stick insect

We enjoyed seeing this collection of moths, butterflies, mantises and beetles created by Montreal-based fashion designer Raku Inoue out of seasonal foliage. This series was inspired from studying ikebana or kadō (華道, the way of flowers)—the art of floral arrangement considered one of the three classical Japanese arts of refinement along with kōdō (香道, the Way of Fragrance) or incense appreciation and chadō (茶道), the ritual of the tea ceremony, and taught the artist to respect and work with Nature, selecting bounty over beauty.

bratři v triku

Active from 1945 to 1965, influential Czech illustrator and animator Jiří Trnka was heralded as the Walt Disney of Eastern Europe for his manner of storytelling that drew on classic folktales but his distinctive stop-motion short films were allegories intended for adult audiences and a vehicle for satire.  Trnka found two partners and started an animation studio called Bratři v Triku (Brothers in Tricks) and eventually discovered his style, returning to the puppets that he used to entertain friends and family in his childhood.
Their early productions received international acclaim, recognised at the Cannes and Venice film festivals and Trnka managed to skirt the censors with messages that were mild to pointed rebukes of the Communist government. In his final years, however, Trnka’s output became more cynical and bolder in challenging the regime. His crowning achievement—and sadly his last work, dying four years later and banned as subversive after his death—was a short called Ruka (The Hand), which depicts a potter commissioned unwillingly to sculpt a likeness of the all-powerful Hand. Despite being pressured and plied awards and commendations, the potter views this as an unwelcome imposition (he’d rather be left to craft pots for his friends the flowers) turning into persecution as the Hand won’t relent. The potter escapes briefly and runs back home, tossing off his burden of medals and tries to barricade himself in his closet but as he does so, a flowerpot crashes down on his head—killing him. The Hand, afterward, holds a pompous funeral for the potter just as Trnka’s native Plzeň honoured him with a large public event. Only posthumously censored, The Hand may have been a prelude of the Prague Spring of 1968 and signal of a gradual socio-political thawing in the East.

monster of the week

While perhaps best known for his controversial cologne advertisement of kissing sailors in the midst of on-going debates about the US military doctrine of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell regarding the fitness of gay and lesbian to serve openly in the armed forces in 1995, amanuensis and apprentice to Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Andy Warhol David LaChapelle was also famous for his indulgent and wild photography sessions with celebrities. Apparently in circulation again is this exemplary series that encapsulates a certain look of the 1990s (possibly a little cringe-worthy) featuring X-Files stars David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson posed against immersive bright backdrops (perhaps an exploit of audience speculation on the duo’s platonic relationship) that look pretty astonishing for any decade. Visit LaChapelle’s studio to rediscover his work, which really informed the 90s and continues to make bold statements.

clusterfists

Recently my subscription to the Oxford English Dictionary’s Word of the Day (read about the founding contributors to the living document here) introduced me to the delightfully Latinate nonce word, uttered—or rather—committed to paper only once by Scottish epigrammist and translator Sir Thomas Urquhart of Comarty, quomodocunquizing. The term is defined as the act of making money by any means possible and appears in his 1652 work Ekskybalauron (Greek for gold out of dung and subtitled Or, the Discovery of the Most Exquisite Jewel, a prospectus on constructing a universal language) in the context, “those quomodocunquizing clusterfists and rapacious varlets.” On a side note, staunch Royalist and erstwhile political prisoner during the reign of Oliver Cromwell, Urquhart’s cause of death is listed as laughter, dying in a fit after having received the news of the restoration of the Stuart crown.