Wrap your mind around this: If you stick a cross-section of a tree on a turntable, you can play it like a record. Well, it’s not that simple — the process also involves a motorized tone-arm tricked out with a PlayStation Eye Camera and the computer program Ableton Live. But the point is, when given this complex technological boost, trees will reveal the music hidden inside their rings. And it doesn’t just sound like noise, either! German artist Bartholomäus Traubeck has liberated a slow, ponderous piano track from his slice of wood and titled the composition Years. Even if you don’t totally get it (and we admit that we don’t), you can enjoy a video of the tree’s performance after the jump.
Artist and photographer Phillip Toledano’s alter ego is a dictator. See, artists and dictators have a lot in common. Mr. Toledano explains that both “must guzzle an eye-popping cocktail of delusion and narcissism.” Both “must live in a closed loop of self-delusion” where there is no doubt of one’s creative vision. None. In fact, the world awaits in expectation, ready to receive and applaud him. Such is his “gilded daydream of grandiosity.” And so, Mr. Toledano had taken existing political propaganda paintings from North Korea and China and had them re-created in Chinese factories, replacing the Great Leaders with his own image and adding humbling, humorous captions. Meet Kim Jong Phil. See him immortalized in oils as he conducts world domination meetings, performs storied heroics and lectures the troupes: “It’s true. I am utterly fascinating.” Read More »
Jane Austen is one of English literature’s most popular classic authors, among both scholars and general readers. And yet, nearly 200 years after her death, we’re still struggling to put a face to her name. The only two authenticated Austen portraits are this drawing, by her sister Cassandra, and a painting based on that image from 1870, over 50 years after the writer’s death in 1817. So it’s big news indeed that Austen biographer Dr. Paula Byrne may have stumbled upon another portrait of her subject.
As the Guardian reports, Byrne’s husband bought the graphite drawing — thought to be an “imaginary portrait,” with the words “Miss Jane Austin” scrawled on the back — at auction. But the picture dates to 1815, decades before Austen achieved posthumous fame, raising the question of why anyone would have made an imaginary drawing an unknown author. Two of the world’s top three Austen scholars believe the portrait is real, and Byrne hopes that the new image will change the way the world sees the writer, presenting “a woman very confident in her own skin, very happy to be presented as a professional woman writer and a novelist, which does fly in the face of the cutesy, heritage spinster view.” Read more about the portrait and see a larger version of it at the Guardian.
It always feels like we’re pining for more free time during the holiday hustle, but often, when we’re faced with a few days at home to ourselves, we’re too spent to figure out how to enjoy them. Inspired by the release of the all-new Madden NFL 12 from our friends at EA Sports, we decided to spotlight some rewarding holiday activities you can enjoy in your newly discovered down time. Whether you’ve been celebrating Thanksgiving at home this year by choice or by consequence, we’ve come up with ten ways (Madden included) to keep you entertained — and none of them involve stepping foot out the front door. Read More »
This fall, Flavorpill continued its commitment to discovering and creating unique cultural experiences with the nationwide Art of Yoga series. In partnership with Naked®, we brought together members of the Flavorpill community in four major cities to practice yoga at internationally renowned museums. Each installment — in NYC, LA, SF, and Seattle — featured top-notch instructors, captivating DJs, and free admission to the hosting venue, allowing attendees to explore the art when they were finished finding their chi. Click through to check out exclusive image galleries from all the events. Read More »
Today’s sci-fi film posters can be baffling, their shadowy silhouettes lending no clues about the movie’s premise. Artist Dean Walton, aka Mr. Shabba, realized this and set out to create a series of illustrations that utilized the main characters’ outlines in a different, more illuminating way. The result is a collection of five kaleidoscopic works of art that hint at the cinematic narratives of films such as Avatar, The Matrix, and District 9 by recreating scenes from each film’s plot within the main character’s silhouette. Check out Walton’s visually stunning collection below, and purchase the limited-edition prints over at his website.
Using the architecture of Hot Springs, Arkansas’ abandoned Mountainaire Hotel, artist Jessica Wohl created an installation that features a staircase covered in hair. We can reassure you that the locks are indeed synthetic, but the creepy feeling you’re experiencing right now while thinking about trying to climb the staircase is the real deal. Wohl’s love for the uncanny is evident, and the way she’s transformed this rotting architectural space into something sweet (you’ll see why once you get a glimpse of the girly hair barrettes past the break) and sinister is pretty great. Click through for more.
Disney is all about imagination, right? Well, artist José Rodolfo Loaiza Ontiveros has done something imaginative in the silliest of childhood-ruining ways. He’s taken our favorite Disney cartoons and placed them in unfathomable positions. Lampwick enabling Pinocchio’s heroin habit? We always knew that bucktooth brute was bad news. What about The Little Mermaid‘s Prince Eric getting his Sleeping Beauty on with Prince Philip? Sing about that kiss, Sebastian. And we’re just getting started — check ‘em out for yourself after the jump, then visit Ontiveros’s Disenchanted page to find the truth behind Jessica Rabbit’s notoriously juicy lips.
A Florida-based artist is railing against Yoko Ono, accusing the wife of the late John Lennon of making the English musician’s artworks “cut-and-paste mashups” by altering them. The Japanese artist and activist has been selling Lennon’s art over the years, raising money for charities. What many people apparently didn’t know is that she’s also been adding color to various pieces, changing their compositions, and pasting “counterfeit John Lennon chop mark/signatures” on them. Not all the images have been tampered with, but four definitely show signs of alteration. The $5,000 Herd Moving seems to be the most changed, taking ” … a giraffe and a rhino from In His Own Write and [multiplying] them, [flipping] them, and [coloring] them, placing three of each figure in a new work also filled with snakes copied from another composition, three identical elephants (evidently taken from yet another composition), and a monkey swinging from a tree.”
Ono has apparently posthumously forged other works in the past. In 2010, she told some “professional people” in regards to one of Lennon’s pieces that they should ” … at least let [her] color it, because John probably would not have minded it if [she] did it.” Is this compromising the authenticity of Lennon’s work, or merely applying an artistic license the late Beatle would have endorsed? Check out a few of the images in question after the jump.
Our mothers always told us not to play with our food, but perhaps she would sing a different tune if she knew that we could earn money by making logos out of food and posting the results to a blog. Although, chewing gum and spitting it out to make 8-bit portraits of Mario still involves playing with chewed gum, so maybe Mom was right after all.
Even so, it’s still fun to look at Foo-Gos impressive food creations, even if you don’t want to make your own food art after all. There are more behind the jump, but if you just can’t get enough, be sure to check out his extensive Flickr stream.
