A Week of Fire and Ice

"That barricades remain a brutal but effective final resort for desperate citizens was amply on display this past week, not only in Ukraine, where President Viktor F. Yanukovych appeared finally to surrender, but also in Venezuela, where the batons and tear gas of riot police officers failed to quell anti-government demonstrations, and in Thailand, where the police engaged in bloody efforts to clear sites occupied by protesters since late November. The images of fires and riot police officers pummeling demonstrators contrasted with those from Sochi of swirling skaters and daredevil skiers. But it was not all celebration in the melting snows of the Caucasus, as a few surprise results brought some kvetching not in keeping with the Olympic spirit."
NYT: A Week of Fire and Ice
Why is Ukraine in Crisis?: A Quick Primer For Those Too Embarrassed to Ask (Video)
NY Times: Ukraine
W - Ukraine
Guardian - Ukraine
CIA: Ukraine

Italian Futurism, 1909–1944: Reconstructing the Universe

Fortunato Depero, Skyscrapers and Tunnels (Gratticieli e tunnel), 1930
"The first comprehensive overview of Italian Futurism to be presented in the United States, this multidisciplinary exhibition examines the historical sweep of the movement from its inception with F. T. Marinetti’s Futurist manifesto in 1909 through its demise at the end of World War II. Presenting over 300 works executed between 1909 and 1944, the chronological exhibition encompasses not only painting and sculpture, but also architecture, design, ceramics, fashion, film, photography, advertising, free-form poetry, publications, music, theater, and performance. To convey the myriad artistic languages employed by the Futurists as they evolved over a 35-year period, the exhibition integrates multiple disciplines in each section."
Guggenheim
Guggenheim: Exhibition Website
NYT: In Thrall to Machines, War and a More Manly Future
amazon

Crime Jazz: How Miles Davis, Count Basie & Other Jazz Legends Provided the Soundtrack for Noir Films & TV

"When we think of film noir, we tend to think of a mood best set by a look: shadow and light (mostly shadow), grim but visually rich weather, near-depopulated urban streets. You’ll see plenty of that pulled off at the height of the craft in the movies that make up 'noirchaeologist' Eddie Muller’s list of 25 noir pictures that will endure, which we featured last week. But what will you hear? Though no one compositional style dominated the soundtracks of films noirs, you’ll certainly hear more than a few solid pieces of crime jazz. Xeni Jardin at Boing Boing, writing about Rhino’s eponymous compilation album, defines this musical genre as 'jazzy theme music from 1950s TV shows and movies in which very bad people do very bad things.'”
Open Culture (Video)

2009 January: Film noir

Frank Thiel

Berlin Untitled (Palast der Republik #21), 2006
"Frank Thiel was born in Kleinmachnow near Berlin, Germany in 1966. He moved to West Berlin, Germany in 1985 and attended a training college for photography there from 1987-1989. Thiel is widely renown for photographing the architectural spaces of Berlin, reflecting a turbulent social and political history. Thiel's monumental works are not merely documentation, but picture a city reborn after a tumultuous history."
Sean Kelly
Sean Kelly: Selected Works
Tracing Intentions
The Photography of Frank Thiel
Galeria Leme
BBC: Breathtaking Patagonian ice field photographed by German artist Frank Thiel (Video)
vimeo: A Berlin Decade

Bert Jansch / John Renbourn - Bert & John (1966)

"One of the long-standing collaborations of the British folk revival, Bert Jansch and John Renbourn's Bert and John sees the masterful Pentangle guitarists sparing together through their trademark steel-string guitar styles. Their respective solo careers established them both as leading troubadours of British Isles folk, with little debate and few peers, besides maybe Wizz Jones and Ralph McTell. On this album the duo finds good company in each other's techniques, which are quite indistinguishable in both guitar playing and singing through traditional adaptations, blues, and originals in the Anglo-folk style. The duo plays beautifully together in a candid setting."
allmusic
W - Bert & John
YouTube: Bert and John 1966 [full album]

April 2010: Bert Jansch, 2011 October: Bert Jansch (November 1943 – October 2011), 2011 September: Faro Annie, 2011 April: Cruel Sister (1970) - Pentangle, 2012 November: John Renbourn - Sir John Alot, 2013 May: The Lady and the Unicorn.

Cairo: Images of Transition. Perspectives on Visuality in Egypt 2011-2013

"Cairo: Images of Transition. Perspectives on Visuality in Egypt 2011-2013 is a publication that offers a broad range of artistic and academic works that examine the relationship between aesthetics and politics in the wake of the Egyptian revolution of January 25, 2011. With an emphasis on the political processes of 2011-2012, the book traces the shifting status of the image as a communicative tool, a witness to history, and an active agent for change."
Mikala Hyldig Dal
[PDF] Cairo: Images of Transition. Perspectives on Visuality in Egypt 2011-2013
amazon

2011 January: ‘Tomorrow, to Tahrir Again’, 2013 March: First Look: Graffiti and The Egyptian Revolution.

The New York Transit Museum: Grand by Design

"... One of the splendors of Grand Central is that its vast, majestic spaces reveal extraordinary attention to the smallest design detail. The architects brought in Parisian artist Sylvain Saliéres to craft bronze and stone carvings, including ornamental inscriptions, decorative flourishes, and sculpted oak leaves and acorns (symbols of the Vanderbilt family), including playful carved acorns festooning the Main Waiting Room’s chandeliers. The architects specified Tennessee marble for the floors, Botticino marble for wall trim, and imitation Caen stone for the walls. The Oyster Bar’s vaulted ceilings are adorned with a herringbone pattern of Guastavino tiles—like those uptown in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. On the exterior, imposing sculptures of Mercury, Hercules, and Minerva top the 42nd Street façade."
Grand by Design (Video)

2010 December: Grand Central Terminal

The Interstellar Contract

"... Recently, the composer Raphael Mostel told me that one of his colleagues, the composer, musician, and software engineer Laurie Spiegel, has intimate knowledge of the Golden Record and of the curious legal issues it raised. For a section of the disk entitled 'Sounds of Earth,' Sagan’s sonic team had chosen Spiegel’s piece 'Harmonices Mundi.' Spiegel was given a contract to sign, a copy of which she kept in her files. When I asked about it, she kindly sent me a scan of the document, which will be of interest to specialists in the obscure and complex field of Space Copyright Law, and possibly a few connoisseurs of avant-garde legal language."
New Yorker (Video)

2011 May: Laurie Spiegel, 2012 November: Laurie Spiegel - The Expanding Universe

Rosanne Cash - The River & the Thread (2014)

"Nearly eight years after Rosanne Cash last released a set of original songs, 2014's The River & the Thread finds her in a reflective mood, and just as 2009's The List saw her looking back with a set of classic songs recommended by her father, the late country legend Johnny Cash, The River & the Thread is dominated by thoughts and emotions that occurred to her as she was involved in a project to restore Johnny's boyhood home. This doesn't mean that Cash has returned to the spunky, country-accented sound of her most popular work -- this is still Rosanne Cash the mature and thoughtful singer/songwriter we've come to know since the late '90s, and the tone of this album is unfailingly literate. But though this music isn't country, it's certainly Southern, and road trips from Alabama to Tennessee, visits to the Tallahatchie Bridge and Money Street, and vintage gospel music on the radio embroider these songs as Cash immerses herself in the places that were once close to home as if she's reuniting with long lost family."
allmusic
Rolling Stone (Video)
MTV: Rosanne Cash › Music Videos (Video), Etta´s Tune
YouTube: Night School, When The Master Calls The Roll

2010 March: Rosanne Cash, 2012 January: Black Cadillac, 2012 April: "I Was Watching You"  , 2012 July: The Wheel, 2012 February: Live From Zone C.

Graffiti: 40 Years of Hacking New York City

"The title of The Museum of New York City’s latest street art retrospective  —  City as Canvas  —  seems little more than a clever name at first glance; a literal description of an art form that takes the very fabric of urban spaces — the brick and concrete of walls, the steel and plastic of subway cars — as its medium of choice. But in fact, the title is loaded with political and aesthetic connotations, and is in itself a bold statement about the legitimacy of an art form that has had a long, fraught, and troubled relationship with the city that spawned it."
Medium
City As Canvas
Martin Wong Graffiti Collection

Johnny "Guitar" Watson - Space Guitar: The Essential Early Masters

"Johnny 'Guitar' Watson was probably best known for his '70s funk incarnation, but he had been recording as early as the mid-'50s -- not as Johnny 'Guitar' Watson, but as the piano-pounding bluesman Young John Watson. Space Guitar collects Watson's sessions recorded for Federal in the mid-'50s (his first sessions as a leader) and some early-'60s sides recorded for King. As mentioned, he was billed as Young John Watson for the Federal sides, and aside from a bit of guitar on one song at his first session ('Highway 60'), Watson stuck to piano for his first two sessions. These are your typical '50s blues: upbeat and passionate with driving piano and a horn section, solid if unspectacular. It wasn't until his third session for Federal in 1954 (two days before his 19th birthday) that he strapped on the guitar as his featured instrument and cut the astonishing 'Space Guitar,' presented here with an alternate take as well."
allmusic
W - Johnny "Guitar" Watson
soulwalking
YouTube: Gettin Drunk, Cuttin' In, Motor Head Baby, Half Pint A Whiskey, Sweet Lovin' Mama, Gangster Of Love, Space Guitar

Georg Baselitz

"Gagosian London is pleased to present 'Farewell Bill,' an exhibition of new paintings by Georg Baselitz. Seeking to expand the scope of traditional representation in art, Baselitz has constantly revisited and reimagined his chosen subjects over time. In this new series, he co-opts figuration as a vehicle for expression in energized, intuitively painted self-portraits—a new approach in his persistent subversion of the painted subject. Marking a clear departure from the retrospective impulses of the Remix paintings of the past decade, these vibrant new works focus afresh on the affirmative act of painting."
Gagosian
W - Georg Baselitz
Guardian - Georg Baselitz: 'Am I supposed to be friendly?'
MoMA: 8 Engravings after Drawings from 1959 (8...1959-1973)
YouTube: The Art of Georg Baselitz - Sculptures and Paintings, Making Art after Auschwitz and Dresden

The 11 Best Classic Diners and Luncheonettes in NYC

"For a time, diner culture was dining culture in New York. And although those halcyon days have long since passed, the city's need for greasy spoons endures even if wistfulness is often an establishment's most potent spice. Convenience and reliability are the hallmarks of truly great diners, and the most resilient among them usually last thanks to a combination of nostalgia and an occasionally excellent stable of American, Eastern European, Greek, or Italian dishes. Where some see grit and grime, others recognize the smell of a well-seasoned flat top. So brush past the seemingly endless sea of kale salads and join Adam and Eve on that raft ('Adam and Eve on a raft' is diner slang for two poached eggs on toast) in search of these, our 11 best greasy spoons."
Village Voice

Small Stories - David Lynch

"Best known for his work in film, David Lynch is also a musician, designer and artist. After seducing Paris with his underground club, Silencio, two years ago, Lynch has now made a foray into the city’s art scene with his show 'Small Stories'. The exhibition, which opened January 15 at the Maison Européenne de la Photographie (MEP), is far from a traditional retrospective on the life and work of a renowned artist (Lynch's work as a director includes the cult movies 'Blue Velvet' and 'Mulholland Drive' and the TV series 'Twin Peaks'). Lynch was given a 'carte blanche' by the museum, and the result is around 40 black and white photographs made especially for the show."
David Lynch's reveries on show in Paris
purple DIARY
YouTube: "Small Stories" by David Lynch

R.L. Burnside

Wikipedia - "Robert Lee 'R. L.' Burnside (November 23, 1926 – September 1, 2005), was an American blues singer, songwriter, and guitarist who lived much of his life in and around Holly Springs, Mississippi. He played music for much of his life, but did not receive much attention until the early 1990s. In the latter half of the 1990s, Burnside repeatedly recorded with Jon Spencer, garnering crossover appeal and introducing his music to a new fanbase within the underground garage rock scene. ... Burnside had a powerful, expressive voice and played both electric and acoustic guitar, with and without a slide. His drone-heavy style was more characteristic of North Mississippi hill country blues than Delta blues. Like other country blues musicians, he did not always adhere to strict 12- or 16-bar blues patterns, often adding extra beats to a measure as he saw fit. He referred to this rhythmic eccentricity as 'Burnside style' and recommended that backing musicians familiarize themselves with his style before playing along."
Wikipedia
allmusic
YouTube: See My Jumper Hanging On the Line (1978), Poor Boy A Long Way From Home (1978), When My First Wife Left Me (1978), Going Down South, Poor Black Mattie (1984), Let My Baby Ride, Rollin and Tumblin, R.L. Burnside & Johnny Woods - Telephone Blues, 44 Pistol, R.L.Burnside & Jon Spencer Blues Explosion - Shake'em On Down, Hard Time Killing Floor, Someday Baby
YouTube: Sound Machine Groove (Full Album), A Bothered Mind (full album), A Pocket Ass of Whiskey (Full Album)

2013 March: “Dust My Broom”: The Story of a Song, 2013 September: Deep Blues: A Musical Pilgrimage to the Crossroads (1990).

Loot No Longer

"When France’s culture minister, Aurélie Filippetti, handed over six looted 18th-century paintings to a Boston man in March, she declared a new 'proactive approach' to tracking the original owners of recovered artworks that were stolen by the Nazis. The announcement was welcomed here and abroad as an overdue step after decades of bureaucratic resistance to returning the art in a nation scarred by the most systematic plunder of any country during World War II. But since that pledge, there has been scant evidence of change. Filippetti created two groups to study the subject and submit progress reports to her, one due at the end of the year to describe objects that can be tracked and a second due next summer. No additional funds have been earmarked for research, and no additional staff members have been hired or dedicated to this project, Thierry Bajou, the ministry official in charge of the recovery effort, acknowledged."
NYT: Loot No Longer

Thelonious Monk - Genius of Modern Music, Vol. 1, Vol. 2

"Volume 1 of the two-volume Genius of Modern Music set comprises the first sessions Thelonious Monk recorded as a leader, on October 15 and 24 and November 21 of 1947. It's impossible to overstate the importance of these sessions. They include some of the earliest recordings of Monk compositions that would become standards, despite their angularity and technical difficulty: the strange, sideways chord progression of 'Thelonious'; the bouncy and cheerful but melodically cockeyed 'Well, You Needn't'; the post-bop Bud Powell tribute 'In Walked Bud'; and, of course, 'Round Midnight,' which is now one of the most frequently recorded jazz compositions ever. There are kinks to be worked out: Art Blakey's drumming is fine, but he obviously hasn't quite taken the measure of Monk's compositional genius, and on the November session, alto saxophonist Sahib Shihab employs a fat, warbly tone that sounds out of place. But the excitement of discovery permeates every measure, and Monk himself is in top form, his solos jagged and strange, yet utterly beautiful."
allmusic - Genius of Modern Music, Vol. 1
allmusic - Genius of Modern Music, Vol. 2
W - Genius of Modern Music, Vol. 1
W - Genius of Modern Music, Vol. 2
NPR: Genius of Modern Music, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 (Video)
ArtistDirect: I Mean You (Live From Salle Pleyel, Paris, France/1969) (Video), Straight No Chaser (1965), 'Round Midnight (1966)
YouTube: Genius Of Modern Music Vol. 1/'Round About Midnight~Off Minor, Genius Of Modern Music Vol.2/Humph~Straight No Chaser

2012 September: Thelonious Monk: Straight No Chaser, 2013 August: Five Spot Café.

Comics

Fran Krause
Wikipedia - "Comics is a visual medium used to express ideas via images, often combined with text or visual information. Comics frequently takes the form of juxtaposed sequences of panels of images. Often textual devices such as speech balloons, captions, and sound effects ('onomatopoeia') indicate dialogue, narration, or other information. Elements such as size and arrangement of panels control narrative pacing. Cartooning and similar forms of illustration are the most common image-making means in comics; fumetti is a form which uses photographic images. Common forms of comics include comic strips, editorial and gag cartoons, and comic books. Since the late 20th century, bound volumes such as graphic novels, comics albums, and tankōbon have become increasingly common, and online webcomics have proliferated. The history of comics has followed divergent paths in different cultures."
Wikipedia

William Burroughs at 100

‘William S. Burroughs: A Man Within’
"William S. Burroughs, at his centenary, remains an indelible presence. His writings, ideas, and influence are everywhere still, and it is as though the man himself were hovering right alongside them. So original a public persona, as vivid as ever some two decades after his death, is hard to shake. Few mugs are as iconic. The long poker face, imposing, rarely smiling (if not quite unfriendly), comes across as self-possessed as a cat’s. When there is a smile, it’s a little surprising: a delicate and playful thing, twitchy (never toothy), suggesting the giddy ambivalence of the solitary boy before a welcoming audience. And there’s the voice, prophetic and profane, a high nasal twang issuing from the top of the throat, determined yet reedy, before resolving itself into a contented grumble of half-chewed words."
Fandor
William S Burroughs 100
Telegraph: William S Burroughs: a Life by Barry Miles, review
NPR: 100 Years Ago, Writer William S. Burroughs Was Born
William S. Burroughs at 100: Exploding Five Major Myths
100 years of William S. Burroughs: The nakedness of words
YouTube: Kathy Acker interviews William S. Burroughs - part 1/3, part 2/3, part 3/3

French Revolution Digital Archive

"The Images are composed of high-resolution digital images of approximately 12,000 individual visual items, primarily prints, but also illustrations, medals, coins, and other objects, which display aspects of the Revolution. These materials were selected from across the BnF’s departments, and include thousands of images for the important collections entitled Hennin and De Vinck. Detailed metadata exists for the images, so that researchers can search by artist, subject, genre, and place."
French Revolution Digital Archive - Stanford University Libraries
About the collections - Stanford University Libraries
Hyperallergic: 14,000 Images of the French Revolution Released Online

2009 November: The French Revolution (1789–1799)

Sochi 2014

"Comprehensive coverage of the XXII Olympic Winter Games from Sochi, Russia, will be presented across NBCUniversal’s broadcast and digital platforms. Beginning on Thursday, Feb. 6, with preliminary rounds of Snowboarding, Freestyle Skiing and Figure Skating, every phase of competition from all 15 sports on the Sochi program, including each medal-winning performance in all 98 events, will be streamed LIVE on NBCOlympics.com and via the NBC Sports Live Extra mobile app."
2014 Sochi Olympics: Viewers Guide
Sochi 2014 - NY Times
Sochi 2014 - NBC
Sochi 2014 - BBC
NYT: An Olympics in the Shadow of a War Zone
NYT: Terrorism and Tension for Sochi, Not Sports and Joy
W - Concerns and controversies at the 2014 Winter Olympics
W - 2014 Winter Olympics

Delaney & Bonnie & Friends: Copenhagen December 10, 1969

"This is a Danish TV recording of Delaney & Bonnie & Friends performing. This is the rare complete recording in good quality. Note: The 'Friends' is really the future Derek and the Dominos in the making. Line-up: Bonnie Bramlett : voc, Delaney Bramlett : voc, g, Eric Clapton : g, voc, George Harrison : g, Carl Radle : b, Jim Gordon : dr, Bobby Whitlock : kbd, voc, Billy Preston : org, Jim Price : tr, Bobby Keys : ts, Rita Coolidge : voc, Tex Johnson : perc."
YouTube: Delaney & Bonnie & Friends: Copenhagen December 10, 1969 45:02

2010 August: Derek and the Dominos, 2010 September: Delaney & Bonnie & Friends.

Enrique Martínez Celaya - A Wasted Journey, A Half-Finished Blaze

"Artist Enrique Martínez Celaya incorporates multiple media to express his vision of art and life: painting, sculpture, photography or writing. These disciplines are intertwined in particular contexts or environments, in which the line that separates art, philosophy, literature and religion almost seems to disappear. From February 2 to March 7, the complexity of his oeuvre will be displayed at Andersson/Sandström Gallery in Umeå, Sweden, in the exhibition titled A Wasted Journey, A Half-Finished Blaze."
Enrique Martínez Celaya: A Prolific Journey with a Bright Future
Umeå2014
Enrique Martinez Celaya
YouTube: Enrique Martínez Celaya 2012, Making Art

2009 February: Enrique Martínez Celaya, 2009 December: Enrique Martínez Celaya - 1.

Women And Their Machines: A Think-piece About Female Pioneerism in Electronic Music

Eliane Radique
"An article with such a mighty subtitle is obviously quite a hefty affair. Not only when it comes to the substantial research involved, with the need to dig relatively deep into the history of women electronic music, those involved in analogue technological development and pioneering moments of musical creation, but also in terms of the questions any such project raises. First hand observations and comments made by some of the interviewees - among them veteran punk electronic musician Gudrun Gut, early member of Einstuerzende Neubauten and part of the cult girl band Malaria, and Madeleine Bloom, musician and ex-technical support of the music software Ableton - lead to questions about the impact of feminism and gender equality in the field of electronic music, in which females are still direly underrepresented and, moreover, frequently mis-represented."
Meoko
NYT: Rediscovering the Electronic Music Godmothers
BOMBLOG: Holly Herndon by Sean Higgins (Video)
Guardian: Manchester honours the woman behind the pioneering music of Doctor Who (Video)
Resident Visitor: Laurie Spiegel's Machine Music (Video)
Cynthia Webster: Designing Modular Analog Synthesizers
W - List of female electronic musicians
YouTube: Laurie Spiegel plays Alles synth - temporary replacement, Laurie Spiegel - Old Wave, Delia Derbyshire/Nightwalker, Delia Derbyshire - "Falling", from The Dreams (1964), Daphne Oram - Snow, Daphne Oram - Four Aspects, Daphne Oram documentary - Wee Have Also Sound-Houses, Wendy Carlos Shining soundtrack, Doris Norton - Erosraptus, Doris Norton - Norton Apple Software, Suzanne Ciani - "The Fifth Wave: Water Lullaby" (1982), Clara Rockmore - Vocalise, Pril Smiley - Geminiacal Acidestiny, Louis & Bebe Barron - Forbidden Planet, Louis and Bebe Barron - Graveyard , a Night with two Moons, ALICE SHIELDS -"STUDY FOR VOICE AND TAPE" (1968), Maryanne Amacher -- Living Sound, Patent Pending Music, Head Rhythm 1 and Plaything 2 - Maryanne Amacher, Ikue Mori - Bhima Swarga

2012 February: Pink Noises: Women on Electronic Music and Sound, 2011 May: Laurie Spiegel, 2012 November: Laurie Spiegel - The Expanding Universe, 2011 January: Maryanne Amacher, 2012 October: Ikue Mori, 2009 October: Sound collage

Precision And Splendor: Clocks And Watches At The Frick Collection

"The Frick Collection has one of the most important public collections of European timepieces in the United States, much of it acquired through the 1999 bequest of the New York collector Winthrop Kellogg Edey. This extraordinary gift of thirty-eight watches and clocks dating from the Renaissance to the early nineteenth century covers the art of horology in France, Germany, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. For reasons of space, only part of the collection can be on permanent view in the museum's galleries. - See more at: http://www.frick.org/exhibitions/clocks#sthash.1aFoPaV4.dpuf"
Precision And Splendor: Clocks And Watches At The Frick Collection
REVOLUTION Press
Precision And Splendor: Clocks And Watches At The Frick Collection (Video)

"Walking on Thin Ice" - Yoko Ono (1981)

Wikipedia - "'Walking on Thin Ice' is a song by Yoko Ono, released in 1981. She and John Lennon concluded the recording of the song on December 8, 1980. It was upon their return from the recording studio to The Dakota (their home in New York City) that Lennon was murdered by Mark David Chapman. Lennon was clutching a tape of a final mix when he was shot. The song was both a critical and commercial success. Lennon's lead guitar work on the track, which he recorded on 8 December 1980, was his final creative act. At the end of January 1981, 'Walking on Thin Ice' was released as a single and became Ono's first chart success, peaking at number 58 in the US and gaining major club/underground airplay. The single was released in February 1981 in the UK and reached number 35 on the chart. The critical reception was favorable: NME rated it in the best tracks of year 1981 at number 10."
Wikipedia
YouTube: Walking On Thin Ice (1981 Re-Edit), Walking On Thin Ice (best version), "Walking On Thin Ice" (Danny Tenaglia's Give Ice a Chance Mix), "Walking On Thin Ice" (R3HAB Remix), Walking On Thin Ice (Pet Shop Boys Electro Mix)

2009 January: Yoko Ono, 2009 September: Toronto Rock and Roll Revival, 2011 April: Grapefruit.

BBC FOUR Sessions: Gillian Welch

"BBC FOUR Sessions features a special concert by acclaimed country-folk singer songwriter Gillian Welch. Songs include Look at Miss Ohio, Revelator and from the soundtrack of O Brother, Where Art Thou? - I'll Fly Away. The session was recorded with Gillian and her partner-producer David Rawlings at LSO St Luke's in London on Monday 2 August and includes a special encore cover of The Band's classic The Weight, with bluegrass outfit Old Crow Medicine Show. Gillian grew up in West Los Angeles where she first got into bluegrass and early country music such as Delmore Brothers, the Carter Family, and the Stanley Brothers."
BBC
YouTube: BBC4 St. Luke's Full Concert August 4, 2004 London

2009 February: Gillian Welch, 2011 March: Gillian Welch & Dave Rawlings NPRP, 2012 July: Harrow Harvest, 2012 September: By The Mark (2004).

Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs

"Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs is a groundbreaking reassessment of the colourful and innovative final works of modern art master, Henri Matisse. Bringing together around 120 works, many seen together for the first time, the exhibition celebrates the period in which Matisse began ‘cutting into colour’ and his series of spectacular cut-outs was born. Henri Matisse is a leading figure of modern art and one of the most significant colourists of all time. In a career spanning over half a century, Matisse made a large body of work of which the cut-outs are a brilliant final chapter. The drama, scale and innovation of these works, made between 1936 and 1954, remain without precedent or parallel. Matisse’s first cut-outs were collected together in Jazz 1947, a book of 20 plates. Copies of the book, featuring a text hand-written by Matisse, are shown alongside the original cut-outs."
Tate
ARTBOOK
Rooms Magazine

2012 March: The Steins Collect, 2013 March: Matisse: In Search of True Painting

Le Skate Moderne - Raymond Depardon

"Clichés are hard to uprooot, particularly in sports and movements stemming from the urban universe which often have difficulty in emancipating themselves of their own esthetic standards. Tiring and deceiving for years of the fisheye (among others), skateboard videos do not make an exception to this rule and are all alike. All? Not now anymore. The French collective Kloudbox has finally just opened the shutters of this small world divided up to let in a big fresh draft with its documentary 'Le Skate Moderne' (The Modern Skateboard). Claiming the major influence of Raymond Depardon and his movie 'La Vie Moderne', this documentary is interested in a group of skaters who live in the most rural places in Dordogne (France), at one thousand miles of the Californian swimming pools and the original skateboard lifestyle."
Documentary | “Le Skate Moderne” (Video)
W - Raymond Depardon
Photographer Raymond Depardon Captures the ‘Sweet Moments'
MUBI: Raymond Depardon (Video)

An Anthology of Concrete Poetry

"First published by the legendary Something Else Press in 1967, An Anthology of Concrete Poetry was the first American anthology on the international movement of Concrete poetry. The movement itself began in the early 1950s, in Germany–through Eugen Gomringer, who borrowed the term 'concrete' from the art of his mentor, Max Bill–and in Brazil, through the Noigandres group, which included the de Campos brothers and Decio Pignatari. Over the course of the 1960s it exploded across Europe, America and Japan, as other protagonists of the movement emerged, such as Dieter Roth, Öyvind Fahlström, Ernst Jandl, bpNichol, Mary Ellen Solt, Jackson Mac Low, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Bob Cobbing, Dom Sylvester Houédard, Pierre Garnier, Henri Chopin, Brion Gysin and Kitasono Katue."
Primary Information
amazon
INTERVIEW WITH EMMETT WILLIAMS: FLUXUS ARTIST EXTRAORDINAIRE
W - Concrete poetry

Triage for Treasures After a Bomb Blast

"A man in a white lab coat sat alone among piles of blown-off ceiling, mangled metal and splintered wood here on Thursday inside the Museum of Islamic Art — home to a world-renowned collection that covers centuries of art from countries across the Islamic world. He carefully separated ochre-tinted pieces of old glass from the clear shards of modern showcases. The precious glass came from exquisite medieval lamps — or meshkawat — from some of Cairo’s most important mosques. They were among the biggest material losses from a truck bomb blast on Jan. 24 that tore through this 111-year-old museum, blowing out windows and sending metal and glass flying through its halls."
NYT: Triage for Treasures After a Bomb Blast
W - Museum of Islamic Art, Cairo

Day of the Fight - Stanley Kubrick (1951)

Wikipedia - "Day of the Fight is a 1951 American short subject documentary film shot in black-and-white and also the first picture directed by Stanley Kubrick. Kubrick financed the film himself, and it is based on an earlier photo feature he had done as a photographer for Look magazine in 1949. Day Of The Fight shows Irish-American middleweight boxer Walter Cartier during the height of his career, on the day of a fight with black middleweight Bobby James, which took place on April 17, 1950. The film opens with a short section on boxing's history, and then follows Cartier through his day, as he prepares for the 10 P.M. bout that night. He eats breakfast in his West 12th Street apartment in Greenwich Village, then goes to early mass and eats lunch at his favorite restaurant. At 4 P.M., he starts preparations for the fight. By 8 P.M., he is waiting in his dressing room at Laurel Gardens in Newark, New Jersey for the fight to begin. We then see the fight itself, where he comes out victorious in a short match."
Wikipedia
TCM
TIME: From Photography to Film: Stanley Kubrick Enters the Ring (Video)
YouTube: Day of the Fight (1951)

2008 August: Stanley Kubrick, 2010 September: 2001: A Space Odyssey, 2011 February: A Stanley Kubrick Odyssey - A Tribute, 2011 April: Killer's Kiss (1955), 2011 December: Chicago (1949), 2012 October: Dr. Strangelove (1965), 2013 April: LACMA.

Michael Nyman - Drowning by Numbers (1988)

"Having already scored a few successful soundtracks for director Peter Greenaway, composer Michael Nyman applies his minimalist and romantic art to the director's 1988 release Drowning By Numbers. While not as provocative as future Greenaway collaborations like The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover and Prospero's Books, this disc contains enough solid material to keep the Nyman faithful satisfied. ..."
allmusic
W - Drowning by Numbers
amazon: Drowning By Numbers (1987 Film)
Soundcloud: Trysting Fields from Drowning by Numbers (Video)
YouTube: Drowning by Number 3, Knowing The Ropes, Wheelbarrow Walk, Endgame
YouTube: "Drowning by Numbers Knowing the Ropes" Baltic Philharmonic Hall, Poland - Gdańsk, SOLIDARITY OF ARTS FESTIVAL 2009, Trysting Fields, Sheep 'n' Tides

2008 April: Michael Nyman, 2010 August: Decay Music, 2010 December: After Extra Time, 2011 March: Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond, 2011 August: Michael Nyman Band, 2011 December: The Draughtsman's Contract - Peter Greenaway, 2012 March: Time Lapse, 2013 July: Composer in Progress, In Concert (2010).

On the Mountain A Cry Was Heard - Pina Bausch (1993)

"... Bausch’s stiletto says other things, too. It approximates ballet’s pointe shoe in the way it cocks the ankle and ups the arch, yet stiffens the women’s (and sometimes the men’s) connection to the floor. It grounds the stage in a social milieu—the offstage, adult world—yet flirts with fetish, that hairy underworld intimated in the unshaven legs that rise out of those high heels. When Bausch dancers kick off their pumps, which they wear with the confidence of Nazi commandants, they bump down with a harummph, stripped of some erotic power, culturally undressed. Their ballgowns crumple at the hem like musty old mansions. A Bausch evening, you realize, takes place in those three to four inches between nature and nurture, good and evil, and just about any other dichotomy one cares to name. It’s a tight crawlspace."
The New Criterion
Tanztheater Wuppertal: On the Mountain A Cry Was Heard
Telegraph: The mighty Pina Bausch
facebook: Das StÜck mit dem Schiff 1994 (Video)
YouTube: Das Stück mit dem Schiff

2008 May: Pina Bausch, 2009 June: Pina Bausch 1940-2009, 2012 August: Pina Bausch Costumes.

Sun Ra - The Eternal Myth Revealed Vol. 1 (2011)

"It is not an exaggeration to say that this lavishly illustrated and annotated 14-CD box is an essential addition to the shelf of every single hardcore Sun Ra fan as well as musicologists and critics. The Eternal Myth Revealed, Vol. 1 was carefully curated, assembled, annotated, and sequenced by official Sun Ra Music Archive head Michael D. Anderson and issued on his Transparency Records imprint. It traces the musical roots of Sun Ra from his earliest years up to the end of the 1950s. This is accomplished via interviews and narration by Ra, his sidemen, musicologists, historians, and other Sun Ra aficionados, as well as presenting musical selections by Ra's many influences, his contemporaries, and his own early recordings as both an artist and producer, not only in jazz, but in rhythm & blues, doo wop, poetry, blues, and more."
allmusic
Sun Ra: The Eternal Myth Revealed Vol. 1
Sun Ra Arkive
amazon
YouTube: The Eternal Myth Revealed - CD Box Set - Promo Video Part 1, Part 2