Even though there seems not to have been any snow in the cities, there has been plenty in the hills. So I spent the weekend skiing in Eggedal Norway. Brilliant place!
with some great views…
Normal blogging will be resumed soon…
Images
Pictures, lots and lots of pictures
Flickr has an amazing amount of pictures – last year they hit the 2 billion mark! The pictures are organised by names, tags, groups and more. This makes it one of the more amusing site online to search for the unexpected. Some of the groups are really fun. Some of the interesting ones are the voyeuristic What’s in your bag, moleskinerie, walls only walls and your books…
my contribution to What’s in your bag
Oh, and don’t forget to check out interestingness.
Hearing Aid
“Amplifiers at Bolling Field, 1921.”
Two giant horns with ear tubes, evidently designed to listen for approaching aircraft. View full size. National Photo Co. (via Shorpy)
Eight hours
Eight hours lecturing in two days. My mind is going, my feet hurt, my throat is raw… This is why lecturing is a cool sport.
No energy left for real blogging so I will leave you with this picture of another sign I saw in Brussels…
picture fundamental right by Klang (CC by)
the sign is intriguing since it this was the only fundamental right they seemed to feel the need to inform the passers by about…
Happy Surveillance
While in Brussels I came across the strangest combination of signs, a smiley and a CCTV sign. Is this meant to mean that we should all be happy because of there are surveillance cameras?
photo happy surveillance by wrote (CC by)
The future of street art
A Banksy murial on Portobello road was sold on ebay for £208,100 (approx. $400,000) the price did not include removal costs. The wall belonged to Luti Fagbenle who felt that he could not “really justify owning a piece of art worth as much as it is.”
(Photo by Cactusbones) (CC by-nc-sa)
Street art has been growing for a long time and Banksy must be seen as one of the most widely known artists in the genre. But he is not alone. As Art Threat reports the world’s first Urban Art auction at Bonhams Fine Art Auctioneers will be held on February 5th.
What does this mean for the future of Street Art? Art Threat has written an interesting comment on street arts ephemeral nature as an important feature and Banksy has added a comment on the his webpage:
“Aren’t street art auctions a bit lame?
I don’t agree with auction houses selling street art – its undemocratic, it glorifies greed and I never see any of the money.”
So the artists don’t get paid and the artwork is ripped, literally sometimes, out of their context – how will this effect the art? Previously the most exploitative use of graffiti has been street art photo books. These products raise exciting questions about copyright and graffiti (blogged about this issue earlier here and here) but selling the works raises other exciting questions.
The person buying the work will most probably remove it to display it elsewhere. This de-contextualizes of the art but it also adds a disincentive to the artist. Now it is not enough to know that your work will be painted over but it may also be removed and sold to enrich someone else. Your work may become a commodity to be regularly bought and sold without the artists control or permission. Should the artists be concerned?
The Mexican Suitcase
A cultural treasure referred to as “the Mexican suitcase” lost for fifty years, the legendary Robert Capra, a train station in 1922, the Spanish Civil War, Mexican diplomats, Mexico City… It all sounds like a spy novel but the lost negatives of Robert Capra have resurfaced.
Understanding art for geeks
Paulthewineguy has created a set on Flickr aimed at helping geeks to understand art. In 44 commented pieces of art culture is explained to geeks. Lots of really great examples.
Take a look at the rest of the set…
Tagging the Past
A while back I read about the collaboration between the Library of Congress photo collection collaborating with Flickr and going online. This was interesting but it didn’t get me excited. But when I looked more closely at it I did become excited (insert sarcasm here).
Library of Congress “Italian Artillery in Tripoli“
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.print
The Library of Congress has a Prints and Photographs Online Catalog comprised of over 1 million images (and growing) that have been available online for over 10 years. This is cool but not exciting. It’s not that the pictures are online but the point is to allow everyone to go look at the pictures and start adding tags and comments. This makes the Library of Congress’ collection on Flickr interesting because first becomes a site of huge potential interaction and if this works it will also create a huge searchable database.
This is, of course, very exciting 🙂
