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Excellent '70s strangeness: two songs by the Boston-based Orchestra Luna, who released one record of eccentric showtune-influenced music on Epic and then were dropped by the label. Produced by Rupert Holmes of "Pina Colada" fame, and it shows. Nevertheless, it's not a big stretch from this music to the Bonzo Dog Band or Slapp Happy. I thought I was a cult of one; thank god for the internet. The sound files below are from the website of Rick Berlin, who recorded under his given name Rick Kinscherf on the Orchestra Luna LP.
"Boy Scout Camp" [2.8 MB .mp3]
"Little Sam" [3.8 .mp3]
I'm happy to announce that my DVDs and works on paper will be in Miami this year--artMovingProjects is showing them at DiVa Miami, the Digital and Video Art Fair, which will have "white cube" spaces set up in shipping containers on the beach. A page for my work is here. Other artists represented include Jillian Mcdonald, Marcin Ramocki, Linda Post and Adam Simon.
Ramocki, who also directed the movie 8 BIT, will be attending with the film's producer and co-director Justin Strawhand. He reports, over on the vertexList blog:
8 BIT is going to open the party; presented by artMoving and KBP, we will be screening at Hotel Victor, Ocean Drive between 11th and 12th street - South Beach, Miami Beach, 12/08/2006, 7 00 pm - 8 30 pm. You can get the tickets for the event here. Both Justin and I will be there to answer questions and have some tropical drinks.Ramocki adds:
For those trying to catch 8 BIT here in NYC, I am proud to announce we will be a part of the historic Blip Festival 2006! Our screening is on Saturday, Dec 02, 2 pm - check it out!
"ally3" - GIF artist unknown - enlarged - 188KB
Anxiety of Influence
1999
Kristin Lucas, mousepad drawings.
Lucas inked a mouseball and let it make gestural drawings while she played games, answered email, etc.
2006
Eyebeam Open Lab - mousepad paintings
Similar gesture paintings made with a USB "double mouse"
(hat tip to jim bassett--demoted from "attack of the clones" to "anxiety of influence" since the Lucas was part meat-space, part virtual and the double mouse is all virtual. it is basically the same idea, though)
Update: another mouse doing "automatic writing," by Joseph DeLappe, from '99 (thx to ed halter)
Update 2: Some critical musings on all this are here.
More digital pog blogging:
An earlier post on the subject of digital pogs addressed only the collectible aspect of these "caps." Yet in the physical world their main purpose, and means of exchange, is a game where the pogs are stacked and knocked over, with the pogs landing face up going to the winner. Some serious thought needs to be given to how digital pogs can acquire the edge of competition, gambling, and classroom disruption that led to their banishment in schools across America in '94-'95.
To put it more bluntly, how do you kick people's asses and get all their pogs with the digital version?
Brown Wolf, 1989, oil on canvas, 54" x 64". After a big corporation purchased a canvas of mine for a high-tech training center it built in Dallas, the director of the center asked if I would accept a commission for a painting of a "brown wolf." (It was an inside reference that I won't explain here.) He stipulated only that it be "a magnificent animal, and I don't want it with its tail between its legs or howling at the moon." The money was good, and while I had done many photorealistic portraits I had never done a "nature painting" per se, so I took it as a personal challenge. As a source I used a black and white image from a Dover book of copyright-free photos, gridded and enlarged it in pencil (old school) and then added the colors (such as they were) from my imagination. The Dover image was of a rather unmagnificent animal obviously in a zoo pen so I had my work cut out for me to make him appear strong and free. Last I saw it was hanging proudly in the lobby of the office building. I have no idea where it is now but due to corporate turnover (and changing tastes) it could very well be in a storeroom or landfill. The piece led to a series of ambiguous, grisaille paintings of copyright-free North American mammals (some of which I've posted and will continue to post here). The photo of the painting is by Harrison Evans.
Looking back at the invoice for this painting reminded me that the director also bought some drawings of mine--one of which was done on the Macintosh with MacPaint. Just to bring this post back to my usual subject matter.
Non-standard digital pogs
whoops, forgot about my self-imposed bandwidth limit for the front page of the blog, so...
I really like Matt Stoller's writing at MyDD:
So anyway, if you need evidence that journalists in DC adopt the biases of their sources and eagerly sop up conventional wisdom, you need go no further than [New York Times temporary columnist Thomas] Edsall. Look at who he doesn't like in this article--pro-choice groups, unions, and minority rights groups. These groups, if you are a Democratic insider, are annoying. They make you do work. They force you to not cut deals with the other side, and they hold Democrats accountable for bad economic choices. They make people like Steny Hoyer and Rahm Emanuel uncomfortable because they demand good policy choices, and by and large aren't (or shouldn't) be willing to trade away core principles to the right for better parking spots.
Edsall of course didn't talk to a janitor who just got a raise in Houston, he didn't talk to a Goodyear worker losing his job, or a displaced New Orleans resident, or a NJ retiree with good pension and benefits because of his union. Edsall talked to his friends, and his friends know, they just know, how important better parking spots are. To these people, knocking labor unions just feels so right, doesn't it? I guess it's a testament to how firmly the intellectual core of journalism has rotted that journalists now work strongly against their own economic interest. Even as Edsall attacks unions as an out of touch "pressure group on the left" that "no longer command broad popular allegiance," his former colleagues are relying on their union to improve journalism and stop the job cuts devastating newsrooms across the country.
[...]I suppose in Edsall's world, corporate media barons are part of the coalition of "dominant," and unions are not. So even though the Republican Party was soundly repudiated at the polls in favor of a strongly populist Democratic Party backed by labor, and a touchstone abortion ban was popularly rejected in one of the reddest states in the country, Democrats have no choice but to reject unions and pro-choice groups, or they will face judgment at the polls.