Is Graphic Design Art?

A City Renewal Project from Dan Bergeron on Vimeo.

via wooster collective

NOTCOT: Banksy’s Village Petstore & Charcoal Grill from Jean Aw on Vimeo.

This film from NOTCOT’s Jean Aw is great in capturing Banksy’s Village Pet Store & Charcoal Grill.

via Wooster Collective.

Untitled from mudlevel on Vimeo.

via wooster collective.

Things I Have Learned In My Life So Far on TED.

Techno-artist Evan Roth got tired of the passive role he had as a traveler inconvenienced by the excessive airport security post 9/11. His view is that flying would be a lot safer if America “stop being such an international a*****e”. His response: Take a metal plate, stencil and cut out a message - words or an image - place the plate at the bottom of his carry-on bag, and watches the reaction of the TSA employee operating the airport X-ray machine.

via swissmiss.

Nothing seems out of the ordinary when you first look at this clock. upon closer inspection, you may
notice the numbers seem a little high. this is because one rotation of this clock is equal to the average
human lifespan. the clock is an artwork by bertrand planes which uses an ordinary clock slowed
down 61320 times to make each minute equal to a year.

via swissmiss and designboom’s contemporary timepieces.

Abu Ghraib Bobble-Head, Moulded Resin, 7″

U.S. foreign policy gets broadsided with Phillip Toledano’s latest project, America the Gift Shop. In using the vocabulary of retail and specifically that of kitchsy holiday souvenirs, the repercussions of U.S. foreign policy is given a veneer of frivolity but one that barely masks atrocities committed in the name of democracy. Visit the gift shop here.

Banksy’s Kate Moss tops recognition poll ahead of Mona Lisa. Read more here.

As the global economy chokes and sputters, someone spent £10.3 million for Damien Hirst’s Golden Calf - which is essentially a white bullock with 18-carat gold hoofs and horns and a gold disc crown pickled in formaldehyde. Incidentally, Hirst also set the a new record for his 2-day auction at Sotheby’s, London, raking in £111 million. As I was saying, as the global economy chokes and sputters…

via quipsologies.

Anonymous British street artist Banksy appears to be on the move in the US. After making a stop in New Orleans before Gustav did, it is almost certain that he’s making his way through the Deep South now. This piece, which will no doubt ruffle the hoods of the local KKK chapter, was done near Birmingham, Alabama.

via wooster collective.

John Pasche, 1970.

Purchased at the cost $92,500 for the permanent collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum, London. Beginning with Sticky Fingers, Rolling Stones has used this design continuously until today.

“When I was 15, in the North-west of England…. the record cover to me was like a picture window to another world. Seeing an Andy Warhol illustration on a Velvet Underground album was a revelation…. It was the art of your generation… true pop art.” - Peter Saville.

In little more than one square foot, the album cover captured the dreams, hopes and fears of a music-loving generation. If CDs left the record sleeve mortally wounded, downloading has performed the coup de grâce on album artwork. Read more here.

Designer Peter Saville, whose Factory Records artwork included Joy Division and New Order album covers curates Spin: The Art of Cover Design. In this exhibition, Saville has chosen some of the best LP cover art of the past 40 years of work by former students of University of the Arts London.

Before Category 4 Gustav hits New Orleans, Banksy descends to leave his mark coinciding with the 3rd anniversary of Katrina. More of Banksy in New Orleans in this flickr set and the Wooster Collective.

The former Talking Heads frontman and recent collaborator with Brian Eno has designed a series of bike racks for DOT of NYC. See the rest of them here.

Aoki Takamasa’s Mirabeau (from the Parabolica album). Visuals by Ryoichi Kurokawa.

See the higher resolution podcast here.

I had these photos in my inbox since January this year. Thanks to a post on boingboing and coolhunting, I now know that the person behind the work is one Kittiwat Unarrom. He is a trained fine artist who switched to baking truly realistic putrefying human body parts. Kittiwat fashions his creations out of dough and uses chocolate, raisins and cashews to fill in the details that make his work so realistic. Fact is, it’s all edible and tastes like regular bread. His works are sold at his family’s bakery in Ratchaburi, Thailand.

I believe in the power of the imagination
to remake the world,
to release the truth within us,
to hold back the night,
to transcend death,
to charm motorways,
to ingratiate ourselves with birds,
to enlist the confidences of madmen.

I believe in the forgotten runways of Wake Island,
pointing towards the Pacifics of our imaginations.

I believe in Max Ernst, Delvaux, Dali, Titian,
Goya, Leonardo, Vermeer, Chirico, Magritte,
Redon, Duerer, Tanguy, the Facteur Cheval,
the Watts Towers, Boecklin, Francis Bacon,
and all the invisible artists
within the psychiatric institutions of the planet.

I believe in madness,
in the truth of the inexplicable,
in the common sense of stones,
in the lunacy of flowers,
in the disease stored up for the human race
by the Apollo astronauts.

I believe in my own obsessions,
in the beauty of the car crash,
in the peace of the submerged forest,
in the excitements of the deserted holiday beach,
in the elegance of automobile graveyards,
in the mystery of multi-storey car parks,
in the poetry of abandoned hotels.

I believe in the gentleness of the surgeon’s knife,
in the limitless geometry of the cinema screen,
in the hidden universe within supermarkets,
in the loneliness of the sun, in the garrulousness of planets,
in the repetitiveness or ourselves,
in the inexistence of the universe and the boredom of the atom.

I believe in flight,
in the beauty of the wing,
and in the beauty of everything that has ever flown,
in the stone thrown by a small child
that carries with it the wisdom of statesmen and midwives.

I believe in the death of the emotions,
and the triumph of the imagination.

I believe in nothing.
- J.G. Ballard // Autopsy of the New Millennium

Zevs, PARIS.

Inside Outside is a documentary about graffiti evolving. In an interview with PingMag, director Andreas Johnsen said that graffiti is no longer confined to hip-hop culture and tagging.

“A lot of young folks have started to express themselves by writing deeper messages instead of simply tagging.”

Johnsen adds that graffiti also represents how the world is changing.

“There are more kids who want to speak up and maybe they feel that they can’t really do it through regular media. They might be feeling that our leaders keep people down by not telling us the truth. The increase of ads we see on the streets could be another reason too…”

Featuring: ZEVS (Paris), SWOON, KR, EARSNOT (New York City), OS GEMEOS, PIGMEUS (Sao Paulo), RON ENGLISH (Jersey City), ADAM & ITSO (Stockholm, Copenhagen).