Category: ART

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R.I.P. Nam Jun Paik

Nam Jun Paik passed away at his Miami home at 8:00pm EST on Sunday, January 29th, 2006 while being watched by his Japanese-American wife Shigeko Kubota and a nurse. “Paik brought to the world many questions and warnings about the passive acceptance of television.”(Via Korea Times)

Nam Jun PaikNam Jun Paik

He was a very funny man who spoke five languages all very badly.

Cinema Metaphysics No2, 3 &4 by Nam June Paik and Jud Yalkut
“Reminiscent of Beckett’s theater, as well as the minimal movements of 1960s avant-garde dance, Cinéma Metaphysique is a study in gesture and stillness, noise and silence.” (more works at
Electronix Art Intermix)

Video Flag and more images here.

Here is a comprehensive tribute from Netlex France.
Something from thriftstore here.
A blog from Korea shows this beautiful image of TV cello and this TV (Magnet 65) from Joseph.

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Amadeus and Marcos Baghdatis

You were simply amazing!Marcos Baghdatis Marcos Baghdatis

A little miracle and joy spread to the world with the appearance of a young Tennis player from Cyprus.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Morzart
Birthday (250 years old) of Mozart googled and rearranged for your eyes and not for wrapping chocolates in order that Tom Hanks could say the words some of us detest.

Piano Sonata (Listen)
Don Giovanni was composed in Prague, read more at Mozart Praha 2006

Quiz: Can you tell Mozart from Salieri? Listen here.

Skull mystery and his diary

“Author Mario Livio has studied the relationship between art and mathematics. He tells Michele Norris most of us are attracted to symmetry spiced by some elements of surprise… and that combo is the essence of Mozart’s music.” (from NPR)

Glenn Gould playing Mozart? Found one article on this subject and samples to listen here.
“It is precisely Gould’s wrong-headedness that makes his Mozart so interesting; that, and a keyboard technique that was the envy of six continents. Gould’s avowed dislike of Mozart’s music is impossible to fathom in view of the obvious intelligence and hard work that went into these performances.”

(I think G. G was jealous and competitive with Mozart.)

Mozart had Sun Aquarius Moon in Sagittarius (same as Yoko Ono)
“you have the qualities of an uncompromising intellectual; honesty, strong opinions, and a broad viewpoint on world affairs. … are impulsively quick to act on … ideas, advanced and revolutionary as they may sometimes be. … believe in getting things done, and done in shortest possible time, employing the most innovative methods … can devise.” from here.
His chart

Auden on Mozart: Metalogue to the Magic Flute (Kyle Gann’s Postclassic)

Mozart and films and the best of all was by Ingmar Bergman’s The Magic Flute.

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First Love – Wislawa Szymborska

Wislawa Szymborska wislawa2

Poem by Wislawa Szymborska

First Love

They say
the first love’s most important.
That’s very romantic,
but not my experience.

Something was and wasn’t there between us,
something went on and went away.

My hands never tremble
when I stumble on silly keepsakes
and a sheaf of letters tied with string
— not even ribbon.

Our only meeting after years:
two chairs chatting
at a chilly table.

Other loves
still breathe deep inside me.
This one’s too short of breath even to sigh.

Yet just exactly as it is,
it does what the others still can’t manage:
unremembered,
not even seen in dreams,
it introduces me to death.

Translated from the Polish by
Clare Cavanagh and Stanislaw Baranczak
Monologue of a Dog
Harcourt, Inc.

More on Wislawa here, and here

Jeannette Winterson selected THE BALL: As long as nothing can be known for sure , a poem by W. Szymborska for her Latest Poem section in her homepage.

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Princess Diaries – Sasha Cohen and Shahzia Sikander

Romeo and Juliet at Marshall 2005

Sasha CohenIndian Miniture

Sasha Cohen won her first US Gold last night! The image on the right
is by Shahzia Sikander, see more at Crownpoint Press and here.

The two elegant, exquisite lolitas or (Princesses) are growing and maturing as artists – both naturally gifted one with pen and brushes, another with skates on ice. Both are endowed with genuine creative spirits.

Sasha is a Scorpio Rat “This person is generally lithe and agile as well as quick-spirited. He or she will probably enjoy all manner of graceful sport and prove able at competitive games”

Off ice Sasha takes cooking lessons, designs clothes and talks to her fans from her website.

Reflect Sikander Reflect by S. Sikander

Shahzia was born in Lahore, Pakistan and graduated from Rhode Island School of Design.
“IB: You began your interrogation of miniature painting in the late 1980s in Pakistan at the National College of Art in Lahore. What was your initial interest in working this way?
SS: I elected to work in the miniature format in 1988 during my second semester of foundation year at school. The choice itself was an act of defiance. At that time, there was no interest in the miniature painting department ” (via)

“Shahzia Sikander: No. I’m interested in the very fine play with tradition, but the intention was not to subvert or to reinvent, but definitely to take it on, to learn the language before you can talk.”
(Via A Conversation with Shirin Neshat and Shahzia Sikander)

Another Princess, Chelsea was spotted in India.
Why Chelsea Clinton visited Rajasthan? (via 3quarksdaily)
Margaret Cho visited India too, read her blog and see the pictures.

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To Live in China – Yu Hua and Lu Xun

High price to pay for China’s wealth reads this headline.
China is changing and the city people are abandoning bicycles for cars these days. Chinese automaker Geely plans to move aggressively to U.S. market by 2008.

Bikers byZhang Hongtu Zhang Hongtu or Mr Momao

Zhang Hongtu whose portrait of Mao’s last supper was featured last year when Jung Chang’s Mao book was released.

Picked up Yu Hua’s To Live from the library. It is a slim book for an epic story that was adapted to an award winning film with the same title by Zhang Yimou. Unlike the huge book on Mao by Jung Chang, Yu Hua’s light book was easy to carry on my bike. (The spouse had just finished reading Mao Tse Tung, since then he never stopped talking about Mao’s atrocity and monstrous acts on his people. He was a Sun Emperor who scorched everyone who came close to him. )

The differences of the novel and film adaptation are discussed from this review.

Film review “To Live’ as allegory of historical discourse” and this page with more photos and reviews.

A conversation with Yu Hua

This web page on Lu Xun was bookmarked about a week ago and the fate has it his name got repeatedly mentioned in the afterword section of Yu Hua’s To Live and also from the conversation from the above link.
Lu Xun wikipedia page is here.

Update: just stumbled upon on this review of Zhang Yimou’s new film “Riding Along for Thousand Miles” by Rob Smith. Zhang wrote this film for Takakura Ken a 74 years old veteran of Japanese cinema known in the west for the movie “The Yakuza” with Robert Mitchum.

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Louis Braille at Google

Google in braille in black and white

Braille A google braille

Google celebrated the birthday of Louis Braille yesterday (Jan 4).

Braille B google braille

Post a L’aveugle from a French blog. (More faithful to google original).

The Gift from a Blind Poet
“One day Cartier-Bresson received a telephone call from the writer JL Borges, who wished to know whether he would be willing to accept a prize for which Borges wanted to nominate him.

The prize was offered by a rich woman who lived in Sicily. It was for artists of all kinds. What distinguished this prize from most others was that it was the previous prize winner who nominated, after two years, the next one. And today Borges wanted to give the prize to Cartier -Bresson. Why me? he asked. Because I am blind, said Borges, and I want to give it to you in recognition of your eyes.

“Cartier-Bresson felt he could not refuse Borges and so he traveled to Palermo for the award ceremony. There he was put up in a highly reputed old hotel. Its name, or something about it, seemed familiar to him. Finally he found out why. It was the hotel his parents had gone to on their honeymoon. He was born nine months later.In this same hotel, where he was lodged because his eyes had won a prize, he had been conceived” (via zonezero)

Riddle of Poetry (J.L. Borges)

Braille t shirt is $37.00
(No braille in sight but came across a Heated bra ).

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Ake Ome Koto Yoro – 2006

Josephine Baker Calder Josephine Baker By Calder

Ake Ome Koto Yoro – continuing the tradition of snappy Japanese new year greetings I learned on this blog last year.

Mutant Eggplant New Year 2006 New Year Greetings

In pictures: Celebrations of New Year (BBC)
(From Sydney and other cities around the world)
Osechi – Japanese New Years feast for your eyes.

Mark Morris Mark Morris image source design by Maira Kalman
“Four Saints, Three Acts,” by Gertrude Stein

Gong Li celebrated her birthday yesterday.
Gong Li is a Capricorn/Snake like Mao Tse Tung, Martin Luther King and Mohamed Ali. They are big people with presence.
Matisse and Paul Bowles were also born on Dec 31.

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Celebrate Life with Louise Bourgeois – Dec 25, 2005

Happy Birthday!
Louise Bourgeois is 94 years old today. Her rap was a big hit among my friends when we celebrated her birthday last year.

Passionate LouiseLouis Bourgeois (via)

From Cut in Two:
A Conversation Between Louise Bourgeois and Cheryl Kaplan.
“Bourgeois’ sculptures and installations use hooks, guillotines and sculptural incisions as flaying devices related to a disruptive past. Bourgeois uses events she saw as a young girl during and after WWI when large numbers of men returned from battle as amputees. Body parts are frequently the subject of her work. ”

The Walters Art Museum and the Contemporary Museum in Baltimore will present Louise Bourgeois: Femme, an exploration of the artist Louise Bourgeois’ fascination with the female form through a groundbreaking “intervention,” on view Feb. 11 through May 21, 2006 at both museums.

Louise as beast Louis Bourgeois 2
(image via)

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Characters, Destiny and Geishas

Memoirs of Cactus Geishas
Andy as Sayuri Andy Warhol & Glenn Gould and Glenn Geisha

A few days not spending time on the net and spending time cleaning up my files and came back with these two funny guys. The photos were copied from a site that most likely no longer exists.
The one on the left used to remind me of Andy Warhol and the right Glenn Gould. Both Andy and Glenn were twisted Geishas playing with the public’s minds in the last Century.

Two Characters in search of a reality One character in samurai costume has a blond wig. See these startling images, and read about this new campy Samurai film from Japan. The Japanese behave and think differently and they continue to evolve uniquely.

More strange images of old Japanese films, here in another language.

Marketing of Geisha, here.
and Geisha gone wild.
Chinese Geisha Reunion, here (or at sidebar menu under freepress)

Girl-in-kimono melon (also from sidebar menu under Melondrama)

Here is another photo from my old file, a test shot for my brand new digital camera at the a mall pre War in Iraq Christmas time 2001.
(Christmas sounds like kurushimi mas in Japanese – meaning “I am suffering”. )

Look at this image while shopping online.
Mall
Saving gas is one advantage and another one is not having to look for your car in the parking lot.

Update: Andy Warhol believed in Santa (from Guardian).

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Slogger’s Progress

Our cable is not working. Hopefully it will get fixed tomorrow.
We’ll see.
Slow Progress Slogger's Progress

We will win this war with the help of our team.
Our competent Pilgrims' Progress team marching toward its goal.
The blind leading the blind.