Magpie Monday on Thursday: Art Objects

For Angela Still, who celebrates another year of fabulousness today!

BABA  YAGA.

As you know, I adore Baba Yaga. I can’t tell you why, but I do. And I also adore Forest Rogers’ work, and I especially adore her Baba Yaga. Here’s a recent picture from her blog of Baba Yaga and Vasilisa, with the chicken-legged Hut in the background. This, this is the precious. Click to enlarge.

ASSEMBLAGE SCULPTURES.

Do you think this typewriter-parts bird

Swall-er by Jeremy Meyer | Via Boing Boing

…will eat these clockwork bugs?

GALLERIES WORTH VIEWING.

From Flavorwire:

Kevin LCK

Object by Kevin LCK: “…the pieces nest remarkably normal, uninhabited domestic scenes within the gadgets they might contain: a television showcases a living room, a kitchen table spins in a microwave, and—in a bit of sly humor—a toilet rises out of a smartphone. Instead of a portal to the outside world, then, these technological relics become mirrors of the environments where they’re typically found.”

Jamie Diamond

Fake family portraits by Jamie Diamond, who says of his project, “I am interested in the shifting paradigm of the traditional family structure and in the paradox of the familiar. … The portraits are of actual people being themselves in an entirely new context; they intuitively follow the rules of the genre and the group they form for the camera ascribes them an identity.”

Matthew Rose

The Letters by Matthew Rose: “Paris-based artist Matthew Rose is fascinated by alphabets, letters (of both kinds), and mixed messages, and to that end, the artist has mailed 333 works of collage and writing, created on paper, canvas, and “terribly unusual objects” to the Converge Gallery in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, where they will be displayed—along with any love letters you might send to him.”

50 great works of video art, including pieces by Gillian Wearing, Wolf Vostell, Peter Campus, Andy Warhol, Pipilotti Rist, Nam Jun Paik, Joseph Beuys, Chantal Akerman, Chris Burden, Vito Acconci, Christian Marclay, John Baldessari, Joan Jonas, Cory Arcangel, Matthew Barney, Bill Viola, Marina Abramovic and Ulay, Bruce Nauman, Dan Graham, Omer Fast, Martha Rosler, William Wegman, Gary Hill, Colin Campbell, Miranda July, David Hall, Peter Weibel, Coco Fusco and Paula Heredia, Lisa Steele, Eija-Liisa Ahtila, Richard Serra, Angela Deufresne, and General Idea.

Paco Pomet

Surrealist paintings inspired by vintage photography by Paco Pomet: “Combining classic imagery from early photographic works with the otherworldly sensibilities of the early-20th-century Surrealist movement, Pomet’s work plays with the viewer’s brain as much as it does the eye. It’s a blend of historical context and visual trickery, with hilarious results.”

Fiction exhibition at Modern Eden Gallery: “If you’re an avid reader, you know that the best literary characters seldom stay on the page, but rather climb out and wander around, manifesting themselves in whatever medium they can insinuate themselves into. To that end, San Francisco’s Modern Eden Gallery has put together a bookish group exhibition called Fiction, featuring portraits of famous literary characters from Ahab to Lisbeth, which is on view through July 13.”

Night Flow by Soey Milk for the Fiction exhibit

Jon Uriarte

The Men Under the Influence series by Jon Uriarte “takes full-length portraits of young men wearing clothes owned by their girlfriends or wives. Uriarte’s collection ‘adresses the recent change in roles in heterosexual relationships from the relationships of our predecessors and how those changes have affected men in particular.'”

From Bleeding Cool: The Memory Palace at the V&A: “Scott McCloud defines comics as sequential. juxtaposed, visual art. This is usually interpreted as comic strips, comics pages, ways of telling stories in that flat fashion. // The Memory Palace, the new exhibition at the V&A, takes that interpretation and stamps on it from a height.”

From Tor.com: the Illustration Master Class at Amherst College produces new art for A Game of Thrones, The Graveyard Book, The Unwrapped Sky, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a viking battle, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and The Nostalgist, and a couple others.

John William Keedy

From My Modern Met: It’s Hardly Noticeable by John William Keedy, which “explores themes of anxiety and varied neuroses…. Examining his own struggles with anxiety over the past nine years and drawing from other mental disorders, the images present an insightful look at behaviors that are deemed ‘abnormal’ while simultaneously challenging ideas of normalcy. The serious topic is addressed in an intriguing fashion, one that offers small windows into the lives of people who suffer from mental illnesses. Each image is like a pocket of information that reveals a tiny corner of a bigger picture.” Via.

One last gallery from Flavorwire: To the Surface by Meg Cowell, which “captures stunning period dresses as spectral figures floating through darkness. The artist submerges the feminine garments in water and photographs them against black velvet. Each one resembles a ghostly Ophelia rising from the brook amongst the willows. For Cowell, the journey each gown makes to the water’s surface represents a psychological transformation. The photos are also an exploration of her own femininity.”

Meg Cowell

TOM GAULD.

PHOTOGRAPHY.

Look carefully at this photograph by Bela Borsodi for the VLP album Terrain. It’s actually not four separate images but one single image. My mind was blown, people! Check out Boing Boing for a photo of the composition from another angle as well as a “making of” video.

Cover for Terrain by VLP | Photograph by Bela Borsodi

A new image by Ellie Lane I find haunting.

Forever More, More, More, self-portrait by Ellie Lane, 30 June 2013

BENJAMIN LACOMBE.

I love Benjamin Lacombe‘s artwork something terrible, and it’s easy to see why in this trailer for a new limited edition book of his work. If I had not already spent an obscene amount on a UK limited edition of The Ocean at the End of the Lane, I would totally buy this book in. a. heartbeat. Another most preciousssss. But one must think of the cost sometime.

 

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Magpie Monday on Wednesday: Someone’s in the Kitchen….

Tasty tidbits to make hump day humpalicious!

ANGRY WATERMELONS.

Fans of watermelon might enjoy this Angry Birds watermelon carving from the National Watermelon Promotion Board. Are Angry Birds still “in”? And did anyone know we had a National Watermelon Promotion Board? Fascinating, and I’m not even a fan of watermelon (or any of the melons, for that matter).

Instructions for carving your own Angry Birds watermelon are here. Via.

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Magpie Monday on Tuesday: Viewers’ Paradise & Science!

Fun film and TV bits (with special science guests at the end of the post):

TRAILERS!

Anne Fontaine’s Adore looks to be intense and uncomfortable, as well as intensely uncomfortable and uncomfortably intense. The subject matter may put off some viewers, but I’m completely intrigued by the unexpected situation in which Naomi Watts and Robin Wright find themselves (and, after having watched the trailer a couple times, I have to wonder if there’s any plot point left to be revealed). Check out the trailer!

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Magpie Monday

Photo by Fir0002 | Flagstaffotos

Monday morning has broken, like the first morning
Magpie has spoken, like the first bird*

Welcome to another week-long Magpie Monday fest (well, Friday is only Video Friday, but a week full of posts!). Please to enjoy these dainty dishes set before the king! And queen, and princesses and princes, and dukes and earls and duchesses and viscountesses, and so on and so forth.

PARKOUR.

Check out this very cool video of James Kingston practicing parkour from Kingston’s point of view as he travels the rooftops in Cambridge, UK. For my money, as fun as this video is (and it is fun), I’d still rather watch people perform parkour. Kingston is part of the parkour team Ampisound. Via.

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Video Friday

A couple of animated shorts that will (I hope) make you smile a little as you start your Friday.

Chicken or The Egg, a student film by Christine Kim and Elaine Wu, is irrepressibly charming. Everything works so well!

Via.

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