The painting itself sits in a relatively darkened room at Tate Modern, where a major retrospective of the career of its creator, Kasimir Malevich from Kiev, opens today. Given that the painting is black from top to toe and hip to hip, and that it is often said to represent a pivotal moment in the history of abstraction and the art of the 20th century, this strikes the onlooker as an odd decision. Why not be given the opportunity to see it as clearly as possible?

Extraordinary entries for a travel photography competition were unveiled on Tuesday – including a man canoeing past dripping globules of molten lava, and a giraffe towering through a window to polish off some crumbs left on a plate. 

Aiko Tezuka came to Europe from her native Japan in 2010, first to London and then to Berlin, on a Künstlerhaus Bethanien Residency. She now lives and works in a flat in the fashionable Neukölln area in southeast Berlin.

I've been called 'the mistress of the splodge' [in recognition of her preference for sculpting rounded works], which I rather like. But even when critics are rude they have revealed things about my work that's accurate. [The Sunday Times art critic] Waldemar Januszczak once described a piece [for a show at the Serpentine Gallery, in 2010] as like snot thrown on the wall. But I think the disgustingness of a spillage or a splodge has its own beauty, and fascinates me.

With paintings called “Arse Flowers in Bloom” and “Giants of Modernism (Carrot Head)”, it is easy to assume Ansel Krut’s work is light-hearted.

Gesai#20 Bronze Winners Exhibition - Kim Zeluck
at Hidari Zingaro (Musashino, Tama area)
(2014-07-24 - 2014-07-29)

The gold, silver and bronze award winners of Gesai#20　held on May 4th 2014 are each given the opportunity to present their solo exhibition at Hidari Zingaro, starting with the bronze award winner Kim Zeluck.

Mission [Space X Art] －Beyond Cosmologies
at Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo (Kiyosumi, Ryogoku area)
(2014-06-07 - 2014-08-31)

In the second decade of the twenty-first century both outer space, into which research and development progresses, and artists’ expressions of inner space are rapidly expanding/converging to constitute a parallel world. Coinciding with the 2014 space boom, this exhibition examines how outer space has been drawn infinitely closer to our daily lives, along with the inner space created by artists as a multiverse, surpassing individual cosmologies. Japan joined the exploration space after the war, and the since this time artists have also come to interpret our steps into the universe through their own particular expressions. This exhibition will present art installations; items connected with space exploration, such as parts of satellites and rockets (fairings); documents from the world of entertainment, such as literature, manga and anime; interactive exhibits; discussions and other events to explore the new possibilities that ‘reflect the expanding/converging world’. It will offer the opportunity to experience and consider ‘space’, not only as some different world or Utopia, but also as something that is ‘ordinary’ in a true sense. [Related Event] Shintaro Tanikawa Book Reading “The Next Universe” Date: June 29(Sun) 14:00-15:30 Venue: B2F Auditorium

Takehiko Inoue Interprets Gaudi’s Universe
at Mori Arts Center Gallery (Roppongi, Nogizaka area)
(2014-07-12 - 2014-09-07)

This exhibition combines the artistic worlds of Antoni Gaudi, the groundbreaking architect responsible for sites including the Sagrada Familia, Park Guell, and Casa Milà, and the manga artist Takehiko Inoue, who is known for popular works such as “Slam Dunk”, “Vagabond”, and “Real”. Inoue has illustrated Gaudi’s youth in the countryside south of Barcelona, a time when he was called by the nickname “Tonet”. Appointed by the Spanish ambassador as a project to commemorate the 400th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Japan and Spain in December 2013, Inoue, who has deep ties with Spain, recreates Gaudi’s universe. Inoue’s works are also displayed along with drawings, furniture, models, and materials related to Gaudi. [Image: Takehiko Inoue “Tonet” (2013) ©I.T.Planning]

Big Sky Friendship
at Towada Art Center (Greater Tokyo area)
(2014-04-19 - 2014-09-23)

This exhibition brings together artworks addressing the way that loose forms of communication can develop between strangers as a result of unlikely catalysts. In the aftermath of the Great East Japan Earthquake - “3.11.” disaster we were met with the refreshing and encouraging sight of people joining hands and helping each other, above and beyond the frameworks and rules provided by local governments or society. In those unprecedented circumstances it required courage for people to rely not on social systems or ideas of reciprocity, and instead reach out to strangers of their own accord. And yet the world that opens up when such courage is demonstrated, although it might be fleeting can be seen as being full of love. Sociologists such as Itoko Kitahara and Rebecca Solnit have called such impromptu communities a type of utopia. Nevertheless, as reconstruction projects proceed and things return to normal, it at least appears that they gradually disappear. In this exhibition we explore through artworks and other post-disaster activities exactly what those spaces, full of creativity and love, were. In the teaching of “form is emptiness,” which appears in the Buddhist Heart Sutra, the “emptiness” is the whole world and the “form” refers to everything in it. This is an attempt to address once again the strength of the people who attempt to overcome difficult days, amidst a world that is forever changing.

2D Work Award Winners Exhibition
at Tokyo Wonder Wall (Shinjuku area)
(2013-10-10 - 2014-09-29)

12 artists selected for the Wonder Wall Award from 479 competitors present their work in a relay of solo exhibitions held between October 2013 - September 2014, with an artist talk held each month. Exhibition Schedule Chie Sannami Exhibition Period: 10th October-31st October Opening Talk: 10th October 17:30-18:30 Issei Nishimura Exhibition Period: 7th November-28th November Tsuyoshi Matsunami Exhibition Period: 5th December-26th December Opening Talk: 5th December 17:30-18:30 Mayu Hirota Exhibition Period: 9th January-30th Janurary Opening Talk: 9th January 17:30-18:30 Momi Abe Exhibition Period: 6th February- 27th February Opening Talk: 6th February 17:30-18:30 Shizuka Mitsui Exhibition Period: 6th March-28th March Opening Talk: 6th March 17:30-18:30 Eijiro Saito Exhibition Period: 10th April-30th April Opening Talk: 10th April 17:30-18:30 Saiko Kasajima Exhibition Period: 8th May-29th May Opening Talk: 8th May 17:30-18:30 Hiroaki Ito Exhibition Period: 5th June-26th June Opening Talk: 5th June 17:30-18:30 Narumi Sasaki Exhibition Period: 3rd July-25th July Opening Talk: 3rd July 17:30-18:30 Nanako Mukai Exhibition Period: 7th August-28th August Opening Talk: 7th August 17:30-18:30 Shiro Ishibashi Exhibition Period: 4th September-29th September Gallery Talk: 11th September 12:15-13:00

Hideo Ogiwara “Playing with Lines”
at Kichijoji Art Museum (Musashino, Tama area)
(2014-07-03 - 2014-11-03)

Exhibiting the print works of Hideo Ogiwara with an opportunity to compare the various techniques employed in his practice with such impressive works as “Fairytale Land” and “Aesop’s Fables”.

Stephen Mushin “Now, if, what, then - Farming Tokyo”
at Spiral (Omotesando, Aoyama area)
(2014-08-18 - 2014-08-31)

Melbourne based artist Stephan Mushin presents a vision of Tokyo reconsiders the city from ecological perspectives of energy, the food chain, and recycling. His “Tokyo” is one of the biggest cities in the world, endowed with a rich food culture but also a massive producer of waste. He presents images of fictional yet realizable machines that would both enliven Tokyo and help to solve these environmental problems in fantastical, fun ways. Experiencing the artworks and accompanying discussions, visitors of all ages will be encouraged to deepen their imagination and creativity, and dream of a positive future. [Related Events] Wrorkshop for Children and Families Dates: August 18th (Monday) – 21st, 2014 (Thursday) 14:00-15:00/16:00～17:00 Target: 5-12years old and families Creative Ideas Bar A discussion forum will also take place during the exhibition, inviting key persons in the fields of art, design, and education from Australia and Japan. Offering the opportunity to hear about the latest developments in these fields in both countries, visitors and experts alike will exchange ideas and gain new outlooks on learning and creativity. Date: August 20th (Wednesday) 18:00-20:00 Target: Students, teachers, designers and artists

Juliane Zelwies, Hamburger Diagram

Saturday, August 8th, the Laundromat kicks off its 2009 season with The Burger Group Show – a one-day exhibition complete with selections from The Laundromat Flat File and a menu of 'conceptual burgers.' The show features work by returning Laundromat artists, as well as newcomers who will be exhibiting their work with the space this fall.

Each participating artist has crafted a 'conceptual hamburger' that references the study of art history, or art-related concepts. The artists will be writing descriptions of their respective burgers for the menu, and cooking their creations for patrons. Founder and director of the Laundromat, Kevin Andrew Curran, sees the menu as a "tongue-in-cheek" opportunity for the artists to make commentary and fuel artistic discourse.

Curran does not intend to teach visitors a formal lesson, but he does see the potential for artists and visitors alike to indulge in "some (serious) fun with the idea of creating and consuming hamburgers that are playfully engaging art history." The show also provides an opportunity for the Laundromat to display works from the space's rotating Flat File. Artists included in the File lend their work to the Laundromat for one year, after which the drawer may be offered to another artist. In this way, Curran hopes to increase the number of artists whose work may be viewed in the flat file, while simultaneously increasing the geographic diversity of the collection.

The Burger Group Show will be held at the Laundromat gallery on Saturday, August 8th, from 6-10 PM. Participating artists include Chris Deo, Sarah McDougald Kohn, Maria Walker, Jonathan Allmaier, Scott Wilson, Ben Godward, Joe Protheroe, Ianthe Jackson and Liz Atzberger. Conceptual burgers will be on sale for $5 to $20, and visitors are invited to take home a copy of the menu.

Installation view of Tattoo at Kathleen Cullen Fine Arts. Via gallery.

Tattoo at Kathleen Cullen Fine Arts is a multimedia exploration of tattoo art and its ever-changing role in society. The exhibition includes paintings, photography, sculpture and film, as well as a few empty bottles of Jack Daniels littered about the gallery for an something like an authentic, tattoo parlor feel. We caught up with Cullen, the director of the gallery, and asked about her inspiration for the show and her take on tattoo art.-- S.K.

Stephanie Korszen for ArtCat: What was your inspiration for situating the work of tattoo artists within the context of a fine art gallery?

Kathleen Cullen: The inspiration is really the everyday. You need only sit down at a café or bar, or stand at a traffic light, to grant your eyes the opportunity to admire the body art on others' skin. Additionally, one of the artists I represent, Max Snow, served as the catalyst for this exhibition. In 2008, Max documented the stories of Latino gang members in L.A., for whom tattoo art serves an important role in self-identity. Max also wears part of his identity externally in the form of body art.

In the 1930s, Herbert Hoffmann photographed people and documented their fantastic stories before they were sent to prison by the Third Reich. He developed a great respect for these people, whom he saw as hard-working and unpretentious. Many bore the simplest of tattoos on their arms and hands – historically a sign of degeneracy. Over the years, tattoos have broken free of this inherent link to all things degenerate, to the point where they now have the potential to serve as a status symbol on par with designer handbags. Bruce Willis, on the cover of W Magazine, sports tattoos. Supermodels adorn themselves with body art. We see biker motifs, as well as Maori, Japanese, and sailor themes – rich codes to decipher on other’s bodies.

AC: You’ve discussed tattoo art as an intercession between the arenas of popular and high culture. How have you mirrored this comingling of cultures in your gallery space?

KC: We have everything from a Keith Haring poster, graffiti tattoos, tattoo-inspired furniture
and a film, Mark of Cain, by Alix Lambert. This film was part of a ten-year project during which the Lambert interviewed criminals in Russia. Lambert’s project inspired David Cronenberg to review the Russian criminal tattoo codes for the well-known movie Eastern Promises, starring Vigo Mortensen and Naomi Watts. Lambert reveals the hidden history behind Russian tattoos, as well as their complex symbolism.

Installation view of Tattoo at Kathleen Cullen Fine Arts. Via gallery.

AC: How did you conduct your research for this exhibition?

KC: We began by researching books and articles on the tattoo subculture from the 1930s
through the 1950s, and then followed the evolution of the tattoo further into the punk generation of the 1970s and 80s. Tattoos have transcended their stereotypical role as the mark of a lowlife in the first half of the twentieth century – though youthful sailors often flaunted tattoos as a rite of manhood – to arrive at a socially-accepted norm. Represented in our exhibit are biker, Maori, Japanese and sailor motifs.

Also included is Larry Clark's Tulsa tattoo. Like Danny Lyons, Clark blurred the lines between observer and participant. Lyons photographed unwanted, hated bikers. A common underlying theme for the artists represented in the exhibition is the desire to share an emotional closeness with their subjects. The resulting works are not merely documents; they are empathetic portraits.

AC: In presenting tattoo art, all of the works on display also portray the tattooed. Do you feel that the meaning of a tattoo is inherently tied to – and thus dependent upon – the individual’s identity?

KC: The meaning of a tattoo is intrinsically tied to a person's identity, because without the individual, the tattoo is rendered meaningless. If the individual was done away with, the tattoo would become an image devoid of significance.

Are you or do you know a Toronto-based artist who is enrolled in or has recently graduated from an MFA program focusing on photography? If yes, the Aimia | AGO Photography Prize has an opportunity to share.

This August, one of the artists on the yet-to-be-announced shortlist for the 2014 Aimia | AGO Photography Prize will be in Toronto to participate in the Prize’s residency program. Each year, all four artists on the shortlist receive a fully funded, self-directed residency designed to deepen or enrich their respective practices.

credit

There will be three to four group meetings, and the artist will meet with each of the students individually two to three times over the course of the two-week period. The students will work between the visits to develop ideas and/or create new work. Each student will receive a $500 honorarium to support production and expenses during the study period.

Applicants must be currently enrolled in an MFA program in Canada or internationally or have graduated from such a program after Jan. 1, 2013. Applicants must be based in Toronto between Aug. 18 and 29, 2014, and be available for regular meetings and studio visits during this time.

Although the artist’s identity won’t be publicly revealed until the Aug. 13 shortlist announcement, students under consideration for the program will be notified of the artist’s identity before their participation is confirmed.

Applications must include an artist statement, CV and portfolio of as many as 25 images and/or 10 minutes of video work with detailed credit information (title, date, medium, dimensions). Applications to the program are due July 9.

To submit an application or for more information, please contact Sean O’Neill, Manager, Aimia | AGO Photography Prize at sean_oneill@ago.net.

The Art Gallery of Ontario shares in the loss of Lynne Cohen, one of Canada’s finest visual artists. Lynne’s remarkable body of work took us to extraordinary, often-foreboding places — places we would be unlikely to encounter in our daily lives, except through her compelling photographs. Her enigmatic, real-world photographs of interior environments, uninhabited by humans, alluded to her sense of wit and irony.

Lynne Cohen, Untitled (Column), 2009. © Lynne Cohen, 2010.

Lynne’s legacy will be remembered by all who admired her vision, dedication to students, loyalty to those who knew her and her incredible strength the past three years. Our deepest condolences to Andrews Lugg, her partner of 50 years, who was closest to Lynne in every way.

— Maia Sutnik, Curator, Special Photography Projects at the AGO

Oscar T. Blanca, designer (Spanish, b. 1941), B.D. Barcelona Designs, manufacturer
Gaulino Armchair, 1987
Indianapolis Museum of Art, Robertine Daniels Art Fund in Memory of Her Late Husband, Richard Monroe Fairbanks Sr., and Her Late Son, Michael Fairbanks, 2013.4

Oscar Tusquets Blanca (who prefers we use both surnames) was born in 1941. The Barcelona native trained as an architect and began working as a designer of furniture and objects in 1972 with BD (Barcelona Design). Since then he has won several award,s including the Spanish National Design Award. Tusquets Blanca designed the Gaulino chair in 1987 and it is a prime example of Spanish design and functional art. Every angle of the Gaulino chair has beautiful complex lines bringing joy to your eyes as you follow along its subtle, sculptural curves. This is the result of his friendship with Salvador Dali and his interests in painting and writing. It seems clear he was also inspired by Antoni Gaudi and Carlo Mollino for which he named the chair.

The Gaulino chair, winner of the 1989 Industrial Design Prize, has a handmade appearance yet it was his first industrial project in wood. Its structure is made of solid ash and is available in a natural varnish, oak stain or black stain. The oak seat can be upholstered in black, natural, or honey leather. It can be stacked, but what a crime that would be! This is a gorgeous piece that I want to sit in, touch, and be close to in order to study every detail. The anamorphic shapes speak to me and fascinate me. I am not surprised to learn that Tusquets Blanca considers this chair one of his best works. The Gaulino chair is now a part of the Design Arts permanent collection at the IMA.

— Marika Klemm, ASID, Marika Designs, LLC

Tusquets Blanca’s Gaulino chair is an inspired mix of masculine and feminine lines. It may be a dining chair but I prefer to see it as a stand-alone chair that exudes an international design ethos of beauty and functionality. At first glance, the Gaulino chair has a masculine stance on the floor that dares you to have a seat. Yet its machismo belies the feminine, almost sensual, lines of the seat and arms which draw you in and seal the deal. Some will use the Gaulino with the matching table. Others will place it in any room as a side chair to add a sophisticated, sublime and lean design element for the occasional aperitif, but I would use it as the ultimate desk chair, in black, at a small writing desk.

— Michael Lubarsky, DAS Member

2014 Tokyo Art Directors Club Exhibition
at Ginza Graphic Gallery (Ginza, Marunouchi area)
(2014-07-04 - 2014-07-28)

With over 8500 submissions the annual open call exhibition of advertising and graphic design, including newspaper and magazine adverts, packaging, logo designs, displays and TV commercials, the group of 80 jurists of the Artistic Directors Club have carefully selected their choice of the best innovations which have appeared between May 2013-April 2014 and here present them across two venues, Ginza Graphic Gallery and G8 Gallery.

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The 67th Dentsu Advertising Awards
at Advertising Museum Tokyo (Ginza, Marunouchi area)
(2014-07-18 - 2014-08-24)

The Dentsu Advertising Awards were launched in 1947 by Hideo Yoshida, the fourth president of Dentsu, with the objective of raising the status of advertising socially and culturally, together with advertisers and media circles, by improving advertising theory and executional skills, and by introducing outstanding works. 67 years have passed since then and we have experienced a tremendous number of changes in the world we live in. Economic and social globalization and digitalization in communication means are probably the most outstanding changes. In the midst of these changes, advertising is at a turning point. Nevertheless, Hideo Yoshida’s belief that “advertising is a vital means to unite business and people” remains sound and advertising keeps being an important pillar of business strategy through corporate communication activities.

9th Golden Eggs All Star Design Showcase
at Axis Gallery (Roppongi, Nogizaka area)
(2014-08-28 - 2014-09-07)

The annual exhibition aiming to connect students and society through design this year showcases selected work which highlights the future of design alongside individual submissions under the title of “Thank Nature - Design which learns from and draws upon the riches of nature” including various approaches to community and food design. [Related Event] Participating Students Presentation August 30(Sat) 14:00- September 2(Tues) 18:30-, September 4(Thurs) 18:30-

The Holy Lake
at Entre Deux (Ichigaya, Kagurazaka area)
(2014-05-31 - 2014-07-31)

Masayuki Furukawa “Diary”
at Voilld (Ebisu, Daikanyama area)
(2014-07-18 - 2014-08-03)

The London-based photographer Masayuki Furukawa has done advertising, commercial, music video, and magazine work in Japan and abroad. His first exhibition is a special opportunity to see a portion of his enormous body of work from all over the world. A film Furukawa made in collaboration with director Eri Sawatari will also be screened.

Tamaki Shindo “Fly Over, Connect Paths”
at Gallery Art Unlimited (Roppongi, Nogizaka area)
(2014-07-09 - 2014-08-09)

Tamaki Shindo recreates unknown landscapes from fragments of cut-up pictures of places she has photographed herself. She then photographs and enlarges these collages to reveal original scenes that are all the more mysterious. Transcending the digital age with time and labor-intensive analog techniques, her works are worlds of new creation that cannot be called simply photographs.

“Semamori - Stitched Amulets on the Back of Children’s Kimonos - “
at LIXIL Gallery 1 & 2 (Kyobashi, Nihonbashi area)
(2014-06-05 - 2014-08-23)

Introducing the special forms of kimono popular up to the early Showa period with “Semamori” emblems designed to protect a child’s well-being and “Hyakutoku-kimono” created from cloth gathered from 100 people in a particular form of prayer, this exhibition features various examples and documents relating to this form of kimono, along with photographic produced by Miyako Ishuchi since winning the Shiju Hosho award. 「Related Event] Lecture “The World of Semamori” Date: July 29(Tues) 18:30-20:00 Speaker: Yukari Saji(director of Koriyama City Museum of Art) Venue: AGC Studio (Tokyo Chuo-ku Kyobashi 2-15-18 Kyobashi Souseikan 2F * 1 min from LIXIL) Admission: Free For further information on reservations please refer to the official website

Tsuneko Taniuchi “Micro-Events”
at Maison Hermès (Ginza, Marunouchi area)
(2014-07-18 - 2014-09-21)

Since 1995 Tsuneko Taniuchi has been enacting “Micro Events”, playing out through performance the various layers of society and their functions. Taking up the role of a variety of contemporary female characters, she has been known to take up the form of the “Bunny girl” in passing off ironical comments on the VIP system of art fairs and other such events, while at other times she has brought her room into the gallery and made it her living space pointing to the issues of residence rights in the city, often confronting social questions through her eclectic performances which mix acting with action, reality with fiction, conversation with exclusion, engagement and games, art and the kitsch, weaving between ideas and values in an examination of one’s right to be one’s self. 「Related Events] Micro Event No. 45 “6 Female Characters + 1 Woman / 7 Days” Taking on the roles of waitress, boxer, gymnast, ganguro, ninja and a homeless person the artist will perform her role each day, with the exception of Sunday when she will be her mere self, exchanging things her characters have made with visitors. Dates: Everyday Mon-Sat 17:00-19:00 Sun 14:00-16:00 Micro Event No. 46 “Wedding Tokyo” The latest event in Taniuchi’s Wedding Series, which has been developed since 2002, and has seen over 250 ceremonies to date. An open call is made for men and women to marry the artist and a series of 20 ceremonies will take place in the gallery. Date: August 3(Sun) For further details please refer to the official website.

“Unseen Daily Life” (Part1)
at Tokyo Wonder Site, Hongo (Chiyoda area)
(2014-08-02 - 2014-09-28)

Tokyo Wonder Site features a two part exhibition of work from 6 Japanese and international artists all incorporating familiar everyday materials into their works. In the first volume of this program showcases the work of 3 artists who have recently joined TWS’s residency programs in Stockholm, Seoul and Tokyo, evolving new vantage points through their encounter with the culture of their host city and their daily living within this. The exhibition will also be accompanied by workshops which offer up the creative possibilities of environmental sound and everyday objects. (admission free/reservation required)

Kiiro “Light Exhibition”
at Emon Photo Gallery (Shirokane, Hiroo area)
(2014-08-19 - 2014-09-20)

Kiiro has consistently pursued cosmos flowers throughout his photographic career for their touching, understated fragility that hides an indomitable robustness, and for the way in which they awaken distant memories. Kiiro’s premier work “Opera” received a prestigious International Fine Art Photography award. With “Light,” Kiiro continues to express a unique lyricism born of his enchantment with the various properties of flowers, and expressed through a deft mastery of the photomontage format. “Light” comes to us as a continuation of the Japanese aesthetic, so skillfully depicted in his second series “Elegance of Silence.” Various hues are captured with light particles that spread to every corner of each layered print, woven together in a way reminiscent of a tapestry. [Related Event] Dance Performance by “Flowers” featuring Yumi Yoshimoto Dates: August 23rd (Sat) 16:00 -16:40 (doors open at 15:30), September 12 (Fri) 19:30 - 20:10（doors open at 19:00）

Are you or do you know a Toronto-based artist who is enrolled in or has recently graduated from an MFA program focusing on photography? If yes, the Aimia | AGO Photography Prize has an opportunity to share.

This August, one of the artists on the yet-to-be-announced shortlist for the 2014 Aimia | AGO Photography Prize will be in Toronto to participate in the Prize’s residency program. Each year, all four artists on the shortlist receive a fully funded, self-directed residency designed to deepen or enrich their respective practices.

credit

There will be three to four group meetings, and the artist will meet with each of the students individually two to three times over the course of the two-week period. The students will work between the visits to develop ideas and/or create new work. Each student will receive a $500 honorarium to support production and expenses during the study period.

Applicants must be currently enrolled in an MFA program in Canada or internationally or have graduated from such a program after Jan. 1, 2013. Applicants must be based in Toronto between Aug. 18 and 29, 2014, and be available for regular meetings and studio visits during this time.

Although the artist’s identity won’t be publicly revealed until the Aug. 13 shortlist announcement, students under consideration for the program will be notified of the artist’s identity before their participation is confirmed.

Applications must include an artist statement, CV and portfolio of as many as 25 images and/or 10 minutes of video work with detailed credit information (title, date, medium, dimensions). Applications to the program are due July 9.

To submit an application or for more information, please contact Sean O’Neill, Manager, Aimia | AGO Photography Prize at sean_oneill@ago.net.

The Art Gallery of Ontario shares in the loss of Lynne Cohen, one of Canada’s finest visual artists. Lynne’s remarkable body of work took us to extraordinary, often-foreboding places — places we would be unlikely to encounter in our daily lives, except through her compelling photographs. Her enigmatic, real-world photographs of interior environments, uninhabited by humans, alluded to her sense of wit and irony.

Lynne Cohen, Untitled (Column), 2009. © Lynne Cohen, 2010.

Lynne’s legacy will be remembered by all who admired her vision, dedication to students, loyalty to those who knew her and her incredible strength the past three years. Our deepest condolences to Andrews Lugg, her partner of 50 years, who was closest to Lynne in every way.

— Maia Sutnik, Curator, Special Photography Projects at the AGO

Tamaki Shindo “Fly Over, Connect Paths”
at Gallery Art Unlimited (Roppongi, Nogizaka area)
(2014-07-09 - 2014-08-09)

Tamaki Shindo recreates unknown landscapes from fragments of cut-up pictures of places she has photographed herself. She then photographs and enlarges these collages to reveal original scenes that are all the more mysterious. Transcending the digital age with time and labor-intensive analog techniques, her works are worlds of new creation that cannot be called simply photographs.

Depicting the Indelible Japanese Landscape: Hiroshige’s “The Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido” and Contemporary Artists
at Bernard Buffet Museum (Greater Tokyo area)
(2014-07-19 - 2014-09-28)

The Musée Bernard Buffet is holding an exhibition of the Hoeido edition of “The Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido” by the ukiyo-e master Hiroshige Utagawa (1797-1858) and works by contemporary artists who have been inspired by him. The Hoeido edition of “The Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido,” regarded as the artist’s ultimate masterpiece, presents scenes along the highway as they change over the seasons and over time with abundant lyricism. The prints in this series are also known for the rich variety with which Utagawa depicts the human figure in the landscapes at each location. The world these prints creates, abounding in its rich sense of humanity, continues to capture the hearts of artists today. Leiko Ikemura (1951- ) is an artist who lives and works in Europe, where she continues her fundamental questioning of human existence. After the 2011 Tohoku earthquake, she began engaging in a dialogue with Hiroshige’s “The Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido,” which could be said to depict the essential, primordial landscapes of Japan. That experience has led to her creating poems and a new series of drawings. Samurai warriors coexist with contemporary individuals in the Yamato-e style miniatures of Akira Yamaguchi (1969- ). In them, Yamaguchi engages in a dialogue with styles from the past while humorously applying the spirit of modern criticism. Yamaguchi creates new landscapes based on places that have caught his eye in the Mishima area, such as the Mishima Taisha and other shrines, expressed through his own interpretations of them. “Hiroshige is my hero!” says Kazuyuki Takezaki (1976- ). Staying in the Mishima area, he has become enthralled with the landscapes along the Genpe and Kakita rivers and has created paintings and built installations inspired by phenomena he has observed there. This exhibition is an opportunity to rediscover the fascination of Utagawa’s “The Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido,” to experience the work of several contemporary artists, and to contemplate the indelible, essential landscapes within each of us. [Related Event] Workshop “Let’s Make a Landscape with Takezaki-san!” Date: Jul. 21 (Mon, public holiday) 13:00–15:30 Participants: 18 (Young children through Junior High Students) Admission: ¥1000 Please see the venue’s website for reservations, details, and information on more related events.

The child of Italian immigrants and an award-winning scholar of Italian literature Joseph Luzzi tells his family’s story and links it to Italy’s north-south divide and the country's passion for art, food, and family. His book My Two Italies gives an account of his Calabrian father’s time as a military internee in Nazi Germany—where he had a love affair with a local Bavarian woman. Luzzi also looks at Italy’s contradictions—it has produced some of the world’s greatest art but it also suffers from corruption, political fragmentation, and an enfeebled civil society.

Hoarding is a disorder marked by the persistent need to hold onto things and extreme anxiety at the thought of having to part with objects, even things with no value or use. But even people who don’t have hoarding tendencies can find it difficult to get rid of things and to clear away clutter. Dr. Simon Rego, Director of Psychology Training and Director of the Cognitive Behavior Therapy Training Program at Montefiore Medical Center, and Collette Shine, who runs a professional organizing company called Organize and Shine and is the New York Chapter President of the National Association of Professional Organizers, discuss the psychology behind clutter and hoarding, why we find it so hard to let go of certain items, and what that reveals about our personality.

World War I began 100 years ago, and our word maven, Patricia T. O’Conner, looks at the words that came out of that war—like blimp, doughboy, cooties. She’ll also answer questions about language and grammar. An updated and expanded third edition of O’Conner’s book, Woe is I: The Grammarphobe's Guide to Better English in Plain English, is available in paperback, as is  Origins of the Specious, written with Stewart Kellerman.

If you have a question about language and grammar, leave a comment or call us at 212-433-9692!

O'Conner and Leonard discussed a number of words and phrases that originated—or became popular—during WWI, including:

taxiing (as in a plane on a runway)
trench coat
zero hour
liaise
tailspinnosedive
cushy (to mean comfortable or easy)
shell shock
dud
hush hush
pushing up daisies
in a funk

Hello all,

Apologies for the delay here. Fieldwork has left me terribly behind on
correspondence this summer.

I'm Dan Greene, a PhD candidate in American Studies at the University of
Maryland. My dissertation focuses on the hope that access to ICT and
ICT-related industries will help individuals, cities, and countries lift
themselves up by their own bootstraps. The Clinton administration built
this belief into a common sense as they steered the US into a supposedly
New Economy, deregulated the telecommunications industry, and replaced
welfare with workfare. Today it manifests on the one hand as a mission to
close the so-called digital divide, and on the other as an effort to
recruit or cultivate Richard Florida's creative class and save desperate
cities. The dissertation first traces the roots of this common sense to the
neoliberal political economy of the 1990s and the framing of the 'digital
divide' as a problem of getting computers to poor people rather than ending
poverty per se, and then tracks how th

Greetings from balmy New York City. It has been exciting to read through
all of your proposals and now the introductions, and posts to the mailing
list.

This is just as good a time as any to jump in and say hello, starting with
a reference to a short intervention that I just wrote for Public Seminar,
trying to decompress my thoughts about the so-called "sharing economy." I
will just leave it at that and see if there is anybody on the list who has
followed the protests against Uber, and the regulatory efforts concerning
Airbnb.

http://www.publicseminar.org/2014/06/the-politics-of-the-sharing-economy/#.U7FkPaiXvjA

~ Trebor

=============
R. Trebor Scholz
Associate Professor
Culture & Media Department
THE NEW SCHOOL
65 West 11th Street
New York, NY 10011

This will be my second digital labor conference. I'm happy to see how much
the concept has developed over the past five years.

I am presently completing an essay on automation
<http://balkin.blogspot.com/2014/06/a-more-nuanced-view-of-legal-automation.html>,
in response to a call for proposals
<http://canopycanopycanopy.com/contents/2014_commission_recipients> from
Triple Canopy. I edited and wrote for a New Museum-sponsored project on "The
Last Newspaper <http://newcityreader.net/issue08.html>." My book, The Black
Box Society <http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674368279>,
will be published this fall.

My presentation at the conference will explore proposals to "automate the
automators"--i.e., how to computerize (and thus render redundant) the
managers and investors who claim automation should render most workers
redundant.

--Frank


Frank Pasquale
Professor of Law
University of Maryland Carey School of Law
500 W. Baltimore St.
Baltimore, MD 21201
(410)-706-4820


On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 5:06

I recently completed an installation at Farnborough in Hampshire, where I got to do something I’ve wanted to do for quite a while: draw a rainbow plane. (More images of the installation are available on Flickr.)

Farnborough is the home of British aviation, site of the first powered flight on British soil (by the American showman William Cody) in 1908, as well as the British Army Balloon School, the formation of the RAF, the Royal Aircraft Establishment, and the research facilities which produced the jet engine, carbon fibre and more. Much of the site of the RAE has now been cleared, but, thanks in large part to the efforts of the Farnborough Air Sciences Trust, several buildings have been saved, including the extraordinary wind tunnels and the magnificent, reconstructed airship shed, under which the installation is sited.

Like the Drone Shadows, the Rainbow Plane is a 1:1 outline of an aircraft – in this case, the Miles M.52, an experimental jet plane developed at Farnborough in the 1940s. The M.52 never flew, but several of its innovations, including the all-moving tailplane and the biconvex “Gilette” wing, were crucial to the success of the American effort to break the sound barrier with the Bell X-1.

The M.52 is shown here as if distorted by the characteristic pansharpening effect of satellite photography – as if viewed, in flight, from space. I’ve been fascinated by the “rainbow plane” effect visible in satellite maps for some time, and have collected many examples.

I’d seen many of these but didn’t really understand what I was looking at, until I started to process the imagery myself. After installing the Washington DC drone shadow, I purchased commercial satellite imagery of the city, in order to try to see my drone from space.

The image which I purchased came from Digital Globe’s WorldView-2, a 6000lb commercial observation satellite fired into space aboard a Delta II rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, in October 2009. Digital Globe was originally founded in 1992, ahead of the 1992 Land Remote Sensing Policy Act which permitted private companies to enter the satellite imaging business. It received its initial funding from Silicon Valley, and corporations in the US, Europe and Japan. Much of Google Maps imagery is purchased from Digital Globe.

The image shows 25 square kilometres of Washington, D.C., photographed on the 26th August, 2013 – but it’s not a photograph. Observation satellites do not carry conventional cameras, but multispectral scanners which contain an array of sensors for recording data across a range of frequencies. WorldView-2′s scanner contains 8 sensors with a resolution of 1.85m per pixel: four in the visible spectrum, recording red, yellow, green, and blue, and four more, in the deep blue, the red edge, and in the inner and outer near-infrared, covering a total spectrum of more than twice the visual range of the human eye. One more sensor measures panchromatic intensity across the visible spectrum, allowing images to be sharpened to a resolution of 0.46m per pixel.

In order to make this image, it is necessary to combine data from different sensors, so a 5-3-2 image, in this case, composites data from the visible red, green and blue sensors into a single, “true colour” image (although there is nothing ‘true’ about this). This image is then used to add colour to the higher resolution but black-and-white panchromatic image, a process called “panchromatic sharpening.”

This is the process which produces the rainbow planes, which move fast enough to blur themselves across the satellites’ different chromatic sensors. It’s a glitch, but like all good glitches the rainbow plane is also a key to uncovering the functioning of the image-making machines, a glimpse into the way the machines see the world.

Hunter Drohojowska-Philp says the show provides a rare opportunity to better understand a rigorous and complex artist.

Today is International Migrants Day. Last week, I wrote about the failed deportation of Isa Muaza. Yesterday, entreglasgow.org/?page_id=914">Unity Centre Glasgow announced that another appeal by Muaza’s legal team had failed, and he was rescheduled for deportation, alongside a large number of others, on Tuesday night.

I heard at about 7pm that several detainees had been loaded onto vans at Harmondsworth Detention Centre and were on the move. I didn’t know where they were headed, but I knew that many previous flights had left from the private aviation area at Stansted Airport, a largely un-signposted collection of car parks and hangars on the western side of the airport. I arrived there at 8, just in time to see the first of several coaches and security vans, together with a police escort, arrive at the Inflite Jet Centre, a private customs and handling facility mostly used by private jets.

The coaches, five in all and probably from several different detention centres, arrived between 8 and 9, and were accompanied by silver vans bearing the logo of security company Tascor, formerly Reliance, who took over the role of deportation escorts from G4S in 2011 following the death of Jimmy Mubenga. Tascor has a page on its website called Our Values, where it boasts: “We steer clear of politics”. Most of the coaches were from WH Tours in Crawley, although one bore the bright yellow sun and jaunty typography of Just Go!

It is profoundly uncomfortable watching anonymous people of colour being loaded on and off vans and planes in the middle of the night under tight security. When you know a little of the background of the detainees, when you read their claims of torture and violence, their long battles to secure asylum, the institutional racism and homophobia, it’s terrible. But even without knowing these things, the manner in which it is done should tell you everything you need to know. The British Human Rights lawyer Gareth Peirce writes in Dispatches from the Dark Side, on UK complicity in torture, that “what is in fact the law precisely mirrors instinctive moral revulsion” but that “in this country, the government hardly needs such acceptance, since here the additional and crucial factor is that the public is unlikely to be given sufficient information to trigger revulsion.” Hence the night, the private terminals, charter flights, the hired coaches. All of this is deliberate: it is a policy of not being seen.

The detainees were kept on the coaches for some time, and there appeared to be some confusion about when they were going to depart. It’s standard practice in this situation to bring extra “reserve” deportees to the airport without warning, a practice condemned as inhumane by some MPs and the Inspector of Prisons. Before deportation, each detainee is issued with a plane ticket which gives the flight time – 22:20hrs in this case – and a flight number. As the flights are chartered, the flight number – here PVT091 – is internal, so it’s impossible to find out more details about it, except by going to the airport. The Home Office has been running deportation charter flights for some time, under as much secrecy as they can get away with, and refuses to disclose the companies involved in case it damages their commercial relationships. The ongoing deportation of Nigerians on charter flights is called “Operation Majestic”, but there are regular flights to many other countries, including “popular destinations” such as Pakistan and Afghanistan. Corporate Watch published a comprehensive report on what they call collective expulsion last month.

On the tarmac by the jet centre sat a Titan Airways 767. Titan Airways is based at Stansted, and describes itself as “the UK’s most prestigious charter airline.” Its fleet ranges from small business aircraft to widebodied airliners:

Since it’s foundation in 1988, Titan Airways has grown into the UK’s most prestigious charter airline, specialising in bespoke air charter, tour operator programmes and high end / corporate air travel as well as airline sub charter and aircraft leasing. It brings the very best standards of care and comfort to all its passengers. Once safely aboard, they can relax and enjoy our superb in-flight service and a wide choice of cuisine and fine wines to complete the experience. Titan’s modern, reliable aircraft can operate from all major international and regional airports day and night, 365 days a year.

It’s cold, and wet, and dark, and some of the deportees have been sitting on board coaches for hours, while Tascor guards mill about, smoke and chat. As it approached midnight, there was more activity around the plane, and it appeared that all the deportees were on board as the coaches left the terminal compound empty and parked up outside. (The next day, Unity tells me that two people were taken off the flight at the last minute, but those people estimated that around 80 Nigerians and Ghanaians were on board, including Isa Muaza, who was taken straight to hospital on arrival in Lagos, and a woman who married a British citizen two years ago, and was not expected to be deported).

You can watch flights taking off from the far side of the airport, from a muddy lane alongside the north end of the runway. On the way over to it, I was stopped by the Police, who had been told I had been seen around the private aviation area. They were happy that I was a ‘spotter’ looking for planes – and advised me to join Essex Police’s Plane Watch scheme – but also warned me that the private aviation section was a restricted area, and I shouldn’t go there.

At 00:27, the Titan Airways 767 roared down the Stansted runway and into the night. Moments before, its call-sign appeared on Flightradar: AWC48A. And from there, an aircraft registration number: G-POWD.

We can see G-POWD on approach to Lagos a little after 6am. Two hours later, it’s on the move again, making the hop westwards from Lagos to Accra, the capital of Ghana, where it makes another stop. And then at 11am it appears to lift off back in the direction of London – at time of writing, it is probably somewhere over North Africa.

When I got back to my car around 1, I had a flat battery, and had to wait for a repair man. When he arrived, and I explained what I was doing in this godforsaken place, he told me he’d been at the Inflite Terminal recently too, to jump-start a brand-new Tascor transporter van, whose driver told him these flights happen all the time, and nobody knows about it, not even most of the people who work at the airport. “Makes you think,” he said. “Makes you think.”

*

Photos are available at Flickr

For some time, I have been threatening to write about the Render Ghosts. I was asked to contribute something to Electronic Voice Phenomena, an online literature and art project by Mercy and Penned in the Margins, and so I wrote about my recent trip to New Mexico, in search of the Render Ghosts:

I first noticed the Render Ghosts on the hoardings surrounding a new development near Finsbury Square. On the balconies of some vast, virtual tower, two pixelated figures looked out over a darkened London, a perfect red-pink gradient sunset behind them. He had short dark hair and stubble, wore a black jacket and blue jeans. She had a cropped red bob, white jacket, and a purple knee-length skirt. I didn’t know who they were, but I started seeing them everywhere.

Read the full piece over at EVP.

I also have a short essay and illustrations in the wonderful new Visual Editions‘ book of writing and maps, Where You Are, which also includes contributions from Joe Dunthorne, Geoff Dyer, Olafur Eliasson, Sheila Heti, and more.

To ask “Where You Are” invites a series of responses: cartographic, historical, social, spiritual, situational; discursive or prescriptive. The GPS system is a monumental network that provides a permanent “You Are Here” sign hanging in the sky, its signal a constant, synchronised timecode. It suggests the possibility that one may never need be lost again; that future generations will grow up not knowing what it means to be truly lost.

The book is available to order now, but you can read the essay, and see the illustrations (much beautified by the designers at Bibliothèque), alongside all the other contributions on the Where You Are website.

The astute among you might notice a strong similarity between the diagrams in Where You Are and the piece I made for Container some months back:

This 3D-printed object is the same thing under discussion in Where You Are:

This is a model of the Global Positioning System (GPS), a constellation of 24 satellites, in six orbital groups of four satellites, each orbital plane at 55 degrees inclination, and 60 degrees right ascension to its neighbour, 20,200 kilometres above the surface of the earth; a machine we are all living inside.

I’d had the original model sitting on my desk for some time before Tim asked me for a contribution to Container. In trying to draw and understand the GPS system as an abstract machine, I’d modelled the constellation in Sketchup – it was a natural step to flip-flop this nest of intersecting cones of influence back into the physical realm again, so that I could roll it between my fingers, as Einar and I did with airfix models of the drones, before the shadows (Einar’s own thinking about GPS, with Timo and Jørn, led to the Satellite Lamps project.) I call this the “Close Encounters” method.

A while back, I started the Laaaaaaandsat tumblr, which automatically posts, several times a day, every image released by the USGS Landsat observation programme – an ongoing, comprehensive survey of the planet by another satellite, 700km above the earth’s surface.

The endless stream of off-kilter images – reoriented so North is ‘up’ – remains a endless source of pleasure. So when Aperture magazine asked for 200 words on “What Matters Now” in photography, I thought of this little robot cameraman in the sky. 200 words is not enough, but it’s in the new issue.

NASA’s Landsat is the longest-running program dedicated to photographing the Earth from space, and has created millions of images since its inception in 1969. The first satellite, Landsat 1, was launched on July 23, 1972, atop a Delta 900 rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Its mission was to photograph the whole Earth using three cameras which see both visible light and the near-infrared, and a four-channel multispectral scanner. The scanner was the project’s greatest innovation as it reveals hidden details about the planet’s surface, producing data and imagery used for everything from disaster relief, to agriculture, to studying climate change.

In February of this year, the program continued with the launch of Landsat 8. This incarnation features a more powerful scanner which sees in the ultraviolet; the panchromatic; the shortwave, near-, and thermal-infrared; revealing the presence of dust and smoke, of chlorophyll, of sub-surface rock formations, and the shape of clouds. The satellite captures four hundred images every day, creating a complete picture of the planet every sixteen days. Every one of these images is in the public domain, allowing every one of us to use, benefit from, and marvel at this ever-growing, ever-changing automated portrait of our planet.

This week I was due to install another Drone Shadow, this one in Brisbane, Australia (that’s a planning mock-up, above). I had been invited by the Brisbane Writers Festival, and we had received permission from the Queensland State Library to install the work on their premises. Unfortunately, due to the actions of Arts Queensland, the department of the State Government with overall responsibility for the arts, it has been impossible to proceed with the work. The actions of Arts Queensland in this case have been both incredibly frustrating and boringly familiar: they have stalled, dissembled, obfuscated and lied, all in the service of silencing an artistic work and preventing a proper debate occurring, either about the work, or the government’s censorship of it. (For the record, there is a full account of my dealings with Arts Queensland available here.)

I’ve often been asked if I have got into any kind of trouble for creating the Drone Shadows before, and the answer has always been no. This is despite the fact that we have drawn them in Istanbul, during a period when the Turkish government was in negotiation to purchase Predator drones from the US, and in Washington DC – right next to the White House – at the height of the US drone war. But apparently the image – the bare outline – of a drone was too much for the government of Queensland.

In Istanbul we drew a Predator, in DC a Reaper. In Brisbane I proposed to draw a Global Hawk, the largest military unmanned aircraft currently in service. Late last year it was revealed that the United States flew secret Global Hawk spy missions from Air Force bases in Australia in 2001-2006. The programme was revealed by a group of amateur aviation historians who tracked the Global Hawks arriving and taking off. When they revealed details of the flights, they were visited by Australian defence security officials who demanded they not reveal details of the flights. An Australian senator who proposed to notify the public of the flights was silenced by the US Air Force, which demanded the flights remain classified.

Since then, Australia has been in prolonged negotiations with the US to purchase Global Hawks itself, announcing an AU$1 billion programme in 2004, rising to AU$3 billion in 2012. The latest election, which takes place quite coincidentally this Saturday, has led to further fierce debates over Australian defence and the drone program.

Australia’s domestic drone program is primarily aimed at “securing borders”, and its preference for maritime versions of the Global Hawk is due to the need for surveillance of immigration by sea. This program aims to ensure, in the words of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in July 2013, that “any asylum seeker who arrives in Australia by boat will have no chance of being settled in Australia as refugees”, by shifting the problem to neighbouring countries such as Papua New Guinea. There is also a long history of asylum claimants being housed at former Air Force bases – and a long history of government objection to artworks dealing with the subject: see for example the story of Escape from Woomera, a political computer game about a detention camp in a remote Australian Defence Force base in South Australia.

One of the many reasons given by Arts Queensland for their opposition to the installation of the Drone Shadow was the opening at the Queensland Museum next door of an exhibition of thousands-year-old artefacts from Afghanistan, to which members of the local Afghan community had been invited. Arts Queensland expressed their view (after several weeks of denying any such issue) that this community might be made uncomfortable by the work. The community was never consulted, and the Museum itself raised no objection. Arts Queensland called it a “raw issue”. Indeed it is.

Australia’s Defence Forces have been involved in the war in Afghanistan since 2001. This contribution has included ships, manned aircraft, ground troops – and, more recently, drones.

The Royal Australian Air Force has been using drones in Afghanistan since 2009, when it first started to deploy the Israeli-built Heron drone, a twin-hulled surveillance drone the size of a light aircraft. At a 2012 promotional event on Australia’s Gold Coast, a short drive from Brisbane, Australia’s most senior military drone commander stated that the drone program was “like crack cocaine, a drug, for our guys involved – [they] just can’t get enough of it.”

These drones are in fact still owned by the Israeli manufacturer, and leased via a Canadian company – as Australia’s ABC News put it: “Israeli-owned drones, leased by Canadians, flown by Australians, fighting a war against Islamist insurgents in Afghanistan”. The RAAF drone teams are trained by Canadian and Israeli civilians at Amberley in Queensland, on the outskirts of Brisbane. Before they deploy to the field, they spend hours test-flying the drones over a simulated Afghan village, constructed in 2011, on the Woomera test range, close by the notorious refugee detention centre. (Picture above: a Heron drone parked at Woomera Air Base, South Australia, via Google Earth.)

The RAAF’s Herons are nominally unarmed, but they are equipped with lasers which allow them to mark targets for incoming airstrikes or artillery – the networking of contemporary military forces means that the formal distinctions between the capabilities of different weapons systems are increasingly meaningless. The drones are a key part of the “kill chain”, the process by which targets are selected and attacked by the entire system, and the ADF also calls on US and British armed Reaper drones to support its ground troops in battle.

In describing the contours of Australia’s relationship with drones, we see how, once again, such relationships extend beyond the individual aircraft to encompass far wider issues including domestic politics, international relations, warfare, immigration and networked technologies.

Drones are avatars of the the political process: they are instantiations of a set of ideologies and beliefs, made visible by their reification in electromechanical systems. When we talk about drones, we are really talking about the politics that demand, shape, and deploy them, and the politics which are made possible by them. This politics reflects the drones themselves: it is a politics of violence, of obfuscation, of radical inequality of sight and action, and it is sustained by that obfuscation and that inequality.

No wonder then that politicians are afraid of even artistic representations of the drone. No wonder they cite feelings of “discomfort” at even mentioning them, although in projecting this discomfort onto an immigrant population – without consultation – they reveal even more clearly the complicity of the technology in war and social oppression.

The Drone Shadow is not just a picture of a drone. It is a diagram of a political system. Every time we draw one, we use it to cast light on the actors who would prefer that the reality of their intentions and actions remain hidden.

This is the nature of networked technology today: it is the product of an embedded politics which it simultaneously obscures, through its apparent sophistication, and renders startlingly visible, through its explicit form. That invisibility is the intention of power; rendering it visible is the intention of art.

In the present case, power in all its petty exercise has done its utmost to render such a debate invisible. That it has succeeded for the moment, with the barest minimum of opposition from the cultural institutions which should oppose such exercises at every step, is saddening. It is also, I have to believe, unlikely and impossible to remain the case for long.

*

If you would like to draw your own Global Hawk shadow, you can download a schematic for the installation here.

“Perception, in whatever sensory modality, is the result of the brain’s cartographic skill.” Antonio Dimasio

New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc. (NRPA) invites you to propose a hybrid net art project for Turbulence.org - Augment it Yourself (AiY). Projects must use both the World Wide Web and a physical site :: Deadline: July 1, 2014 :: Commission Amount: $6,000 :: Commission Date: July 2015.

• The behavior of all particles is contingent on the presence of a conscious observer.
• Our internal and external perceptions are inextricably connected.
• Reality is the perpetual enfolding/unfolding of autopoiesis (self-making), in relationship with others and our environment.

Augmented Reality (AR) is a real-time experience of a real-world environment whose elements are augmented by computer-generated sensory input — such as video, graphics or sound — and mapped to GPS coordinates. Thus, after downloading an AR ‘app’ to a smartphone and going to the specified location, users are able to experience intertwined realities.

While AR refers to the technologies that make these experiences possible, we are interested in how we have always augmented our realities — with our brains and other reality-mediating technologies — modifying and/or enhancing reality by layering memories on real-time perceptions, for instance. How will your project contribute to perception, memory, and the creation of the autobiographical self?

Required: Proposal (max 500 words), Biography (max 300 words), and URLS of past work.

Email them to turbulence @ turbulence.org with the Subject: Turbulence.org - AiY Proposal.

* Do it Yourself (DiY) empowers individuals to make things without the aid of “experts” or professionals; it is an alternative to consumer culture’s emphasis on relying on others to satisfy ones needs.

“Perception, in whatever sensory modality, is the result of the brain’s cartographic skill.” Antonio Dimasio

New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc. (NRPA) invites you to propose a hybrid net art project for Turbulence.org - Augment it Yourself (AiY). Projects must use both the World Wide Web and a physical site :: Deadline: July 1, 2014 :: Commission Amount: $6,000 :: Commission Date: July 2015.

• The behavior of all particles is contingent on the presence of a conscious observer.
• Our internal and external perceptions are inextricably connected.
• Reality is the perpetual enfolding/unfolding of autopoiesis (self-making), in relationship with others and our environment.

Augmented Reality (AR) is a real-time experience of a real-world environment whose elements are augmented by computer-generated sensory input — such as video, graphics or sound — and mapped to GPS coordinates. Thus, after downloading an AR ‘app’ to a smartphone and going to the specified location, users are able to experience intertwined realities.

While AR refers to the technologies that make these experiences possible, we are interested in how we have always augmented our realities — with our brains and other reality-mediating technologies — modifying and/or enhancing reality by layering memories on real-time perceptions, for instance. How will your project contribute to perception, memory, and the creation of the autobiographical self?

Required: Proposal (max 500 words), Biography (max 300 words), and URLS of past work.

Email them to turbulence @ turbulence.org with the Subject: Turbulence.org - AiY Proposal.

* Do it Yourself (DiY) empowers individuals to make things without the aid of “experts” or professionals; it is an alternative to consumer culture’s emphasis on relying on others to satisfy ones needs.

Two Tyler students organized the “Call + Response” show.

The article Art students answer the call by Alexa Bricker appeared first on The Temple News.

Conrad Benner’s blog calls attention to Philly’s street art culture.

The article A View from the Top by Patricia Madej appeared first on The Temple News.

Local artists of any skill level could submit art to the gallery's Philadelphia Community Exhibit, which opens to the public today, Jan. 30.

The article 3rd Street Gallery’s Philadelphia Community Exhibit puts local talent on display by Cheyenne Shaffer appeared first on The Temple News.

The RAW Awards will showcase design talent in Philadelphia, with winners advancing to compete on a national level.

The article ‘RAW’ talent showcased in awards ceremony by Taylor Farnsworth appeared first on The Temple News.

Film editing is all about making (mostly smooth) transitions from one shot to another. Here we briefly discuss the 6 frequently used transitions between shots:

1. CUT: The end of the first shot is attached to the beginning of the second shot. The most often used of all transitions, it creates an instantaneous change in one or more of the following: angle, distance, subject etc. In narrative films, normally only cuts are used within a scene.

2. MATCH CUT: A match cut (sometimes called a form cut) maintains continuity between two shots by matching objects with similar shapes or movements or both similar shapes and similar movements. One of the best known examples of a match cut is from 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), in which a bone slowly tumbling end over end in the air is replaced by an orbiting spacecraft with a similar shape. Watch video below for reference:

3. JUMP CUT: A jump cut is a discontinuous transition between shots. For example, one shot shows a woman running on a beach towards the water, and the next shot shows her running away from the water. A jump cut is sometimes used to surprise or disorient viewers. It may also occur if the film print or video has missing footage. Many filmmakers and film schools associate a jump cut with bad editing.

4. FADE OUT, FADE IN: The first shot fades to darkness, (normally black); then the second shot fades in(by degree goes from darkness to illuminated image). The fade out, fade in can provide a short but meaningful pause between scenes and sequences. If this editing transition is doe slowly, it can serve as a leisurely transition.; if done rapidly, it is less noticeable or not noticeable at all. Perhaps because of the current popularity of fast pacing in films, this transition is used far less often than it used to be,

5. LAP DISSOLVE: The first shot fades out as the second shot fades in, overlaps the first, then replaces it entirely. Lap dissolves may be rapid and nearly imperceptible or slow and quite noticeable, creating a momentary superimposition of two images, sometimes suggesting similarities or even meaning.

6. WIPE: A wipe seems to push one shot off the screen as it replaces it with the next shot. The wipe, which comes with many variations, has been popular in science fiction, serials and action movies. but it has also been used in such diverse films as It Happened on Night, (1934), The Maltese Falcon (1941), The Seven Samurai (1954), Ed Wood (1994) and Battlefield Earth (2000).

Many other transitions are used but much less often than these six mentioned above. We will post more on video editing techniques on the Digital Filmmaking Blog in the coming days,

George Clooney will receive the Chairman's Award for his acting work in The Descendants and his directing of The Ides of March at the 2012 Palm Springs International Film Festival.

The award will be presented on January 7 at PSIFF's annual Awards Gala, a black-tie event that always hands out an array of awards to luminaries who figure to be in the Oscar race.

Like the awards given at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival in late January, the Palm Springs event has become a valuable stop on the Oscar campaign trail. Previous recipients of the Chairman's Award include Dustin Hoffman, Nicole Kidman and Ben Affleck.

Oscar-nominated actress Michelle Williams will also be rewarded for her portrayal of Marilyn Monroe in “My Week With Marilyn,” which is already generating Oscar buzz.

Williams, 31, will receive the Desert Palm Achievement Actress Award at the Palm Springs International Film Festival awards gala at the Palm Springs Convention Center. Previous recipients include Academy Award winners Natalie Portman, Marion Cotillard, Charlize Theron and Kate Winslet.

“My Week With Marilyn,” which opens Wednesday in limited distribution, premiered Oct. 9 at the New York International Film Festival. Directed by Simon Curtis, the film was presented Nov. 6 as part of the AFI Fest at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, where Monroe put her hand and footprints in cement in 1952.

The Palm Springs International Film Festival runs Jan. 5-16 2012 at various venues in Palm Springs

Sources: mydesert.com & Reuters

“We are excited to expand the reach and depth of our programming to support individual artists in the field,”

We give young filmmakers a topic and everything they need to create their own movie -- video, music, and sound effects. Then let them create the best short film they can using these materials. Because everyone's using the same "building blocks," contestants will be judged not by their budget but on their creativity and storytelling abilities.

Their first competition is called "The Marijuana Mash-Up." For this contest, they are asking contestants to “mash up” (that is, creatively condense and re-edit) an hour’s worth of hilariously dated drug education films from the 50s and 60s to create a short campaign commercial that convinces people to vote for or against legalizing marijuana. The contest is motivated by the California initiative that'll be on the ballot this fall, but young filmmakers across the country have passionate views on this issue, to say the least! Finalists will be named late in the summer and a winner just before the election.

2. Fleetflicks: FleetFlicks.com is trying to revive the short film as both art and entertainment. It's a place for filmmakers to expose their work to an international audience. The site hopes to spread the word to a diverse viewership and combat the stigma that the short film is only for crotch-punch and cat videos. The site has been up for a few months and has gathered a lot of followers, many of whom have uploaded their short films on the site.

3. Student Film Makers of India: SFMI is a site for student film from India where they can upload their films, make their profile and network with other film makers. The website has a decent design and has got quite a few members already who have uploaded their short films and animations there.

This weekend, June 7th & 8th, Canon is bringing their Canon in Action Tour to Seattle! The tour will be taught by Canon Explorers of Light Jack Reznicki and Jim Divitale, along with Amina Moreau of Stillmotion.
 
Jack is best known for his commercial work with companies like Hyatt and Time Magazine, as well as teaching at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. 
 
Jim’s digital photography is featured in magazines like Rangefinder and Professional Photographer and lectures at WPPI, Imaging USA, and Photoshop World.
 
Amina is the cofounder of Emmy Award-winning Stillmotion, whose client list includes Apple and CBS.
 
There is going to be a Saturday seminar and a few Sunday workshops on June 7th and 8th.
 
The Saturday seminar’s goal is to teach imaging essentials and help you understand and expand your creative options. Thoroughly understanding photography principles like ISO and aperture is essential to putting your photography ideas to practice. The Saturday seminar will cover lens choice, camera settings and features, light exposure, portraits, landscapes, HD video, and a whole lot more. We’ll learn quality vs. quantity of light, incorporating video into your image making process. Jack, Jim, and Amina are going to let you discover the possibilities in your camera so that you can discover the possibilities in your photography.
 
The Sunday workshop is an opportunity to practice your new skills, work with live models, and try out professional Canon equipment. We’re going to have interactive discussions and hands-on exercises so attendees will receive feedback for every milestone hit. The workshop is designed to give attendees the tools to create visually stunning and engaging videos and photography.

The photography portion of the workshop is going to let you practice the concepts of flash photography, like functions of Speedlites and ETTL. Since light can be unpredictable, Jim and Dave are going to work with the class on mastering light using flash.

Camera movement, audio capture, and shot sequencing are the main points the video portion of the workshop will cover. Filmmakers use this knowledge every day as the foundation to any well-made video.
 
It’s going to be a weekend packed with learning! Head over to CanonInAction.com and use the discount code CIAMZED10 for $10 off Saturday tickets!

We’d like to congratulate Ulrich Pakker for being selected to receive the UNESCO art award for "Inspiring Peace and Humanity Through Art and Science". Ulrich is also a premier gallery member of SeattleArtists.com.

"I am honored to be receiving this UNESCO art award from Dr. Sheree Wen, U.S. National Commissioner for UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization).  It has been a great year and this is certainly the crowning glory." says Ulrich Pakker.

If you’d like any more information on the UNESCO award or on what Ulrich has been working on lately, please visit http://www.RPArt.com.

Unreliable Reality – The Where of This World
at Shiseido Gallery (Ginza, Marunouchi area)
(2014-07-18 - 2014-08-22)

“Me” is an artist collective comprised of Haruka Kojin along with Kenji Minamigawa and Hirofumi Masui, the latter two being members of the “expressive action squad” called “wah document.” Wah document’s main mission is to execute ideas for works of art collected from the public. In their first exhibition in Tokyo “Me” transform the space of Shiseido Gallery into an encounter with our unreliable realities, questioning the rules of science and our own existence, layering personal memories with sculptural contrivances which gradually displace us and call into question “where of this world” we live in. [Related Event] Gallery Talk Date: August 3(Sun) 14:00-16:00 Venue: Word Shiseido (Shiseido Bld. 9F) Admission: Free *Please refer to the official website for further details

Takehiko Inoue Interprets Gaudi’s Universe
at Mori Arts Center Gallery (Roppongi, Nogizaka area)
(2014-07-12 - 2014-09-07)

This exhibition combines the artistic worlds of Antoni Gaudi, the groundbreaking architect responsible for sites including the Sagrada Familia, Park Guell, and Casa Milà, and the manga artist Takehiko Inoue, who is known for popular works such as “Slam Dunk”, “Vagabond”, and “Real”. Inoue has illustrated Gaudi’s youth in the countryside south of Barcelona, a time when he was called by the nickname “Tonet”. Appointed by the Spanish ambassador as a project to commemorate the 400th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Japan and Spain in December 2013, Inoue, who has deep ties with Spain, recreates Gaudi’s universe. Inoue’s works are also displayed along with drawings, furniture, models, and materials related to Gaudi. [Image: Takehiko Inoue “Tonet” (2013) ©I.T.Planning]

Windows
at Diesel Art Gallery (Shibuya area)
(2014-02-21 - 2015-02-15)

Diesel Shibuya has recently launched a new initiative as part of its Home Collection inviting installations by architects and interior designers to be exhibited within the store. For the 4th version of this project, the innovative installation “Windows” has been created by Kimihiko Okada, an award winning architect working across a variety of fields.

“Unseen Daily Life” (Part1)
at Tokyo Wonder Site, Hongo (Chiyoda area)
(2014-08-02 - 2014-09-28)

Tokyo Wonder Site features a two part exhibition of work from 6 Japanese and international artists all incorporating familiar everyday materials into their works. In the first volume of this program showcases the work of 3 artists who have recently joined TWS’s residency programs in Stockholm, Seoul and Tokyo, evolving new vantage points through their encounter with the culture of their host city and their daily living within this. The exhibition will also be accompanied by workshops which offer up the creative possibilities of environmental sound and everyday objects. (admission free/reservation required)

Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague rules in favour of investors in defunct Russian oil giant Yukos, 10 years after it was forced into bankrupcy.

• Mikhail Khodorkovsky issues statement
• Victory for Yukos shareholders
  
• Yukos shareholders: We are thrilled
  
• Court: Russia was bent on bankrupting Yukos
  
• Russia likely to appeal
  
• See the ruling here
  

12.12pm BST

Shares in Rosneft, which bought many of Yukos's assets a decade ago, have fallen almost 2.8% today following the court ruling.

Rosneft shares have now fallen 14% since the end of June, as the geopolitical crisis over Ukraine escalated.

11.58am BST

Here's one of the many assets which Yukos lost when it collapsed a decade ago under the weight of Moscow's tax demands:

11.35am BST

Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the former boss of Yukos, has just issued a statement on today's court ruling.

It is with a feeling of satisfaction that I have learned about the award by the Permanent Court of Arbitration.

It is the first independent tribunal to have considered the YUKOS case in its entirety, to have examined the evidence and to have heard witness testimony. The findings were predictable for any unbiased observer of the disgraceful Basmannyi travesty of justice: from beginning to end, the YUKOS case has been an instance of unabashed plundering of a successful company by a mafia with links to the State.

Former Yukos boss @khodorkovsky on Hague ruling: `It is with a feeling of satisfaction that I have learned about the award.'

Former Yukos boss @khodorkovsky on Hague ruling: `It's sad the recompense will have to come from State's coffers not from pockets of Mafiosi

Former Yukos boss @khodorkovsky on Hague ruling: `I am not a party to legal proceedings and I don't seek to benefit financially from outcome

11.14am BST

Over in Israel, Yukos investor and business magnate Leonid Nevzlin says he's 'pleased' with today's verdict (as I guess one would be):

11.04am BST

Russia has 180 days to meet the ruling, according to lawyers representing the Yukos shareholders. After 15 January 2015, interest will start racking up.

Just out of interest, what exactly would be the Russian state property in other countries Yukos could seize if Russia doesn't pay?

11.01am BST

Russia had already pledged to fight the ruling, Associated Press reports:

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, commenting earlier Monday, said Russia will be appealing the ruling.

"Authorities who are representing Russia in this trial will use all possible legal means to defend their position," Lavrov said.

10.57am BST

Yukos's corporate structure does look rather complex, including a swathe of holding companies and international divisions (there's a blurry chart at the end of the ruling)

Also, here's a Yukos company structure from deep within the arbitration rulings. pic.twitter.com/wlbBENADB4

Judging by the company's complex corporate structure, I'm not surprised the tax structure was complicated at #Yukos

10.53am BST

I've just recropped the images in the last entry, so refreshing your browser should make them a little clearer.

10.46am BST

Having made its ruling, the Permanent Court had to determine a fair value for Yukos's assets today.

It decided that Yukos did bear some responsibility for its demise, and cut the total payout by 25%.

10.42am BST

Vladimir Putin may have accidentally handed Yukos the proof it needed that the sale of its assets to Rosneft was politically motivated.

Speaking at a press conference in 2004, the Russian president told reporters that the state was "looking after its own interests", having seen valuable assets snaffled on the cheap in Russia's 1990s privatisation drive.

From Yukos ruling - tribunal ready to accept Rosneft wasn't acting for Russian state... then Putin himself ruins it pic.twitter.com/UTHTJT6XJe

10.32am BST

In their defence, the Russian authorities had insisted that Yukos had "fraudulently evaded billions of dollars of tax" between 1999 to 2004, by setting up 'sham trading shells' in Russian regions with lower tax rates.

They accused its oligarch owners of building their investments through "illegal acts and bad faith" conduct.

Yukos abused the low-tax region program, and evaded Russian corporate profit tax in violation of the bad faith taxpayer doctrine, by implementing what Yukos referred to internally as its tax optimization scheme.

Pursuant to this scheme, Yukos established dozens of sham trading companies in low-tax regions that had no business purpose, and then shifted its own profits to the sham trading companies. These sham trading shells had no genuine economic substance and served no purpose other than to reduce Yukos tax liabilities, an arrangement described by Yukos own lawyers as constituting unlawful tax evasion.

After having now traversed, at some length, the treatment of Yukos by Russian tax authorities, the bailiffs and the courts, and having considered the totality of the evidence, especially the VAT evidence, the Tribunal has concluded that the primary objective of the Russian Federation was not to collect taxes but rather to bankrupt Yukos and appropriate its valuable assets.

10.16am BST

Today's ruling has some fascinating detail about the intersection between politics and business in Vladimir Putin's Russia.

On page 62, for example, former chief economic advisor Andrei Illarionov told the court that Yukos was "one of the most dangerous enemies for those who did not want to see Russia a free country.

According to Dr. Illarionov, the arrests of Messrs. Khodorkovsky and [chief executive] Lebedev and the dismantlement of Yukos were politically and economically motivated.

Yukos intended merger with Western oil majors was seen as a national betrayal and a hurdle to expropriation. Dr. Illarionov describes the 19 February 2003 meeting at the Kremlin between President Putin and business leaders, at which Mr. Khodorkovsky made a presentation on corruption, to which President Putin responded that everyone knew how various assets, including Yukos, were acquired, and told Mr. Khodorkovsky: I return the ball in your corner.

10.02am BST

Tim Osborne, director of GML (the Yukos shareholders), says:

We are thrilled with this decision, although we know it is not the end of the road.

It is unlikely Mr. Khodorkovsky will benefit financially from the verdict, as he contends he handed over his stake to a partner, Leonid B. Nevzlin, who lives in Israel, in 2005.

9.58am BST

The victorious Yukos investors are holding a press conference in London now. My colleague Jennifer Rankin is tweeting from it:

Hague court rules against Russia in Yukos case, seized assets via "a devious and calculated expropriation".

Judgement finds Russian courts "bent to the will" of Russian authorities. #yukos

yukos compensation ruling could spell trouble for bp, shareholders considering its assets, "nobody is safe" says head s-h group.

9.54am BST

Good day for ousted Russian billionaires....Former Yukos s/h wins $50bln in damages against Russia

9.53am BST

The court ruling over the Yukos case is online here.

It's over 600 pages long. The size of the compensation payment comes on page 521.

Tthe Tribunal has decided to award Claimants post- award interest on the damages of USD 50,020,867,798 for which the Tribunal has found Respondent liable.

9.47am BST

Rosneft, which ended up with many of Yukos's energy assets after the company collapsed, is denying that any wrongdoing took place.

It doesn't expect to pay any of the $50bn compensation claim.

9.38am BST

Reuters is snapping more details of the Yukos ruling:

9.36am BST

Russia has been ordered to pay $50bn to the shareholders in former oil company Yukos, to compensate them for the loss of valuable assets a decade ago.

Yukos award v Russia $50bn, unanimous ruling, 20 times largest ever arb award in Hague.. running now

9.10am BST

Michael Heise, chief economist of fund manager Allianz, is worried about the deteriorating relations between Russia and the West, saying "the situation is very dangerous."

"An escalation carries large risks for the economy.

"There is a big risk from further sanctions although one has to accept that clear (diplomatic) signals are needed."

If there has been any good news in the Ukraine conflict or in Gaza I missed it, but while the rubble has weakened somewhat over the last week, even the Turkish Lira has held up.

That speaks to the dominance of the risk-friendly global backdrop as low US rates and continued, albeit modest global growth trump almost anything else.

European leaders are reportedly considering further restrictions on Russias access to capital markets and this is likely to remain a talking point this week.

8.42am BST

Russia's MICEX stock index has dropped by 0.75% so far today, as the prospect of new sanctions loom over Moscow.

8.39am BST

It's a somewhat subdued start to trading in Europe, where the main stock markets have all risen a little.

In London, the FTSE 100 has gained 15 points or 0.25%, led by consumer giant Reckitt Benckiser (+3%) which announced plans to spin off its pharmaceuticals arm this morning.

8.34am BST

Shares in Ryanair have jumped 5% in early trading, as traders welcome its raised profit forecasts.

8.24am BST

Budget airline Ryanair has added to the optimism in the markets this morning, by hiking its profit forecasts.

After hitting investors with some nasty profit warnings in 2013, CEO Michael O'Leary was on more comfortable ground this morning.

"We are overrun with growth offers from primary European airports whose incumbent flag and regional carriers continue to cut capacity and traffic,"

8.12am BST

The Nikkei's rally was also driven by hopes that Japanese car makers will report decent earnings this week.

Ryota Sakagami, chief equity strategist at SMBC Nikko Securities, predicted that the index could "quickly push toward 16,000 [points], possibly by the end of August."

8.01am BST

Japan's stock market has hit its highest level since late January, driven by economic optimism and the prospect of decent company earnings.

The Nikkei has closed at 15529, up 71 points, a point not reached since late January.

Asia late... Shanghai up 2.4% HK up 1.1% Nikkei ends 0.5% up ASX down 0.1% in rolling close Taiex ends down 0.2% Sensex down 0.5% $NIK $HSI

"Geopolitical concerns remain as the conflict in the Ukraine does not look like it will end soon, but there is some relief spreading that the impact will be contained,"

8.01am BST

Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of the financial markets, the world economy, business and the eurozone.

Glaxo has opened up the possibility of breaking up the company and is open to spinning off consumer healthcare unit as standalone company

On a similar note Reckitt Benckiser is to pursue a demerger of pharmaceuticals unit with a separate UK listing Continue reading...

We may recoil from the idea of housing developments with separate entrances for the rich and the rest, but they are just a symptom of a much bigger problem in London

Like business class air travel or first class train carriages, apartment blocks with backstreet entrances - so-called "poor doors" - and worse facilities for residents of their cheaper flats hit a raw nerve. In London, they set in stone - or, more likely, steel and glass - the very standard class status of some Londoners compared with others, many of whom don't actually live in London at all and are just passing through.

But while their symbolism repels, the sobering fact is that "poor doors" at least open onto homes you don't need to be a millionaire to inhabit. They are the least endearing aspect of trade-offs between private developers and London boroughs and mayors, which have long been vital for augmenting the inadequate supply of homes that Londoners on low and even middle incomes can afford.
Continue reading...

Tulisa Contostavlos has said she contemplated taking her own life after falling victim to a tabloid cocaine sting which led to a trial that collapsed last week.

In a BBC3 documentary being aired on Monday night called Tulisa: the Price of Fame, the 26-year-old X Factor judge said she had suffered depression and had taken a potentially lethal concoction of painkillers and alcohol after an elaborate sting by the Sun on Sunday reporter Mazher Mahmood last year. Continue reading...

If we were still naming wars as colourfully as they used to the War of the Spanish Succession, the War of Jenkins' Ear we should call the one that began 100 years ago today the War of Unintended Consequences.

No one, certainly, intended to create what Winston Churchill would later call a "crippled, broken world". Austria-Hungary, which declared war on 28 July 1914, merely wanted to dismember Serbia, where irredentists were stirring up ethnic Serbs in Austrian territory. Continue reading...

Tom Lawton is an inventor, and a father. He has already fathered two children Barney and Rufus. And he has already invented a few inventions, like a recordable alarm clock, a 360-degree lens for a smartphone camera, and honking handlebars ("handlebars that honk", he explains) for a child's scooter.

Now he's inventing a boat. Well, boats have been invented obviously. He gets that. But then he's making some modifications, turning it into a houseboat/floating experimental test bed I'm not sure what the hell it is, to be honest. Tom's head, turned inside out, floating on the water, something like that? They're calling it Tom's Fantastic Floating Home (Sunday, Channel 4). Continue reading...

• 'Grey Lady' editorial calls for dropping of 44-year ban
  
• Rating of drug with LSD and heroin 'an increasing absurdity'

One of Americas most influential newspapers, the New York Times, on Sunday called the federal ban on marijuana a laughing stock and urged the White House to drop the law and give permission for states to legalise the drug.

Marijuana for recreational use went on sale in Colorado on 1 January; Washington state followed suit this month and Oregon and Alaska will vote on the issue in the November midterm elections. Earlier this month New York became the 23rd state, along with the District of Columbia, to allow cannabis for medical use. Continue reading...

For once Europes greens and securocrats can join forces by reducing the EUs dependence on imports of Russian gas

Europe has a Russia problem, as Herman van Rompuy, the president of the European council, recognised on Friday by sending out the latest draft of the proposed sanctions. Nick Clegg is right that Russia should lose the 2018 World Cup, but that is Fifas call. In those areas where it has clout, the EU is going to be tougher than most predict. The shooting down of MH17 has dramatised Russias role, and made it harder for European leaders to duck the consequences.

Astonishingly, the MH17 incident does not appear to have even interrupted Russian arms supplies to the Ukrainian rebels. Petro Poroshenko, Ukraines new president, believes Russia is continuing to supply weaponry and according to western intelligence sources, he is right. Whether Putin wants to annex the Donbas Luhansk and Donetsk as well as Crimea is moot. Some argue that he sees Russian interests as equally well served by a fractured and weak Ukraine. Whatever the objective, the means are clear and hard to misinterpret. Continue reading...

One of Liberia's most high-profile doctors has died of Ebola, a government official said on Sunday, and a second US healthcare worker has been infected in what the World Health Organisation (WHO) is calling the largest outbreak ever recorded of the disease.

Dr Samuel Brisbane is the first Liberian doctor to die in an outbreak, which the WHO says has killed 129 people in the west African nation. A Ugandan doctor working in the country died this month. Continue reading...

WINNER

No Walls Between Us, Pablo Munoz, Vancouver (British Colombia)

FINALIST

Round dance on Parliament Hill, Fabric, Acrylic, Sharpie, 2013, Roxanne Martin, Sault Ste. Marie (Ontario)

FINALIST

Sans titre, Matthilde Cing-Mars, Trois-Rivières (Québec)

FINALIST

United, Leo Samilo, Surrey (British Colombia)

FINALIST

Untold truth, Bogdan Salii, Toronto (Ontario)

FINALIST

Complexity, Brianne Walker, Windsor (Ontario)

The Michaëlle Jean Foundation, the AGO and WorldPride Toronto 2014 are delighted to announce the winner of the 4th Wall Youth Solidarity Project online vote.

Selected as winner by more than a thousand Canadians of all ages from across the country, Vancouver-based artist and rights activist Pablo Muñoz receives $1,000 and will work with a seasoned public art practitioner to see his art mounted on the western wall of the AGO.

His work, No Walls Between Us, highlights the unique experiences of migrant and racialized LGBT youth. It was one of six pieces of art chosen by a jury to represent the theme of “Solidarity with Canada’s Two-Spirited and LGBTTIQQ Communities,” in an unprecedented exhibition celebrating WorldPride Toronto 2014.

On view at the AGO between June 22 and Nov. 15, 2014, the Youth Solidarity Exhibition will inspire Canadians to work together to promote safe, inclusive and healthy communities for Two-Spirited and LGBTTIQQ youth throughout the country. The other young artists featured in the exhibition are:

• Mathilde Cinq-Mars, a multidisciplinary visual and animation artist from Trois-Rivière, Que. who has a BA from the University of Strasbourg;
• Roxanne Martin, a digital artist from Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., and the great-niece of Cecil Youngfox, a trailblazing Anishinaabe painter and gay rights activist;
• Bogdan Salii, a passionate visual artist from Toronto, Ont., who recently immigrated to Canada from Ukraine to pursue his dream of transforming his love for art into a lucrative business;
• Leo Samilo, a nascent artist and recent high school graduate from Surrey, B.C’s Filipino community; and
• Brianne Walker, a 17-year-old human rights activist from Windsor, Ont., and aspiring visual artist and filmmaker.

This project is actively supported by more than 55 human rights, faith-based, arts, newcomer, Aboriginal and health organizations across Canada. For a full list of project collaborators, click here.

About Pablo Muño
Colombian-born Pablo Muñoz arrived to Canada as a refugee in 2000. Today, he is an accomplished citizen whose artistic work extends from painting, design, performance art and writing, and his community work centers around immigrant and refugee youth issues, intersections of queer and racialized identities, and solidarity with indigenous communities. Over the past year, Pablo worked on the Make it Count campaign — a project that created community dialogues across the province addressing challenges faced by migrant youth. He is currently working as a story editor on a documentary telling the story of queer refugees coming into Canada. He also is a member of the Vancouver Foundation’s Education Granting Committee and the City of Vancouver’s Youth Advisory Committee.

The Youth Solidarity Project is funded in part by StreetARToronto, a program of the City of Toronto, as well as the K.M. Hunter Foundation.

About the 4th Wall program
In theatre, the “fourth wall” is an imaginary screen that creates a virtual separation between actor and spectator. There are many ways to cross the fourth wall and to make the invisible visible. The Michaëlle Jean Foundation chose to do so through the 4th Wall: Make the Invisible Visible program, in collaboration with several prestigious Canadian museums and art galleries. The goal is to invite young creators to break down the invisible walls that create solitudes between individuals and communities across Canada, by opening the doors of our major cultural institutions to emerging creators from marginalized backgrounds. The Foundation offers museum and art gallery space and bursaries to youth from disadvantaged backgrounds, often cut off from museums, so that they can produce original art that conveys their experiences, ideas and challenges. On display for the public to see, their work provokes debate and builds solutions. The first 4th Wall exhibition was launched on Feb. 5, 2014, at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, to mark Black History Month in collaboration with FRO Foundation.

Click to play:

Download 81.4 MB MP3

Recorded: March 26, 2014, at the Art Gallery of Ontario
Duration: 01:29:05

In this podcast, hear AGO artist-in-residence Jim Munroe in conversation with artists Mark Connery, a Toronto-based comic and zine artist, and Jonathan Mak, a Toronto-based game developer, about their work, indie culture and how playfulness factors into their practices.

Jonathan Mak is a Toronto-based game developer working under the title Queasy Games. He recently collaborated with I am Robot and Proud (aka Shaw-Han Liem), a Toronto-based electronic music artist, on Sound Shapes for PS Vita and PlayStation®3. Sound Shapes features music by Beck, Deadmau5 and Jim Guthrie and graphics by Capy, Superbrothers, Pixeljam and Pyramid Attack.

Mark Connery is a Toronto-based producer of comics and zines. He is most known for the mini-comic adventures of Rudy. In addition to his own publications, his work has appeared in many group exhibitions and has been published in Exclaim!, Kiss Machine and in many small-press lit zines in Toronto and Vancouver.

APPLICATION NOW CLOSED

Eyebeam and Shapeways are pleased to announce the first Computational Fashion Master Class. In this ten-day intensive course, participants will:

call-for-participants" target="_blank">read more

This year the AGO celebrates moms with special programming all over the Gallery. Here’s what’s on:

Maternité au lit jaune, or Madame Fontaine et le petit Noël, 1896. Denis, Maurice. Oil and graphite on canvas. 44.6 x 50.9 cm. Framed: 64.8 x 70 cm. Gift of Mrs. Judy Simmonds, 2008. © 2014 Art Gallery of Ontario.

Mother’s Day brunch
Edit, May 9, 4 p.m. SOLD OUT
On Sunday, May 11, FRANK restaurant celebrates moms with a special Mother’s Day brunch buffet. The menu features an enormous selection of offerings including traditional breakfast fare, a seafood station, a carving station featuring roasted AAA tenderloin, a la carte [check accents] menus, kid-friendly options and more. Brunch will be served from 11 a.m to 3:30 p.m. at a cost of $75 per adult. Children ages 6-10 can dine for $20 and children under 5 eat for $12. Reservations are encouraged as space is limited. Please call 416-979-6688 or visit FRANK online for more information.

Mother’s Day tea at The Grange (members only)
Enjoy Mother’s Day with a deliciously modern version of a Victorian tea on May 11 (seatings at 11:30 a.m. and 1:15 and 3:15 p.m.). Members are invited to enjoy a wide variety of tea along with delicious scones, croissants, sandwiches, assorted desserts and a few surprises. Book tickets for this exclusive Mother’s Day event and spend the rest of the day exploring the Collection at the Gallery.

Mother’s Day card-making at AGO Family Sundays
Part of our Family Sunday programming on Sunday, May 4, includes card-making! Get ready to cut, paste and draw something special for Mom.

Mother’s Day gift ideas

Our shopAGO team has selected a range of items perfect for Mom. See some of them below and visit the shop’s special Mother’s Day display for more options.

Design Ideas

Soapstones – 9

IMM Living

Duck Cake Plate Holder - 54

IMM Living

Swallow Wings Ring Holder - 19

Marina Babic

Small Vine Silver Earrings - 175 Small Vine Silver/Gold Earrings - 195

Schleeh Design

Red Tail Wood Vase - 1,600

Atelier Trema

Assorted Ceramic Pears - 26

IMM Living

Duck Body Container - 27

Uta Ottmar

Pebble Earrings - 50

Eyebeam Art + Technology Center is looking for a part time (3 days/week) Communications Director to start August 1. Eyebeam Art + Technology Center is the nation's leading center for art and technology, offering artists and creative technologists paid residences in its Chelsea facility, in addition to a wide range of public programs.  

We are looking for a creative self-starter who can work closely with our staff and artists to tell the Eyebeam story. The candidate should be able to engage with audiences through both traditional and social media. Great writing skills, a good design sense, an ability to think strategically, and a collaborative approach are essential.  

Other criteria include: 

Contact E-mail: 

calls/communications-director" target="_blank">read more

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Eye To Eyebeam is a series on Eyebeam's residents and fellows. It includes interviews, photos, and other news and is authored by Eyebeam intern Katherine DiPierro. These interactive posts offer visitors the opportunity to learn more about Eyebeam's diverse community of creative practitioners.

Each week, you'll see interviews profiling individual Eyebeamers. Artists who have already engaged in conversation about their projects include:

read more

I wonder if in some sense the New Wilderness is this society we live in where comfortable, former boundaries still exist, but they are permeable. They exist in ways that are not settled and have no assurance that they will live on into the future.

-Ellen Waterman, in dialogue with Tyler Kinnear

With the financial support of the Rio Tinto Alcan Performing Arts Award, Music 2014, the Western Front produced Music from the New Wilderness, a production consisting of new compositions that integrate pre-recorded material, including an archival wax cylinder recording and recent field recordings.  Music scholar Ellen Waterman and doctoral student Tyler Kinnear attended the production several times.  At the invitation of DB Boyko (who played a major role as director/curator of Music from the New Wilderness), Ellen and Tyler scheduled time to formally discuss their experiences.  Prior to conversation, they exchanged a series of questions to guide their discussion (see “Questions”).  Topics addressed during the dialogue included stylistic features of works on the program and larger concepts, such as wilderness, technology, and genre.  Tyler created the following audio work using excerpts from the meeting and field recordings he made in Vancouver and on Vancouver Island.  The recordings used in the piece are as follows:

- Dialogue at Ellen’s brother’s house, with Gypsy the dog accompanying us (East Vancouver)

- Tide pool at Third Beach (Stanley Park)

- Boardwalk in Pacific Rim National Park (Vancouver Island)

- At the base of the University Boulevard Water Feature (UBC)

- Contact microphone affixed to Tyler’s apartment window on a rainy day (Kitsilano)

- Garden near the Faculty of Land and Foods Systems (UBC)

CLICK HERE for Video Excerpt of the performance of Songs of Love and Despair

 ___________________________________________________

Questions

How might we position these works in relation to a broader history of experimental music?

In what ways do these works engage the concept of wilderness?  (What is “new” here?)

What genre expectations are foiled and/or fulfilled by this concert?

What contextualization does the audience need in order to be let into these works?

Amidst recent demands for expansion here in British Columbia in natural resources export (pipelines, coal terminals, etc.), do these works stimulate discussion around some of the cultural, environmental, and political aspects (perhaps also anxieties) of this moment in BC history?  More directly, can such works raise environmental awareness?

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Bios

Ellen Waterman is both a music scholar and a flutist specializing in creative improvisation and contemporary music. She is currently Dean of the School of Music at Memorial University of Newfoundland where she also teaches in ethnomusicology.

Tyler Kinnear is a Ph.D. Candidate in Musicology at the University of British Columbia. His research focuses on conceptions of nature in music of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

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Music from the New Wilderness Program

• when you’re looking for something, all you can find is yourself (2014)
  
• Multi-channel audio
• Composition: Adam Basanta
• Interviews, research, and dramaturgy: Jennifer Schine

• Conversations with Billy Proctor (2014)
• Sound Installation: Jennifer Schine

• The Senses of Belonging (2014)
• Piano, voice, strings
• Composition/performance: Alicia Hansen
• String quartet: Peggy Lee, Jean René, Jesse Zubot, Joshua Zubot

• Objects from a Landscore (2014)
• Multi-channel projection
• Composition: Christian Calon

• Songs of Love and Despair: The Songs of Therese and the Potato Gardens Band (2014)
• String quartet and archival recordings
• Composition: Jesse Zubot
• String quartet: Peggy Lee, Jean René, Jesse Zubot, Joshua Zubot
• Visuals: Krista Belle Stewart

Grand Luxe Hall, Western Front

FREE

Have you ever heard a drawing before? Come and draw your own score and hear it played by international pianist Lisa Ullén. Ullén collaborates with artist Kathleen Taylor to guide this hands-on event to create instant graphic scores from drawings and doodles. No experience required.

Scoring Sound is one of forty five FREE drawing workshops for Vancouver Draw Down, an annual event that celebrates creativity. Now in its 5th year, the Vancouver Draw Down is a city-wide day of drawing that challenges commonplace ideas about what drawing is and what it can do. It’s time to spark the right side of your brain and connect with the innovative and imaginative recesses of your mind. This is about process and pleasure, not about technical skill. That’s why everyone -including you- can participate!

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Stolkholm-based composer and pianist Lisa Ullén visits the Western Front as Musician-In-Residence for the month of June. She is one of the key artists on the Swedish jazz and improvisation scene with several projects and constellations. Lisa has many international collaborations, and has been touring in Europe and the USA. Her latest and long awaited solo album Catachresis was released in May 2011 (NUSCOPE recordings, US). Ullén works in the realms of jazz, experimental, and contemporary music as a pianist, improviser, composer, and arranger. As part of her residency, Ullén will work in collaboration with local musicians and present a solo piano concert.

Kathleen Taylor is an artist and writer based in Vancouver. Focused in drawing that approaches sculpture and painting, her current practice is centered around paper and pathos. She received her BFA from Emily Carr University in 2013, and recently participated in the exhibition “The Hatchery” at Avenue gallery.

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Co-presented with the Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre and Coastal Jazz & Blues with support from the Swedish Arts Grants Committee