My multi-talented pal Wiley Wiggins has just finished the gorgeous video “Magic Horse” for Austin-based band Horse + Donkey.
Having been a bit overwhelmed lately by blanched, washed out, sepia-tinted, Dover-collagey everything, surreal footage that looks like animated Lomo imagery is delightful change of pace. Plus? Ponies!
In addition to his fashion designs and his epic weight loss, Karl Lagerfeld is also known for his fashion photography. The above is from Vogue Germany October 2007.
The Story: “Wellen”
Photografed by Karl Lagerfeld
Fashion Editor: Christiane Arp
Models: Claudia Schiffer and others
See the rest on foto_decadent.
I always hated the writing of Lovecraft – how many tedious descriptions of shrubbery can you bear? – but paradoxically adore everything that’s inspired by his work, from Cthulhu Sex Magazine to the song “Colours Out of Space” by Evil’s Toy to stories like “Shoggoth’s Old Peculiar” by Gaiman to the Tigerlilies/Alexander Hacke Mountains of Madness project to Hello Cthulhu to, most recently and hilariously, to LOLCTHULHU macros. Like a bad song that reveals itself to be a masterpiece after a good remix, the Cthulhu Mythos lend themselves to brilliant interpretation time and time again.
In its most recent incarnation, Lovecraft’s work is to become a film called CTHULHU. The film deals with gay themes, anti-Bush sentiments, the Apocalypse, an it features – get ready for this – Tori Spelling! As some fans have already commented, sadly and quite surprisingly Spelling does not play Cthulhu. Go watch the trailer right now.
Stalin, or “Good Ol’ Uncle Joe” as he was called in America before the tides turned, liked to have fancy titles bestowed upon him in Russia. Below are some of the most epic:
Source: Wikipedia. These handy for generating a title for yourself on the Brass Goggles Forum. All aboard Airship Stalin!
This is even better than The Klingons vs. The Furries. Someone’s goin’ down! Which side will YOU choose?
Greg Gutfeld, widely hailed as FOX’s answer to Jon Stewart (this is their second stalwart attempt since embarrassing themselves with the Half-Hour News Hour), takes a jab at Suicide Girls and peripheral cultures in a rant entitled “Be a Rebel with a Cause“:
I know who these girls are — they’re annoying, Goth-punk chicks who champion uniqueness through tattoos, piercing and bisexual posturing. I imagine they also self-mutilate, since that’s pretty deep too… They should be pushed into rivers. This non-conformity is purely conformist. All these rebels look and act the same — spouting relativistic nonsense through silver tongue studs. Why do they proclaim their individuality, but look identical? It’s because they’re fake.
Mr. Gutfeld, you have stabbed me and rest of the alternative world right in the heart, deeper than our Bic razors ever went. I’ve never thought of it this way before! Perhaps only the most wise and introspective amongst us have contemplated our collective existence with such cold-eyed realism.
Who in our scene is strong enough to fully grasp Mr. Gutfeld’s insight? I know only of the great sage mercifulXicution of VampireFreaks, who offers some hope for our kind with her ruminations: “I really really hate fake people….so if you are not yourself (Are a fake bisexual person, have fake tats and piercings) please just fucking LEAVE now.” Such similarity in discourse from such different camps. Perhaps, with such intellectual leaders as these, there is hope for friendship between our people.
The rest of the article is amusing and reads like a gentle version of Vice’s DOs and DON’Ts, lamenting the prevalence of “50-year-old women getting dolphin tattoos on their ankles and fat old men wearing board shorts and wallet chains.” The conclusion reminds you that you’re on foxnews.com again:
Real rebels are people who work hard. Love their parents. And fight for their beliefs, preferably in the military. Those folks are far cooler than self-harming skanks.
Oh, Fox News, Suicide Girls, can’t we all just get along? No? I think I have a compromise that will appeal to both parties:
Image ganked from Encyclopedia Dramatica.
“Honor to the Futurists who forbade the painting of female hams, the painting of portraits and guitars in the moonlight. They made a huge step forward: they abandoned meat and glorified the machine.”
- Kasimir Malevich, 1918
Image by Russian industrial musician Alexander Lebedev-Frontov.
In 1921, Russian physicist Lev Theremin, an inventor who insisted on building all his creations by hand, constructed the theremin, one of the 20 th century’s first successful electronic musical instruments and still the only music instrument whose haunting tones are elicited without touching the device. Unlike Theremin, neither famous theremin-users John Cage, Download, Brian Eno, Meat Beat Manifesto or Edgar Varese were ever arrested for its use. After a decade of teaching and performing, Theremin was suddenly seized and imprisoned in 1938 by the KGB on the grounds of “anti-Soviet Propaganda.” Theremin was sent to Siberia and later to a labor camp in Omsk, where, alongside other indentured scientists, he was forced to work on various military projects (Theremin was later given the Stalin Prize for perfecting the eavesdropping device known as “the bug”). Thus begins the history of industrial music in Russia…
Twain, originally uploaded by Coilhouse.
I can’t have been any older than 8 or 9 when my brain was permanently warped by The Adventures of Mark Twain. My folks though they were treating me to fluffy kid’s fare. They were quite wrong. A full length feature directed by claymation innovator Will Vinton, the film follows the existensial journey of Huck Finn, Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher as crew members aboard the funky, Verne-inspired flying machine of a very suicidal Mark Twain.
It’s been well documented that Twain –who was born and died with the arrival of Halley’s Comet– was a deeply depressed, reclusive misanthrope in his later years. In the film, disgusted with the human condition, Twain is determined to hunt down the comet and crash into it. “I will continue on doing my duty, but when I get to the other side, I will use my considerable influence to have the human race drowned again, this time drowned good. No omissions. No ark.”
Worried about their own fate, the kids plot to hijack the ship. With the aid of an inter-dimensional portal aboard, they meet several characters from Twain’s various short stories, including Captain Stormfield, the Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, and The Mysterious Stranger (this last sequence has got to be one of the impressive displays of clay animation around, not to mention the creepiest):
Brrrruh. Bruce Bickford would be proud.
Men! At a loss about where to turn for l33t style tips, discussion and more with like-minded humans? Wipe your tears with your finest Naoto kerchief, for the day your fashions woes end is here!
I was recently introduced to StyleZeigeist.com by a friend whose name i haven’t stopped cursing since for getting me addicted. Though it’s predominantly male-populated, I’ve been cruising the SZ forums, shocked, impressed and curious. The users appear to be a cluster of painfully well-dressed and well-informed persons, mostly male, sharing tips, photos and designer news, with minimal snippiness and hair-pulling [for the most part]. Though much of what’s discussed here may not suit most wallets or reason, you’re sure to get inspired. I highly recommend this site to newbs and seasoned fashionistas alike.
A few member looks below. If you’re one of the gentlemen in these photos and would like to be credited, let me know.
Paris-based 24-year-old photographer Andy Julia is a versatile artist whose commercial work has sincere gothic sensibilities, and whose gothic personal work creates an intimate vintage atmosphere. Andy became known in the alt world through his contributions to Elegy Magazine, and chats with Coilhouse about his first photoshoot, his new book, agency models vs. alt models and other interesting topics below:
Do you remember the first photo shoot you ever did?
Yes I remember perfectly. I was a 17 years old teenager who’d just discovered the sense of love. I began my first roll in shooting my girlfriend innocently. I was unconscious of what photography was, and felt really out of all material conditions…
This first roll had a very hard light, supplied by a simple bedside light. Her skin was wrapped in a piece of black satin, and her legs hidden behind beautiful stockings, she was wearing a black velvet men’s “Haut de forme” from the end of the 19th century…our bed was surrounded by mirrors. We just made only one roll this day, as the teacher asked to us at the Beaux Art school, to learn how to develop and to print photographical pictures. This roll changed my life forever, and I was not conscious of that.
Laika the spacedog., originally uploaded by Coilhouse.
We are approaching the 50 year anniversary of Laika‘s flight!
Her story has always resonated with me. Still deciding how this should be celebrated and suggestions are welcome. Anything reminiscent of a furry party will be disregarded. I’m considering a Laika sanctification ceremony. In the meantime, a transcription from my personal journal follows.
If anyone deserves to have a religion devoted to them, it is you. An army of zealots and their children, whispering your name before bed, thinking of your sacrifice. An innocent, a martyr offered to science in the real world.
To Laika!
To Science!
