Spy On Your Dog
It comes in peace.
Your friends at Skynet bring you the Rovio! Rovio is a robotic webcam with microphone and speaker for 2-way audio. This wi-fi connected bad little bot will stream video and audio to your favorite web-enabled browser anywhere in the world! Use your PC, your MAC, your iPhone, even your PS3 to control Rovio.In this way meatbags will have the illusion of control over the machine. Drive the bot around the house, take pictures of the family and e-mail them to friends. All this can be done from thousands of miles away.
Throwdown At The Bee
A Literary Night Out: Spelling Bee Humiliation and Partying With PEN
By Steven Kurutz
The Council of Literary Magazines and Presses [CLMP] was holding its annual spelling bee at the Diane von Furstenberg Studio. Since 1967, the CLMP has offered assistance to literary publications, ranging from the well-known (N+1; Virginia Quarterly) to the obscure (Les Figues Press). 
To simultaneously raise money and humiliate writers, each year the organization holds a charity auction and spelling bee. Last year’s winner was Harper publisher Jonathan Burnham, who edged out Sara Nelson, former editor of Publishers Weekly and current books editor for “O: The Oprah Magazine.”
Nelson was determined to avenge the defeat, but said her desire hadn’t translated to hours spent reading the dictionary. “I studied one year and got knocked out in the first or second round,” she said. “Now I don’t study.” Other spellers included novelists James Frey and Francine Prose, Vogue editor Sally Singer, Village Voice mainstay Michael Musto, former New York Times reporter Alex Kuczynski and New Yorker staffers Nancy Franklin and Ben Greenman. The event was emceed by literary agent Ira Silverberg, and judged by Oxford English Dictionary editor-at-large Jesse Sheidlower, who took visible delight in tripping up accomplished writers with deceptively simple-to-spell words like sacrilegious (which knocked several contestants out).
Britain’s Most Violent Prisoner Goes To The Matte
Looking at an Inmate, Seeing an Artist
In the British press he is often called the country’s most violent prisoner and — thanks to his knack for setting off riots and engineering hostage situations — its most expensive inmate.
But in “Bronson,” a stylized film biography by the Danish director Nicolas Winding Refn, this tabloid legend is above all a kind of performance artist, a savage showman for whom, Mr. Refn said, “violence is the brush and life is the canvas.”
This may seem like an overly romantic way to portray the life of a man who has been held in solitary confinement for a total of some three decades. But when Mr. Refn, 39, identifies Bronson’s aggression as a perverse means of creative expression, he is, in a sense, speaking from experience.
“I used to think art had to be a destructive medium,” Mr. Refn said over lunch in Manhattan recently. “When I began making films I was 24. It was like punk rock. Everything had to be destroyed.”
Angels Of Anarchy
Still crazy after all these years
The first major international exhibition of surrealist art by women in more than 60 years opens in Manchester. It was worth the wait
Above: Dora Maar, Sans Titre, 1934, photomontage–a woman famous as Picasso’s muse, but not as an artist in her own right
Angels of Anarchy: Women Artists and Surrealism26th September to 10th January 2010, Manchester Art Gallery
Women are often the subjects of surrealist art: dismembered, deliquescent, with doors in their stomachs, breasts for eyes and so forth. More elusive, however, are women as proponents of surrealist art. Lee Miller and Frida Kahlo are the star names; general surveys of the movement also tend to include a few individual works by women–Meret Oppenheim’s Object (a teacup, saucer and spoon covered in fur, 1936), Leonora Carrington’s shock-haired Self-Portrait (1938) with rocking horse and Eileen Agar’s sculpture of a scarf-shrouded head, Angel of Anarchy (1936-40). But, as a new exhibition in Manchester shows, there are many more heroines of surrealism who have been sidelined from the canon.
The alpha males of surrealism are among the best-known names in 20th-century art: André Breton, Salvador Dalí, Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Man Ray, Joan Miró. So why haven’t we heard of Emmy Bridgewater, whose influence on the British movement was—according to the French critic Michel Remy—as powerful as Dalí’s in France? Search for her name in the British Library and there is only one return, a flimsy exhibition catalogue. And why haven’t we heard of the devoted lesbian stepsisters of Jersey, Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore? They fought the Nazi occupation of the island with a campaign of subversive propaganda, some of it in rhyme. Yet instead of getting the Hollywood biopic they clearly deserve, they tend to be discussed only in journals of gender studies.
Spelling Bee Tonight @ Diane von Furstenberg’s (to benefit the Council of Literary Magazines & Presses)
Notable New York, This Week 10/26 – 11/1
ROZALIA JOVANOVIC BIO ↓ · October 26th, 2009 · filed under BOOKS, FILM, MUSIC
In New York this week, James Frey and Maira Kalman at the CLMP Spelling Bee, members of The National collaborate with visual artist Matthew Ritchie in The Long Count at BAM, Sherman Alexie and Chuck Klosterman read, Guernica Magazine turns 5, Literary Death Match returns to New York, and Lawrence Weschler presents Halloween Wonder Cabinet.
MONDAY 10/26 – Let it Bee – James Frey, Maira Kalman, Victor Lavalle and Francine Prose, among many other savvy writer-spellers duke it out at the spelling bee hosted by the Diane von Furstenberg studio to benefit the Council of Literary Magazines & Presses. Silent Auction 7:00pm. Bee 8:00pm.
When You Marry
“He disliked nearly all… who were the most bigoted adherents of the party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers-out of unorthodoxy.”
LAPD’s creepy Orwellian anti-terrorism ad
Ever get the feeling you’re being watched?
Check out the Los Angeles Police Department’s creepy new public service announcement for its city-wide anti-terrorism iWatch program. The civilian program was launched earlier this month and is endorsed by 63 police chiefs around the country.
The ad features wide-eyed, blink-free residents reciting Orwellian mantras and looking as if they’re about to crawl out of your television like that girl in “The Ring.”
The Greek Mother
Greek Mother: Hello?
Daughter: Hi Mom. Can I leave the kids with you tonight?
Greek Mother: You’re going out?
Daughter: Yes.
Greek Mother: With whom?
Daughter: With a friend.
Greek Mother: I don’t know why you left your husband. He is such a good man.
Daughter: I didn’t leave him. He left me!
Greek Mother: You let him leave you, and now you go out with anybodies and nobodies.
Daughter: I do not go out with anybody. Can I bring over the kids?
Greek Mother: I never left you to go out with anybody except your father.
Daughter: There are lots of things that you did and I don’t.
Greek Mother: What are you hinting at?
Daughter: Nothing. I just want to know if I can bring the kids over tonight.
Greek Mother: You’re going to stay the night with him? What will your husband say if he finds out?
Daughter: My EX husband. I don’t think he would be bothered. From the day he left me, he probably never slept alone!
Greek Mother: So you’re going to sleep over at this loser’s place?
Daughter: He’s not a loser.
Greek Mother: A man who goes out with a divorced woman with children is a loser and a parasite.
Daughter: I don’t want to argue. Should I bring over the kids or not?
Greek Mother: Poor children with such a mother.
Daughter: Such a what?
Greek Mother: With no stability. No wonder your husband left you.
Daughter: ENOUGH !!!
Greek Mother: Don’t scream at me. You probably scream at this loser too!
Daughter: Now you’re worried about the loser?
Greek Mother: Ah, so you see he’s a loser. I spotted him immediately.
Daughter: Goodbye mother.
Greek Mother: Wait! Don’t hang up! When are you bringing them over?
Daughter: I’m not bringing them over! I’m not going out!
Greek Mother: If you never go out, how do you expect to meet anyone?
Cat Rant
Why Vegetarianism Has Never Really Caught On With The Canucks
from Peter H.
Shelly Nicole’s Blakbushe Has Come To Kick Me’Shell Ndegéocello’s Fender Jazz Ass (and Tracy Chapman better watch her back, as well)
“Semi-disturbing inner tension that is tough to ignore.”
Minjae Lee is a young South Korean artist whose work expresses a semi-disturbing inner tension that is tough to ignore, even if you feel that you’d like to. It draws you in with its powerful colors, halting imagery and clever juxtaposition of beauty, innocence and fragility with brash, loud and aggressive.
Rodrigo Corral, Professional Boxing Fan, Feted
School of Visual Arts alum Rodrigo Corral is responsible for some of the most memorable book covers of the past few years. The red-splashed silhouette for the cover of Junot Diaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. That beautiful sprinkled-covered hand on the cover of James Frey’s A Million Little Pieces. Those fuchsia lips on the cover of Chuck Palahniuk’s Snuff. His visuals stick with you as much as the story.
You can check out more of Corral’s work as part of SVA’s The Wilde Years: Four Decades of Shaping Visual Culturethrough November 7th, and view a slideshow of select pieces featured in the show here>>
1. Do you believe that less is more in graphic design?
No, at least not conceptually. I don’t like overly decorated work, but can appreciate design that is layered with multiple ideas, especially in books.
2. Have you ever designed a cover you loved for a book you hated? If so, did it make you feel deceitful?
Hated? Have I designed covers for books that felt less than completely new and fresh? Sure; but it’s my job to give every book the best possible chance out there on the shelves — strictly visually speaking, and I shouldn’t judge their literary merits. It does feel pretty good to work on books I love reading though.
3. Have you formed any friendships with authors because of your work — particularly with someone like Palahniuk, who you’ve worked with more than once?
Not many friendships because I don’t generally work directly with the authors, but there have been many instances of mutual respect, and I’ve received some very generous letters. I have watched some fights (professional boxing, of course) with James Frey, which has been fun.
Grendel Came From Arkansas
Wal-Mart outdiscounts Amazon and retailers
Effect of online price war could have wide impact
By By Ashley M. Heher, Associated Press, Saturday, October 17, 2009
CHICAGO — Taking a page from its original playbook, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. launched a full-fledged price war with Amazon.com Inc. and a nation of book retailers, lowering online prices on certain highly anticipated hardback titles to $9.
The volley of discounts, which began Thursday when the retailer listed prices for some upcoming hardcover releases such as Dean Koontz’ “Breathless” and Stephen King’s “Under the Dome” at $10, was answered with a similar price cut by Amazon, the largest online bookseller. Then the two competitors lowered the prices even further to $9.
The book discounts, the latest in a series of aggressive online maneuvers by the world’s largest retailer, could position the company to do to the online marketplace what Walmart stores did to local merchants decades ago.
Sunday Morning Kozmik Reggae
Freeze Over At Frieze
Cunning After Caution at London Art Fair
LONDON — Business is booming in at least one remote corner of the Frieze Art Fair here.
As Stephanie Syjuco, a San Francisco artist, talked to collectors on Wednesday, she busily wrote out invoices and swiped credit cards, all the while keeping an eye on a group of young artists who were diligently working at nearby tables. One of them, Claudia Djanbbari, was molding self-hardening clay into a coffee-table-size version of a South Korean artist’s version of a Jeff Koons’s “Balloon Dog” sculpture. “I’m making a copy of a copy,” Ms. Djanbbari said.
The buyer, Mimi Brown, a collector who is based in Hong Kong, happily paid $243 for the miniature third-generation knockoff. The second generation, a commentary on the Koons work by the Korean artist Gimhongsok, was fashioned out of trash bags and cast in resin. It is prominently displayed at the Kukje Gallery stand, priced at $50,000. One of Mr. Koons’s original “Balloon Dog” sculptures sold for around $20 million two years ago.
“I love having conversation pieces,” Ms. Brown said, adding that her purchase seemed only appropriate, “coming from Hong Kong, the land of fakes.”
One Always Must Have A Compelling Story
American Artifact
American Artifact Chronicles Rock Poster Art’s Long, Strange Trip
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In 2004, Merle Becker quit her corporate television job at MTV to pursue a growing fascination with rock posters. Soon, she was traveling across the country interviewing artists such as Stanley Mouse, Art Chantry, and Tara McPherson. “My initial intent was to find out why so many artists are drawn to doing rock posters,” says Becker. “I also wanted to tell a clear story of the history of the art form.” The result is American Artifact, a documentary that has been making the festival rounds and premieres tonight in New York at the Royal Flush Festival.
The film chronicles the rise of American rock poster art, from the skeleton and roses posters created for the Grateful Dead and the birth of silk-screening to grunge and the off-kilter whimsy associated with contemporary bands. “It is my hope that this film causes people to see ‘lowbrow’ art in a different way,” notes Becker, “as beautiful pieces of art that are also valid statements about the cultural changes that America has seen throughout the years.”
Always a huge music fan, Becker was inspired to make American Artifact after encountering Paul Grushkin and Dennis King‘s coffee table tome Art of Modern Rock. “I was not only blown away by the artwork, but I was also surprised that nobody had done a film about its history and the current rock poster art movement,” Becker tells us. “I really had no idea that modern rock posters were being done, and until that book, I thought that the ’60s rock poster art had marked the end of that medium.” She soon found her way to GigPosters.com, “and the rest is history.”
Read on for more from our interview with Becker at MediaBistro.com.
Pulp Fiction via Google Wave
Stephen Elliott Interviewed by James Frey
Of Murder and Memory: Stephen Elliott’s The Adderall Diaries
In the latest edition of the Gawker Book Club, we have Stephen Elliott discussing his murder potboiler-cum-memoir The Adderall Diaries with special guest interviewer Gawker special correspondent James Frey . They’ll be dropping in comments around 12:30pm. Why not join in?
Stephen, author of the novel Happy Baby, describes his seventh book this way: “The book is about a murder story I was following, that led me to another murder trial, and also about my father’s murder confession. That’s a lot of murder. But ultimately, all the confessions were false, so in some ways it’s really a book about truth and identity and how the lie mixes with the truth like red and yellow paint and it becomes orange, and you can never change it back to red or yellow. At one point this was a true crime book, but it became a memoir, and if I boiled it down to one thing I would say it’s a book about writing and being a writer.”
Once Upon A Time In The Den
She’s Got The Looks That Kill
Nevada Man Gets 2.5 Years In The Pen For Killing Alleged “Puppy”
Nev. man to jail for killing neighbor’s puppy
Oct. 12, 2009 03:01 PM, Associated Press
RENO, Nev. – A Nevada man has been sentenced to up to 2½ years in jail for killing his neighbor’s puppy.
Daniel Thomas Wells earlier pleaded guilty to a charge of “killing an animal of another” in the beating death of the 6-month-old chihuahua in May.
Washoe County Deputy District Attorney Derek Dreiling says the case was elevated to felony status because there was evidence of malice. He says Wells had been drinking, had a bad day at work and ended up acting inappropriately when the neighbor’s dog got on his nerves.
Future Tacos
Gourmet Gone
Farewell, Gourmet: A Look Back at Ten Tasty Covers
“Stopped to buy sandwich (no time to eat today),” Twittered former Gourmeteditor-in-chief Ruth Reichl from the Newark airport on Wednesday afternoon. “And the woman behind the counter said, ‘I’m so sorry; this one’s on me.'” We’ll have the rest of our lives to look back in hunger at Gourmet, the 68-year-old Conde Nast title that was shuttered on Monday along with Cookie, Elegant Bride, and Modern Bride (fear not, brides, there’s still Brides), but we thought we’d take this opportunity to remember some of our favorite covers. First up, the last cover (at left, October 2009), a blood-red candy apple with a wooden stake through its heart—OK, maybe we’re projecting. And at right, the March 2009 cover that imparted a humble sandwich with the dreamy grandure of a Richard Misrach beach photo.
Fuck Buttons Ready To Pop
Fuck Buttons
Brighton Audio
There is a crackle of anticipation in the air before Fuck Buttons take the stage: the sense that the audience feel they’re about to see a band on the brink of great things. You couldn’t accuse the Bristol duo of relentlessly chasing success.
If you call yourselves Fuck Buttons, it’s pretty clear you’re not angling for a guest appearance on The X Factor – a state of affairs further underlined by their sound, which, on their debut album Street Horrrsing, offered that legendarily radio-friendly cocktail of distorted synthesisers, tribal drums and screaming.
And yet there’s a genuine sense of momentum building behind their forthcoming second album, Tarot Sport, on which producer Andy Weatherall seems to have removed some of its predecessors’ less palatable edges, without sacrificing any of the band’s visceral power. They play almost all of it tonight, and it sounds hugely impressive: vast, corrosive swathes of electronic sound, weirdly euphoric melodies and clattering rhythms, somewhere between dance music and an electronic take on Mogwai’s surging power.
Standing at opposite ends of a table laden with equipment and old children’s toys, Andrew Hung and Benjamin Power look utterly lost in the music they’re creating, their heads bobbing frantically, their eyes locked in contact, though it would be wrong to say there’s nothing in the way of performance: Power has developed an impressively baroque way of playing a drum, with much elaborate flinging of the arms skyward.
