uncanny valley ranch (10. 781)

With varied results—most AI creations fall into one or two categories of either “there, I ruined it” or “that’s an interesting/uncanny/horrific take”—Hyperalleric experimented with Adobe’s Generative Fill (see previously) to expand the canvas of iconic works of art and test the software’s imaginative capacity for what might be just beyond the four corners. Some were able to limn and extend the backgrounds quite nice while others, like for The Great Wave of Kanagawa, find the addition rather unnecessary.

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7x7 (10. 778)

omnes vanitas: the puzzling thanatopsis of the paintings of David Bailly 

hbo in space: music made for television—see previously here and here  

journey to the west: in the Hall of the Monkey King 

trompe-l’œil: the hyper realistic paintings of John Frederick, see previously—via Messy Nessy Chic  

outside the frame: using LLM and AI to hear the rest of the story–not that we needed to 

velvet goldmine: the art collection of David Bowie—see previously here and here  

memento mori: an elaborate lie-detection apparatus from the 1920s

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platonic solids (10. 769)

Via tmn, we are directed to a 1974 installation by collector, curator and conceptual artist Sol LeWitt’s serial exploration of negative and positive space, both flat and realised in three-dimensions, in his one hundred-twenty-two permutations of how a cube could be not closed space. This matrix of deconstruction invites one to reexamine the fundamentals of geometry and perspective that we otherwise might take for granted. More at the links above including a tour of the gallery space hosting these open cubes.

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pompon (10. 767)

Whilst only expected to fetch about five thousand dollars at auction, a portrait of one of favourite canine companions by Jacques Barthélémy Delamarre (the eighteenth century painter whose portfolio limited to pictures of this dog with shaved hindquarters and few other studies of cats and rabbits and not to be confused with Joseph Ducreux—though equally meme-worthy) commanded over a quarter of a million. Not much is known about either the artist or the subject, that is believed to be a Cavalier King Charles—other than the French queen kept a menagerie of pets and this one is as elaborately coiffed as their human, though unclear if they shared the same political views, see also.

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6x6 (10. 749)

unartificial: city of Vienna is using AI feline-added artwork to promote its inspiration—via Miss Cellania  

paved paradise: the American obsession with car storage and its attendant ills  

world police: US military bases around the globe—see previously here and here 

sour grapes: the art of the sulk as a form of indirect communication and social-leveller  

bakerloo line: an incredible schematic of the Piccadilly Circus under- and overground by Renzo Picasso—see previously 

uhohlingo: a AI that generates language learning lessons—and tends to be notoriously wrong

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beflix (10. 736)

Via Waxy, we a directed to this thoroughgoing study of early computer art of the 1950s and 1960s by Amy Goodchild, beginning with the moment of inception with Babbage and Lovelace speculating on the creative potential of their difference engine to the realisation of mathematician Ben Laposky using sine functions and oscilloscopy to produce “electrical compositions” and one of the earliest interactive applications called MusiColor that generated patterns and light mapped from audio inputs. There are profiles of the pioneers in this field with images and video presentations of various pivotal works and installations as well as the above programming language for computer animation—from Bell Flicks—made for educational and engineering applications 1970 to explore, which are really remarkable considering the time and labour put into each project and makes one reflect how pace and patience temper the creative process in an age of instant iteration.

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boulevard of broken dreams (10. 732)

Via Miss Cellania, sort of in the same vein as those ubiquitous posters of nail salons, we take a deep dive into the equally omnipresent cafe and restaurant mural featuring variations on the fantasy gathering of celebrities—the usual suspects being Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley, James Dean and Humphrey Bogart when an artist called Gottfried Helnwein, best known for album covers, created a homage to Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks in 1985. The mass-reproduced piece, intended as a bit of humour, took on a life of its own with other painters taking up the trope of the ‘Fakehawk’ foursome in different settings that do not only echo a singular facet of Hollywood nostalgia but also serves as activity placemats for adults with meaning to decode and hidden Easter Eggs embedded in the backdrop. More from Ryan H Walsh for The Believer at the link above.

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populuxe (10. 714)

Via friend of the blog par excellence, Nag on the Lake, we are directed towards the futuristic portfolio of artist and illustrator Charles Schridde (1926 - 2011), who exhibiting real talent from an early age was awarded a scholarship to the Chicago Institute of Art, and returning to a career as a free-lance graphic designer after service in World War II, was commissioned by Motorola (notice the central figure is home media) for a series of advertisements appearing in Life and The Saturday Evening Post and helped define the Mid-Century Modern aesthetic that capitalised on optimism for a brighter future. More at the links above.

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in the room the women come and go, talking of michaelangelo (10. 706)

The BBC reports that the Florida principal pressured to resign after introducing pupils to the artist’s masterpiece, David, without prior parental approval of the curricula, has travelled to Florence with her family and saw the colossal marble statue in person at the Accademia Galleria, at the invitation of the museum’s director. The biblical figure whose nakedness and vulnerability represent the triumph of purity over the forces of evil was originally destined as an ensemble lining the roof buttresses of the cathedral but once finally realised, authorities instead decided, due to its size and grandeur, to place the statue in the public square of the seat of the Florentine government in 1504. A fig leaf (foglia di fico, a loin-garland) was added shortly after installation and though not a permanent addition, the practise was perpetuated by Victoria after expressing shock over the nudity of a full scale replica presented to the Victoria & Albert Museum. The original was removed from Palazzo della Signoria to the gallery in 1873, with a copy on public display, to protect it from the elements.

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126³ (10. 687)

Via Present /&/ Correct, we are directed to the superb Tiny Voxel Shop series by Shin Oh. Working with three-dimensional pixels—from volume + pixel, which in turn is from pics + element—became therapeutic for the artist working through depressed and dispassionate point and hopes the collection of typical Malaysian shops and stalls will be an inspiration for others to cherish and conserve small local businesses and the distinctive character that they bring to communities, once lost gone forever.  More at the link above.

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hofatelier elvira (10. 680)

Fellow internet peripatetic Messy Nessy Chic directs our attention to the former nexus of Germany’s pacifist and feminist movement in the photography studio and artists’ salon in glorious Jugenstil. Ultimately demolished and the address on Von-der-Tann-Strasse now occupied by the US Consulate of Munich after its stylised dragon façade was vandalised during the war years, the property used provisionally as a canteen kitchen, the enterprise spanning from 1898 to 1928 was notable as the first company in Germany founded by women, jurist, suffragist, writer and actress Anita Theodora Johanna Sophie Augsprung partnering with entrepreneur and photographer Sophia N J Goudstikker, and an important meeting place for avant garde artists in parallel with its primary business of taking pictures of celebrities and the aristocracy.

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9x9 (10. 671)

mod squad: celebrating the long life and career of Dame Mary Quant, Swinging Sixties fashion icon  

the cure at troy: a poetic reflection on the anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement  

31 at jennie richee: outsider artist Henry Darger 

thug shaker central: self-promoting US Air National Guardsman identified as suspected source of Pentagon leaks 

liberica: the studier coffee bean that could save the industry 

ncc-1701: a meticulous ranging of all the Enterprises 

news at 11: an epic 19 80s bumper

rupublicans: images of GOP politicians in drag—see also  

hyperbole: more on the Googie style with this iconic Southern California motel

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7x7 (10. 642)

one day near salinas: a sizeable California city has no local coverage, with original content limited to paid obituaries—see also 

suzanne primate: every documentary about historical Edinburgh 

ugly duchess: Quinten Massy’s 1513 portrait, “The Old Woman” is likely a drag queen 

the future is a dead mall: Dan Olson on the impoverished, dystopian metaverse as a third-place—via Waxy  

confessions of an idiom: the proverbial elephant in the room confronts the skeleton in the closet 

the pictish trail: wanderlust in northern Scotland  

strategies to foreground vertical video: media company Gannet’s success has little to do with journalism—via the New Shelton wet/dry—see also

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masterclass (10. 601)

Capitalising on the excitement of a once-in-a-lifetime exhibition of all the Old Dutch Master’s work displayed together, Open Culture refers us a reality show and competition from the Netherlands making quite a sensation with audiences where amateur and professional painters are vying to be de Nieuwe Vermeer, with participants reimagining the trove of real and putative lost works (or otherwiseredacted) of the artist to attempt to complete his portfolio of some fifty paintings, including The Concert stolen in a 1990 heist of the Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum. Much more at Open Culture at the link above.

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7x7 (10. 578)

for love of the glove: a revival of the unauthorised musical biography about the King of Pop  

frogmorton house: a tiny home built for a resident amphibian  

davy and goliath: smaller AIs recom-mendations on how to hack a more dominant one—see previously from AI Weirdness  

girl with the pearl earring: whilst the original is on loan as part of a comprehensive Vermeer exhibition, the Mauitshuis is displaying a set of reinterpretations—see previously  

steak & ale: the Midcentury Medieval aesthetic—via Messy Nessy Chic 

diamonds are forever: tiny spherical chambers could help harness the power of the sun—see also  

zone improvement plan: more on the Swinging Six and Mister Zip—via Weird Universe

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thread and throughline (10. 567)

Premiering on BBC2 on this day in 1969, the mini-series with the very self-aware subtitle (see previously) conceived by David Attenborough whilst overseeing the transition to colour broadcasting and thought programming about great paintings would be a good showcase and presented by art historian Kenneth Clark was the first documentary of its kind and was regarded as edifying and enlightening for general audiences, if not admittedly from a limited perspective and subject to Western chauvinism. Disclaiming comprehensiveness, the series—through the lens of Western European artists—outlined the course of history from the end of the Dark Ages through the Renaissance to early modernity. A nine part sequel, Civilisations with presenters David Olusoga, Mary Beard and Simon Schama, was produced and streamed on Netflix in March of 2018. The first five installments of the original are below.

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8x8 (10. 551)

§230: US Supreme Court reconsidering foundational regulations and their application to algorithmic recommendations  

pole position: researchers propose adding a fourth white light to traffic signals for self-driving vehicles—via Kottke  

the master of the countess of warwick:unveiling the artist responsible for this Tudor-era aesthetic 

ƛcdm: massive blackholes might be the source of the mysterious dark energy that causes the Cosmos to expand 

side hustle: professional comedians are increasingly turning to babysitting to supplement incomes, find source material—via TYWKIWDBI  

leviathan: in search of the giants of the deep 

future tense: the wow list of architectural wonders—including the City—for 2023, via digg 

samuel alito’s mom’s satanic abortion clinic: facility, named in honour of the woman who birthed the justice whose opinion overturned Roe v Wade, is the first based on religious principles

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7x7 (10. 541)

sky survey: a massive, high resolution picture of the Milky Way with three billion distinct objects  

pachyderm prototype: presenting the Platybelodon—see also

braggoscope: using machine learning to create affiliative indices of the extensive archives of BBC4’s In Our Time with Melvin Bragg—via Web Curios 

hobohemian: a primer for Tramp Art  

book renewal: the New York Public Library has found that the majority of literature published prior to 1964 may already be in the public domain—via Kottke 

opuntia: invasive cacti are spreading in the Swiss Alps  

stardust to dust: researchers propose kicking up lunar debris to create a sunshade and cool the Earth—see also

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statistical breviary (10. 499)

Currently on exhibit at the National Arts Club in New York City, we are finding ourselves preoccupied with the presentation of Greg Colson and his studies in pie charts that reflect our collective and dissected anxieties and fear, surveyed as they are suggesting that each wedge might be susceptible to reduction or expansion in a way that’s wiser than the format seems at first glance. More at Hyperalleric at the link above.

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money to burn (10. 497)

Once seized as the counterfeiting scheme of a mysterious Frenchman, Public Domain Review contributor Dorinda Evans reassesses the hyperrealistic paintings of Victor Dubreuil of US paper currency as a social critique of capitalism and exploitative working practises at a time when few were openly questioning the status quo. These still lives with dollars and trompe l’oeil paintings of legal tender enjoyed some contemporary popularity in addition to scrutiny by the US for the starving artist but most missed the anti-imperialism, anti-kleptocractic allegory of Dubreuil. Find a whole gallery of his works at the link above.

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