sundance

Book spine art

California based artist Mike Stilkey uses the spines and covers of piled old books as a canvas upon which he paints to form larger, often wonderful images. When asked in a recent New Yorker interview on how he selects the books, Stilkey said:

I consider several aspects of the book when I’m selecting for a painting. One factor is the color of the book cover, another is the material of the cover, and a third is the title of the book and how this relates to the narrative of the piece.

Visit Fecal Face’s Dave Kinsey for more on Stilkey’s works.

One more photo after the jump.

Organic Hip Hop Conference hits Miami this weekend

Quick: think of a hip hop song that addresses urban farming or vegetarianism. You might have a tough time… doesn’t most of the music associated with this style revolve around glorifying gangstas? Not according to the organizers of this weekend’s sixth annual Organic Hip-Hop conference: “Just as Hip Hop as a culture was birthed in activism with the goal of saving lives, we seek to continue in that tradition by providing an alternative lifestyle that will garner better physical as well mental and spiritual health.”

MOCA: the first 30 years

Robert Rauschenberg’s “Small Rebus” It seems crazy that MOCA, one of the most important and influential contemporary art museums in the world has only been around for 30 years, and I suppose it speaks to the ingenuity of its founders that it has made such an impact in that time. To celebrate its 30th birthday, [...]

The Divine 80s

The venerable NYC nightclub 1984 has been celebrating the 80s long before they became chic again. And it still offers a remarkable treat to those of us who spent our formative years in day-glo listening to Duran Duran. Resident DJ Chip Duckett, who also happens to be NYC’s biggest drag queen booker, curates a video show each week worthy of price of admission alone.

Last week he played 6 plus hours of all Kate Bush’s videos. Yes, Kate Bush is an acquired taste. And this week’s videos are even more so: Divine.

LELO reinvents the rabbit.

The dual action–or “rabbit” vibrator–is probably one of the best known sex toys on the market. It’s also one of the most overrated. Most rabbit vibrators are cheaply made, using toxic materials, and running on weak motors that give out long before you’re done with them. But one company is about to change all that. [...]

Solar boat racing provides hands-on learning for students

When you were a high school student, how did you prefer to learn your science: formulas on the board and text books, or hands-on experiments involving building things (or maybe even blowing things up, or dropping items from high distances)? Yeah, I thought so… Southern California’s Metropolitan Water District has provided a hands-on opportunity for kids throughout the area to learn about engineering principles, solar power and electrical systems, and even water pollution and other broad environmental issues through its annual Solar Cup boat races.

Alice Guy Blaché: the first female director

Still from THE OCEAN WAIF (1916) Alice Guy, as she was known, was not only the first female director, but the first director of narrative films – period. At a time when films were being made mainly for scientific or commercial purposes, Alice Guy had the bright idea to tell a story instead. Her first [...]

DOCK ELLIS & THE LSD NO-NO by James Blagden

Brooklyn artist James Blagden created a terrific short film that animates former major league pitcher Dock Ellis’ entertaining narration of his infamous no-hitter for the Pittsburgh Pirates against the San Diego Padres in 1970 while he was “high as a Georgia pie,” or specifically under the influence of LSD. After retiring, he later worked as [...]

Visual history of a New York City block

Inspired by an attempt to learn more about the five story tenement building located today at 218 Eldridge Street in New York City that his great-great-grandfather lived in, Zach van Schouwen created a super cool interactive visual history or “a complete record of the life cycle” of this block located between Rivington and Stanton Street [...]

Pet Shop Boys cover Coldplay

If you were lucky enough to catch the still-going-strong Pet Shop Boys last tour then you undoubtedly remember their glorious cover of Coldplay’s Viva La Vida. It was mixed at the show with their Miami-inspired hit record Domino Dancing. Now word is out that the duo has recorded the mix-up with Madonna record producer Stuart [...]

Chevron sitting in environmental hotseat

American oil-giant, Chevron, has been battling against a 27 billion dollar court ruling from an Ecuadorian court that finds the company was guilty of damaging the environment with its oil drilling operations in the country.

Naked Levi Johnston Is Not Alone

Sarah Palin’s worst nightmare, Levi Johnston, just did his Playgirl shoot, flaunting some of his body parts as unselfconsciously as he tried to show the world the flaws in Palin’s family values. The ex of Palin’s daughter Bristol, Levi’s the one who earlier this year carried out a p.r. campaign labeling Palin a hypocrite and an opportunist who stepped down as Alaska Governor partly because she could make more cash on the lecture circuit.

And where does Levi go from there? Making more cash on the nude magazine circuit! Tacky? Maybe, but it was an inevitable step on the road to reality shows and Seth Rogen movies. And Levi will be thrilled to know that the history of celebrity nudity and semi-nudity reveals that he’s in really good company.

KOYAANISQATSI with Philip Glass

A far cry from those mandatory educational videos we all had to watch in middle school, KOYAANISQATSI (1982) is a film without narrative or plot that BAM is screening specially for students in grades 8-12. And with a new score composed by Philip Glass (who will moderate a post-screening discussion) it’s a shame the rest [...]

Naked News: Belle du Jour outs herself! Plus, cheery sex news from abroad.

• Britain’s most famous — and heretofore anonymous — sex worker and blogger, Belle du Jour, reveals her true identity…turns out she’s a specialist in developmental neurotoxicology and cancer epidemiology. We shit you not. And in case you were wondering, yes she did pay taxes on her sex work earnings.
  
  
• A German drug-maker is putting the finishing touches on a pill that is designed to boost female sexual desire by lowering inhibitions. In other words, yes, it’s all in your head — but don’t worry, we’ve got a pill for that, too!

Gays with beards say a little prayer

I think I am the only queer in the universe who is not going nuts over Glee. It’s not that I have anything against Glee, I just don’t have the time to sit down and watch TV, unless of course, you’re Larry David. I always make time for Curb Your Enthusiasm. But I am always [...]

Interview with Kris Lefcoe, director of TINY RIOT PROJECT

TINY RIOT PROJECT director Kris Lefcoe.

Sundance Channel recently sat down for an interview with Kris Lefcoe, the director of TINY RIOT PROJECT. What started as a music video for a small Canadian band ended up installed at some of the most prestigious art galleries and venues in the world suck as Art Basel Miami, Havana Biennale, and Galerie Tomas Schulte Berlin. Watch TINY RIOT PROJECT at Sundance Channel’s Digital Shorts.

What was the inspiration for TINY RIOT PROJECT?

Lefcoe : A few years ago I had a vision of an army of Care Bears and Coppertone girls attacking kids. I wanted to re-contextualize these sweet and cuddly icons as a bastion of corporate power. I ended up dropping the Coppertone girls and going for more of the Saturday morning cartoon plushies.

Why did you choose stop motion over other forms of animation, even live action?

Lefcoe : Stop motion is just so charming, so endearing. The viewer is drawn into this magical world, it’s irresistible. So it was the perfect medium, a surprising juxtaposition with the violence and political critique in the film. But it’s dangerously addictive. After shooting it, I wanted to shoot everything in stop motion.

Views out the window

Italian artist Matteo Pericoli convinced 63 notable and prominent New Yorkers including Stephen Colbert, Mikhail Baryshnikov, and Junot Diaz (seen above) to permit him to illustrate the window views from their homes or offices for his new book “The City Out My Window.” Am I the only one that thinks only Baryshnikov could get away [...]

A Feminist in Fox’s Clothing? Megan Fox in the NYTimes Magazine

We weren’t sure how or why the sex symbol with diarrhea of the mouth, Megan Fox, got an entire cover article dedicated to her in the New York Times Sunday magazine. Is she really such a cultural force? She’s been in like a whopping two movies (we’re counting TRANSFORMERS I and II as one)! Well, we guess a billion Google searches can’t be wrong. We weren’t expecting to be riveted by the article, but surprisingly there was a ton of fascinating stuff on sex and gender roles — and not just out of skilled profiler Lynn Hirschberg’s mouth. Here are some of the best bits (in case you just can’t bring yourself to read a prettied up version of an US Weekly article):

The Myth of Thanksgiving

Not to be a Debbie Downer but as we near every gourmand’s favorite holiday, Thanksgiving, GOOD Magazine drops by like an unwanted guests bearing some tough truths about this November American holiday of feasting and giving thanks. The popular normative and celebrated mainstream history of Thanksgiving portrays “Pilgrims in brass-buckle shoes being saved from starvation in 1621 by kindly buckskin-clad Indians bearing gifts of wild game and corn.” The first documented mention of such an interaction was a letter from 1961 mentioning a feast with Native American king Massasoit and his men, but as GOOD points out, “the purpose of this letter makes it suspect: It was sent to England to attract more settlers to Plymouth Plantation. Rather than the founding document of America’s a multicultural past, it’s something of a hyped-up real-estate advertisement.” Ah, advertising, the second oldest profession!

FANTASTIC MR. FOX

Finally, a film that lives up to the hype. Not only is FANTASTIC MR. FOX thrilling to simply look at, I think even hard-core Roald Dahl fans will appreciate the liberties Wes Anderson and Noah Baumbach (SQUID AND THE WHALE, MARGOT AT THE WEDDING) took with the story. While it’s not clear what they invented and what they took from Dahl’s original notes, the events in the book occupy the middle of the film with added backstory in the beginning and a more involved and complete ending.

Simon Evans, Everything I Have

Former pro-skateboarder and writer, artist Simon Evans received a lot of buzz earlier this year for his New York City debut at James Cohan Gallery. One work in particular, “Everything I Have” especially entranced many viewers by meticulously detailing every material object the artist possessed using just pen, paper, scotch tape, and WhiteOut.

Marshall University dining: “Hold the trays, please”

If you’ve spent any time looking at the marketing for educational institutions lately, you’ve likely noticed that many schools are working hard to build reputations as “green colleges.” In addition to building green, cutting energy use, and landscaping with water consumption in mind, many colleges and universities are implementing sustainability policies for their food services. Some are composting food wastes. Others are buying locally and organically. A few are even growing their own food.

At West Virginia’s Marshall University, moving towards a greener cafeteria involves… taking away the trays.

The rhyming chef: a foodie rapper

Mix one part chef, one part rapper, and one part the ladies man, and you’ll get Philman George aka The Rhyming Chef. A Canadian-born chef executive chef, George also hosts a cooking show where he humorously weaves love advice for the guys along with raps into his directions on how to cook various plates. I [...]

Two More Suits Filed in Legal War Over Bay-Delta Smelt

The Center for Biological Diversity today filed two lawsuits against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for failing to protect two critically imperiled San Francisco Bay-Delta fish species, the longfin smelt and delta smelt.

Obama and Hatoyama Pledge ‘Success’ at Copenhagen Climate Summit

Meeting for the first time on Japanese soil, Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama and President Barack Obama today committed their governments to “a new era in the global fight against climate change” by shifting to low-carbon growth and achieving “a successful outcome” at the UN climate conference next month.