Home

Advertisement

Customize
Nov. 8th, 2009 @ 06:04 pm Fragments
  • 20:09 Finished reading RETURNING MY SISTER'S FACE by Eugie Foster, a collection of Asian folktale inspired fantasy tales. #
  • 21:28 Top 3 weekly #lastfm artists: Lisa Gerrard - 55. Biosphere - 24. Sylvain Chauveau - 19. bit.ly/1MSGsi #
Automatically shipped by LoudTwitter
[info]ethereal_lad
Nov. 8th, 2009 @ 11:41 am Self Promotion Guide

I am writing a document for self-promotion when you're with a small press--a guide for Lethe authors. Does anyone have any tips? Or can they point me to another source about self-promotion do's and don'ts?


[info]ethereal_lad
Nov. 8th, 2009 @ 12:28 pm Everything you know isn't a panda
A new decade is a time in which to declare "everything you know is wrong". A fresh decade is a time to jettison secure old knowledge and grope around for new. Since a new decade is just around the corner, let's start groping now.

Forget the places you've been going on holiday, and go on holiday instead to Beirut.

Do not expect to learn about the world through journalists.

Any Obama backlash will simply help usher in someone worse. Skip it.

Your mother holds a key piece of information, essential to your happiness. All you have to do is ask her the right question.

Blogs you check habitually are the wrong ones because they tell you nothing new. Try switching to Letters of Note, correspondence deserving of a wider audience. Certainly, the letters collected here are from the past. But they very readily suggest parallel futures -- for instance, a future in which Andy Warhol isn't famous.

You've been trained to talk about "sexualisation" without paying due attention to the fact that God and Freud (possibly the same person, long grey beard, knows everything) made us sexual from birth.

The everyday contains everything you need for a religion.

Stop expecting new musician Y to be "the new musician X". And stop expecting old musician X to be the new musician X.

You have been underestimating the colour yellow.

Conspiracy theories waste your time. It's all a big conspiracy.

Your body will thank you for using a bicycle every day during the new decade. Using bicycles will become a condition of using computers successfully too: the correspondence between them will become clearer over time.

The teens are destined to be the decade in which we'll finally stop wearing jeans. It'll be a slow sputtering process, but why wait? Ban the jean from your wardrobe starting January 1st by this simple rule: each time you find yourself reaching for jeans, reach for hose instead.

You thought a new decade was a blank slate. It's not; it's a rebellion.

Drums are finished. Except for kettledrums and gongs.

You know too much about LA and not enough about Laos. On the internet and in "the real world" you're consistently looking in the wrong places for inspiration. Why is that? Partly it's because the things that could really change you make you scared.

This is the decade in which you will finally make the switch from quantity to value. One ramification: you will move from an expensive place where you have to do a lot of meaningless work just to exist to a cheap place where you can exist easily and can therefore afford to dedicate yourself to work that really means something to you.

The penny finally drops: people who drive cars just end up seeing a lot of roads.

You have not been eating enough mushrooms.

No computer game beats computer chess.

Your enemies are your best teachers.

Watch Indian TV.

No previous decades are to be revived this decade. Make a little more effort with the shapes of things, please.

Cognition, not recognition.

Pretend to be older than you are, not younger.

Everything you once fried, you will now begin to bake.

Read the Mahabarata, watch the 1988 TV series...



...or seek out the Peter Brook theatre production on DVD.

You will probably be happier amongst people who think as you do, but they might be located on the other side of the world.

You will probably be happier amongst people who think as you do, but you might have to make them with your body.

You will probably be happier amongst people who think as you do. They are hidden next door, but to befriend them you will have to learn a new language.

You will probably be happier amongst people who do not think as you do.

Nothing could be better than a market at 5am, but to experience it you will have to get up earlier and brave the cold.

Learn to make things with wood.

The person who perfects seawater desalination will become rich beyond the dreams of kings. Why not make that person you?

Everything you know is right, but that was then and this is now.

Wherever you plan to go, go next door instead.

Eat more fish, and breed more fish.
[info]imomus
Nov. 8th, 2009 @ 12:22 am Magical
Had a magical day today:

+Went to Tender Buttons on the Upper East Side. Inspired by Gertrude Stein's poem of the same name, it sells nothing but buttons. Some are even from the Renaissance! (Sis bought buttons. I didn't see anything the right size for my red coat.

+Swooned over the French Bulldog Puppies playing in the pet shop window. (Just how much is that doggie in the window you may ask? He's $499! Woof!)

+Bought a huge periwinkle-colored flower fascinator and wore it all over the East Village.

+Went hat shopping with sis. She bought two lovely cloches.

+Had a yummy vegan lunch.

+Saw the Red Shoes (one of my favorite films, ever) at Film Forum

+Plus the weather was perfect. A clear, crisp fall day.
[info]beamishgirl
Nov. 8th, 2009 @ 01:46 am I Love Japan

I Love Japan

Book cover designed by Tom Tor for an upcoming project. Via FFFFOUND!


[info]jeansnow_feed
Nov. 7th, 2009 @ 01:06 pm blue toes!
Current Mood: anxious
i forgot to mention the other night i got my first pedicure!

blue painted toes

i LOVE the color!!!! teehee
one of my friends is going on holiday to Jamaica (actually she's already gone) and she invited me to get a pedicure with her so i said "what the hell!"

don't know if it was worth $30, but it was still an experience to have, i guess.

my toes are awfully purty now though :)
[info]groovcat
Nov. 7th, 2009 @ 04:00 am TAB 5th Anniversary Party

I think it’s well worth reminding everyone that tonight (November 7) is Tokyo Art Beat’s 5th anniversary party at SuperDeluxe. The festivities kick off at 19:00, with a host of activities taking place — check the event page for more details, and print it out to get in for 1,000 yen.


[info]jeansnow_feed
Nov. 7th, 2009 @ 03:24 am Brel, Seb, Rog
Here are three videos of Carousel rehearsals last month at Music Bank in the Tower Bridge Business Complex in which I sang through -- for the first time with real musicians -- three Jacques Brel songs arranged by David Coulter and Mike Smith, and translated by me (you can read my translations, two of which were made specially for this performance, beside the videos as they appear on YouTube). The band of twenty musicians (including Roger Eno on piano, Seb Rochford on drums, Leo Abrahams on guitar, Kate St Clair on oboe and Thomas Bloch on onde martinot) performed these songs with me at The Barbican on October 22nd and the Warwick Arts Centre the next day.


Don't Leave Me (Brel's Ne Me Quitte Pas)
(for comparison, watch the 1993 version of my version of this song, filmed in on my Christmas tour of Japan that year)


The Town Tumbled (Brel's La Ville S'Endormait)


Bourgeois Pigs (Brel's Les Bourgeois)


Finally, Jacky, filmed onstage at The Barbican at the end of the first concert.



I was particularly taken with Aberdonian drummer Seb Rochford (of Polar Bear and Acoustic Ladyland) and his extraordinary afro. Seb exudes a 70s countercultural cool as well as incredible percussive flair, and it was easy to believe Leo's tales of Brian Eno attending recording sessions with Seb, watching all his takes. Here he is doing his stuff:



As for Roger Eno (he crosses the picture at the beginning of the video for The Town Tumbled), the man does this footstomping thing while playing the piano, and grins like Elton John, and loves to laugh, joke and do crosswords. On the tour bus to Warwick I noticed that a lot of the stories he was telling sounded familiar: there was one about the Pepsi campaign that promised "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave", one about Picasso undermining representational image-making by asking a man who showed a photo of his wife "But is she really so small and flat?", one about art being a plane you can crash and walk away from, and one (at my request) about his dad the postman. Eventually the coin dropped. I'd heard some or all these tales from the same source he had: his big brother Brian. But Roger had heard them firsthand.
[info]imomus
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 03:10 pm HAIL THE WALE!
This Wednesday, The Corduroy Club will be holding its grand annual meeting. More information here.
[info]lord_whimsy
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 03:07 pm oh hello gauche alchemy!
Current Mood: happy
my first post for gauche alchemy is up!
no cut and paste - go here to see:

http://gauchealchemy.wordpress.com/2009/11/06/oh-hello/

[info]groovcat
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 07:06 pm (no subject)

apparently i’m a dandy. righty-oh

[info]juno_doran
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 01:12 pm FERN HILL
[info]lord_whimsy
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 12:30 pm TWO MAN GENTLEMEN BAND


Seeing these boys tonight at Record Collector in Bordentown, NJ. My grandmother used to play spoons and thimbles/washboard in a jug band. I'm a sucker for the stuff. Anyone who can't tap a toe to this stuff needs a fun transplant.
[info]lord_whimsy
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 04:07 am Postglobal

Postglobal

Tonight (November 6) marks the official launch of Postglobal, a new book (in Japanese) that takes a look at Gelman’s activities since his “business” retirement a few years ago.

[T]his book is an illustrated documentation of Alexander Gelman’s thrilling adventures in Japan since his retirement from business a few years ago. He’s not the author, rather the subject. The book contains extensive research and information about deep Japanese traditions and culture. In a way, it reintroduces Japanese readers to their heritage. Things they take for granted come in a new light, other issues explained for the first time. The broad range of Gelman’s encounters makes the book quite rich in visual and thematic content and promises for an addictive educational reading.

Gelman will be on hand tonight at Aoyama Book Center in Roppongi from 19:00 to 20:00 to signs copies of the book.


[info]jeansnow_feed
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 03:14 am Apartamento + Utrecht

Apartamento + Utrecht

I’m sad I had to miss out on the festivities for the launch of the fourth issue of the excellent interior magazine Apartamento here in Tokyo last week. The magazine teamed up with Utrecht — at the NOW IDeA by Utrecht shop — and created a temporary cafe (one of the chef’s for the week was Digiki). TABlog posts a photo report on the event.


[info]jeansnow_feed
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 03:05 am Insidehouse & Outsidehouse

Insidehouse & Outsidehouse

I love all the open areas in Takeshi Hosaka Architects‘ Insidehouse & Outsidehouse — Designboom posts photos of the interior.


[info]jeansnow_feed
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 03:01 am Domo-kun Shills for 7-Eleven

Domo-kun

In the US, 7-Eleven has introduced a host of products featuring packaging inspired by NHK’s mascot, Domo-kun. Slurpee cups will be part of the deal, and from this quote by Evan Brody, the company’s marketing manager, you can see that there’s a lot of respect for the character: “consumers love crazy Japanese shit.”


[info]jeansnow_feed
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 02:50 am Urban Airgap

Urban Airgap

It may just be a proposal, but Suppose Design Office’s “Urban Airgap” design for a competition in Greece looks pretty damn amazing. It would be to revitalize a rundown area of Athens.

In their research, Suppose Design Office noted that the existing building designs in the Kerameikos-Metaxourgeio area did not allow for a window opening into the adjacent property.

“Urban Airgap” aimed to create as many openings — airgaps — on each site. This was achieved by building central core towers, containing a stairwell, to which the residential units are cantilevered from the cores and which form a sandwich that encloses the main social communal zone.

There’s much more to see in this Designboom post.


[info]jeansnow_feed
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 03:19 am Hey kids, why not make a creepy text-to-movie movie?
The nights are drawing in and the weather's crappy, so why don't you settle down in front of a crackling computer screen and direct your own frankly creepy text-to-movie movie? There are hours of fun to be had making wooden-looking 3D characters say rude things in bizarre settings. I know, I've tried it.

I discovered XtraNormal's text-to-movie site when Dr David Woodard sent me a short film he'd made, based on one of his essays, entitled Hans Blüher Story. I immediately made one of my own, a dramatisation of Chapter 2 of The Book of Jokes.



Now, it so happens that Dr Woodard and I will both exhibit artworks in Vienna next week in a group show called Verausgabungssymposium ("Expenditure Symposium"), held at Contemporary Concerns (COCO) Gallery. Curated by Christian Kobald and Severin Dünser, the show is about waste. My piece, intended to be displayed on an electronic signboard, is called The Facebook Proverbs. For a while now, I've been using my Facebook page's status updates as a place to put proverbs. By re-cycling these "deep tweets" as an artwork (in a medium pioneered by people like Jenny Holzer and Claude Closky) I want to embody the logic of an old proverb: "Waste not, want not!"

So my second text-to-movie effort is a film of The Facebook Proverbs as -- and not as -- they'll be appearing in Vienna.

[info]imomus
Nov. 6th, 2009 @ 01:10 am Dezeen Stumbles on KDa Show

Klein Dytham architecture

Although it’s great that Dezeen has decided to cover KDa’s Gallery MA show by posting a collection of photos, they really do need to get their facts straight — the exhibition is not “on show,” it was held earlier this year from April to June.


[info]jeansnow_feed
Recent Entries | Archive |  |  | Previous 20 | Top

Advertisement

Customize