Chen Jiagang
Chinese photographer Chen Jiagang makes large, beautiful images of the vacant factories and and scarred landscapes of what is the equivalent to China's Rust Belt. If you want to see more of these photos or read about the Third Front, where these photos were taken in the Southwestern provinces of Guizhou, Sichuan and Yunnan, you should download the entire 79 page book Forbidden City (8MB .pdf) for free.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008 @ 6:48 am
Take the Freeway
No really, take the freeway. A group of L.A. cyclist ne'er-do-wells calling themselves the Crimanimalz recently went for a ride on the traffic-choked freeways of Los Angeles. Specifically, about 30 cyclists took the 10 freeway to the 405 and got off at Santa Monica Blvd., weaving through traffic and passing all the cars before getting busted by the CHP. Take a look at the group's previous ride a few weeks earlier. If you'd like to join them try reading more about the Freeway Traffic Jam Ride or going to crimanimalz.com.
Sunday, June 15, 2008 @ 9:40 pm
Cycle Ball
The world's silliiest sport might be Cycle Ball, or Rad Ball as it's called where this goofy-assed sport is most popular.
Thursday, June 12, 2008 @ 9:59 pm
Rory Donaldson
Scottish New Yorker Rory Donaldson is able to create really interesting imagery by digitally stretching the corners of his photos to make something entirely new and transformative. A show of his work just closed at the Winkleman Gallery in NY.
Thursday, June 12, 2008 @ 8:15 am
Your Type
Type for you is the best type blog in town.
Thursday, June 12, 2008 @ 8:02 am
Sigur Rós
Although it's not officially out for a few weeks yet, Sigur Rós is streaming the entire new album, Međ suđ í eyrum viđ spilum endalaust, for your listening pleasure.
Thursday, June 12, 2008 @ 7:50 am
The Tallest Climbing Wall
An unintended consequence of sheathing the new Renzo Piano-designed New York Times building in a ceramic-rod lattice is that crazy people can climb the building like a ladder. And it was climbed by two different crazy people just yesterday. It took the first climber 40 minutes to reach the top of the 52-story tower. See photos and video of the climbs.
Friday, June 6, 2008 @ 8:26 am
LACMA Guards Pack Some Serious Heat
For the last month armed guards at LACMA have been standing in front of Damien Hirst's Away from the Flock which features a formaldehyde-embalmed lamb. They're reportedly packin' a 9-millimeter a .38.
Wednesday, June 4, 2008 @ 6:26 pm
How to Read at Work
Yo slacker, if you can't get away with cracking open a book at your desk, but still want to slack off and read at work, then try readatwork.com where several public domain classics are readable in a convincing XP-looking faux Powerpoint presentation.
Friday, May 30, 2008 @ 12:48 pm
On Their Wrists in Tokyo
As the site says, if you're looking for a super cool watch, then you've just found the only place to buy one. At least the only place online in Engrish. Indeed, most of the watches at Tokyo Flash are super cool, though some of the watches, like the JLr7, are a little heavier on form than function. There are 12 lights for the hour, 3 for "quarter past", "half past" & "quarter to" and 14 lights for the times in between. There are also 3 other lights which show the seconds ticking by. Yeah not that easy to tell the time at glance.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008 @ 8:46 pm
How to Quickly Spend $100m on Art
So who the hell does spend more than $100m on paintings in one week? A guy like the Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich. Buying both Francis Bacon’s Triptych for $86m as well as Lucian Freud’s Benefits Supervisor Sleeping for $33m at auction this week, Abramovich reportedly purchased both works for display in his London home. You should browse through this list of his other toys and gadgets which include a 377ft yacht (soon to be upgraded to a 550ft yacht, with 2 helipads and an indoor-outdoor pool), 2 submarines, a Boeing 767 with a two-story bedroom and an anti-missle system. That kind of guy.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008 @ 8:48 pm
The Cans Festival
A few weeks ago in London Banksy's Cans Festival took over an old train platform near Waterloo Station (with the approval of the manager of the site, Eurostar) and invited people to come down, look and add their own stencils. Check out these photos of the walls and the huge crowds of Londoners who went. And videos of the fest.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008 @ 7:41 am
Van Gogh Discovered?
For some reason I don't believe a previously unknown Van Gogh portrait of Dr. Paul Gachet has been found in a bank vault in Athens, Greece.
Monday, May 19, 2008 @ 10:31 pm
MUTO
You'll like this: MUTO a wall-painted animation made in Buenos Aires and in Baden. Read more about Blu. Don't miss the drawings.
Thursday, May 15, 2008 @ 9:34 pm
Kanye
Website I'm check the most lately? Kanye West's blog. No joke, it's awesome.
Thursday, May 15, 2008 @ 9:26 pm
Alanna Heiss's P.S.1
Great article in New York Magazine describing the tensions between MoMA and P.S.1 and the impending retirement of its founding director Alanna Heiss. Over 32 years, she built P.S. 1 into one of the city’s most refreshingly unpredictable venues for contemporary art, drawing crowds of young, aggressively hip visitors to see its exhibitions and join in its boozy summer dance parties. But former MoMA curator Rob Storr says that while Alanna has built something that is very important to New York. She should be very proud of it and she should be lauded for it, but it has outgrown her, and she needs to graciously let it go. Since the merger with the Modern, he adds, it’s become a semi-museum institution, where what it really needs to be is the sexiest, fastest-moving, most dynamic non-museum institution in town.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008 @ 10:23 pm
Elizabeth Fleming
You should look at Elizabeth Fleming's photographs. With beautiful photos of the smallest details of family life in her series Life is a series of small moments, it's almost as if Fleming is answering Sally Mann's rustic, humid Southern life lived outdoors with her own suburban New Jersey interiors that are no less delicate and attentive.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008 @ 9:00 pm
Robert Rauschenberg
Robert Rauschenberg has died at 82. Read his obituary in the New York Times. See MoMA's collection of Rauschenberg works and take a look at his covers for Time Magazine.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008 @ 6:46 am
Play the Building
David Byrne will be turning the Battery Maritime Building in Lower Manhattan into a very large musical instrument this Summer. Devices will be attached to the building structure — to the metal beams and pillars, the heating pipes, the water pipes — and are used to make these things produce sound.. The building will be open and free to be played every weekend for 11 weeks this Summer.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008 @ 7:41 am
Henry Moore: $2.45/lb
As copper price have risen to $4 per pound, scrap thieves are starting to nab public sculptures. The Orange County city of Brea has lost 3 public bronze sculptures in the last 18 months, reports the Wall Street Journal.
Friday, May 2, 2008 @ 2:53 pm
Guston Drawings at the Morgan
An exhibit of more than 100 drawings by Philip Guston opens today at the Morgan Library in NYC. It's the first major survey of his drawings in more than 20 years and the only U.S. appearance for the exhibit. Nice review of the show in the New York Times.
Friday, May 2, 2008 @ 1:55 pm
Ian Baguskas
Philly-born photographer Ian Baguskas has some great pictures viewable online for his current exhibit at the Jen Bekman Gallery in NYC. I like the dry quiet in these. Also, you should really check out all the sets in his series South Korea: Below Line 38. Fantastic stuff.
Thursday, April 24, 2008 @ 11:02 pm
Being Frank About Frank
Great article on Robert Frank by Charlie LeDuff.
Thursday, April 24, 2008 @ 10:28 pm
Arakawa + Gins
Husband and wife architects have built a house in East Hampton that has undulating floors, disorienting colors, off kilter fixtures and a somewhat dangerous layout. The house purposefully cradles tentativeness with its bumpy concrete hills in the kitchen and if you feel tentative and challenging in the house, Gins and Arakawa believe, you'll achieve a youthfulness and elation that may defy death. But you have to sign an injury waiver to enter the house, just in case. Check out an audio slide show tour. Or see more at Arakawa + Gins' site, reversibledestiny.org.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008 @ 8:26 pm
Never Gonna Give, Never Gonna Give
I'm jumping on the bandwagon here, but only because it mesmerizes me. Chambray on denim, it was a trope for our innocence.
Monday, March 31, 2008 @ 9:52 pm
Shorpy
At Fireman School in 1920 you had to jump off a few buildings. See more great hi-res old photos at Shorpy, the 100 year-old photo blog. The site's also got a some nice collections from great photojournalists Walker Evans, Lewis Hine, Dorothea Lange.
Friday, March 21, 2008 @ 11:35 am
Web Trend Map
Another way you could browse the web is by thinking of it as one big subway map. Next stop Gmail, transfer here to Gmaps, Gdocs and iGoogle. Standcleardaclosindoors.
Saturday, March 15, 2008 @ 11:44 am
Emilio Morenatti
Great photo by AP photographer Emilio Morenatti in the New York Times of a lawyer at a protest in Pakistan.
Sunday, March 9, 2008 @ 10:59 pm
Garfield
Here's a couple of reasons why it's really all about Garfield lately. If Garfield minus Garfield doesn't inspire, try LasagnaCat.
Tuesday, February 26, 2008 @ 12:46 pm
Reason 1,206 That I Will Always Love Brooklyn
At the The Main Event Brooklyn Boy Scouts sold hamburgers for $1.50. See more about this night at a Brooklyn Bingo Hall. And take a look at more great photos from Bryan Derballa. Don't miss his blog as well.
Monday, February 4, 2008 @ 7:30 pm
Time Stands Still
Great video of 207 people frozen in place for 5 minutes in Grand Central Station.
Friday, February 1, 2008 @ 9:33 am
Pelican Project
The Pelican Project puts six decades of Pelican Book covers online! They are quite something when you seen them all a decade at a time. Read more about this gallery put together by Things Magazine.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008 @ 8:31 am
Mike Davis Hates Sprawl, Loves Avocados
Urban critic and apocalyptic exaggerater Mike Davis offers his reasons why seasonal wildfires keep getting worse. The loss of more than 90 percent of Southern California’s agricultural buffer zone is the principal, if seldom referenced, reason why wildfires incinerate such spectacular swathes of luxury.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008 @ 7:30 am
Jeff Scher
You'll like the work of Brooklyn artist Jeff Scher. You should watch both L’Eau Life and White Out.
Monday, January 28, 2008 @ 8:21 pm
AirMail
Well that was quick. Here's a manila envelope sleeve fer yer MacBook Air.
Monday, January 28, 2008 @ 7:25 pm
United Slices of America
While you thought you could find this on Wikipedia, what you really need is some subjectivity to come up with a good, fairly complete list of regional pizza styles. And check out more good foodblogin' at Serious Eats
Friday, January 25, 2008 @ 8:59 am
Color Photos From the 30s & 40s
The Library of Congress recently uploaded more than 3,000 photos to Flickr. And many of them are vivid color images taken by photographers working for the Farm Security Administration (FSA) and the Office of War Information (OWI) between 1939 and 1944. By putting them on Flickr, the LOC is hoping to have the public tag, notate and add information about the copyright-free images. Read more about the project on the Library of Congress blog.
Thursday, January 17, 2008 @ 1:12 pm
Chris Harris
Here, enjoy the warm comfort of Chris Harris's blurry pinhole photos. Along with his landscapes and seascapes, don't miss his shots of mall windows
and a collection of scratched photos.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008 @ 7:12 am
Beer, For Dogs and Kids
Mmm beer--dogs love it and now the Japanese company Petcomyu is finally giving dogs what they want. Happy Lager, is a beer designed for dogs that is non-alcoholic and flavored with beef extract. Looks like they love it. It's almost as funny as Sangaria's beer for kids. Personally, I like the looks of the stout this one kid is drinking. It could be fake beer, I don't know. Watch more here. Kampai!
Sunday, January 6, 2008 @ 6:36 pm
Ork Posters
Great hand screen print posters of San Francisco neighborhoods. Too bad it's sold out. More cities from Chicago design firm Ork.
Thursday, December 13, 2007 @ 8:20 am
Google Charts
A new API from Google lets you dynamically generate information charts. Along with pie charts, like this useful one, you can create line charts, bar charts, Venn diagrams and scatterplots. Learn how at the Googles.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007 @ 6:14 pm
Pashley
Some great classic bikes from English manufacturer Pashley. I can't decide between the Guv'nor or the Phantom.
Monday, December 10, 2007 @ 8:16 am
Liz Hickok's New Skyline
New San Francisco skyline in Jell-o as seen from Alcatraz. See it big and see more of Hickock's great Jell-o work.
Friday, December 7, 2007 @ 8:30 am
Mark Wallinger
Mark Wallinger has won the Turner Prize 2007 for his representation of Brian Haw's antiwar protest in front of Britain's Parliament Square. The jury commended its immediacy, visceral intensity and historic importance. The three other artists who were shortlisted for the Turner Prize 2007 were Zarina Bhimji, Nathan Coley and Mike Nelson. Read more coverage from the Guardian and the BBC.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007 @ 7:55 am
New Museum
Take a tour of the New Museum of Contemporary Art's shiny new building on the Bowery, the only major thoroughfare in New York never to have had a single church built upon it.
Saturday, December 1, 2007 @ 6:46 pm
Curtis Mann
You'll probably like Curtis Mann's manipulated photos. He gives 'em the analog business with bleach and scraping. Mann's Blog is pretty nice too.
Friday, November 30, 2007 @ 6:22 am
The Real First Class
The best First Class in the air is probably on Emirates planes where they offer private suites in First Class. They come
fully equipped with individual storage, a coat closet, vanity desk and personal mini bar. The extra-large seat reclines to become a fully flat bed, and the 23" wide-screen LCD screen with 600 channels of entertainment. It's more like a train compartment with a real door you can shut.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007 @ 8:42 am
Inside Roden Crater
Although it won't be officially open to the public until 2011, you can take a sneak peak inside James Turrell's Roden Crater in this Flickr set by San Francisco designer Heidi Pollock. Apparently getting into the giant earthwork piece, which Turrell has been working on since the 1970s, has become the hottest ticket in the artworld. Read more stories of how others have sneaked in.
Sunday, November 25, 2007 @ 10:18 pm
Strength in Numbers
If you've got a big enough crew, it really only takes a couple of minutes to do up a train right.
Friday, November 23, 2007 @ 7:36 pm
Pieter Hugo
Amazing portraits from South African photographer Pieter Hugo. I especially like he photos of Nigerian men and their animals in The Hyena & Other Men as well his odd family portraits in Messina/Musina. And then there's Looking Aside. Hugo's work will be shown at the Yossi Milo Gallery in New York soon.
Monday, November 19, 2007 @ 6:03 pm
Watch My Feet
Don't watch me, Watch My Feet.
Monday, November 19, 2007 @ 6:01 pm
The Gaze of 45 Mexican Photographers
The Guangdong Museum of Art in Guangzhou, China is showing an exhibition of 45 contemporary Mexican photographers. Curated by Francisco Mata and Pedro Meyer, The Gaze of 45 Mexican Photographers has 450 photos available for browsing on the website. It's a daunting volume of great work-- but just keep clicking, it gets better the more you see. You can also browse by photographer.
Monday, November 12, 2007 @ 6:27 pm
Melody Road
When you drive on The Melody Road, ridges in the pavement make your car play a simple tune. There are three of these roads in (where else) the Japanese areas of Hokkaido, Wakayama and Gunma.
Monday, November 12, 2007 @ 7:41 am
Quicksilver
How they rolled in 1986. Stay tuned to the end.
Sunday, November 11, 2007 @ 4:20 pm
Tanyth Berkeley
Check out New York photographer Tanyth Berkeley's series of haunting portraits in Orchidaceae. Scroll below the photos to read an interview with her. See more of her photos at the Bellwether Gallery.
Thursday, November 1, 2007 @ 8:00 am
Tilt Viewer
From Airtight Interactive, the folks who brought us the awesome Simple Viewer photo gallery flash app., comes Tilt Viewer. It may not be better, but it's more fun.
Friday, October 26, 2007 @ 5:28 pm
St. Vincent
St. Vincent walks around a Parisian apartment hitting shite with sticks. And casting a spell. See more at Take Away Shows.
Friday, October 26, 2007 @ 7:10 am
Chris Buck
New York photographer Chris Buck does some pretty amazing editorial work.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007 @ 8:12 pm
Last Night's Garbage
Last Night's Garbage is a photoblog documenting garbage on the streets of NYC. And more.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007 @ 7:56 pm
Thom Mayne on the New Fed Building
The AIA San Francisco has an interesting conversation with Thom Mayne of Morphosis and the writer Andrew Blum talking about the new Federal Building. And it comes with lots of great images of the building, inside and out.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007 @ 7:57 am
Jack or Meg
Contributing at least their color palette, The White Stripes have teamed with Lomographische AG to produce limited edition Holgas. The Jack model will be a Holga with a fisheye lens and the Meg will come with a ringflash. They come in red and white and are $180 per kit.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007 @ 7:07 am
Jyrki Parantainen
Finnish photographer Jyrki Parantainen of the Helsinki school makes some interesting images using strings and pushpins attached to his subjects.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007 @ 6:36 am
Jottit
Wow, Jottit is simple. Right on.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007 @ 7:14 pm
Vanity Ring
German digital media artist Markus Kison has come up with a VanityRing that displays the number of Google hits your name returns. Each night you can place it in a docking station to refresh your hits.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007 @ 6:41 am
Noah Kalina
New York photographer Noah Kalina is probably best known for his Noah K. Everyday project where he's taken a self-portrait everyday since 2000. But I also really like Kalina's other photos in his portfolios. Great portraits and night shots. And, weirdly a portrait taken on a doorstep five doors down from me (I see that dude all the time).
His self-portraits in Las Vegas are great, and funnier the more you see.
Monday, October 15, 2007 @ 7:42 am
PikaPika
Here's an animation from PikaPika, the Japanese light doodlers. Read PikaPika's blog for more.
Thursday, October 4, 2007 @ 9:15 pm
I, Like, Live at the Mall
Michael Townsend and seven other artists built a 750-square-foot apartment in the parking garage of a Providence, RI shopping mall four years ago and had lived there for up to three weeks at a time while documenting mall life. Their home sweet mall was only recently discovered and Townsend was sentenced with probation. See the website documenting the experience and a few photos of the place.
Wednesday, October 3, 2007 @ 8:25 pm
Graph Paper
Free graph paper .pdfs. I don't know, it might be useful to you.
Monday, October 1, 2007 @ 6:45 am
Beirut's Bang on a Can
Damnit people, you're not going to Take Away Shows enough. You haven't even seen this video of Beirut singing Nantes behind a restaurant in Paris. And yeah, it's the whole lot of them with tubas and garbage can percussion. Don't miss the second one either, where Zach Condon goes into the bar singing with his ukulele and then...
Saturday, September 29, 2007 @ 9:40 am
Village Music
After 50 years, Village Music in Mill Valley is closing its doors for good this weekend. If you've never been, hurry up.
Friday, September 28, 2007 @ 5:07 pm
Jan Von Holleben
German photographer Jan Von Holleben's series Dreams of Flying does a great job at capturing the spirit of kids' imagination and creativity without being corny. And also check out the photos inspired by Dreams of Flying taken by kids.
Friday, September 21, 2007 @ 8:25 am
Nicholas Hughes
You'll be surprised at what English photographer Nicholas Hughes can do with just trees and water. More of his painterly ghost trees are on view at The Photographers' Gallery in London through Nov. 3.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007 @ 6:53 am
The Times, They Are Achanging
Starting at midnight tonight The New York Times is giving up on TimesSelect and will stop charging for parts of its online content. . The Times will also make available its archives from 1987 to the present without charge, as well as those from 1851 to 1922, which are in the public domain.. According to the paper, future ad revenue generated by the newly-freed content is expected to exceed the $10 million a year in revenue TimesSelect was producing.
Monday, September 17, 2007 @ 5:42 pm
Graphed and Indexed
Jessica Hagy makes some great diagrams and charts about the everyday.
Friday, September 14, 2007 @ 7:44 am
James Spencer
I love these wrinkled old James Spencer photos from the 70s--especially the ones of Muhammad Ali and James Brown with a mustache. The interview is great, but watch the video too.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007 @ 10:04 pm
Don't Stop the Cycle of Violence
The Cycle of Violence tee from LA-based Protoculture is pretty great.
Monday, September 3, 2007 @ 8:29 pm
José Gonzaléz in Marfa
If there's a hipster refrigerator-magnet poetry set out there I'm sure it's got the components to make this sentence: José Gonzaléz playing in the back of a pickup truck while cruising through the streets of Marfa, TX. From the indefatigable Take-Away Shows.
Saturday, September 1, 2007 @ 4:31 pm
Hand Soaps
These hand soaps creep me out.
Saturday, September 1, 2007 @ 11:01 am
Crewdsonzilla Takes Pittsfield
Boston.com has a great behind the scenes of a recent Greg Crewdson photo shoot in Pittsfield, Mass. With a crew of 30 people, huge cranes, the town's cops shutting down traffic, and it's fire department recruited to hose down all the streets to give it that freshly rained look, Crewdson's one photo is an entire afternoon of entertainment for the town.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007 @ 7:56 pm
Soviet Poster a Day
Awesome blog that gives you a Soviet Poster a Day.
Sunday, August 26, 2007 @ 7:29 pm
Misty Keasler
Texas-based photographer Misty Keasler has plumbed the depths of some of the more fascinating rooms in Japan love hotels and published some great photos in her book Love Hotels: The Hidden Fantasy Rooms of Japan, from Chronicle Books. You can take a look at some of the photos in this interview with Keasler. And check out her site where she has some great photos of Chinese Amusement parks, Guatamalan dumps, orphans, and her East Texas roots.
Thursday, August 16, 2007 @ 7:36 am
Shark
It kind of looks like this when a shark swims toward you.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007 @ 8:13 am
WPA Posters
Browse WPA posters from 1936-1943 in the Library of Congress' collection By the People, For the People. You can search through more than 900 works in the collection or head straight for the highlights here.
Tuesday, August 14, 2007 @ 8:08 am
Elizabeth Murray
Painter Elizabeth Murray passed away of complications from lung cancer Sunday at the age of 66.
Tuesday, August 14, 2007 @ 7:25 am
Automated Flickr Music Video
Felix Jung has created Astronaut, a Flickr-based Flash slideshow/music video that searches Flickr to grab photos to go along with the lyrics of a song playing in the background. Music's OK, but it's a great idea.
Monday, August 13, 2007 @ 7:32 am
Tuesday is the New Friday
Here's a network diagram which maps the iterations of the phrase "___is the new___" from various sources in 2005.
Monday, August 13, 2007 @ 7:20 am
CAMP
Check out this great video of Don Fisher walking San Francisco Chronicle art critic Kenneth Baker through his juicy collection of contemporary art and talking about his new museum ideas. Fisher's plans for CAMP, Contemporary Art Museum in the Presidio-- as the museum to house the estimated $1B collection will probably be called-- will have more exhibition space than all of SFMoMA to display more than 1,000 works in the Fishers' collection. Lots of Lichtensteins, Warhols, Kiefers and Richters, Richters, Richters. He's no Charles Saatchi, but it'll still be amazing to have this collection on public view nearby. For a taste, go to the Gap Corp. art gallery at 2 Folsom, open weekdays between 11-2.
Thursday, August 9, 2007 @ 10:09 pm
I Welcome Our Robot Insects Overlords
Robert Wood and his research team at Harvard have created some amazing little robot flies which can take off using tiny little 0.3mg wings.
Tuesday, August 7, 2007 @ 8:07 am
Chinese Urinals!
The city of Chongqing China has built the world's largest restroom. It's a four-story, 1,000-stall facility with TVs and al fresco Virgin Mary-themed urinals.
Wednesday, August 1, 2007 @ 6:42 am
Joseph O. Holmes
Great photos from New York photographer Joe Holmes. He has consistently amazing daily photos on his site. But I also like his series AMNH with photos of silhouetted people in front of dioramas in the American Museum of Natural History. And great stuff in his Workplace project of photos of peoples cubicles and desks. Holmes is represented by the Jen Bekman Gallery in NYC.
Monday, July 30, 2007 @ 8:04 am
Rameniac
For an exhaustive study of noodles, the Rameniac has made a useful guide to the 22 popular ramen styles of Japan. And there's also reviews of a handful of Bay Area ramen shops.
Saturday, July 21, 2007 @ 12:47 pm
Garry Winogrand
Here's a 1982 clip of Garry Winogrand talking about how he takes photos.
Friday, July 20, 2007 @ 8:49 am
Stranded Google Map
For the Road Trip show at Mixed Greens Gallery in NYC, photographer Amy Stein has created a Google Map of her Stranded series. The 61 photographs in the series are marked on the map to show the location where the pictures were taken.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007 @ 8:01 am
Pillowig
Interactive Telecommunications student Joo Youn Paek has created some really great objects. Pillowig is one of the best. It lets users to sleep comfortably whenever and whenever they’d like.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007 @ 7:52 am
Bernd Becher
German photographer and teacher Bernd Becher died this week at the age of 75. With his wife Hilla, Becher took beautifully systematic photos of industrial structures for more than 40 years. Becher was also an influential teacher at the Dusseldorf Academy, where he taught Andreas Gursky, Candida Hofer, Thomas Ruff and Thomas Struth. Here's a pretty good collection of their water towers and blast furnace photos. And a nice long article on the Bechers and their influence on contemporary photography.
Friday, June 29, 2007 @ 8:23 am
Grizzly Bear
Here's a great video of Grizzly Bear singing an acapella version of The Knife, improvisée dans une rue de Paris. More good stuff like this, always, at Takeaway Shows.
Thursday, June 28, 2007 @ 9:38 pm
Gloo Man
You should go and print yerself an army of Gloo Men.
Wednesday, June 20, 2007 @ 6:33 am
Google My Ride
And then Google took over the road too. Working with PG&E, Google has launched an initiative to add extra batteries to store energy from the power grid and get double the mpg.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007 @ 8:08 am
Orly Cogan
Orly Cogan embroiders vintage tablecloths with scenes of sex, daydreams, coke and cake. You can see more of her work at the Hammer Gallery in Chicago, Projects Gallery in Philadelphia, and on the walls of Steven Wolf Fine Arts in San Francisco through June.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007 @ 6:57 am
Gursky Over?
New York Magazine's Jerry Saltz has an interesting review of the latest Andreas Gursky show at the Matthew Marks Gallery in New York. He says Gursky's run out of ideas.
Monday, June 11, 2007 @ 8:24 am
The Long Weekend
To mark the twentieth anniversary of the death of Andy Warhol, the Tate Modern hosted The Long Weekend May 25-28. Museum goers were encouraged to bring sleeping bags to a 19-hour screening of Warhol's film Sleep accompanied by a performance of Erik Satie's Vexations played by 10 pianists (including composers Michael Nyman and Gavin Bryars)-- repeated 840 times. And all this while visitors drifted in and out of sleep on the Tate's cold, concrete floor. The Guardian's Samuel Wigley has a first hand account of the Tate's mass sleepover.
Wednesday, June 6, 2007 @ 7:37 am
New Amsterdam City - The Big Orange
Neue Dutch activists say it's time to return New York to its rightful owner- The Netherlands. Give us Back New York! has some photos and videos of what New Amsterdam City would look like. No more amnesty for the English immigrants in New Amsterdam!
Tuesday, June 5, 2007 @ 7:37 am
Toyota Hybrid-Hybrid
That 60mpg you're getting from your Prius just not good enough? Then slap some solar panels on it. SEV, a Southern California solar company has developed a system that improves the fuel economy of Toyota hybrids by up to 29% by putting high efficiency mono-crystalline photovoltaic cells on the roof of the car. The SEV system also qualifies for Federal renewable energy tax credits of up to $2,000.
Tuesday, June 5, 2007 @ 6:53 am
Scott Peterman
I like Scott Peterman's stark photos of ice shacks and landscapes.
Monday, June 4, 2007 @ 7:16 am
Peat's Room
The indefatigable stencil graffiti artist Peat Wollaeger has painted a room in the Hotel des Arts in San Francisco. Called Casa Del Luchador, Wollaeger's room has 7-foot tall stencils of masked Mexican wrestlers and boxing ring ropes for the footboard. Check out the video of the painting action, and more photos. And see more of the rooms at Hotel des Arts, including rooms painted by Sam Flores, Jeremy Fish, Kelly Tunstall and others.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007 @ 8:15 am
Theo Jansen
Dutch artist Theo Jansen uses yellow plastic tubes to make mechanical skeletons which walk on the wind. Watch the videos where he lets them loose to ramble on the beach. Check out Animaris Currens Ventosa.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007 @ 8:05 am
The Other 90%
Here's a business plan for you: A billion customers in the world, entrepreneur and philanthropist Dr. Paul Polakis was quoted in this New York Times article as saying, are waiting for a $2 pair of eyeglasses, a $10 solar lantern and a $100 house. Take a look at the great, cheap ideas at the Cooper Hewitt show, Design for the other 90%.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007 @ 9:45 pm
Google Streetview
Google added a great feature to Google Maps today. It lets you see street level images in a few cities. So far it only looks like it works in San Francisco, NYC, Miami, Las Vegas and Denver. Let this nerd explain it. Or check it out yerself. A9.com had something like this a few years ago, but without Google's muscle, it flopped I guess.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007 @ 6:48 pm
Pete Jackson
Irish photographer Pete Jackson has taken some amazing panoramic infared photos of Los Angeles. His photos are at the L.A. Center for Digital Art until June 2.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007 @ 7:27 am
Growing Business Cards
London designer Jamie Wieck hands out Growing Business Cards which sprout alfalfa or cress when dipped in water.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007 @ 7:11 am
Antony Gormley
Check these photos from British sculpture Antony Gornley's Blind Light installation at the Southbank Centre in London. Humidifiers create a dense fog reducing the visibility inside an 8m x 10m glass enclosure so that you can't see your hand in front of your face. Read more on Gormley.
Tuesday, May 15, 2007 @ 9:33 pm
The Japanese Tradition － 謝罪 Shazai
Here's a nice video explaining how to apologize in Japan. Let's all put our hearts into expressing remorse!
Tuesday, May 15, 2007 @ 6:10 pm
Minchi
Japanese artist Minchi's work is pretty cool. Using oil paint and then photoshop, the works look like manga, but fantastically painterly. One piece, tooth, is a vivid representation of what I remember of my 13th year.
Friday, May 11, 2007 @ 7:08 am
British Road Sign Fonts
Download the fonts used in British road signs.
Thursday, May 10, 2007 @ 11:30 pm
Annie Shoots the Queen
Annie Leibovitz's portrait of Queen Elizabeth has been made public. It's my favorite Leibovitz photo.
Thursday, May 10, 2007 @ 9:50 pm
Johan Rosenmunthe
In the series Imagine Remembering Danish photographer Johan Rosenmunthe makes compelling remixes of photos left behind by his grandfather.
Thursday, May 10, 2007 @ 7:55 am
Merricks Beach House
For a few days this year, a group of 8 Australian artists were give permission to do whatever they wanted to a soon-to-be demolished house. See result at Merricks Beach. Great results from all the artists, but my favorites are from Susan Jacobs and Robbie Rowlands.
Thursday, May 10, 2007 @ 7:17 am
Griffith Park Fire Photos
Some amazing photos in the New York Times of the Griffith Park fire. Especially this one from inside a house.
Wednesday, May 9, 2007 @ 9:32 pm
Takashi Murakami
Check out the new work from Japanese artist Takashi Murakami at Gagosian Gallery in New York. There's a new element worked into his usually smooth and bright paintings: wrinkly old men. View some of the work on the walls.
Wednesday, May 9, 2007 @ 8:55 am
What YouTube is All About
Allen Ginsburg explains YouTube and it's false universe of pure imagery in 1967.
Wednesday, May 9, 2007 @ 8:28 am
Virtual Shoe Museum
Staggering variety of weird footwear in the Virtual Shoe Museum.
Wednesday, May 9, 2007 @ 8:21 am
Free Museums
During the month of May Bank of America is giving free admission to museums in California and the East Coast. All you need is a BofA ATM or credit card.
Thursday, May 3, 2007 @ 7:29 pm
Getting Warm in Here?
Plant zones are changing across the U.S. and the traditional climate zone definitions have changed so quickly over the past few years that according to the National Arbor Day Foundation Hardiness Zone Map, Atlanta, which was in Zone 7 in 1990, is now in Zone 8, along with most of northern Georgia. By the end of the century, the climate will no longer be favorable for the official state tree or flower in 28 states.
Thursday, May 3, 2007 @ 7:38 am
Japan Photos
Got a lot of time to kill? Then take a look at the more than 900 photos I took in Japan. Just not all at one time. Seriously, take it one city at a time or something or you'll ruin your eyes.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007 @ 9:41 pm
T-post
Do you wish clever, cool t-shirts just magically appeared in your mailbox every few weeks? Subscribe to T-post. It's a lot like having a subscription to a magazine but instead of receiving magazines in your mailbox - you receive T-shirts. Every six weeks they design a t-shirt based on a current news item and while the $32/shirt price is a little steep, the shirts look great.
Tuesday, March 13, 2007 @ 8:00 am
Stephen Wiltshire
Stephen Wiltshire draws a huge panorama of Tokyo from memory. (He starts drawing around 3 minutes in.)
Saturday, March 10, 2007 @ 5:42 pm
Art at the Naval Observatory
Let the wife of the Vice President, Lynne Cheney, take you on a tour of the art on the walls of the Vice President's residence. The living room is dominated by a wonderful painting by Helen Frankenthaler-- and it's called Lush Spring... and the colors are just so wonderful... the greens just pop out, notes Mrs. Cheney. Moving to the library she describes a carved ship made by French prisoners during the Napoleonic period and it's carved from animal bone. I think that prisoner condition in that era were pretty awful and people did this incredibly intricate work in order to earn just a little bit of money and they would then sell the ship so they could maybe buy a little extra food.
Monday, March 5, 2007 @ 7:54 pm
Dubai
Headshaking article on the bizarreness that is Dubai. But where are you? Is this a new Margaret Atwood novel, Philip K. Dick’s unpublished sequel to Blade Runner or Donald Trump on acid? No. It is the Persian Gulf city-state of Dubai in 2010.
Thursday, March 1, 2007 @ 7:24 pm
Jon Tran
Great spraycan stencil art illustrations from English illustrator Jon Tran. Check out more of Tran's work and other great illustrators at English illustration agency Private View.
Thursday, March 1, 2007 @ 7:05 pm
Running the Sahara
3 guys just rain 4000 miles in 111 days. They ran across the Sahara Desert-- the entire Sahara for the-- H2O Africa Foundation. That's nearly 2 marathons a day along camel tracks in 130F degree heat. See photos of their tired asses at National Geographic's Running the Sahara.
Friday, February 23, 2007 @ 6:36 pm
Photo of the Year Winner
US photographer Spencer Platt's photo of young Lebanese driving through a devastated neighborhood of South Beirut has won the World Press Photo of the Year 2006. See more of Platt's photos of Beirut from last Summer. Also read the story behind the photo.
Wednesday, February 21, 2007 @ 7:04 am
Flexible Seating
Take a look at this flexible seating from Vancouver-based furniture company Molo Design. It's made from kraft paper and it's 100% recyclable and looks like a slinky. Read more info.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007 @ 9:44 pm
Neighboroo
What's the demographic lowdown on where you live? Check Neighboroo.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007 @ 9:28 pm
Gwong Osang
You might like the work of Korean artist Gwong Osang. You also might get creeped out by it. His series The Deodorant Type is filled with lifesized sculptures of people and objects made of photos (see 2,3,4 too). And in The Flat, Osang makes prints of something like 3D collages of photographed objects.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007 @ 8:01 am
Rich Little Does a Great Eisenhower Impersonation
After Stephen Colbert's amazing performance at last year's White House Correspondents’ Association dinner The association is taking no chances this year and has hired 69-year old comedian Rich Little as host.
Saturday, January 27, 2007 @ 11:16 am
Phillip Toledano
Check out the amazing work of New York photographer Phillip Toledano. Don't miss Video Gamer portraits or Hope & Fear, which, believe it or not, lives up to it's description as the external manifestation of the internal desires and paranoia that are adrift in America. And Arctic Circle is nice too.
Saturday, January 27, 2007 @ 10:34 am
Blond
So the other day my dining room was telling me it wants to go blond. And I was like, don't do it, your dark chocolate color is my favorite. And besides, the drapes won't match the carpet.
Saturday, January 27, 2007 @ 10:11 am
Believers
Here you go, an atlas of world faiths showing who believes what, where.
Saturday, January 27, 2007 @ 10:08 am
Put Yourself in Google Maps
Wanna get a few pixels of your smiling face on google maps? Just be near Sydney Harbor on January 26th. Google is flying its Google branded plane low over Sydney on Australia Day and is encouraging people in the area to hoist a sign, arrange your family into a fun formation or just get a bunch of friends together to wave so people can be seen in Google maps. If all goes well, she'll be a ripper of a snap.
Wednesday, January 24, 2007 @ 6:32 pm
Susan Stockwell
Great things spring English artist Susan Stockwell's obsession with maps. Take a look at the Empire Dress, a Victorian style dress made from maps of the British Isles; or The Americas, a map of North and South America made from used coffee filters. She's also made a lace from the pattern of South London arterial roads.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007 @ 8:22 am
Coyotes
As bizarre as it seems that packs of coyotes are now living in Golden Gate Park, right in the center of San Francisco, it's worth noting that dense urban areas are actually great habitat for coyotes. Read more about how coyotes are thriving in Chicago.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007 @ 8:10 am
Yvonne Todd
The work of New Zealand photographer Yvonne Todd is so weird, you'll like it. There's a background hum when you look at the portraits.
Thursday, January 11, 2007 @ 8:17 am
You Wood Wear Those
Wood grain shoes from Medium and font foundry House Industries.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007 @ 10:41 pm
Los Abandoned
Los Abandoned is band from Los Angeles. Watch their video Van Nuys (es very nice). Hold on 'til the chorus.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007 @ 6:33 pm
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