7x7

a sweep is as lucky as lucky can be: a look at the brilliant decorative chimneys of Hampton Court

elvis, elvis let me be: a meeting of the minds (and spirits) with Presley and Ann-Margaret, via the fantastic Nag on the Lake

abecedarium: the alphabet for spoiled children, via Kottke’s quick links

point of origin: artists’ palettes transformed into canvases

stowaways: an investigation into how even orderly, ornamental nature can propagate invasive species, raising an interesting counterpoint to extinctions that humans have caused through the speciation and advantage it has imparted for some so called weeds and pests

portable hole: the laws of cartoon physics

atomteller: a line of commemorative porcelain plates of German nuclear reactors either already taken off-line or scheduled to be mothballed soon

shear madness

Poseidon’s Underworld presents a curated gallery of stylist to the stars, Jose Eber—vintage 1982, posing with some of the celebrities who’ve had their hair-dos done by the French hair-dresser. It’s really sort of a guilty-pleasure to pore over these glamour shots with accompanying, campy short interviews—confessions derived from an assessment that’s meant to identify one’s colour and thus one’s personality. Clients include Goldie Hawn, Penny Marshall, Farrah Fawcett, Jamie Lee, Cathy Lee, Barbara Walters and Pia Zadora.

5x5

bars and bathhouses: in 1983, a gay version of the Monopoly board game was produced

weinkönigin: Trier crowns a Syrian refugee as its Wine Queen

simcity: a new game invites players to redesign NYC’s subway system and test the outcomes of different scenarios

tiki room: the intrepid explorers of Atlas Obscura examine how romancing fake Polynesian culture taught Americans how to relax and be more social

lossless: the Olympics committee has forbidden the creation or sharing animated GIFs of any of its events, via Boing Boing

armorial achievement or ladies companion

The College of Heralds, as Boing Boing astutely informs, has established protocols for the management of shields and devices for the union of same-sex couples, which would pass muster during a royal heraldic visitation. “A man who contracts a same-sex marriage may impale the arms of his husband with his own on a shield or banner but should bear his own crest rather than the crest of both parties…” No matter what one thinks about the landed-gentry and old-money or the relevance of such institutions, it was nice to learn that even such a conservative and exclusive custom can become receptive to change.

pastiche or ultraviolence

The subversively engaging Dangerous Minds has a nice appreciation for the 1969 Japanese counter-culture work of director Toshio Matsumoto called Funeral Parade of Roses (薔薇の葬列). The film, itself based on Sophocles’ Œdipus Rex, focuses on the misadventures of a cadre of transvestites in contemporary Tokyo, and was a major stylistic influence on Stanley Kubrick’s 1971 adaptation of Anthony Burgess’ A Clockwork Orange—thematically, no equivalence in delinquency—along with the short story Flowers for Algernon, which sort of makes the idea of inspiration material and footnoting all the more dissonant and it takes an artist to understand the echoes of homage.

Via Madam Jujujive’s Everlasting Blört, comes a moving gallery of grief and solidarity of vigils and memorials voicing support for the victims and families of Orlando.

twinkie-defence

I’d venture to say that there could be nothing that so succinctly encapsulates the downfall of society into an overly-sheltered and gratified mockery of itself than the news that the fabled Playboy mansion has been sold to a cupcake magnate. There’s small consolation in the stipulation that the ninety-year old Hugh Hefner gets to reside there until his death, but the new owner has expressed interest in acquiring the whole empire. Who can say what the franchise, not that it’s necessarily worth preserving—but given this infantilising, sweet-toothed legacy, might be a vehicle for in the near future?

epitaph

Ahead of its planned field-trips on its founding day (we all ought to arrange our own outings as well to showcase the places for which we could be expert tour-guides), Atlas Obscura features a bitter-sweet, maudlin memorial to the struggles and triumphs of the gay community with a locus in the Congressional Cemetery securing of its own special corner.
Dishonourably discharged from the US armed forces for being a homosexual (against the advice of the court-appointed psychologist), Vietnam veteran Leonard Matlovich, sadly in anticipation of his imminent demise from AIDS related complications, devoted himself to making a statement for the ages. Within view of the resting place of self-loathing J Edgar Hoover, whose witch-hunts perpetuated discriminatory practises, and his suspected lover, Matlovich purchased a pair of plots and designed his nameless headstone, to be etched for the silent and anonymous sufferers whom had to hide their love away. Since his funeral, Matlovich has been joined by many others in repose and symbolically in victory as well, with several military same-sex weddings, legal and wholly vetted, held before Matlovich’s grave.

volare

Atlas Obscura has an interesting feature on the antiquated though not wholly forgotten and not wholly exclusive homosexual canting dialect called polari—from the Italian to chatter.
Camp as camp is, that’s one of the core vocabulary derived from polari (so too fruity), along flair for the theatric with ajax for near by, naff for drab and plain, troll, and zhoosh to smarten-up, it was once used as code for when the practise was considered illegal among polite company and was part of the steerage for men in the merchant-marines and waiters on cruise-lines. The parlance fell out of favour once it started to be parodied on a popular BBC production in the 1970s and became main-stream, as it were, but polari has seen a revival—with some endearing terms lasting all this time, with latter-day glam rock and specifically the final album from David Bowie.

i’m lovin’ it

Although the global fast food franchise has stirred controversy beforehand with a very similar advertisement back in 2010 for French markets (ahead of the country’s landmark decision to recognise same-sex marriages), the café division of this restauranteur, as Super Punch informs, is facing a boycott at the urging of some religious authorities in Taiwan over its latest iteration of this theme.
Despite seeming to be an unlikely medium for coming out to one’s father, a teen pens in the dialogue balloon of his coffee cup the admission that he likes guys—to which, his father angrily departs. After a beat the father returns, conciliatory, writing on the cup, “I accept that you like guys.” What do you think? Click through for more details and to watch the commercial. The company deserves praise for this, I think, and will weather protests, but should international businesses such as this be expected to remain neutral on cultural norms or do they have obligations to take a stance?

mmxv: annus horribilis

These end-of-year annuals have become somewhat of a tradition here (here, here, here, and here too) at PfRC but never before in these annuls of time has one period been so stand-out negative and gloomy.  We tried to accentuate the positive but that was yeoman’s task, so this year-in-review is coming out a few days early in hopes that the holidays will be a time of lasting good cheer to cleanse the palette and that some last minute joys might befall us all.  There were a few bright points which mostly involved accomplishments in space exploration, but on balance, we are happy to be saying good riddance to bad rubbish.

january: Unpegging the Swiss franc from the euro unleashes more turmoil on financial markets and oversees the gradient of reserve currencies levelled out. With the situation in Ukraine still very tense, the Eurasian Economic Union comes into being. In Nigeria, Boko Haram’s brutality goes unrestrained. Elements of the Cosplay Caliphate in Paris assassinate cartoonists and satirists.

february: Faced with its own deck of sanctions, Russia drafts and submits to the United Nations for passage Resolution 2199 that provided for asset-freezing and curtailing financial resources for the Cosplay Caliphate, strongly condemning as well the group’s destruction of ancient archaeological sites in Syria. The Egyptian armed forces retaliate for the beheading of Copts in Libya by the Caliphate—with more atrocities broadcasted. Sadly, Leonard Nimoy passes away.

march: A space probe visits the Dwarf Planet Ceres. An unholy alliance forms between terror groups as al Qaeda tries to distance itself from these extremists. A suicidal pilot deliberately crashes an airplane full of passengers in the French Alps.

april: A massive earthquake causes destruction across south-east Asia.  Writer Günter Grass and performer Percy Sledge passed.

may: Ireland, by popular-vote, legalises same-sex marriage. Truer to the original, audiences began getting hints of the continuation of the Stars Wars saga to be screened later in the year.  We had to bid farewell to musician B. B. King.

june: Fédération Internationale de Football Association chief resigns pending an on-going criminal probe into corruption allegations championed by the American Federal Bureau of Investigation. A real estate magnate and beauty pageant judge announced his candidacy for president of the US.  The Caliphate perpetrates several horrific attacks during Ramadan. Actor Christopher Lee died.

july: Greece becomes the first country to miss a payment to the International Monetary Fund and political revolt is unable to extricate them from this web of debt. New Horizons visits the dwarf planet Pluto. Cuba and the USA normalise diplomatic relations after half a century of hostilities. Video game godfather Satoru Iwata passed away.

august: The march of refugees from war-torn Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan to Europe via the Balkans in unending.  We had to say goodbye to philosopher Oliver Sacks.

september: Liquid water is confirmed on Mars. A major German automaker was found to have doctored the cleanliness of their fleet of vehicles. The proxy war continues in Syria, with Russia launching air-strikes and powers are at odds with which party to back. Personality Jackie Collins died.

october: The Caliphate sabotages a jetliner of holiday-goers in the Sinai Peninsula. Maureen O’Hara departed.

november: Turkey destroys Russian fighter jets for violating a tip of its airspace, possibly setting off World War III. The Caliphate again attacks Paris with horrific and terrifying efficiency. Weeks later, the UN holds its climate change conference in the same venue. Former Chancellor of West Germany Helmut Schmidt passes away.

december: Tragically, yet another mass shooting takes place in California, inspired by religious fanaticism. A wayward Japanese space probe that over-shot its mark five years ago gets a second chance to rendezvous with Venus. Stone Temple Pilot Scott Weiland passed away.  Recognising what the world needs now, Pope Francis threw open the Mercy Gate at the Vatican.

birthright or pride and prejudice

The always challenging Æon magazine, far from raining on anyone’s parade, does introduce a seed of doubt in a sense and circumspection that needs addressing in regards to society’s increasing acceptance of lifestyles that do not fit the standard hetero-normative model and reforms in regulatory frame-works either granted or bidden.

Though contextually there is no direct correspondence and biographies and history is told by people recognising early on that they don’t quite fit with what society expects of them and much hardship can ensue in trying to either conform or be made an outcast, but it’s nonetheless an interesting and contentious to wonder what it means that the community embraces being born with one predilection or other—whereas, for other civil rights movements, to be defined by one’s genes would be an egregious insult and very much counter to their goals. Happily, just as attitudes have shifted from revulsion to tolerance to acceptance for gay rights, so too it has become repugnant to hold attitudes that another’s chances are somehow limited or prejudiced due to their genetic pedigree or gender. Is the nuance something completely different—or is it the same as saying that one’s deficient of mathematical acumen can be attributed to one being born a woman is the equivalent as a born and bred gay individual’s lack of heterosexuality? Such declarations can be unintentionally discriminatory. The politics of identity are still hot items, depending on one’s side and advantage in the matter—whether it is something self-reported or imposed from an outside source.  What do you think?  Is the question of determinism an old vestige of racist-thinking or something becoming obsolete and optional and a cause for celebration for that alone?

noble lies oder lüggenpresse

Madame Chancellor is getting quite the armchair beating and baiting lately. Not to say that her response to an unscripted plea was measured in reducing a young girl to tears or that her views of marriage equality—rather matrimony as defined, are either correct or callous, instead those interpretations are reflective (and very much so, I think) of the realities of European Union bureaucracy—unable to act on any resolution without unanimity that failed to address a Greek tragedy that was not inevitable (another source of vitriol, deservedly or not)—and populism, both broad and narrow. For economic reasons, Germany enjoys this strange type of mandate that’s lost on other member governments, whose politicians—despite the will of the public that they represent—are instead beholden to the Union and regimes and coalitions topple over curried-disfavour.
This encounter with a young refugee was unexpected and I believe was conducted in a human and sympathetic manner—insofar as possible, but maybe politicians ought not stop seeking out such photo-opportunities to portray themselves as kind aunties and uncles and instead pledge to do more to build prospects in the places where these asylum-seekers come from, but was constrained by her support-base, the polls. I bet the Chancellor was ashamed of herself but by the way she snapped at the minder, I think she didn’t care much for her image at that moment and did not try to backtrack. In the domestic arena, there would be a revolt among her political partners, not as an excuse or being an apologist for such attitudes, and alienation of a substantial voting bloc if she expressed more progressive views on gay marriage. As with an immigration policy which is at its core quite accommodating and is attacked for being too liberal, the Chancellor’s positive reforms towards greater tolerance and equality have really been in-stead with much of the rest of the world, but some factions become fixated on the word marriage—which the twice-married Chancellor reserved as a matter of choice and to placate her party. The same EU that’s the Sword of Damocles hanging over Greece could also dictate, by the same mechanisms or lack thereof, that marriage equality be universal among members. What do you think? Might does not confer sole entitlement to the exercise of democracy—or the illusion of such—and it becomes the tyranny of the privileged and useful.

5x5

helm’s deep: South-westerns brace themselves for large-scale US military training exercise

jello submarine: iconic Beatles’ classic in gelatine form

freejack: via the mesmerising Mind Hacks, thieves come closer to prising open mental wallets

senor-shooter-interoperability: scary report about a German missile battery briefly commandeered

mappyland: a Swedish based service that renders stylish, sleek schematics of any place in the world

5x5

ephemera: MOMA acquires beautiful set of postcards advertising the inaugural Bauhaus exhibition

mincome going dutch: Utrecht will test out basic income plus a look at historical experiments with eliminating poverty

redrum: food decoration inspired by Stanley Kubrick classic The Shining, via the splendiferous Nag on the Lake

proud as a peacock: charming round up of railings against the US Supremes’ decision to ban state-level curbs on marriage

neapolitan: biography of Rose Totino, patroness, of frozen pizza—plus a selection of inventive advertisements made with stock-images  

5x5

ostalgie: doll houses and dioramas of East Germany

in search of lost time: introduction to Alain de Botton’s series on how Marcel Proust can turn one’s life around

throughput: Disney corporate flow-chart for strategic success

sperrgebiet (dead link): Germany will transform sixty closed military installations into nature reserves, via TYWKIDBI

notorious rbg: US supreme court justice’s civil rights sojourn and superstar status

5x5

straβenverkkehrsordnung: a unique roadway configuration and the technicalities of traffic regulations means that one stop light has been red for three decades in Dresden

over the rainbow: MOMA acquires the pride flag and interviews the seamstress

four thousand holes in blackburn, lancashire: internet giant is checking computer reading-comprehension with conservative, sensational tabloids

electric babysitter: artist captures images of her children in listless, powerful moments of watching TV

raptor squat: honest-to-goodness zookeepers re-enacting pose from new Jurassic World

five-by-five

one ring to bind them: wonderfully geeky and romantic science-fiction inspired jewellery

swim-lanes: a vintage timeline of human history

dollies: beautiful lace patterns created out of newspaper collages

[edit]: audio landscape of revisions, additions to Wikipedia

ampelmännchen: in the run up to EuroVision, Vienna installs same sex couple cross-walk lights

poète maudit

velvet mafia

Though the truth is a very difficult matter to reconstruct, small bridges to the real story virtually pulverised by redaction and secrets yet to expire, the testimony of those he worked with and his compatriots of the so called Cambridge Five, a spy ring recruited from impressionable or impassioned students from the University by the Soviet Union in the interbellum period and for the course of the war, that operative Guy Burgess was the most ruthless and diplomat with the less tact was probably no hyperbole.

Committed to the belief that there were only two alternative world-views for a world that was dangerously close to slipping back into grave conflict, communism or fascism, and fearful that England would side for fascism ultimately and continue with appeasement of Nazi Germany, Burgess worked covertly to forward the agenda of the Bolshevik government. Despite or possibly because of his nature as a double-agent, Burgess not only ingratiated himself to the media, directing several programmes that covered parliament and foreign policy matters, he also came to earn the trust and confidence of powerful members of the Foreign Office and diplomatic mission to the United States. With essentially unchecked access to thousands of documents, Burgess was able to provide his controllers with incredulous amounts of information—and even they began to be skeptical of his sources and how long this relationship might go on before all were caught. That Burgess was flagrantly homosexual—but seemingly not blackmailed into treason like some of the other spies at the time, and was just as uncensored in that aspect of his personality as in all others, might have elevated him above suspicion in a way. That’s just Burgie, queer duck. Maybe that affectation kept others at a safe distance—or maybe no one dared risk having their own dirty laundry aired. Or maybe the British Intelligence services were devising a triple bluff, with voluminous but harmless information to distribute with hopes of catching bigger offenders. I don’t suppose that that truth will ever out.
Throughout the war and in the aftermath, Burgess funneled the Soviet Union details of treaty negotiations, the alliance between Britain and America and how the Marshall Plan would take shape. An aside: it is worth noting that the small-minded laws that criminalised homosexual-pratises in the UK never seemed to adversely affect a traitor but destroyed a genius and hero, Alan Turing, whom were incidentally both recently portrayed by the same actor—the former on stage and the later in film. Around 1951, feeling that his activities were about to be discovered, Burgess fled to Moscow. Burgess settled in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, but was reportedly never very happy there because he couldn’t carry on like he was accustomed to, despite being permitted to openly reside with a male-lover. Burgess never returned from exile, fearing he would stand for high treason if he tried to enter the UK. The courts were not forthcoming about the fact that the charges would most likely be inadmissible since it mostly came from fellow-defectors.