Sophianotloren

Happy Tuesday, everyone.

bspencer

• Ron Fournier is concerned that libs are “smug, condescending jerks.” Untrue. The Jerk Store called and they said they only have one jerk in stock and it’s RON FOURNIER.
• Soon it won’t be necessary for me to nag everyone to watch the finest movie ever made–“The Room.” Soon people will have to watch it if only because they don’t want to be troooolololled. It will be a purely defensive instinct instilled in everyone. My plan is working excellently!
• This article about writing about female artists is a few years old, but still very relevant I’d reckon.
• Folks, the next cookbook you need to buy is “Sheet Pan Suppers.” The recipes are decidedly unfussy but not completely devoid sophistication. Sample suppers include: Hearty Ratatouille with Goat Cheese, Quick Chicken and Baby Broccoli with Spicy Peanut Sauce, and Baked Turkey Meatballs and Slow-Roasted Tomatoes. Each recipe is accompanied with a little story and lots of extra info about ingredients. It’s written in an extremely pleasing conversational style that makes you want to try the recipes and maybe even break bread with the author.

There are so many ways for presidential candidates to spar: in debates, in conversation with the press — and now, on social media! Yesterday, Hillary Clinton’s and Jeb Bush’s interns Twitter accounts began duking it out in a highly entertaining battle of images.

It all began when Hillary tried to convince us that she could magically fix the student debt crisis in this country:

(screenshot via @HillaryClinton/Twitter)

Not to be outdone, two and half hours later Jeb fired back with a graphic that softened Hillary’s blue, turned her gentle magenta into a raging red, and followed a dubious line of logic:

(screenshot via @JebBush/Twitter)

That really pissed off someone on Hillary’s team, who took a proverbial marker to the image and went teacher on it. The result is a pretty unexciting image, but the sentence accompanying it — including those periods at the beginning and the end — reads like a perfectly lobbed bomb of social media shade (that probably accounted for the extreme increase in the numbers of retweets and favorites).

(screenshot via @HillaryClinton/Twitter)

But Jeb’s team wasn’t having it! And so they flipped Hillary’s logo on its side and wrote in “TAXES” dozens of time, filtering the obsessive madness of The Shining through the glorious possibilities of Microsoft Paint:

(screenshot via @JebBush/Twitter)

Ironically, with this hack design job, Jeb has sort of solved the problem of Hillary’s logo, which is that it features a red arrow pointing right: the arrow now points upwards, suggesting that the Republicans will in fact be the ones to raise taxes. Maybe Hillary’s recognition of this fueled her decision not to respond. Or maybe she just went to bed early.

Stay tuned for next week’s episode of presidential candidate wars — when we reveal that not only are Carly Fiorina and Bernie Sanders on Ello, but they’ve been using it to fight about abortion using only Fast and Furious GIFs for over a year!

Unauthorized copies of John Raimondi’s “Dian” (1987), left and “Ceres” (1994), right, at Olen Properties developments (images from legal documents, screenshot by the author)

Last week a federal judge ordered Russian-born, Florida-based billionaire Igor Olenicoff to pay sculptor John Raimondi $640,000 for having unauthorized copies of his work made in China and installed at his development sites. However, US District Judge Andrew Guilford denied the artist’s request that the fakes be scrapped; instead, the stainless steel sculptures will be given new plaques attributing them to Raimondi.

“[Olenicoff] would, of course, have to spend time, money, and effort in removing and replacing the sculptures if the injunction is granted,” the judge wrote in his decision, according to Courthouse News. “As for [Raimondi], he has already been compensated for the ongoing rights to display the sculptures. It is true that he must live with what amounts to a forced license, something that copyright law disfavors, but under the circumstances this hardship does not exceed [Olenicoff’s].” The decision, which forces Raimondi to accept that four sculptures made without his consent or involvement will hereafter be attributed to him, is unprecedented.

“Judge Guilford, in his Order in the Raimondi case, stated that his decision essentially amounts to a forced license, which he acknowledges is disfavored in copyright law,” Gene J. Brockland, a partner at Herzog Crebs and Raimondi’s lead counsel in the case, told Hyperallergic. “We believe he should have allowed the jury’s $640,00 verdict to stand AND ordered the four infringing copies destroyed. Anything short of that is a forced license, and I am not aware of any case in law supporting what amounts to a forced license. While we were happy that Judge Guilford at least ordered that placards be placed on the infringing copies indicating that they are ‘unauthorized copies,’ we felt that did not go far enough.”

John Raimondi’s “Dian” (1987) at top, and two unauthorized copies titled “Link to Compassion” at Olen Properties development sites (illustration courtesy Herzog Crebs) (click to enlarge)

The works in question are four copies of two sculptures by Raimondi, “Dian” (1987) and “Ceres” (1994), retitled in Olenicoff’s versions as “Link to Compassion” and “Intertwined,” respectively. They are installed at the Century Centre and Olen Pointe developments in Irvine and Brea, California, respectively, both projects built by Olenicoff’s real estate company, Olen Properties. In order to comply with local percent-for-art ordinances, Olenicoff had inquired in 2001 about commissioning sculptures by Raimondi for his developments. According to the artist’s original complaint, the two met in person twice to discuss the commissions, and during the second meeting Raimondi provided several photographs showing existing editions of the sculptures from various angles. “Beginning approximately ten days after the second meeting, Olenicoff refused to speak with Raimondi,” the complaint recounts. “Defendants instead had an assistant relay to Raimondi that Olenicoff had a change of heart about the sculptures.”

Nine years later, a representative of the City of Brea contacted Raimondi to tell him that a copy of one of his sculptures was on view in the Olen Pointe development, but that a plaque attributed it to a Chinese sculptor. In his lawsuit, filed in 2012, the artist demanded not only a permanent injunction preventing Olen Properties and Olenicoff from creating future unauthorized copies of his work, but also that any existing copies be destroyed.

This isn’t the first time public sculpture shenanigans have landed both Olenicoff and Raimondi in court. In 2014 sculptor Donald Wakefield was awarded $450,000 after six unauthorized copies of his work, also produced in China, turned up at Olen Pointe and Century Centre. And earlier this year Raimondi sued the Palm Beach Opera for allegedly removing his bronze sculpture “Spirit Ascending” from its grounds and selling it for scrap.

• * Karmen Bella, Jessy Jones – The Way She Moves
• * Alexa Raye, Mila Jade, Ryan D. – Mila Jade Casts Alexa Raye
• * Kimmy Granger, Bambino – Poolside Pick Up
• * Miranda Miller, Xander Corvus – Strip Teaser

• * Dakota Skye, Samantha Hayes, Van Wylde – After Party
• * Odette Delacroix, Logan Pierce – Perfect Stranger
• * Kristina Bell, Ryan D. – Ready For Anything
• * Arian – Bare Skin

The post Eye Candy: Quickies appeared first on Violet Blue ® | Open Source Sex.

TW: Hate speech (esp. racism and misogyny), death threats, and other violent rhetoric.

It will surprise no one that Rebecca Watson’s “Planned Parenthood is Not Selling Baby Parts, You Fucking Idiots” led to a flood of comments, emails, and tweets of outrage as well as the usual accusations of censorship for moderating comments and muting or blocking tweets.

If you are one of the many victims of our feminazi fascism, take heart! The Uncensorship Project is here to display your delightful comments and questions in all their ridiculous, nonsensical, often ironic glory within a context that highlights their true nature: old-timey photos.

I’ll share a few of my favorites here, but we have plenty more on the tumblr, so if you don’t see your CENSORED comment or tweet here, odds are it’s there now or will be soon.

The comments that first inspired me to get back into this project were those that revealed what an ironic misnomer “prolife” really is. For example:

Before you kill a baby. Kill yourself. #drinkbleach –@ChapesMn

This chick is seriously bat-s**t CRAZY !!! Just like a liberal to deny what is right in front of her. did you ever notice that all pro-abortion people are already born ?? Maybe if we chopped HER up and sold HER body parts, she wouldn’t be able to deny it !! –Mark Shultz

It’s astonishing how many “prolife” people are actually pro-abortion. Here are a couple examples among many:

Your mom should’ve aborted your dumb ass! Do everyone a favor and kill yourself. Pathetic whiny cunt. –@KMGTHEU
It’s a shame that it’s to late for you to be aborted!!! –@kduckfield

Less astonishing, perhaps, was the pervasive confusion about biology and what words mean threading through the bulk of comments and tweets. Rebecca wrote about one angle of this confusion in her post Do Anti-abortion Activists Even Know How Babies Are Made?, but believing that women carry pregnancies in their stomach was only one of several misunderstandings among commenters.

The most common misunderstanding was confusing a fetus with a baby. This confusion is so pervasive, people even tried to ask Biology 101 questions as though they were gotcha questions.

Wait Its not baby parts its fetal tissue and its only a little bit, OK got it. What’s the scientific definition of a fetus? When dose science say a new life start? What is an offspring?
–Frank Jaeger
At what point in pregnancy is it a baby? Eight months? Nine months? You willing to draw the line somewhere? –@jmdoman

At no point in the pregnancy is it a baby. A baby is by definition born. This is one reason it is ridiculous to say that the Planned Parenthood videos show them selling baby parts. Another, of course, is that they aren’t selling fetal tissue, which they actually say repeatedly in the unedited videos (in comments such as “Nobody should be ‘selling’ tissue. That’s just not the goal here.”). PP donates fetal tissue with the woman’s consent, and donation has costs, including shipping, storage, handling, recordkeeping, and so forth, costs that vary depending on location, amount, special requests, and so on. At no point do the PP representatives in these videos discuss an amount that could come even close to making a profit. (See more information from biorepository experts in the FactCheck.org article on these videos.)

So to recap: A fetus is not a baby. It is also not a woman. Not even a tiny woman.

But what if that fetus was a woman, you’d be a misogynist –@mashxtowin

A fetus is also not a puppy. Never thought that needed clarification, but apparently it does.

Willing to destroy another person 4 ur body? Willing to destroy a puppy 4 Ur body too?
–@RFILTD (ReFounders Indiana)

A related misunderstanding among comments is of what fetal tissue is. Many, MANY people sought to disprove that PP was donating fetal tissue by sending us lists of body parts shown in the videos. Where do they imagine fetal tissue comes from? Is it like dark matter existing in the interstices of the parts and organs? Researchers who work with fetal tissue need specific tissue cells, such as liver or lung cells for vaccines or neural cells for spinal cord injuries. The more cells that can be extracted from a single source, the more good can be done with those cells, minimizing source variables in the research. So yes, the more they can get, the more intact it is, the better the donation for research purposes.

Even understanding all of this probably would not have made much difference to the anti-abortion crowd, who care more about the imaginary baby they’ve concocted by personifying a fetus with characteristics it does not have than they care about women. This was abundantly obvious on Twitter, especially in response to this tweet:

You gave someone rights to your body or you wouldn’t have a baby to exterminate.
–@RWReagan1

You gave up certain “rights” when you consent to sex. Period.
–@seanhinckley

These tweets and many more like them illustrate the crux of the issue, that those against abortion believe that women are less valuable than an imaginary baby and that we do not deserve the same rights to our bodies that men do. Sex, in their eyes, is giving up the right to our own bodies. Pregnancy apparently always results from consensual sex, except consensual really just means indentured servitude to men and imaginary babies. It’s not surprising that so many people blame women for their own rape or refuse to call rape rape considering the pervasive belief that women deserve only a tenuous hold on human rights.

Some even went so far as to essentially describe women as valuable only for reproduction, the perfect storm of misogyny, transphobia, and heterosexism.

The womb was created for ONE reason. She hates to admit that her body exists for a baby.
–@sarahzview

Even those who claim to be pro-choice, to believe it’s wrong to police a woman’s body, have no problem policing how a woman expresses herself. The tone police were out in droves in the tweets, emails, and comments on Rebecca’s post, from the blatantly sexist comments about a woman using profanity to the more subtly but equally sexist insistence that they knew what she was trying to achieve with her post and that they knew better how she should have gone about achieving what they thought she should be achieving.

While you make good points, you fail by using profanity and insults. Grow up. –@KHLthe2nd
Well if you can wade through all that ladylike PROFANITY, the “lady” is WRONG. –southernproud
Your facts are correct, but you’re offensive and act just like a republican. . . . You just want to rant and feel smart. Calling others stupid don’t make you smart. –Carlos Allende McFadden
Name calling does not become you. –southernproud

I know swearing makes you feel empowered but honestly your language says far more about you than your issue. –Mary Dinan
While I may agree with you on content, you will turn off many people by using the “F” word. Can’t you get your point across without cursing??? –sharon Tonsager

Please check your pampered ass princess…no one thinks your intelligent.
You can disagree and still not be a cunt about it.
–Gregg McPhedrain

Some combined tone policing with the inevitable Godwinning:

Do you kiss your Mother with that FOUL MOUTH.
What’s the difference between Planned HOLOCAUSTHOOD and Hitler’s NAZIS “Final Solution?
–MikeL Kafir

Antisemitic comparisons were of course accompanied by the racism most of us have witnessed in anti-abortion activists’ coopting of the Black Lives Matter movement, because nothing shows how much you care about life than exploiting and belittling the death, pain, and oppression of actual people to save imaginary babies. If you’re writing in to quote Margaret Sanger or make a eugenics argument, consider how much you are doing to combat racism in this century and how it affects actual living people, such as, say, the women of color you devalue and actively harm when you campaign against one of the only affordable healthcare resources some have available to them.

The racism was particularly stark on Twitter.

Amen sister. Abortion helps to disproportionately wipe out the spawn of leftists and blacks. I say kill with prejudice. –@e_the_o
What if it was a little black baby with his hands up saying “don’t abort, I dindo nuffins”? –@HavenMonahan

So yeah, we moderate our comments and Twitter at our own discretion. This is not a platform for anyone to spout their often racist, always sexist arguments against Planned Parenthood or abortion in general. This includes the bigotry in many comments with pro-choice disclaimers.

I’m pro-choice, but . . .

No. You’re really not.

DIY Manual for Urban Projection

Continuing the subject of art and projection, here is a very brief talk from Ali Momeni who is putting together a book to inspire lo-fi creative projects using light:

Creative Capital have put together a small interview with the artist:

Alex: A Manual for Urban Projection is the first book to come out of this project. Who is it meant for? What do you hope will come out of its publication?

Ali: We wrote A Manual for Urban Projection for a broad range of people. It’s made to be readable in 1-hour, easily photocopiable, and it’s highly pictorial. We think it’ll be useful for artists, activists, community organizers or citizens at large who see potential in sharing images and ideas in public spaces. We really believe that the medium of urban projection is approachable to many more people outside of large-scale spectacle producers and advertisement companies, and the manual is an attempt to open those doorways.

You can read the interview at Creative Capital here

[Previously on PK - Ali collaborated on the Dranimate project to create animated characters using gestures captured with a Leap Motion sensor]

A Room Listening to Itself

Sound installation by Adam Basanta is a room fitted with microphones and bare speakers listening to itself, creating a soft ambient feedback:

In A Room Listening to Itself, sound is produced exclusively through the physical relationships between microphones, reclaimed speaker cones, and the gallery’s surrounding acoustic environment. Using the aural phenomena of tuned microphone feedback alongside recursive amplification networks, the gallery space is turned into a giant resonator that amplifies its acoustic activity and inactivity as a product of spatial relationships. Custom-built computer software constantly re- calibrates the room to ever-changing acoustic situations, aiming for a sonic equilibrium that remains out of reach.

More Here

The El Portal Fire burns on a hillside in the Stanislaus National Forest and Yosemite National Park on Sunday evening July 27, 2014. The community of El Portal was under a mandatory evacuation. By Tuesday the blaze had burned nearly 3,000 acres. Long exposure image.

The Etiwanda Fire burns shortly after dusk on April 30, 2014 in Rancho Cucamonga, CA. Long exposure image.

The news of deadly wildfires ravaging California has been as awe-inspiring as it is terrifying. Great swaths of forests, mountains, fields, and entire neighborhoods can be incinerated in moments leaving nothing unscathed. For the last few years, Los Angeles-based photographer Stuart Palley has been shooting these fires as they rage across Southern California as part of a series he calls Terra Flamma.

More than just capturing flames or firefighters, Palley focuses instead on the entire landscape surrounding each event. By utilizing long exposure techniques he incorporates trails of sparks, the lights of firefighting aircraft, and even the stars above to create images that speak more to the strange beauty of wildfires than simple editorial documentation.

Though Palley often jumps at the opportunity to photograph a fire at a moment’s notice, he’s also well prepared. He takes a number of precautions including completion of the US Forestry Service’s “Introduction to Wildland Fire Behavior” to better ensure his safety.

You can follow more of Palley’s work on Instagram. (via PetaPixel)

The French Fire burns overnight in the Sierra National Forest near the town of North Fork, CA on August 1st, 2014. The blaze was burning in steep, rugged, and remote terrain.

The Way Fire burns on August 19, 2014 in the Sierra National Forest near Kernville, CA overnight. Long exposure image.

The Meadow Fire burns overnight near Half Dome in Yosemite National Park early Monday September 8, 2014. As of Wednesday the fire had burned over 4,500 acres and was 10% contained. Long exposure image.

The Shirley Fire burns at night off of Old State Rd near Lake Isabella, CA while a helicopter circles overhead and crews work on a slopover. Long exposure image.

The Lake Fire burns in the San Bernardino National Forest Thursday June 18, 2015. By evening the fire burned over 10,000 acres and was 5% contained. The Lake Fire burns along its northern flank at night in the San Bernardino National Forest Late Thursday night.

The Lake Fire burns in the San Bernardino National Forest Thursday June 18, 2015. By evening the fire burned over 10,000 acres and was 5% contained. The Lake Fire burns along its northern flank at night in the San Bernardino National Forest Late Thursday night.

The Lake Fire burns in the San Bernardino National Forest Thursday June 18, 2015. By evening the fire burned over 10,000 acres and was 5% contained. The Lake Fire burns along its northern flank at night in the San Bernardino National Forest Late Thursday night.

The Lake Fire burns in the San Bernardino National Forest Friday June 19, 2015. By evening the fire burned over 13,000 acres and was 10% contained.

The Lake Fire burns in the San Bernardino National Forest Friday June 19, 2015. By evening the fire burned over 13,000 acres and was 10% contained.

Originally posted 2015-08-11 20:30:48. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

throated sarah vandella source: droolingfemme.

Till death do us part (by Anya Anti)

My latest piece on Huffington Post is available to read and share, titled "Minimum Wages vs. Universal Basic Income"

Excerpt:

Because basic income provides an income floor, there's no longer any reason to keep any of these bureaucracy-filled ways of easing but never ending poverty. Instead, poverty would be gone. And because poverty is gone, all jobs have to either pay enough for people to accept them, or those jobs will be automated. If automated, no one has to do that job anymore. They can do something else instead.

Like my blog? Please subscribe and also consider making a monthly pledge of support.

Help me create basic incomes and take the BIG Patreon Creator Pledge.

Subscribe to my blog | Follow me on Twitter | Like me on Facebook | Follow me on Tumblr

Automatic Sample Layout

Coding experiment from Kyle McDonald arranging samples for music production in a unique way using machine learning:

I’ve been thinking about new ways of making music and working with sound. I’m especially excited about machine learning augmenting our selection of sounds, analyzing and decomposing existing recordings, and making automatic suggestions for compositions.

This shows around 30k “drum samples” from a few different sample packs, organized in 2d (position) and 3d (color). All sounds are less than 4 seconds long, but I only analyze and play the first second while scrolling through. I used librosa to extract the constant-q transform of each sound with 84 bins and 11 time steps. I used t-SNE with perplexity 100 to layout the sounds from those 924 dimensional vectors.

Link

17 summers ago, I tore the anterior cruciate ligament in my left knee while attempting a spin move in a pick-up basketball game. I planted awkwardly, my knee twisted a way it wasn’t supposed to twist, and I immediately knew something was wrong. It was painful. But, as many who’ve also torn their ACLs will tell you, it wasn’t an excruciating pain. I’ve also sprained each ankle several times, and each time that happens it feels like your foot is on fire. This wasn’t that. But it was scarier because a knee injury is exponentially more serious. Possible surgery, longer rehab, and a good chance you may never fully recover. And the knowledge of this fucks you up more than the actual pain.

But, back to the pain. I walked home that day. I needed crutches, but I was able to move myself. A week or so later, after the swelling subsided, I was walking without a limp. And if you didn’t know I was missing a ligament in my left knee, you’d have no idea I was missing a ligament in my left knee. Sure, it was far from 100% — if I tried playing I wouldn’t have been able to jump, cut, or stop — but it was manageable. I couldn’t continue playing basketball without it (although some, like DeJuan Blair, have managed to do that), but I could live without it.

But I was a basketball player. And my knee needed to be 100%. And for it to be 100%, I needed surgery. And I needed to rehab the knee for 6-12 months after the surgery to make a full recovery. So I had surgery.

And the week following the surgery was the worst week of my entire life.

Because, immediately after you wake up from the surgery — while your knee is the size of a fat toddler’s head and you still have a tube in it to drain blood and pus — you start working on your range of motion. Actually, you don’t work on your range of motion yourself. A nice nurse comes into your room with a machine. And that machine stretches and bends your knee for you. Because you can’t do it yet. And even if you could, you wouldn’t because it hurts too fucking much. You’re bleeding. The stitches keeping your incision closed tug at your skin. Every movement radiates. You move your knee and your ears somehow start throbbing. And then your face. And then your entire body. And then you ask for more morphine, because the bitch-ass droplets they’re giving you just aint enough. And then that same nice nurse comes back in your room to tell you you’ve already been given enough. And that you need to just deal with it.

And then, three hours later, they send you and the machine home. It’s outpatient surgery, after all. And this process — the forced bending, the bleeding, the radiating and excruciating pain — continues. A process interrupted once a day by the baths your mom assists you with because your leg is too limited, too weak, and too painful to move. And this is where you lose it. Where the pain and the embarrassment and the self-pity all congeal in a big-ass batch of self-doubt stew. Your eyes water. Your face numbs. You seriously wonder if you’ll ever be able to jump and cut and stop and slide as effortlessly as you were able to before that gotdamn spin move. That fucking spin move.

But then, after a week or so, you start feeling better. The swelling begins to dissipate. The pain isn’t as excruciating. Your range of motion increases. It’s strong enough for you to shit and shower with limited assistance. And then you’re able to stand with crutches. And then you’re able to walk with crutches. And then you’re able to walk without them but with a limp. And then you’re able to walk without a limp. And then there are several more “and then”s until, 12 months later, you’re playing on concrete in an outdoor summer league with no brace, no pain, no fear, and no evidence of the process aside from a half inch-long vertical scar on your kneecap.

§

America is changing. Incrementally, haltingly, and imperfectly. But it is changing. And this change is progress. Uprisings, protests, sit-ins, anger, outrage, fury — these are not signs of regression. These are the stitches stretching, bleeding, and breaking after forcibly bending your knee. Being challenged, having your feelings hurt, being forced to acknowledge certain things you either weren’t aware existed or were aware existed but refused to acknowledge — this is what change looks and feels like. It’s ugly. It’s bloody. It’s painful. It makes you question. It makes you doubt. It makes you cry. It is, in every sense of the term, fucked up. 

It makes you wonder if it’s all really worth it. Because, I can imagine things seemed fine before. They weren’t perfect, but they were manageable. At least much more manageable than this fuck shit muck proceeding it.

But this is the difference between wanting actual change, actual progress, and wanting the appearance of change. Because everyone — at least everyone who considers themselves a liberal or a progressive or an ally — says they want progress. But some only want it on a cosmetic level. They want the appearance of giving an effort — an effort facsimile — and a pat on the back for this performance instead of the actual effort. Basketball coaches call this “fake hustle.” Ex-girlfriends call it “your bullshit.”

Unlike an ACL reconstruction, there is no rehab timetable for America. 20 years. 50 years. 500 years. We have no idea how long it will take us to progress to a point of full range of motion. Of full freedom. Shit, it might never happen. But right now, today, we are better than we were yesterday. We are moving. And if you want to move too, it’s going to hurt. It will be fucking excruciating. But it will be better than doing nothing. Because you will be better too.

ramjet94:

Remember how Teen Titans had a lesson about Racism without blatantly bringing Cyborg’s Race into it?

buzzfeed:

There Is A New Type Of Firework Called The Sky Ladder And It’s Beautiful

Jeremy Deller’s Brixton Pound design (via brixtonpound.org)

Perhaps it’s a sign that paper money has entered its late rococo period as the revolution of digital currency makes bills feel as arcane as fax machines, but there’s been a recent burst of creativity as designers and artists are tackling banknotes as a medium. A few months ago, we reported on the beautifully abstract design by Snøhetta for Norway’s note, but now Jeremy Deller’s new Brixton Pound is the latest to cash.

The Turner Prize–winning British artist has designed the B£5 note of the Brixton Pound, a local currency in south London. The psychedelic design commemorates the fifth anniversary of the currency, which was created in 2009 to support local businesses. The design is bright and vibrant, even if it’s a little quirky. One Brixton news site, Brixton Buzz, accurately joked that the creation looks like it has “been whizzed through Google’s image recognition neural network.”

And the bill is not without its self-critical quirks — it is art, after all. Dezeen pointed out that the B£5 even features a quote by proto-Marxist Karl Marx on the back:

(image via Dezeen)

It isn’t the first creative design for the Brixton Pound, which was launched in 2009, but it is certainly the most high profile. In 2011, creative studio This Ain’t Rock’n’Roll designed the money with various local celebrities, including Len Garrison, one of the founders of the Black Cultural Archives.

The group promoting the Deller designs thinks it has a winner on its hands, and is offering the special edition for sale on its website for a rather reasonable £11.20, which might be the most affordable Deller multiple ever. In case you need more convincing, the Brixton Pound’s own designer, Charlie Waterhouse, offers this endorsement that reads like a sales pitch:

These are the most amazing currency notes ever produced. No exaggeration. They’re beautiful and mysterious; spiritual and politicising. In two small sides of paper it provides the most compelling response to the rot that emanates from the Square Mile that I’ve seen since we were all told we had to live under the yoke of Austerity.

The banknote even comes in a special fold-out B£ presentation case, which is fitting as all these pretty notes will undoubtedly become collectibles.

Michael Beutler, “Pequod” (2015) (all photo the author for Hyperallergic)

BERLIN — Walking into the Hamburger Bahnhof brings back a very formative moment in my art education. Ten years ago I came to this museum and saw a breathtaking exhibition of works by Anselm Kiefer, who promptly became one of my favorite artists and definitely nudged me closer to studying sculpture years later. Memories of raw, powerful, and masterful installations resurfaced as I entered the main exhibition hall of the Hamburger Bahnhof, only to be, at first, disappointed with what appeared to be large piles of garbage strewn about the hall.

Michael Beutler’s solo exhibition, Moby Dick, seemed like so many post-minimal exhibitions that I’ve come to disdain: an overload of chaotically displayed material with zero appreciation for craft; a Tom Sachs exhibition without content or the (albeit) obsessive appreciation of material. However, as I made my way through the space, the show grew on me as the “trash” took on surprisingly creative forms and meaning.

Michael Beutler, “Pequod” (2015)

Below oft-ignored materials — cardboard, paper, chicken wire — Beutler discovers a hidden structure, waiting to be activated in labor-intensive constructions that are equally playful and beautiful. Their lightness, texture, and colors (if not their permanence) create forms usually accomplished by plastics, woods, concrete, and steel.

The most immediately impressive piece is “Pequod” (2015): a giant carousel form constructed from a steel frame with a milky, semi-translucent material for the skin. The entire structure, intended to represent the ill-fated boat of Moby Dick, floats on water and magically rotates with no machine assistance. You can enter and admire the spinning carousel as you sit on stationary chairs that circle the inner cylinder. Light pours through the material as it all inexplicably and silently spins.

Installation view of ‘Michael Beutler: Moby Dick’ at Hamburger Bahnhof

Outside of “Pequod” is a chaos of color and material that never stopped being overwhelming. The installation “Haus Beutler,” (2014–15) (“Haus” is German for “house”) really started my appreciation of the show. The installation reveals, through physical and video documentation, the production processes, field notes, and unimaginable materials (styrofoam, rubber, zip ties) that the artist uses to build his forms, and finally convinced me of Beutler’s affinity for and understanding of material and construction.

In “Moby Dick” (2015), a series of semi-translucent sculptures replicate the architecture of the surrounding gallery space, embodying our remarkable fetishization of old buildings like the neoclassical museum itself. Europe is filled with old buildings, constantly maintained (at a cost) to remain old-looking. “Pequod” (2015) then represents the absurd vessel Beutler will ride to face this indestructible monster of architectural tradition, which Beutler’s work so flagrantly defies. This dream is embodied by “Haus Beutler,” I’d imagine, a word play on Bauhaus.

Installation view of Michael Beutler’s “Moby Dick” (2015)

While Moby Dick shows Beutler admitting an imminent defeat in his conquest — the traditional architectural forms he references will certainly not be replaced or forgotten any time soon — he makes a valiant and bold stance. The installations will continue to be reorganized, edited, and added onto by Beutler and his assistants throughout the exhibition, maintaining an element of chaos to the work. Will Beutler’s constructions become the new norm in architecture? As the theme suggests, it is unlikely and maybe not even a good idea, but the pursuit is worth visiting.

Michael Beutler: Moby Dick continues at the Hamburger Bahnhof Museum (Invalidenstraße 50-51, Berlin) through September 6. 

iridessence:

deerstroyer:

when u go on someone’s blog and the text is tiny af

a more fitting gif was never used

gobe:

“Last night I photographed a Barn Owl hovering above prey at a local farm where I have been baiting them for some time, I did attempt this last winter but failed due to the lens misting, still a work in progress” ~ Roy Rimmer

frrmsd:

Digital Artist:

YURI SHWEDOFF

“Wolf Pack”

upcycledpatches:

“I Owe You Nothing” shirt now available

nostalgic-solitude7:

Howl’s Moving Castle (Hayao Miyazaki, 2004)