Fashion Shows and Random Old School Treadmill Thoughts
So, there’s a fashion show coming up, and I’m doing some design for it. Not fashion design, but designs for t-shirts and various other media (perhaps thongs, hats, cups, who knows). It should be a good time. Check out the sweet card artwork above. It’s on November 14th at the USF Tampa Marshall Center. Be there or be square.
And, randomly on the treadmill, I started thinking about really REALLY old stuff from 6th and 7th grade. I think it might be a sign as I start brainstorming my new site. But it was really random stuff, like Bilbo the Rabid Walrus and Newbus: the Dumbest Slug on Earth. I’m not even sure how they would play into my site. Yet.
Revisiting childhood sounds like a pretty good idea for a theme.
October 23, 2009 at 12:07 am | Art, Branding, Design, Random | No comment
Miami is nice, so I’ll say it thrice….
So, we’d been planning this trip to Art Basel in Miami since August but dizziness, exhaustion and the onset of a cold sent us home roughly 18 hours after arriving (cutting our trip short by three days). We didn’t see any of the art exhibitions, but we did see enough to warrant commentary. Oh, and if you can successfully identify the source material of this post’s title, you’ll get a pat on the back.
1) South Beach looks like it’s still trapped in the decadence of the 80′s Art Deco revival. The people in general might be dressed contemporarily, but the architecture and neon on everything screams pastel suits and Don Johnson. On top of that, friends and I counted roughly six Lamborghinis over six square blocks of the beach area.
2) While there for Art Basel, a really fun game to play is “Art Hipster or Homeless Guy?” Huh, I guess this game already exists.
3) While sitting near the beach, we saw a woman walking a dog that had a shirt, bandana and baseball cap on. No big deal, people dress their dogs all the time, right? While true, most people do not dress their dogs in people clothes that have been affixed to the dog in some awkward and seemingly uncomfortable fashion. Upon closer inspection it was clear that the dog was wearing an XL t-shirt that had been wrapped and safety pinned together and the baseball cap was tied to the dog’s head with shoe laces. Don’t imagine a chin strap; just imagine wrapping shoe laces around a dog’s head and that’s what it was like. Oh, and she kept talking to the dog like one would talk to a regular human.
4) It is never too early to be fashionable. At roughly 8:00 a.m. we saw a couple crossing the street. She was in a short skirt with leggings and boots. Not too abnormal. He, on the other hand was sporting tight black jeans, canvas sneakers, a leather jacket, a scarf, sunglasses and a holster. He didn’t have a gun, just a holster. And it was like 80 degrees in the sun.
5) If you’ve ever felt inadequate when looking at wafer-thin mannequins parading about store fronts, Miami will succeed in making you feel worse. I think they’re fake.
6) I was disappointed to learn that the house lived in by the Golden Girls was not actually in Miami and that the facade that was used for exterior shots was destroyed in 2003 when Disney-MGM tore down Residential Street in their Orlando theme park. I guess that getting my picture taken at that locale will forever be crossed off of my checklist of things to do before I die.
Screw you Disney and your damned Lights, Motors, Action! Extreme Stunt Show.
And with that, I’m off. Only a couple more hours until I’m finished with Bioshock, then it’s on to researching zombies brought on by the nuclear holocaust, thanks to Fallout 3.
December 6, 2008 at 1:09 am | Art, Random | No comment
The Beauty of Corporate America
Hi faithful readers! It’s admittedly been a very long time since I last updated this blog. I’ll try harder to keep everyone up to date a little more frequently. So, here’s the dilly-o on my happenings:
- I have a piece that will be displayed at the Illinois Institute of Art’s Gallery 350 (in Chicago) from December 9, 2008–January 23, 2009. What’s that? A show in Chicago? Yep. It’s called Make Me An Offer. Take a look.
- I’ve been spending some quality time with Bioshock on PS3. Wow. The game is pretty freaking sweet. The story is incredibly well-done for an FPS and the ambiance is impeccable. I’m on my second play-through, and although I know what’s going to happen, I’m still giddy. Aaaah… I love bleak, dystopian stories.
- Work is going pretty well. I think that perhaps one of the best parts of working for a corporation and being housed in a business complex is that the bathrooms are clean. I remember going to college with the misconception that since my floor-mates were all adults, we’d have fairly clean stalls. Finally, after almost 8 years I’m living my public bathroom dream. God bless America.
And that’s about it. Until next time, true believers. Go eat some turkey and pass out. (For my vegetarian friends, go eat some sort of vegetarian-Thanksgiving-turkey-substitute and pass out.)
November 24, 2008 at 11:30 pm | Art, Gaming, Random | No comment
George A. Romero’s Diary of the Dead
Be warned, this is a LONG entry, but it touches on a lot. Even racism! Woo hoo!
So, to treat myself tonight while I’m holed up with a bad back and two (now) unused tickets for the Tampa Bay Lightning and Carolina Hurricanes game, I decided to watch George Romero’s most recent foray into the canon he himself crafted: the zombie genre. If you’re unaware, the foray of which I speak is Diary of the Dead, a film that looks to re-invent the “of the Dead” series.
The plot follows the typical zombie fare—reasonably attractive individuals realize something screwy is happening and then try to escape their shambling pursuers, with a number of them dying/coming back/dying again. While it doesn’t sound much like a re-invention, Romero himself explains that this is a story about the beginning of the outbreak, the first few days (much like Night of the Living Dead) not a continuation as seen in the previous three movies succeeding Night (Dawn, Day and Land).
Another piece of this un-dead puzzle is that the entire film is supposedly seen through the lens of a student-filmmaker who is using prosumer HD cameras to capture and re-tell the events that transpired. Throughout, there are also clips interspersed that have been downloaded from the internet, clips that build upon the myth and give it a truly global reach. While this is a novel idea and gives this zombie movie a new, emotional and involving twist, it also causes the film to feel a little bit shaky (metaphorically more so than literally).
First of all, if you haven’t seen a movie shot in POV, then go watch The Blair Witch Project and/or Cloverfield. I’ll wait until you’ve had the chance to watch them.
Done? Good.
Now, go watch Diary of the Dead. See the difference? Now, I understand that Diary opens with the main heroine, Deb, explaining that the movie we’re about to watch was shot on two HD cameras and was cut by her on a laptop. Okay, Romero, you’ve covered your butt. However, when you actually watch the film, it feels anything BUT home-made.
What’s that Mr. Romero? All of the protagonists are in film school? That would explain how their shots are all expertly framed and how, in general, the action is pretty well in-focus. But, the protagonists’ credentials don’t excuse the high-quality YouTube footage of a girl in Tokyo or a couple of rednecks who sure as hell wouldn’t have the cash to purchase an HD camera, let alone the chops to edit the footage. Add to that all of the astonishingly high-quality surveillance equipment and the viewer will have to suspend disbelief in order to accept that a good chunk of this movie is supposedly “found footage.”
My other issue with the filming is that there wasn’t any humanity in it. People are being attacked, and the camera rolls. Scratch that—BOTH cameras roll. There were a plethora of scenes in which I wanted to scream at the TWO people holding the cameras when one of their friends is being eaten no more than three feet away. Who cares if you can’t see the zombie’s head explode; put the damned camera down and help your friend.
Oh, wait—everybody is dead and so you have to hold the camera because the only other living person is currently being attacked. Oh now it all makes sense. For a moment I thought it was just that you were a jerk, but instead it’s because you’re an ass. Nice job, ass. I hope your friend comes back to life and chews on your face.
For me I had problems connecting to characters who failed to come to the aid of their good friends for the sake of getting it all on camera. I watched a lot of blurry, shaky ground and feet and darkness in Cloverfield and still hope that more people will survive the next time I watch it. Diary left me feeling kind of empty.
However, I suppose some of that emptiness was due, in part, to the ham-fistedness of the cardboard cutouts who were on-screen. I will admit that all of the stereotypes that I expected were broken half-way through the film and everyone settled into their characters. It just sucks that all the characters were pretty much the same. It sucked even more that “the same” was angsty, clichéd and fairly unlikeable. I shouldn’t be rooting for a person to live just because I know that someone HAS to live.
And what was with the weird racist vibe I got from all of the black characters? At one point in the film, the protagonists get ambushed by a trio of powerful and armed black men. After being taken to their hideout, an exchange occurs in which one of the captors explains their reasoning for staying behind saying something to the extent of “We’re finally in power. When all of this went down, everyone without a sun tan left.” Maybe it’s because I just read a couple articles on whites vs. the world and watched American History X, but here is how I break down this group of decidedly “outsider” individuals:
1) The black men and women are ALL big and strong. It’s like that one Vogue cover with Lebronn and Gisele; I would like to be the first person to welcome back loaded stereotypes and will do so with a firm handshake and warm smile. I really missed you.
2) What’s the deal with the power comment? They’re 65 miles from Scranton, PA; while I understand that America subconsciously holds racism close to its heart, wouldn’t that area have been northern territory from the start? Had they been in the deep south, I would have understood the implications. Could you have made it any more implicit that as soon as white guys drop their guard, black people will rise up and take control? And now that I think of it, I don’t remember any non-white zombies anywhere in the film.
3) I sure am glad that, in a moment of confusion, the black people kill a non-zombie black man on accident and a white guy saves the day by killing the actual black zombie. Thank heavens that a white guy was there to save the others from themselves.
And I guess this leads me to my final disappointment with the film. One of the things Romero has been lauded for is his ability to weave social commentary into his horror stories. Night of the Living Dead? Race and paranoia. Dawn of the Dead? Mass consumerism and humanity’s emotional shortcomings. Day of the Dead? Military control, seclusion and the balance of force vs. reasoning. Land of the Dead? Mass paranoia, again, and the failures of public reliance on the perceptual good-intentions of governing bodies. Don’t worry, I’m not going to say that Diary does not have a social commentary. It does. And, thankfully, it’s made glaringly obvious in the first 5 minutes of the movie. And it’s not told through anecdote or action or subtlety; it’s beat into your brain by a voice-over. It’s kind of like admitting that the movie wasn’t quite good enough on its own without explaining it to the audience.
Overall, it wasn’t bad, but it’s definitely not my favorite zombie movie. The idea was novel, but the execution was lacking. Kudos to Romero, though, for re-defining the of the Dead mythos but I think that to succeed, the series is going to need a little more punch to re-animate its shambling, undead roots.
October 11, 2008 at 11:04 pm | Art, Random | No comment
A star is born
Actually, the star was born in 1982, but it shined brightly last Wednesday night at a group performance piece at the Contemporary Art Museum (CAM) in Tampa, Florida.
The exhibition is titled Mash Up and it’s all about the destruction of music. One of the installation/performance/video pieces is by Pedro Reyes, an artist who has staged (now) three opportunities for individuals to jam karaoke-style to their favorite songs, wailing on 1/4″ MDF guitars. At some point during the performance, the participant smashes the guitar, ending the song and looking like a bad-ass in the process.
I got the opportunity to participate (I think there were maybe 17 participants total in the Tampa piece) and will now live on in infamy as a piece of Pedro Reyes’s The New Group Therapies: Part III (Instant Rockstar) which will hopefully travel the world (I know his last two have gone international to some extent).
Here’s a clip from the channel 10 news. I am true to form, with an idiotic sound byte, but then make up for it by being the capstone at the end of the segment.
For those of you keeping track at home, the song I chose was Final Countdown by Europe.