we make money not art

Links for 2012-05-15 [del.icio.us]

2012-05-16T00:00:00-07:00

Portrait of the artist: Bill Viola, video artist | Culture | The Guardian
'I fell into a lake aged six and saw the most beautiful world. My work is about getting back there'

Links for 2012-05-13 [del.icio.us]

2012-05-14T00:00:00-07:00

London 2012: army to use 'sonic weapon' on Thames during Olympics
American-built 'long-range acoustic device', used by US military in Iraq, can produce deafening 150db levels at one metre

Sony World Photography Awards 2012

2012-05-13T07:59:26Z

object to paying £7.50 to see and exhibition which title starts with the name of a brand. I feel cheated when the show closes with a shop selling goods manufactured by the above-mentioned brand and i don't look kindly to being forbidden to take pictures (which i do purely for documenting reason) because that would mean that i won't shell more ££ to buy the booklet of the exhibition. That said, the photos selected and exhibited are so remarkable that i still feel like recommending that you go and see the World Photography Awards if you're in London continue

My Name Is Janez Janša

2012-05-09T18:16:15Z

The film that inspires you to google your name again.... My name is Janez Janša is a documentary film about names and name changes, focusing on one particular and rather unique name change that took place 5 years ago, when three artists officially changed their names into the name of the Prime Minister of Slovenia, Janez Janša continue

American Dreamers

2012-05-08T15:44:36Z

Does the American dream still exist? What is its future in an era in which the promise of happiness and economic prosperity seems to clash with an increasingly complex and difficult scenario? continue

The Chronocyclegraph

2012-05-06T16:43:13Z

The museum of photography in Antwerp has a number of fascinating show right now. One of them is an installation by Zoe Beloff that takes as its point of departure America's longest running comic strip to explore the influence of cinema on the movement of the body and the mind. Beloff's exhibition contains a number of historical documents. Some of them show intriguing photos of sportsmen and factory workers in movement. They are called chronocyclegraphs. I had never heard of the chronocyclegraph before... continue

The Immortal, life-support machines keeping each other alive

2012-05-04T05:48:45Z

A number of life-support machines are connected to each other, circulating liquids and air in attempt to mimic a biological structure. The Immortal investigates human dependence on electronics, the desire to make machines replicate organisms and our perception of anatomy as reflected by biomedical engineering continue

Compulsion

2012-05-02T08:48:54Z

In Prager's part film noir, part fashion shoot work, heroines wear impeccable make-up, pose as if they were in a Hitchcock movie, breathe through an atmosphere worthy of David Lynch, and are submitted to ordeals inspired by the images of crime photographers Weegee and Enrique Metinides. The stories might take place in Hollywood-like settings but they promise to never end on a happy note continue

Links for 2012-05-03 [del.icio.us]

2012-05-04T00:00:00-07:00

2012 Olympics: Kabul. Baghdad. London. Three to avoid this summer
The Olympics have become an Orwellian parody of what happens when a world agency blackmails a government aching for prestige into spending without limit. Not one defence spokesman has come up with a plausible scenario for the jets and missiles. The latter have a range of just three miles and are said to be usable "only at the express instruction of the prime minister". What will they shoot down, and on whose head will it crash?

Book review: Utopia & Contemporary Art

2012-04-29T11:02:51Z

Utopia has become a controversial concept, spanning the field between the belief in an ideal society and the dystopian nightmare. Within the last decade, the contemporary art scene has witnessed a return of utopia and utopian thinking. Whether detectable as an impulse, critically reassessed as a concept, or cautiously or daringly articulated in a specific vision--utopia continues to matter continue

ZOO, or the letter Z, just after Zionism

2012-04-25T16:17:52Z

'ZOO, or the letter Z, just after Zionism' starts at page number 437 of 'The Atlas of the Conflict' and continues into a fascinating exploration of ideas, snapshots and associations, that could be raised once seeing a white donkey tied with a rope, covered with beige tape and being transformed into a zebra by a beautiful Palestinian boy continue

Links for 2012-04-29 [del.icio.us]

2012-04-30T00:00:00-07:00

Co-op boycotts exports from Israel's West Bank settlements | World news | The Observer
Hilary Smith, Co-op member and Boycott Israel Network (BIN) agricultural trade campaign co-ordinator, said the Co-op "has taken the lead internationally in this historic decision to hold corporations to account for complicity in Israel's violations of Palestinian human rights We strongly urge other retailers to take similar action."

Links for 2012-04-25 [del.icio.us]

2012-04-26T00:00:00-07:00

The 'world's most pampered – and bored – prisoner' - Telegraph
The 30-year-old man has his meals brought to him from a local restaurant because it is not economical to lay on a canteen service for him alone. He enjoys the exclusive use of a gym, library and television room and occupies one of six cells which make up San Marino's only jail, which is tucked into a wing of a former Capuchin monastery.

Sometimes i actually see fun exhibitions

2012-04-22T14:39:44Z

Two photo series that made me smile at the Biennale of Photography in Liege... Jean-Claude Delalande creates bitter family albums in which the protagonists never look at each other, perform the most mundane tasks, go on holiday with the same torpor that'd show on a supermarket trip, and lead a joyless family life. Meanwhile, Miyoko Ihara follows the relationship between her 85 year old grandmother and her cat, Fukumaru continue

Links for 2012-04-24 [del.icio.us]

2012-04-25T00:00:00-07:00

Asteroid mining
A new company called Planetary Resources, with investors and advisers including the Google bosses Larry Page and Eric Schmidt and the Avatar director James Cameron, aims to mine valuable metals from the asteroids that routinely zoom past the Earth. Along with gold, platinum and other metals, the company hopes to find water, which could provide the raw material for rocket fuel, raising the possibility of fuel stations for passing deep-space rockets

Welcome to the Republic of Abkhazia

2012-04-19T17:21:54Z

You might never have heard of Abkhazia and that's probably because only a handful of countries regard it as an independent state. Abkhazia broke away from Georgia after a short, violent civil war in '92-'93 and only Russia, Venezuela, Nicaragua and the atoll of Nauru recognised it as independent state in 2008. The artists spent four years witnessing and documenting the country's attempts to repopulate with new immigrants a country that is ravaged by the war, almost empty and in great economic distress continue

If this blog became a radio programme

2012-04-18T17:58:19Z

On Friday at 4pm, set your radio to 104.4fm if you live in London and your browser to http://resonancefm.com/ if you don't. That's when the pilot for programme i've recently recorded for Resonance104.4fm, London's edgy, radical, art radio is going to be aired. The focus of the programme is art & science/technology. Critical designers Revital Cohen and Tuur Van Balen were kind and kamikaze enough to join me in the studio for the first episode. We've discussed topics as diverse as the beauty of life support machines, pigeons that poop soap, using design to infiltrate synthetic biology, collaborating with scientists and communicating the complexities of a projects that explores critically the impact of science on society continue

Brains: The Mind as Matter

2012-04-16T04:26:16Z

Brains: The Mind as Matter has a seemingly very specific, very narrow focus: the brain and not even the mind, just the physical organ. Yet, the exhibition branches out into issues of ethics, history, and reminds us that while some of the moments in the history of neuroscience are glorious, others are downright disgraceful continue

Mind Over Matter

2012-04-14T06:22:15Z

The collaboration between artist Ania Dabrowska and social scientist Dr Bronwyn Parry gives a visibility to the medical research on dementia. The photos demystifies what happens behind the doors of brain bank laboratories, and in so doing actively seeks to rehabilitate, even celebrate, the practice of bodily donation in the public imagination continue

Jeremy Deller: Joy in People

2012-04-08T08:57:31Z

Jeremy Deller does art outside galleries. It thrives in 'low culture' and it is usually ambitious, socially-engaged and unexpected. Indeed, most of his career is built on looking for art in the most unpredictable places, working with the public or with people who have particular knowledge or skill but who wouldn't otherwise be associated with the contemporary art world. They include unemployed miners, brass bands, a campaign banner maker, fans of Depeche Mode, a glam rock wrestler, experts in re-enactments, etc. He even collaborated on an art project with nightclub owner and trendsetter Peter Stringfellow continue

Links for 2012-04-13 [del.icio.us]

2012-04-14T00:00:00-07:00

Israel expected to block 'flytilla' of international Palestinian sympathisers | World news | guardian.co.uk
The mayor of Bethlehem, Victor Batarseh, told a press conference: "These people are coming to talk about peace, they are not coming to wage war against Israel. They are coming to visit the Palestinian people who are under occupation and to talk to them and to help them because these people are isolated." Turner said she would seek legal advice on Jet2.com's move. "I think the airline should honour its commitment. We had checked in, and we have our boarding passes. "Every country has the right to control its own borders. But to stop us leaving British shores just shows the extent of Israel's power and influence."

Visualizing Sound - Representations of Sound in Contemporary Creation

2012-04-04T16:45:02Z

The exhibition focuses on the convergence of electronic sound creation and visual arts. Some works give a graphic, architectural and physical presence to sound, others reveal the sound produced by physical objects we'd otherwise regard as perfectly silent continue