I'm going to start a weekely collaborative poem. I will post a line or two or three and you comment on this post adding/deleting as you feel necessary. Seriously. Anybody and everybody. Go:
I would welcome your handshake
however xxxxxx he’s the money
congratulations for the recovery
cheers to you.doc was recently
undeleted
felicitations!
dot.
hats off!
dot.
well done!
dot.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Monday, April 27, 2009
John Ashbery
taken from this
Q. You are still writing poetry and last fall you had an exhibit of your collages at a Manhattan gallery. Could you please share some lessons of a long life?
A. I go back to Harvard and see all the same buildings and streets and rivers. It seems as though this was only a few months ago that I was there. I don't know that I have really accumulated any wisdom in my fourscore years. I feel as unprepared now as I was when I was a student. I guess I'm just an 80-year-old adolescent. Or 81.
I almost wept when I read Ashbery's answer.
An Ashbery collage:
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Incredible
We've all heard/heard of this band, but seriously watch this entire thing.
Then read this assessment of the band here and tell me what you think of them after you have done both. My impression of the band has definitely changed.
Then read this assessment of the band here and tell me what you think of them after you have done both. My impression of the band has definitely changed.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
music in film
An interesting take on the film industry's Frankenstein approach to adding music to a film in post-production by Will Oldham in an interview (read the interview here):
AVC: You mentioned talking to Richard Linklater and Caveh Zahedi about your ideas on movie music. Can you summarize those ideas?
WO: Well, for a while, it seemed like you were always seeing movies where all the music was determined by the music supervisors and their special relationships with certain record labels. And I just felt like, “Wow, I’ll bet they spent months or years writing this screenplay, and I’ll bet they spent months shooting this, and I’ll bet they spent months editing this, and now they’re spending no time at all picking these completely inappropriate songs with lyrics to put under a scene that has dialogue.” How does that even work? How can you have a song with someone singing lyrics under spoken dialogue and consider that mood-music, or supportive of the storyline? As somebody who likes music, when that happens, I tend to listen to the lyrics, which have nothing to do with the movie. And then I’m lost in the storyline. Not only is that a crime, but it’s a crime not to give people who are good at making music for movies the work. It’s like saying, “We don’t need you, even though you’re so much better at it than I am as a music supervisor.” Like the cancer that is that Darjeeling guy… what’s his name?
AVC: Wes Anderson?
WO: Yeah. His completely cancerous approach to using music is basically, “Here’s my iPod on shuffle, and here’s my movie.” The two are just thrown together. People are constantly contacting me saying, “I’ve been editing my movie, and I’ve been using your song in the editing process. What would it take to license the song?” And for me it’s like, “Regardless of what you’ve been doing, my song doesn’t belong in your movie.” That’s where the conversation should end. Music should be made for movies, you know?
I suppose I can see where Will Oldham is going with this. On the one hand, the music of a film is part of a film's language (yes, film is a language), and it helps set a scene's inflection. When we speak to each other, the inflection in our voices serves the purpose of projecting mood, tone, and feeling. In a movie, however, inflection would be nonexistent in a scene with no dialogue, leaving it up to the viewer to interpret or impose their understanding of feeling onto the movie. This, in and of itself, isn't necessarily a bad tool to use in some cases, at least in my mind. However, what makes a movie successful a lot of the time is how well a movie directs the viewer in terms of the feelings the movie itself is projecting.
It's easy for us to think of using familiar songs as a cop out in a way, but on the other hand, maybe that familiarity is something people like Wes Anderson are using to direct our feelings and perceptions of a movie. I would be hard pressed to find a more appropriate song to put in place of The Beatles, "Hey Jude," when Richie Tenenbaum frees his bird Mordecai in The Royal Tenenbaums. It was comforting and climactic all at the same time because it was so familiar.
I can agree with Will Oldham to a certain extent, but to say Wes Anderson doesn't put enough thought into his films is presumptuous at best.
AVC: You mentioned talking to Richard Linklater and Caveh Zahedi about your ideas on movie music. Can you summarize those ideas?
WO: Well, for a while, it seemed like you were always seeing movies where all the music was determined by the music supervisors and their special relationships with certain record labels. And I just felt like, “Wow, I’ll bet they spent months or years writing this screenplay, and I’ll bet they spent months shooting this, and I’ll bet they spent months editing this, and now they’re spending no time at all picking these completely inappropriate songs with lyrics to put under a scene that has dialogue.” How does that even work? How can you have a song with someone singing lyrics under spoken dialogue and consider that mood-music, or supportive of the storyline? As somebody who likes music, when that happens, I tend to listen to the lyrics, which have nothing to do with the movie. And then I’m lost in the storyline. Not only is that a crime, but it’s a crime not to give people who are good at making music for movies the work. It’s like saying, “We don’t need you, even though you’re so much better at it than I am as a music supervisor.” Like the cancer that is that Darjeeling guy… what’s his name?
AVC: Wes Anderson?
WO: Yeah. His completely cancerous approach to using music is basically, “Here’s my iPod on shuffle, and here’s my movie.” The two are just thrown together. People are constantly contacting me saying, “I’ve been editing my movie, and I’ve been using your song in the editing process. What would it take to license the song?” And for me it’s like, “Regardless of what you’ve been doing, my song doesn’t belong in your movie.” That’s where the conversation should end. Music should be made for movies, you know?
I suppose I can see where Will Oldham is going with this. On the one hand, the music of a film is part of a film's language (yes, film is a language), and it helps set a scene's inflection. When we speak to each other, the inflection in our voices serves the purpose of projecting mood, tone, and feeling. In a movie, however, inflection would be nonexistent in a scene with no dialogue, leaving it up to the viewer to interpret or impose their understanding of feeling onto the movie. This, in and of itself, isn't necessarily a bad tool to use in some cases, at least in my mind. However, what makes a movie successful a lot of the time is how well a movie directs the viewer in terms of the feelings the movie itself is projecting.
It's easy for us to think of using familiar songs as a cop out in a way, but on the other hand, maybe that familiarity is something people like Wes Anderson are using to direct our feelings and perceptions of a movie. I would be hard pressed to find a more appropriate song to put in place of The Beatles, "Hey Jude," when Richie Tenenbaum frees his bird Mordecai in The Royal Tenenbaums. It was comforting and climactic all at the same time because it was so familiar.
I can agree with Will Oldham to a certain extent, but to say Wes Anderson doesn't put enough thought into his films is presumptuous at best.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
song/video of the day
Black Moth Super Rainbow's new album leaked on #it recently. It's called, "Eating Us." It's unbelievable.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Friday, April 10, 2009
Saturday, April 4, 2009
Friday, April 3, 2009
not working at work (after lunch)
I guess I should preface this post by saying my definition of art is NEBULOUS at best.
I was eating the most blah club sandwich of my life about an hour ago when I saw a woman strolling around the campus of the University taking pictures of windows. Incidentally, I saw this same woman taking pictures of the windows of the Wells Fargo building on my way to ingest this blah sandwich. This woman was not taking snapshots. No, this woman was using, what looked to be, an expensive SLR digital camera. This woman was a serious photographer. This woman was an artist. Or so it goes. This means of production, this technology we all brandish says something to me about art and about our generational artistic struggle that is to come.
We take from the earth and syphon it through box after box after box until the product is so filtered and abstracted that there is nothing else to call it but art. And that is alright. Or maybe it is wrong. That is not really my point. Point is, art is becoming less organic and more artificial through these lenses of technology. Automatic cameras, Flarf poetry, lasers, gadgets, robots, etc. I get the feeling that the long standing split between traditional and avant movements (forgive the crude dichotomy, it's just a blog) that have, until the last generation or two, been organically based, is rapidly being replaced with a split between organic (that is, structurally the products of humans, and often times directly influenced with a human hand) and artificial art (that is, products that are influenced largely by an electrical or artificial means). I will accept most anything as art, so what this means to me is largely peripheral (if it's good, it's good. No?). But while I was eating this sandwich I envisioned my generation taking stances on this idea, because let us face it, drama is inevitable with art.
I had a conversation with a roommate of mine about art the other night where I found out she had some very strong feelings about what art is and what art is not. I mentioned Marcel Duchamp (and explained a bit about him and his ideas), and according to her, his creations were not art. Let's say we discount Marcel Duchamp's politics and artistic theory and place a toilet of his in a room. If we know nothing of Marcel Duchamp, is this art to us? Possibly. But because "we" do know something about this man, and because of where this toilet is generally placed, we assume it is art, because what do you call exhibits placed in an art gallery? Is this toilet art because of or in spite of the context in which it is placed and what surrounds it? Where you sit depends on where you stand, or so the saying goes. I guess I can actually see a valid argument in saying that if a piece of art is dependent upon its surrounding, or the motivation behind the artist, then it is not necessarily full art, maybe half art? Kenneth? It reminds me of New Criticism in Literature in that one should factor in an author's biography when analyzing that author's work instead of taking on the text by itself, without a frame of reference. I've always been very suspect of that approach, and assume it is for the same reasons why I am open to the possibility in the argument I just mentioned. As much as I appreciate people like Marcel Duchamp and the ideas he provided us with, I can see where people would be hesitant about it.
Technology seems to be blurring this line of what art is for some people and what art is not for some, even more. I guess it's good art to me if it affects me somehow. Either because of what it projects itself, or what I project onto it. I remember when I thought fractals were the coolest things ever in 5th grade. I guess that was the beginning of my fascination with artificial art that only briefly lifted the curtain on what would become a slight obsession later on in my life.
I was eating the most blah club sandwich of my life about an hour ago when I saw a woman strolling around the campus of the University taking pictures of windows. Incidentally, I saw this same woman taking pictures of the windows of the Wells Fargo building on my way to ingest this blah sandwich. This woman was not taking snapshots. No, this woman was using, what looked to be, an expensive SLR digital camera. This woman was a serious photographer. This woman was an artist. Or so it goes. This means of production, this technology we all brandish says something to me about art and about our generational artistic struggle that is to come.
We take from the earth and syphon it through box after box after box until the product is so filtered and abstracted that there is nothing else to call it but art. And that is alright. Or maybe it is wrong. That is not really my point. Point is, art is becoming less organic and more artificial through these lenses of technology. Automatic cameras, Flarf poetry, lasers, gadgets, robots, etc. I get the feeling that the long standing split between traditional and avant movements (forgive the crude dichotomy, it's just a blog) that have, until the last generation or two, been organically based, is rapidly being replaced with a split between organic (that is, structurally the products of humans, and often times directly influenced with a human hand) and artificial art (that is, products that are influenced largely by an electrical or artificial means). I will accept most anything as art, so what this means to me is largely peripheral (if it's good, it's good. No?). But while I was eating this sandwich I envisioned my generation taking stances on this idea, because let us face it, drama is inevitable with art.
I had a conversation with a roommate of mine about art the other night where I found out she had some very strong feelings about what art is and what art is not. I mentioned Marcel Duchamp (and explained a bit about him and his ideas), and according to her, his creations were not art. Let's say we discount Marcel Duchamp's politics and artistic theory and place a toilet of his in a room. If we know nothing of Marcel Duchamp, is this art to us? Possibly. But because "we" do know something about this man, and because of where this toilet is generally placed, we assume it is art, because what do you call exhibits placed in an art gallery? Is this toilet art because of or in spite of the context in which it is placed and what surrounds it? Where you sit depends on where you stand, or so the saying goes. I guess I can actually see a valid argument in saying that if a piece of art is dependent upon its surrounding, or the motivation behind the artist, then it is not necessarily full art, maybe half art? Kenneth? It reminds me of New Criticism in Literature in that one should factor in an author's biography when analyzing that author's work instead of taking on the text by itself, without a frame of reference. I've always been very suspect of that approach, and assume it is for the same reasons why I am open to the possibility in the argument I just mentioned. As much as I appreciate people like Marcel Duchamp and the ideas he provided us with, I can see where people would be hesitant about it.
Technology seems to be blurring this line of what art is for some people and what art is not for some, even more. I guess it's good art to me if it affects me somehow. Either because of what it projects itself, or what I project onto it. I remember when I thought fractals were the coolest things ever in 5th grade. I guess that was the beginning of my fascination with artificial art that only briefly lifted the curtain on what would become a slight obsession later on in my life.
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