Thumbs and Ammo posits the idea: would it be funny to replace guns with thumbs up in stills from movies?
YES!
100 Best First Lines from Novels from American Book Review
There is a great list over on American Book Review of first lines of novels in English.
Here's the top ten (and a few other favorites)...
1. Call me Ishmael. —Herman Melville, Moby-Dick (1851)
2. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. —Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (1813)
3. A screaming comes across the sky. —Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow (1973)
4. Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice. —Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967; trans. Gregory Rabassa)
5. Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. —Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita (1955)
6. Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. —Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina (1877; trans. Constance Garnett)
7. riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs. —James Joyce, Finnegans Wake (1939)
8. It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. —George Orwell, 1984 (1949)
9. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. —Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities (1859)
10. I am an invisible man. —Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (1952)
31. I am a sick man . . . I am a spiteful man. —Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Notes from Underground (1864; trans. Michael R. Katz)
65. You better not never tell nobody but God. —Alice Walker, The Color Purple (1982)
68. Most really pretty girls have pretty ugly feet, and so does Mindy Metalman, Lenore notices, all of a sudden. —David Foster Wallace, The Broom of the System (1987)
Poesia Para La Gente - Poetry on the LA Metro Red Line
Poesia Para La Gente (Poetry for the People) is a program that brings poetry to the people of the community, in non-traditional places. Some of these places have been affected, in one way or another, by economical hardship or various forms of social stigmas. All locations are unique in providing a safe setting for uninhibited artistic expression.
Poesia Para La Gente is a program of the Avenue 50 Studio's monthly La Palabra Poetry. The program has been made possible by a grant from The James Irvine Foundation.
______________________________________________
WHY THE LA METRO?
Our goal is to share poetry with the community, outside of our choir and into the streets in order to encourage, nurture, and stimulate artistic expression every which way we can, and every where we can. By providing a welcoming, and non-traditional public platform for sharing the power of the spoken word, we hope to stimulate cultural understanding within the diverse population of the North East Los Angeles area...and beyond.
______________________________________________
featuring:
Billy Burgos
Yago Cura
Sean Hill
Karineh Mahdessian (email)
Ryan Nance (me, here)
Conney Williams
Hosted by Jessica Ceballos
Growing Illustrations in Rice Paddys
‘Tanbo art’ (田んぼアート), rice of various types and colors are planted to create enormous pictures in rice fields, with no need to use dye.
Inner Mechanisms of Fine Watches
Fine watches, Patek Philippe, Audemars Piguet, Chopard, etc., are photographed in studio by Guido Mocafico.
Cidade Cinza (Grey City) Trailer
Shot over 6 years Grey City is about the back and forth between Sao Paulo’s street art community and the city government.
There are English captions, so make sure those are turned on if you don't understand Portuguese.
Best Of Web 5 - Supercut of Super Videos
Official list of Best Of Web 5
http://bit.ly/132vsTb
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Anxiety-Ridden Images from John William Keedy
John William Keedy‘s artist statement:
“It’s Hardly Noticeable explores the world of a character who navigates living with an unspecified anxiety-based mental illness. He negotiates situations constructed to highlight the impacts and implications of his differences on his thoughts and behaviors, and by doing so raises question of normalcy. Through constructed tableaus and metaphorical still lifes, the series reveals the relationship between reality and perception, and highlights issues of pathology while questioning stereotypes of normalcy.
In 2009 economist Bill Gross used the term New Normal to define the American economic landscape of the very recent past. In ensuing years, the term resonated with culture at large and became an umbrella term for changes in cultural and societal practices, identifying a shift in held notions of what is commonly viewed as acceptable.
These images question the legitimacy of applying the term normal in a societal context by prompting a reconsideration of what, if anything, is normal, or at least what is perceived and labeled as such. Is it possible for a society to have a commonly held idea of what is normal, when few individuals in that society actually meet the criteria for normalcy?”
Flowers X-Ray Photos - Two Ways
These two project ( left: British photographer Nick Veasey; right: Singapore-based Brendan Fitzpatrick) each have a stunning beauty. I love them each.
The Insides of Ammo
The photos were shot inside a WWII bunker in Switzerland and consists of 900 specimen in total by Sabine Pearlman:
“The cross-sections reveal a hidden complexity and beauty of form, which stands in vast contrast to the destructive purpose of the object. It’s a representation of the evil and the beautiful, a reflection of the human condition.”
Also, have a poetry reading this saturday in Venice, CA: Poems Not Bullets
June 30 - Poesia Para La Gente on the LA Metro
Avenue 50 Studio proudly presents...
This time…poetry is riding on the metro!
A one-time event on a Sunday afternoon,
to stimulate and encourage artistic expression
throughout the Los Angeles area…
via the
red
blue
gold
expo
purple
and
red
metro lines
________________________________________
SUNDAY, June 30 | 12PM | $5 for all day metro pass
Meeting at the RED LINE platform LA Union Station
featuring:
Billy Burgos
Yago Cura
Sean Hill
Karineh Mahdessian (email)
Ryan Nance (me, here)
Conney Williams
Hosted by Jessica Ceballos
w/ open mic
& musical accompaniment
JOIN US...READ YOUR WORK...it'll be video recorded, photographed, etc.
FOLLOW US LIVE - or hop on the nearest train by finding out where we'll be - by using the hashtag -> #PPLG
We'll be live tweeting/facebooking beginning at 11:30 AM #PPLG
This isn't the first Poesia Para La Gente reading i've read at. A couple of months ago I got to read with a great set at the first Poesia Para La Gente and Guerro's Market in Highland Park.
I am excited about the group I am getting to read with this time. I've collected videos of of them reading below.
The Egg: A temporary, energy efficient, self-sustaining work space for artist Stephen Turner
On the River Beaulieu estuary, The Egg is designed as a place to stay as well as a temporary, energy efficient, self-sustaining work space for artist Stephen Turner. The Egg will be ‘tethered’ like a boat and will rise and fall with the tide.
The Locus Of Poetry
Where does the poetry happen
So, it’s telling that in this prose that I am writing, my first tendency is to reach for a definition of poetry, for my own, for someone else’s (Hass’ lovely ‘a poem is the score written for the symphony of the singular human voice’ is a favorite) or a historical pedigree (something half-remembered about poem and cheetah having the same Indo-European root, something to do with creature or creation). I started thumbing through my old and loved American Heritage Dictionary’s appendix… but then put it aside for later.
The impulse of prose is to haul the goldfish that lives deep in the well up to the surface with whatever bucket-type implement there is at hand. Poetry (creation of the non-prosaic sort) has an impulse to jump into the well.
So often I get asked about a poem’s meaning, and this is certainly indicative of how poetry is taught, viewed, shared and feared. It is a meaning-making game in the eyes of man, a demi-god’s pantomime.
read the whole piece over on Medium »
Beautiful Tunisian Door Designs
Doors are a big deal in Tunisia. With metal tacks and bright colors, what could be ordinary are gorgeous, fascinating and inspirational.
Southwind: Vibrant Video View of Southeast Asia
Old LA Zoo on Tom Explores LA
The Old Zoo at Griffith Park is a favorite spot of mine in Los Angeles. This episode of the great little web series Tom Explores Los Angeles cover it well.
In the summer the great Independent Shakespeare Company puts on its productions at this very spot.
REBOUND DISSECTIONS AND EXCAVATIONS IN BOOK ART
Doug Beube, Long-Bin Chen, Brian Dettmer, Guy Laramée, and Francesca Pastine transform various types of literature and/or printed books through sculptural intervention.
Photographer's POV Capturing the Brazilian Protests
Rio de Janiero-based photographer Michel de Souza was on the scene shooting photos the people protesting the lack of public services. He also captured this point-of-view footage using two GoPro cameras mounted to his DSLRs.
Riot police were sent to fire tear gas and rubber bullets in order to break up the gathering.
De Souza: “I confess that, towards the end, it moved me to tears."
SYLVIA PLATH, 30
Born: October 27, 1932
(Boston, Massachusetts)
Died: February 11, 1963
(London, England)
Born: October 27, 1932
(Boston, Massachusetts)
Died: February 11, 1963
(London, England)
Cause of death: carbon-monoxide poisoning
Last Words: Suicides of Women Authors
The stories of the untimely deaths, the suicides of famous women authors are fascinating and heartbreaking. Here, Vice brings us this macabre series in a photo set.
VIRGINIA WOOLF, 59
Born: January 25, 1882
(London, England)
Died: March 28, 1941
(Lewes, England)
Cause Of Death: drowning
Stylist: Annette Lamothe-Ramos
Set Design: Grace Kelsey
Models in order of appearance: Grace Kelsey, Amelia Fleetwood, Erica Cho, Virginia Talbot, Kumara Sawyer, Thao Dang, Paige Morgan
Special thanks to the Kelsey Family
IRIS CHANG, 36
Born: March 28, 1968
(Princeton, New Jersey)
Died: November 9, 2004
(Los Gatos, California)
Cause of death: gunshot to the head
The Row shirt, jacket, and pants, vintage necklace
DOROTHY PARKER, 73
Born: August 22, 1893
(Long Branch, New Jersey)
Died: June 7, 1967
(New York, New York)
Cause of death: natural causes, despite several unsuccessful suicide attempts, the first in January 1923, at age 23, by slitting her wrists
Ruffian jacket, vintage Christian Dior skirt, vintage rings
CHARLOTTE PERKINS, 75
Born: July 3, 1860
(Hartford, Connecticut)
Died: August 17, 1935
(Pasadena, California)
Cause of death: suicide by chloroform
SANMAO, 47
Born: March 26, 1943
(Chongqing, China)
Died: January 4, 1991
(Taipei, Taiwan)
Cause of death: hanged herself with a pair of tights
ELISE COWEN, 28
Born: July 31, 1933
(New York, New York)
Died: February 1, 1962
(New York, New York)
Cause of death: self-defenestration
One Year-Old Photoshopped into Amazing Situations
One-year-old Singlhild demonstrates capacities that are way beyond her years in the creative pictures, photoshopped by her dad, Swedish photographer Emil Nystrom.
