SHUDDERING NOISE MACHINE

We finally got here.

2008-11-04T23:31:00.002-05:00

Whistling

2008-11-04T17:45:00.000-05:00

I have been walking around all day whistling Hail to the Chief...

In the meantime...

2008-10-28T22:21:00.000-04:00

...enjoy this photograph (which may seem vaguely familiar to some of you).

New video piece coming very soon

2008-10-28T22:10:00.000-04:00

You may have noticed that things have been very quiet here lately - there is good, and I hope justifiable reason for this. I have been hard at work on a video piece that I hope to debut here in the next day or two, depending on my confidence in my ability to let go of the thing.

Once I finish this monster I hope to be more active on this here blog once again.

Keep your eyes peeled kids...

Proposition 8, or A Disaster for Equal Rights

2008-10-18T23:19:00.000-04:00

I just wanted to write a brief post about Proposition 8 in California, a measure on their ballot this November that would "Eliminate the Right of Same-Sex Couples to Marry", as the very title of the initiative indicates, by altering the California state constitution.

I believe wholeheartedly that the movement to extend equal rights to the lesbian and gay communities is the primary battle being fought in civil rights in this country today, with the possible exception of the battle over immigration policy. Furthermore, I feel that this conflict will be key in defining whether we are a moral people who treat all of our citizens with respect and dignity or whether we allow the battered ideology of a shrinking but powerful alliance of religious crackpots and "family values" touting hypocrites to consign us to continuing moral imbalance as a nation.

Frankly, I am fighting mad that some people have so much god damned time to piss away that they would put a proposition on the ballot to end the hard fought and briefly enjoyed equality and happiness of their fellow Americans. That is un-American. Sarah Palin recently mentioned that she likes to come speak in the "pro-America" parts of our country. I say that every person who would actively seek to support a sick measure like Prop 8 is at root un-American, anti-American and hostile to the very things that make us great as a country.

In particular, I would like to call out those in the Mormon Church who have recently taken a forceful stand in favor of this measure. Have they forgotten their own history? Do they no longer remember what it is like to be the target of hateful attacks and inequality? If not, why would they seek to inshrine inequality in the law?

I know that this measure does not have any direct affect on the majority of those of you who will be reading this, either because of geography or imagined inapplicability, but I argue that this measure is a mar upon the soul of our nation and we all have a responsibility to do what we can to fight it, while we still have a chance. I may not be a gay man, but I feel that I am my brother's and sister's keeper, and certainly as a citizen have a right to stand up for the rights of my fellows. I am certainly as much a steward of the rights and dignity of my comrades as of my own. Therefore I am pledging that I will make a financial contribution to the fight against this ill conceived and backwards measure. It may not be a lot, but it will be something. I urge you, good reader, to do the same, here, or elsewhere. And if you happen to be a Californian, I urge you to do even more - actively volunteer your time to fight this battle for the soul of your state, and ultimately, our country.

Last Debate Liveblog!

2008-10-15T20:20:00.000-04:00

11:08 pm
One more note - for those commentators on CNN who are saying that Obama's performance was "flat" - what do you want from the guy - should he run laps around the table flailing his arms in the air, or would McCainian scowls and snorts suffice? Far from being "flat", he was serious, even toned and behaved like an adult, nay - like a President.

I love how these pundits have to back up and change their tune when the snap polls come out, after they have been spewing "informed" opinions for 30 minutes.

Anyway - goodnight and thanks for joining me one last time.

10:27: pm
McCain's closing remarks:

Change, last 8 years bad, reform, long record. Spending. Trust, tax dollars. Institutions of government. Long line of McCains have served.

Obama's closing remarks:
Tough times, tough problems economic crisis. Failed policies, same failed politics. Fundamental change. Brighter days ahead. Middle class, businesses, lift wages, grow our middle class. Not easy, not quick, dems, reps, indies come together.

Like I said, Obama wins!

10:23 pm
Now - will there be closing statements?

10:19 pm
Halfway through McCain's answer on the education thing. This debate has followed the same pattern, overall as the last two: McCain comes out swinging, gets worn down trying to score a knockout punch against an superior opponent, who bides his time and whips McCain in the second half with a tsunami of details and and soaring vision. McCain once again comes off as embittered and desperate to attack, although not quite as bad as last time, and Obama comes off as calm, collected and affable.

Obama wins again!

10:16 pm

Last question? This one has gone fast!

10:15 pm

McCain gets into Obama's record on votes pertaining to partial birth abortion. Obama swats the criticism down.

Obama is our best hope for turning our backs on the bullshit of the culture wars and I hope that he makes a point of helping us do so as President.

McCain is full of trite attacks and cannot equal Obama's vision on this or any other issue tonight.

10:12 pm
McCain says he will never and has never applied a litmus test to a Supreme Court nominee. Crazy baseland is not happy right now...
Obama pivots after delivering a great Judicial Nominee response to the equal pay issue and puts the fight to John Sidney McCain.

10:06 pm
"Senator Government" I love it!

10:03 pm
"Joe - you're rich. Congratulations."

How weird that McCain would make light of this issue which is so fucking hard for so many of us to contend with. Because our jobs don't offer benefits. Or because our insurance agency screwed us over. Or because we have suffered catastrophic illness. What a jackass.

10:00 pm

Joe the plumber is the most courted voter in America right now. And his job? Clearing turds from clogged johns. I love this country! Only in America!

9:57 pm
I want Obama's healthcare system. Now. Do we really have to wait till he is in office?

9:56 pm
McCain raises the specter of Herbert Hoover, thereby raising memory of his history obsessed performance from debate number one.

9:54 pm
I have given up on trying to interpret what about Obama's statements please/displease the men in CNN's focus group who are driving the line meter thing. It sometimes seems random.

9:52 pm

Obama speaks capably on international trade agreements. McCain compliments him on his eloquence and goes on to attack him for not traveling to Columbia. After having attacked him earlier in the year for traveling to Europe and the Middle East. After having suggested that he travel to the Middle East. Erratic indeed.

9:46 pm

"why does he always want to spend more?"

Well John, if you want to solve problems YOU HAVE TO INVEST IN PROBLEM SOLVING. Cutting taxes won't solve everything always.

9:45 pm
McCain wastes his time attacking Biden.

9:44 pm
A coy sidestep from Obama on whether or not Pallin would be able to capably step in as A number 1.

9:42 pm
According to McCain, Pallin is "a role model to women"

HAHAHAAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!

9:36 pm
Obama confronts the Ayers thing head on as well as addressing ACORN. I wish he had mentioned McCain's prior affiliation with ACORN.

I think McCain started this debate strongly, but has wallowed here too long. This topic will mark a turning point in the debate, as it shows that the McCain we have seen recently is the McCain we will have in our memory for the next three weeks, due to this debate.

9:35 pm

The CNN people line meter thing seems more volatile tonight and generally more sympathetic to McCain (whereas in the last debate it seemed more sympathetic to Obama).

9:33 pm

Obama brought up the "palling around" phrase. So much for McCain's vaunted fighting spirit. And McCain goes on to defend the people who come to his rallies. Thereby missing Obama's ultimate point, that we need to be discussing the issues.

9:29 pm
Obama pivots back to the issues, as everyone said he would and puts the townhall thing away.

9:28 pm
Unless I missed something, McCain did not directly confront the Ayers thing.

9:26 pm
McCain feels hurt Rep. Lewis.
And then proceeds to whine about a number of other things.

9:25 pm

McCAIN - GIVE UP ON THE TOWNHALL BULLSHIT. THAT WOULD NOT HAVE STOPPED YOUR VITRIOLIC LIES, STOP KIDDING US.

9:24 pm
This is the most spirited debate yet.

Now we get the question about mud-hurling - Schieffer even mentions Ayrers. Let's see what happens...

9:20 pm
"If you wanted to run against President Bush you should have run four years ago" - McCain. Let's see what Obama comes back with on this...

9:19 pm

McCain brought up the planetarium again! He really does hate science.

Obama: "Earmarks consist of one half of one percent of the budget." Bravo!!!

9:17 pm

McCain brings up Hillary first.

9:14 pm
McCain is clearly on the offensive, yet again tonight.
This format is far better than last week's.
The moderator asks about what the candidates expect to cut and McCain will doubtless launch into the old "porkbarrel earmarks" routine.

9:12 pm
McCain comes back with by quoting Obama as having said to Joe the Plumber that he wants to "spread the wealth around".
Obama's rebuttal is clear and calm.

9:10 pm

Obama remarks that Joe the plumber had probabaly seen McCain ads and makes clear that McCain and him have major differences on taxes. Clearly he was ready for this.

9:07 pm

Wow! Did you see McCain STARING with huge, blinky eyes at Obama? It was like someone trying to stare at the sun!

McCain brings up the plumber in Ohio. And addresses him directly. Not bad!
Let's see how Obama addresses this smart little ploy...

9:06 pm
So McCain starts by trying to peg the economic swan dive on Fannie May and Freddie Mack - in other words, the Democrats, if you follow the logic of wingnut "thought".

Interestingly, he did not clariify, so that one was coded for the base.

Obama starts by addressing the concerns of the middle class, and by getting very, very specific.

8:20 pm

So. Here we are awaiting the last of these debates and I am overjoyed that I won't have to go through another one of these for the next four years, but a bit saddened as well, since I have had such a good time opining in real time up here.

One note - I know a guy who is doing TV work up at the debates and I told him he ought to dial in a narrow Q peak at 2kHz on the feed coming from McCain's mic, in order to induce auditory fatigue in the listeners.

On second thought though, McCain's content and style of address do enough to turn off the public - he doesn't need any help from a creative application of EQ.

So here is the question we have all been wasting our time with: will McCain bring up Ayers and if so how will Obama handle it?

The correct answer: who cares!

Subanswer: if he does, he is toast.

I look forward to hearing their respective closing statements most of all and hope that we don't have a repeat of last week's god-awful moderation.

See you at 9:00...

Some old paintings

2008-10-14T20:59:00.001-04:00

Now that the two art events I have been relentlessly hyping have commenced and happened (I mean, respectively, the Train Car Project show and Memory Cloud - see my prior posts below) I have had the leisure to document some of my older work, which I am hoping to rework, recontextualize and reinvestigate in the coming months, via the magic of Finalcut Pro and Logic Pro 8. Expect me to post the results of this undertaking.

In the meantime, I would like to introduce you to some of these older specimens so that those of you who are unfamiliar with my recurrent motifs and aesthetic methodology can see where I am coming from. Above is a painting called "Megatrops", based loosely on a carved wood sculpture of the the same creature.

The following are from a series called "Strata and Vortices" that I painted about three years ago (I can't believe it has been so long!), a few months after taking a life-changing trip out West to, among other divine places, the Cascade range of volcanos in Oregon, Washington and California.

Above is a typical work from this series.

Here is one of the last in the series, as the series currently stands.

And one last one, a favorite of mine.

I will give y'all one last image today, a strange piece, which consists of a frame with a painting in it, which in turn has a frame in it. This frame itself holds a painting. This inner painting depicts a scene in which a frame of sorts either delineates a window, a painting or a mirror - I am not telling which. I call this painting Three Generations.

More to come, but this is it for tonight.

I will liveblog the last debate tomorrow as Barack Obama drives the nails even deeper into the coffin of John McCain's campaign - feel free to join me. I will try to post some more older work as well.

Thanks for looking.

Shuddering Noise Machine

Art, art and politics

2008-10-09T21:43:00.000-04:00

Hello world!

I will be back in Brooklyn tomorrow again for the opening of the Train Car Show (see below) which today was featured on the website of everyone's favorite magazine, Juxtapoz! This is a big deal, folks and you should show Scott Albrecht, the man behind the show lots of love by showing up at Papa B tomorrow, Friday, October 11th, 2008 AD for the opening. The address is 907 Broadway, Brooklyn, NY 11206 and the time is 7:30 pm.

My friend Steve has informed me via secret electronic-mail and textual messaging communiqués that the Memory Cloud installation in Trafalgar Square has been going swimmingly! He said that they have been getting a great response to the project and were interviewed on the BBC. Not only that, but the weather guy did the forecast from their installation! I love a world.

FLICKR GALLERY HERE.

I have been brewing up all kinds of political observations all week that I intend to write about, but I have been pretty busy, so y'all will have to wait till next week for them. I would like to give you all succor, if you, like me, have been irked at the cable news (and presumably network news) coverage of the bullshit Ayers allegations. Tomorrow the Legislative Council report on Troopergate will come out and in advance of this, we have the following doozy from the New York Times:

D O O Z Y !!!!

The McCain/Palin "campaign" will doubtless not cease their pathetic and ungrounded attacks, but will also have to go into a defensive crouch here and the media narrative with regards to all this nasty stuff will roll over to scrutiny of Troopergate. I think that the McCain camp was basically throwing up flack in an attempt to confuse the matter when Troopergate inevitably came back around.

I doubt that the Ayers rubbish was really moving too many undecided voters, but the facts of the Troopergate scandal, as they will be laid bare tomorrow will at least undermine any attempt to shiv Obama over whom he supposedly associates with, and the allied issue of "judgement". I mean, COME ON!! McCain picked this malicious clown as his running mate! You want to talk about guilt by association and poor judgement? There you have it, in a nutshell - a wingnut, to be precise.

Hopefully all of this will clear the air so we can get back to discussing real issues, for instance, our current economic apocalypse. I, however, won't be discussing them in this forum this weekend, so if you want my opinion you'll have to come to Brooklyn or New Jersey, folks. On that note, bye for now and have a fantastic weekend!

Shuddering Noise Machine

BREAKING: SCARY DINOSAUR ATTACKS BROOKLYN!!!

2008-10-08T20:44:00.000-04:00

Here is my contribution to the GARGANTUAN Train Car Project show, put together by my dear friend and personal hero, Scott Albrecht under the auspices of his design and art collaborative, Process. You can see Scott's terrified reflection in plexi as he struggles to swallow his fear long enough to snap a photograph.

The show is being hosted by a gallery called Papa B in Brooklyn, NY. If you are in town make sure to come by to help fight the good fight against the dinosaur menace! Also come by to dig the art, live DJs and good company.

(NOTE FOR DEVOTED READERS: this show is the one I mentioned some time ago when I said I was up in NJ to build 32 picture frames, one of which you see depicted here, barely containing the fearsome theropod threatening the page mounted within its bounds.)

I hope to see you there for the opening, at 7:30 pm!

2nd Presidential Liveblog

2008-10-07T21:02:00.000-04:00

Thanks to anyone who may have watched this with me...

10:36 pm

As I said earlier, OBAMA WINS!!! And even if you disagree with that, certainly not a game changer for McCain, therefore leaving Obama unscathed!

10:33 pm
McCain's closing remarks were vague and feel-good - no attacks, surprisingly.

10:33 pm
"What I don't know is what the unexpected will be."

You DO know all about tautology, however, Senator McCain.

10:32 pm

Obama delivers an impassioned closing remark.

10:26 pm

Is it me or has this debate been tilted toward foreign affairs in a fashion that does not pay heed to what the nation is currently contending with?

As I said earlier, I hate you, Brokaw.

10:19 pm

I am so impressed by the way Obama took control and proceeded to demolish McCain that I can't even pay attention. Unless something else HUMUNGOUS happens tonight, game over, OBAMA WINS IT AGAIN. That was a knockout blow, as far as I am concerned. This basically ends the campaign with respect to Iraq and foreign affairs generally.

10:15 pm

McCain is on the defensive! His ploy to throw bombs from the safety of the format has BACKFIRED BIGTIME!!!! The CNN response meter is deadlined in response to his explanation of his "Bomb Iran" and the rest of his garbled answer.

10:14 pm

Obama is taking him to task! Best moment so far. Let's see if this gets under McCain's skin...

10:13 pm

Three cheers to Obama for standing up to both old, irritable white men sharing the stage with him!!!

10:10 pm

"My Hero is a guy named Teddy Roosevelt" I thought it was Reagan?
At any rate, McCain's populism is doubtful and his naked, loud bellicosity is not in any doubt, whatsoever.

10:07 pm

"... I stood up to Reagan, my hero"
YIKES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

10:03 pm

On the war, Obama delivers a home-run of an answer, although not a grand-slam like in the last Presidential debate.

10:00 pm

McCain tries to make the judgement argument on whether or not to go to war, thereby setting himself up for a beating by Obama. Let's see what Obama says...

9:59 pm

McCain's jokes are pretty lame.

9:53 pm

Whatever the relative credit of their arguments, just taken as arguments devoid of the personalities presenting them, taken in the context of this debate I have no sense that McCain actually gives a shit about the policies he is promoting, while Obama seems to mean it, and in a very serious way, which is sometimes his downfall, with respect to tone.

Furthermore, I cannot imagine that McCain would give a damn about someone like me, and I daresay you.

9:52 pm

"One hand giveth, the other hand taketh away" - an effective turn of phrase here.

9:48 pm

"That one" - McCain, you are a creep. You are a horrible old man and are basically a bullying meathead. Your new campaign strategies have amply demonstrated this and your referring to another Senator, who is five feet away from you as "that one" reemphasizes your disrespectful and unbecoming attitude and demeanor. President? You don't deserve to be a Senator.

9:44 pm

"...and all of that!"
I think McCain just had a senior moment!

9:42 pm

I hate you, Brokaw.

9:41 pm
"Our wonderful Ronald Reagan"
Clearly, the McCain people took note of how the little CNN meter got a small bump (or "hard on", as I like to say) every time McCain mentioned the Gipper...

9:40 pm

BROKAW: YOU ARE A GAWD DAMNED IMPEDIMENT TO CONVERSATION. STOP TAKING YOURSELF SO FUCKING SERIOUSLY. WE WANT TO HEAR THE CANDIDATES, NOT YOU.

Barack, McCain is obviously adept at lashing out and using the format as a shield against rebuttal. I am happy that you keep on pursuing him, but perhaps you need to do the same.

John McCain, I look forward to seeing you relegated to the dustbin of history, along with Sarah Palin.

9:35 pm

McCain's analogies are so bizarre - he will present a slightly disturbing image, like "nailing jello to the wall" and then not carry through with it.

"Senator Obama's secret" - there is the meme that Tweety over on MSNBC has been hinting at as JSmcM's MO.

9:30 pm

McCain is more comfortable in this format, without a doubt.

9:23 pm

This format is irritating. Brokaw is not the ideal moderator for it, to boot.

9:19 pm

Obama feels a bit professorial on this, I hate to say.

9:18 pm

Do you think anyone really cares about your little letter, Mr. McCain? People have real problems these days and want answers, not solutions. A rhetorical flop, if I ever heard one?

9:14 pm
"Not surprisingly" Hooray! Creating the impression that McCain cannot be trusted on the facts with respect to his opponent, and in essence making this an extension of their prior engagement. A good, solid rhetorical gambit.

(yes, I am blowing up the importance of a passing phrase, but such are the building blocks of a rhetorical strategy that operates beneath the radar)

9:12 pm
I am tired of the "mainstreet"/wall street dichotomy - the point of this crisis is that the two are interwoven, nay blended in their very substance.
McCain goes on the attack - no surprise there, although if he sticks to it, it may backfire on him in this national mood.

I wonder if Obama will play defense again and otherwise keep on target with the economy, or will he go on the offensive?

9:10 pm
Obama goes Pallin on it and basically ignores the question, taking the opportunity to talk policy. Good, it was a dumb question.

9:09 pm
McCain lauds Warren Buffet, an Obama supporter. Is he going to use the "hold my opponent close" that Obama employed so slyly in their last matchup?

9:06 pm
A competent response from Obama, and McCain glances on energy independence as a prelude to playing rhetorical hopscotch, going from tax cuts to the national debt to home values. That was confusing, John!

9:02 pm

I was dreading having to listen to John McCain tonight, but find myself now excited to see and hear from Senator Obama.

Let's see how this debate format works out - wow no chance for an opening statement from the combatants.

I'm back!

2008-10-07T18:43:00.000-04:00

Here I am, after a weekend in New Jersey and Brooklyn, New York, where I celebrated my birthday with a boatload of my favorite people. If you came out to celebrate with me and are reading this, know that you are made this a really great birthday for me!

So. This will be a busy week here - I will be writing about my dear friend Scott's massive and fantastic group-show, the Train Car Project, that is opening in Brooklyn this Friday (be there - I will). I also will be doing another piece on the astounding Memory Cloud installation that my comrade Steve Spyropoulos is currently prepping over in London, which will begin tomorrow in Trafalgar fucking Square! But tonight its all about politics.

I will once again liveblog the debate - I hope I can devote more of my attention to it tonight than I could for the Veep debate. In a way, I don't regret not being able to closely watch the Biden-Palin showdown, even though I was looking forward to it, since anytime I have to sit through her schmaltzy act for an extended duration I start to bleed from my brainstem.

Not that McCain's performance has much of a better effect upon me, but then again, he has yet to wink at me.

So come back shortly and join me for this thing a little later this evening...

Memory Cloud Interview

2008-10-02T23:24:00.000-04:00

Hello - sorry to any of you who might have bothered to keep track of my liveblog a little earlier - it was a busy night and I could not really focus on it. Alas...

However, I have a special treat for you all.

My friend Steve Spyropoulos passed along to me a BBC Radio interview with his brother and collaborator, Theo Spyropolous on the theme of their Memory Cloud installation coming soon to Trafalgar Square, London.

I, being a Minimaforms fanboy, set the interview to a slideshow of images from their last large scale installation, the incredible Smoke Signals installation from Brisol, UK and mixed in some weird audio manipulations for a few seconds in the beginning for the hell of it.

Here is a link to the video, as hosted by Youtube, and here is the site for this mind blowing project.

Cheers, y'all - I am off to Jersey and New York City for the weekend to celebrate my birthday with family and friends, so keep it real in the meantime and expect a flurry of blognation when I return.

Veep debate liveblog

2008-10-02T21:03:00.000-04:00

10:21 pm
Biden poors his heart out with GENUINE EMOTION and Palin comes back with more fake self-aggrandizing braggadocio about being a gawd d a m n e d maverick. Again.

10:07 pm
So basically, all this bullshit that the media has been up-chucking at us for over a week about how Biden needs to take it easy on her because she is a delicate flower is completely irrelevant to the debate that I am seeing. I love being right. See my earlier post on this matter (more or less).

10:02 pm
"bosniacs" - Joe Biden
HA! I like it...

9:55 pm
Pete here notes his disgust for Palin's perma-smile and we all agree...

9:54 pm
"Huge blenders in the world"

9:44 pm
"Let me say that again."
BIDEN!!!! YOU RULE THE SCHOOL!!

9:42 pm
The Woman meter just maxed out on CNN during Biden's discussion of the war.

9:39 pm
Famous Dinosaurs notes here that Palin seems REALLY uncomfortable discussing homosexuality.

9:35 pm
her passive voice here is telling...

9:29 pm
"East coast politicians..."
She's really preaching at the base.

9:21 pm
"The ultimate bridge to nowhere"
I don't know if I am more in love with Joe Biden or Gwen.

He is trying to get under her skin to make her defend herself, instead of John McCain.

9:18 pm
Palin defines patriotism as the impulse towards small government. Her neo-conservatism is positively baroque.

9:14 pm
"I'm gonna ignore the moderator because I am not good with questions..."

Way to go Gwen! Cut her off!

9:12 pm
Biden is better about staying on the attack. They are both pretty focused.

9:10 I am already sickened by her cutesy phrases.

9:09 pm
American's DO want something new, Governor!

9:08 pm
Joe Biden gets on the attack.
Hey look! Palin is willing to look at her opponent!
But she's on a team of mavericks who put partisanship aside. Like in all her winger speeches.

9:03 pm
"Can I call you Joe?"
Hello microphone...

AGGGHHHH!!! No time to do anything!!! This liveblog will be like swiss cheese because this place is a zoo right now...

Is Sarah Palin a ringer?

2008-10-01T18:42:00.000-04:00

I figured that I would confront this possibility before the debate on Thursday, so that I would have the pleasure of saying "I told you so" if it turns out to be the case and to make you giggle with me at the notion of it otherwise.

So imagine that Sarah Palin is in truth a deeply informed and completely articulate debater and a powerful and original thinker who can reframe the conservative cause with fresh and brilliant arguments, like a twenty-first century William Buckley. Could it be that she faked abject incompetence for all those interviews and has been ejaculating weary bromides in her interviews, speeches and other appearances in an effort to spring upon Joe Biden the most unexpected debate ambush of all time? What a demented Rovian prank that would be.

The fact is that in footage of her debating other contenders for the 2006 Alaskan governorship she is calm and collected and generally seems comfortable with the issues and with herself. What this should tell us is that she is capable of putting forth a solid showing.

On the other hand, her recent behavior in public venues suggests that in the heightened context of a neck-and-neck presidential campaign where the issues are clearly new to her she is out of her league and her recent fumbles are the result of discomfort and poor preparation. In the roundtable discussion of the footage I have linked to above (thanks to the man, nay - the legend behind The Army Ants for the link) the tone is contained, even when discussing contentious material like abortion in the case of rape. The atmosphere is one of civilized discussion between people who are largely discussing the mundane business of state government. This is a far cry from the role she has been thrust into of defending the record and future intent of a complicated politician with almost a thirty year record on manifold issues and attacking a man who has led an impeccable life and stands for immaculate principles. She seems more or less adept at defending her own views in a sincere fashion (I know little of her tenure as governor and will not comment here upon her abilities in that capacity), but is not capable of taking to heart the talking points that her newly appointed neo-con tenders have been feeding her and spewing them back to us convincingly. She is by turns stiffly false and catastrophically sincere.

I would also suggest that Palin is not capable of faking her recent flubs in order to purposefully lower expectations for her performance on Thursday. But if that is what proves to be the case, you heard it bandied about here first.

MEMORY CLOUD

2008-09-30T20:02:00.000-04:00

I have the pleasure this evening of writing about an artist who I had the privilege of studying alongside some years ago at the Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University, where we obtained our BFA's, made some art and indulged in some high-jinks.

Steve Spyropoulos is a designer who's day job currently brings him every morning to the obscure and provincial isle of Manhattan, a small body of land somewhere off the coast of northern New Jersey, where Steve hails from. He slings pixels all day long as the Design Director for heavy.com until he can return to his secret headquarters, far flung back across the Hudson River, where he coaxes brilliant design and art concepts forth from the ether and, in collaboration with his London based brother, architect and all-around genius Theo Spyropoulos, brings them to bloom in forms more glorious than we have the right to perceive. Minimaforms is the name of Theo and Steve's design partnership and I urge you to take a gander at their website.

Between October 8th and October 10th of this year Minimaforms will bring their signature work, an installation formerly referred to as Smoke Signals, but here reborn as Memory Cloud to Trafalgar Square, right in the beating heart of London, England. They have been sponsored in this endeavor by the Institute of Contemporary Arts.

The installation gives the public the opportunity to shape its content by providing a number, to which anyone with a mobile phone may send a text message. This message is then projected, using extremely powerful data projectors through a blast of smoke, which reveals the text of the text while inflecting and distorting it according to the whims of the air current and the powers of any nearby deities.

I am so happy to see these two creative whirlwinds bring forth their unimpeachable and sublime artwork in a venue that is large enough and prominent enough to suit their immense talent and bottomless potential. This will not be the last that you hear of them, rest assured. I only regret that I am unable to get over to the UK to see this installation with my very eyes, although I devoutly pray to what gods there may be that it comes stateside so that we Americans may take succor from our humble woes in its magnificence and partake of an opportunity to join our will and wit with the breath of the wind.

Veep debate expectations BS

2008-09-29T20:49:00.001-04:00

One more political post, since I got all pent up, not being able to post here this weekend (my, have I taken to this quickly!):

I am deeply offended by the outright drivel being shoveled at us in the traditional media about the upcoming Vice Presidential debates. Specifically, I resent the way that the so-called professionals in the field of political reporting are sucking down and regurgitating (so we can enjoy it too) the Cool Aid with respect to Joe Biden's need to avoid beating up on Sarah Palin, since she is a woman.

Obviously, Joe Biden should avoid being dismissive, pandering, condescending or rude to his opponent, but not because he will be debating a woman. He would need to avoid acting in such a fashion whether he were debating a woman, a man or a transgender person. Obama v. McCain showed us last Friday evening the value of acting like a decent and basically generous participant when seeking to convince an audience during a debate, and the pitfalls of acting like a cantankerous and mean crank.

Ultimately, to inject gender into this is unfair to Sarah Palin (never thought I'd be typing those words) and turns a blind eye to whatever gains the feminist movement has actually managed to bring to our soul-crushingly obstinate and retrograde culture. It is not the above observation that is the worst problem here, but the notion that Biden needs to hold back from revealing the full extent of his knowledge so as not to seem like a know-it-all or come off as overbearing as compared to his female opponent. In other words, we are told he should dumb himself down in order to avoid coming off as unfairly gifted or qualified as compared to Palin because she cannot represent herself competently in this venue, being a woman, or something along those despicable lines. This strange warning to Biden works from the fucked-up premise that a female debater needs special protection against the virile mastery of her male opponent. Not only is that a false (and awful) premise, but it undermines the very justification for holding these things: to allow the contenders to show their knowledge, wisdom and judgement in a context that will reveal these qualities in an unscripted light and to let them air their differences. If Biden has to hold back and not display his chops and talent why bother having the debate?

Sadly, I think that McCain's proxies are playing this reprehensible gender-based argument up so that they diminish anyone's expectations for her to do well and put Biden under immense scrutiny. Clearly they don't believe that she can compete on her own merits. What a bizarre position for the standard bearers of the party that has opposed affirmative action as unfair on the very grounds by which I have criticized this "warning". What this serves to reveal, if I may follow this tangent for a moment, is that their embrace of this argument most likely is a convenient shield for some more ugly opposition to affirmative action: old fashioned bigotry. ...as if we didn't already know...

Why, at the end of the day, are they so unconfident in their own candidate's abilities that they are resorting to such a perverse strategy to shield her from getting a fair assessment as a debater? It is because she is inexperienced and lacks the appropriate level of expertise to justify her candidacy. I think she will reveal this without Biden's help on Thursday. She may prove to be a fantastic debater - she certainly can level barbs with great authority, but whether she will convince anyone is a different matter and should be taken completely apart from whatever her gender may be.

By way of closing this post out (and I really resent that I even HAVE to discuss this whole ridiculous matter - thank you John McCain for leading a campaign that would employ this kind of unsavory methodology) let me remind all of you that Joe Biden has plenty of experience debating women - he was in many debates with Hillary Clinton and no one made the claim that she needed to be treated with kid gloves. This meme, that Biden will be debating not the other vice presidential candidate but the woman vice presidential candidate needs to die and it needs to die right here, on this spot because it does nothing to ennoble our progress as a nation and it will blind us to the merits of those who we so desperately need to judge with clear eyes and clear minds this Thursday.

In case you were wondering

2008-09-29T19:31:00.000-04:00

So, just in case you were wondering (because I know you were) about my perspective on the Wall Street crisis and the contentious wrangling in Washington, D.C. I am now ready to go on the record:

I have little pity for those avaricious bastards who brought us to this point by first lobbying the Federal Government to deregulate their little corner of the world (with the eager help of Phil Gramm and John McCain) and then by behaving in a totally undisciplined and perverse fashion as they made greedy deals and granted subprime mortgages with no thought of the long term consequences. I think that seeking justice for those in their number who broke the law and capping the salaries and bonuses of those CEO's and other executive officers in their outfits who would participate in a federal program designed to help their corporations get back on their feet is A MORAL ISSUE. Whether or not we act correctly on these matters says a lot about our status as an ethical culture. Likewise for those regulators who managed to not regulate the horror-show.

However, that all may have to wait. I think that the most important thing right now is to do whatever it takes to re-infuse the market with liquidity, which is the mysterious quality that the experts on television have assured me is necessary to get credit flowing again. Do I want to see the bastards pay? Yes. Do I want vengeance at the expense of a sound economy? No. Therefore I am in favor of what is being called the "bail out plan", as it was presented to the House of Representatives earlier today, the very same one that was defeated by a fairly narrow margin. I was not happy to see that many promised features were lacking, like direct attention to the agony of the common people who have fallen into the abyss in these hellish days and sufficient actions taken to prevent the future floating of those storied Golden Parachutes, but I am willing to forego those features for the time being in order to allow that something gets done.

If we think that this is bad now, just keep delaying and we will see the meaning of bad. And in a demented way, my evil libertarian heart knows we deserve to reap the boons of our infractions against common sense and wants to see the bloody end of our current way of life as it collapses into a wreckage of poverty and each-man-for-himselfmanship. But my sensible mind says this should not be so - if we are a civilized people we should be capable of taking reasonable action to save ourselves from our own bad behavior.

Each side is currently pointing fingers at the other, and are doing so in an attempt to malign the ideology of their opponents, hoping to score a critical blow that may help their cause this November. The Republican say that this would be another manifestation of librul tax-and-spend policies, on a grand scale. The Democrats point to the Republican's corrosion of regulatory safeguards that were justified by the unassailable dogma of the free market and note that the unholy alliance between the Republican Party and the Wall Street fat cats who they are now so careful to malign.

I say ideology is all fair and good, but who gives a rat's ass when Rome is burning? Of course no one would be happy to put their name on the deal as it emerged in a rosier economic time, and no one can justify this kind of action with any kind of sensible ideology, but sometimes real life calls on you to grant your ascent to unpleasant things that work. Or may work. But in any case have a better chance of working than doing nothing at all. Or cutting the capital gains tax, again.

So, in conclusion, I condemn those members of the Congress who today voted against the bill, against their better judgement, to score political points or attempt to ensure their re-election. In the grand scheme of things, who cares about them and their political careers? Can't they see that the economic life of the nation they serve is at stake here? And if they voted against it because they really believe that their ideological objections or grasping unto small details were so important, than they may need to consider life outside of practical politics and in some more theoretical field, such as Political Science or talk radio. No one needs to like it, we just need to get it done.

****

One more thing: I think that it has been a grave rhetorical mistake on the part of Congressmen, Congresswomen and Senators who knew they would have a stake in getting to a workable solution here to call this, even in its earliest and most hideous manifestation (steaming fresh from the Bush Executive Orifice) a "Wall Street bail out". Yes, it attempts to get at the situation by addressing the problems affecting Wall Street banking entities first and foremost, but does so in order to protect and heal the American economy as a whole. As for it being a "bail out", who knows what that is even supposed to mean, besides BAD. By allowing such language to float around in the media and in their own language, at least early on, legislators lashed themselves tightly to a depiction of the end product that would have to be a public-image disaster. And all so that they could hold their noses with sufficient contempt, and avoid being associated with the thing. I think it is fair to say that they went a bit overboard in this public display of revulsion. Finally, today we heard some more optimistic terminology to describe the compromise: buy-out, buy-in, rescue and things of that nature. Alas, the damage was already done, and poor rhetorical framing played its part in helping to sink our crappy best hope for avoiding what we ultimately deserve but really, really don't want.

Let us assess...

2008-09-29T18:44:00.000-04:00

SO how did I do with my little liveblog last Friday?

(And sorry if you've been checking this thing over the weekend - I currently don't have internet access where I live and therefore cannot update this on days of the week that start with "S".)

Well, I was, for the most part, dead wrong about my prediction that Obama would come out swinging in a fashion that we have not seen before. He played it cool and remained amiable throughout - to great effect, I might mention. This is why (if I might borrow a line of reasoning we often see Markos from Daily Kos proclaim) Obama is the candidate and I am not. While I would have had him dig in to McCain in a vicious fashion, he knew that laying back and acting with Presidential dignity was the right thing to do in this debate.

On the other hand, this same aspect of the debate made good one of my other predictions: that the two would be jockeying for contrasts of leadership style, here embodied by style of debate itself. We know what Obama was striving to project, but what was McCain attempting to do by acting like a rude and aloof curmudgeon? Was he behaving like that for tactical reasons? Or was he actually unable to look at his opponent or address him in personal terms?

Also, did I just use the word "tactical" when I really mean "strategic"? Maybe I don't really know the difference? Perhaps John McCain can tell me if he finds a link to this on the google.

Well, I don't want to linger on this debate anymore, since at this point it seems like ancient history, but I would be remiss if I did not thank any of you who were actually reading this during the debate or glanced at it later. At some point towards the end I looked to see if there were any comments and I found that my friend Sam had been checking it out, which delighted me in ways I cannot explain and made it seem more worthwhile, since I knew that I had an audience of at least one.

I will most likely try to liveblog the veep debate on Thursday, so stay tuned for more irritating emails and Facebook announcements urging you to give a damn!

Liveblog!

2008-09-26T19:41:00.000-04:00

10:37 pm
OBAMA WINS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

10:31 pm
"American blood and treasure"
Great. McCain was a "maverick", but now he's a pirate.

10:23 pm
no mention of Putin's head rearing up so far...

10:14 pm
McCain is pretty giggly... do you think he is high?

10:13
The seal joke was a little bit funny, but a defensive stroke.

10:10 pm
Obama pounces on the Kissinger reference. What's with McCain and the history lessons tonight? People say Obama sounds professorial sometimes, but McCain is coming off like some weird History Channel obsessed cretin.

10:01 pm
Obama just schooled McCain in how to nail a bracelet anecdote to the wall.

9:55 pm
AN EPIC SWEEP OF HISTORY IN REPLY TO JIM LEHRER"S QUESTION, FROM ALEXANDER THE GREAT TO THE SOVIETS IN THE '80'S.

9:51
Did anyone catch sight of the "GOP watch party" on CNN? Not to state the obvious, but those people were all positively ANCIENT!!

9:47 pm
Obama cuts through Mc's crap on funding the troops by clarifying that they each supported different plans - Obama's had a timetable, Mc's did not. A classic gambit/lie on McCain's part, tossed aside by Obama's clear explanation.

9:44 pm
"John, you like to pretend like the war started in 2007" Brilliant! Getting under McCain's skin...

9:38
HE CALLED HIMSELF A MAVERICK!!! WHAT A SELF REGARDING CREEP!!

9:38 pm
"ORGY OF SPENDING"!!!!!!!

9:34 pm
"You're using a hatchet where you need a scalpel" Best line yet. And the Iraq line too, finally a shot at McCain's very heart.

Keep it up...

9:28 pm
Obama comes up with a litany of hopeful proposals that will bring us forward and McCain...
CUT SPENDING!!! That's his answer to everything. And why? So we can cut the capital gains tax again and again and again and give more money to big oil...

9:22
Did McCain just open himself to a brutal reaming on the definition of "rich"? Is Obama gonna take this shot? Or does McCain have some sort of pre-made, canned reply?

9:21 pm
You can sense the animosity now, but still nothing great. Lots of attacks coming from McCain but he is preaching to the base

9:15 pm
Its gonna be Big Bad Spending versus Big Bad Taxcuts. Lets see who can bust out of the old boilerplate rhetorical model first and land a real punch...

9:14 pm
This format seems rigid, but we will se what happens as we get on a roll.
So here is where McCain snipes at his party and tries to get some separation from his ally, G.W.B. In other words he tries to co-opt Obama's thunder.

9:06 pm
McCain, I'm glad you haven't been feeling to great lately, being buffered and all by your millions of dollars and scores of homes and cars. You must have had some investments go south...

9:05 pm
Obama tears into him confidently.

9:03
We'll see how silent the audience keeps.
And with a minimum of BS, we are off and running (J.L rules)

9:00 pm
here we go.
For what its worth, I am watching PBS (but keeping an eye on CNN).

8:49 pm
About expectations:
McCain? Who knows, who cares.
Obama: We did not see his full potential in the primary debates, inasmuch as he was trying not to bleed his opponents (mainly Hillary) too much so as not to damage his party's chances in the Fall if he lost the nomination race. (She didn't return the favor, to a great degree, IMO.) Expect to see a more brutal debater than you remembered, so in other words forget everything you know about Obama as a debater.

8:28 pm
So the talking heads on TV are bloviating about what they think is about to happen in Oxford, Mississippi and I figure its a good time to start my babbling and blathering here.
From what I understand (and I may be wrong) this thing is still centered on foreign affairs. See my earlier entry about why this hurts McCain in the grand scheme of things and consequently why he tried to bail on this thing or delay it till next Thursday (conveniently bumping the Biden-Palin tango).
It seems to me that as a consequence of the intent focus on the economy right now there won't be major substantive proposals brought forward in this debate - why stick your neck out when you don't have the opportunity to score big as a result. This debate will be about leadership style, even more so than normal. Expect to see both candidates jockeying for contrasts that show them in a good light tonight. And regardless of the expressed focus on the greater world expect lots of allusions to the economic trails of our humble nation.
check back for more from me when this beast gets galloping...

So I figure, what better way to kick off a blog that has virtually no readers (and I am bursting with gratitude and affection for those of you who ARE reading this) than by liveblogging the debate, or attempting to do so.

Let's see how long I last....

A strange moment

2008-09-26T11:16:00.000-04:00

This is one of those odd moments in politics when you have to step back and be a little bit in awe of the scope and scale of the uncertainties that confront us, whatever your partisan inclinations. Will this bailout happen, and whether it does or doesn't, what effect will it have on the Presidential election, never mind the close House and Senate races throughout the country? Which party will do a better job playing this to their advantage? Such is the kind of question we must ask in this volatile moment.

The obvious antecedent here is the government shutdown in 1995, where Clinton and Gingrich went head to head over the budget. As I remember it, Gingrich went in with a boatload of political capital leftover from his Contract with America coup from the previous fall and the resulting legislative tangles and came out of it deflated. Clinton whipped him and he never recovered.

But who could have predicted that outcome at the outset or at any point in the middle of that crisis? This is such a moment.

We are seeing what some have called "political theater", but just because it is theater and has a large element of artifice does not mean that it is anything less than deadly serious. We are really betting the farm on this one...

From my sketchbook

2008-09-25T18:30:00.000-04:00

So I have gotten into this odd habit of erasing my drawings, not because I am unhappy with them in part or in whole, but because I am interested in finding the frontier of just how little information is necessary to convey a likeness or information. I try to see how little I can put down or leave (having draw plenty) without either totally negating the thing or without blinking, so to speak. This steer skull, appropriate for out current moment, I think, is one example of this practice. I stopped short (or "blinked") and didn't take this back as far as I could have, but I think you can see what I mean, if only in a vague way.

Here is an example of putting down as little as necessary in the first place to form a definite and recognizable image. Thanatology is, of course, the study of death. Perhaps this second grim image is (both in its hinted-at icon and in its expressed theme) appropriate for where we find ourselves this day as a nation potentially at the cusp of hell. Sometimes it is a necessary rhetorical tool to hint at or imply something, or hide beyond five syllable words in order to safely handle a powerful theme. Whisper and encode, lest your icons blind and deafen you.

Train Car Project

2008-09-25T14:42:00.000-04:00

So, as I mentioned in a post from yesterday, one of my close friends, the talented designer Scott Albrecht, has put together a fantastic show which will be opening on October 10th in Brooklyn, NY. For this show Scott marvelously silkscreened a red train car on countless scores of creamery off-white paper and generously distributed these to artists throughout the wide world and in particular to graffiti artists so that they might modify and paint upon the cars in any way they desired. They proceeded to make magic happen. Scott also distributed digital files of the train cars for those artists who were inclined to work in the Realm of the 1's and 0's. This show collects and brings to your attention the diverse work of these many artists in a single venue, and represents two years of hard work on the part of Scott and his design outfit Process.

I recently was in NJ helping Scott concoct some 32 picture frames for the non-digital pieces and I hope to post on that endeavor soon. We were helped in this work by two living saints, our good friends RJ Calabrese and Mr. Mike Alfono (take a bow, boys). I was also there to deliver my very own contribution to the show itself (hint: think extinct meat eating reptile).

As I mentioned, this will be opening soon in Brooklyn and to celebrate the opening and culmination so much effort there will be what I am modestly calling The Mother of All Art Openings. Details to come, stay tuned...

JOHN McCAIN, DON'T MAKE ME COME DOWN THERE AND DEBATE YOU MYSELF

2008-09-24T19:30:00.000-04:00

What a bold faced political ploy to try and cancel a presidential debate under the guise of putting aside politics. Let me reveal to you the actual motivation behind this pathetic gambit:

John McCain's polling numbers rise when the dialogue is centered on foriegn affairs and warfare, inasmuch as this is seen as his strong suite. This actually begs the question as to whether or not he has any worthwhile policy suggestions or general ideas in this field, but the traditional media have allowed him to take a pass on any real scrutiny in this area, supposing that his credentials are beyond dispute. What a joke. But here is the point:

John McCain was depending upon this debate to bring his "strengths" back front and center. When he and his advisors realized that they would have their moment to shine overshadowed by economic disaster, they opted to try and put off that debate so that he could get the most bang for his withered buck.

Were there other calculations that helped him arrive at this miserable decision? Sure, but I think this was the core motive.

Do I have any expertise here or inside information? No. But call it a hunch...

So, should the debate go on? If possible, yes! Obama should do everything in his power to make it clear that he is ready to go, no matter what the theme, which I am certain he is. Any sign of hesitation here will deny Obama the opportunity for a moment of contrast on the intangible matter of "leadership style". If McCain wants to play politics deny him the opportunity to do so and rob him of a opportunity to profit from his accident. Play hard ball here, Obama.

If there is a consensus that the debate should go on and center on economic woes, Obama should enthusiastically embrace this proposition as well. Remember - this is a moment in which Obama needs to capitalize on his momentum, not hunker down on John McCain's terms .

(cross-posted at Daily Kos: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/9/24/195041/368/849/609345)

Gouache

2008-09-24T18:22:00.000-04:00

Formerly, I despised gouache, having used it a little bit, here or there, about ten years ago, back in art school. However, I have recently fallen in love with this medium, as a means of getting some color on the paper with the least possible hassle and without the plastic quality and subtle glossiness that accompanies acrylic (who I still love with all of my bastard heart). I started using gouache again in order to create a piece (NOT PICTURED HERE) for a show that a close friend of mine is having. More on that soon, including images and links, etc......

For now, enjoy this delicately perverse abstraction, created by yours truly not-so-long-ago.

Hey now

2008-09-24T17:04:00.000-04:00

Let me, by way of introduction, lay out some of what I'd like to talk about here. I will be discussing art, politics, music, and whatever else pleases me to discuss. When I say art I mean mostly my own, but also that of my friends and colleagues and the larger art world in general. When I say politics, expect them to be electoral (for now), with a dash of the theoretical thrown in as I continually struggle to negotiate between real life and my fantasy politics. And when I say music I mean pretentious music that you probably find insufferable.

If you are reading this you probably know me personally but if not, thanks for taking the time to suffer through my not-so-adroit musings. Whether you know me or not, feel free to comment and kick up a conversation. Tell me if you like or hate the work I will (hopefully) post. Let's have some fun.

Shuddering Noise Machine