“It’s no longer safe here.”

This Friday, Devotion Gallery in Brooklyn will be hosting Expanded Taxonomy – an exhibit of artist Nicole Aptekar’s new paper works. Featured previously on Coilhouse for her first collection of paper art, Nicole has upped her game with this exhibition: the geometry is more complex, the pieces are bigger, and each one is composed of 40 sheets or more (whereas the previous pieces were, at most, half that size).

“Condense, diffuse, swell, and strike.” 

“The process of making these works is like hunting—traveling through all the possible shapes to find one that speaks,” writes Nicole in her artist statement. “Once discovered, this abstract form is held captive like a biological specimen. Shiny pins, screws, and hardware make it a part of this world, restraining it in its frame in a way that distances it from its platonic digital origins.” This exhibit also includes two collaborations: one piece with with Mary Franck that uses projection mapping on a large cardboard piece, and another with Ian Baker that utilizes intersections of vinyl that begin inside of the frame but branch outside of it.

The opening is this Friday, April 27th, from 7-11 PM. If you’re coming, I’ll see you there! More images from the show, after the cut.

“At the edge, leaning in.”

Yves Rossy, a latter-day Swiss Air Force fighter pilot and current full-time daredevil, has been working on this jet-powered carbon-fiber design with an engineering team for well over a decade. The most resent incarnation, seen above as the Jetman soars high above the Alps of his homeland, can “only” fly for ten minutes at a time. Pffftwhatever. This stuff is still nothing short of MEGA AWESOMEBALLS. (Incredible high-def footage, too.)

Wheeeeeeeee!

[via The Daily What]

Levon Helm died today at the age of 71. Here’s a spectacular photograph of Helm that Siege made at the legendary musician’s studio, The Barn, in Woodstock (for Rolling Stone magazine) a few years ago:

Photo by Clayton James Cubitt.

On heavy rotation today: “Up on Cripple Creek“, “The Shape I’m In“, “The Weight“, “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down“, various nuggets from Helm’s Midnight Ramble concerts, and, last but not least, “Ophelia“. (“Ashes of laughter / The ghost is clear / Why do the best things always disappear?”)

There’s never been a voice or a soul quite like Helm’s in popular music, and there never will be again. (He was, of course, a very generous and intuitive drummer, too.) Here’s a transcript excerpt from The Band’s concert film The Last Waltz, directed by Scorcese –a film which Helm later famously decried (though, comfortingly, his longstanding feud with bandmate Robbie Robertson appears to have been put to rest shortly before Helm’s death)– but the quote’s just too perfect:

LEVON HELM: Bluegrass and country music … if it comes down into that area and if it mixes there with the rhythm and if it dances, then you’ve got a combination of all that music …

MARTIN SCORSESE: What’s it called?

LEVON HELM: Rock and roll.

Pure and good and true. Thank you for that, Levon Helm. Rest in peace.

It’s hard to believe Dick Clark is gone. Is it safe to surmise that secretly, many of us kids who grew up watching him on the boob tube decided long ago that Clark (or, at the very least, legions of indiscernible vat-grown clones of Clark kept in a top-secret underground facility located a few miles beyond the city limits of Fresno) would be Rockin’ our Eves for centuries to come? Alas.

But the beat must go on. Perhaps… in hologram form?

In (somewhat oblique) honor of the departed (and because NO halfway decent excuse to feature the Mael Brothers on Coilhouse should ever be passed up) here’s a fabulous performance of “Pulling Rabbits out of Hats” by Sparks on Dick Clark’s American Bandstand in 1984, followed by a unexpectedly sweet and silly “interview” between three very disparately distinguished gentlemen. SO GOOD.

Previously on Coilhouse:

• “This Town Ain’t Big Enough For the Both of Us” Top of the Pops, 1974. (A very old post, wherein I get grumpy about Bedford Ave. hipsters and the SPARKS energy drink. Ignore that bit. S’all about the MAEL LURVE.)

For the past two years, Kevin McTurk –a world-renowned cinematic effects artist– has been hard at work on a breathtaking personal project called The Narrative of Victor Karloch. McTurk describes it as a “Victorian ghost story puppet film”.

Featuring the voices of Christopher Lloyd, Elijah Wood, and Maurice LaMarche, Karloch combines bunraku style rod puppets, shadow puppetry, and an array of traditional in-camera effects to present a tale from from the journal pages of one Victor Karloch: weatherbeaten alchemist, scholar, and ghost hunter. This film, very much a labor of love for McTurk and his crew, was made possible by grants from Heather Henson’s Handmade Puppet Dreams Film Series and from The Jim Henson Foundation.

Photo provided by Kevin KcTurk.

As you can see from the above preview, it’s a stunning piece of work. And did I mention that the film’s score was provided by Zoe Keating, Lustmord, and… our very own Meredith Yayanos? Yes!

This Thursday, April 19, at Meltdown Comics/NerdMelt Theater in Los Angeles, McTurk will be holding a sneak peek/wrap party reception. There will be a live marionette performance by Eli Presser (one of the film’s key puppeteers) and limited edition Narrative of Victor Karloch t-shirts (designed by comics legend Mike Mignola!) available for sale.

Congrats to all involved! Attendees of the wrap party are enthusiastically encouraged to report back in comments.

Karloch illustration and design by Mike Mignola.

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.

Should they choose to delve deep into the dreckish pools of distant memory, some Coilhouse readers may recall this cheeky wee embloggening from 2009, written about the Dictionnaire Infernal, with illustrations by Louis Breton.

Well, here’s the sitch: dearest Ariana Osborne, who (in addition to sending over all manner of silliness and cuteness and beauty for us to blog here through the years) happens to be an absolutely brilliant graphic designer, has a Kickstarter project! She’s setting her sights on restoring the very same public-domain vintage demonic illustrations contained in that infamous blog post of yesteryear.

She wants to design and print a deck of 69 large (3.5″x5.75″), full-color heavy-stock art cards, each one featuring a Breton illustration from the Dictionnaire Infernal. She’s also planning to create “a supplementary PDF for the deck, with all 69 card images and extended information about each.” She’s given the project room to expand and evolve, depending on how much she raises beyond her minimum goal.

Ariana is all about fastidious documentation, immaculate restoration, and TEH LULZ (see below). EVIL GOOD TIMES. Click on MISTER SCARY ANTEATER OV DOOOO0M to learn more:

This collage series by Nadine Boughton combines men’s adventure magazines from the 50s and early 60s with the pristine rooms of Better Homes and Gardens. Bedrooms, living rooms and bathrooms are attacked by squids and rabid baboons, overrun by bats,  submerged underwater, and besieged by helicopters.

“The collages are set against the backdrop of the McCarthy era, advertising, sexual repression, WWII and the Korean War. The cool, insular world of mid-century modern living glossed over all danger and darkness, which the heroic male fought off in every corner,” writes Boughton.

Previously on Coilhouse:

• 50’s Jell-O Salad is Actually a Shoggoth

This is so lovely. Daniel Palacios, ‘Waves’ installation (2007):

(Via Siege, who describes it aptly as “‘Double Dutch’ meets ‘Unknown Pleasures'”. Definitely watch it full screen.)

Artist’s description:

“‘Waves’ utilizes a basic construction of a long piece of elastic string and two motors to visualize the presence of people close to the installation. The string between the two motorized chambers reacts to the people presence and movements, it twirls to produce a sine-wave simulation that eloquently resembles both the digitization of real-time sound waves and patterns of flow and connectivity found in natural systems.”

Unf, UNF, UNF, UNF:

QAPLA

An hour ago, the darque benevolent sartorial powerhouse known as Mildred Von launched her official Mother of London website, with a webstore containing her glorious new, never-before-available, ready-to-wear line of MoL garments. Creaking black stroppy strappy happiness. Studs and grommets and buckles. Softly eldritch curve-hugging knits and witchy tees. Go take a look. Go.

You’re still here?! GO!! Drool. Spontaneously ejaculate. Cry molten rubies. Fer serious.

Having some inkling of just how many years of blood, sweat, orgone depletion, and fiery cussin’ went into making this uncompromisingly exquisite line a reality, we here at Coilhouse could not be more happy for Milly, or for everyone lucky enough to snatch up one of her amazing pieces before they sell out.

(And they WILL sell out. Soon. So if you want ’em, go git ’em. ASAP.)

GORKON

More images after the jump. All photos by the fabulous Twink. Gorgeous model is Lacy Soto. Immaculate hair and makeup by Cazzie at Gorgeous Salon on Melrose.

LONG LIVE MOTHER OF LONDON. CONGRATS, DOOD. HEGHLU’MEH QaQ JAJVAM.