Norwegian artist Egil Paulson:

Kamicarus

Virtuoso Violence

Furioso Deluge

The ever-fascinating Endicott Redux recently posted a video of Ben Okri discussing his approach to writing, in which he says:

“A story is not a beginning, a middle, and an end. A story is much richer than that. A story is almost like an interval in the enchantment of living. Phases of music, that’s what a story really is. It’s not that this happened to this person and then they did that, that’s not what a story is.”

Also word that Jeannette Winterson wrote a children's book!

San Diego scientist-turned-artist Kelsey Brookes:

Hot Tub

Tiger Head

ps - "After much debate, conclusion inevitable: verbs bad."

Firstly, I couldn't believe it when CSP told me, but it's true - John Ashbery has been named Poet Laureate of mtvU.

Secondly, say what you will about Kanye West, the following video, which was officially commissioned by the Louis Vuitton Don, is unequivocally cool. It features Zach Galifianakis and Will Oldham lip syncing the track "You Can't Tell Me Nothing." Enjoy:

Scott Chandler earned his BFA at the Ontario College of Art & Design. The following photos are from two different collections, but share a creepy resemblance:

Untitled #4, Funeral Homes Series

Untitled #2, Hotel Lobbies Series

Untitled #5, Funeral Homes Series

Untitled #4, Hotel Lobbies Series

My brother sent me this great video of Johnny Cash and John Denver playing a duet of "Country Roads," which seems apropos given that Caitlin and I recently spent a week with her family in West Virginia, a place I found to be quite lovely:

Desiree Arlette Holman earned her MFA at the University of California Berkley:

Masks (Conduits of Fantasy) 1

Monster's Mate

Buck

ps - Click here to listen to Charles Bernstein's super fantastic poem "Every Lake Has A House."

Mathias Svalina's new chapbook "Why I Am White" is now alive. You may own it for only $7, if you go to Kitchen Press.

And/or...

For $120 you could subscribe to THE THING, a new object based quarterly publication. Each issue of THE THING is conceived of by an individual artist, wrapped by the editors ( Jonn Hershend and Will Rogan ) and sent to the subscribers. The first four artists creating objects for THE THING are: Miranda July, Anne Walsh, Kota Ezawa, and Trisha Donnelly. It sounds cool, but $120 plus $40 s/h per thing is too much, if you ask me.

A new issue of Lamination Colony is up. In it you'll find a wicked piece by Derek White called "The Colloidal Broth of Brothers." I highly recommend it.

I also highly recommend Michael Jauchen's experimental piece in the new issue of Word Riot, called "Here We Split."

Today I thought I'd share Jan Švankmajer's fantabulous short film, "Dimensions of Dialogue," which he made in 1982. If you are not already a huge fan of Švankmajer, you owe it to yourself to become one:

(Part 1)


(Part 2 - my personal favorite)

My fellow Ohioan Chris Ryniak:

Grant

Martha

Canadian artist Christian Northeast:

Anne Austin Pearce earned her BFA at the University of Kansas and her MFA at James Madison University:

Chains

Texas Back

The handmade collage of San Francisco artist Alexis Mackenzie:

whitebat

headhuntress ii

departure

Legendary percussionist Max Roach died today.

Kris Lewis lives and works in New Jersey:

Promise Broken

Rose Zephyr

Click here to read an interview with Paul D. Miller (a.k.a. DJ Spooky that Subliminal Kid) about Deleuze and Guattari.

Also...

Radiohead has a blog.

Adam Gopnik has a piece on Philip K. Dick in The New Yorker.

Roger Kimball has a piece called "Why the art world is a disaster" in The New Criterion.

Here is a very short film by Florian Gerbaud (the artist behind the curtain at Bats and Swallows). The title is "Vers le premier Radium" and it is said to be about the world and drawings of Corinne Chaufour:

"Do the stars gaze back?"

Caitlin and I went with another couple to see Stardust last night. I have not enjoyed a movie going experience more in many a moon. I vote for Robert De Niro to win an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor, as he plays a role I would never in a billion years imagine him playing. From the opening sequence to the closing credits I was smiling and truly engaged with this film. If you like fairy tales, love stories, pirates, witches, princes and princesses, you'll enjoy this one. It's like The Princess Bride for a new generation.

"I am Fidel Castro and we have come to liberate Cuba."

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

In today's NYTimes, Woody Allen has a piece on Bergman, which is uncharacteristically unfunny. And Martin Scorsese has a piece on Antonioni, which includes a passage that echoes my sentiments from last weekend about the superiority of challenging work:

"I loved Fellini’s pictures and I admired “La Dolce Vita,” but I was challenged by “L’Avventura.” Fellini’s film moved me and entertained me, but Antonioni’s film changed my perception of cinema, and the world around me, and made both seem limitless."

In other super important art news, 50cent says he'll quit solo rapping if Kanye West outsells him. I'm with Weiss, even though I abhor the idea of actually purchasing music, I might just spend money on the new Kanye in order to put Curtis out of business.

& finally...

Here's the work of Amy Ross, who attended the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, earned a BA in Religious Studies from Connecticut College, and a MA in Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School:

Birdshroom 22

SheWolf Series 8

Goat Morel

The work of Norwegian artist Simen Johan:








Also...

It seems that there was an attempt to create a canon of Slipstream literature at this year's Readercon. I'll share the top five works and then if you're interested you can click here to read more:

1. Collected Fictions (coll 1998), Jorge Luis Borges
2. Invisible Cities (1972, trans 1974), Italo Calvino
3. Little, Big (1981), John Crowley
4. Magic for Beginners (coll 2005), Kelly Link
5. Dhalgren (1974), Samuel R. Delany

In the early 90s, German artist Jochem Hendricks created "Augenzeichnungen" (Eye-drawings) in which "human eye movements are traced and digitized during the visual process of looking at something, so as to be able to do an ink-jet print out of these movements":

Hand
left eye/right eye

Time

Nothing

Editorial Comment (by a Ben Marcus sympathizer)


In yesterday's New York Times, A.O. Scott wrote an interesting piece on Bergman and Antonioni. In it, he notes that "The two of them upheld, as filmmakers, T.S. Eliot's observation that "poets, in our civilization, as it exists at present, must be difficult."

I found this line of thinking quite relevant to my particular literary convictions, and then as I continued reading I felt the warm light of recognition:

"There was, among certain filmgoers in the 1960s, an appetite for difficulty, a conviction that symbolic obscurity and psychological alienation were authentic responses to the state of the world. More than that, the idea that a difficult work had special value — that being challenged was a distinct form of pleasure — enjoyed a prestige, at the time, that is almost unimaginable today. We would rather be teased than troubled, and the measure of artistic sophistication is cleverness rather than seriousness."

That about sums up my frustration with contemporary fiction.

I anxiously await the day when others will awake from the stupor and return to the embrace of seriousness and difficulty.

THE CUPBOARD

IS TO ALTERIOR MOTIVES WHAT

A PAMPHLET

IS TO ALTERIOR MOTIVES.

The new issue of America's favorite literary pamphlet is now available for free here. Inside you will find three pieces: one on knickers, one on lovers, and one on clumsy cows. Enjoy.

Because everybody else already talked it to death and because I didn't find it very interesting, I never mentioned Damien Hirst’s diamond encrusted skull called “For the love of God, what are you going to do next?”


But now, I've found something that I think is actually pretty interesting: Subodh Gupta’s 1000 kilo sculpture "Very Hungry God" which is made out of aluminum pots and pans:

If you like post-rock bands such as Godspeed You! Black Emperor or Mogwai or other bands that are good, you will likely like the French group Kwoon. Here is a video for their track "I Lived on the Moon"

Today I share with you the work of Mark Kostabi:

Automatic Painting

The Subjective Mind Over Subject Matter

The Woman At The Window

Finally, for the first time in a long time the U.S. Poet Laureate (aka The White Guy Award) will actually be an interesting poet: Charles Simic will replace Donald Hall.

Of course it would have been nice to see a woman appointed; I can think of four names off the top of my head that would've been excellent choices: Lucille Clifton, Rosmarie Waldrop, Lyn Hejinian, or Rae Armantrout, but since the Laureate position was established in 1937 there's only been 9 women selected, so I guess statistically it's unlikely that they might look beyond the old (typically boring) white guys.

Bad news for white supremacists and postcolonial theorists, looks like all human life did in fact originate in Africa, which means:

1) We are all African.

2) It would be sorta silly to argue over who the true "indigenous" people are and are not.

The Chronicle of Higher Education recently published a piece by Thomas Bartlett about the raging battle over Derrida's papers. Click here to read it.

The new issue of Octopus Magazine is alive, full of prose on poetry action.

My friend Adam has joined the blogosphere.

Time does not exist.

&

In closing, I give you a music video for the Brooklyn disco band Escort's song "All Through The Night":