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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 [...]
Making an Illuminated Manuscript
In the category of “Things Our Ancestors Did to Humble Us,” this mini-documentary [UPDATE: a little over six minutes long] from the J. Paul Getty Museum: (If you go to the page at the ArtBabble site where I found this, you might also like some of the “related videos” in the right sidebar there.)
Knowing What You’re Looking At
[Image: graffiti artist Bansky visited a subway archway in central London, adding a caption to a wall which just happens to fall within the view of a surveillance camera.] From whiskey river: All men, at one time or another, have fallen in love with the veiled Isis whom they call Truth. With most, this has [...]
Do We Ever Really Get It?
[Image: looking up into the Ring Around a Tree playspace/bus shelter in Fuji, Japan. Click to enlarge; see the note at the foot of this post for more information.] From whiskey river: I always gained something from making myself better, better than I am, better than I was, that most subtle citation: to recover some [...]
