It's Our Patriotic Duty

to use Jumbotron tv's to screen protest-related visual art and texts in Minnesota during the RNC (you go True Blue Minnesota!) More here. HA HA CBS (which recently cancelled its contract to afford Minneapolis billboard space for portraits of U.S. soldiers by Suzanne Opton, which have been exhibited in the Brooklyn Museum, the Cleveland (Ohio) Museum of Art, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston).

"Circadian" by Rick Silva

A new piece by one of the artists included in The Program.



Gorgeous and evocative; it looks even better here. Rick also has a great blog, here.

Received by e-mail.

Sorry; low-hanging fruit.

Police Prepare for RNC by Pre-Emptively Detaining 50 Potential Protestors, Journalists, & Lawyer

Ok, try not to chortle about the lawyer. Story and videos here.

(And just how were all these people targeted, since no criminal act has yet occurred? Oh yeah, possession of computers and other stuff as part of a conspiracy to exercise their first amendment rights.)

UPDATE: City inspectors boarded up the home of one of the potential protestors raided by the police without stating any specific reason.

"[A]long with being unable to enter her home, Bickling will have another rude awakening when she’s released from jail: The city charges $6,000 to homeowners for boarding up properties. Often these are charges for abandoning properties, a result of the foreclosure crisis. But in Bickling’s case, all that anyone, including the roommates and Bickling’s lawyer, were told before the plywood went up is that the home had 'code violations.'"

"Neighbors were angry that the city was boarding the home, too. One neighbor yelled to police officers, 'We have a crack house next door that you do nothing about. But then you’re going to board up the home of these kids! This is pure propaganda and you should be ashamed of yourselves!' Indeed, the home next door did have a number of visible code violations: tall grass and weeds, trash in the yard. Neighbors said they call about problems with the home all the time, and nothing is ever done."

Story here.

Further UPDATE: It gets entertaining at about the 4 min. mark.

Also, more info here.

National Debt Under Democratic vs. Republican Leadership

The chart only extends through 2006.

Here's a more legible version with live links to sources for the information relied on in compiling the chart.

Writerz Block 2008

Close-ups here.

(Thanks, Bombingscience!)

Banksy in New Orleans

Pics of this and other recent Banksy's in N.O. at jonnodotcom (via Bombingscience; thanks, all!)

Graffiti Research Lab Co-Founder Detained by Chinese

"Days without potable water, hours of interrogation, sleep deprivation, and the theft of more than $20,000 in cash and equipment are among the hardships two New Yorkers say they endured as prisoners of the Chinese government during the Beijing Olympics.

"'They threatened our lives, threatened the lives of people we know, of our family members, and they told us that they could get us, even outside of China,' [GRL co-founder] James Powderly said yesterday."

More at The New York Sun; see also boingboing and cnet.

Denver Police Unlawfully Confiscate Artists/Journalists' Equipment and Notes

The three artists/journalists whose rights were violated "have a track record of documenting police abuse."

Made Me Laugh

(madhatter via tom moody; I'd be happy to live with either of tm's selections -- thanks!)

You Go, Dennis.

Wachet auf!

K.O. Interviews Maher on the DNC 2008 Thus Far.

Please Register Now, and Vote!

(If you think Obama has it in the basket, read this and think again).

Application and info re- registration in Texas here, or, last I checked, you can pick up an application in any U.S. post office. For info re- other states, try your Secretary of State's website.

Please encourage your friends to register and vote as well.

If you think you're already registered, double-check it here (not sure-fire, but convenient and worth doing).

Basic requirements in Texas:

• Your voter registration will become effective 30 days after it is received or on your 18th birthday, whichever is later. Your registration must be effective on or before an election in order to vote in that election.
• You must be at least 17 years and 10 months old to register, and you must be 18 years of age
by election day.
• You must register to vote in the county in which you reside.
• If you move to another county, you must re-register in the county of your new residence.
• You must provide your Texas driver's license or personal identification number. If you do not have a driver's license or personal identification number, then give the last four digits of your social security number, or if you do not have any of these identification numbers, then you must indicate by checking the appropriate box on the application side.
• If you do not have a Texas driver's license or a social security number, you will be required to present identification when you vote in person or enclose a copy of such identification with your ballot if you vote by mail. Identification includes: a current and valid ID; a copy of a current utility bill; bank statement; government check; paycheck; or other government document that shows your name and address.
• If you have been convicted of a felony, you must have completed all of your punishment, including any parole, supervision, period of probation, or you must have received a pardon.

Election Day is Tuesday, November 4. In Texas, the deadline to register and be eligible to vote in the election is October 6, 2008. This can be either the postmark date or the date the application is received in the office of the voter registrar.

Never forget.

Fox vs. Dem Convention Protestors

Of course I enjoyed this; but I wish leftist protesters were better-prepared to exploit any soapboxes provided by offering informed, empathetic reasoning.

Fox prolly will continue to air footage that makes leftists look like a unreasoning, arguably dangerous mob.

Hacker Broke into Homeland Security Phone System and Made 400 Calls

The illegal activity was caught by Sprint, which apparently thought it odd when $12,000 in calls to the Middle East from FEMA (now part of the Department of Homeland Security) were racked up over a weekend.

According to the Canadian Press via Yahoo, " [t]his type of hacking is very low-tech and 'old school,' said John Jackson, a St. Louis-based security consultant."

The identity of the hacker remains unknown. The system vulnerability "' . . . enables unauthorized individuals anywhere in the world to communicate via compromised U.S. phone systems in a way that is difficult to trace,' according to a department information bulletin from June 3, 2003" [emphasis supplied].

Johannes Kreidler: Licensing for Composition Comprising 70,200 Samples

Company f.k.a. Diebold Admits Electronic Voting Machines Seriously Flawed

If election officials have to "verify what the machines are telling them," the point of the machines is . . . ?

Ahmet Ögüt's "Clear Blue Sky"

"AK: You also use 'found history' for your installation at SITE Santa Fe, Clear Blue Sky versus Generous Earth, mixing slogans from a civilian-defense manual, which you've reprinted on red tote bags for visitors to take, with an urban legend, which you've painted lowrider-style on a car hood. How did you think to bring these elements together?

"AÖ: I used an urban legend about a cow falling from a plane and sinking a Japanese trawler as a starting point, and I wanted to illustrate this legend in a way that would engage with Southwestern lowrider culture. The reprinted warnings are from Los Alamos, and out of context, they become a parody of insecurity. Together, the urban legend and the civil-defense warnings are metaphorical elements, with the sky playing the role of the nomadic forces and Earth as the place of rightful nations."

Who doesn't love a free tote bag.

More at artkrush and SITE Santa Fe.

Australian Government Plans to Require Payments to Original Artists on All Subsequent Sales

[The Australian Government] "is determined to introduce a resale royalty scheme this year giving artists a percentage of the sale price whenever their work is sold. The details have yet to be finalised but some industry bodies have called for a flat rate of 5 per cent on all sales and for the royalty to apply to all works sold for more than $500. That would mean an artist who sold a work 10 years ago for $500 could reap up to $10,000 if it was sold again for 200,000." Per The Sidney Morning Herald (more that the foregoing link), via artkrush.

New Company to Assume Production of Polaroid Materials

"The investor and philanthropist Daniel H. Stern and long-time Polaroid artist John Reuter have reached "an agreement in principle" to assume production of the chemicals and products needed to make Polaroid images, The Wall Street Journal reports. . . . [but they are apparently interested in producing] a particular, and rather rare, form of Polaroid. Their new company, 20X24 Holdings LLC, will support only the Polaroid 20x24, which was introduced in the late 1970s as a glamor product. The 20x24 produces large-scale images and, according to [The WSJ], 'requires a camera as big as a refrigerator, an enormous lens, movie-bright lights, and, crucially, skilled operators.' Though only six of these cameras were ever made, the 20x24 was critical to the careers of such artists as Chuck Close, William Wegman, Lucas Samaras, Elsa Dorfman, and Timothy Greenfield-Sanders." Via Artinfo; more at the link.

ok it starts with a shredded forearm

Best DU OP of the Month

What if huge oil reserves were discovered up dick cheney's *ss?

Would we invade and occupy? Would the ol' face shooter move to an undisclosed location to protect his assets?

Would we drill there, drill now?

As one respondent said, "Shock and Ow!"

Thanks, Philosoraptor!

Why I'm not sure I can ever stay on Manhattan again, unless it's for free.

The cupcakes are cool; but.

If only the implicit promise were true, that you'll be cute if what you eat is cute!

For What It's Worth

Some work I'd have liked to have included in The Program, if we'd had the means, by the Russian collective, AES+F: see here et seq. (from the 2007 Venice Biennial; as usual, I felt like I missed getting the best parts) and here.

Sharp Intake of Breath

1,503,631 views so guess I'm the only one who missed this. If you haven't seen it, it's a must:



Ever-erect hair forever!

UPDATE: The Program, Week Four

So click here for full details regarding this week's exhibition, which includes two more pieces by Nathalie Djurberg, Stealing Beauty by Guy Ben-Ner, and iMirror (A Second Life Documentary Film by China Tracy a.k.a. Cao Fei).

But here's the scoop on one installation new this week. In Second Life, eteam has created a dumpster for the virtual things people there decide to delete. At right, see a bunch of "virtual-virtual" objects selected by me, Danette Dufilho, and AC Abbott per eteam's guidelines to resemble such discarded items (which were of course originally designed to look real). These objects were then photographed by Ben Britt and me from multiple angles, and eteam used the photographs to construct virtual-virtual-virtual objects, which they placed in their dumpster in Second Life -- see the following virtual photographs of the objects they made and put there (if you see the objects in "Real Life," eteam's work is even more impressive -- nice work, eteam!). Next, eteam "filmed" the programmed decay of these objects, sent me the file, and it's playing on the tv included in the installation.

The artists see Second Life Dumpster as "a continuation of their interest in the value of property, possibilities of land use, (web) site specificity, ownership, and investment."

I also see this project as, among other things, part of a trend toward art as mad scientist-experiment. See more of eteam's findings from this research here.

Police Plan to Track Every Vehicle that Enters Manhattan

Via cryptogon (thanks, Ben!) Like, wow, that "Ring of Steel" really helped London prevent the 7-7-05 bombings.

Paul McCarthy Turd Rampage

"A giant inflatable . . . turd created by the American artist Paul McCarthy was blown from its moorings at [the Paul Klee Centre in Berne, Switzerland], bringing down a power line and breaking a window before landing in the grounds of a children's home.

"The exhibit, entitled Complex Shit, is the size of a house."

McCarthy was selling butt plugs for X-mas; but who knew?

Test via The Guardian UK; photo via The Mayor of Mitchieville.

Velvet Portrait of Stephen Hawking

Hand-painted by professional artist ARGO in Tijuana, Mexico for Indignico Inc. and The Toy Baroness (2008). Personally, I think Hawking's physical reality is more grueling than this conveys, and I'd like the painting better if it did convey that; but still too cool to resist. Via boingboing.

does anyone else have this feeling

my computer helps me appear more human than i really am.

iPatriot Act Ready and Waiting for i911; and, About the Cloud . . . .

Too impt. not to re-blog. Transcript from starting around 4:30 min.:

Lawrence Lessig: "There's going to be an i-911 event . . . I had dinner once with Richard Clark at the table and I said, 'is there an equivalent to the Patriot Act -- an iPatriot Act -- just sitting waiting for some substantial event . . . for them to come have the excuse for radically changing the way the Internet works?' And he said, 'Of course there is' -- and I swear this is what he said, and quote -- 'and Vint Cerf is not going to like it very much.'"

I wish more people were aware that this is what's been going on; but to quote some useful cliches, nature abhors a vacuum, and the unconscious does not hear the negative. So, it's not enough for us to just point this out and say, we can't let that happen. We need to have our OWN counter-iPatriot proposal sitting on the shelf. Theirs is ready; we'd better catch up fast.

And how about us having a few initiatives of our own that are actually in advance of theirs, instead of merely trying to catch up all the time?

About the Cloud, here's a recent article showing how one of the risks I've discussed has materialized:

"Can you trust your data to the cloud? For users of an online storage service called The Linkup, formerly known as MediaMax, the answer turned out to be a resounding 'no.'

"The Linkup shut down on Aug. 8 after losing access to unspecified amounts of customer data . . . ."

The Linkup says 55% of the data is safe, but they're not sure about the other 45%.

Here's my related, 2007 post.

Honeycomb Skyscraper Has No Internal Support

To open in Beijing in 2012. Cool interiors, too; see Gizmodo (thanks, Ben!)

Michinori Saigo "Flocks II" Video for Collections of Colonies of Bees

Bradly Brown, an artist whose work I admire and own, does visuals for record co., Table of the Elements. He sent me a link to a new music video for a CD they've released by Collections of Colonies of Bees. Nice work by both the Bees and Flocks II video director Michinori Saigo.

See the video at stereogum, which looks like a great music site.

Our Glorified Selves

When I was a child, I asked my mom about heaven. She was raised as a Christian Scientist -- I think they believe if the Lord wants you to live, He'll heal you -- and she married a doctor. She told me she'd been taught that in heaven we'd be our "glorified" selves.

I assume our "best" selves would mainly concern what we do rather than how we look. But looking good never hurts; and why wait for heaven?

Here's a pic of our puppy. IN our earthly reality, she has a wound over her left eye from playing with other dogs; not sure if her hair will ever grow back; but she is a chunk of heaven here today; and Photoshop brings us the appearance to match.

(Thanks, Julie, for the raincoat -- as I understand, whippet-types might really appreciate it!)

Unless Obama Turn-Out is GIGANTIC,

. . . one statistician projects he'll lose to election fraud. Statistical analysis here.

So pls f'ing VOTE.

Tom Moody Interviews Paul Slocum Re-

his "sampler remixer," used by Paul in his performance at the opening nite of The Program -- interview here.

Surprise!

UPDATE on THE PROGRAM: Week Two Opening

Another full house. If you missed it, the work will as usual remain available for viewing at Conduit through noon this Thur. during the gallery's normal hours, Tues.-Sat. 10am-5pm, except there are a couple of pieces that will remain installed longer, and ALSO except that Nathalie Djurberg's Once Removed on My Mother's Side will be available for viewing only on Tuesday and Thursday, and Dumstrut will be available for viewing only on Wednesday (in order to comply with the artist's exhibition requirements and our own installation schedule).

After-party at Bolsa, a lovely, laid-back wine bar in Oak Cliff (recommended! -- 614 W. Davis west of the Bishop Arts District, 214-367-9367). Pics from the opening and after-party here.

I and my co-curator Charles Dee Mitchell are, briefly, on tv, on KERA's Think program. If I got it right, the remaining broadcasts are 8/4 at 11:30 am, and Wed. 8/6 in the wee hours, at 1:30 am. I think it's also supposed to be available online and/or by podcast for a week or two. (Thanks again to everyone at KERA, as well as Lisa Taylor for setting it up!)

Upcoming highlights: on Sat., August 9, we'll open Ryan Trecartin's A Family Finds Entertainment (42 jam-packed minutes, installed -- be sure to make the time to see it; it will be up through the remainder of THE PROGRAM), Tryptych TV (a compilation from a vlog by jimpunk, Mr. Tamale, and Rick Silva a.k.a. Abe Linkoln), and Michael Bell-Smith's Battleship Potemkin Dance Edit (120 BPM). The popular ShiftSpace installations will also remain up. The seated screenings will include another Trecartin plus works by Andrea Fraser, Kalup Linzy, Shana Moulton, and Anthony Goicolea, among others.

If you'd like to see Matthew Barney's Drawing Restraint 13 (27 min.), it runs through noon on Thursday, August 14, Tues.-Sat 10am-5pm.

ALSO, there will be a panel discussion at the Dallas Museum of Art, with the three co-curators and Paul Slocum and moderated by Suzanne Weaver, the Nancy and Tim Hanley Associate Curator of Contemporary Art, on Sun., Aug. 10 at 1:30, featuring three additional works as well as clips from those shown at Conduit.

Details including the most up-to-date version of the schedule here.

IF YOU HAVE DONATED at the Kilobyter ($100) level or above, you are entitled to one or more reserved seats at the seated programs (number depending on the level of donation). To reserve your seat(s), please e-mail the Video Association's Exec. Dir., AC Abbott, at ac(a)videofest.org with your name, the number of seats you'd like to reserve, and the programs for which you'd like to reserve them. And thank you for your support!

While You Were Out . . .

. . . a few headline stories:

B*sh Admin Recently Discussed Killing U.S. Sailors to Create Pretext to Attack Iran, per Pullitzer-winning Seymour Hersh, as reported by Think Progress.

B*sh Plans to Redefine Abortion to Include Contraception, as reported by the Tucson Citizen.

Blackwater Mercenaries Used in Medical MJ Bust? As reported by Salem-News.com; see also The LA Times.

And some interesting stats here . . . certain interests would like us to believe the election could be close, for more than one reason. Please help make this the biggest landslide ever.

Pretty Funny Political Video

here. Parental advisory.