Chomsky's Been Right 20 Yrs. or So Ahead of Most, for a Long Time:

Update on "Second Life Dumpster"

here.

Here's a pic of another virtual-virtual incarnation; objects curated by Marcin Ramocki, Lovid, Olaf Breuning, Makiko Aoki, Caspar Stracke, Gabriela Monroy, Ijan Hilaire, Kirin Schwindt, Jason Dean, Arnold von Wedemeyer, Annette Gödde, Penelope Umbrico, Jim Supanick + more.


Background here and here. eteam comprises Franziska Lamprecht + Hajoe Moderegger.

Love Train

I totally call this for my next party perf. (don't forget to rate it up on YouTube).

White House Apologizes for Hanukkah Cards

WASHINGTON, Nov. 27 (UPI) -- "A Bush administration spokeswoman said the invitations to this year's White House Hanukkah reception bore images of Christmas trees due to a 'staff mistake.'"

* * * * *

"The cards, which were sent to U.S. Jewish leaders, are emblazoned with an image of the White House Christmas tree being pulled by a horse-drawn cart with a Christmas wreath tacked on to the White House in the background."

More here.

Obama's Annoying Speaking Style

"Millions of Americans who watched Mr. Obama's recent appearance on CBS' Sixty Minutes witnessed the President-Elect's unorthodox verbal tick, which had Mr. Obama employing grammatically correct sentences virtually every time he opened his mouth. . . .

"According to presidential historian Davis Logsdon of the University of Minnesota, . . . . 'If he keeps it up, he is running the risk of sounding like an elitist.'

"The historian said that if Mr. Obama insists on using complete sentences in his speeches, the public may find itself saying, 'Okay, subject, predicate, subject predicate - we get it, stop showing off.'''

(Thanks Richard D!)

Think Trickle-Downers:

Except, the Beatles left you wanting more. More here.

I am totally learning that dance routine for my next gig.

Iraqis Topple Effigy of Bush

This was in response to a proposed agreement to allow the U.S. to continue occupying Iraq for three more years. Per The NYT, Bush said we'd leave when they asked us to. I think this counts as an ask.

Somali Pirates in Discussions to Acquire Citigroup

More here.

Coupons: Buy a Toaster . . .

Bosses:

(Thanks apricotX; via thanks snarky!).

Young Repubs'

reaction to Obama win:



Makes me want to comfort 'em, too.

South Park Creators Plan Ripost to Mormons

Trey Parker and Matt Stone are working on a Broadway musical based on the lives and (many) loves of typical members of the Church of Latter Day Saints.

Mormons contributed heavily to the Proposition 8 campaign that reversed California law permitting gay marriage.

Cheyenne Jackson, an openly gay Broadway star, has agreed to play the lead in the musical, as a Mormon missionary.

The show is scheduled to open in 2009. More here.

Crash Course on the Economy, Etc.: Where We Are, How We Got Here, & Where We're Going

Do yourself a favor and watch all chapters starting here. Many of the pieces won't be new to you; but the way Chris Martenson puts them together is impressive and illuminating.

Continuous Partial Awareness

Cory Arcangel's trailer for his performance at the New Museum 11/14/08:



Arcangel explains (quoting an unnamed other), "'you know, like, when you have 3 IM windows open, 2 email inboxs dinging away, are txting 5 different people, and also have 5 tabs open on your browser, each with updated content.' . . . It is different from multitasking, because with multitasking, one actually is expected to concentrate on tasks at some point, even if in small doses.

". . . . I still dont know how this performance will take shape, . . . but what I do know is that the feeling of 'non-concentration' that has seeped into today's life through our flat screen displays and wifi will be its starting point."

He opened a new solo show the same nite at Team Gallery.

Bailout: Chump Change

Sums it up pretty well.

ScHmamlet

The initial credits are a li'l long; but they had me with, "[t]here's a ghost mowing the lawn!"

Free Markets vs. Regulation

Pretty fully 'splained 8 years ago, here.

Guess It'll Be a While Before We Take a Decent Prez for Granted Again?

You can now buy "Ojamas" to help you "[s]leep soundly and awake to a brand new day for America!"

Report on Prospect.1 New Orleans (the U.S.'s New International Art Biennial)

Prospect.1 is directed and curated by Dan Cameron, former Sr. Curator of the New Museum in New York, artistic director of the Istanbul Biennial in 2003, and current Visual Arts Director at the New Orleans Contemporary Arts Center (CAC). He's been visiting New Orleans for years and conceived of the new biennial as a way to help bring visitors back to the city, which is still struggling to recover from Katrina.

Cameron points out that until now, the biggest biennial in the the U.S. has been the Whitney, which isn't international.

I concur that New Orleans is an ideal location for this event, because of its cosmopolitan heritage and culture, its location, and above all its indomitable and disproportionately elegant and beauty-and-fun-loving population.

The Prospect.1 exhibitions include some 80 artists, most well-known within the art world. A possibly unusually large percentage of the works were created specifically for Prospect.1; e.g., there's a wonderful installation by Cao Fei which incorporates a virtual, New Orleans-related space within Second Life, called NO LAB (to see the video online, go here, scroll to 081 - 04|11|08, and click on SEE VIDEO).

The official Prospect.1 exhibitions are located at over two dozen venues throughout New Orleans. This initially seemed inconvenient, but I think it was the right decision; as intended, it helped me get to know the city, which proved to be a pleasure. New Orleans is easy to navigate by car; there's also a shuttle running every 20 min.

Also showing are a number of independently-organized exhibitions; e.g., by KK Projects, which has transformed four small houses in St. Roch, one into a gallery and three more into home-sized artworks. For The NYT on KK Projects and its founder, Kirsha Kaechele, go here.

As far as I can tell, the city parties constantly. So, I recommend allowing at least four days, if you can. And go soon: the weather's great (no irony intended).

Below are links to more pics and vidis.

Some of the works I liked best include:

• Takashi Horisaki's piece at the Hefler Center (starting here; and when I say starting, I mean you might want to click on "next" 'til you're sure it's over) was made by actually slathering a semi-destroyed house with latex, inside and out; I understand it took the artist two years of effort to create it.
• Candice Breitz's A Portrait of Bob Marley (here). What might not be obvious from my li'l vidi is that each individual is hearing the song through headphones and singing along, or not, without hearing the others.
• The "Batman on Poppers" (here) at the CAC was part of a pretty wonderful installation about a gay bar in N.O. destroyed by a fire in which many died. The story is provided as part of the installation and is worth the read.
• Pedro Reyes' Leverage (starting here), which I can't resist calling, "Teeter-Totter for Ten."
• Fiona Tan's Island (starting here) looked terrific in its space at the CAC, though I had trouble deciphering the audio.
• Allora y Calzadilla's brilliant piece, A Man Screaming Its Not a Dancing (starting here) -- I'm so sorry my four brief vidis don't begin to do it justice -- at the CAC. (I could have captured this piece better; but I think I unconsciously balked on the grounds that it was too stunning to steal.)
• The Cao Fei (starting here), I'm already a huge fan and she totally lived up to it, at the CAC.
• Sunset Refinery by David Sullivan (here), in the Universal Furniture space in the St. Roch area -- again, my vidi doesn't do it justice.
• The KK Projects house starting here. (I have to mention, the nite I saw these houses, little kids from the neighborhood were giving guided tours. They stood at the doors and hawked in high voices, "Come see the lovely art!"; and if you got anywhere near, they'd capture your hand and draw you into the house. Once inside, they carefully pointed out various features of the installations, recited the names of the artists involved, and offered interpretive tips.)
  
• Stephen G. Rhodes' installation at the U.S. Mint (starting here), though I didn't expect to. It captures certain aspects of life under B*shCo (e.g., the shock+awe), among other things, perfectly.
  
• The Kalup Linzy piece at the New Orleans Museum of Art is wonderful (clip here); also Pulse Tank (here) by Rafael Lozano-Hemmer.

And there were plenty of other great pieces.

Before I lose any more of you, looking again at the visuals of this work, I'm pretty slapped up the head with how much of it seems concerned in part with the sweeping away, containment, erasure, or veiling of individuals -- and with efforts, at least partly successful, toward individual expression nonetheless.

Overall, the works included are perhaps not the most difficult -- many are downright charismatic. Conclude from that what you will; still, there's quality, breadth, and depth, and what I think will prove a fruitful sensitivity both to New Orleans' (decreasingly) peculiar plight and to the potential benefit to us all of having a truly great, international biennial based in the U.S.

Credit for this sensitivity is due both to Cameron and to the artists he selected (many of whom, of course, are furriners).

From a purely personal point of view, I was happy to find a decent amount of video, sorry not to find more new "new media."

Prospect.1 runs through January 17, 2009. The official P.1 homepage is here. Roberta Smith/NYT reviews the event (with more pics) here; artkrush has an article (with more pics) here.

Go here for my own pics and vidis (totally unadjusted, unedited, etc.; deepest apologies for all deficiencies and also for my failure to snap the artist/title cards for some works. Those I did snap generally appear AFTER the visual(s) of the work to which they relate. Also, I include some party pics and the like for those who were there, etc., though the emphasis is on the art. Finally, there were some great works I didn't snap, too many I missed seeing altogether, and others I snapped even though I'm not sure how much I like them; so no judgment should be inferred.)

If your interests are more selective . . .

For work at the Hefler Welcome Center, start here.
For work at the Contemporary Art Center, start here.
For the block party/gallery walk on Julia St., including 527 Gallery, start here.
For work at Louisiana ArtWorks, start here.
For Halloween nite, start here (including my costume).
For work etc. in and around St. Roch, start here.
For the dinner and work at KK Projects (including party pics of Kirsha, her mom, and other new friends), start here.
For the after-party and work at the Brickyard, start here.
For work etc. in and around the Lower Ninth Ward, start here.
For work at the U.S. Mint, start here.
For work in and around the New Orleans Museum of Art, start here.

On the way home, we caught a swamp tour from Cajun Man, also rec'd. Caveat: don't assume you can plug the address into your GPS and get there; call him for directions.

Below's a l'il Brickyard after-party for ya. Somewhat bigger-better version here; continued here; and I'm trying to get the band name, so if you like it, check back.

How Much Damage Can B*shCo Do Bef. They Leave?

Read this (Naomi Klein on how "[t]he Wall Street bailout looks a lot like Iraq -- a 'free-fraud' zone where private contractors cash in on the mess they helped create"), just re- financial aspects.

UPDATE on the 21st Annual DVF

I managed to catch most of everything I rec'd here, and loved it.

See you there next year!

US Army to Use World of Warcraft to Test Sci-Fi Tech

The U.S. Army wants to use the massively multi-player online game, World of Warcraft, to see if they can fool human players using "self-aware virtual photorealistic soldiers that can be deployed in the battlefield through 'quantum ghost imaging'" -- sorta like a robot, only it's a hologram?

Other scary projects include technologies to translate one person's thoughts into electrical signals that can be beamed to others and to selectively erase memories. I'm not kidding.

Via Gizmodo (thanks, Ben!)

Weight Watchers Recipe Cards 1974

. . . starting with Cabbage Casserole Czarina. (i'm no cook; but is that coleslaw with toast points?)

(thanks, lofqui!)

Sorry i've been uncommunicative this last week; been at Prospect.1, New Orleans. Had a great time, will blog it soon.