Archive for June, 2008
Mystery Solved: It’s Nagel
Coop killing his devil. Click image to visit its source.
Paintblogger and pop-culture powerhouse Coop recently published his thoughts about a runaway image. He painted it, he sold it, and the durn thing grew legs and ran away to live its own life. (One never knows what’s going to take hold of the public’s attention.) Coop likens his experience to the nail salon poster phenomenon. You know, the ones with the white skin, black hair, sharp eyes, linear features? I’ve seen those my whole life and wondered where they first came from. Now, thanks to Coop and BoingBoing, I know. Those of you who, like me, were born after 1979, meet Patrick Nagel.
notabene. Sites linked to from this blog post may contain R-rated material.
All Faiths Beautiful
Recently on PostSecret I saw this video promoting the current exhibit at the American Visionary Art Museum:
Link to the All Faiths Beautiful Flickr set.
From a Washington Post review of the All Faiths Beautiful show:
Outsider artists are presumed to create out of some pure inner vision and not in response to any trends in the art world. Their creations tend to be idiosyncratic and sometimes inscrutable, and have a long-night-of-hallucination feel. …The creations seem driven by an instinct that lies somewhere between compulsion and belief. They express less a coherent faith than a desperate attempt to be seen and understood, even if the outreach ultimately fails. …The show is at its best when it showcases the more peculiar “faiths,” and then challenges you to connect.
One of the more challenging parts of All Faiths Beautiful is the portion of the show devoted to atheism. As to whether atheism can be considered a faith, that’s up for grabs. But one individual who has expressed a particularly poetic atheistic worldview is the late great Mr. George Carlin. In a 2004 interview with Terry Gross, Carlin explained that while he was not a religious man, he did find spiritual sustenance in the notion that everything in this universe is made up of atoms that were created in the heart of a star. If we are all made of the same material, he reasoned, then we are all one, and if that’s true, then what is there to be afraid of? I’ve included a video of Carlin explaining his views on religion below. (Caution: salty language and challenging notions.) Because all faiths ARE BEAUTIFUL in this here blog post.
Related: Sarah’s del.icio.us sites tagged religion.
“Picturing The Museum” Photography Exhibit
(Mommy, why did the lelephant take his clothes off?)
The above photo is from the new web-based exhibit Picturing The Museum from the American Museum of Natural History Research Library. This came to me via Morbid Anatomy.
Can I just say? Those men are cleaning an elephant skin. With no elephant inside. It makes my ontology ache.
Related: Sarah’s del.icio.us links tagged anatomy.
Photos from Smithsonian Archives on Flickr
[via BoingBoing] The Smithsonian Institution has just uploaded a boatload of scanned photographs to Flickr. The best part is that the images are under no known copyright restrictions, i.e. they are free for our fair use. (Wow, this is a long way away from selling your legacy to a cable tv channel. Good on you, Smith!)
I’m especially enjoying this set of portraits of scientists and inventors. Love those moustaches!
The image above is titled Uniformed Letter Carrier With Child in Mailbag. Here’s a short explanation:
This city letter carrier posed for a humorous photograph with a young boy in his mailbag. After parcel post service was introduced in 1913, at least two children were sent by the service. With stamps attached to their clothing, the children rode with railway and city carriers to their destination. The Postmaster General quickly issued a regulation forbidding the sending of children in the mail after hearing of those examples.
Someone tagged this photo “Stork?” Let’s hear it for crowdsourcing.
How I Spent Memorial Day Weekend
Inspired by Indexed. (Auxiliary thanks to GraphJam.)
In a nutshell, I’ve upped and moved myself from Norman to Oklahoma City to be with The Guy. It’s awesome.
Oh, and by the way, the NaBloPoMo theme for June is “Home.” (Not like I’m putting 30 posts on the web this month or anything. Pshaw! Who has that kind of time?)
Related: Sarah’s del.icio.us sites tagged visualization.
Puzzle Collages
Found on Flickr: Picazzle’s intricate jigsaw puzzle collages. They’re retro! They’re postmodern! They make my head hurt, in that good way.
Picazzle also links to jigsaw puzzle art by others on Flickr.
Art 365 Documentary Preview Online
As part of the year-long Art 365 process, filmmakers Melissa Scaramucci and Cacky Poarch produced a documentary film about the seven artists. You can see a 15-minute preview online at Google Video. If you’re new to Art 365, this is a great introduction.
The film premiered in its entirety at the Art 365 opening in Tulsa last month. There will also be a screening in Oklahoma City on July 3rd.
Click here to read more about Normal, OK, my series for Art 365.
Related: Sonarta also has footage of the Art 365 process. Part 1 is below; here are parts two, three, and four.
Legion Arts of Cedar Rapids, IA Needs You
Click here to support the Iowa Artists’ Relief Fund.
Cedar Rapids, Iowa, is currently underwater. One of the institutions affected by this tragedy is Legion Arts, who was kind enough to agree to host the Art 365 show this coming Fall. Right now nobody knows exactly if or how that will happen, but that’s not our most pressing concern.
Legion Arts has set up an emergency fund to help Iowa artists whose lives and work have been affected by the flooding. Please give if you can, especially you Oklahoma artists: Legion Arts is like our OVAC. We need the help of support systems like these to make our unique, talented, relevant voices heard.
The above photo, taken by CRArtist, is titled June 12, 2008 (2). It is part of this Flickr set titled Flood of 2008.
Related: The Simple Dollar lists seven things you can do right now to help flood victims.
