Brené Brown is a big-hearted, über-thoughtful Texan research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work. She has spent a decade of her life studying the effects of “vulnerability, courage, authenticity, and shame” on the day-to-day human experience. Both of her TED talks have gone megaviral, for understandable reasons. She bravely asks her audience to parse and confront the following quandaries:
How do we learn to embrace our vulnerabilities and imperfections so that we can engage in our lives from a place of authenticity and worthiness? How do we cultivate the courage, compassion, and connection that we need to recognize that we are enough – that we are worthy of love, belonging, and joy?
Here’s Brown’s first TED talk, from 2011, called “The Power of Vulnerability”:
Talk number two, from 2012, is called “Listening to Shame”:
Brown puts her finger on some extremely tender universal trigger points, and presses with gentle frankness. If you haven’t watched them yet, both of these talks are highly recommended viewing on a quiet Sunday afternoon.
I’m not going to claim to understand the process by which French duo Lucie & Simon captured these images of cities like Paris, Bejing, and New York without people (save for a single figure). It involves using a “neutral density filter that allows for extra-long exposures, which removes moving objects like people and cars.” How that works or what a “neutral density filter” is, I really cannot say, however, the images produced speak for themselves (and are of much higher resolution on their site.)
I lived in New York for a short time, years ago, and the effect of seeing it this empty is really stunning. The only time it ever came close to this when I was there was early in the morning, on my walk to work at 5:30 or so, and even then, it depended on the neighborhood I was walking through at the time and there were always a few cars. It’s eerie to see it looking so quiet.
A small sampling of work by Mexican illustrator and street artist Smithe. A small sampling because, were I not to limit myself I would, most likely, just wind up hoarding every piece of art on his blog and transposing it to this one, which is poor form, really, no matter how much you like someone’s portfolio.
The cartoonishness of his style works well with the subject matter, making sure that the exploded anatomy found in many of his pieces retain an air of playfulness so as not to overwhelm the viewer with grotesquerie. His newer illustrations (specifically the bio-mechanical heads) feature more of a comic book feel, with their dark shadows and copious hatching. This seems like a departure (though, no less successfully executed) from his previous work which features a looser, more animated style. Either way, I am a fan.
In addition to providing an overview of both the documentary and vogue ball culture (both past and present) the NPR feature includes testimonies from Big Freedia, Light Asylum, Zebra Katz, Del Marquis, and many others. A quick, great read. It’s also exciting to discover that the documentary –which has been, for decades, fairly difficult to track down a decent copy of– is now readily available on iTunes and Netflix Streaming.
The realm of Paris Is Burning: resonant and radiant as it ever was.
If you’ve already experienced Will Sweeney and Steve Scott‘s animated psychedelic 2009 music video for Birdy Nam Nam‘s tune “The Parachute Ending”, look away. Or, hey, don’t. Because you know it’s trippin’ AMAZEBALLS and you probably won’t mind watching it again over a nice morning bowl of strawberries ‘n’ Special K.
Most Birdy Nam Nam-related things tend to be –in this blogger’s humble opinion– pretty thoroughly amazeballs. The BNN DJ crew is comprised of four fabulous Frenchmen known as Crazy-B, DJ Need, DJ Pone, and Little Mike. They joined forces in 2006 and has been steadily gaining notoriety ever since thanks largely to their novel and challenging style of music-making: they take thousands of samples gleaned from various sources, press all of the beats and patterns into towering stacks of vinyl, and then assemble/spin these kaleidoscopic collaged elements live. It’s bleepybloopy bonkersbrilliance.
Welcome to the best worst thing you will see all week. Icelandic comedy troupe Midland, in a fit of horrible genius, has done what, no doubt, only a few severely stoned first year film students have thought of. That is, they have created the above trailer for a movie entitled Den Lille Grimme Aelling (The Ugly Duckling), a movie that interprets the world of Walt Disney’s barely comprehensible Donald Duck through the harsh, unforgiving lens of the Dogme 95 school of film making. What follows is nearly three minutes of childhood memories funneled through the unyielding, sadomasochistic vision of von Trier and Vinterberg (though, like von Trier and Vinterberg Midland winds up cheating a bit here and there.) So come along and follow Donald as he deals with his three children, a sizable drug debt, and the rich uncle who abused him as a child. Then maybe weep a little.
The ghostly garment resembles magically symmetrical wisps of smoke curling around the model. Below, zip ties are used to create a striking crown of thorns.
These images are from a series called “LastBreathe” by fashion designer Robert Wun. A recent graduate of the University of the Arts in London, Wun creates textured, airy garments such as the ones pictured here. This series was photographed by Bobby Sham, and the model is Lauren H.
In addition to creating several of the most nerve-wracking and suspenseful movies ever made, filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock was an infamously vicious prankster and tormentor of ingenues.
Nevertheless, this has got to be one of the most succinctly and serenely affirming definitions of happiness ever uttered by an artist:
Last night at the DNA Lounge in San Francisco, the wonderful Hubba Hubba Revue unveiled (hurr!) Jim Sweeney, Lara Miranda and friends’ How to Dance Goth– the first volume in HH’s Educational Film Dance Instruction series:
Many of you are, no doubt, already familiar with these darque dance styles… or various iterations/amalgams thereof. (For instance, those “Cobweb”/”Cappuccino” moves are quite similar to an ancient SoCal spookypants maneuver known as “Pick a Penny Up, Put it Over There”. And “Step Over Your Dead Friend” is a kissin’ cousin to the time-honored “I Have Shit Myself and I’m In Distress” dance often seen in Atlanta, GA goth clubs shortly after a new shipment of ketamine has arrived in town.)
Well done, Hubba Hubba batlings! We await your cyber-industrial tutorial with bated breath.
It’s been a while since we mentioned Zoë Keating on the blog! Here’s a lovely six-minute feature about our very favorite avant cellist in the whole world, produced by Intel Visual Life:
Zoë’s been up to all kinds of cool stuff: traveling around the world along with her cellobaby and cellobabydaddy, making cellotastic “In-C” remixes, analyzing the Spotify hubbub from her unique vantage point as a highly successful unsigned musician… and her current live performance collaboration with the ODC dance ensemble, Breathing Underwater, is getting all kinds of rave-ups in the press! (NoCal folks can catch one of the final Yerba Buena shows in San Francisco tonight, the 23th, or the 25th.)
Then there’s this deeply moving video that high school student Gabriella Runnells recently made addressing the plight of girls in the developing world, using Zoë’s song “Optimist” as the score (which you can read more about on Zoë’s Tumblr):
Zoë’s also got a short tour in the works. US west coast beasties, this may be your last chance to see her live before 2013, after her new album (in the works now) comes out:
