Wayne Martin Belger builds pinhole cameras – this much can be said with certainty. The rest becomes as rain-blurred and effervescent as the images his unique apparatuses produce. Pinhole cameras are still popular among hobbyists and are occasionally hailed as the purest photographic tool. With no lenses between the tool and the subject, the scene, the light and the depth of field are captured in smoky stills – as if snapped by the mind’s eye. Experiencing these images for the first time is more like viewing impressions, memories.
As you can see above, WMB’s cameras are beyond mere tools, more than means to an end. While many artists long for the process more than the product, Belger has redefined process-love completely. His projects sometimes plant their seeds through the items he collects, other times through ideas, upon the birth of which collecting begins. The camera he used to photograph AIDS victims is built with a vial of AIDS-infected blood, the one with which he captured the secret life of deer is crowned with antlers, expectant mothers were shot with a camera within which an infant’s heart sits still. He’s used bees, human skulls, religious relics, and more. Each device built by Belger contains its sacred object, each otherworldly photo series is just part of a ritual and carries with it the spirit of the camera, the concept, the execution itself.
Belger and his exquisite cameras can be seen next at Device Gallery on September 13, at a special reception from 6 to 9 pm.
The prices for Courteille’s diamond-encrusted bijoux range in the average of $10,000. Why use real diamonds? Gross! Nevertheless, there are a couple of baubles on Courteille’s site that I covet, and I include them here for your viewing pleasure.
As promised, a look at one of the Fantastic Contraption artists, Stephane Halleux. Stephane is a Belgian artist specializing in mixed media sculpture. There’s an outstanding amount of labor that goes into each of his almost cognizant creatures, from the beginning stages of acquiring found objects to sketch concepts to actual construction. Here’s more about what Stephane does, in his own words:
I like crazy mixtures, unlikely associations, advanced technology mixed with mechanisms of long ago. I’ve always been fascinated by robotics, its advantages and contradictions. The importance of robotisation and its increasing influence on mankind. Who never dreamt of owning a robot able to do the dirty work. But where are the bounds? How far is a robot useful to men and when does it begin endangering their life ? That’s what I want to make: caricatures of robots that have gone beyond the limits, all that with a fanciful vision of the future. The future we imagined some years ago: big computers full of cables with warning lights everywhere. That’s what I like: an old fashioned universe’s future.
A few more of my favorite images, beyond the jump.
Brace yourselves, for today I am the bearer of grand news! Seriously, if you like art, exhibits and mechanical parts you may want to have a seat and grab the smelling salts.
On July 19th Device Gallery in La Jolla opens what very well could be The Ultimate Steam-Cyber-Cog-And Otherwise-Punk Art Show. Once you’ve collected yourselves after taking a bewildered gander at the list of names I have provided below you will know I speak the truth. And if you somehow do not, have no fear. Over the next two weeks Coilhouse will be giving you detailed looks at the work of these skilled creators. Rejoice!
Shining Time Station: Mr. Conductor & his sister in One of the Family
“Most everyone refers to George Carlin as a comedian, which I believe to be slightly misleading. The man was a teacher, with a great gift to pass his ideas and observations through the use of comedy” – vlpod’s YouTube comment on It’s Bad for Ya! – 2008 (Part 7 of 7)
Everyone took a moment today to remember George Carlin. Some people scoured YouTube for Carlin from every era: the scrubbed, black-and-white ’60s Carlin in a suit as Al Sleet, the Hippie-Dippie Weatherman, the shaggy-haired, FCC-infuriating Carlin performing the immortal 7 Words You Can’t Say on Television of the 70’s, the talkin’-like-he’s-from-the-‘hood Place for My Stuff Carlin of the ’80s, cab driver “George O’Grady” Carlin of the ’90s, and finally, the vitriolic, white-haired, Old Fuck (“not an Old Fart, but an Old Fuck, mind you!”) Carlin of the new millenium. This was my favorite Carlin. Now he’s gone, and the nation is just this much stupider; there’s this much less of a chance for people to question what’s around them. That’s how I felt all day.
Out of all the balding, acerbic little digital ghosts that paced around my screen today, there was one iteration of George Carlin in particular that put me weirdly at peace after a day of unrest. Mr. Conductor from Shining Time Station:
Until today, I never even knew that this version of George Carlin ever existed. And that’s the thing; we always find ourselves researching people after they’re gone; hitting up their Wikipedia page, finding old interviews, watching clips. So he’s an idea: every week, pick one person who inspires you and research the shit out of them. Don’t wait ’til they die to learn what they’ve been up to, what you’ve been missing out on – be there and support them while they’re still out there. You have the entire internet at your fingertips – Carlin would probably tell you to enjoy that while it lasts.
What happens when you bring together the leading actress from Audition, the FX artist behind The Machine Girl as a first-time director, the screenwriter of Uzumaki and the action star of Versus as fight choreographer? You have a cinematic supergroup that makes the geysers of blood you’ve come to expect from violent Asian films look like minuscule popping zits. Behold, the 5-minute trailer for the upcoming J-splatter film Tokyo Gore Police:
The trailer starts off kinda slow, but gets better and better as it goes along. Gore and body horror await: exploding heads, sliced-off faces, penises instead of noses, borg-like facial implants and a mermaid-from-hell with a chomping crocodile head instead of legs. There are also some hyper-detailed fetish costumes by the latex designer duo Kariwanz.
One of the mutants looks like she escaped from Kurôzu-cho
The plot: future Tokyo is plagued by bio-mechanical a virus. People who contract the virus turn into “Engineers,” named so for their ability to assemble weapons out of their infected flesh wounds. A special privatized police force (the gore police, also known as “Engineer Hunters”) exists to wipe out these beings, but if they’re wounded by one of the engineers, they quickly join their ranks, horrific implements of death quickly spawning from their own flesh. The protagonist is Ruka, one of the strongest members of the police force. Ruka appears to be the archetypal cute Japanese girl with a sword, but one thing I found interesting about her character is that according to one review, she’s a cutter. There are not many films that I’m aware of in which a main character suffers from self-mutilation, other than the French film Dans ma Pau, or In My Skin (definitely not a ‘feel-good movie’… and since we already got the ball rolling on the horrors of the flesh, here you go)
The main storyline of the film is peppered with faux commercials, reminding me of the faketrailersinGrindhouse. As reviewer Mike Skurko describes it:
We flash back and forth to some extremely demented and hilarious public service announcements as T.V. commercials throughout the film. My personal favorite being three cute school girls singing “Let’s go stylish with wrist cutting!” Just enough “Engrish” charm and realism to make this scene as cute as Hello Kitty while they morbidly introduce a new design that is “rounded for a cleaner cutting edge that school girls love!” Oh, this can’t be beat. More great T.V. ads: “Remote Control Exterminate!!” is a demented Wii that lets the viewer slice and dice a tormented player. Complete with all the spraying blood we’ve come to expect from just about everything with the Tokyo Shock label.
If you’re in New York or San Francisco this weekend, you are among the lucky few who can catch this film’s on-screen North American debut. It will premiere this Saturday at the New York Asian Film Festival. In San Francisco, you’ll be able to see it this Sunday at the Brava Theater as part of the Another Hole In The Head film festival, which looks like a lot of fun. A little bit later on, this film will also be premiering in Montreal.
Cyd Charisse might be most remembered for her emerald gangster mole number in Singing In The Rain but it’s her serpentine performance with Fred Astaire in The Girl Hunt Ballet, a sequence from The Band Wagon, that has me floored this morning. Here they are, cutting the rug at Dem Bones Café like there’s no tomorrow.
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Coilfact: Michael Jackson’s “Smooth Criminal” video is based on this number.
By the time she was fourteen, Cyd (born in Texas Tula Ellice Finklea) was honing her moves under the pseudonym “Felia Sidorova” with the Ballet Russe. I don’t exactly envision Nizhinskaya secretly teaching her to loosen her hips and knees, but Cyd’s signature style certainly displays the precision of strict ballet training behind the fluid writhing and risqué kicks so loved by her fans. There is a power to this performer’s presence that transcends sexuality and grace, as if hinting at a playful sorceress, ever-threatening to reveal herself before a charmed audience.
Coilfact: Charisse made the 2001 Guiness Book of World Records as “Most Valuable Legs” after receiving a $5,000,000 insurance policy on her legs. And how!
I recall enjoying the ADD-inducing tunes of Australian vinyl sampler kings the Avalanches when their first record Since I Left You was released several years ago, but I’d never seen this stupefying video for “Frontier Psychiatrist” before tonight. I’m now having what can only be described as an “it’s comforting to know that no matter what you do in life, it will never be as awesome as this video” moment:
Whatever happened to the Avalanches’ follow-up album? Anyone know? According to their Wiki entry, the last word from the band came in early ’07: “one day when you least expect it you’ll wake up and the sample fairy will have left it under your pillow.”
Question: How do you say “oh, fuckballs, I think I took the brown acid” in Telugu?
Answer: “Idhi Oka Idi Le!”
Just kidding. “Idhi Oka Idi Le” is merely the title of an exuberant duet between classic Tollywood stars Radha and Chiranjeevi (star of that notorious “Indian Thriller” video). Actually, I have no idea what “Idhi Oka Idi Le” means. What I do know is that I’d rather eat a live centipede than watch the “Idhi Oka Idi Le” video while tripping.
Embedding’s been disabled on this, so make with the clickies (provided you’re not on any hallucinogenics right now).
Move over, Sea Cucumber; your title as “most obscene specimen of marine life” has just been usurped. Enter The Pigbutt Worm! In addition to its official name, this newly-discovered species is also sometimes called The Flying Buttocks. Its Latin name, Chaetopterus pugaporcinus, translates to “resembling a pig’s rump.” These marble-sized creatures float below oxygen minimum zone and appear to catch food inside a small cloud of mucus that surrounds their mouth. Yum!
So Coilhouse is supposed to be on this crazy deadline moratorium but when I saw this picture, for some reason it made me think of all of you, and I just had to share. Enjoy!
Many thanks to (what other pervert could have submitted this?) Paul Komoda.
