Sometimes Making Art is Risky

A couple of models discovered that posing underwater is a hazardous working condition when some sharks decided to investigate:

Underwater Nude Model Bitten by Shark on Photo Shoot; 'We Push the Envelope'

For some reason, I'm reminded of photographers who risk warfare to take photos of the action.

While the models where scantily clad, I wondered what the person taking the pictures were wearing. Todd Essick's site explains more about the project (NSFW - Note there are images on his site that may be Not Safe For Work.)

Flags Across America

I was at a party this weekend in Chesapeake City, Maryland. After the party broke up, I was walking with some friends back to our cars. We walked past a large truck painted like a flag, with a pair of antlers attached to the front of the vehicle.

Chesapeake City is a nice little town, filled with restaurants and antique shops. It has a couple of interesting geographical features. One is the Delaware - Chesapeake Canal that runs through the middle of town, connecting the Delaware Bay with the Chesapeake Bay. The other is a very high bridge that casts a long shadow over the town.

The newspaper the next day explained a little more about the patriotic truck. It belongs to an artist who is attempting to paint a flag on at least one rooftop in every state in the United States. The artist is Scott LoBaido, and his web site, which describes some of his adventures so far, is CreativePatriot.org.

A tip of the hat to Scott LoBaido.

Postscript.

The artist who created the "Wake Up America Day" poster above was James Montgomery Flagg. He created more than forty patriotic posters, with one showing Uncle Sam probably the most well known.

ukiyo-e in Hawaii

A few days ago, I wrote about Tsukioka Yoshitoshi and the Japanese painting tradition of Ukiyo-e. I was surprised to discover that one of the most famous practitioners of that style was an Englishman, and a long time resident of Hawaii.

Charles William Bartlett was a well-known water color artist in Europe before he left on a five year tour of Asia. In Japan, he was exposed to Ukiyo-e production methods.

On his return to England, he stopped over in Hawaii. Intending to stay a few weeks, he instead stayed and became a resident of Hawaii.

I'm really enthralled by his work.

China Miéville's The Scar

Review of The Scar
Written by British author, China Miéville,

Set in the same world as Perdido Street Station, The Scar is a merging of maritime legend, urban fantasy, and and exploration of utopian cities.

There isn't much overlap with Perido Street Station when it comes to plot, though the events in that first book caused one of the main characters in this book to set off on the voyage that this book starts with.

Again, there's a rich undertone of social criticism in this book, layered under a tale that's pretty compelling in its own right. It is the second of three novels which share the same unusual location, the world of Bas-Lag. I've read all three, and will be writing a review of the third sometime soon.

The Scar was published in 2002, and it is as rich in every way as the first book by the author set in this world.

The main character is a linguist on the run, fleeing the inquisitive eye of the militia and government of New Crobuzon. Relying on a bureacracy not to tie together a larger picture and identify her before she escapes, she signs on as interpreter for a government ship making a long journey to a criminal colony, where remade prisoners will be given a chance to start again, albeit in altered shape.

One of the interesting aspects of New Crubonzon is how they treat criminals. They remake them, by altering their physical makeup in odd ways, such as merging their body with machines, or animal forms. On the journey to this coloney, the voyage is diverted on a secret government mission, and then overtaken by pirates. They are taken to a new city, floating on the waters, which has a destiny to meet with a strange affliction forced upon the planet - a scar.

The title to the book is also a theme that runs through it, sometimes a little too bluntly, but it ties the tale together in interesting ways. Who amongst us doesn't have some scar, physical or emotional, that afflicts us or has healed over in some manner and shaped our path in some way.

I enjoyed this book as much, or more, than Perdido Street Station, and I'm looking forward to more tales set on the world of Bas-Lag. Fortunately, there was one more, which I'll write more about in a few days.

The prints of Tsukioka Yoshitoshi

The US Library of Congress has a great set of Japanese Prints from before 1915 in their Prints and Photographs Reading Room. One of the artist I found there whose woodblock prints I enjoyed were from Tsukioka Yoshitoshi.

He was an artist of the Ukiyo-e tradition - perhaps the most well known of the artists in that style. One of his most popular series he called One Hundred Views of the Moon.

The picture at the top of this post is from that series, and is titled Cassia Tree Moon. My favorites from him (so far) are from a later series, New Forms of Thirty-Six Ghosts. Here's Kiyohime Changes from a Serpent from that series:

Poet Laureate Warns of the Evils of Highlighters

Nice advice from former poet laureate Billy Collins: Poet tells freshmen to scribble, not Hi-Lite

If you highlight something in a book, and return an hour later, or a day later, or a week later, are you going to be able to understand the significance of that signal you left upon that page? A note in a margin can impart more meaning, can make more sense upon return, and can force you to articulate the importance of a passage.

Liked this:

"Participate in your education," he said. "Speak up in class, write in the margins; the margins of the world await your notation."

Sounds like it could apply to blogs as well as books.

Movies as Art

The Seattle Times asks of the movie Jackass the question Is it art? I haven't seen the movie, but the argument is afforded an extensive analysis in the article, and somehow they answer in the affirmative.

I watched the documentary, The Boys of Baraka this weekend, and in a style similar to that employed by 60 Minutes, we are introduced to children from the inner city of Baltimore, who spend a year in Kenya, given a chance for growth without the influences of troubled surroundings in Baltimore. Is it art?

In both cases, I'd say yes. Thinking about it, I'm probably going to add some movie reviews here as well as the book reviews I mentioned a couple of days ago. I tend to watch a lot of movies, and it would be nice to have an outlet to write about them a little.

I want to explore this theme of what makes a movie art. Right now, I'm not sure of the answer. I hope that thinking about style, structure, message, and more will help me find one.

New Deal Art 1

Love many of the WPA posters over at the Library of Congress online Prints and Photographs catalog. Need some art here, so I may begin posting some of these on a regular basis.

Artifacts as Wedding Gifts

Not such a good idea.

A friend was married in Poland last year. One of the wedding gifts from a family member was a painting from the early 1900s. On the way through the airport back to the US, the artwork was uncovered, and taken as a "cultural artifact." Decisions were made as to whether to charge the newly married couple with a crime.

Jeeze.

Review of Perdido Street Station

Written by British author, China Miéville, this fictional tale set in a grand metropolis filled with mad scientists, exotic non-human races, and unusual creatures, is one of the more interesting pieces of social criticism I've read in quite a while. It's the first of three novels written in the same fantastic world by the author, and I've had the pleasure of reading all three recently.

I've been meaning to add book reviews to my blogging efforts, and this seems like a great choice to begin with.

Perdido Street Station was first published in the United States in 2001, and introduces readers to the urban landscape of New Crobuzon and the eccentric workings of an unusual scientist and his client, who would like to regain the power of flight.

I'm finding it interesting that the reviews at Amazon cover a wide range of opinions, from people who loved the book, to others who found it unreadable.
First warning - the characters that inhabit this world are flawed. They aren't paragons of virtue, and some of them aren't even nice folks. But, they are believable, even when they shouldn't be.

Second warning - the world in which they inhabit is filled with odd and unusual mysteries, and stretch our knowledge and limits of belief. But it's a rich and colorful world, and the political struggles and troubles painted with the author's pen often see echoes in the world that surrounds the reader.

Third warning - the author paints vivid pictures with his words, in static scenes. The parts with action don't flow as well, but I'm not sure that's really an impediment to enjoying the work.

Somehow, I think that I could expand this list of warnings down the page for quite a while, and not tire of listing them, but I'd rather a reader do that for him or herself. The flaws in writing, in describing, and in world-building are fascinating in their own right, and inspite of them, and perhaps because of some of them, this series of books is one that I enjoyed tremendously.

The author is daring, taking chances, engaging reader's imaginations. This is much more dark and gritty a fantasy than many I've seen, and it caused me to pause and reflect upon my own world more than once. Parts of it are difficult, but ultimately rewarding.

Ok, my first book review. I may try to tackle this one again, after a hundred or so other reviews. The book is worth reading again.

National Postal Museum

Art happens in places that we don't always think about too much.

I didn't know that there was a National Postal Museum. I'm going to have to add it to my list of places that I want to visit in Washington, DC.

My choice for best section of the site is the National Postal Museum's Photographic Archives, and the best photo, hand's down, is of a mail carrier with a child in his mail bag. Seems that right after parcel post was started, a couple of children were sent by mail, with stamps adorning their clothing. The post master general halted that practice, but this picture (which predates parcel post) is great.