Skeletal systems

Ever wonder what your favorite cartoon character might look like under all that skin? Here is one man's interpretation.

Pina Bausch on NPR

On Morning Edition, NPR had a short piece on choreographer Pina Bausch. There's a short clip of a dance she choreographed that was showcased in the Almodovar film Talk to Her. On Sunday I get to see her group perform at BAM. I can't wait!

Transformers

David sent me a link to this commercial. Talk about Transformers: more than meets the eye. I'd hate to be in the driver's seat while that thing's getting down.

Hanzismatter

While surfing around I found this site, which breaks down the (mis)use of Chinese characters in various ads and tattoos. So far, my favorite mystery is that of Marcus Camby's tattoo. Courtesy of Angry Asian Man.

In alphabetical order

The NYT best 1000 movies ever made.

2046

Kit just pointed me to the 2046 website. I took a quick peek but I really don't want to know. I want to see it cold. Eric and I went to Chinatown the other day and found the 2046 dvd and vcd. Unfortunately, it's the version from China, dubbed into Mandarin and without English subtitles. Still, I was sorely tempted. But I'll wait for the HK DVD. And my new tv.

Wong Kar-Wai news

Kino's releasing a Wong Kar-Wai DVD box set, containing five of his earlier films (the only film that's missing is Ashes of Time. I've never seen the Kino prints, but they must be better than the Chinatown DVD versions I own and so now I'm sorely tempted to get this. They're also re-releasing Days of Being Wild to theaters with a new translation. I just wonder if it's a new print. For those in the New York area, it'll be playing at the Film Forum in November. Looks like it's gonna be a WKW fall . . .

Eminem lets his politics be known

Eminem's Mosh Music Video. See it here.

Sticker shock

Sasha Frere-Jones, Dave Tompkins, Hua Hsu, and Jeff Chang have just about launched their new audioblog, Sticker Shock. I was involved in the minimal design. It's gonna be big.

New photoblogs

My cousin Dan just started his first photoblog. It's called Un Object d'art.

THREE.2

THREE.2 is a new digifotoblog posting frequent images thus far in and around New York.

Kill Kitty

Chang Cheng-Yue is performing in New York and Boston on Sunday and Monday (and he's playing in LA Oct 23. He's a Chinese Rock star, and this marks the first time a Chinese Rock artist has toured the states. Click on the banner for more information.

I love eggs

And you might too after seeing this. Though maybe eating them 365 days a year would be bad for your health. . . . Thanks to Dennis for pointing it out.

Open House New York

"The Second Annual OHNY weekend is scheduled for Saturday & Sunday, October 9 & 10, 2004. 100 fascinating spaces and places in all five boroughs will be open for tours - free of charge. Each site will offer different experiences, including guided and self-guided tours, informal talks and conversations with the designers." I missed this last year so I'm definitely going out this year to check it out. Read about it on their site: www.openhousenewyork.org

Photo books

I'm ordering two books. Eric had recommended the VII agency's book War to me a few weeks ago. At AIGA's 50 books 50 covers I saw the book itself and spent a good portion of my time there flipping through it (you would think that their site would have at least thumbnails of the winners). The other book I'm buying is Michael Ackerman's End Time City, a collection of photographs he took while in Benares. I've been meaning to get that one for a wihle and am finally breaking down and doing it.

Audio blogs

On the subject of audio blogs, here's two more that I'm enjoying (one courtesy of SF/J). Today, Moistworks is offering some mashups. The one mixing the Beatles and the All Saints is eeriely cool. Fluxblog's offering a Phil Specorish song and a funky little jam. The winner today would be Moistworks if you were to compare mp3s. Though Fluxblog's been quoted in the Times on an article about marketing through audiobloggers.

Fruits of Chaos

Fruits of Chaos is an mp3 blog devoted to (mostly) Asian pop music. At least as far as I can discern from my initial glance at it.

The 8th Tehran International Poster Biennial

"The 8th Tehran International Poster Biennial is the latest in a succession of seven national Biennials of Iranian Graphic Designers. It has been prepared for a long time, and very carefully, and has been preceeded by a number of exhibtions both in Tehran and in Europe." You can see some of the posters and the designers here. Oh to be in Tehran!

Creep (acoustic)

Cool animated music video set to Radiohead's "Creep". Very nicely done.

Mining links

I haven't checked #1/usr/bin/girl in a while, and she's put up some links to some cool games and animations. Check out the Scarecrow game, which looks like Tim Burton might have designed it; MoMa's site on Tall buildings, which is nicely designed though it bothers me that three or four of the buildings are WTC sketches which won't even be built; the speed reading test; and the cartoon Heroes.

Soul Sides

Oliver Wang (aka O-Dub) is running this great audio blog called Soul Sides. It started as a place to post record reviews, but it's since become a place where he posts mp3s and comments on those. One of the greatest discoveries in recent weeks is the Bizzie Boys. If I had the original 12"'s, I'd be wearing out the grooves. As it is, the three tracks O-Dub's posted are quickly climbing the charts according to my Itunes play count. It's too bad they only had those four singles. It's almost enough to convince me to become a record collector.

Like sand for water

A neat video showing that sand behaves like water.

Hot in Herrre

What happens when two video game combatants decide to lay down their arms and get funky? Well, you might get something like Dance, Voldo, Dance.

Middle East photographs

I've spent the last three days scanning negatives and designing and producing a site to exhibit some of the black and white photos I took while in the Middle East. A color site will have to come later (when I have the time to edit all the photos). You can find the site here.

Pentrx: Pen Spinning Revolution

I never got but the basic tricks down (and that took forever). Some of the moves shown on this site are beyond what meagre abilities I might ever hope to have. (courtesy #!/usr/bin/girl)

Terror, Terrorism, and the Human Condition

This is my 200th post on this blog. Just thought I'd note that. I'm still trying to figure out what to do with my day. Guillemette guilted me into working (she's been working on her book all weekend) and so I spent part of my afternoon doing this. About the book: In an attempt to explore the impact of terrorism at its most basic level--that of sowing fear and anxiety--this book investigates our now centuries-long attraction to, and dread of, terror and its progeny, including terrorism, or political terror, and mass murder. It is also a call to thought, and an appeal to reasoned action. Charles Webel argues that while a "war" on terrorism cannot succeed in eliminating terror from our human condition, this does not mean that it cannot, and should not, be confronted by means other than war.

Women's Police Stations

There are times that I wish I did read all the books that I design, especially those for the academic press for which I do work. This book "examines the changing and complex relationship between women and the state, and the construction of a gendered citizenship and justice, using the case study of women's police stations in Sao Paulo. These are police stations run by police women to deal with crimes against women, such as domestic violence, assault, and rape." Think of how much better informed if I could read all these books (and retain the facts—that's the other problem. Remembering what I read).

T-shirt designs

O.K. I'm suddenly obsessed with t-shirts and t-shirt designs. I had promised a friend of mine that I was going to design a t-shirt with her face on it for a friend of hers and here's a possible thought. Any opinions?

Back in the saddle

O.K. I'm trying to get back to work, though it's not so easy. First up, a book about the two Korea's. Here's the blurb: In post-Cold War thinking, North Korea was expected to collapse and be absorbed into a single Korean state by the democratic regime in South Korea. Fifteen years later, this has not happened, and June 2000 saw a summit marking the warmest inter-Korean relations yet. Over that time period, the two Korean states found instead new mechanisms and methods for interacting with each other on the level of de facto if not yet completely de jure sovereign states and have begun to overcome some of the shadows cast by the partition and violent war that befell the peninsula following World War II. This book examines the origins, dynamics, and impacts of these multi-level relations between North and South Korea, situating them variously as two incomplete nation-states, as a single national entity, and within a larger international environment. The contributors demonstrate how inter-Korean relations have fostered new forms of conflict management and reconciliation on the peninsula. They wanted something designy and authoritative.

Threadless

Threadless sells T-shirts designed by its community members. I wanted to buy the shirt to the left, but it's sold out in my size. :-( There are still a few that I'm thinking of at the moment. I'd love to design a shirt to submit, but I can't think of what might be appropriate . . . That and the fact that I can't draw. Maybe I'll try something with type if I can think of interesting words to use.

Tongue-tied

The London Times has translated the most untranslateable word in the world.

The word is ilunga, from the Bantu language of Tshiluba, and means a person ready to forgive any abuse for the first time, to tolerate it a second time, but never a third time. It came top of a list drawn up with the help of 1,000 translators, narrowly beating hlimazl, Yiddish for a chronically unlucky person and radioukacz, Polish for a person who worked as a telegraphist for the resistance movements on the Soviet side of the Iron Curtain.

Read the rest of the article reproduced here.

Fly Guy

Here's a fun interactive plaything. Manuever the man through the clouds and discover what you can. From Time's 50 Coolest Websites.

Peach be mine

I spent the weekend attending wedding celebrations for Lin and Michael. For the Saturday brunch, Guillemette made peach marmelade, for which I supplied the above label.

Pitchfork top 100 albums of the 70s

Pitchfork has their list of the top 100 albums of the 70s. I'm a sucker for such lists. Even if I don't agree with them it's interesting to see them and there's always new discoveries on them. For one, I'm surprised to find that Van Halen was around in the 70s. I'm also surprised that two Fela Kuti albums made the list. The top album also surprises me, but maybe that's cause I've never really listened to it. I should see about trying it out.

To the 5 Boroughs

I just picked up the new Beastie Boys album. It's a solid stripped back affair, leaning on old skool hip hop while riding recent trends. The first song indicates the influence of the Neptunes, and other tunes demonstrate their take on Missy and Timbaland's recent homages to the golden age of hip hop. Their voices belie their age, however, their vocal chords sounding a bit ragged. Still, it's amaizng they've been in the game as long as they have, producing good music.

A Cook's Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisine

I just started this book, written by the guy who wrote Kitchen Confidential. After the success of that book, he convinced his publisher to send him around the world searching for the perfect meal. He starts in Portugal, where his Portuguese boss at Les Halles invites him to a family cookout where they slaughter and eat an entire pig, from snout to hoof. His travels take him to East Asia, Southeast Asia, Latin America, Europe, and points in between, where he eats what he can. Throughout he's being filmed by the Food Network, where the cameramen are eating and vomiting along with him. He's a funny writer and already I can feel that I'll be hooked into reading this book well into the night.

Morrissey

I find myself sucked into the new Morrisey album these days. It's a decent album, reminiscent of his earlier work. It seems that there are a number of 80s artists who are re-emerging with albums that recall their prime. Ki.Hu was over and as she listened to the album she said she used to love one of the songs that was playing. I told her it was the new album. She was surprised, but it's not surprising. It's easy to like the familiar, and the new album is almost instantly familiar.

Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China

On the subject of museum shows, it appears that there is a new one at the ICP (unfortunately I missed the show on photographs from Iraq since I didn't have the time before leaving for the Middle East myself). This show purports to be "the first comprehensive look at the innovative photo and video art produced since the mid-1990s in China." Unfortunately the ICP site never seems to have a good sampling of what it has on offer. It's a shame, especially for those who can't make it all the way to New York. The exhibit is jointly presented with the Asia Society, with two sections at ICP and two sections at the Asia Society. I wonder if you have to buy two tickets? Looks like it's going to be a busy museum week for me next weekend . . .

August Sandler and Andy Goldsworthy

There's reason to go to the Met museum these days. Ch.Mo informed me that she had been to see the August Sandler exhibit at the museum. The photographs are taken from his project People of the Twentieth Century in which he attempted to create a comprehensive visual record of the German populace. I'm definitely going to see the show either this week or next. As an added bonus, there's a piece by British sculptor Andy Goldsworthy adorning the roof gallery. When in Cupertino I went to Palo Alto to see the wall he had built in front of the Stanford art museum, which was reminiscent of his work at Storm King (though the construction methods were very different). And I'm still waiting for Rivers and Tides to be released on DVD so I can finally see more of his work.

M*A*S*H* and MASH

When I was in Cupertino, I was starting to get into M*A*S*H* again. I had liked the show well enough when I was younger, but I was really getting into it at my aunt's house. It's just so smartly written at it's best. I was just thinking about the show and did a google search, and found a site where you can play MASH online. Not the tv show, but the mansion, apartment, shack, house game from elementary school! Oddly, there seem to be more categories than I remember . . .

Summer reading

I'm reading Kitchen Confidential these days, by the chef of Les Halles. It's a quick fun read (a friend lent it to me last night and I'm half done with it already) that I recommend to people who have been in the food industry or are vaguely curious about it. At times it reads like Less Than Zero or a Jay MacInerny novel from the other side of the bar at Odeon, at others he's laying down how it is. It's not an expose on the industry, really, which is how I think some people have fashioned it. It's more a cook telling you his side of the story and giving a glimpse into the kitchen, from his humble beginnings at Cape Cod fish fry joints to the big leagues of New York. Fascinating.

New music

I've been stocking up on new music since getting back. I finally got around to getting the new Madvillain album, Madvillainy, which is a collaboration between MF Doom and Madlib. I had first heard Madlib on his Shades of Blue album, where he was given the keys to the Blue Note records store. I was a little disappointed with the record, probably because I was expecting remixes of the hard bop sides. I've been relistening to Shades of Blue after checking out the Madvillain, however, to see what I was missing. I've also been listening to Quasimoto's The Unseen to round out the roots and influences, Q being a Madlib sideproject and character. I've also been spinning the new Prince album in preparation for seeing him in a month. The album starts in a funky groove and then mixes it up from there. I really only like about half of it, but I do like that half. And it's more than I can say for some of his other recent albums. Soon he'll be per4ming his hits 4 the last time with me in the audience. I can't wait! I picked up Loretta Lynn's Van Lear Rose after reading some good reviews. Produced by Jack White of the White Stripes, it sounds just like what one might expect, with the 60 year old Lynn singing sometimes over a country-fied garage groove, sometimes over more traditionally country arrangements. Rounding out this bunch would be the Street's new album A Grand Don't Come For Free. A single story spun out over its running time, I'm really into the spare beats and his casual flow. It makes me want to go back and listen to his first album, which I couldn't get into when it came out. I must have not been ready for it yet.

Photography exhibits in Los Angeles

This past week I caught two exhibits in Los Angeles. Both were excellent and excellently presented. The Getty is now offering the Photographers of Genius, a historical retrospective of photography presented through the work of 38 photographers. The exhibit celebrates the 20+ years over which the museum has amassed its colection of over 600 photographs. Unfortunately, the Diane Arbus exhibit at the LACMA has recently closed. If it comes to a museum near you it's well worth seeking out.

Carb Couture

Carb Couture looks like it's open for business and taking pre-orders. I'm getting me the shirt on the left. And yes, that's Jean on the home page. And yes, I did design the website. Though my friend Patty and her friends came up with the idea. So go and order some shirts! And apologies for being out of touch on this blog a little bit. I was travelling and posting on my text blog.

Spinning

I've been in a hip hop mood all of a sudden. Digging the last Non Prophets album Hope and the leaked Jaylib and MF Doom Are Madvillain album. The first has a nice laid back beat and solid production work by Joe Beats which reaches back towards an earlier era of hip hop. The latter is a series of cuts Jaylib had put on a mix tape to take to Brazil with him. The Madvillain album is out now and I'll have to get that soon. Rounding things out, I've been listening to Oval's 94 Diskont, a glitch electronic album with an ethereal initial 24 minute track that barely seems a song at all until it slowly reveals the music's patterns, and Nigasa Ni Te's Feel. The latter is a Japanese indie rock duo whose stripped back lo-fi album owes a bit to the Velvet Underground and Nick Drake.    

The Gates

On Feburary 12, 2005, Christo and Jean-Claude will launch their first project in New York City. 7500 gates, each 16 feet tall will follow the edges of the walkways and will be perpendicular to the selected 23 miles of footpaths in Central Park. Free hanging saffron colored fabric panels will be suspended from each of these gates, drooping to seven feet above the ground. The name comes from Frederick Law Ohlmstead's reference to the various arches already located throughout the park as "gates." I'm already trying to think of places above the park from which to take photographs. If there's a reason to stay in New York for another year, this would be it. Read more about the project here.

New music

O.K. I've been bad lately with updating this site. I'll try harder in the coming weeks. As far as recent music, I've been listening to Stars' Heart, Depeche Mode's Black Celebration, and Club 8's The friend I Once Had. At least those are the albums in heavy rotation. Lately, I've been having some trouble finding something else to listen to. The DM infatuation lingers, however. I actually rented 101 a week or two ago and was surprised how popular they really were. I also finally realized that the final concert was not in the Hollywood Bowl. For some reason it always played there in my mind. Stars is a somewhat twee indie rock band, and Club 8 are a poppy rock band where the lead singer bears a passing resemblance to Dolores O'Riordan.

New (and not so new) Music

Lately I find myself drawn to the electronic/rock mix of things. This time it started with the Morr Music compilation Blue Skied an' Clear, which then got me back into Ms. John Soda's No P. or D, mainly through the song "Solid Ground," which has a beautiful woody bass. Most recently, I picked up Lali Puna's new album Faking the Books, which starts off with a Radioheadesque sliced vocal sample over a song that has shades of Notwist in it. Rounding things out is Mum's Finally We Are No One. A friend was using "K/Half Noise" on the soundtrack of a project she was working on and I got sucked into the album itself.        

More penguin games

No. three here.

Weekly roundup

This week started with The Walkmen's Everyone Who Pretended to Like Me Is Gone. Somehow this seems to fall into a similar Velvet Underground influenced rock that informs Interpol and, to a certain extent, The Strokes. I don't have their new album yet, but I'll probably get it sometime soon. Alirio Diaz's Five Centuries of Spanish Guitar Music is recorded by one of the masters of Spanish Guitar. Invited to become assistant and substitute for Andres Segovia in 1957, Diaz spent seven years working with the Spanish guitar master and sharpening his skills. Michel Legrand's score for Les Parapluies de Cherbourg bring back the movie with every note. As the entire film is sung, you could probably follow the entire plot without having seen the movie. If you could speak French. Salif Keita's Mouffou brings it back to his roots. The Malian singer combines African, jazz, funk, Europop, and R&B to fashion his own brand of Afro-Pop.       As far as singles are concerned, I'm listening to a lot of Vienna Teng's songs from her website. It's like a cross between Vanessa Carlton and October Project. Or something like that.

NY Songlines

Virtual walking tours of New York. (courtesy littlerabbit).

New Nickel

The U.S. mint is rolling out new nickels in addition to all the other new money that's coming out.

Spaced Penguin!

Try to get the penguin back to his ship. (courtesy littlefluffy).

Baa Baa black beats

Instead of counting sheep, let the sheep count the beats for you. You can also add keys and bass. I'm just happy with the drum and bass. I wish you could speed up the tempo . . . (courtesy to here knows when).

Railroad Tycoon

Remember Pipe Dream? Here it is with trains and a cool harmonica soundtrack.

Tunes for the week

Kanye West's College Dropout is one of the best hip hop albums to drop in a while. I can listen to it from beginning to end without feeling that there's a ton of filler taking up space. And even the skits are funny. For the most part. Between this and The Grey Album, 2004 is already shaping up to be a pretty good year. Burger/Ink's Las Vegas is a collaboration between Jorg Burger and Mike Ink. It's an electronica album bearing some resemblance to Monolake, but with a little more going on. Xiu Xiu's Fabulous Muscles mixes electronics and experimental rock into a fascinatingly creepy album. Red Hot Chili Peppers' Blood Sugar Sex Magik is an album I had heard in the past but for some reason this past week I was suddenly into it in a way I'd never been in the past. The mix of metal and funk was exactly what the good doctor ordered.             Most of the singles I've been rocking are from the Kanye West album, including "We Don't Dare," "Family Business," and "All Falls Down."

Ishkur's Guide to Electronic Music v.2.0

It's back and it's bigger than before. Check it out and learn the difference between Happy House and HiNRG.

Heads I win, tails you lose

Apparently, flipping a coin is not as fair as it might seem. Statistician Persi Diaconis built himself a machine to flip coins and determined that "if a coin is launched exactly the same way, it lands exactly the same way. You can listen to the story on NPR.

Leaving No Child Behind redesign

After sending in the original design of this (left) I was told that the book should have larger type and indicate more of a policy bent. They felt the original design was too quiet, focusing on the individuals in question too much. And they wanted an all-cap title. So the option on the right.    

Evening's work

I spent the weekend in New Jersey attending a baby shower and now I'm trying to finish up some designs before the week starts. The Subversive Self in Modern Chinese Literature explores Japan's role in shaping Chinese cultural modernity by comparing and contrasting what appear to be similar narrative modes between the shishosetsu and work coming out of the Creation Society, studying how Chinese writers both appropriated and reconceptualized this Japanese approach. The Turkish-Israeli Relationship examines the historic, geo-strategic and political-cultural roots of the Turkish-Israeli relationship, from the 1950s until today.    

Speaking of the Grey Album

Grey Tuesday is creating coordinated civil disobedience. On Tuesday, February 24, websites will post Danger Mouse's Grey Album on their site for 24 hours in protest of EMI's attempts to censor this work. Read the site for the full story.

Esquire magazine covers

I was reading design observer's article about the decline of magazine covers. The article specifically references George Lois and his 60's Esquire covers. I followed some of the links and realized that Esqure has all of its covers posted online. I love those old covers, before, as the design observer article says, celebrity took over from design.

Weekly faves.

DJ Dangermouse mixes Jay-Z's vocals from The Black Album with beats culled from the Beatles' White Album and creates The Grey Album. It's such a vast improvement over The Black Album you wonder why Jay-Z didn't hire Dangermouse in the first place. And I'll never hear the Beatles in the same way. Brilliant. I started listening to Sinatra because I was working on a book on the subject. Come Fly With Me marks his first outing with arranger Billy May, and together they take a swinging trip around the world. I've always loved Sam Cooke. The Rhythm and the Blues collects a number of early 60's sides and remasters them. Cooke has never sounded better. The sound is crisp, the vocals clear. A-mei is a Taiwanese singer. I saw her in concert on Christmas Day, and picked up her album to prepare myself. Some great Chinese pop music, though she still hasn't quite ascended the heights of her hit single a few years back.             Singles this week I've been returning to include Tori Amos's "Taxi Ride," Pizzicato Five's "Baby Love Child," and Frank Sinatra's "Come Fly With Me."

Continuing Series . . .

A while ago, I designed template for a series of books put out under the auspices of NYU. Here's the latest:    

Historic Tale Construction Kit

Now you can weave a tapestry of your deeds. I think even in multiple pages. Once I have more time I'll see what tale I can tell. (courtesy #!/usr/bin/girl)

The Lost World Game

The BBC has this neat 3-D adventure game. I didn't get very far but it looks nice.

Musicplasma

Looking for music recommendations? Plug in a name into Musicplasma and follow the yellow brick road. Well, the pastel links.

Recent first passes

I worked on two covers this past weekend. One is a book on Frank Sinatra's persona and how it relates to Italian Americans, and the other is an evaluation of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. I've also spent the better part of the past two days listening to Frank Sinatra's Come Fly With Me album to get in the mood. Thoughts?