In New Exam for Cabbies, Knowledge of Streets Takes a Back Seat

"The trip from Kennedy Airport to La Guardia is a straight shot on the Van Wyck Expressway, with a little jog on the Grand Central Parkway at the end. Canal Street may be the shortest route from the Holland Tunnel to the Manhattan Bridge, but traffic can make it feel like the longest. And all even-numbered, one-way streets in Manhattan run west-to-east, except for the handful that do not. Knowing how to get around the five boroughs of New York City — understanding not just the geography, but the nuances of timing and the endless exceptions to every rule — is part of driving a yellow cab here. And as part of their training, New York cabbies have long had to face a rigorous set of geography questions on the 80-question test they must pass to get a license. Landmarks and popular destinations were on the test, but so were less familiar streets and alternate routes. ..."
NY Times
NY Times: Who Needs a GPS? A New York Geography Quiz

2012 June: Taxicabs of New York City

"Freddie's Dead" - Curtis Mayfield (1972)

Wikipedia - "'Freddie's Dead' is a song by Curtis Mayfield. It was the first single from his 1972 soundtrack album for the film Super Fly. The single was released before the Super Fly album, and in fact before the film itself was in theaters. ... The song laments the death of Fat Freddie, a character in the film who is run over by a car. Like most of the music from the Super Fly album, 'Freddie's Dead' appears in the film only in an instrumental arrangement, without any lyrics. The song's music is featured prominently in the film's opening sequence and also recurs at several other points. Because of this usage the song was subtitled 'Theme from Superfly' on its single release (but not on the album). It is not to be confused with 'Superfly', a different song and the second single released from the Super Fly album. The arrangement is driven by a strong bass line, wah wah guitars, and a melancholy string orchestration."
Wikipedia
YouTube: "Freddies Dead" (Live)

2013 June: Roots (1971), 2014 May: Super Fly (1972), 2014 July: There's No Place Like America Today (1975), 2014 September: Back to the World (1973), 2014 October: Omnibus (1995).

Lumière and Company - David Lynch (1995)

"Lumière and Company (1995, original title 'Lumière et compagnie') was a collaboration between 41 international film directors in which each made a short film using the original Cinématographe camera invented by the Lumière brothers. Shorts were edited in-camera and abided by three rules: A short may be no longer than 52 seconds; No synchronized sound; No more than three takes."
UbuWeb (Video)
#147: David Lynch's Lumière Short (David Lynch, 1995)
Open Culture: What David Lynch Can Do With a 100-Year-Old Camera and 52 Seconds of Film (Video)

2014 September: David Lynch: The Unified Field, 2014 December: David Lynch’s Bad Thoughts - J. Hoberman.

Richard Estes: Painting New York City

"From March 10 to September 20, 2015, the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) presents Richard Estes: Painting New York City, the first exhibition of the art of Richard Estes to focus on the artist’s technique and process, through an examination of his New York City paintings, prints, and photographs. Spanning from the mid-1960s to the present and featuring over forty paintings and works on paper, the exhibition is Estes’ first New York City museum survey. It is also the first solo painting show in the history of the Museum of Arts and Design. ..."
Madmuseum
Madmuseum: Richard Estes
NY Times - From Snapshots Come Paintings: Work by Richard Estes
W - Richard Estes
NPR: Painting Or Photograph? With Richard Estes, It's Hard To Tell (Video)
amazon: Richard Estes' Realism (Portland Museum of Art)
vimeo: PMA presents: Richard Estes' Realism
YouTube: Not photos...paintings !!!, An Evening with Richard Estes - Smithsonian American Art Museum 1:09:11

Revisiting Selma

"Growing up as a person of African descent in Sweden made me hungry for role models, so I read about the fight for civil rights in America with fascination. As I took photos around the world, I saw that I was not alone. Blacks and other minorities I met in Europe, South America and the Middle East looked toward leaders like the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as beacons of hope. When I moved to the United States in 2003, I felt that I was stepping into that history. Being black here means that one stands on the shoulders of those who fought for freedom. Before I visited Alabama, the American South blended together for me, as I imagine it does for many outsiders, but the photographic landscape of the civil rights movement, and in particular the march from Selma to Montgomery, was much more familiar. ..."
NY Times

2015 January: Freedom Journey 1965: Photographs of the Selma to Montgomery March by Stephen Somerstein, 2015 February: Spider Martin’s Photographs of the Selma March Get a Broader View.

In Which Berthe Morisot And Claude Monet Exchange Winter Letters

Monet, Snow Scene
"Seasonal depression affected the most talented artists. The more talent they had, the more likely they were to be felled to their knees by this phenomenon. Then as now, it was the worst winter in recorded history. People always have the tendency to exaggerate the horrors of the most recent snow. The letters of Berthe Morisot and her friend Claude Monet during this period are unmistakably gloomy. It was the dark surroundings that moved the two artists to write to each other at all, for if the weather was at all better, they would have seen one another in person. ..."
This Recording

Blu goes black, buffing his own work in Berlin

"Last week, Blu shocked Berlin by orchestrating the removal of two of his own iconic murals, including a mural that was at one point a collaboration with JR. The murals were located in the city’s famous Kreuzberg neighborhood, which was once home to squatters and artists, but is now undergoing significant and swift gentrification. The squatters in the buildings Blu had painted were recently evicted, and a real estate developer is about to build on the empty lot in front of the murals. Apparently, the new condos would have had a great view of the murals. So, one night last week, a team with two lifts painted the walls black, and they did it with Blu’s support. ..."
Vandalog
Blu

Delta 5

Wikipedia - "Delta 5 were a post-punk band from Leeds, England. The original members of Delta 5, Julz Sale (vocals/guitar), Ros Allen (bass) and Bethan Peters (bass), formed the band 'on a lark', but soon became a part of the thriving Leeds post-punk scene, and later added Kelvin Knight on drums and Alan Riggs on guitar. Combining feminist politics with a two-bass funk-punk sound (much in the style of another, more famous Leeds band, Gang of Four), they released their debut single in 1979, 'Mind Your Own Business'. ... Delta 5 were also important figures in the Rock Against Racism movement, and were the subject of a highly publicized assault at the hands of a right-wing group affiliated with rival movement Rock Against Communism."
Wikipedia
Perfect Sound Forever
allmusic/a>
amazon
YouTube: Anticipation, Mind Your Own Business, You, Now That You've Gone, Journey, Shadow, Train song (BBC radio session) 1981, Make Up (John Peel Session), Triangle (John Peel Session)
Live Berkeley Square 9:27:80 47:35

Dagmar Krause - "The Ballad of Bougeois Welfare", "The Ballad of The Sackslingers", "Pavel's Prison Song", Etc.

"... Radical in both music and politics, the band relocated to London in the early '70s, eventually joining forces with progressives Henry Cow. After Cow's demise in 1980, Krause teamed up with former-bandmates guitarist Fred Frith and drummer Chris Cutler in the wonderfully anarchic Art Bears, who disbanded after three excellent records.  ... As a vocalist, Krause is arguably something of an acquired taste. Her husky, vibrato-laden alto can suddenly swoop into a breathtaking upper register with a power that belies her small, frail physique. Her English singing retains a heavy German accent, but whether she sings in German or English (which she often does on the same record), she retains her impeccable phrasing and ability to inject the most oft-heard lyric with almost palpable emotion."
SoundHound
YouTube: "The Ballad of Bougeois Welfare", "The Ballad of The Sackslingers", "Pavel's Prison Song", "Genevieve", "Surabaya Johnny", "Song of a German Mother"

2010 January: Dagmar Krause, 2010 February: Art Bears, 2012 July: Supply and Demand: Songs by Brecht / Weill & Eisler, 2012 November: News from Babel, 2013 February: Tank Battles: The Songs of Hanns Eisler.

Art+Feminism

Cuban Feminist Poster Art “Lipstick” — Artist José Gómez Fresquet (Frémez), circa 1970
"Art+Feminism is a campaign to improve coverage of women and the arts on Wikipedia. Wikipedia’s content and community skews male, creating significant gaps in an increasingly important repository of shared knowledge. We invite you to address this absence by organizing in-person, communal updating of Wikipedia’s entries on art and feminism."
Art+Feminism (Video)
W - Meetup/ArtAndFeminism
Feminism & Feminist Art
Brooklyn Museum - Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art: Feminist Art Base
facebook: Art+Feminism

Albert Maysles, Pioneering Documentarian

"Albert Maysles, the award-winning documentarian who, with his brother, David, made intensely talked-about films, including 'Grey Gardens' and 'Gimme Shelter,' with their American version of cinéma vérité, died Thursday night at his home in Manhattan. He was 88. His death was confirmed by K. A. Dilday, a family friend. Mr. Maysles (pronounced MAY-zuls) departed from documentary conventions by not interviewing his films’ subjects. As he explained in an interview with The New York Times in 1994, 'Making a film isn’t finding the answer to a question; it’s trying to capture life as it is.' That immediacy was a hallmark of the Maysles brothers’ films, beginning in the 1960s, when they made several well-regarded documentaries. But it was 'Gimme Shelter' (1970), about the Rolling Stones’ 1969 American tour, that brought them widespread attention. It included a scene of a fan being stabbed to death at the group’s concert in Altamont, Calif., and the critical admiration for the film was at least partly countered by concerns that it was exploiting that violence.”
NY Times
MAYSLES FILMS (Video)
W - Albert and David Maysles

Jonathas de Andrade - 40 Nego Bom é um real

"In the work 40 Nego Bom é um real, the young Brazilian artist Jonathas de Andrade tells the story of a sweet. Based on the production process of this nego bom (the name literally means 'good black' and has racial connotations), he shows how in the social, political and ideological reality of Brazilian society, difficult issues are preferably 'forgotten'. His work is based on a variety of historical documentary material. The installation is inspired by a street vendor promoting his banana sweets at the top of his voice. Like an anthropologist, the artist sketches a fictive sweet factory with forty workers. The work is divided into two parts. Colourful silk prints and paintings on board show people working in apparent harmony on the production of the sweet. The second part consists of pictures of individual workers. The accompanying texts show a less good-humoured picture and expose the false working relationships. Andrade subtly reveals a racism that is deeply rooted in Brazilian culture."
Bonnefanten
Jonathas de Andrade - 40 Nego Bom é um real
Jonathas de Andrade
Guggenheim
frieze - Focus: Jonathas de Andrade
YouTube: Future Generation Art Prize 2012

"I Only Want to Be with You" - Dusty Springfield (1963)

"I don't know what it is that makes me love you so
I only know I never want to let you go
'Cause you've started something
Oh, can't you see?
That ever since we met
You've had a hold on me
It happens to be true
I only want to be with you"
W - "I Only Want to Be with You"
YouTube: "I Only Want to Be with You"

In Reverse - Ron Arad

Pressed Flower Navy Blue, 2013
"... Each catalogue contains its own trio of real pressed flowers hidden within its pages, making each one a unique specimen in its own right. The flowers in the catalogue poetically replicate in miniature the large pressed-flower fiat Cinquecentos on the walls of the In Reverse Exhibition. With a typeface derived from those of licence plates, and the usual layout of a catalogue being reversed with the headline at the bottom of pages, and the bottom at the top, the themes of reversal and cars run through from the front page to the back. The cover is an image of the Roddy Giacosa, a metal tube piece in the show, and is embossed so that the texture and feel of the image recall that of the sculpture itself."
Ron Arad
WSJ: Crushed Cars
Paul Kasmin Gallery
Design Museum Holon

The Forever Now: Contemporary Painting in an Atemporal World

Laura Owens, “Untitled” (2013)
"Forever Now presents the work of 17 artists whose paintings reflect a singular approach that characterizes our cultural moment at the beginning of this new millennium: they refuse to allow us to define or even meter our time by them. This phenomenon in culture was first identified by the science fiction writer William Gibson, who used the term 'a-temporality' to describe a cultural product of our moment that paradoxically doesn’t represent, through style, through content, or through medium, the time from which it comes. A-temporality, or timelessness, manifests itself in painting as an ahistorical free-for-all, where contemporaneity as an indicator of new form is nowhere to be found, and all eras coexist. ..."
MoMA
MoMA: INSIDE/OUT
amazon
New Yorker: Take Your Time by Peter Schjeldahl
NY Times: The Paintbrush in the Digital Era
YouTube: The Forever Now: Contemporary Painting in an Atemporal World at MoMA

To Arms! Deployment of Troops I THE GREAT WAR - Week 3

"The first few days of war were a combination of failed organisation and chaos. The Austro-Hungarian supreme command lacks in combat experience, and their irrational actions in Serbia are causing turmoil among the Germans. At the Eastern and Western Front, early signs of problems can be seen, too, which the armies will pay a terrible price for, in the upcoming weeks."
YouTube: To Arms! Deployment of Troops I THE GREAT WAR - Week 3

2014 December: The Great War: WWI Starts - How Europe Spiraled Into the Great War - Week 1, Europe Prior to WWI: Allies and Enemies I PRELUDE TO WW1 - Part 1/3, Tinderbox Europe - From Balkan Troubles to WWI I PRELUDE TO WW1 - Part 2/3, A Shot that Changed the World - The Assassination of Franz Ferdinand I PRELUDE TO WW1 - Part 3/3, 2015 January: Germany in Two-Front War and the Schlieffen-Plan I - Week 2

Studio One: Jump Up

"... In the early releases featured here you will find the roots of Studio One’s unique sound – from the first jump-up, boogie-woogie and shuffle recordings made in Jamaica in the late 1950s, as the artists emulated their American rhythm and blues idols – Louis Jordan, Roscoe Gordon, Fats Domino – through to the early Rastafari rhythms of Count Ossie, the righteous Baptist beat of Toots and the Maytals up to the joyous excitement of Ska with tracks by Studio One’s young protégées Bob Marley and The Wailers and the all-mighty Skatalites. Clement ‘Sir Coxsone’ Dodd first began recording music in the late 1950s, making one-off records to play on his Downbeat Sound System. These ‘exclusive dup-plates’ enabled him to reign supreme in the regular dancehall soundclashes of Kingston, fighting off the competition from rivals including Duke Reid the Trojan and Prince Buster. This new album traces the roots of the legendary label as it created the sound of the young independent Jamaican nation going into the early 1960s. ..."
Soul Jazz Records
amazon
Juno: Studio One Jump Up: The Birth Of A Sound Jump Up (Video)

Madame Cézanne

Paul Cézanne, Madame Cézanne in a Red Armchair. About 1877.
"This exhibition of paintings, drawings, and watercolors by Paul Cézanne (French, 1839–1906) traces his lifelong attachment to Hortense Fiquet (French, 1850–1922), his wife, the mother of his only son, and his most painted model. Featuring twenty-five of the artist's twenty-nine known portraits of Hortense, including Madame Cézanne in the Conservatory (1891) and Madame Cézanne in a Red Dress (1888–90), both from the Metropolitan Museum's collection, the exhibition explores the profound impact she had on Cézanne's portrait practice."
Metropolitan Museum of Art (Video)
Metropolitan Museum of Art: Exhibition Objects
NY Times: Take My Wife. S’il Vous Plaît.
amazon: Madame Cézanne

Manhole covers that left their mark on the city

"Looking up at New York’s buildings isn’t the only way to get a sense of the city’s past. Cast your eyes down on the sidewalk and street, and you’ll start seeing an incredible variety of manhole covers—many from the 19th and early 20th centuries. These iron lids serve a utilitarian purpose. But the men who made them at Ironworks across the city imbued them with a sense of pride and craftsmanship. Jacob Mark created his signature covers with colored glass, which look like glistening jewels. The one at top of the page was discovered in Tribeca. ..."
Ephemeral New York
Ephemeral New York: Manhole covers that left their mark on the city
Ephemeral New York: The most beautiful manhole covers in Manhattan
Ephemeral New York: More old-school city manhole covers
Ephemeral New York: What a 19th century manhole cover has to say

System and Vision

Type 42 (Anonymous), Ursula Andress 37–22–35, 1960s–1970s
"David Zwirner is pleased to present the group exhibition System and Vision, organized in collaboration with Delmes & Zander in Berlin and Cologne. It includes artists whose unique ideas developed outside the circuit of art world institutions, often with limited interaction with other peers. Each offers a highly individualistic, authentic, and imaginative practice that roughly falls into one of four identifiable areas commonly absent from mainstream art-historical narratives: pseudo-science, science fiction, eroticism, and the occult. ..."
David Zwirner
Widewalls
Paris Photo

Lydia Davis

Wikipedia - "Lydia Davis (born July 15, 1947) is an American writer noted for her short stories. Davis is also a novelist, essayist, and translator from French and other languages, and has produced several new translations of French literary classics, including Proust's Swann’s Way and Flaubert's Madame Bovary.  Davis' stories are acclaimed for their brevity and humour. Many are only one or two sentences. Davis has compared these shorter stories to skyscrapers in the sense that they are surrounded by an imposing blank expanse. Some of her stories are considered poetry or somewhere between philosophy, poetry and short story. ... Davis has also translated Proust, Flaubert, Blanchot, Foucault, Michel Leiris, Pierre Jean Jouve and other French writers, as well as the Dutch writer A.L. Snijders."
Wikipedia
New Yorker: Long Story Short
Believer
NPR: Lydia Davis' New Collection Has Stories Shorter Than This Headline (Video)
Atlantic: Lydia Davis’s Very Short Stories
amazon: Lydia Davis

Wes Anderson’s Cinematic Influences: Video Series Reveals His Roots in Truffaut, Welles, Scorsese & More

"Matt Zoller Seitz is easily one of the finest film critics working today. Over the years, he has done quite a lot of work unpacking the dense visual world of filmmaker Wes Anderson, culminating in a gorgeous coffee table book called, aptly, The Wes Anderson Collection. Today you can explore a series of video essays that delve into the filmmaker’s work. Zoller Seitz argues that Anderson’s distinctive look is not merely empty aesthetics. Instead, he asserts that there is substance to Anderson’s style."
Open Culture (Video)

2013 November: Wes Anderson Honors Fellini in a Delightful New Short Film, 2013 November: Rushmore (1998), 2013 Decemher: Hotel Chevalier (2007), 2014 March: Wes Anderson Collection, 2014 April: The Perfect Symmetry of Wes Anderson’s Movies, 2014 July: The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), 2014 August: Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), 2014 December: Welcome to Union Glacier (2013), 2015 January: Inhabiting Wes Anderson’s Universe.

The Filming Locations of The Naked City

"...The Lower East Side & Williamsburg Bridge. Location: Norfolk St. & Rivington St. No neighborhood shines more in The Naked City than the Lower East Side, its Jewish heritage on display in nearly every shot. We’ll start at the corner of Norfolk and Rivington. Note the corner soda fountain, offering Borden’s ice cream. Today, it’s Tiny’s Giant Sandwich (quite good!)."
Part 1: The Lower East Side & Williamsburg Bridge, Part 2: Times Square, Chelsea, Soho and Wall Street

2012 April: The Naked City - Jules Dassin

Recap: In the Finale, Mary Meets Mr. Handsome

"Season 5, Episode 9. Oh, Abbots. It can’t be over, can it? Another season, gone as quickly as a grouse flying over Brancaster Castle. So let us keep sorrow at bay by reminding ourselves: We’ve finally pulled abreast. Oh, sure, those viewers in Britain got their usual three-month head start on us (just as the Brits used to get first crack at the latest Dickens installment). Viewers in the United States who were too impatient to wait for the weekly drip of revelation snapped up their DVDs and sometimes blurted out key plot developments over a few too many Manhattans. They had us in their spoiler-alert grip, Abbots, but no longer. Democracy reigns."
NY Times: Recap: In the Finale, Mary Meets Mr. Handsome

2012 March: Downton Abbey, 2013 February: Downton Abbey 3, 2015 January: ‘Downton Abbey’ and History: A Look Back, Recap: Rumble With Lord G!, 2015 February: Recap: Prayers for Lord G’s Truest, Furriest Love, 2015 February: Recap: The Crawleys Should Have Sent Their Regrets, 2015 February: Recap: Yes, It’s Called the Hornby Hotel.

Rare Early ’70s Sun Ra and June Tyson Recording I Roam The Cosmos Presented As 24-Bit iTunes Release

"... Known for their acceptance of avant-garde forms in jazz and beyond, it was in 1966 and 1967 that the Sun Ra Arkestra would become residents at the club, playing every Monday and coming back a handful of times after their residency had ended. 1972 was the year Slug’s would end and it’s a great historical document to get an unreleased Ra recording from this venue and the year they closed operations. This set deviated from the main system of live shows Sun Ra was giving to the world in the early ’70s, showcasing June Tyson and Ra in a cosmo-drama call and response performance for the entire concert. More of a play, the Arkestra is backing the two in their vocal voyage and considering the wealth of live and studio material from Sun Ra available to the public, it’s beautiful to experience brand new music from the mysterious creator with such clarity and quality."
Sound Colour Vibration
Spotify
YouTube: I Roam The Cosmos 51:18

The Life Of A Slave From Cradle To The Tomb

The grounds include slave quarters, a mule barn, an African-American church founded by freed slaves and sugar kettles, where they used to boil the cane to make sugar. Some buildings have been brought in from other historic sites.
"The section of Louisiana's serpentine River Road that tracks along the Mississippi between New Orleans and Baton Rouge is known as 'Plantation Alley.' The restored antebellum mansions along the route draw hundreds of thousands of visitors a year. The newest attraction aims to give visitors a realistic look at life in the pre-Civil War South. Don't expect hoop skirts and mint juleps, but stark relics that tell the story of a dark period in American history, through the eyes of the enslaved. From the entrance, Whitney Plantation in Wallace, La., resembles the other plantations, with majestic oaks framing the front walk to the French-Creole style 'big house'."
NPR: New Museum (Video)
NY Times: Building the First Slavery Museum in America
The house that slavery built gets a new home in Smithsonian

PJ Harvey - Who Will Love Me Now (1996)

"In the forest lives a monster
he has done terrible things
so in the wood it's hiding
And this is the song he sings

Who will love me now
Who will ever love me?
Who will say to me
You are my desire
I'll set you free"
YouTube: Who Will Love Me Now

2009 November: PJ Harvey, 2011 May: Let England Shake, 2013 May: Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea, 2013 July: White Chalk (2007), 2014 July: LSO St Luke's in London (2005).

Historic Places LA

"Historic Places LA is the first online information and management system specifically created to inventory, map and help protect the City of Los Angeles’ significant historic resources. It showcases the city's diversity of historic resources, including architecturally significant buildings and places of social importance, as well as historic districts, bridges, parks, and streetscapes."
Historic Places LA
Getty and city of L.A. launch website mapping historic places

2014 July: Downtown Los Angeles

"I'm with Stupid" - Pet Shop Boys (2006)

Wikipedia - "'I'm with Stupid' is a song by British synthpop band Pet Shop Boys and is featured on their 2006 album, Fundamental. It was released 8 May 2006 as the lead single from the album in the United Kingdom and the rest of the European Union (see 2006 in British music). It became the duo's 21st Top 10 single in the UK, peaking at #8. Though ostensibly about a romantic relationship with a man perceived by the public as a "moron", the song has been acknowledged as being, on another level, about Tony Blair's beleaguered relationship with George W. Bush."
Wikipedia
YouTube: I'm with Stupid, I'm With Stupid (Official Live Video), I m With Stupid PSB Video Extended Remix 1, The Resurrectionist, The Resurrectionist (Extended Mix)

2010 August: Village People, 2008 September: Pet Shop Boys, 2010 November: Pet Shop Boys - 1985-1989, 2011 January: Behaviour, 2011 May: Very, 2011 December: Bilingual, 2012 March: "Always on My Mind", 2012 August: Nightlife, 2012 September: "Where the Streets Have No Name (I Can't Take My Eyes off You)", 2012 December: Release, 2013 March: Pandemonium Tour, 2013 November: Leaving, 2014 April: Introspective (1988), 2014 August: Go West, 2015 January: "So Hard"(1990).

Black Panther Newspapers

"The UC Berkeley Social Activism Sound Recording Project is a partnership between the UC Berkeley Library, the Pacifica Foundation, and other private and institutional sources. The intent of the project is to gather, catalog, and make accessible primary source media resources related to social activism and activist movements in California in the 1960's and 1970's. Some recordings have been slightly edited for purposes of sound quality and continuity."
UC Berkeley
Black Panther Newspapers
PBS Interview with Angela Davis (1998)
Google
Diva: Black Panther Newspaper

2011 December: Black Panther Party, 2014 July: Black Panthers (Agnès Varda, 1968 doc.), 2015 January: The Black Panthers Revisited.

The dangers of digital: Brian Eno on technology and modern music

"Digital technology has enhanced music production, recording and distribution in ways unimaginable just a few decades ago, but are we losing something more essential in the process? Chris May talks to ambient pioneer and friend of technology Brian Eno about the dangers of digital dependence in modern music. ... Eno was speaking on the eve of the release of Knitting Factory Records’ Fela: Vinyl Box Set 3, which he compiled. He has been an Afrobeat devotee since 1973, when he chanced on Fela Kuti’s album Afrodisiac. I had asked Eno if he thought it was possible to retain the human touch, so explicit in Kuti’s Afrobeat recordings, while using sophisticated, digital studio-technology. ..."
The dangers of digital: Brian Eno on technology and modern music (Video)
Brian Eno curates new Fela Kuti vinyl box set (Video)
W - Noble savage
YouTube: Guitarra de Lata ciega Liberiana - Musico Liberiano ciego toca su guitarra de lata al mundo

Davy Byrne’s

"Most Joyce enthusiasts, and even  many non-enthusiasts, recognize Davy Byrne’s as the place where Bloom ate a cheese sandwich and drank a glass of burgundy in Ulysses. Many a Bloomsday pilgrim has stopped into the pub over the years to experience a moment in the life of Leopold Bloom, and literary pub crawls  (including the excellent one I experienced in the summer of 2014, linked) highlight the premises as a staple in Dublin’s literary scene. Perhaps less noted is the pub’s appearance in Dubliners. It appears only once, and briefly, but it resonates in Joyce’s weblike world as an intersection of person, place, and theme."
Mapping Dubliners Project
Davy Byrne’s
Dublin Pub Crawl

2011 March: Passages from James Joyce's "Finnegans Wake" (1965-67), 2010 March: Ulysses Seen, 2013 February: ULYSSES “SEEN” is moving to Dublin!, 2013: Dubliners, 2014 May: The Dead (1987 film), 2014 May: “Have I Ever Left It?” by Mark O'Connell, 2014 July: Digital Dubliners, 2014 September: Read "Ulysses Seen", A Graphic Novel Adaptation of James Joyce’s Classic, 2015 January: The Mapping Dubliners Project.

"Epistrophy" - Thelonious Monk / Kenny Clarke (1941)

Wikipedia - "'Epistrophy' is a jazz standard composed by Thelonious Monk and Kenny Clarke in 1941. It has been called 'the first classic, modern jazz composition.' It was first recorded later that year, under the title 'Fly Right,' by a big band led by Cootie Williams. Its 'A' section is based on a pattern of alternating chords a semitone apart. The title 'Epistrophy' is not a word in any dictionary. However, the word 'epistrophe' is defined by Merriam-Webster as 'the repetition of a word or expression at the end of successive phrases, clauses, sentences, or verses especially for rhetorical or poetic effect.' It is therefore likely that Monk coined the word to mean the use of repeated sounds at the end of a musical line. This corresponds to the term 'BeBop' which refers not only to the new style of jazz Monk and others helped to create at Minton's Playhouse in Harlem, but to the imitative onomatopoeia of the two-note phrase so often repeated at the end of a 1940s bebop musical line, in which the 'bop' is five tones down from the 'be.'"
Wikipedia
YouTube: "Epistrophy"

2012 September: Thelonious Monk: Straight No Chaser, 2013 August: Five Spot Café, 2014 February: Thelonious Monk - Genius of Modern Music, Vol. 1, Vol. 2.

Pablo Power’s Solo Exhibit, A Circle Unbroken: Tributes in Pattern, at Tribeca’s No Romance Galleries through Today

"A Circle Unbroken: Tributes in Pattern, Pablo Power’s solo exhibit at No Romance Galleries, is a splendid poetic homage to life’s cycles and patterns. Reflecting Power’s vast experience with both graffiti and the streets, the multi-media images presented here fuse a dreamlike beauty with a rich rawness."
Street Art NYC

The man who made Monet: how impressionism was saved from obscurity

Monet - Sunrise (1872)
"It is one of the ironies of impressionism, the quintessential French movement, that it had its beginning and its end not in Paris but in London. It is another irony that the key figure in the movement was not a painter but, that most maligned of species, a dealer. In 1871, having fled the Franco-Prussian war, Claude Monet was living in London. It was in January that year that the landscapist Charles-François Daubigny took him along to the inaptly named German Gallery on New Bond Street and introduced him to the proprietor, another French expat, named Paul Durand-Ruel (1831-1922). Whether or not the gallerist believed Daubigny’s words of introduction – 'This artist will surpass us all' – he liked Monet’s work well enough to buy numerous canvases and, a few days later, paintings by his fellow artist-refugee Camille Pissarro, too. ..."
Guardian

Fred Frith - Gravity (1980)

Wikipedia - "Gravity is a 1980 solo album by English guitarist, composer and improviser Fred Frith from Henry Cow and Art Bears. It was Frith's second solo album and his first since the demise of Henry Cow in 1978. ...
Gravity was recorded in Sweden, the United States and Switzerland and featured Frith with Swedish Rock in Opposition group Samla Mammas Manna on one side of the LP, and Frith with United States progressive rock group The Muffins on the other side. Additional musicians included Marc Hollander from Aksak Maboul and Chris Cutler from Henry Cow. Gravity has been described as an avant-garde "dance" record that draws on rhythm and dance from folk music across the world. ..."
Wikipedia
allmusic
BBC
YouTube: Gravity (1980) [Full Album]

40 maps that explain the internet

"The internet increasingly pervades our lives, delivering information to us no matter where we are. It takes a complex system of cables, servers, towers, and other infrastructure, developed over decades, to allow us to stay in touch with our friends and family so effortlessly. Here are 40 maps that will help you better understand the internet — where it came from, how it works, and how it's used by people around the world.
Vox

7 Rock Album Covers Designed by Iconic Artists: Warhol, Rauschenberg, Dalí, Richter, Mapplethorpe & More

"The art of the album cover is ground we cover here often enough, from the jazz deco creations of album art inventor Alex Steinweiss to the bawdy burlesques of underground comix legend R. Crumb. We could add to these American references the iconic covers of European graphic artists like Peter Saville of Joy Divisions’ Unknown Pleasures and Storm Thorgerson of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon. These names represent just a small sampling of the many renowned designers who have given popular music its distinctive look over the decades, and without whom the experience of record shopping—perhaps itself a bygone art—would be a dreary one. Though these creative personalities work in a primarily commercial vein, there’s no reason not to call their products fine art. ..."
Open Culture

Los Angeles, the City in Cinema

"... I've made sixteen of these 'Los Angeles, the City in Cinema' video essays so far, some exploring visions of Los Angeles' future, some of its present, and some of its past. ... If you have any suggestions of Los Angeles movies to consider next, please don't hesitate to let me know. Every fiction film also inadvertently documents the place in which its story happens: its built environment, its social environment, or even just the way people think about it. That goes for movies new and old, mainstream and obscure, respectable and schlocky, appealing and unappealing — all the qualities, in other words, of the city itself."
Alien Nation (Graham Baker, 1988), Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, 1982), Brother (Takeshi Kitano, 2000), The Crimson Kimono (Samuel Fuller, 1959), Drive (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2011), The Driver (Walter Hill, 1978), Her (Spike Jonze, 2013), The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (John Cassavetes, 1978), Kiss Me Deadly (Robert Aldrich, 1955), The Limey (Steven Soderbergh, 1999), Model Shop (Jacques Demy, 1969), Night of the Comet (Thom Eberhardt, 1984), Repo Man (Alex Cox, 1984), Southland Tales (Richard Kelly, 2006), Strange Days (Kathryn Bigelow, 1995), Timecode (Mike Figgis, 2000)
boingboing (Video)
vimeo: The City in Cinema
Colin Marshall
Colin Marshall - Category Archives: Los Angeles

Every Breaking Wave - A Film By Aoife McArdle

"Whilst U2’s involvement in this long-form music video from Northern Irish writer/director/photographer Aoife McArdle will almost certainly steal most of the headlines, strip away their participation in this project (and even their music) and you’d still be left with a powerful and assertive piece of filmmaking tackling themes of love and conflict. Taking its audience back to the streets of Northern Ireland in the early 1980’s, McArdle’s 13-minute film throws its viewers into the violent conflicts of the time, with its high-energy tempo and passionate-performances making it a short you don’t dare take your eyes off for one-second."
Short of the Week
vimeo: Every Breaking Wave (Short film)

'The Media Doesn’t Care What Happens Here'

"The favelas of Complexo do Alemão, one of the largest urban slums in Brazil, spill across 700 hilly acres in the North Zone of Rio de Janeiro, not far from the city’s international airport. Bounded on three sides by bustling highways and on the fourth by a forested ridge, Alemão can no longer grow outward, and so it has grown upward instead, in increasingly unstable conglomerations of quadruple-decker concrete boxes. 'The grandfather builds the first floor, the son the second, the grandson the third and the great-grandson the fourth,' residents like to say. Rebar sprouts from the rooftops, awaiting the installation of the next story and the next generation that will occupy it."
NY Times

‘Drowned in a sea of salt’ Blake Morrison on the literature of the east coast

‘The most abandoned spot in the entire region’ WG Sebald visited Shingle Street in Suffolk
"Sixty-two years ago today, the combination of a severe storm and high spring tide brought catastrophe to the east coast of England, as the water rose to six metres above sea level and overwhelmed the land. The Dutch had it even worse, with the loss of 1,800 lives – they called it the Watersnoodramp, the 'flood disaster'. But Suffolk and Essex suffered badly, too, with 307 deaths in all, including 38 at Felixstowe, 37 in Jaywick, and 58 on Canvey Island. A couple of documentaries appeared around the time of the 60th anniversary of the flood but compared with the commemoration of the 2004 Asian tsunami the coverage was modest. There wasn’t the footage; the only survivors with memories of the event were past pension age, and the loss of life was on a smaller scale. But perhaps another factor explains the neglect: resignation to the idea that the North Sea is destined to wreak havoc periodically and that nothing can be done to prevent it."
Guardian (Video)

2011 July: The Rings of Saturn - W.G. Sebald

Spider Martin’s Photographs of the Selma March Get a Broader View

"When Spider Martin, a young photographer for The Birmingham News, stepped onto the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala., on March 7, 1965, he knew exactly what to do. ... Today, everyone knows the score from that day in Selma, known as Bloody Sunday, thanks in part to Mr. Martin’s powerful images of the police beating back peaceful civil rights marchers, which were blasted around the world via The Associated Press. And now, Mr. Martin — one of the few photojournalists present in Selma over the whole of the weekslong course of events there — may be about to get better known, too. The Briscoe Center for American History at the University of Texas in Austin has acquired Mr. Martin’s archive, including more than 1,000 images shot in and around Selma, many existing only on negatives that have been kept in a bank box for decades, virtually unseen."
NY Times

Down in Washington Square: The Smithsonian Folkways Collection

"Called 'The Mayor of MacDougal Street,' Dave Van Ronk (1936-2002) was a leading figure in the Greenwich Village music scene for more than four decades. He epitomized the urban 'folksinger' — apprenticing through immersion in the music revival’s New York City epicenter of Washington Square Park. Drawing from and developing a wide repertoire of songs, guitar techniques, and performing skills, he mentored younger musicians and songwriters such as Bob Dylan, Jack Hardy, Suzanne Vega, Christine Lavin, and many others. Down in Washington Square includes 16 never-before-released recordings coupled with tracks from the Smithsonian Folkways archive, spanning early live recordings made in 1958 (one year before his first Folkways album) to his final studio recordings in 2001, just months before his death."
Smithsonian Folkways
UNCUT
amazon
Dave Van Ronk at Caffe Lena, Saratoga Springs, NY, 1974 (Spotify)

Women of the Avant-garde 1920-1940

"The exhibition Women of the Avant-garde 1920-1940 presents an exciting but hitherto under-illuminated chapter in the history of art to the public. Works by eight of the most prominent women avant-garde artists of the inter-war years, Sophie Taeuber-Arp, Claude Cahun, Sonia Delaunay, Germaine Dulac, Florence Henri, Hannah Höch, Katarzyna Kobro and Dora Maar reveal the story of a network of striking artists who were pioneers and driving forces in the avant-garde movements that flourished in Europe in those years. The exhibition presents around 200 works of painting, photography, collage, design, film, and sculpture. ... The women of the avant-garde took part in redefining art and at the same time they challenged the notion of what women can, may and should do. Unlike the male artists, the women had no historical status in the academies and artists’ groups that were the natural platforms for men in the art world. The women had to make their own way, and independence, openness and mobility are recurring features in all eight biographies."
Louisiana
ARTBOOK: Women of the Avant-Garde 1920–1940
Poetry Foundation: The Women of the Avant-Garde, (Sound), part 2 (Sound)

Funky Ghetto Getdown!

"This upload features tracks from Marvin Gaye, Edwin Starr, Earnest Jackson, Willie Hutch, Curtis Mayfield and more. SoulSistas And SoulBruthas! As we approach the heart of election season here in the USA, I'm reminded of how SOUL and FUNK music back in the day was so influenced by what was going down politically. The economics and every day experiences of the 'hood' were expressed as much in the music as was LOVE or having a good time. Not sure if that exists too much any more. Here's a selection of tunes loosely based on this theme. Some serious tunes here, but a real sense of joy in the quality of the musical expression as well."
Mixcloud (Video)

Edward Hopper's New York: A Walking Tour

"Does this stretch of Seventh Avenue look familiar to you? If you’re an Edward Hopper fan, there’s a good chance the answer is yes; the street served as inspiration for Early Sunday Morning. Check out this video in which Whitney curator Carter Foster visits sites in downtown New York that inspired Hopper’s most iconic paintings. See the works in person in Hopper Drawing, on view through Sunday."
Whitney Museum (Video)

2008 July: Edward Hopper, 2010 October: Finding Nighthawks, 2010 December: Modern Life: Edward Hopper and His Time, 2012 Wednesday: Through Edward Hopper's eyes: in search of an artist's seaside inspiration, 2013 July: Hopper Drawing, 2014 May: INTERVIEW: “An Interview with Edward Hopper, June 17, 1959″., 2014 September: How Edward Hopper “Storyboarded” His Iconic Painting Nighthawks.

Sophia Dawson

"Sophia Dawson, born February 25, 1988, is a talented and self-motivated African American woman. She is a Brooklyn based artist who discovered her gift while painting a portrait of her father as she studied at Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School for Music, Art and Performing Arts. At that very young age of sixteen, she witnessed that her work moved and touched people from all walks of life. Sophia soon participated in Groundswell Community Mural Project, a non-profit arts organization, as a teen volunteer. In their afterschool program she had the opportunity to direct her artistic skills towards bringing about social change through designing and creating large-scale murals. The mural projects she participated in transformed various spaces throughout the borough."
ilovewetpaint
iamwetpaint

Zombie - Fela Kuti (1976)

Wikipedia - "Zombie is a studio album by Nigerian Afrobeat musician Fela Kuti. It was released in Nigeria by Coconut Records in 1976, and in the United Kingdom by Creole Records in 1977. The album criticised the Nigerian government; and it is thought to have resulted in the murder of Kuti's mother Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, and the destruction of his commune by the military. ... The album was a scathing attack on Nigerian soldiers using the zombie metaphor to describe the methods of the Nigerian military. The album was a smash hit with the people and infuriated the government, setting off a vicious attack against the Kalakuta Republic (a commune that Fela had established in Nigeria), during which one thousand soldiers attacked the commune."
Wikipedia
allmusic
Spotify
YouTube: Zombie, Mr. Follow Follow, Observation Is No Crime, Mistake (Live At The Berlin Jazz Festival - 1978)

John Wesley Harding - Bob Dylan (1967)

Wikipedia - "John Wesley Harding is the eighth studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on December 27, 1967 by Columbia Records. Produced by Bob Johnston, the album marked Dylan's return to acoustic music and traditional roots, after three albums of electric rock music. John Wesley Harding shares many stylistic threads with, and was recorded around the same time as, the prolific series of home recording sessions with The Band, partly released in 1975 as The Basement Tapes. ... Most of the songs on John Wesley Harding have pared-down lyrics. Though the style remains evocative, continuing Dylan's strong use of bold imagery, the wild, intoxicating surreality that seemed to flow in a stream-of-consciousness fashion has been tamed into something earthier and more crisp."
Wikipedia
Rolling Stone: John Wesley Harding, February 24, 1968
47 Years Ago: Bob Dylan’s ‘John Wesley Harding’ Album Released
Revisiting Dylan’s ‘John Wesley Harding’
amazon, Spotify
YouTube: John Wesley Harding Full Album