... these are a few of my favorite things, October-November 2014

Some stuff I particularly enjoyed ...

Konstantin Kalynovych / The Alchemist.  I'm happy to own a print, meticulously done.  Artist's site: kalynovych.net/

metroplastique.com/bijoux-talismans/208-mineral.html

Koralie (Metroplastique) / Mineral Talisman Earrings from "Collection Composite."  I had to get just to admire.  More here: metroplastique.com/

librairieminima.com/album/la-boutique-minima/

librairieminima.com/album/livres-miniatures/2/

Catherine Prats & Kimihito Okuyama / Librairie Galerie MiniMa.  I've been dreaming of a shop exclusively for miniature art and books.  Edition L'atelier du lierre: librairieminima.com/pages/l-atelier-du-lierre/l.html

Subcultural Girl.  Ballpoint pen, 2014.

Shohei Otomo.  More here: backwoodsgallery.com/shohei-otomo-prints/.  Artist's site: hakuchi.jp/

phlegmcomicnews.blogspot.com/2014/08/totems-moss-norway.html

Phlegm / Totems.  Artist's site: phlegmcomicnews.blogspot.com/

 

I recommend his book of pen and ink drawings, which includes a nice poster of 'Civilisation': phlegm.bigcartel.com/product/phlegm-book

Michel Leiris / Nights as Day, Days as Night (1988).  Original: Nuits sans nuit et quelques jours sans jour, Paris: Gallimard, 1961.

mhpbooks.com/books/la-boutique-obscure/

Another dream journal ... Georges Perec / La Boutique Obscure: 124 Dreams (2013).  Original: La boutique obscure. 124 rêves, Paris: Denoël/Gonthier, 1973.

 

And another of sorts ... Alfred Jarry / Days and Nights, various from Atlas Press.  Original: Les Jours et les nuits, roman d'un déserteur, Paris: Mercure de France, 1897.

taschen.com/pages/en/catalogue/art/all/01102/facts.hieronymus_bosch_complete_works.htm

Stefan Fischer / Hieronymus Bosch: Complete Works (2014).  Look inside: 
taschen.com/pages/en/community/video/37396.leaf_through_hieronymus_bosch_the_complete_works.htm

taschen.com/pages/en/catalogue/popculture/all/01129/facts.winsor_mccay_the_complete_little_nemo.htm

I'm also looking forward to 2 upcoming releases from Taschen: Winsor McCay: The Complete Little Nemo and van Eyck: The Complete Works.

ohjoy.blogs.com/my_weblog/2014/01/the-coolest-pop-up-book-ever.html

Kimika Warabe / とびだす! うごく! -たべもの, Tobidasu! Ugoku! Tabemono (2008).  My sister gave this mini pop-up book to my nephew, and he loved it.  I must say, it is a very cute book.

Panos Cosmatos / Beyond the Black Rainbow (2010).

 

Susan Sontag / Promised Lands (1974).

Asif Kapadia / The Warrior (2001).

John Coney / Space is the Place (1974).  I like to rewatch it from time to time.

These days, a lot of newly remastered Sun Ra.  More info: the-temple.net/sunradisco/list.php

La Femme / Psycho Tropical Berlin (2013).  More info: lafemmemusic.com/

Melt-Banana / Charlie (1998).  More info: geocities.jp/azaplink/mb/mxbx.html

Pierre Schaeffer / L'œuvre musicale, various from INA/GRM/EMF.

The Lykes of Us / '7:30 Said' (1967).  More info: cicadelic.com/lykesofus.htm

Andrei Khrzhanovsky's Glass Harmonica (1968)

Not quite Mur ...

... these are a few of my favorite things, September 2014

Some stuff I particularly enjoyed this month:

magpictures.com/thedouble/

The best part of Richard Ayoade's The Double (2013), this drawing.

semiotextes.com/shop/fantomas-versus-the-multinational-vampires

Julio Cortázar's Fantomas contra los vampiros multinacionales / Fantomas Versus the Multinational Vampires.  Recently released in translation by Semiotext(e).

theschoolband.co.uk/

The School - "All I Wanna Do" (2008).

vignelli.com/home/product/heller3.html

Massimo Vignelli died in late May this year.  It's nice to have the Compact Stacking Cup.  I also suggest the Stacking Dinnerware and Mug, adds a certain charm to everyday meals.  Heller offers a clear version of the mug, but it suffers from poor production.

too legit to quit

Russia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs recently stated about the circumstances in Ukraine: "A course has been set to use dictatorial and sometimes terrorist methods to suppress dissenters in various regions.” 

Below, an antiseptic against those pesky dictatorial and sometimes terrorist methods, foreign or domestic.

Update 02/28/2014: Ukraine will be confronting sabotage on the part of the Russian kleptocracy and its cronies, vacillation on the part of the EU and the US, as well as internal shortchanging. Ukraine will benefit generally from the EU more than from the Russian Federation, now and in the long run ... but it's like dealing with a slightly shinier Mephistopheles.  

Update 03/01/2014: Vladimir Putin has set in motion not only a scary destabilization of Ukraine but his own discrediting.  Russia is aiding and abetting Viktor Yanukovych, wanted for mass murder, also a big time swindler.  Putin showed good judgment in Edward Snowden's case, bad in this case.  Yanukovych is a liability, he has lost feasibility to the point that he can't even defend Russian interests.  With the military push, Putin is encouraging violence in Crimea and elsewhere rather than seeking its de-escalation and some compromise, he isn't seeking "normalization"  ... and he has tipped his hand all too quickly.

Update 03/03/2014: Sen. John McCain is correct in saying Russia's "crown jewel" is Ukraine, but the dumb yahoo forgets that a Cold War goes both ways, nationalist demagoguery and militarist profiteering being telltale signs.  Maybe Putin learned a thing or two from the US playbook.  Hard to breathe with all the hypocrisy.  

Tim's Vermeer, believing isn't seeing

A good rule of thumb may be to critique only the things that one respects.  However, this can't always be the case ... when one doesn't believe the hype, such as the hype of Tim's Vermeer (2013) directed by Teller: sonyclassics.com/timsvermeer/

                                   Tim Jenison's copy of Johannes Vermeer's The Music Lesson.

One can agree or disagree with the unraveling of the so-called mystery of Vermeer, that he used a sort of camera obscura.  Man or machine etc, the implications are pretty hackneyed.  I can admire Jenison's perfectionism but it's not carried over into the painting itself.  Look closely, it's not all that remarkable, flat, a bit "high school" as they say ... nothing 'gainst high school students because some of them are great artists.  Jenison doesn't have formal training, but the excuse undercuts the premise.  The result's mediocre even with "cheating," far from a Vermeer or good photorealism for that matter.  Technology just doesn't replace talent, which's another kind of eye, another kind of vision.  

Copy enlargement here: vanityfair.com/culture/2013/11/vermeer-secret-tool-mirrors-lenses

Original here: royalcollection.org.uk/collection/405346/a-lady-at-the-virginal-with-a-gentleman-the-music-lesson

100 favorites, film

Sick?  Snowed in possibly?  Better yet, playing hooky from school or work, or whatever else may stiff ya out of a satisfying dreamlife?  Or just taking it easy.   

I personally like the chilly weather, which affords one the opportunity to do some serious snuggling whether alone or together ... and watch a nice flick.

René Clair / Entr'acte (1924)

Viking Eggeling / Symphonie Diagonale (1924)
Man Ray / Emak-Bakia (1926)
Clarence Brown / Flesh and the Devil (1926)
Buster Keaton / The General (1926)
Dziga Vertov / Chelovek s kinoapparatom, Man with a Movie Camera (1929)
G.W. Pabst / Die Büchse der Pandora, Pandora's Box (1929)
Josef von Sternberg / Der blaue Engel, The Blue Angel (1930)
Charlie Chaplin / City Lights (1931)
Fritz Lang / M (1931)

Jean Vigo / L'Atalante (1934)

Irving Rapper / Now, Voyager (1942)
Howard Hawks / To Have and Have Not (1944)
Akira Kurosawa / Nora inu, Stray Dog (1949)
Jean Genet / Un chant d'amour, A Song of Love (1950)
Isidore Isou / Traité de bave et d'éternité, Venom and Eternity (1951)
Kenji Mizoguchi / Ugetsu (1953)
Nicholas Ray / Johnny Guitar (1954)
Alfred Hitchcock / Rear Window (1954)
Charles Laughton / The Night of the Hunter (1955)

Jules Dassin / Rififi (1955)
Jean-Pierre Melville / Bob le flambeur (1956)

Douglas Sirk / Written on the Wind (1956)

Federico Fellini / Le notti di Cabiria, Nights of Cabiria (1957)

Michelangelo Antonioni / L'avventura (1960)

Claude Chabrol / Les Bonnes Femmes (1960)

Luchino Visconti / Rocco e i suoi fratelli, Rocco and His Brothers (1960)

François Truffaut / Tirez sur le pianiste, Shoot the Piano Player (1960)

Alain Resnais / L'Année dernière à Marienbad, Last Year at Marienbad (1961)
Luis Buñuel / Viridiana (1961)

Chris Marker / La Jetée (1962)
Hiroshi Teshigahara / Suna no onna, Woman in the Dunes (1964)
Ingmar Bergman / Persona (1966)
Věra Chytilová / Sedmikrásky, Daisies (1966)
Jean-Luc Godard / 2 ou 3 choses que je sais d'elle, 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967)
Sergio Leone / C'era una volta il West, Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)
Sergei Parajanov / Sayat-Nova, The Color of Pomegranates (1968)
Nagisa Oshima / Shinjuku dorobô nikki, Diary of a Shinjuku Thief (1968)
Pier Paolo Pasolini / Teorema (1968)
Vittorio De Sica / Il giardino dei Finzi-Contini, The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (1970)

Barbara Loden / Wanda (1970)
Walerian Borowczyk / Blanche (1971)
Peter Watkins / Punishment Park (1971)
Dušan Makavejev / W.R. - Misterije organizma, W.R.: Mysteries of the Organism (1971)
Perry Henzell / The Harder They Come (1972)
Fernando Arrabal / J'irai comme un cheval fou, I Will Walk Like a Crazy Horse (1972)
Lina Wertmüller / Mimí metallurgico ferito nell'onore, The Seduction of Mimi (1972)
Kôji Wakamatsu / Tenshi no kôkotsu, Ecstasy of the Angels (1972)
Ted Post / The Baby (1973)
Jean Eustache / La Maman et la Putain, The Mother and the Whore (1973)

René Laloux / La Planète sauvage, Fantastic Planet (1973)

Liliana Cavani / Il Portiere di notte, The Night Porter (1974)
Robert Altman / Nashville (1975)
Andrei Tarkovsky / Zerkalo, The Mirror (1975)
Rainer Werner Fassbinder / Chinesisches Roulette, Chinese Roulette (1976)
John Cassavetes / The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976)
John Landis / The Blues Brothers (1980)
Stanley Kubrick / The Shining (1980)
Louis Malle / My Dinner with Andre (1981)
Masashi Yamamoto / Yami no kānibaru, Carnival in the Night (1983)

Wim Wenders / Paris, Texas (1984)

Elem Klimov / Idi i smotri, Come and See (1985)
Claude Lanzmann / Shoah (1985)

Jean-Jacques Beineix / 37°2 le matin, Betty Blue (1986)
David Lynch / Blue Velvet (1986)
Jim Jarmusch / Down by Law (1986)
Béla Tarr / Kárhozat, Damnation (1988)
Theo Angelopoulos / Topio stin omichli, Landscape in the Mist (1988)

Ildikó Enyedi / Az én XX. századom, My Twentieth Century (1989) 

Krzysztof Kieślowski / Dekalog, The Decalogue (1989)
* I'm also quite fond of Enyedi's Simon mágus, Simon the Magician (1999).

Jonathan Wacks / Powwow Highway (1989)
Alejandro Jodorowsky / Santa Sangre (1989)
Bae Yong-kyun / Dalmaga dongjjok-euro gan ggadakeun?, Why Has Bodhi-Dharma Left for the East? (1989)
Rémy Belvaux / C'est arrivé près de chez vous, Man Bites Dog (1992)
Zhang Yimou / Qiū Jú dǎ guān sī, The Story of Qui Ju (1992)
Larry Clark / Kids (1995)
Emir Kusturica / Podzemlje, Underground (1995)
Youssef Chahine / Al-massir, Destiny (1997)
Woody Allen / Deconstructing Harry (1997)
Tony Gatlif / Gadjo Dilo (1997)

Bennett Miller / The Cruise (1998)
Thomas Vinterberg / Festen, The Celebration (1998)
Joan Chen / Tiān Yù, Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl (1998)
Ryuichi Hiroki / Tôkyô gomi onna, Tokyo Trash Baby (2000)
Zacharias Kunuk / Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner (2001)
Adam Ripp / Gang Tapes (2001)
Kim Ki-duk / Nabbeun namja, Bad Guy (2001)
Seijun Suzuki / Pisutoru opera, Pistol Opera (2001)
Kátia Lund, Fernando Meirelles / Cidade de Deus, City of God (2002)
Michael Haneke / Le temps du loup, Time of the Wolf (2003)

Guy Maddin / The Saddest Music in the World (2003)
Lucile Hadžihalilović / Innocence (2004)
David Cronenberg / A History of Violence (2005)
Guillermo del Toro / El laberinto del fauno, Pan's Labyrinth (2006)
Tarsem Singh / The Fall (2006)
Esteban Sapir / La antena, The Aerial (2007)
Urszula Antoniak / Nothing Personal (2009)
Jacques Audiard / Un prophète, A Prophet (2009)
Daisuke Miura / Bôizu on za ran, Boys on the Run (2010)
Júlia Murat / Histórias que Só Existem Quando Lembradas, Found Memories (2011)

bird gifts

Yes, 'tis the season already, but winter holiday shopping is for the birds you say?  Well, birds are a nice idea, but not real birds - leave them alone!  

One way to look at it, blowing money on yourself and loved ones can relieve stress and depression.  

Here are my 12 picks, all doable.  So, spread the wealth.

apakstudio.com/apak/

etsy.com/listing/167273657/tree-of-life-limited-edition-print

Apak (Aaron & Ayumi Piland) limited edition print.  Original painting Tree of Life, 2009.  

Artwork of equal whimsy and wisdom.  The Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upanishad timelessly tells us "Da-da-da! (damyata, datta, dayadhvam)  Be self-controlled!  Give!  Be compassionate!"

abbeville.com/bookpage.asp?ISBN=9781558591288

Most recent edition of John James Audubon's The Birds of America, 1827-1839.

metmuseum.org/collections/search-the-collections/486757

Canberra

nga.gov.au/International/Catalogue/Detail.cfm?IRN=89748

Los Angeles

collections.lacma.org/node/213720

New York

moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=81033

moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=81503

Pasadena

nortonsimon.org/collections/browse_artist.php?name=Brancusi,+Constantin&resultnum=1

Philadelphia

philamuseum.org/collections/permanent/51057.html

philamuseum.org/collections/permanent/51114.html

Seattle

seattleartmuseum.org/exhibit/exhibitDetail.asp?eventID=10852

Venezia

guggenheim.org/new-york/collections/collection-online/artwork/669

Constantin Brâncuși's Bird in Space, 1923.

A day spent together at the museum, well worth the price of admission.  It's one of the most pleasurable casual adventures.  For me, modern sculpture reached its zenith with Brâncuși.

Also check out Galerie de l'Atelier Brancusi: 
centrepompidou.fr/cpv/ressource.action?param.id=FR_R-b48bd4ab504cd917caf7a9559e7370f5&param.idSource=FR_E-b48bd4ab504cd917caf7a9559e7370f5

cavallini.com/p-notebooks-notebooksets.php

Cavallini & Co. notebook set, 2013.

vitra.com/en-us/product/eames-house-bird

Charles & Ray Eames House Bird, c. 1910.

gallimard.fr/Catalogue/GALLIMARD/Livres-d-Art/Une-semaine-de-bonte

Max Ernst's Une semaine de bonté, 1934.

I suggest the editions by Gallimard or DuMont Buchverlag, but Dover's is pretty good.  And above all, the Jeanne Bucher original 5 volumes.  

djeco.com

Katsumi Komagata/Christel Sadde Mobile Birds, 2009.

There's also a white version.

lladro.com/figurines/01010077-MAGIC_FOREST_RING/

Lladró Magic Forest Ring, 2007.

Wearable sculpture in the round ... and not as overburdened as a lot of that haute couture nonsense haha.

muji.com / muji.net
muji.eu/pages/online.asp?Sec=6&Sub=28&PID=6303

muji.us/store/cuckoo-clock-white.html

MUJI cuckoo clock, 2012.

hmhco.com/shop/books/Little-Birds/9780156029049

Anaïs Nin's Little Birds, 1979.

If you've been nice, you can be a li'l naughty.

Music by Bird.

There's a lot of debate about which recordings are best.  Several disc box sets are available.  Also see cmgww.com/music/parker/about/music.html

Another great selection would be any of Olivier Messiaen's oiseaux works, there are several.  Info here: oliviermessiaen.org/messiaen2index.htm

(original source unknown)

A gift that keeps on giving, for life.

Myself, I have an Aztec bird motif on my shoulder.

shopdecoylab.com/product/it-s-my-forest

Decoylab It's My Forest clock, 2010.

An extra item, because it's really neat!

check 'em out

I can't help constantly listening to this song ...

UK/European and North American tours: missfrankierose.com

And an oldie but a goodie, the band's still around.

WEEK-END Fest, Stadthalle Köln Mülheim 14.12.2013: weekendfest.de/

Art Made From Books, paper art

chroniclebooks.com/titles/art-made-from-books.html

Nice book on the subject.  I also suggest Paper Cutting: Contemporary Artists, Timeless Craft:

chroniclebooks.com/titles/paper-cutting.html

loftwork.com/portfolios/oonoyusuke

One of my book art favorites, Yusuke Oono's 360°Book.  I dislike Disney, but I like the concept and the execution. 

eckmanfineart.com

Impressive cast paper sculpture, Prairie Edge Hunt by Allen & Patty Eckman.

A great short.  Animation by Brothers Quay, music by Olga Neuwirth.

SupaKitch & Koralie.  Also see metroplastique.tumblr.com.