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Life by a Thousand Cuts
[Image: "Webster's New Inner Diction" (2007), by Brian Dettmer] From Neil Gaiman’s Twitter feed, I learned of the artwork of Brian Dettmer. Dettmer uses surgical tools — scalpel, tweezers, and such — to dig down into books and other media (such as cassette tapes), revealing deep layers of what might or might not be meaning in [...]
The Propagational Library (Introduction): The Librarian
[Image: The Beginning of Everything: Remembering Distance (oil on linen, 90 x 180 cm, 2010), by Kathryn Brimblecombe-Fox] That’s what it said (on what would have been the little placard on what would have been his desk — if he had required a desk in the first place): The Librarian.
The Kindness of Every Split-Second
[Image: display window of "mini-prints" taken with the Fujifilm Instax camera (originally from the Photojojo store). See note at bottom of post for more.] From whiskey river: You know what I believe? I remember in college I was taking this math class, this really great math class taught by this tiny old woman. She was [...]
The Absorbing and the Absorbed
[Image: a Menger sponge overgrown with vines, found here. Wikipedia explains how to construct a real Menger sponge, noting -- without elaboration -- that the resulting object "simultaneously exhibits an infinite surface area and encloses zero volume."*] From whiskey river: You know when you see something like a marvelous mountain against the blue sky, the [...]
“I Carved These Places, This Flower, This Bird”… with Gunpowder
From Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang: And then there was Black Ceremony, a recent daytime fireworks exhibition in the desert sky over Qatar, kicking off his exhibit at the Arab Museum of Modern Art:
The Chime of the Moment
[Image: night view of House Attack, a 2006 installation by artist Erwin Wurm -- a real house, turned upside down and embedded in the roof at Vienna's Museum Moderner Kunst (MUMOK). See the daytime look here.] From whiskey river (which, I think, offered an especially rich selection this week): Everything That Acts Is Actual From the [...]
Liquid Assets, Compounded
[Image: "Butterfly Splash," by Alex Koloskov. For more information, including an "e-videobook" tutorial on creating this sort of effect, see the photographer's site, which is where I found it.] From whiskey river (italicized portion): Poem Holding Its Heart In One Fist Each pebble in this world keeps its own counsel. Certain words — these, for [...]
Split and Crazy
[For information about this image ("Mirror Mask"), see the artist's statement at the foot of this page. Clicking on the image above will enlarge it, if you want to experiment.] From whiskey river: This writing stuff saved me. It has become my way of responding to and dealing with things I find too disturbing or distressing [...]
Waking Up to the Unreal
[Image: promotional still from The Troll Hunter, a 2010 "mockumentary" from Norway about -- well, perhaps you can guess.] From whiskey river: Fairy tales were maps formed of blood and hair and bones; they were the knots of the sub-conscious unwound. Every word in every tale was real and as true as apples and stones. [...]
Step by Step, and an Ounce at a Time
[Image: Beast of Burden, a sculpture by Sarah Perry. For more information, see the note at the foot of this post.] From whiskey river: Burlap Sack A person is full of sorrow the way a burlap sack is full of stones or sand. We say, “Hand me the sack,” but we get the weight. Heavier [...]
