zones of immaterial pictorial sensibility

Via Super Punch and vis-à-vis the enthrallment and repulsion that the markets are experiencing for tokens—fungible or otherwise—we really enjoyed learning about these performative pieces from Nouveau réalisme artist and judo master Yves Klein (*1928 - †1962) called Zone de Sensibilité Picturale Immatérielle, who wanted his patrons to experience the void, offering vacant spaces in exchange for gold. The buyer received a certificate of ownership. Eight such invisible works were sold, some with elaborate rituals including throwing the gold in the Seine and burning the bill-of-sale.

6x6

moulted: people are crafting miniature monsters out of discarded cicada shells  

fantastica: music from outer space by Hollywood composer Russell Garcia (*1916 - †2011)  

project daedalus: the venerable British Interplanetary Society, founded in 1933—once chaired by Sir Arthur C. Clark (previously) 

 cais das artes: a retrospective look at some of the landmark projects of recently departed architect Paulo Mendes da Rocha (*1928)  

greenwood: a look back at the Tulsa massacre (previously) and race riots as we approach its centenary at the end of the month  

five-octave vocal range: dolphin responds with glee to Mariah Carey’s high note

i have a certain amount of homework to do and i’d like to get it done on time

Via r/Obscure Media, we are directed to the 1958 McGraw Hill educational short The Snob about pushing away friends and working on oneself with a bunch of cavorting middle-aged teens. Sarah’s just too high-hat, but it’s hard to frame these personality types in a contemporary, intergenerational milieu—who’s the model adolescent, and what was perceived as snobbery is internalised as social anxiety. “All the kids who get by on apple-polishing will be there too and I don’t like them!”

one year gone

One year on from the violent murder of George Floyd, we are reacquainted with the award-winning cover for de Volksrant newspaper’s Saturday Supplement from Noma Bar utilising negative space to illustrate people rallying in the streets over this injustice and inhumanity.  Indisputably a harsh and discomforting reality that many are made to cope with on a daily basis but a sobering and eye-opening experience for all.  Thanks to Duck Soup for the timeline of events that occurred in the aftermath of Floyd’s death and their enduring impact.

stack overflow

Released on this this day in cinemas in 1995, the Keanu Reeves and Dolph Lundgren dystopian science-fiction adaptation of the eponymous William Ford Gibson cyberpunk novel, the film takes place in 2021 with global population deeply and irretrievably engaged with an augmented reality internet which has a debilitating long-term effect called “nervous attenuation syndrome” (NAS) and transfer and transmission of data is closely controlled by mega-corporations who enforce their hegemony through the mafia.

Reeves’ character is a mnemonic courier discreetly transports data, avoiding traffic on the worldwide web, with an implant in his brain, and is entrusted with the safekeeping and eventually uploading into the public domain documents that reveal the corporations’ connections with organised crime and the computer virus that will return power and autonomy to the people, teaming up with the Lo-Teks under the leadership of J-Bone, played by Ice-T, a mysterious female projection of an omnipresent digital assistant and a genetically enhanced dolphin with abilities to break any encryption.

your daily demon: leraje

Ruling from this day until the final day of May, the fifth through the ninth degrees of Gemini, this fourteenth spirit and infernal marquis presents as a gallant archer (see also) dressed in green. Instigator of fights, Leraje has the power to cause wounds to turn gangrenous and to disperse mobs and governs a legion of thirty demons. According to the Ars Goetia and other sources, Leraje is countered with angel Mehahel.

triptych

Via friend of the blog Everlasting Blört, we thoroughly enjoyed pouring of the details of Carla Gannis’ 2014 digital art project that replaces the

religious allegory and iconography of Hieronymus Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights (see previously here and here) with a more secular and contemporary vernacular, the collage exploring modern vanities and consumerism. Much more at the links above and the short video on the exhibition below. Check out all three panels compared with the original and let us know your favourite emoji substitutions.

on the clock

Through the lens of some of the artefacts of the transitional era when the railways began not only to collapse space but time as well and the attendant need for standardisation and synchronisation 99% Invisible (which one can read or listen to as a podcast) takes us on a tour of some of the remnants and malingerers of that period when the world suddenly grew a lot smaller and more interconnected. Especially notable is the introductory clock of the Corn Exchange in Bristol that made an early concession to locomotion by adding a second minute hand to its face to mark London time, with local time, lagging (see also here and here) by around ten minutes according to the reckoning of high noon. Much more to explore at the links above.