It should be pointed out that I never claimed any great love for humanity. Cloistered as I am deep in the warrens of the Catacombs I do not profess to be my brother’s keeper. Here, shuttered in nigh total darkness, chained to the floor in front of a rickety desk and computer, no human contact save for when my editors send down one of their smooth, mahogany-skinned eunuchs to push a bowl of thin, watery gruel through the slot in my door, I have nothing but the internet and my own disdain for the outside world to warm me. I can replay the events leading up to my current imprisonment a hundred times over and I will never fully understand just how I came to be here. All I know is that I am here and you, you dear readers are up there. Up there, free and traipsing in the sun and eating anything but thin, watery gruel and I loathe you.
Oh you vicious creatures and your traipsing! How many nights have I tortured myself with these thoughts? No matter, for today I have my revenge. Today I have been given the power to break minds and make men weep like children, to make women crush their babes to their breasts in lamentation. Today I have been given a clip of a tour of the It’s a Small World ride at Disneyland, circa 1964, narrated by hell’s own ringleader Walt Disney. May the endless, infectious repetition of the Sherman Brothers’s insipid song burrow deep into your minds! May the wooden shoe children of Holland crush your souls and may the wee bagpiper of Scotland haunt your dreams!
Now if you’ll excuse me, I must go. It is coming on midnight and that’s when the…ah, it doesn’t matter. It’s just time to go.
Ah, the iPhone, near ubiquitous accessory of the hipster elite and tech obsessed, it seems to be everywhere. When I first arrived at the Catacombs I expected to see the vile object somewhere in its vast warrens, and prepared myself to deal with people intently glazing the surfaces of tiny screens with their filthy finger oils, not bothering to make eye contact. I was not to be disappointed. In fact, one of the first sights to greet me upon my arrival was that of Miss Ebb. She was in an alcove off the main hall. The entryway had no door, but in its stead a yellowed and moldy sheet was hung. This was pulled to the side and I could see Zo sprawled upon a filthy mattress; a soiled nightgown, which at one time may have been white but had long ago darkened to a grimy beige, clinging to her emaciated frame. Her loyal servant girl, Jing Hua, knelt in stoic silence at her side, tending an enormous, ornately carved opium pipe. The odor coming from that alcove smelled of the drug and sweat and urine, all combining into a faint but unmistakable scent, like death.
Zo was gazing languidly at her phone’s screen and it was several seconds before she noticed me. Slowly raising her head she looked at me through half-closed eyes and from her chapped and crusted lips she said, “I’m in Paris. I told everyone on Twitter that I was, so it must be true,” before her head lolled back and she let loose a loping, dizzy giggle. She stopped suddenly, as if she had forgotten what she had found so funny, and let the phone slip from her fingers. She then rolled on her side and Jing Hua, obviously aware of her mistress’s subtle signals, placed the pipe in her mouth, letting her inhale deeply. I turned as she exhaled a massive plume of thick smoke and continued on down the hall, the sounds of a dry, spastic cough echoing behind me, having gotten the distinct impression that this particular conversation was over.
As I walked I thought that there had to be something to Apple’s gadget, if even a spaced-out dope fiend could navigate its surface competently while in the midst of chasing the dragon. It was interesting to note, then, The New Yorker — that bastion of culture and obtuse cartoons — touting that the cover for this week’s magazine was digitally crafted by artist Jorge Colombo using Brushes, and recorded with Brushes Viewer so that we can all see how absolutely mind blowing and future-fabulous it is.
All sarcasm aside, I actually wish they could have filmed his fingers as he painted it. I can’t help but think that my own, clumsy digits would allow for lines too fat and globular for even The New Yorker’s Impressionist leanings.
In the wake of the California Supreme Court’s decision to uphold Proposition 8, banning gay marriage, I found this 2004 documentary by Rosa von Praunheim about gay men in Germany who belong to ultra right-wing, nationalist organizations interesting, if only for the dichotomy it seems to represent. It may boggle the mind to imagine someone who, as a member of an oppressed group or subculture, would choose to associate with a group who champions a way of thinking that is so diametrically opposed to that individual’s well-being; a way of thinking that went so far as to sanction their extermination. That they themselves don’t appear to see this conflict of interests is strange, but that they would not sympathize with the groups that they speak against may strike one as stranger.
It is, I think, a blind spot for many of the more liberal minded of us. The quest for equality, as noble and necessary as it is, will always have a less savory side; for while we are all indeed the same regardless of skin color, or belief, or sexual orientation, we can also fear the same way, and hate the same way, and discriminate the same way. It seems that for many — many more than should be — equality does not apply to everyone and just because they deserve the same rights and privileges as “everyone else”, doesn’t mean there aren’t those lower on the totem pole who don’t deserve the same; those who can still remain quantified as “other”.
It is, perhaps, a cynical take on human nature but one that bears some truth. Hopefully in time it, like Prop 8, will be nothing but a sad and embarrassing memory.
Considering this is my second post concerned with dolls one may have the impression that I am some sort of aficionado; an enthusiast; a doll fancier. While it is true that I may have a small collection of figurines, I would not take this as a sign that I am deeply embedded in the hobby. And while, yes, it is true that some of the dolls may have been painstakingly handcrafted by myself; requiring hours of meticulous effort under a dingy, sixty watt bulb this does not necessarily mean that I have any deep affection for the craft. And while these dolls may have been modeled after the curves and features of the otherworldly nymphs who are my editors, the clothes fashioned from the surreptitiously stolen threads of their garments, their hair being the same follicles so carefully and secretively trimmed and harvested whenever one of these heavenly creatures appeared at my desk to inform me that no, Ross, no one wants to read about your fantasies of being given a sponge bath by Norwegian nurses of Amazonian stature and maybe you should think about, I don’t know, perhaps writing a paragraph or two about the actual fucking thing you are linking instead of stringing a bunch of arcane adjectives together with commas and semi-colons into a long winded sentence concerning nothing but your own, sick little world — that doesn’t mean that I’m obsessed or odd.
Which brings us, slowly but surely, to the work of Julien Martinez, whose highly detailed figures exude a different sort of oddness. Most of the people and creatures who inhabit his world are hunched, squat, and old, their swollen conjunctiva making even the children appear octogenarian. Indeed, even their skeletons are drooping, the mouths pulled down by massive, boned jowls. It’s striking that only two figures of the entire portfolio are what many would consider traditionally beautiful, Végalia, pictured above, being one of them with her delicate face protected by a fishbowl mask. Most resemble Melchior et Brutus, exuding a forlorn weariness tinged with ennui; beautiful in their own, otherworldly way.
The trunk of the car looked like a mobile police narcotics lab. We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers . . . and also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls . . . Not that we needed all that for the trip, but once you get locked into a serious drug collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can. The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. And I knew we’d get into that rotten stuff pretty soon.
-Hunter S. Thompson from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
The late, great Thompson’s masterpiece, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas has been a favorite of mine ever since my father gave me his battered, paperback copy to read in high school. All these years later its magical lunacy is still just as powerful as when I first found Duke and his attorney in the desert.
No surprise then that I am enamored of Jonathan Baldwin’s Rauol inspired, narcotics themed board game. A worthy display piece for anyone with a yen for H.S.T.’s particular brand of mayhem.
Bottle caps are a particular source of shame for me, being as they are at the center of a particularly awful incident. Upon a hot summer afternoon a few years ago, in search of a salve for my burning thirst, I walked into my local drugstore and approached the soda counter. The jerk was busy with a young woman and her daughter who, being all of what seemed to be six or seven, was having an issue deciding exactly what to order. Not wishing to wait for my refreshment, I walked over to the cooler and extracted a frosty bottle of pop. Upon returning to the counter I looked over at the woman who, now aware of my presence looked over and, smiling politely, apologized for her offspring’s indecision. Telling her not to worry, I took my newly procured bottle of pop, pressed the neck of the bottle against the edge of the counter and preceded to execute the Donovan’s Reef maneuver.
Why I chose to attempt such a feat is a bit of mystery to me, even now. It may have had something to do with the fact that the woman was fairly attractive and I did it in an attempt to impress her or maybe it was just that the gleam of the counter’s edge caught my eye, calling to me and I was unable to resist its siren call. It may have been both but regardless, as my hand came down to strike that bottle cap it dawned on me that I had never actually done this before and as my hand struck the bottle’s neck I thought that perhaps this was a bad idea and I should have at least practiced this, preferably in the privacy of my own home, before using it in public to impress attractive mothers, and as the bottle shattered and glass broke the surface of my skin I thought that these were all excellent thoughts.
I’m unsure what to make of Colin, the newish, ultra low-budget zombie film from Nowhere Fast Productions. When I say ultra low-budget I mean ultra. The entire cost of filming Colin was roughly $71.00, the most extravagant expenses, according to director Marc Price, were “a crowbar, some mini DV tapes and some tea and coffee – but only Tesco Value tea and coffee, not any expensive stuff.” He was able to convince actors and make-up artists to contribute their services in order to help flesh out their portfolios. Whether this was done using blackmail or blowjobs was not specified.
This same movie is set to explode at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival, according to the Daily Mail, but I’ll be damned if I can figure out why from the, albeit brief, teaser trailer. The concept itself is interesting, a movie shown from the perspective of a person turned into a zombie, but to my eyes the sub-hundred-dollar budget shines through in a particularly ugly way. Part of me wonders if this is merely a case of critics enamored with process — the story of an unknown filmmaker with some chutzpa making a movie with limited resources — over product. Still, I’m eager to actually see the thing; far be it from me to ignore a zombie flick.
Like cherubs stuffed to their breaking point, Cheng Fei’s figures revel in vice. Their corpulent bodies, drenched in lust and gluttony, roil and roll on the canvas. Faceless, save for collagen plumped pornstar lips, their appendages have ballooned and bloated so that they are nigh unrecognizable. Incapable of seeing, hearing, or smelling they can only imbibe and consume, feeding their own, selfish desires. Some, their skins forced beyond the confines of their elasticity, split asunder, revealing a beautiful and ghastly store of jeweled offal; strings of pearly entrails; the digested result of their hedonism which, even in death, they claw at.
Cute and macabre they manage, mostly, to draw the viewer in while simultaneously repulsing them. They are undeniably repugnant, embodying as they do the most base facets of our society, culture, species, what have you; but they do it with a greeting card sensibility which is, perhaps, what makes them so effective. It’s an interesting dichotomy, regardless of the message.
Lena & Katsya Popova, beautiful sisters, are new wave in Russian doll scene. Their early creations were proportional figures as shown this album, but their recent series as ‘Fashion MOON’ and ‘SKIN’ are quite unique and aggressive in deformed body.
My ignorance of a “Russian doll scene” should come as no surprise. That is, while I am aware of Russian dolls in the form of matryoshkas, I was unaware that there was a scene. Of course, this may have more to do with the connotations that I attach to the word “scene”, meaning that “Russian doll scene” makes me think of imposing, babushka-wearing Barbies looking disinterested at a trendy dance party. This would be wrong.
Looking beyond my own linguistic hang-ups we have the sisters’s actual work, and I can’t help but be drawn to it. The more traditional lamps are beautiful, their voluminous dresses lit up from within, belying their spindly frames topped by ivory faces. However, SKIN is a completely different animal all together. These are stunning, foregoing the traditional doll trimmings in favor of displaying fully that alien body-type, elongated just beyond the point of believability, clad in Westernized tribal chic.
It’s some impressive work, retaining the cuteness of a child’s toy while simultaneously functioning as modern sculpture. Plus, I can easily imagine them looking bored while listening to, say, Lady Gaga.
Look, ye, upon the 80s wonder that was the Music Vest. Take in its gorgeous exterior, available in metallic silver or jet black. Let your eyes trace the fine, angular, Flash Gordan-esque lines. The next step in personal audio entertainment; marvel at its water proof speaker technology which facilitates musical enjoyment in any situation whether it be jogging, fishing, or simply break-dancing in your parents’s driveway in Secaucus.
Obviously the result of many hundreds of dollars of research and development and worn by one entire family, the Music Vest represents the ultimate in auditory rape. There was a time that the only way to forcibly expose the unwilling public to your own, personal soundtrack was to carry a heavy boombox. This led to shoulder strain; also, it made you look like a tool. Not so with the Music Vest. The Music Vest is light, slimming, and stylish and leaves both your hands free to receive high fives. Imagine looks you’ll get when you emerge from your DeLorean, swathed in space-age material, blasting the latest Duran Duran album. So do yourself a favor, pick up that phone and order yours today.*
* Requires use of time machine. Perhaps the aforementioned DeLorean. Time machine not included.
