Jeanne-Claude

"Jeanne-Claude, who collaborated with her husband, Christo, on dozens of environmental art projects, notably the wrapping of the Pont Neuf in Paris and the Reichstag in Berlin and the installation of 7,503 vinyl gates with saffron-colored nylon panels in Central Park, died Wednesday in Manhattan, where she lived. She was 74. A statement on the couple’s Web site, christojeanneclaude.net, said the cause was complications of a brain aneurysm."
NYT, Telegraph, Wikipedia, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, YouTube, (1), (2)

Todd Hido

"The very talented Todd Hido will be giving a lecture tonight at Aperture. Todd consistently produces images that are uncanny and haunting, but never foreboding. Much like Hopper his work propagates the kind of mystery that invites you into the scene instead of warning you to keep a safe distance."
Amy Stein Photo, See Saw, artnet

Massive Cut up Collage

Abraham Lincoln Being assassinated at Ford's Theater, 2009
"The piece is a burroughs style cut-up poetry collage which forms the picture of Abraham Lincoln's Assassination at Ford Theater. The piece was made over the course of 3 years."
Massive Cut up Collage

Clifford Ross

"Well, I’m uncomfortable trying to put together the state of my emotions and the Sublime in one neat package, but I do know that from very early on, when I looked at art, I liked having my socks knocked off. I liked being overwhelmed and finding myself slightly giddy. Both abstract and realistic paintings were able to deliver the sensation—Rothko’s and Rembrandt’s could both do it. It was the effect and the content of the art that ultimately counted, not its form."
Clifford Ross, artnet, Wikipedia

The Future Sounds Like This: 10 Magnificently Modern Musical Instruments

"The study of musical instruments (’organology’ – no, really) is the study of the human condition. Every culture is defined by its own distinctive set of trills, whistles, parps, honks and beats, and every corner of the world has evolved its own location-specific indigenous instrument to renew a sense of cultural identity through noisy self-expression."
Web Urbanist

The Society of the Spectacle

Wikipedia - "The Society of the Spectacle (La Société du spectacle) is a work of philosophy and critical theory by Situationist and Marxist theorist, Guy Debord. It was first published in 1967 in France."
Wikipedia, BUREAU OF PUBLIC SECRETS, SI, Society Spectacle, Google, Ubu, Welcome to Hyperreality, amazon

Abigail Uhteg

"Somehow Abigail Uhteg managed to not only edition a book and take some of the sweetest photos ever during her residency here at WSW, but she also managed to put together over 3000 of her photos to make a fabulous video of the process."
WSWORK, Abigail Uhteg

Douglas Sahm

Wikipedia - "Douglas Wayne Sahm (November 6, 1941 – November 18, 1999), was a musician from Texas. Born in San Antonio, Texas, he was a child prodigy in country music, but became a significant figure in blues, rock and other genres. Today Sahm is considered one of the most important figures in what is identified as Tex-Mex."
Wikipedia, Laventure, YouTube, (1), (2)

Shahzia Sikander

The Illustrated Page Series #1, 2005-6
"Sikander specializes in Indian and Persian miniature painting, a traditional style that is both highly stylized and disciplined. While becoming an expert in this technique-driven, often impersonal art form, she imbued it with a personal context and history, blending the Eastern focus on precision and methodology with a Western emphasis on creative, subjective expression. In doing so, Sikander transported miniature painting into the realm of contemporary art."
PBS, Shahzia Sikander, Cooper Hewitt

One From The Archives: Sir X

"Sir X has just launched his website. You can check it out here."
Wooster Collective

Grunge

Grunge texture #1174
Wikipedia - "Grunge (sometimes referred to as the Seattle sound) is a subgenre of alternative rock that emerged during the mid-1980s in the American state of Washington, particularly in the Seattle area. Inspired by hardcore punk, heavy metal and indie rock, grunge is generally characterized by heavily distorted electric guitars, contrasting song dynamics, and apathetic or angst-filled lyrics. The grunge aesthetic is stripped-down compared to other forms of rock music, and many grunge musicians were noted for their unkempt appearances and rejection of theatrics."
Wikipedia, Abrams, YouTube, (1)

Calvin and Hobbes

Wikipedia - "Calvin and Hobbes was a syndicated comic strip written and illustrated by Bill Watterson. It follows the humorous antics of Calvin, an imaginative six-year old boy, and Hobbes, his energetic and sardonic stuffed tiger. The pair are named after John Calvin, a 16th-century French Reformation theologian, and Thomas Hobbes, a 17th-century English political philosopher."
Wikipedia, Go Comics, Google, Progressive Boink

Khosrow Hassanzadeh

Faneshe / Prostitutes, 2002
Wikipedia - "Khosrow Hassanzadeh (born 1963 in Tehran) is an Iranian painter. He is known for his 'Terrorist' collection. Hassanzadeh lives and works in Tehran, where he works as an actor and visual artist. His work featured in many exhibitions in Europe and the Middle East. Hassanzadeh works primarily with painting, silkscreen and mixed media. His works often deal with issues that are considered sensitive in Iranian society and therefore he is frequently referred to as a 'political' artist."
Wikipedai, Khosrow Hassanzadeh, Google, artnet, Lightstalkers

Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster

"This, it seems to me, also nicely sums up what Gonzalez-Foerster achieves in her solo filmic experiments, which are some times displayed in dark theaters on a screen but just as often branch out to envelop architecture, public space, and even whole cities--be they the artist's native Paris or distant metropolises in Asia or Latin America."
BNET, Dia, TimesOnline, ada

Khaled

Wikipedia - "Khaled Hadj Brahim (Arabic: خالد حاج ابراهيم‎, born 29 February 1960), better known as Khaled, is a raï singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist born in Sidi-El-Houari in Oran Province of Algeria."
Wikipedia, last.fm, YouTube, (1), (2), (3)

Felipe Jesus Consalvos

The End of the Beginning, c. 1920-50
Wikipedia - "Felipe Jesus Consalvos (1891 – c. 1960) was a Cuban-American cigar roller and artist, known for his posthumously-discovered body of art work based on the vernacular tradition of cigar band collage."
Wikipedia, artnet, Fleisher/Ollman Gallery

Mike Stilkey

"Los Angeles native Mike Stilkey has always been attracted to painting and drawing not only on vintage paper, record covers and book pages, but on the books themselves. Using a mix of ink, colored pencil, paint and lacquer, Stilkey depicts a melancholic and at times a whimsical cast of characters inhabiting ambiguous spaces and narratives of fantasy and fairy tales."
Mike Stilkey, Fecal Face, Rice Gallery

Riot grrrl

Wikipedia -"Riot grrrl was an underground feminist punk movement that started in the early 1990s, and it is often associated with third-wave feminism (it is sometimes seen as its starting point). However, riot grrrl's emphasis on universal female identity and separatism often appears more closely allied with second-wave feminism than with the third wave."
Wikipedia

Dock Ellis

"Former Pittsburgh Pirates' pitcher Dock Ellis says he was under the influence of LSD when he pitched a 1970 no-hitter against the San Diego Padres."
Dock Ellis Says He Pitched 1970 No-Hitter Under The Influence of LSD, YouTube - No Mas Presents: Dock Ellis & The LSD No-No by James Blagden

300,000 birds

"Dear Straight Dope: I'm curious as to how certain flocks of birds seem to turn en masse simultaneously. All of them. In unison. I guess I've witnessed this for years, but only recently started really noticing and subsequently wondering. ..."
Straight Dope, environmental graffiti, Scientific American, YouTune - 300,000 birds

Sam the Sham

Wikipedia - "Sam the Sham is the stage name of rock 'n' roll singer Domingo 'Sam' Samudio (born 1937) from Dallas, Texas, USA. Sam the Sham was known for his camp robe and turban (inspiring Norton Records' 1994 Turban Renewal) and hauling his equipment in a 1952 Packard hearse with maroon velvet curtains. As the front man for the Pharaohs, he sang on a half dozen Top 40 hits in the mid-1960s, notably 'Wooly Bully'."
Wikipedia, Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs, YouTube, (1)

Fresh Stuff From Priest in New Orleans

"this house was destroyed during construction when hurricane katrina hit. like most of the city all that was left was a skeleton of what once was. someone clearly started gutting it and then eventually stopped. the water line was evident on the outside of the house and when i asked my friend where the levee broke he took three steps outside the house and pointed to the top of the road."
Wooster Collective

Carillon

25-bell carillon
Wikipedia - "A carillon ... is a musical instrument that is usually housed in a free-standing bell tower, or the belfry of a church or other municipal building. The instrument consists of at least 23 cast bronze cup-shaped bells, which are played serially to play a melody, or sounded together to play a chord."
Wikipedia, YouTube, (1), (2), (3)

4 American Composers - Peter Greenaway, Meredith Monk, Robert Ashley, John Cage, Philip Glass, Tom Phillips

"Based on London performances under the aegis of the New York/Almeida Festival, this set of four one-hour documentaries, originally produced in 1983, introduced these avant-garde composers and their music to general British audiences. It is a tribute to the filmmakers' accomplishment (and a sorry comment on how we honor our own prophets) that the set provides no less valuable an introduction for American audiences a full decade later."
Ubu

Allora & Calzadilla

"By drawing historical, cultural, and political metaphors out of basic materials, Allora & Calzadilla’s works explore the complex associations between an object and its meaning."
pbs, YouTube

John Collier, Jr.

Fort Kent, Aroostook County, Maine, 1942
"John Collier, Jr. was born in 1913, the youngest son of Lucy Wood Collier and John Collier, Sr. His father was a social activist who later served as the Commissioner of Indian Affairs from 1933 to 1945 and, because of this work, the family maintained ties to the area around Taos, New Mexico."
American Image

Etienne Chambaud

Le Comble, 2007
Wikipedia - "Etienne Chambaud is a French artist based in Paris. He was born in France in 1980."
Wikipedia, Courtesy of the Artists, Carefully Aimed Darts, Museo Magazine

Lee "Scratch" Perry

Wiukipedia - "Lee "Scratch" Perry (born Rainford Hugh Perry, on 20 March 1936, in Kendal, Jamaica) is a musician, who has been highly influential in the development and acceptance of reggae and dub music in Jamaica and overseas. He employs numerous pseudonyms, such as Pipecock Jackxon and The Upsetter."
Wikipedia, MySpace, Lee Perry, Perfect Sound Forever, last.fm, Roots World, YouTube, (1), (2), (3), (4), (5), (6), (7)

The Fantastic Tavern: The Tbilisi Avant-Garde

"The Fantastic Tavern: The Tbilisi Avant-Garde is an exhibition about a highly significant yet overlooked period in art history. During Georgia’s short independence as the Democratic Republic of Georgia from 1918-1921, Tbilisi became the 'Paris' of the East, where an inspired community of artists not only developed unprecedented creative practices but also collaborated to produce astonishing works of art."
Georgian Daily, Casey Kaplan Gallery

William Kentridge

Wikipedia - "Kentridge is perhaps best known for his animated films. These are constructed by filming a drawing, making erasures and changes, and filming it again. He continues this process meticulously, giving each change to the drawing a quarter of a second to two seconds' screen time. A single drawing will be altered and filmed this way until the end of a scene. These drawings are later displayed along with the films as finished pieces of art."
Wikipedia, William Kentridge, Greg Kucera, artnet, YouTube, (1), (2), (3), (4)

Wings of Desire

Wikipedia - "Wings of Desire is a 1987 film by the German director Wim Wenders. Its original German title is Der Himmel über Berlin, which can be translated as The Sky (or Heaven) over Berlin. Rainer Maria Rilke's poetry partially inspired the movie; Wenders claimed angels seemed to dwell in Rilke's poetry."
Wikipedia, Wim Wenders, Cinematical, Film, YouTube, (1), (2)

Fortune cookie

Wikipedia - "A fortune cookie is a crisp Asian American cookie usually made from flour, sugar, vanilla, and oil with a 'fortune' wrapped inside. A 'fortune' is a piece of paper with words of faux wisdom or a vague prophecy."
Wikipedia

Bent Larsen

Wikipedia - "Jørgen Bent Larsen (born March 4, 1935, Thisted) is a Danish chess Grandmaster. He has been a six-time Danish champion, and a Candidate for the World Chess Championship on four occasions: 1965, 1968, 1971, and 1977. He won three Interzonal tournaments: Amsterdam 1964, Sousse 1967, and Biel 1976."
Wikipedia, Chess Games, YouTube, (1), (2)

Stealing Home: The Case of Contemporary Cuban Baseball

"In the debate over Cuban Baseball, so much is a matter of subject position. Often point of view and geographic location are inextricably tied and knowing what to think is like navigating the impossible medieval labyrinth. Browse what the various interested parties have said on a range of topics critical to forming an educated opinion about Cuban baseball."
PBS, NYT, (1), Time, Vanity Fair

Erick Beltrán

"Erick Beltrán’s practice work reveals his interest in language and the systems in which information is dispersed. He often inserts his work as ‘viruses’ into conventional communication systems, questioning the economic and political motives driving the circulation of information in the public realm."
SCAPE, 28 Bienal sao paulo, MDE07, Google