Really interesting (and scary) article from Wired about the mass appeal and allure of emoji when it comes to mobile advertising: link
curly hair...and darker skin -- a recent development in the available selection (DOVE/WIRED)
The idea here is pretty simple: Mobile advertising is really hard.
Grabbing your attention inside your mobile messages is even harder. So
instead of creating, say, a series of pop-up shampoo ads that drive you
crazy, Dove wants to give you the chance to share a curly-haired smiling
face if you want to. And, if you do, you may think of Dove and its
products when you share that emoji.
Brands, celebrities, and marketers know that we spend so much of our
time on our phones. But traditional pop-ups and banner ads don’t work
well on those small screens. Emoji, however, increasingly rule our digital interactions. Sure, we, the people, have to choose
to download and use a corporation or celebrity’s emoji, stickers, or
GIF keyboards. But once we do, brands have a direct connection into our
private messages, the place on our phones where we pay the most
attention.
These kinds of emoji keyboards could actually capture our attention
in a way that we want—and in a place that could become central to the
future of advertising. And yet, for it to work, we have to want to play
along.
To me, all of this is pretty terrifying. Emoji is an emerging language, much like how bitcoin is now a legitimate currency. I'm not going to deny its importance and dominance in the current digital (and social) landscape. Emojis have a way of heightening and enhancing typical conversations (a well-placed smiley face in a heated text convo could make or break a friendship, depending on the context.) But what this article predicts is the increasing length that corporations will take to intrude in our inner lives. Not even the smiley poop emoji is safe, after all...you can find its pillow counterpart in Walmart. Verdict: No me gusta.
My toy weapon was a bunny switchblade. However, when I printed it out, I realized I modeled it incorrectly in Blender. I was so disappointed...mostly because I'm THAT person who had to pay a total of $9 at the Poe parking garage in Downtown because I'm an idiot and lost the yellow ticket AFTER I PAID IT
(my fee: $1.20, in there for 5 minutes? Lost ticket fee: $7). That made me so pissed that I vowed to never go back. I still think about it sometimes and I fume with rage. The Breaking Bad spin-off, Better Call Saul, captures the scene perfectly:
My bunny switchblade mock-up; it printed out too thin:
For the paper airplane project, I decided to take two paper airplane designs on the internet that were very popular. I'm not very gifted with paper crafts, so I blame my airplane's mediocre performance on my poor folding abilities. I also think the quality of paper used matters a lot, and I don't see that discussed in any tutorials.
I think I was feeling particularly grumpy that day, and was debating whether or not to use a paper ball for my 'airplane.' Cheeky. But I decided against that...too predictable, even for me (maybe not for the class though).
As a (soon-to-be-retired) slave to the office, I'm ABSOLUTELY ELATED (yes) about this news. Yes! I hated everything about Microsoft Office, but I think the one thing I hated the most was the shitty clip art. That's the only worthy adjective, honestly. Also, let's not even mention Bing's image search.
The images on Pickit are uploaded by individual photographers and stock image banks, which get 60 percent of revenues made, meaning they should be sharing things that beat the old Clip Art catalog.
Since Clip Art closed, Microsoft users have been directed to open
Bing image search, but there’s no telling how many of those images are
actually free to use – Pickit reckons 85 percent of all pictures used in
presentations are just stolen from the internet.
Now, rather than pinching pictures from the Web, there’s a database
of images right in the Microsoft dropdown. Just like the heady days of
Clip Art, but better. - link
Oh, to live a life like Agnes does...so simple and pure.
I like to think
(it has to be!)
of a cybernetic ecology
where we are free of our labors
and joined back to nature,
returned to our mammal
brothers and sisters,
and all watched over
by machines of loving grace.
Richard Brautigan, All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace (1967)
I need to garden more and have plants fill my entire house. I never thought of making a vase with a 3D printer...this seems like a fun and relatively easy project.
I love how this piece takes advantage of nonrenewable resources and its environment (looks like it's staged in a coastal town.) The projected neon lights make the mammoth fish stand out even more, and coupled with the similar slope of the mountains behind them...it's a nice treat for the eyes.
Women + synthesizers = swooon. Very cool video. I think the hallmark of good sound design and composition is for it to be completely unnoticeable, yet still present. It's organic. It makes sense.
I've never seen this Lumiere Brothers stop-motion film -- I feel like this should be the worthy replacement for that infamous train clip shown in every film class. It's entertaining...(and spooooky).
One of
the most famous films from The Lumière Brothers, who are often credited
as the Fathers of All Cinema, "Le Squelette Joyeaux" (also known as
"The Dancing Skeleton") is arguably the first stop-motion film but
surely the best known of its time, packing in the viewers for this witty
short comedy film.
This is one of my favorite paintings because I see myself as that little boy in red. Goya is one of my inspirations (his progression as an artist, coupled with his dark wit, is simultaneously captivating and horrific) and I wanted to be a lil' goofy, like him. Manuel Osorio Manrique de Zuñiga, meet Susie.
This opera (Elektra) is hardcore and raw in its intensity. Honestly, I didn't even care for the music -- I was more entranced by the performers gestures and stage presence. The title actress succumbed to the depths of abjection and horror for this role, and it's mesmerizing to watch. I wish I could see a live adaption of this play, especially since the narrative is one of my favorite classic stories (of revenge, family and womanly anger).
Orlando (1992; Sally Potter) is one of my favorite films. And it definitely fits into the topic of "time-based media"...a synopsis:
In 1600, nobleman Orlando (Tilda Swinton) inherits his parents'
house, thanks to Queen Elizabeth I (Quentin Crisp), who commands the
young man to never change. After a disastrous affair with Russian
princess Sasha (Charlotte Valandrey), Orlando looks for solace in the
arts before being appointed ambassador to
Constantinople in 1700, where war is raging. One morning, Orlando is
shocked to wake up as a woman and returns home, struggling as a female
to retain her property as the centuries roll by.
Also: TILDA SWINTON, doing what she does best ...gender-bending and making me weep from her otherworldly presence. She has my heart.
A simple illustration I did in Illustrator to figure out how it works. I actually prefer what I can produce in this program compared to Photoshop; I'm kind of tired of digital paintings, so this serves as a welcome break. I love Japanese folklore, so I decided to play with some existing imagery and iconography.
I don't really listen to Radiohead anymore (meanwhile, Blur is eternal)...but this caught my eye. They're currently preparing to release their ninth album, and a day or two ago they mysteriously wiped any trace of the band on social media. Then this popped up. I like it--they always had a penchant for lo-fi designs and sketches. Their art direction served as a great contrast when coupled with their future-facing tunes, so this fits in well with their existing catalog. I'm thinking this album could be a companion piece to Hail to the Thief (judging from the themes I see), which was one of my favorite albums...(I always forget that I've seen them live. Oops).
I'm a HUGE fan of Rupaul's Drag Race. I've watched several seasons live and have even seen a few queens in the flesh (I was not disappointed, unlike my experience with Hamburger Mary's nasty guacamole. What a disgrace!) Every Monday night, like a junkie who needs a fix, I stay glued to my seat as I await a new episode. I bet, I predict, I holler at the screen. It's my humble participation in sports...or the Olympics...or whatever.
LET'S TALK ABOUT SEASON 8 (current season) AND KIM CHI, THE KOREAN AVANT GARDE PRINCESS.
Kim Chi often spoke about drag's diversity problem (where are all the Asian drag queens?) and embracing your flaws (she immigrated to this country as a child and still faces language constraints, much like myself) during the competition. The visibility she represented week after week meant a lot to me, and her talent and success on the show (her makeup is simply art, coupled with her looks) made me an instant fan. I hope she wins in two weeks! Also...fried chicken buttholes. That's all.
I discussed with a friend that I think she has the potential to really catapult drag into a new direction with her emphasis on high fashion, experimental #looks and her strong cultural background. It's very rare to see anyone with this amount of attention who is Asian and in the LGBTQ community, so I'm VERY glad she's being celebrated (and recognized) for her talents.
I love this film so much. I was immensely grateful to see it at the Tampa Theater a few months ago (the director's cut, too!) I felt like the theater's architecture and setup (the organ player that rises to the stage! that old world statuary and gargoyles galore!) created the perfect ambience and heightened my viewing experience.
Part of the mass appeal of this film, of course, is the amount of excess involved in its production and story line. From the amount of detail in the set design, costumes and even dialogue (it's all very silly, especially the rivalry between Mozart and Salieri)--it never ends. The universe the film creates is both effortless and endless, and a treat for the eyes.
I'm not much of a theater or opera fan-- I never gravitated toward it, mostly because of a lack of knowledge on the subject. Also, I find opera intolerable, much like how I can't stand death metal (unlike most of my peers.) It comes down to a question of taste, which I believe is innate and cannot really be grown.
In our first class discussions, we spoke of a society controlled and dominated by spectacle. Spectacle, art and technology all intertwine and transform over the years, and in a way, reflect the anxieties, moods and temperament of our times. In the retrospective I linked, the author speaks of how seventeenth-century Venice was an "apex point" in the history of special effects when it came to scenic and set design. Patrons and visitors of the stage were awed by the realistic and incredibly life-like structures, which changed and transformed before their eyes with each set change.
A quote:
Baroque opera, scholars have argued, reflected the vanities and
anxieties of the European court. Texts on opera and court life in
Venetian society underscore the power of theater through special
effects to convey messages on the dangers and rewards of social
performance. However, it seems, that special effects, like art and
social expression in general, change with new technology,
representing new events, economic forces and information. This poses the
question of how special effects in popular entertainment reflect
the anxieties of our society today. Yet the exhibition embodies
the idea that special effects signify more than ideology: they
create a vocabulary for the marvelous.
Adjust Your Tracking (2013) is a documentary about people obsessed with collecting VHS tapes. We have an extra room in house full of tapes...some are worth between $50-$100. The last tape I bought was a Christmas gift: Michael Jackson's Making of Thriller. It was a huge part of my childhood; I remember being absolutely terrified of the music video, to the point that I thought the tape it was recorded on was possessed. A possessed DVD is not as threatening as an analog anomaly, right?
I see the big orange tabby cat
Getting warm on the cover of the laptop
He turns over on his back
Looking for a belly rub
I see the deer trap
And the snow on the end of the path
That leads into my backyard
I hear the sound of my girlfriend's car
Coming up the driveway and it fills my heart
With joy
Though I know it'll all end someday
Sun Kil Moon combines melody with casual stream-of-consciousness rambles and deeply personal anecdotes to make music that celebrates the mundane. His openness reminds me of how social media has transformed our modes of communication (and art.) We share openly, often without thought. He's the David Foster Wallace of folk.
I love Boards of Canada because their songs always strike a chord. Often, I feel like an alien visiting earth, stranded and alone. Their music sounds like a field recording an alien may create if it visited this planet. A capsule of what it means to be human - artificial, but still an embodiment. Music of the future and now.
My boyfriend introduced me to Holly Herndon. She's a doctoral student at Stanford who studies composition. Her music is out of this world, and incredibly forward-facing. Her relationship with technology is both conflicted yet dependent, and it's reflected beautifully in her latest album Platform. Platform was the first album to include a track (Lonely at the Top) intended to trigger Autonomous sensory meridian response (ASMR).
Takashi Ito is a Japanese experimental filmmaker. A quote by the man himself:
"Film is capable of presenting unrealistic world as a
vivid reality and creating a strange space peculiar to the media. My
major intention is to change the ordinary every day life scenes and draw
the audience (myself) into a vortex of supernatural illusion by
exercising the magic of films." - (Takashi Ito, in Image Forum, Oct. 1984)
I think this quote represents how even the mundane has a fantastical potential, all thanks to technology. Film as a medium can serve as a literal gateway to unexplored worlds...or it can make ours a little bit more interesting. Depends on your perspective.
A music video directed by David Dean Burkhart, using Andy Stott's "Faith in Strangers" and clips from Ito's Grim,Ghost and Hunger captures his unique vision in mystical ways...haven't been this enchanted in awhile.
My boyfriend has a very expensive (and rare) text about Viennese Actionism that currently serves as our coffee table book. When I think of Vienna, I think of royalty and delicate pastries. Before informing myself of the movement, I thought nothing of what it actually entails.
The four artists who made up the core of the movement — Günter Brus, Otto
Muehl, Hermann Nitsch and Rudolf Schwarzkogler — witnessed the ravages
of World War II and its aftermath, though only one of them, Muehl, was
old enough to fight, entering the Wehrmacht in 1943 at the age of 18.
The movement faced the horrors of fascism and war head on, with an unapologetic brutality. By involving every taboo and bodily fluid imaginable, the artists used violence to awaken a largely complacent (and manipulated) society.
In a 2010 interview with Jonas Vogt for the online magazine, VICE, Nitsch, who continued to stage performances of his Orgien Mysterien Theater
(Orgies Mysteries Theater) into the late 1990s, states that his
intention was “to deal with immediate color, real flesh, real entrails,
the human body. In addition, my work is also more or less a
psychoanalytic realization of subconscious associations. I am a great
admirer of Freud and Jung. Myths of all times play an important role in
my work.”
As a person very interested in the limitations and vast potential of the human body (I have Yukio Mishima and Kafka to thank), the movement interested me the most. Its embrace of the grotesque is beautiful.
Noise artist John Duncan is largely influenced by the principles and qualities of the movement:
Fluxus was a movement based in the 1960s influenced largely by John Cage, who idealized the process behind making art. To Cage, the process of creating was paramount to anything else. Another main influence was Marcel Duchamp, of toilet-in-a-museum fame. It's all about potential. Yet with potential, you let yourself be vulnerable to the flame. See Yoko Ono's Cut Piece:
Thanks to some unused office supplies, I was able to finish my grid project with relative ease. I ordered too many paper clips, binder clips, all the clips...I also had an excess of sticky pads, so I used that as a base to attach all this metal and plastic. I didn't want to use food or anything too messy, and as a plus, this little...hot mess still serves a practical use. Just dissemble and you're set.
I've always drew. It just made sense; a lot of people joked that I had a sketchbook and pencil in hand when I came out of the womb.
I stopped when I entered college (the first time) due to depression. That sucked.
But I've picked it up, slowly, and it still brings me happiness...unfortunately, this time it also comes with a great deal of frustration.
Here's my flipbook. I wanted to do something simple; I always go way beyond my means when it comes to illustrative projects. I felt like ripping up the book several times during my process, and there's a lot of measly scribbles in there. Yikes.
“News stories don’t satisfy on a human level,” she said. “We know that
Guantánamo is still open, but do we really know what that means? The
idea is to experience an emotional understanding, so it’s not just an
intellectual abstraction.”
Astro Noise is a museum exhibition piece by Laura Poitrus, the director of
the Edward Snowden documentary CITIZENFOUR. The immersive installation
is currently on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York
City, and explores themes she's chosen as hallmarks of her career:
governmental surveillance, the war on terror, drones and the lingering
trauma of a post-9/11 world.
The
exhibition interests me due to its immersive aspect, a quality that
plays with issues of consent and comfort that are ever-so present in a
society impacted by mass surveillance. One is forced to interact and
engage in a dialogue with the images and words Poitras imparts on her
audience. What seems like a run-of-the-mill art installation turns into
curtailed assault of the senses, forcing anyone who comes into contact
with her evidence - from documentary footage, primary documents and even
elements of the personal, like voice-over narration - to come face to
face with the realities of our modern-day state of mass surveillance.
In
a lot of ways, we view our political systems and governments as
untouchable and body-less entities. Heads of state and politicians seem
untouchable, and therefore shrouded in a realm of well-meaning secrecy
(it's for our protection, right?) Poitras' work attempts to breath a
necessary life (and in turn, a greater understanding) into these unseen
spaces and conversations that undoubtedly fuel our everyday lives. And most importantly, the knowledge we gain leads to a greater sense of agency (a quality that we take for granted nowadays, especially in the realm of political participation).
Poitras
is not alone with her desire to inform the public of the consequences behind total surveillance. Like Poitras, Massive Attack (the trip-hop
act from good ole' Bristol, UK) incorporate immersive elements into
their live performances through an aggressive use of projected lights.
Light shows are common in many electronic musicians' live works -- one
can't deny the almost primitive appeal of it, especially under the use
of certain drugs that are so popular in the genre's fanbase.
But Massive Attack does something different with the tradition, and it's in the realm between pleasure and discomfort. See below:
Madama Butterfly reminded me of the fantastical and sweetly grotesque stop-motion work of the Brothers Quay.
Aren't the living quarters of rag dolls the perfect place to play house? The framing of the above image shows how effective puppetry can be in film work. The miniature sets and props allow the director to have precise control over mise-en-scene. To me, they're even more appealing than actors (AKA: no drama on set).
I've seen this film probably more times than I can count but I never paid much attention to this shot in particular. The air of oppression Zulawski embeds in the home (a symbol of holy comfort for many) is probably the most terrifying aspect of the film. Even the toy soldiers seem like legitimate threats.
"When the hero or the villain of the drama, the man who was seen a few
minutes earlier possessed by moral rage, magnified into a sort of
metaphysical sign, leaves the wrestling hall, impassive, anonymous,
carrying a small suitcase and arm-in-arm with his wife, no one can doubt
that wrestling holds the power of transmutation which is common to the
Spectacle and to Religious Worship. In the ring, and even in the depths
of their voluntary ignomity, wrestlers remain gods because they are,
for a few moments, the key which opens Nature, the pure gesture which
separates Good from Evil, and unveils the form of a Justice which is at
last intelligible." - Roland Barthes, The World of Wrestling
There's a reason why Roland Barthes' essay on wrestling is found in his aptly titled collection, Mythologies. Is a myth not the very definition of a "spectacle of excess"? Gods, monsters and a slew of otherworldly beings thrive in the realm of myths.
A wrestler's conveyed personality (with all its manifestations and exaggerated gestures, either through physical appearance or catchphrases) determines his or her power in the ring. When the aforementioned attributes fail to mesh coherently, the audience conveys confusion (or worse: complete apathy.) And without an audience, the wrestler (man or woman) is, as the Iron Sheikh famously proclaimed, a Jabroni. There are no Jabronis in Olympus.
I was a big fan of wrestling growing up due to its absurd dramatics and characters (to me, they weren't even people...they were always 'characters.') Personalities like Mick Foley (who had a planned appearance at a Shark Convention in Tampa last year but failed to show up, much to my disappointment) kept the imagination of my messed-up kindergarten brain alive.
Here is Mankind (AKA Foley) experiencing a tumble from Mount Olympus:
For a few summers in high school, I worked in a research lab similar to Raul Cuero's. I was never interested in the complexities behind medical science and the like, so I only remember a few key details, like how cancerous cell samples from Labradors helped fuel an overwhelming majority of our research. Back then, I found the entire setup peculiar. But at my age now, coupled with the insight provided in Cuero's interview, I understand that the decision to use samples from dogs (our beloved pets!) is quite ingenious. And it's also better than the alternative: testing on live rats.
Cuero gave the impression of being a remarkably talented and sensitive man, possessing the rare combination of emotional and logical intelligence. One of my favourite parts of his interview involved his thoughts on having a "universal consciousness." I've felt discrimination like he has, albeit the prejudice I faced is somewhat different and shouldn't be compared side by side (in short: I'm Iranian, a woman and often butt heads with the ideals prescribed by my parents and culture.) I've battled these prejudices and judgements constantly, and for a bulk of my life I resorted to pathetic defeat. A life stuck in the in-between is not pretty.
I realised recently (one to two years ago) that surpressing my creativity and artistic goals in favour of classical conventions of success does nothing for me. It only caused more harm. I constantly felt like I was in a fugue state, and it made me feel alien to myself, not only to other people.
Like Cuero, I see creativity as a tool that can be used to bypass social rules and limitations. 'Transcendence' is the key word here. Creativity is based upon innovation and the Unknown (quoted verbatim from the interview.) The shock of what isn't expected jolts ourselves from this fugue state that I spoke of, and quite frankly, shuts naysayers up. It levels all playing fields.
And an example of creativity without a consciousness:
I don't know whether I have a death anxiety or a genuine fear of growing old. There's a difference between both, of course. What I do know: the thought of owning brittle bones and a scrap body like Emanuelle Riva in Haneke's Amour and havingmy semi-nonfunctional partner scoop wet food into my mouth until my end days terrifies me.
I have a general theory as to why I've always been enamored with the relationship between art and technology: The combination represents ever-present youth. There's so much room for play, and with this loving marriage I've been able to express my alien rugrat self perfectly.
I probably expect more from this class because I'm older and already have a BA in something not as hands-on as I would have liked and have a few itchy regrets. But I'm (very) happy to be enrolled...and to have fun with two subjects I love very much.
![Interesting project made from plastic bottles [600x1177]](http://i.imgur.com/ln579Tc.jpg?2)
