June 14, 2005

monsters, music & photos

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Rem Koolhaas's CCTV tower as described in the most authentic terms in this article :

Budgeted at 400 million pounds, and designed by the Dutch avant-garde architect Rem Koolhaas, it resembles two upside-down Ls leaning against each other like a pair of drunks.

Great leap forward for XL high-rise monstrosities, huge fall backward for sensible urbanism; in summary: expensive and ugly.

And in general, the Beijing olympic building boom as described by professor Wu Liangyong:

These buildings will be a scar left on the face of time, which will record our pains for ever. Once the land is used and this unreasonable urbanization spreads, it is irreversible.

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Matthew Barney and Björk's Drawing Restraint 9: epic art film or ego-caressing, drawn-out Asian fetish?

Barney and Björk "together tell a tale of tea ceremonies, vaseline, a shinto marriage and of course the old classic whale-shapeshifting ending." (tinymixtapes)

Sounds like a potential farce (description taken from her website): a visual artwork in film form ... for which Björk has contributed the soundtrack after having spent time in Japan studying their ways.

Björk worked with scholars of the Noh theater, adding "low, growling vocal techniques" to the music.


For lack of an articulate reaction: are you fucking serious?

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On a cooler note: a really interesting sociological / street photo series by Rotterdam-based photographer Ari Versluis and stylist Ellie Uyttenbroek. On "the apparent contradiction between individuality and uniformity." (Thanks, Roger)

Which reminds me of a Raf Simons quote: "On the one side I think the individual is the priority, but I'm obsessed with repetition. Visually, that is the most beautiful thing there is. Individuality is in your mind."

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Lastly, a music/info-visualization gem: the "History of Sampling v 1.2." Interactive graphing of sampled and sampling tracks from jazz, soul, and funk favorites such as Quincy Jones, Commodores, Cannonball Adderley ... sweet.

4 comments:

carrie said...

i like your blog.

Anonymous said...

WOW! great snacks!


those music graphs are gorgeous.

i can't stand repitition (sorry mr. simons, but i love your work!)

those photographs by ari versluis is VERY VERY fuckin interesting. it makes me "THINK!" haha


so fetish that is. fetish to the extreme :(


rem koolhaas is getting away with too much.

Miss J said...

mmmm ... bird's nest ... :) hey ... i wanted to tell you that i've stopped playing katamari damacy bc i went crazy for a week (i played it like everyday for 3-4 hours after work) and then i started getting dizzy everytime i played! so i figured it was time to stop! (:(

cool photo series, eh? my friend roger found it in res (magazine). i was thinking someone should do a series like that for san francisco/bay area ...

Anonymous said...

very neat photo series. i'm getting a new camera soon (yay!). i don't really have the guts to do it myself, (like do the Q&A snap thing). but with someone (wink wink), i could SNAP, and you can CHAT! it be fun to just go out and be more observant (not like we aren't already! haha) ...

i haven't played the game in awhile either! ronnie keeps playing some crashing car game (he won't let me play, insists it's a one player game).. thus i can't seem to pop in katamari damacy!