Rap Lyrics Become Street Poetry. For Reals.

"How’s this for the realness; remember when Q-Tip rapped, 'Street poetry is my everyday'? Well you can thank street artist Jay Shells for taking that sentiment to its logical conclusion with his series of so-simple yet so-fresh street signs featuring rap lyrics at their specific geographic locations. More than 30 in all, the rap quotables by Jay-Z, Nice & Smooth, Mos Def and more were captured by ANIMAL in all their lyrical glory. This is right up our alley."
egotripland (Video)

Gardner Museum Heist Case Might Crack

"Twenty-three years ago this week, two thieves walked into Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and made off with thirteen works of art valued at a half-billion dollars, including paintings by Rembrandt, Vermeer, and Manet, and sketches by Degas. The FBI calls it the largest property heist in history, and it remains officially unsolved. But the agency used the anniversary to announce developments in the case."
Studio360
amazon - The Gardner Heist: The True Story of the World's Largest Unsolved Art Theft
WSJ: Clearer Picture of Art Heist (Video)
W - Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

The Meters

Wikipediav - "The Meters are an American funk band based in New Orleans, Louisiana. The Meters performed and recorded their own music from the late 1960s until 1977. The band played an influential role as backing musicians for other artists, including Lee Dorsey, Robert Palmer, and Dr John. While The Meters rarely enjoyed significant mainstream success, they are considered, along with artists like James Brown, one of the progenitors of funk music and their work is highly influential on many other bands, both their contemporaries and modern musicians working in the funk idiom."
Wikipedia
amazon: The Meters
YouTube: Live 1974 - Look-Ka Py Py / Jungle Man, Ain't No Use, Chicken Strut, Cissy Strut, Hey Pocky A-way, Funkify Your Life

Pina Bausch - "The Seven Deadly Sins"

"The Dance Session is strictly speaking not the session of dance. 'The Seven Deadly Sins' by Kurt Weill and Bertold Brecht and her dance company have come up with the most destructive show one could have ever imagined to see on the German stage. It goes without saying they are doing this quite consciously. This show is not only absolutely unpretentious in terms of scale or humor. It totally lacks any outward luster. This performance is poor, infinitely sad and yet charged with enormous energy… In contrast with Brecht who spoke about seven mortal sins, Pina Bausch focuses on one – renting out female flesh. It is by no means limited to the all too old theme of a woman’s degradation to a sellable pleasure article that can be obtained through fluttery or by force. Neither has it anything to do with emancipation. - Die Welt, June 18, 1976"
"The Seven Deadly Sins" by Kurt Weill and Bertold Brecht
Tanztheater Wuppertal - Die sieben Todsünden (The Seven Deadly Sins)
NYT: "The Seven Deadly Sins" and "Don't Be Afraid"
W - The Seven Deadly Sins (ballet chanté)
[PDF] Brechtian Traces in Pina Bausch's Choreographic and Cinematic Work
blip: Dance Not Dance: Pina Bausch (Video)

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

Outsider Art

Wikipedia - "The term outsider art was coined by art critic Roger Cardinal in 1972 as an English synonym for art brut, 'raw art' or 'rough art'), a label created by French artist Jean Dubuffet to describe art created outside the boundaries of official culture; Dubuffet focused particularly on art by those on the outsides of the established art scene such as insane-asylum inmates and children. While Dubuffet's term is quite specific, the English term 'outsider art' is often applied more broadly, to include certain self-taught or naïve art makers who were never institutionalized."
Wikipedia
What is Outsider Art?
NYT: Feeling Right at Home on the Fringe
Philadelphia Museum of Art
YouTube: The Outsider Art Fair 2012

Spalding Gray (Monologue) "A Personal History of the American Theatre"

"Spalding has all his early summer stockplays, and experimental works on large cards, shuffled. He chooses one at a time and tells an associated story. Very low key and Excellent! ... jb. Alive From Off Center."
Spalding Gray
UbuWeb (Video)

2011 November: Spalding Gray

The Path of Nature: French Paintings from the Wheelock Whitney Collection, 1785–1850

"In 2003 the Metropolitan Museum acquired a significant group of paintings spanning a key period in European history, beginning with the advent of the French Revolution and concluding with the reign of Louis-Philippe. ... The Whitney collection is remarkable for its concentration of plein-air oil studies by artists ranging from Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes to Camille Corot. This is complemented by a strong representation of finished landscapes, history subjects, genre, and portraiture: in short, the full scope of painting that one could expect to find in a Parisian cabinet d'amateur, or private collection, in the first half of the nineteenth century."
Metropolitan Museum of Art (Video)
NYT: The Great Outdoors

Robert Burley

"As an artist working in photography, Robert Burley has sought to describe and interpret the built environment in which he lives. Burley’s photographs have been extensively published and exhibited, and can be found in numerous museum collections including the National Gallery of Canada, Musée de l’Elysée, George Eastman House–International Museum of Photography and Film, Canadian Centre for Architecture, and the Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal."
Robert Burley
The Disappearance of Darkness (vimeo)
NYT: Picturing the End of Analog
amazon: Robert Burley
vimeo: The Disappearance of Darkness

R. Crumb and his Cheap Suit Serenaders

Wikipedia - "R. Crumb and his Cheap Suit Serenaders are an American retro string band playing songs from, and in the style of, the 1920s: old-time music, ragtime, 'evergreen' jazz standards, western swing, country blues, hokum, vaudeville and medicine show tunes. Their three 33⅓ rpm albums, all recorded in the 1970s on the Blue Goose label, were titled R. Crumb and his Cheap Suit Serenaders (1974), R. Crumb and his Cheap Suit Serenaders No. 2 (1976), and R. Crumb and his Cheap Suit Serenaders No. 3 (1978); the latter two have been reissued on the Shanachie label as Chasin' Rainbows (No. 2) and Singing In the Bathtub (No. 3)."
Wikipedia
amazon: R.crumb And His Cheap Suit Serenaders
allmusic: The Cheap Suit Serenaders
YouTube: Cheap Suit Special, My Girl's Pussy, Fine Artiste Blues, Alabama Jubilee, I'm Gonna Get It, Hula Girl, She lived down by the Firehouse

Bruce Odland

"Bruce Odland — sonic thinker, composer, and sound artist — is known for his large scale, public space sound installations which transform city noise into harmony, real-time. In 2004 he and Sam Auinger (O+A) altered the harmonic mix of the World Financial Center Plaza using the moon, tides, harmonic tuning tubes, and cement loudspeakers ('Blue Moon'). Together they have changed the sonic character of man public spaces around the world. His many collaborations include work with Laurie Anderson, Dan Graham, Andre Gregory, Wallace Shawn, Peter Sellars, Joanne Akailitis, Robert Woodruff, Tony Oursler, Peter Erskine, and the Wooster Group. He has contributed ideas and energy to projects in theatre, film, dance, public art, festivals, radio, and museums."
Bruce Odland
vimeo: Bruce Odland
Soundcloud: bruceodland (Video)
kickstarter: SAVE THE TANK (Video)

Ebo Taylor - "Ayesama"

"The music video for 'Ayesama' takes us to Ebo Taylor’s homeland of Saltpond, Ghana. Ghanaians, young and old, cooking, dancing, and going about their daily business give a comforting feel of Taylor’s town. And is the perfect visual to the afrobeat and highlife treasure that is Appia Kwa Bridge, which is out now!
YouTube: Ayesama

2011 August: Ebo Taylor

The Celluloid Records Story

"The story of Celluloid Records is a complicated one, and one that goes deeper than the music. Vivien Goldman did a fantastic job of outlining some of the label's history and context in her liner notes for Change The Beat, and now we have the pleasure of learning even more from some of the key players in the label's storied history. Filmed in Paris and New York City, this two part series features producers and musicians Bill Laswell and DXT (formerly Grand Mixer DST) and founder / owner Jean Karakos. Part two in the series will be posted shortly."
strut (YouTube) The Celluloid Records Story
Test Pressing
Change The Beat – The Celluloid Records Story (YouTube)

2010 June: Celluloid Records

March Madness 2013

"Hate 'em or love 'em, these are the storylines to track. As much as we'd love to let the games decide the storylines, that's never the case. Most results can and should and will dictate the things you read and what you react to, but before we tip off with the 64 squads in place, there are a few awesome angles to consider. Let's list them out. And I'm sparing all the possible second- and third-weekend match ups, because while Kansas-VCU meeting again would be fun to see, it's far from a guarantee. So let's not get ahead of ourselves. Over the next five days, here will be the on-the-surface talking points. And then the games will give us another two dozen to consider. That's the best part!"
CBS: The biggest and best storylines unfolding with the tourney
BR: 25 Greatest Moments in NCAA Tournament History
Grantland: The Most Hated College Basketball Players of the Last 30 Years

CBS
ESPN
Bleacher Report
SI
Wikipedia

I Am The Walrus Time - Stretched

"‘I Am The Walrus’ is one of The Beatles’ crappier songs. But time-stretched and slowed-down by 800%, it becomes something eerie, ambient and very much Sigur Rós-esque. Set to the 1960s cult short film Vertige by Jean Beaudin. Described by Dangerous Minds as 'a mix of LSD imagery, candy-colored sets, go go dancing, Vietnam war and horror movie stills and clips'."
vimeo: Walrus
YouTube:Strawberry Fields Forever - The Beatles 800% Slower, The Long and Winding Road, The Fool On The Hill, Yesterday

14th Street (IND Sixth Avenue Line)

Wikipedia - "14th Street is a local station on the IND Sixth Avenue Line of the New York City Subway. Located at the intersection of Sixth Avenue and 14th Street in Manhattan, it is served by the F train at all times, and by the M train on weekdays. This underground station opened on December 15, 1940 along with the rest of the IND Sixth Avenue Line from West Fourth Street – Washington Square to 47th–50th Streets – Rockefeller Center. Free transfers are available to Sixth Avenue on the BMT Canarsie Line (L train), which is directly underneath the extreme south end of this station, and a walkway from the Canarsie platform provides a transfer to 14th Street on the IRT Broadway – Seventh Avenue Line (1, 2 and 3 trains)."
Wikipedia
14 Street/IND 6 Avenue Line

Blues for Smoke

"Blues for Smoke is an interdisciplinary exhibition that explores a wide range of contemporary art through the lens of the blues and blues aesthetics. Turning to the blues not simply as a musical category but as a field of artistic sensibilities and cultural idioms, the exhibition features works by over forty artists from the 1950s to the present, as well as materials culled from music and popular entertainment."
Whitney
Whitney: Images
Whitney: Video
NYT - Mood Indigo: A Playlist for the Mind
GalleristNY
Blues for Smoke, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

Murray the K

Wikipedia - "Murray Kaufman (February 14, 1922 – February 21, 1982), professionally known as Murray the K, was an influential rock and roll impresario and disc jockey of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. During the early days of Beatlemania, he frequently referred to himself as the fifth Beatle. ... Murray the K reached his peak of popularity in the mid-1960s when, as the top-rated radio host in New York City, he became an early and ardent supporter and friend of The Beatles. When the Beatles came to New York on February 7, 1964, Murray was the first DJ they welcomed into their circle, having heard about him and his Brooklyn Fox shows from American groups such as the Ronettes (sisters Ronnie and Estelle Bennett, and their first cousin, Nedra Talley), also known as Murray's 'dancing girls'."
Wikipedia
Murray the K
The Murray the K Collection

Under An Alias

"Under An Alias is the new big fairytale of nerdworking, a digital historical expression. This time our story takes place in a small German town; Weimar. The effect of a small town with the population of 65,000 people on the world concerns all of us, a city where the majority of its income is from culture. Weimar is a meeting and creation point for eminent intellectuals of our current times. This town, where Goethe wrote his masterpieces, where the music of Franz Liszt could be heard. This is where its republic of Germany was founded in 1919, whose legacy was subsequently marred by the establishment of a Nazi concentration camp in 1937. Weimar, a city that currently merges art and architecture in Bauhaus university, has many untold stories."
vimeo: Under An Alias

Charles Dellschau

"... It turns out that the drawings/watercolors were the work of one Charles August Albert Dellschau (1830 - 1923). Dellschau was a butcher for most of his life and only after his retirement in 1899 did he begin his incredible career as a self-taught artist. He began with three books entitled Recollections which purported to describe a secret organization called the Sonora Aero Club. Dellschau described his duties in the club as that of the draftsman. Within his collaged watercolors were newspaper clippings (he called them 'press blooms') of early attempts at flight overlapped with his own fantastic drawings of airships of all kind."
Design Observer
Wikipedia
Charles Dellschau - Images
ART BRUT

Nina Katchadourian

World Map Scandinavia
"I made this map in college in response to an assignment, and it marks the beginning of my work with maps. Using a blade, I took apart a paper map, moving pieces over to a large piece of paper which I watercolored the same blue as the ocean in the original map. Gradually, the world was reconfigured. I often reconstructed words using presstype in places where the names of countries had gotten truncated. There were switches based on historical or geopological factors (Western Europe inserted into West Africa); others were based on formal correspondences or quirks of the map itself. Australia and Alaska had the same green border color, for example, and fit perfectly together due to the distortion of scale that occurs towards the poles."
Nina Katchadourian: World Map
W - Nina Katchadourian
Nina Katchadourian: Sorted Books project
YouTube: Nina Katchadourian: "Seat Assignment"

Rare Live Footage Documents The Clash From Their Raw Debut to the Career-Defining London Calling

"For all their leftist political fervor, musical richness, and fiercely uncompromised delivery, The Clash still suffered accusations that they sold out when they signed what looked like a relatively lucrative deal with CBS records in 1977. Those charges came from grassroots fans and critics like Mark Perry, who wrote in his seminal British punk fanzine Sniffin’ Glue that 'Punk died the day The Clash signed to CBS'. ... If debut album The Clash was mostly raw, gritty punk rock with sprinklings of reggae, and the follow-up Give ‘Em Enough Rope a little too polished for some fans (at CBS’s insistence), the double album London Calling surely marks the band’s writing and recording apex. It tops so many critics’ 'top' lists that I hardly need say more about it to introduce the high-quality film above of a February 27, 1980 Paris show."
openculture (Video)

Debo Band

"Boston's Debo Band takes inspiration from a golden era of popular music in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in the late '60s and early '70s. During a brief period of cultural freedom in Ethiopia, funk and soul music fused spectacularly with local traditions. Debo Band's debut album both honors and updates the sound of 'swinging Addis.' ... Debo Band's founder, Danny Mekonnen, was born in Sudan and grew up in Texas, learning about the golden age of Ethiopian pop through recordings. He says Debo Band aims to reinvent old sounds, not just reproduce them. The band adds sousaphone, accordion, electric guitar and violins to the lineup. And the players are strong, capable of improvising their way to the edges of free jazz."
npr - Debo Band: Ethiopian Funk, Reinvented (Video)
Debo Band: Interview (Video)
Pitchfork
YouTube: Debo Band - Full Performance (Live on KEXP) 29:29, Debo Band - Debo Band [FULL ALBUM STREAM]

The Angel of the Odd. Dark Romanticism from Goya to Max Ernst

Les Sirenes, Gustave Morea
"It was in the 1930s that the Italian writer and art historian Mario Praz (1896-1982) first highlighted the dark side of Romanticism, thus naming a vast swathe of artistic creation, which from the 1760s onwards exploited the shadows, excesses and irrational elements that lurked behind the apparent triumph of enlightened Reason. This world was created in the English Gothic novels of the late 18th century, a genre of literature that fascinated the public with its penchant for the mysterious and the macabre. The visual arts quickly followed suit: many painters, engravers and sculptors throughout Europe vied with the writers to create horrifying and grotesque worlds: Goya and Géricault presented us with the senseless atrocities of war and the horrifying shipwrecks of their time, Füssli and Delacroix gave substance to the ghosts, witches and devils of Milton, Shakespeare and Goethe, whereas C.D. Friedrich and Carl Blechen cast the viewer into enigmatic, gloomy landscapes, reflecting his fate."
Musée d'Orsay (Video), The Angel of the Odd
Art History News
Slideshow

Orson Welles Cinema

Wikipedia - "The Orson Welles Cinema was a movie theater at 1001 Massachusetts Avenue in Cambridge, Massachusetts that operated from 1969 to 1986. Showcasing independents, foreign films and revivals, it became a focal point of the Boston-Cambridge film community. The Orson Welles Cinema opened April 8, 1969 with Luis Buñuel's Simon of the Desert, Orson Welles' The Immortal Story and a midnight movie, Don Siegel's Invasion of the Body Snatchers. ... Ancillary operations included the Orson Welles Film School, a photo shop, a record store, a bookstore and The Restaurant at the Orson Welles, aka the Orson Welles Restaurant."
Wikipedia
facebook
YouTube - Orson Welles Cinema: The Third Man (1949) Trailer, Dawn Of The Dead (1978) Trailer, At Home, Elsa Dorfman (1973), Bessie Smith 'St. Louis Blues' (Part One), (Part Two)

Matisse: In Search of True Painting

Interior at Nice (Room at the Hôtel Méditerranée)
"Henri Matisse (1869–1954) was one of the most acclaimed artists working in France during the first half of the twentieth century. The critic Clement Greenberg, writing in The Nation in 1949, called him a 'self-assured master who can no more help painting well than breathing.' Unbeknownst to many, painting had rarely come easily to Matisse. Throughout his career, he questioned, repainted, and reevaluated his work. He used his completed canvases as tools, repeating compositions in order to compare effects, gauge his progress, and, as he put it, 'push further and deeper into true painting.'"
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Matisse: In Search of True Painting – At The Met New York
Left Bank Art Blog
amazon
YouTube: The Woman in Blue, An Experiment in Deformation, The Beach at Étretat

Stormy Six

Wikipedia - "Stormy Six were an Italian progressive and folk rock band founded in Milan in 1966. They performed and recorded until 1983, mostly as a sextet but occasionally as a quartet, a quintet and a septet. Although their line-up changed considerably over the years, founding member Franco Fabbri remained with the group for its entire duration. In May 1993 they performed at a re-union concert in Milan, which was recorded and released on a CD, Un Concerto (1995)."
Wikipedia
Italian Prog
YouTube: Stalingrado, Morti di Reggio Emilia, Dante Di Nanni, Gianfranco mattei, Settembre, Le lucciole, Carmine, Cancion Del Poder Popular (Inti-Illimani), Quando S'era Diplomato, 1789, Reparto Novità

The Art of Scent 1889-2012

"The Art of Scent 1889-2012 is the first major museum exhibition to recognize scent as a major medium of artistic creation and fifteen artists who work in this medium. The exhibition focuses on twelve works made between 1889 and 2012, and will include Jicky, created by Aimé Guerlain in 1889; Ernest Beaux’s Chanel N° 5 from 1921; Jean-Claude Ellena’s Osmanthe Yunnan from 2006; and Daniela Andrier’s Untitled, created in 2010."
The Art of Scent 1889-2012
NYT: Fragrances as Art, Displayed Squirt by Squirt
WSJ: The Smells of Commercial Success
YouTube: The Art of Scent: Ralf Schwieger, Daniela Andrier, Céline Barel, Jean-Marc Chaillan

Lewis Klahr

"Called the 'reigning proponent of cut and paste' by critic J. Hoberman of the Village Voice, master collagist Lewis Klahr has been making films since 1977. He is known for his uniquely idiosyncratic experimental films and cutout animations which have been screened extensively in the United States and Europe. Klahr's work is in the permanent collection of New York's Museum of Modern Art and has been included in the Biennial Exhibition of the Whitney Musuem of American Art (1991 & 1995)."
cal arts
ARTFORUM: The Illustrated Mad
Village Voice: Culture Consumer Lewis Klahr
Lewis Klahr : Chris Stults
LUX: Collection / Lewis Klahr (Video)
vimeo: Studio Visit with Filmmaker Lewis Klahr
YouTube: Altair (1995), Pony Glass (1998), The Allusions - Gypsy Woman (1996), The Diptherians Episode Two, LA - Gabriel Kahane, PRETTY TALK by Rachel Kann,GARAGE SCREEN: message from Director of The Pettifogger Lewis Klahr (2012)

Bob Marley & The Wailers - Live Forever: The Stanley Theatre, Pittsburgh, PA

"Recorded 30 years ago while Marley was touring in support of his album Uprising, Live Forever is Bob Marley's last recorded concert. This never before released audio collection offers an incredible snapshot of one of music's most influential performers. Bob Marley & The Wailers - Live Forever: The Stanley Theatre, Pittsburgh, PA, September 23, 2010 is a 2CD/3LP/digital collection that features many of Bob's most cherished songs, and is now available."
Bob Marley & the Wailers Live Forever
amazon
YouTube: Bob Marley "Live At The Stanley Theatre: Pennsylvania, USA" (Complete Concert)

Tom Johnson In Los Angeles

"On Friday, February 22 the week-long 2013 residency of Tom Johnson in Los Angeles was capped off with a concert of his music at the wulf, an experimental performance space deep in the gritty heart of industrial downtown. Featured was the Los Angeles premiere of ’Clarinet Trio’ and four other works, plus the occasion was also marked by the release of a new CD of Tom’s works titled ‘correct music’ from Populist Records. About 50 people crowded into the reclaimed factory loft to attend the event and what the wulf lacks in amenities was more than compensated by the enthusiasm of the young audience."
Sequenza21 (Video)
the wulf
Past Exhibition: Tom Johnson
The Tom Johnson Paradox
YouTube: Eight Patterns for Eight Instruments (1 to 5), Tom Johnson - ARTefacts ensemble

2011 February: Tom Johnson
2012 May: Rational Melodies