It's a Beautiful Day


Wikipedia - "It's a Beautiful Day was a band formed in San Francisco, California in 1967, the brainchild of violinist David LaFlamme. LaFlamme, a former soloist with the Utah Symphony Orchestra, had previously been in the band Orkustra, and unusually, played a five-string violin."
Wikipedia, It's a Beautiful Day, YouTube - It's a Beautiful Day, (1), Soapstone Mountain, Bombay Calling

Masterpieces of European Painting from Dulwich Picture Gallery


Anthony Van Dyck, Samson and Delilah, c. 1619–20
"Dulwich Picture Gallery holds one of the world's major collections of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century paintings. The exhibition, which heralds the Gallery’s bicentenary in 2011, reintroduces American audiences to this institution’s collection through an exceptional group of works, to be shown exclusively at the Frick through May 30, 2010."
The Frick Collection

Made in Abearica


"Yesterday I rendezvoused with a brother in arms at the cigar store and was handed a manila envelope enclosing a dossier pivotal to the success of the Mimeo Revolution. The scans above do not do justice to the breadth and depth of this project. It is a multi-media affair with a CD, a website, text and artwork."
Mimeo Mimeo, Abearica

Senses of Cinema


Sherman Ong, 2005
Wikipedia - "Senses of Cinema is prominent quarterly online film journal founded in 1999. Based in Melbourne, Australia, Senses of Cinema publishes work by film critics from all over the world, including critical essays, career overviews of the works of key directors, and coverage of many international festivals."
Wikipedia, Senses of Cinema, Senses of Cinema - Great Directors, Senses of Cinema - online journal

Clock DVA


Wikipedia - "Clock DVA is an Industrial music, Post-Punk and EBM group from Sheffield, England. The group was formed in 1978, with two members, Adi Newton and Steven 'Judd' Turner."
Wikipedia, My Space, last.fm, YouTube - The Hacker, Sound Mirror, Fractalize, '4 Hours' (7" 1981), NYC OVERLOAD

Peasant


Peasant Wedding, Pieter the Elder Bruegel
Wikipedia - "A peasant is an agricultural worker who subsists by working a small plot of ground. The word is derived from 15th century French païsant meaning one from the pays, or countryside, ultimately from the Latin pagus, or outlying administrative district (when the Roman Empire became Christian, these outlying districts were the last to Christianise, and this gave rise to 'pagan' as a religious term)."
Wikipedia, The Lifestyle of Medieval Peasants, W - Peasants' Revolt, Medieval Peasant, The Medieval Technology Pages - Peasant Houses

The Hobbit


Wikipedia - "The Hobbit, or There and Back Again, better known by its abbreviated title The Hobbit, is a fantasy novel and children's book by J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in a time 'Between the Dawn of Færie and the Dominion of Men', The Hobbit follows the quest of home-loving Bilbo Baggins to win a share of the treasure guarded by the dragon, Smaug."
Wikipedia

Poets House


"Poets House is a national poetry library and literary center that invites poets and the public to step into the living tradition of poetry. Our poetry resources and literary events document the wealth and diversity of modern poetry, and stimulate public dialogue on issues of poetry in culture."
Poets House, Wikipedia

Bob Dylan Musical Roots and Influences Pages


"He is a dime-store philosopher, a drugstore cowboy, a men's room conversationalist. And when he describes his young life, he declares himself dumbfounded at the spectacle. 'With my thumb out, my eyes asleep, my hat turned up an' my head turned on,' says Bob Dylan, 'I'm driftin' and learnin' new lessons.'"
Roots of Bob Dylan, 2000

Dee Dee Sharp


Wikipedia - "Dee Dee Sharp (born Dione LaRue, September 9, 1945, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States) is an American R&B singer, who began her career recording as a backing vocalist in 1961."
Wikipedia, YouTube - Mashed Potato Time, Slow Twist, Gravy( For My Mashed Potatoes)

Textile workers strike (1934)


St. Louis unemployed protest, 1934
Wikipedia - "The textile workers' strike of 1934 was the largest strike in the labor history of the United States at the time, involving 400,000 textile workers from New England, the Mid-Atlantic states and the U.S. Southern states, lasting twenty-two days. The strike's ultimate failure and the trade union's defeat left the Southeastern United States an unorganized and anti-union region for the next 50 years."
Wikipedia

Rough Trade Records


Wikipedia - "Rough Trade Records is an independent record label, based in London, United Kingdom. It was started in 1978 by Geoff Travis."
Wikipedia, Google: "Do It Yourself - The Story Of Rough Trade"

The Paris Review


"'Dear reader,' William Styron wrote in a letter in the inaugural issue, 'The Paris Review hopes to emphasize creative work—fiction and poetry—not to the exclusion of criticism, but with the aim in mind of merely removing criticism from the dominating place it holds in most literary magazines and putting it pretty much where it belongs, i.e., somewhere near the back of the book.'"
The Paris Review, (1), Wikipedia

Pierre Bismuth


Wikipedia - "Pierre Bismuth (b. 1963 in Paris) is a contemporary artist. Through efficient and often humorous gestures, Bismuth interrupts pre-established codes of reading the images and objects that pervade daily life, from headline stories in newspapers to magazine clippings from gentlemen's magazines, to even the color of the walls."
Wikipedia, Pierre Bismuth

Caterpillar


"Edited by Clayton Eshleman, Caterpillar would make many a top ten list of greatest post-WWII little magazines. Mags like Yugen, Floating Bear or J are quick hits. A cigarette break. Caterpillar is like smoking a churchill maduro."
Mimeo Mimeo

Brian Eno on media and his music


"Interview with Brian Eno on media and his music. Edited by Denise Gallant for Video West, San Francisco KQED show, 1980s. Interview by Video West. Video Synthesis effects by the Synopsis Video Synthesizer."
YouTube - Interview/Lecture. The Thing Is... An Interview, (2), (3). Imaginary Landscapes, (2), (3), (4). Constellations (77 Million Paintings), (2). Later, 2001. Music For Airports Interview. Voices. Banned Anti-War Demo in London.

Fresh Stuff from Jorge Rodriguez-Gerada in Monterrey, Mexico


"The work above by Jorge Rodriguez-Gerada was done as part of the project Seres Queridos."
Wooster Collective

Lucinda Williams


Wikipedia - "Lucinda Williams (born January 26, 1953) is an American rock, folk, and country music singer and songwriter. She recorded her first albums in 1978 and 1980 in a traditional country and blues style and received very little attention from radio, the media, or the public."
Wikipedia, Lucinda Williams, last.fm, YouTube - Passionate Kisses, Drunken Angel, Right In Time, Still I Long For Your Kiss, I Just Wanted To See You So Bad, Sweet Side, World Without Tears, Crescent City, Lake Charles, C'mon, Pineola, Overtime, Ventura, Blue, Big Red Sun Blues, Bus To Baton Rouge

Romantic poetry


The Funeral of Shelley , Louis Edouard Fournier (1889)
Wikipedia - "Romanticism largely began as a reaction against the prevailing Enlightenment ideals of the day. Inevitably, the characterization of a broad range of contemporaneous poets and poetry under the single unifying name can be viewed more as an exercise in historical compartmentalization than an attempt to capture the essence of the actual ‘movement’. Indeed, the term 'Romanticism' did not arise until the Victorian period."
Wikipedia

John Lee Hooker


Wikipedia - "John Lee Hooker (August 22, 1917 – June 21, 2001) was an American blues singer-songwriter and guitarist, born near Clarksdale, Mississippi. Hooker began his life as the son of a sharecropper, William Hooker, and rose to prominence performing his own unique style of what was originally closest to Delta blues. He developed a 'talking blues' style that was his trademark. Though similar to the early Delta blues, his music was metrically free."
Wikipedia, John Lee Hooker, YouTube - Boom boom, Beat Room - 1964, Hobo Blues, Tupelo, One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer, Rock Me Baby, I'm in the Mood, Two Songs

Czesław Słania


Wikipedia - "Czesław Słania (22 October 1921 - 17 March 2005)[1] was an accomplished postage stamp and banknote engraver. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, Słania was the most prolific of all stamp engravers, with over 1000 stamps to his credit."
Wikipedia, Collecting the Works of Czeslaw Slania, Czeslaw Slania

Exposé


Wikipedia - "Exposé is an American vocal group. Primarily consisting of lead vocalists Ann Curless, Jeanette Jurado, and Gioia Bruno, the group achieved much of their success in the late 1980s and early 1990s, becoming the first group to have four top ten hits on the Billboard Hot 100 chart from their debut album, including their 1988 #1 hit 'Seasons Change'."
Wikipedia, Exposé, YouTube - Point Of No Return, Come Go With Me, Exposed To Love (DUB MIX), Seasons Change

1939 New York World's Fair


Wikipedia - "The 1939-40 New York World's Fair, which covered the 1,216 acres of Flushing Meadows-Corona Park (also the location of the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair), was the largest world's fair of all time. Many countries around the world participated in it, and over 44 million people attended its exhibits in two seasons."
Wikipedia, 1939’s ‘World of Tomorrow’ Shaped Our Today, April 30, 1939: The Future Arrives at New York World’s Fair

Carrie Mae Weems


Untitled Outtake from The Kitchen Table Series (Lobster)
Wikipedia - "Carrie Mae Weems (born 1953) is an award winning photographer and artist. Her photographs, films, and videos have been displayed in over 50 exhibitions in the United States and abroad and focus on serious issues that face African Americans today, such as racism, gender relations, politics, and personal identity."
Wikipedia, art 21, Carrie Mae Weems, Google

Anne Sexton


Wikipedia - "Sexton is seen as the modern model of the confessional poet. Aside from her standard themes of depression, isolation, suicide, and despair, her work also encompasses issues specific to women, such as menstruation, abortion, and more broadly masturbation and adultery, before such subjects were commonly addressed in poetic discourse."
Wikipedia, Poets, YouTube - Anne Sexton at home - 1 (VOSE), Anne Sexton at home - 2 (VOSE), Rare Film Clips Of The Poet Anne Sexton

The Beauty Of Maps


"The Beauty Of Maps looks at the art of maps, their historical significance, their relevance to modern map-making, and how they shape the future of cartography. Each programme will focus on one specific map and use human stories and testimony, original sketches and artistic impressions, private journals and historic archive sources to tell its story."
BBC

SimCity


Wikipedia - "SimCity is a city-building simulation game, first released in 1989 and designed by Will Wright. SimCity was Maxis' first product, which has since been ported into various personal computers and game consoles, and spawned several sequels including SimCity 2000 in 1993, SimCity 3000 in 1999, SimCity 4 in 2003, SimCity DS, and SimCity Societies in 2007."
Wikiedia, Simcity Societies

Art*o*mat


"There are around 400 contributing artists from 10 different countries currently involved in the Art*o*mat project. We are always searching for fresh work."
Art*o*mat, A Brief History of Art Vending Machines

The Ethiopians


Wikipedia - "The Ethiopians is a ska, rocksteady, and reggae vocal group, founded by Leonard Dillon (born 9 December 1942, Port Antonio, Jamaica), Stephen Taylor and Aston Morris. The group started out recording for Clement 'Coxsone' Dodd in 1966."
Wikipedia, YouTube, (1), (2), (3), (4), (5), (6)

Max Jacob


Wikipedia - "Max Jacob (July 12, 1876 – March 5, 1944) was a French poet, painter, writer, and critic."
Wikipedia, 3 poems by Max Jacob

Summer Hours


"In 1992, I went to Paris to see some movies that weren’t turning up on these shores, at least not as quickly as I wanted them to. At the time, it meant something particular to be going to Paris to see movies. Paris meant 'cinema' and all that the term implied, as distinct from movies or film. To a certain extent, it still does. And cinema meant a response to the world, as opposed to a distraction from it, an engagement with the present and the past, historical and aesthetic—in essence, a dismantling of the barrier between the two."
Criterion, (1)

The Third & The Seventh


"A full-CG animated piece that tries to illustrate architecture art across a photographic point of view where main subjects are already-built spaces. Sometimes in an abstract way. Sometimes surreal."
Laughing Squid, The Third & The Seventh

Grounder to Buckner


"The Mets' 10th-inning comeback is capped off by Mookie Wilson's grounder that squibbed through Bill Buckner's legs and into baseball history"
MLB, W - 1986 World Series, W - Game 6, DVD In My Pants

Neil Young - Part 2


Wikipedia - "After providing the incidental music to a 1980 biopic of Hunter S. Thompson entitled Where the Buffalo Roam, Young released Hawks & Doves, a short record pieced together from sessions going back to 1974. 1981's Re-ac-tor, an electric album recorded with Crazy Horse, also included material from the 1970s."
Wikipedia, YouTube - Powderfinger, Mr Soul, My My Hey Hey Farm-Aid '85, Phoenix Festival 1996 - Hey Hey My My, Goin' Home, El Dorado (Amsterdam 1989), All Along The Watchtower (NYC) Steve Cropper, Rockin' In The Free World - Acoustic 1989, (1), Blowin' in the Wind (Uniondale, 1991), Cry, Cry, Cry, Interstate, Dead Man, Nashville, (1), Sample & Hold, Willie Nelson - Working Cowboys, Four Strong Winds

Material World


"Seven artists have been invited to transform MASS MoCA’s second and third floor galleries into a series of site-specific installations. The selected artists, Michael Beutler, Orly Genger, Tobias Putrih, Alyson Shotz, Dan Steinhilber, and collaborative team Wade Kavanaugh and Stephen B. Nguyen, are known for their innovative investigations of both space and material. Each tend to use a single, simple material in a given work."
MASS MoCA, (1)

Rainer Ganahl


"As I have done with Sigmund Freud, Lenin and Handke (his goal keeper book), I I'm kicking the book of Karl Marx to its full destruction. I don't do that out of hatred for the authors but out of a reminder that books were destroyed in the past (particular those of the firsts 3 authors). I do that also because it is quite an intense act of expression that transcends reading. The relationship between violence, destruction and (re)creation is quite challenging and provokes interesting questions that go beyond my pure will to 'just make art'."
UbuWeb

I Need That Record!


"The original idea for Record Store Day was conceived by Chris Brown, and was founded in 2007 by Eric Levin, Michael Kurtz, Carrie Colliton, Amy Dorfman, Don Van Cleave and Brian Poehner as a celebration of the unique culture surrounding over 700 independently owned record stores in the USA, and hundreds of similar stores internationally."
Record Store Day, Pitchfork

Christo and Jeanne-Claude: Remembering the Running Fence


"In 2008, the Smithsonian American Art Museum acquired the definitive record of Running Fence, Sonoma and Marin Counties, California, 1972-76, a major early work by world-renowned artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude. Running Fence, the culmination of 42 months of collaborative efforts, was 24 1/2 miles long and 18 feet high, with one end dropping down to the Pacific Ocean."
Smithsonian Institution

Erika Iris Simmons


"iri5 is an imaginative painter and sculptor who is driven by an incredible passion for self-expression through art. Her works are often noted for their unique and innovative style that focuses on recycling found materials, such as old cassettes and used books."
Erika Iris Simmons, flickr

Sir James George Frazer


J.M.W. Turner
Wikipedia - "Sir James George Frazer (1 January 1854, Glasgow, Scotland – 7 May 1941, Cambridge), was a Scottish social anthropologist influential in the early stages of the modern studies of mythology and comparative religion. His most famous work, The Golden Bough (1890), documents and details similar magical and religious beliefs across the globe."
Wikipedia, The Golden Bough, YouTube

Roy Orbison


Wikipedia - "Roy Kelton Orbison (April 23, 1936 – December 6, 1988) was an American singer-songwriter and musician, well known for his distinctive, powerful voice, complex compositions, and dark emotional ballads. Orbison grew up in Texas and began singing in a rockabilly / country & western band in high school until he was signed by Sun Records in Memphis."
Wikipedia, last.fm, YouTube - Oh Pretty Woman (1964), Blue Bayou, In Dreams, It's Over, Running Scared, Crying, Goodnight

Hollow Earth


Wikipedia - "According to the Hollow Earth hypothesis, the planet Earth is either wholly hollow or otherwise contains a substantial interior space. The hypothesis has long been contradicted by overwhelming observational evidence, as well as by the modern understanding of planet formation; the scientific community has dismissed the notion since at least the late 18th century."
Wikipedia

Beat Hotel


Journalists, cameramen and fashion designers relax in the Beat Hotel in 1960
Wikipedia - "The Beat Hotel was a small, run-down hotel of 42 rooms at 9 Rue Gît-le-Cœur in the Latin Quarter of Paris, notable chiefly as a residence for members of the Beat poetry movement of the mid-20th century."
Wikipedia, The Beat Hotel, Gallery Package - The Beat Hotel, The Beat Hotel. Ginsberg, Burroughs, and Corso in Paris, 1958-1963, YouTube - The Beat Hotel, The Beat Generation (Part 1), The Beat Generation (Part 2)

Francisco Goya


Third of May, 1808
Wikipedia - "Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (30 March 1746 – 16 April 1828) was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker regarded both as the last of the Old Masters and as the first of the moderns. Goya was a court painter to the Spanish Crown and a chronicler of history. The subversive and subjective element in his art, as well as his bold handling of paint, provided a model for the work of later generations of artists, notably Manet and Picasso."
Wikipedia, WebMuseum, Met Museum, Francisco Goya, YouTube

New York Daily Photo


Enchanted April
"New York City - a place of diversity. Visit a daily photo blog of the timely, the timeless, the classic, the unexpected and the hidden gems by a long time resident who shares his love of New York."
New York Daily Photo

Drone music


Wikipedia - "Drone music is a minimalist musical style that emphasizes the use of sustained or repeated sounds, notes, or tone-clusters – called drones. It is typically characterized by lengthy audio programs with relatively slight harmonic variations throughout each piece compared to other musics. La Monte Young, one of its 1960s originators, defined it in 2000 as 'the sustained tone branch of minimalism'."
Wikipedia, amazon - "The best of drone music, "Stars Of The Lid And Their Refinement Of The Decline", The Platypus Affiliated Society

The Whole Earth Catalog


"In 1968 Stewart Brand launched an innovative publication called The Whole Earth Catalog. It was groundbreaking, enlightening, and spawned a group of later publications. The collection of that work provided on this site is not complete — and probably never will be — but it is a gift to readers who loved the CATALOG and those who are discovering it for the first time."
The Whole Earth Catalog, Wikipedia

SST Records


Wikipedia - "SST Records is an American independent record label formed in 1978 in Long Beach, California by musician Greg Ginn. The company was initially called Solid State Transmitters through which Ginn sold electronics equipment."
Wikipedia, SST, Perfect Sound Forever, SST Records

Stand by Me


Wikipedia - "Stand by Me is the title of a song originally performed by Ben E. King and written by Ben E. King, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller."
Wikipedia, You Tube - Ben E. King, John Lennon, U2, Bruce Springsteen, Cassius Clay, Mink DeVille, Andy, Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora & Friends, Spyder Turner, Playing For Change Song Around the World

Humberto Solás


Wikipedia - "Humberto Solás (14 December 1941 - 18 September 2008) was a Cuban film director, credited with directing the classic film Lucía (1968), which explored the lives of Cuban women during different periods in Cuban history."
Wikipedia, film reference, Guardian, Fandango, YouTube - Lucia, amazon, Cuba Now, In Praise of a Famous Cuban: Humberto Solás and the Power of Melodrama