automatonophilia

Here photographed by the eminent Alfred Eisenstaedt for LIFE magazine at the Stork Club in 1937, via the always excellent Everlasting Blört, we are graced with the presence of New York socialite Cynthia the Mannequin, created by sculptor and window-dressing professional Lester Gaba (*1907 - †1987).
Cynthia retained many of the realistic imperfection found in the individual that she was modelled off of as did all of the many Gaba Girls displays to follow. Although fully aware of the ludicrous nature of his performance art and the attention it was receiving, Gaba’s contribution were pioneering and had influence on other artist including Andy Warhol and Roy Liechtenstein and killing off Cynthia with his conscription into the war effort, Gaba was willing to once again humour fans in 1953 television interview before retiring her for good while continuing work in fashion and marketing.

the ghost of pinterest future

Akin to séance through automatic writing or speaking in tongues albeit much more refined and practised, we appreciated the primer in “mediumistic art” through one of the more prepossessing partakers, Maude Ethel (née Eades) Gill of East Ham, known as Madge to her friends (*1882 – †1961) whom after recovery from an illness in 1920 was suddenly taken with drawing—prolific and guided by a spirit she called “Myrninerest”—that is, my inner rest, having never demonstrated a talent beforehand.
Despite her claim of mediumship, later scholars of her body of work detect a biographical narrative across her portfolio and count Gill among the self-taught outsider artists (see previously here, here and here) regardless of what supernatural help she might have been the recipient of. Rarely exhibiting and never selling her work out of fear of angering Myrninerest, no one had any idea of the extent of her nearly four decades of sketching. Learn more about Art Brut and Madge Gill at Messy Nessy Chic at the link up top.

burolandschap

As part of a larger project rehabilitating and restoring its lake district and wetlands in Bokrijk National Park in Limburg, authorities have commissioned landscapers to replace some of the traditional plank bridges with unique, submerged, sunken trails to allow hikers and cyclists to experience the ponds and lakes from a periscope’s perspective. More at designboom at the link up top.

bassins de lumiéres

Mid-April in Bordeaux will see the public opening of the world’s largest digital art centre in the bunkers and U-boot berths constructed in the city’s harbour during World War II. The art space’s first exhibition features the work of Gustav Klimt and Paul Klee with many others to follow.  Get more of a preview with Plain Magazine at the link above.

bennifer

Nag on the Lake introduces us to the sometimes frightening canny realm of synthetic celebrities. Each is the product of a generative adversarial network (see previously) and display their dominant and recessive influences. While these chimeric twins are well-matched, most turn out a bit monstrous with uncompromising hairlines though their pre-combination traits show through. The offspring of Jeff Bezos and Eminem isn’t awful and neither is the Emmanuel-Macron-Sandra-Bullock hybrid. Who are your favourites? Much more to explore at the links above.

the princess and the pea

At the risk of alienating potential sponsors (though we all ought to aspire to playing the long-game in all our endeavours and not be enticed with fly-by-night operations), we found this collection of sources deconstructing the mail-order mattress field—a very over-crowded one, and how that bubble may soon burst from Things Magazine to be a fascinating and cautionary one.
The anecdotal expertise is strong in this business, trying to positions oneself above the fray and margins for profit vanishingly small and made worse with returns, refunds and compelling competition. I wonder what other commodities might be stealthily following the same doomed business model that escape our recognition by dint of persuasive cheerleading. Though there’s much appeal to be found in an inject of convenience, discharging our obligations and buyer and seller by closing a transaction as quickly and seamlessly as possible is not the overarching principle of commerce and exchange.

all the president’s sophists

Though eventual acquittal of Trump by the jury of the Senate was a foregone conclusion with a super-majority needed to remove him from office and not by the narrowest of margins by which the high house abrogated its ethical and constitution charge to conduct a fair, complete and impartial trial yet refused to hear any further witness testimony—meaning that Trump will feel vindicated and act with the imperial abandon after the outcome of the Mueller Report feel short of an indictment, which Trump took as a full exoneration and celebrated by asking the newly-elected Ukrainian president to dig up some dirt on his political opponent’s son if he wants to receive military aid—the anti-democratic over-reach that brought us to impeachment in the first place.
Arguments propped up by the cowardice of incumbents wanting to retain their seats at any cost, Trump’s counsel’s latest specious rebuttal amongst a tranche of prevarication, hypocrisy and double-standards has atrophied into essentially that any president believes his re-election is in the best interest of the American people (whether or not it’s the case is not for the office holder to decide but rather the constituency that he or she represents) and it is therefore permissible for the president to pursue his campaign. Perhaps, as some maintain, calling witnesses would only prolong the process and net no change in the end but I suspect that the Republican members’ intransigent loyalty will backfire as the trial exits the well of the Senate and once again returns (those parallel proceedings never stopped) to the court of public opinion where the legal process falls short and America relies on the precious precarity of voting and enfranchisement.

xtrmntr

Exactly twenty years ago on this day, the Scottish band Primal Scream released their titular album in the United Kingdom, as NPR reports, with lyrics and themes that seemed a bit overblown at the time but in hindsight seem eerily prescient to the inheritors of the dystopia that they raged against.
Though in those millennial salad days it would be hard to appreciate the trend despite similarly concordant portrayals across the arts and entertainment spectrum, their predictions of epidemics, endless wars, economic asymmetry, surveillance states and the preponderance of propaganda were ignored at our peril. Find more musical retrospectives with National Public Radio at the link above.