detail from Blown-Up Blow-Up (blownupblowup.com), 2008
© Constant Dullart
If you haven’t seen Antonioni’s 1966 classic Blow-Up (even more of a shame if you’re a photographer), you might not understand but should still take a look at Constant Dullaart’s latest web project Blown-Up Blow-Up (following, of course, Blown-Up Balloon and Blown-Up Explosion).
See more of Dullaart’s work here.
Popularity: 25% [?]
I have to thank Ofer for passing on the news that Sigur Rós – a long time favorite band of mine – has just released a track titled “Gobbledigook” off of their forthcoming album Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust (English: With a buzz in our ears we play endlessly).
Along with the release of the song, the band has unveiled a music video directed by Arni & Kinski, “inspired by and in collaboration with Ryan McGinley.” McGinley, as you may have noticed, is also responsible for the album art; the cover (above) is an image from his latest series, I Know Where the Summer Goes.
Having listened to it for so long, it’s interesting for me to see Sigur Rós’ music paired with McGinley’s “vision.” Personally, I think the two work quite well together.
Download the .mp3 and watch the music video at high quality here.
Popularity: 25% [?]
Ira Glass, host and producer of This American Life
Last night Ira Glass brought This American Life to the big screen for a one-night only live event. I was able to catch the broadcast at theater in Boston. From his DJ desk, Glass showed some episode previews, outtakes, and took questions from the audience in New York.
I realize the two are entirely different mediums, each with their own strengths and weaknesses, but I’m curious if the television show will eventually begin to overshadow the original radio program. Maybe it’s because I’m a photographer and spend too much of my time in a “visual” world, but there is something especially nice about just listening to the stories.
Anyway, fans, the new season looks great. Both programs are brilliant.
Popularity: 33% [?]
The other day, I was waiting for a friend in Harvard Square and found myself watching the public video art monitor located on the information booth near the T station. What’s shown is really a mixed bag, but I was happy to have timed my visit just right for the screening of a wonderful short film by Ray Tintori called Death to the Tinman. I later discovered that the film won honorable mention at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival. While I couldn’t find an embeddable video of it online, I did come across another great short of Tintori’s titled Jettison Your Loved Ones (above).
If you’re interested in seeing the film that I saw in the Square, you can purchase it on iTunes for just two dollars. I highly recommend it.
Popularity: 32% [?]
If you haven’t heard of the Prelinger Archives, now is the time to familiarize yourself.
Prelinger Archives was founded in 1983 by Rick Prelinger in New York City. Over the next twenty years, it grew into a collection of over 60,000 “ephemeral” (advertising, educational, industrial, and amateur) films. In 2002, the film collection was acquired by the Library of Congress, Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division. Prelinger Archives remains in existence, holding approximately 4,000 titles on videotape and a smaller collection of film materials acquired subsequent to the Library of Congress transaction. Its goal remains to collect, preserve, and facilitate access to films of historic significance that haven’t been collected elsewhere. Included are films produced by and for many hundreds of important US corporations, nonprofit organizations, trade associations, community and interest groups, and educational institutions.
Online, you can view nearly 2,000 of the films from the archive. There really are some interesting things to find on the site; everything from historic material such as Duck and Cover (1951) to “vintage erotica” of a woman named Sheree dancing (first in a tiger-print outfit, then in a bikini) to the top viewed film, Pick of the Pod (1939), “a peek inside the pea processing operations that culminate in Del Monte brand canned peas… With glimpses of 1930s kitchens and images of Depression-era California agriculture.”
Not sure where to get started? Try the Tag Cloud.
Popularity: 31% [?]
Inspired by a totally cosmic conversation about inner and outer space, I give you Powers of Ten!
Hope everyone is having a nice weekend.
Popularity: 31% [?]
Bill Burke passed along an excellent article – the best I’ve read in a while, in fact – titled Robert Frank’s Unsentimental Journey, written by Charlie LeDuff for the latest Vanity Fair. Once you start, you can’t stop (it has a nice humor to it):
Robert Frank, the photographic master, the last human being it’s been said to discover anything new behind a viewfinder, collapsed in a filthy Chinese soup shop and no one had thought to bring along a camera.He looked like something from a Kandinsky painting—slumped between a wall and stool—sea green, limp, limbs akimbo. It would have made a good, unsentimental picture: a dead man and a bowl of soup. Frank would have liked it. The lighting was right.
The article itself is definitely worth reading the rest of, but I want to also pass along Pull My Donkey [the title references Frank’s first movie and important avant-garde film, Pull My Daisy (1959)], a simple film of Frank and and his wife, June Leaf, made by LeDuff in a style inspired by Frank’s own work.
A great little short to accompany the article. Enjoy.
Popularity: 26% [?]
Indeed, this is a “Sweded” version of the actual trailer – meaning Gondry messed up the film reel and had to re-create his own trailer using whatever props he had on hand. Meta film; brilliant!
See the original “official” trailer here if you don’t get it.
Be Kind Rewind opens in theaters tomorrow.
Popularity: 27% [?]
My relationship with the internet is love/hate. Today it’s love… Dr. Strangelove.
Watch the whole film online here (1 hour, 35 minutes).
Popularity: 23% [?]
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