Lopan Bitches

The Post-Post Studio

One of my Professors at NU sent me 2 articles related to the upcoming Post-Post Studio Panel Discussion at Northwestern. Also a link to a Blog that Lane and Annika started. http://ad502sp2006dialogue.blogspot.com/ (i checked it out and its cool how some of the stuff we're talking about comes up in the other Blog.)

About the Post-Post Studio...
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DEAR POST-POST PANELISTS: I thought it might help if I expanded on the topic a little more. My own initial thoughts have focused on the "studio" which the notion of "post-studio" implies is superceeded. (This is the reason for choosing "post-studio" as a topic rather than "institutional critique.") It's hard not to hear an echo of industrial versus post-industrial in the opposition between studio and post-studio, with the former corresponding to a permanent address, labor and object-making (and by extension collection-based museums) and the latter aligned with "immaterial labor," temporary contracts, mobility and the new project spaces. Post-studio has a specific history to which I alluded in my first email when I cited Baldessari; Allan Kaprow and Dan Flavin also ridiculed the studio in the '60s (Flavin: "The romance of days of belabored feeling, of precious, pious, compulsively grimy studio-bound labor by haphazardly informed neurotic 'loners' is passing from art...the contemporary artist is becoming a public man"). In the '80s Craig Owens warned that "a widespread backlash against the '60s counterculture" that Flavin and Kaprow represented was signalled in the "return to the tangible -- and, what is more important, marketable -- object" and the corresponding "massive retreat to the studio ... where the artist, screened from public view, produces work in intense privacy." The target of the original '60s post-studio argument was of course Abstract Expressionism, but it was indeed media interest during the 1950s that started evacuating the privacy of the studio (I'm thinking of Hans Namuth filming Pollock, those regular Artnews pictorials titled "so and so paints a picture," Conde Nast's Alexander Liberman publishing "The Artist in His Studio," even Kirk Douglas in "Lust for Life," etc.). The photos Hollis Frampton took in 1958 of Frank Stella painting stripes was an ironic comment on all this, and yet both the studio and its publicizing and pictorializing continued to preoccupy a lot of art during the late '60s and '70s, like Nauman's early video's and photo-based work. Recently Claire Bishop has argued that the artworld has erected new project spaces and kunstahalle to accommodate a kind of '90s work that is project-oriented, open-ended, interactive (think Liam Gillick, Rirkrit Tiravanija) and which Bishop claims "is essentially institutionalized studio activity" -- the studio made into showroom display, tableau vivant. What's perhaps going on here is not so much the demise of the studio as its dispersal and displacement. Media helps to disperse the studio, not only in the sense of publicizing and theatricalizing the studio's private interior but also by linking the studio to larger communications networks: from the phones, radios and then TVs that enter studios through the 40s and 50s up to today's computers and DSL-powered internet and email connections. The studio becomes one more mixed space, like the "home office," found everywhere and nowhere (the same could perhaps be said of the very notion of practice, especially as its used in cultural studies).

Spreading the disease, pt. 2

This cool little info-graphic is, coincidentally, the shape of doom. I've always considered the super-plague to be the worst end-game scenario. In a nuclear attack, people would generally band together to survive. In plague-world, every stranger becomes a threat to be shot on sight, like in a zombie movie.

"Using a popular internet game that traces the travels of dollar bills, scientists have unveiled statistical laws of human travel in the United States, and developed a mathematical description that can be used to model the spread of infectious disease in this country. This model is considered a breakthrough in the field."

Link, via ScienceDaily.

The Seattle Sea-Chickens

They didn't just beat the Carolina Panthers in Sunday's NFC Championship Game. They crushed them from kickoff to confetti. Beat them 34-14.
They completed a trip that was 30 years in the taking. The Seahawks are going to the Super Bowl. Pause and let that sink in.
"You can sense this is a big deal to a lot of people," quarterback Matt Hasselbeck said.
The Seahawks, the franchise that has broken your heart more times than you care to remember; the franchise that had become the definition of .500 — Team Medi-hawk-rity — is going to Motown, going to Super Bowl XL.

Complete article

From Seattle Times columnist Steve Kelley

It is a shame that I find watching paint dry more exciting than watching football on television, because this could be really emotional. The only way professional sports affects me is by making lots of traffic.

Here are some photographs of the best and brightest in American culture:

This man frightens me.

I am glad to see that even the Undead have come out to support my hometown team.

I am proud of the people in my community.

He is obviously content in life and truly enjoying a day of sport.

Last but not least. "Winning hearts and minds."

No Comment.

Alternate Reality Department

China and Russia agreed with the United States, Britain, Germany and France on Monday that Iran must completely suspend its nuclear program, the British Foreign Office said.

Washington Post
U.S. Wins Support In Iran Dispute
January 17, 2006

Russia and China today called for more negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program, a day after rebuffing a call by the Americans and the Europeans for the issue to be put before the United Nations Security Council.

New York Times
Russia and China Want More Talks
With Iran, Not Sanctions
January 17, 2006

via BILLMON

myspace

Timeline of Computer Graphics

Learning CAD, as well as other mechanical drawing systems has piqued my interest in the history of computer visualization. It's pretty cool to see how different disciplines use drawing and visual thinking. The gap between, say, engineering and art-making is the presence, or definition of problem solving. If there is problem solving in art (Duchamp claimed there wasn't), the artist solves problems on the way to somewhere else. For technologists, solutions are endpoints.

1966, Head Mounted Display
Link.

All Hail the Master Control Program!

Please post this link: http://davidmichaellee.com

I hear this guy makes paintings.

iTunes 6.0.2 - Spyware or not?

First I am reading the Wall Street Journal and find out MYSPACE is owned by the devious Rupert Murdoch, and now Apple is getting more into the fascist software game, what is a freeware aficianado to do?

From SPYBOT - SEARCH AND DESTROY

"We tested the Windows version inside out, and found a bunch of connections, but only to Apple itself and their mirrors at Akamai, which is legit. We then got the idea to test the Macintosh version, and indeed found connection to 2o7.net, which belongs to a company named Omniture. Omniture is a company for Web Analytics and Web site Statistics. On the one hand, this means that data may be transmitted to a third party even, which according to the license agreement should not happen, at least not without clearly expressed users' consent. On the other hand, why does Apple need an external company for analytics and statistics if they discard the information right after looking up related albums?"
"These doubts have caused us to give Apple a few calls, emails and faxes, expressing our concerns, asking for a statement and offering our help in getting an insight from an anti-spyware companies perspective. The only answer we received was a form letter making fun of the fact that we have no Macintosh version and giving us the clearly wrong standard answer that no personal data is submitted, and a link to their website showing how to disable it."
"Let's summarize it. Should you be paranoid? Unless you have a bunch of MP3s downloaded from file sharing networks maybe, in which case I guess you wouldn't want a company working close with music labels to know, you probably don't need to be. It's a violation of law, and it's a break-in into your privacy, but it's not yet such a big deal as the recent Sony story. But you should show Apple your dislike clearly before they take the next step on the intrusion ladder (by the way, did you know that Apple forces OS registration on you way harder than even Microsoft?)"

"Friends don’t let friends go feral..."

"What’s really going down there is that there is this truly massive number of totally hopeless people. Hopelessly addicted to drugs, no concern for their health and welfare, alternately aggressive and totally withdrawn. Its like walking through Bob Dylan’s “Hard Rain”, or maybe the way I picture 1st century Jerusalem, choked with lepers and madmen. The streets are littered with amputees. Half of the homeless get around by wheelchair; it is really surreal. Toothless mouths in perpetual sneers or screams. There are open wounds, boils, sores. It has to be seen to believed. People screaming, just constantly screaming, with no rhyme or reason. People openly urinating and defecating in the gutter — or the street. I saw a woman bathe her baby in a plastic bucket, dabbing the washcloth in the filthy runoff. I was routinely approached with offers of crack, sex for money, et cetera, by utterly hopeless people."

Fantastic Planet

Last night, some Carlisle kids and I watched a unique French/Checkoslovakian animation from the early '70s entitled La Planete Sauvage. While it could easily be dismissed as "trippy", and is from the same genre as Ralph Bakshi's Wizards (which is boring), it had several things going for it. First was the soundtrack, which was the droning, spaced-out jazz music Stereolab would be founded upon. Second were the depictions of the alien technology, which were thoroughly inventive and at times reminded me of Peter Chung's work. The evenly-hatched pen-and-ink drawings had an old-fashioned feeling; the animators had made a conscious choice of detail over frame-rate. Recommended!

George Bush appreciation week continues!

...with The President's weekly radio address.

push me

Edit: Are you sure you don't you mean push me, Bob? -Mr. Alex

Even Closer to God

Art School Hippies

I post some rad stories about smelly vaginas and crusty penises. And u guys just skip it and go right into the WAR. Are u guys hippies? All hail BUSH all hail the New Empire! Do not forget that it’s YOUR Empire. And we now have control of Babylon. I am going to Ascend to heaven and you fuckers are going to be left behind. Viva BUSH!! Viva CHRIST!!

"We had to burn The Constitution in order to save it!"

From Glenn Greenwald's blog:

On December 22, 2005, the Department of Justice issued a 5-page letter outlining its arguments as to why the President’s NSA warrantless eavesdropping program was legally justified. Those arguments have been thoroughly rebutted, including by the independent and nonpartisan Congressional Research Service (which I discussed briefly here) ; this letter from 14 law professors and former government lawyers; and this comprehensive compilation from The Left Coaster of all the arguments marshaled in the blogosphere against the DoJ’s legal position, including the numerous posts I have written on all of these legal issues.

In response to all of these arguments, the DoJ returned to the drawing board and yesterday released a 42-page single spaced letter (.pdf) elaborating on its original arguments, adding a few new ones, and advancing some positions which clarify both what this scandal is about and the unprecedented, truly limitless powers claimed by the Administration. The most notable new component of the DoJ’s position is its declaration that, if necessary, it will attack the constitutionality of FISA itself if it is found that FISA "impedes" the President’s power to eavesdrop on Americans as part of the fight against terrorism (Letter at pp. 3 & 35).

More here...

These are great

Chump Change

The War in Iraq Costs this much
when post was made.
$235,029,465,433

Check it against the link.
I sure could use some help on the student loan.

I think its funny

Funny stories for the whole family.

A very important conversation

George: Condi! Nice to see you. What's happening?

Condi: Sir, I have the report here about the new leader of China.

George: Great. Lay it on me.


Condi: Hu is the new leader of China.

George: That's what I want to know.

Condi: That's what I'm telling you.

George: That's what I'm asking you. Who is the new leader of China?

Condi: Yes.

George: I mean the fellow's name.

Condi: Hu.

George: The guy in China.

Condi: Hu.

George: The new leader of China.

Condi: Hu.

George: The Chinaman!

Condi: Hu is leading China.

George: Now whaddya' asking me for?

Condi: I'm telling you Hu is leading China.

George: Well, I'm asking you. Who is leading China?

Condi: That's the man's name.

George: That's who's name?

Condi: Yes.

George: Will you or will you not tell me the name of the new leader of China?

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: Yassir? Yassir Arafat is in China? I thought he was dead and from the Middle East.

Condi: That's correct.

George: Then who is in China?

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: Yassir is in China?

Condi: No, sir.

George: Then who is?

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: Yassir?

Condi: No, sir.

George: Look, Condi. I need to know the name of the new leader of China. Get me the Secretary General of the U.N. on the phone.

Condi: Kofi?

George: No, thanks.

Condi: You want Kofi?

George: No.

Condi: You don't want Kofi.

George: No. But now that you mention it, I could use a glass of milk. And then get me the U.N.

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: Not Yassir! The guy at the U.N.

Condi: Kofi?

George: Milk! Will you please make the call?

Condi: And call who?

George: Who is the guy at the U.N?

Condi: Hu is the guy in China.

George: Will you stay out of China?!

Condi: Yes, sir.

George: And stay out of the Middle East! Just get me the guy at the U.N.

Condi: Kofi

George: All right! With cream and two sugars. Now get on the phone.

Iraqi Invasion: A Text Misadventure

What do you want to do now?

> INVADE IRAQ
You are not able to do that, yet.

> LOOK MIRROR
Self-reflection is not your strong suit.

> PET SEAL
It's not that kind of seal.

Theory Of Everything

Behold an awesome radio program about, my hero, Philip K. Dick (via Boing Boing).

NECKFACE

So I don’t look at much art nowadays but while living in LA I saw a lot of the artist NECKFACE. I have never liked graffiti art. But this guy I like a lot. His work reminds me of all that rad Blood rock in the 80s like King Diamond, and Ozzy.

East coast: Jan. 10th to 14th

Jason spent half of last week on the east coast. We cruised around Philadelphia a bit, though we only had enough time to take in some medical oddities. We also climbed a mountain, went to the Hirschorn in D.C., and took in a viewing of "Starship Troopers", which inexplicably Jason had never seen.
The Hirschorn is an unusual modern art museum because more than half of the exhibition space is devoted to sculpture. Also, as Jason put it, the collection is more than the usual suspects, and though it has representatives of art history survey class artists, the curators prefered to show the better work of artists you may not have heard of, rather than lesser works of famous artists.

Besides have several very good paintings by Thiebaud and Balthus, a few lesser-known artists stuck out, but sifting through images on the web, I could only come up with one good example. This is a representative image from the serial work of the Californian Matt Mullican. The drawing is oil-stick-rubbing over acrylic. The imagery combines phone book icons with bird's eye view urban landscapes. The three panels in the Hirschorn (not shown) have the symbols enmeshed with the architecture.

Besides tourism, we also got in some incredibly valuable critique and play-testing of the Neverwinter Nights sandbox module I am building. But I'll save discussion of that for another day.

Was this really necessary?

Here's the link.

I just can't wait for the gripping final moments of the film when Dick Cheney orders the plane shot down.

TVbeGone!

So you guys need one. I created so much chaos with this last night. I went to a local sports bar with lots of plasma tvs. I hit the button and all the TVs turn off. Oh my god people went fucking crazy. Best time of my life. TVBEGONE.

I don't think we went to the moon.

Happy New Year . . . IN SPACE!!!

Fellow cosmonauts, this fits all too well with our theme here:

Soviet era space holiday cards! Link

In other news:
Fan remakes Ultima V!! Link

via BoingBoing

CONSUMERS FOR CHRIST! (Happy Holidays 2)

I had the opportunity this holiday season to do some power tourism in New York City. If I never again walk through Times Square it will be far too soon. That said, I was able to spend a lot of time studying the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) and the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the Met). I just discovered that both of these institutions have very well done cyberspace realms that are worth a look.

Here is a rundown of the temporary exhibits that I think are worth mentioning:


At MOMA there was a very large retrospective dedicated to Elizabeth Murray, who went to SAIC, and whose wacky, shaped, and constructed canvases tended to draw one in. "Behind the seemingly user-friendly demeanor Murray's work sometimes projects, there is daring, especially at a time such as the present, when corrosive irony is the prevailing mode of mass culture, and distancing effects are the norm for advanced aesthetics." I was unable to shake the feeling that these paintings were set pieces for a county fair haunted house, but I enjoyed the the work and the opportunity to see things from throughout her career.


The other big show was a collection of work by Odilon Redon. This work is simply 19th century French Romanticism which I am not normally fond of, but he had the tendency to include so many themes of mythology and fancy that I have always been at the very least amused, particularly by the dark and moody prints of monsters.
Additionally there was an industrial design exhibit about safety equipment and many of its absurd and extreme applications in this fearful epoch but this was really much better in idea form than in practice. As much as bullet resistant masks and tsunami warning signs can make one chuckle, looking at all the different kinds of earplugs just does not get the juices flowing.
The Pixar-suck-up-love-fest was avoided. Remember, STEVE JOBS LOVES YOU!!!


At the Met I saw a show of what appeared to be the complete collection of Combines by Robert Raushchenburg. I could not help the sensation that sometimes he is just putting you on in a smug manner as he splashes a few splotches of paint around but I could not deny the way that this work pushes the limits of the definition of painting, even forty or fifty years later. I still like the little one with the Lincoln Memorial in it from the Art Institute collection best as its small format to me lends itself best to the Combines.
There was a wonderful contemporary drawing show with pieces spanning 1975-2000. There were such powerhouses of drawing that weigh heavily on my consciosnous as Raymond Pettibone, Kerry James Marshall, Jasper Johns and other art stars as well as lesser known artists that often focus on drawing.
Another more subtle show was on a mezzanine and consisted of small watercolours by Paul Klee during a trip to North Africa while he was still in a very experimental stage and forming many of his signature concerns in art. This was a great opportunity to try and understand Klee, someone who I have been attempting to look at more as I obsess over the early years of the Bauhaus movement.
Van Gogh's drawings were there as well, but I already saw that show in Chicago years ago and approximately a bazillion people were present trying to elbow their way close enough to snap a digital photo with their mobile phones, so that was also shunned.

The rest of my time was spent wandering around the very relaxed neighbourhood of Queens during the transit strike with forays into the hipster havens of Brooklyn and the East Village accompanied by a slightly uncomfortable and queasy feeling. Chinatown and Greenwich Village were particular favourites of mine, especially a jazz club that my rock star brother had found on a previous visit to downtown Manhatten. There was a Broadway spectacle in there as well, but I might get lynched by snobbish stagehands if I speak too much about that.
How lovely it was to do absolutely nothing filled with holiday cheer during the end of the year holidays.

Get Your Plush Microbes!

We make stuffed animals that look like tiny microbes—only a million times actual size! Now available: The Common Cold, The Flu, Sore Throat, Stomach Ache, Cough, Ear Ache, Bad Breath, Kissing Disease, Athlete's Foot, Ulcer, Martian Life, Beer & Bread, Black Death, Ebola, Flesh Eating, Sleeping Sickness, Dust Mite, Bed Bug, and Bookworm (and in our Professional line: H.I.V. and Hepatitis).

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Who would have thought you could give someone ghonorrhea for their birthday and make them smile?

Not Again

Sounds like a conspiracy, West Virginia Style


“Ben Hatfield, chief executive of mine owner International Coal Group (ICO), said the miner was apparently killed by the force of the blast.
The cause of death for the other men was not immediately disclosed. But McCoy and the 11 others did as they were trained to do, and huddled behind a fabric barrier they had set up to keep out carbon monoxide gas, which had been detected in deadly concentrations inside the mine, Hatfield and state officials said.
The fabric - designed specifically for use as a gas barrier in an accident - was stretched across an area about 20 feet wide, Hatfield said.”

Associated Press writers Vicki Smith, Allen G. Breed and Mark Williams in Tallmansville contributed to this report.

Spreading the disease

"Behind the kawaii phenomenon, according to Brian J. McVeigh, a scholar of East Asian studies at the University of Arizona, is the strongly hierarchical nature of Japanese culture. 'Cuteness is used to soften up the vertical society,' he said, 'to soften power relations and present authority without being threatening.'" -Natalie Angier, NY Times, Jan. 3rd

"Darwinian aesthetics"? Y'don't say...
Link, via the NY Times.

Dave Lee

hay dave lee wants to be a astromen.
his email ----> ###@###############.com

Edit: email address removed to protect the innocent. -Mr. Alex