Boring Machines Disturbs Sleep

"Art documentation is by definition not art; it merely refers to art, and in precisely this way it makes it clear that art in this case is no longer present and immediately visible but rather absent and hidden."
-Boris Groys

(stolen from> [nonsource)

Things buzz and it is cold. This winter will take sometime to get through- but I like time that takes time. Because so much of it goes so fast these days. Watching my family grow up is truly strange, as it must be for them to watch me grow up.

More freelance work is needed. And Soon. If you know of any/have any please send it my way.

A day later, I continue writing another post that I am not sure if I will actually publish. I save these and then work on them, and then they are deleted. Quite un-worthwhile.

When we were slightly younger
There were trees that grew up into the heavens, and our fathers
had built tunnels down into the earth.
And we became greedy. Wanting more
So we chopped down the trees, and we moved the earth
which shifted the mantle and collapsed the tunnels
like veins being choked off by old fat binges and white goo.
And then when the sky fell we had no where to run
but its what we deserved and so I was thankful
what is comfortable is not always what we should be
but in todays world- Im not sure if anyone agrees

This is labour of love

Icarus 2.0

So. I've (mostly) finished shooting Spenser's Image Design film. The camera jammed twice! Once during the city shots, and once during the wing shots....which is really to bad. We probably didn't get it on 16mm....but c'est la vie.
It was all intended to be done on 16mm but I also was able to capture some video of the burns, as well as both 35mm and digital stills.

So what to do with what I have?
The film was supposed to be a hybrid film between the stories of Prometheus and Icarus. A story about gaining fire (industry, technology, energy) and about what happens when it gets to hot and burns out of control. It looks like the Prometheus section (Kits Film) may not even get done now...

So what to do, what to do...

I've been playing with the Icarus myth for awhile now. And I would like to continue. This project may not have come into fruition this time. But now I have some building blocks. I want to play with the Icarus story more! And it will build, maybe into a completely different project that I had previously though.
Anyone out there want to collaborate?

Well anyways. Here are some photos of process and shoot.

Starting to build the city


Miniature DPW city planning


Getting ready for the shoot with Spens and Mike.

The city with detail on the water


The City Burning


Gears


Wing Test w/ Andreas drooping seed in the foreground.

Mike as Icarus


His hand is supposed to be on fire....and then it fell off.

Im lighting the wings on fire on the back of Mike here.

Mike looking horrified.

Icarus running with his wings on fire.

35mm #2:

So I spent some time in New York & Boston.
Seeing some friends, writing a good deal, and wandering...

Here are a few of the pictures: 35mm - 200asa


Lower East Side, NY


Igor Jazz in Subway


Miriam being assaulted by a subway violinist


The cieling of the Boston Bus Station


Downtown Boston


Jordan Ganz

quick mention....and then more a bit later

First of all: KEO
And for those of you who are more into: Wiki

The Keo Project is a piece of Space Art, (wait? Thats a genre!) conceived in 1994 by Jean-Marc Philippe. KEO is a satellite that will hopefully be launched into space and then fall back to earth in 50,000 years. It will hold personal messages from anyone who writes in. Messages from people all over the world- those who are unable to write (elderly, children, hard-to-reach places) are especially encouraged to write in- which I'm digging. Apparently there is enough digital room in the plans to hold a 4 page letter written by everyone on earth. (So you should write in!) The satellite will also hold a drop of human blood, chosen randomly, and a few other artifacts like a digital modern day "library of Alexandria".
Which when you think about it.....50,000 years? Thats like taking a time machine back to when our ancestors invented fire!
How much will our species accomplish by then? Will we even be the same species? We maybe wiped out, we maybe so differently evolved....
Reading the letters of 50,000 years past is an amazing glimpse of the past for the future! Imagine...we may seem like beautiful, dreaming, and hopeful creatures! Or we may look like fearful, paranoid, unsure creatures....it depends what WE write.

Cool idea. Cool concept.
Here is a picture of the satellite:

2008 Chicago Halloween Parade (Rats Rats Rats)

Welcome to Rat City!

My good friend, Tom Laporte, has been running the Chicago Halsted Street Parade for the past 6 years. This year, he gave away some of his responsibilities to Ben Fain. A graduate student from SAIC. He transformed the parade into a very loose, fruedian, analogy of our subconsciousness. It was complete with a float with spinning pizza, a scared old man, and some 30-40 rats!
We got some great reactions from the crowd. Scared some kids, scared some adults!, and got a bunch of "ooohs" and "ahhhhs".
I'm never quite sure how we get away with these things....Thank you Tom Laporte & Ben Fain.



The Rat Float


I'm dressed as a Rat with a Flame Thrower!






I, looking quite tired and sweaty, along with Downtown Dave on his cellphone.

Third Coast Culture Cooperative (TC3)

So I need more excuses to do more things. Wreck more havoc. Create more Chaos. Cultivate more community, energy and love.

I'd like to throw a fund raiser concert/art show for the West Memphis 3.
One of the most embarrassing things, in my opinion, that the American court system continues to keep alive. 3 teenagers arrested and convicted in Arkansas, for the killing of three young boys. Damien Echols was given the death sentence while Jessie Misskelley and Jason Baldwin were sentenced to life imprisonment. They didn't do it though. They were convicted on fears of 'witchcraft', a false testimony, and a scared jury. The evidence overwhelmingly shows that the boys didn't do it.
Damien hasn't been killed yet. But they've been in jail for 15 years! They're not young teenagers anymore, they're grown men, and they've lost so much of their lives. They need to be freed. Damien is on is last appeal with habeas corpus.

I think it would be groovy to run a fund raiser for their legal fund.

Classical Gas

109 birthed the Catholic Church.
1609 held the worlds worst witch-hunt, the Basque witch trials.
1809 saw Napoleon causing hell in Europe.
1909 was when Theodore Roosevelt left the white house.
1939 marked the outbreak of World War II.
1989 marked the beginning of the end for the Soviet Union and the Cold War.
2009 is rapidly coming.

A hundred years isn't that long. We can consciously guide the future of ourselves as a community, as a nation, as world, as a species.
Gear our selves, change ourselves, evolve ourselves. Everything we think is normal will be foolish in the future.