“WHAT do people really know about New Orleans?” - asks Anne Rice
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“It was a spooky moment when BerlinÂ’s hardest rappers were allowed onto public service television. A spectre flitting across the screen at a late hour when the little ones were already in bed, between the latest unemployment figures and the devastation caused by Hurricane Dennis. A subject to be treated with an editorial barge-pole. The producers spent a long time discussing whether they wanted run the story at all, but you can’t simply draw a veil of silence over something so loud. What followed was a ninety-second clip showing a man covered in tattoos cruising Berlin in a luxury limousine, or on stage yelling obscenities to screams of delight from his teenage audience. Once the fuss was over, the stony expression of ‘heute-journal’ presenter Claus Kleber relaxed a little and he broke into a little rap of his own telling the moral of the story. ‘Bushido finds it all quite funny’ – pause – ‘heÂ’s so busy counting up his money.’” - story
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“Ten thousand years ago, the foundations of human civilization were laid in the fertile floodplain between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in what was Mesopotamia and is now the modern nation of Iraq. […] Decades of political isolation, a protracted war with Iran, and, more recently, the invasion and continuing conflict, which began in 2003, have put this extraordinary heritage at risk. Today, such famous sites as the Assyrian capital of Nineveh, the ziggurat at Ur, the temple precinct at Babylon, and a ninth-century spiral minaret at Samarra have been scarred by violence, while equally important ancient sites […] are being ravaged by looters who work day and night to fuel an international art market hungry for antiquities. […] In response to such widespread damage and continuing threats to our collective cultural heritage and the significance of the sites at risk, WMF [World Monuments Watch] has taken the unprecedented step of including the entire country of Iraq on its 2006 list of 100 Most Endangered Sites.” (my emphasis) - story Yes, we can really be proud of ourselves and of our follies.
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“Synthesiser pioneer Dr Robert Moog has died at his North Carolina home aged 71, four months after being diagnosed with brain cancer.” - story
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If there ever was an American activity it’s consumption, and this goes beyond stereotyping. So it’s almost only logical that in his first major speech after 9/11 the American president told people to go on with their lives by doing some shopping (that’s what you get when you have a[n at best] mediocre president in difficult times). Kate Bingaman’s Obsessive Consumption deals with aspects of consumption. There is some photography, some of which is interesting, some of which is not. Check it out. Oh, and it’s not like the ultra-angry righteous fundamentalism shown in Adbusters. As much as I think they have lots of good points there, I just refuse to be that angry all the time; it’s just not healthy.
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“President Bush used to be content to revel in his own ignorance. Now he wants to share it with America’s schoolchildren. I refer to his recent comments in favor of teaching ‘intelligent design’ alongside evolution. […] The president seems to view the conflict between evolutionary theory and intelligent design as something like the debate over Social Security reform. But this is not a disagreement with two reasonable points of view, let alone two equally valid ones. […] intelligent design is a faith-based theory with no scientific validity or credibility.” - story
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A small deviation from photography today and a look at the country that I grew up in and that has started to transform itself in quite a rapid fashion lately - or maybe it’s just me, watching it from the outside, now for over five years: “Investigators found the bodies of nine babies buried in flower pots in an east German town. […] A crime like the one discovered in Frankfurt an der Oder has never happened here before, although the nation has already lived through the horrifying story of the German cannibal — a man who chopped up and ate his lover for dinner. But, nine dead babies, their bodies found in flower baskets and a sand-filled aquarium, is even more grisly. All the infants died, at least according to [the woman], in her four-room apartment on Democracy Square in Frankfurt an der Oder. When she was evicted from the apartment, she carefully transported the flower pots and aquarium to her parents’ house.” (story). What really bothers me about this is what they say right at the beginning: “Nine pregnancies, nine babies born and no one noticed a thing” even though “at the time of the killings, the brown concrete block was packed with professional spies. All 44 people who leased apartments at the time receieved checks from the Stasi, the East German state secret police.” Maybe some things will never change in Germany.
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A couple years ago, I linked to articles on the looting and destruction of ancient archeological treasures in Baghdad. As time has passed, we now have a pretty good idea of the extent of the damage, and it’s very sad to find out about it. Read this article for more information.
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“4x4 [SUV] advertising is dedicated to manipulating landscapes into generic forms. All that it requires of a landscape is that it evoke the idea of challenge - something resistant to be conquered, something natural to be tamed. A river is valued for its difficulty of fording. A mountain for its dramatic and nameless escarpments. No landscape can be only itself: it must represent an obstacle of some sort. The hypocrisies of 4x4 marketing are dark, multiple and pernicious. Everything about the product urges us to the wrong relationship with our environment. The vehicles themselves are the gargoyle of a rampant and acrid form of individualism: gated communities of one. They bespeak the urge to dominate and crush which is at the root of what Ivan Illich called ‘the 500-year war on sustainability’.” - Robert Macfarlane discusses the impact of car - especially SUV - ads on how we view landscapes. Very interesting.
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“It has been clear for some time now that the American people love art—the museums are choked with visitors and the art market is booming—but hate artists, who are widely regarded as elitist troublemakers. In the old way of thinking, these two things were seen to be irrevocably linked; if we wanted art, we had to endure artists. In the new era, we can perhaps reconfigure.” - whole article (thanks, Kevin!)
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Some of the secrets sent to postsecret might not be actual secrets but made up. Does it matter?
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“What Lucas has devised, over six movies, is a terrible puritan dream: a morality tale in which both sides are bent on moral cleansing, and where their differences can be assuaged only by a triumphant circus of violence. Judging from the whoops and crowings that greeted the opening credits, this is the only dream we are good for. We get the films we deserve.” - whole review PS: While the above review might be the only one that trashes what deserves to be trashed, most other reviews are not too far of. Compare this review, whose criticism about wooden acting, horrible lines, and bad filming would mean desaster for any other movie; but then it turns around in the end, claiming the movie isn’t that bad after all. It’s almost like the critic (and basically every other critic whose reviews I read) expected (and got) utter trash, only then to be surprised that it wasn’t quite as horrible as anticipated. You know, if I was a young, aspiring movie director I’d wish I’d get that kind of treatment from critics (or the audience for that matter)!
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One of the things that amuse or fascinate English speaking people to no end is the habit of Japanese people to wear tshirts with utterly meaningless or nonsensical slogans on them. In a somewhat similar fashion, I can’t help but be intensely amazed and fascinated by Little Debbie, the maker of cheap pastry, cakes, and cookies (“More than 75 varieties are available with suggested retail prices ranging from 25 cents to $2.99.”). The companies slogan is “Little Debbie Has A Snack For You”, and as if that wasn’t weird enough, they even have trucks that feature this slogan. Pictured above is the evidence. This rather scummy truck is driving around Pittsburgh displaying that slogan. If I had little kids and saw that truck driving down the street I’d make sure they’d get into the house. Fittingly enough, since the last US elections the truck is also featuring a bunch of “W2004” stickers.
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I’m more than tempted to file Rent A German under performance art. But it isn’t intended to be art (maybe it is a joke? I can’t tell - it’s German after all). You can rent a German for various things. The holiday package offers “Our Germans will do their best to give you happy moments. In the nature, at the hotel bar or at night dancing…”, and it’s only 750 Euros or about 1000 US$ (“all prices per day, flight included”). Gushes satisfied customer Leila R., “36 (Rio de Janeiro)”: “I will never forget, when I went to the beach with the German. My friends had a good time, eating chicken with him under the sun of Ipanema beach. Next time, I will buy him a new swimming trouser.” Also not to be missed Carl Hagen’s comment “58 (New York)”: “After dinner, we watched TV together with the entire family. Suddenly the German started to cry. It was such real and pure emotion. IÂ’d never seen this before. The support package cheered him up again and we read German poems together ‘til 3 am. Even Grandma stayed up and enjoyed the exotic sound of words like ‘Rasenmäher, Motorsäge or Solidargemeinschaft’. Rented again, before our new friend left.” OK, I take that back. It must be performance art - the kind usually referred to as “life”.
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After photography had been invented, photography was used like painting. You would get your portrait taken, maybe once in your lifetime. Today, we would have one photo of any such person. Once photographic processes became easier to handle and less expensive, some people managed to appear in more than one photo. After the advent of the origins of mass photography, the number of photos taken of a person also increased. But still, the numbers were fairly small - small enough that you would remember photos. For example, I have a photo of myself that shows me at around age 6 with my pet bid. And the total number of photos that I have of myself up to the age of, say, ten is maybe a couple dozen. Now contrast this with what happens when people get a baby these days. I know some people who shoot a roll of film per day; and I also know people who set up webpages of their kids - portraits galleries - with literally hundreds and hundreds of photos. Most young children today will have their photo taken more often in their first year of life than I in my first 18. If you extrapolate this development, at some stage in the future, for every person, there will be a photo taken every day, then every hour etc. Eventually, at least theoretically, there will be enough photos to create a movie… But what do you really gain from all of this? For example, I know people who take rolls and rolls of film of their grandchildren, only to look at those photos once. What kind of memory do you create when suddenly everything is deemed memorable enough to take a photo of it? What will people remember if nothing stands out? What will people do when, after having asked their parents for childhood photos, they will be given boxes and boxes and boxes of photos (or a big harddrive filled with stuff - digital doesn’t really mean any difference)? Are we drowning our lives in photographic white noise?
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This manifesto contains a lot of interesting stuff. And I admit that reading about the feuilletons made me long for living back in Europe. It’s true, you can get this stuff in the US (for example, if you subscribe to The New York Review of Books) but I’d rather get a newspaper that comes with a real feuilleton. It’s just different. You get your Saturday paper, and then you spend a good part of your Saturday breakfast reading the feuilleton.
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“Our study reveals that orthodox assumptions about the function of copyright in creatorsÂ’ lives are largely invalid. Copyright neither appears to support the creative basis of society, nor does it make cultural materials available in a legal form that legitimises creative digital re–use. Future copyright policy must be based on a much clearer empirical picture of the role of copyright in creative production.” - full story Also see Reflecting on the digit(al)isation of music, a follow-up/response to the article mentioned above.
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For quite a while, I was toying with the idea of buying an mp3 player. As it turned out, if you want to make an educated decision about which one to buy, you’re in trouble. To make a long story short, here is what I learned from talking to people in electronics stores and from reading online “reviews”: 1. “the harddrives in those players break within a few months anyway” (actual quote from an employee at a store); 2. mp3 players break when being dropped from heights (you wouldn’t believe the number of people who seriously complain about this in their reviews); 3. There are two vast communities of people out there whose sole reason for living seems to be to promote/trash Apple’s iPod - with about ninety percent of the discussions centered on whether iPods look “cool” or not (I personally am not too thrilled about their design, but what do I know about visual stuff?). To summarize, if you want to waste hours and hours of your time, try the internet. For extra amusement, then go to an electronics store and try to get any reasonable information out of one of the people working there. PS: I ended up buying an mp3 player. No, it’s not an iPod.
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If you live in the US, I’m sure you’re familiar with the Power of Pride bumper stickers. I find those slightly odd given that a) pride is one of the seven deadly sins (see this page for a background) and b) christian religion supposedly plays such an important role in people’s lifes here. Just for completeness, the seven deadly sins are pride, envy, gluttony, lust, anger, greed, and sloth.
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I don’t know what exactly it is that makes this so particularly weird. Is it the fact that you would normally expect to find something like this in Japan? Or is it the fact that even though it looks like a joke it’s real? Or is it the fact that that’s what’s left of one of the biggest business scams in living German memory (They got millions from investors to build what they called “cargolifters” - gigantic Zeppelins to transport containers, and when they went under all that was left was this huge dome)? Or is it that when you look at the photos you ask yourself “where are those guests they’re talking about”?
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Here’s one of my theories: Every piece of advanced technology that you own dimishes your social skills by some - sometimes vast - amount. Take for example cell phones, the pest of modern technology. Seemingly normal people get instantly transformed into utterly annoying retards once their little phones ring. The vast majority of cell phone users simply doesn’t comprehend that the (let’s be nice and call it) information they’re trying to convey (about 90% or which consists of “what?”, “oh my god” and “so I was like and he was like”) is transmitted electronically. Thus, unlike in the case of two yoghurt containers that you connect by a string to communicate with your friend, you do not have to yell. And not only that. In addition to the fact that the little cell phone will transmit normal speech perfectly, in about 99.99% of all cases the other people, who are forced to listen, are not interested in the conversation. Coudal Partners now decided to do something about it, by creating little cards that you can hand out.
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This spam email amused me greatly. It was apparently written by somebody who is a fan of 1970’s heavy metal bands (or ice cream makers) - the ones that added weird umlauts to their names to make those look (sound?) more appealing: “Gët Thë Lowëst Pricë Avaliablë, You Dësërvë It! XXXXX ìs thë fìrst nìcotìnë-frëÂë pìll thât, âs pârt of â comprëhënsìvë progrâm from your hëÂâlth cârë profëssìonâl, cân hëlp you stop smokìng. XXXXX ìs usëd ìn smokìng cëssâtìon. (SMOKìNG DëTëRRëNT) XXXXX ìs thë fìrst nìcotìnë-frëÂë pìll to hëlp you QUìT SMOKìNG.â prëscrìptìon mëdìcìnë,XXXXX hâs hëlpëd mâny smokërs, ëvën thosë who hâvë smokëd 20 yëÂârs or morë, put down thëÂìr cìgârëttës. No onë hâs to know you’rë usìng ìt.” You just can’t make this shit up. Amazing!
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Well, there’s spam, and there’s spam, and then there’s the rare person who knows what to do with it. Brilliant.
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What can I say? Weight Watchers recipe cards from 1974. I still haven’t found out what was wrong with the 1970s. I think I got a good grip on the horribly hideous 1980s. (thanks, Karen!)
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“Sometimes, there is an amazingly simply explanation for the dreaded ‘traffic jam out of nowhere’.” One of my favourite German cartoonists, Bernd Pfarr, died yesterday.
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Have a look at vintage jazz LP covers. That’s from a time when music came in nice packages.
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If you want to get the latest glimpse at how absurd the entertainment industry has become have a look at this article in the New York Times. It’s all about the “problem” “serious” musicians have when they are “attractive”. Note how you’re only a “serious” musicians when you’re playing Bach on a violin!
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“… is many things. But is it criticism?” asks James Marcus
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“Popular science magazines used to be aimed at the geeky wannabe inventor. Today, it’s all about the glamour of war.” - story
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“However much you might play at seeing his work as just another movie, Gibson has gone outside the normal bounds of show business and into the territory of America’s religious absolutists: John Ashcroft having himself anointed with oil, gay-hating lawmakers attempting to write Leviticus into the Constitution, antiabortionists shooting to kill, generals declaring holy war against the Muslim infidel. Our country has a great, great many such people who do not consider their convictions to be open to discussion. They maintain a significant hold on political power; and since a lot of them have an antinomian streak, I doubt the rule of law would stand in their way, should we manage to loosen their grip. The ever-boyish and ingenuous Gibson, with his simple faith, has made The Passion of the Christ as a gift for these people. “Thumbs down.” - Stuart Klawans in The Nation
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Nice article about the exquisite mayhem of Benedikt Taschen. (thru ashleyb.org)
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I filed this under “Culture” but it’s as much “Architecture” and “Photography”: Have a look at this splendid display of Chinese rural architecture.
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A little creative fun from the readers of b3ta.com
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It’s all about beat poetry.
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One of the most famous no-name brands in Germany is called “Ja!” Those must be the most affirmative products ever made. The packaging is all white, and there’s a tilted blue “Ja!” written on it. Underneath, in red, it says what you’re buying. So chocolote would be “Ja! Schokolade” and it’s 29 cents a bar (that’s European cents which, at the time of this writing, is around 30 US cents). You also get what you pay for: The chocolate is terrible. Some of the products are quite nice, though. Needless to say, anything as ridiculous as this easily becomes a cult and the no-name brand “Ja!” now is a fairly well known no-no-name brand. A bunch of German artists decided to style a whole apartment in the “Ja!” style, with big blue “Ja!” all over the place and, in red… You get the idea. Even if you have never seen this stuff I’m sure you’ll enjoy the Ja! Fotos website.
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“One Planet Down, Eight To Go” Rover put as a caption on an ad for an SUV (SubUrban Vehicle - for those people who find that life is a constant problem for their self-esteem). Ad Whore dissects ads. Which in principle we don’t need because we’re all so smart that we look right through them, right? So we have a good laugh about them when we drive home to suburbia in our SUVs, taking a sip from that great Starbucks coffee while we tell our families using our new cell phone.
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Most people don’t know that apart from being a fascinating filmmaker Wim Wenders is a photographer, too.
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I had shown this poster in an earlier entry. Elena Kachuro-Rosenberg sent me email and told me the story behind this poster which is so interesting (and amusing) that I’d like to share it. Elena writes “note that most of the images at the Pitts U. site are of POST-Soviet product labels and posters. The second one - ‘Seksa u nas net / We have no sex [in Russia]’ - must date from sometime in the late 1980s to early 1990s. It’s a pity that no publication references or specifics are provided on the site. Anyhow, most likely, it is a reference to the famous incident that took place in 1987, when the American Phil Donahue co-conducted one of the first TV-‘bridges’ with Russian and American audiences. He had asked the Russian audience a question about sex, and a Russian woman (from somewhere within St. Petersburg’s city gov’t hierarchy) got up and declared ‘U nas v strane seksa net’ (‘In our country there is no sex’). Both audiences laughed and the phrase became an infinite source of puns for years to come, and in general, became immensely popular as well as applicable. There are reasons to believe that along with other developments, it propelled the proliferation of sex-talk and sexualization of the public sphere in Russia, in the 1990s. Incidentally, recently, while visiting some relatives here in the US who receive Russian TV via satellite, I saw this woman appear on a program commemorating St. Petersburg’s 300th anniversary. She was asked to elaborate on what she meant by her phrase in 1987, to which she responded that she merely implied that in Russia a more elevated and refined form of human interaction is practiced, that of romantic love. :o) Whatever the intention, the original statement clearly reflected not so much the individual prudishness (x ridiculousness) but the unspoken gap between public and private spheres that existed in pre-perestroika days. During the 1990s this catch-phrase was used and abused to amuse and enlighten innumerable times. Scholarly studies on contemporary pop culture, and on public health and sex education developments have utilized it as well. “Regarding the above image — the neutered couple’s facial features evoke a combination of generic faces in the depictions of ‘average’ Russians in Soviet-era poster art. For examples, see this poster or this one (‘Come, comrade, to our collective farm!’)”
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If you’re into Japanese animations you shouldn’t miss the new Weebl and Bob episode.
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Glen Allison’s website has lots of very nice photos taken while traveling.
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p.o.v. - a Danish journal of film studies has a whole issue on Wim Wenders’ “Wings of Desire”. (thru incoming signals)
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All about Japanese superheroes (incl. some incredibly goofy music!). (thru geisha asobi blog)
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Rap battle between Weebl and Wee Bull.
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A cool site with tons of old Bollywood LP covers. Pictured above: Gumnaam, a spectacular feast for the senses (albeit a long one).
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Index Magazine has a full list of interviews online, incl. but not limited to, Aphex Twin, Autechre, Naomi Klein, Rem Koolhaas, Parker Posey, and Wolfgang Tillmanns.
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A great collection of Bollywood posters, there are literally hundreds of them. (thru iconomy)
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Happy 1st Birthday, Weebl and Bob!. And don’t forget to check out Wee-Lo.
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On the left you see Miss Germany 2002. That’s what you get when you remove the presentation (make-up, bikini, hair do, …). Obviously, the woman on the right is way more attractive, isn’t she? Bummer, she isn’t real. German scientists composed her face on the computer, using a composite of the faces of the competition’s finalists. And if you’re interested in “plenty of information on a large research project on ‘facial attractiveness’ that has been carried out at the universities of Regensburg and Rostock in Germany” click here. (thru muxway)
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There are still several hundred monarchs” (thru Dublog)
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Tartart Magazine is quite cool and comes as a pdf file. (thru thingsmagazine.net)
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