We will fight with all our might the fanatical, senseless and snobbish religion of the past, a religion encouraged by the vicious existence of museums. We rebel against that spineless worshipping of old canvases, old statues and old bric-a-brac, against everything which is filthy and worm-ridden and corroded by time. We consider the habitual contempt for everything which is young, new and burning with life to be unjust and even criminal.”
– Filippo Tommaso Marinetti
Manifesto of Futurism
February 20, 1909
“The art of Pio Diaz and Thyra Hilden is not aggressive and destructive, they do not demolish what cannot be replaced. Their art is a symbolic burn, their fire is an illusion...By projecting live burning flames on the Trevi Fountain and other famous architectural monuments, the artists interact with cultural icons and provide us with a statement to make us feel the power of destruction and consider the aggressiveness of culture.”
– Line Rosenvinge on artists Thyra Hilden & Pio Diaz who projected flames onto the Trevi fountain in 2005
“After gorging himself on various coloured foodstuff. Jubal Brown enters the Museum Of Modern Art in New York and projectile vomits blue over Composition in Red, White and Blue by Piet Mondrian.”
– Art Crimes
Labels: Art, Signs of Our Time
Monday, April 30, 2007
Signs of Our Times #2: Tom Sawyerism 2.0
"Tom Sawyer got it right. Why paint a fence when you can get your friends to do it for you for free? He would have been the perfect new-media mogul. Spending time and money creating content on the Internet is so hopelessly dated, so dotcom, so very, very 1.0. The secret of today’s successful Web 2.0 companies: build a place that attracts people by encouraging them to create the content — thereby drawing even more people in to create even more stuff..."
– Time, May 8th 2006
Hmmm...case in point: Facebook; which I finally caved in and signed up for this weekend and which has been consuming my spare time ever since. I noticed that there are 12 step programs to get off the bloody thing.
More mentions of the Tom Sawyeresque 2.0 labour exploitation practices at the NYTimes.
"Tom Sawyer got it right. Why paint a fence when you can get your friends to do it for you for free? He would have been the perfect new-media mogul. Spending time and money creating content on the Internet is so hopelessly dated, so dotcom, so very, very 1.0. The secret of today’s successful Web 2.0 companies: build a place that attracts people by encouraging them to create the content — thereby drawing even more people in to create even more stuff..."
– Time, May 8th 2006
Hmmm...case in point: Facebook; which I finally caved in and signed up for this weekend and which has been consuming my spare time ever since. I noticed that there are 12 step programs to get off the bloody thing.
More mentions of the Tom Sawyeresque 2.0 labour exploitation practices at the NYTimes.
Labels: Literature, Signs of Our Time
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Signs of Our Time
"The first video news I watched on a cellphone was a smoke signal. I saw it in the back of a cab. The Pope had died, and CNN had its cameras trained on the chimney over St. Peter’s Square. Viewers were told to expect white smoke when the cardinals had elected his replacement.
The sight of this primitive signal on a screen the size of a Saltine in a taxi in New York City was mind-blowing. I peered into the machine in my hand. I could make out the image. I could understand it. It needed no translation."
– Virginia Hefferman, Screens
The sight of this primitive signal on a screen the size of a Saltine in a taxi in New York City was mind-blowing. I peered into the machine in my hand. I could make out the image. I could understand it. It needed no translation."
– Virginia Hefferman, Screens
Labels: NY Times, Signs of Our Time, World at Large, YouTube
Monday, February 06, 2006
Pop Cultures Collide
The *ahem* Bradgelina paparazzi angle of this story still has me leery to post this but the whole "life imitating art imitating life" on multiple levels was just too much not to. Plus, the Sonic Youth "Goo" album cover is sweet. The play by play from WFMU:
Be sure to note the boyfriend stealing reference on the SY album. Too perfect.
The *ahem* Bradgelina paparazzi angle of this story still has me leery to post this but the whole "life imitating art imitating life" on multiple levels was just too much not to. Plus, the Sonic Youth "Goo" album cover is sweet. The play by play from WFMU:
A paparazzi photo of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt in the back seat of a car from 2005, Raymond Pettibon's artwork for Sonic Youth's album "Goo" from 1990, which is based on a paparazzi photo of David and Maureen Smith (two people named Mr. and Mrs. Smith) driving to the Ian Brady and Myra Hindley trial in 1966. Plate of shrimp, anyone?
Be sure to note the boyfriend stealing reference on the SY album. Too perfect.
Labels: Music, Photography, Raymond Pettibon, Signs of Our Time
