Structural Patterns

I generally, do not like the concept of corporate art or the making of art work closely tied to a corporate sponsor. Of course some forms of art of a long history of corporate/business funding in order to be realized, and amazing work can come of it, that would otherwise be beyond the scope of what a single artist or collective without the financial means of investors would be able to realize (and much of that work, I chalk up as entertainment, rather than art)…

When I encounter something so well-crafted and combines various forms of media, I can’t help but set aside my ethics of what is and isn’t art and the necessary division between big money and creativity… One such work is graphic/comic book artist Rafael Grampá “collaboration” with or through Absolut Vodka – “Dark Noir”. I very much would like to see the full animation, but even this excerpt presents a sense of how visually stunning this work is and that it effectively combines 3D and 2D animation with the main characters and settings in 3D and the demons as 2D art work. Now where to see the entire animation!

Fun music! Takes me back to my high school and college years late 80s to early 90s!

With each manipulation of the Nicaraguan constitution by Ortega and the Sandinista party, I feel a deep sadness for the impoverished country. I am also dumbfounded at the short-sightedness of the ruling party and the ignorant avarice of Daniel Ortega who will not hand over the political reigns of the country to a new generation. Prosperity has been illusive to this small country that has suffered a long-lasting dictatorship, natural disaster, a popular revolution and seemingly inherent political corruption. If only a true leader would emerge who seeks an end to corruption and the engineering of a society striving for the well-being of all its people. Unfortunately, since the Nicaraguan National Assembly elected to eliminate presidential term limits, an end to poverty and corruption appears as distant as the worst period of the Somoza dynasty. Ortega has effectively become Somoza.

Hunter Honors student Cialina Ngo has completed her honor’s thesis – “AccioBook” a book discovery website built on WordPress to discover and learn about young adult literature. What is significant about this literature site is that Cialina along with other editors has created a taxonomy for the site based on the reading of the books and careful consideration of how a book may be indexed and easily found by the site’s users.

As Cialina describes the project:

Unlike other book discovery websites that are based on algorithms, my website will be based on metadata created by a human who has actually read the book. AccioBook will be similar in format to Pandora. Users will be given a list of recommendations based on the title of a book that they recently enjoyed. The list of recommendations will be based on a database of metadata. I will develop a database of book metadata based on plot, characterization, setting, and romance using approximately 100 young adult novels.

5,000 Feet is the Best by Omer Fast.

This is a poignant and beautiful short film.

Donate money to help bring one of Sam Van Aken trees to Brooklyn! Artist Sam Van Aken has donated one of his trees from the project “The Tree of 40 Fruit” to the South Williamsburg community garden La Casita Verde. Now they just need $2500 to cover the transport cost from Syracuse to Williamsburg. Donate on line.

Artist Traci Talasco has maintained an active artist practice in New York City over the last 10 years and she is currently working on an installation that will be featured at the Brooklyn Arts Council.

The installation “Rub Me the Wrong Way” will transform the gallery into a home environment created entirely out of sandpaper, which will wear down as you walk through the space. The title humorously refers to the unrealistic, societal expectations placed on women to “do it all”, and how we become worn down by our absurd attempts to juggle everything.

Traci is reaching out to the public to support the realization of this installation and she’s getting very close. If you like the concept and would like to see it realized go to indiegogo to contribute financially.

Arts Across the Curriculum and the Integrated Media Arts MFA Program at Hunter College will host a performance by Martin Howse on Friday April 4th at 7pm in the Black Box – Hunter North 543.

Martin Howse is a unique new media artist who builds his own electronics and writes his own programs for performance. Berlin-based researcher, artist, inventor and performer Martin Howse traverses the electromagnetic spectrum as a space for exploration that may be manipulated to generate sound and visual. Martin Howse leads “micro_research,” a mobile research platform exploring psychogeophysics and asking the questions of where precisely the plague known as software executes.

Recently the Czech cultural center Školská 28 described Martin Howse performance as

“heavily improvised, playing with the collapse of massed, barely functional salvaged equipment and software systems made manifest in sound/noise and image, Howse presents a complex, process-driven constructivist performance; the symphonic rise of the attempt to piece together fugal systematics is played out against the noise of collapse and machine crash at the deserted border of control.”

As I continue to play with WebGL and the three.js library, I will generate compositions from photographs taken in Helsinki (until I run out of photos that I like). Check out the latest page and click through all the sketches.