Happy Valentine's Day

Feather Installation Bruges

This installation art with feathers was in a church in Bruges, Belgium.

Feather Installation Art, Bruges Belgium

We also got to meet "Mangoboy" who hung where we ate breakfast in our Bruges B&B. I thought it was kinda funny.... like he's running from a tidal wave.

Mango Boy, Bruges, Belgium.

Slowly She Turned Out Good Art in 2009

The blog "Slowly She Turned" has a nice 2009 Retrospective post that is worth a quick view... particularly if you're looking for inspiration.

3304 Miles, 3304 Pictures

Wouldn't it be cool to rig up a camera to take a picture every mile you drove from NYC to San Francisco of what ever happened to be there? Matt Frondorf did it.

As for automation....

"I would count the miles,” he says. “As soon as the thirty-sixth came, I would change rolls, put the exposed roll in a canister, enter its number on a log sheet, take the next one out of the cooler, and insert it. I got to where I could do all that in less than a minute, while steering with my kneecap.”

It wasn't that rudimentary. You can read more about his set-up if you're curious.

Here's a tiny sampling of Matt's photo journey:

Mile Zero - New York City

Mile 204 - Abbotstown, PA

Mile 454 - Stuberville, WV & OH

Mile 1174 - Missouri Countryside

Mile 1504 - Abilene, KS

Mile 2402 - Cisco, UT

Mile 3304 - San Francisco, CA

Sources:

Visit the website for a cool mapped photo album or to watch an automated slide show. He's driven several other routes too. American Mile Markers project by Matt Frondorf.

Iraq? Rings a Bell...

Yes, it's true. Billions of deflating US Dollars continue to pour into The Iraq Occupation Project. It even made Yahoo! headlines today:

Iraq wants US forces out of Mosul on time

GLH Blog had a good "Remember Iraq" post a couple days ago, tho it was actually titled What About Iraq? complete with fine art.... and I've thought of doing a segment on the next forgotten war on GDAE Podcast... but with the US Empire crashing, and swine flu breaking out... and the Iraqi ethnic cleansing complete...

Hopefully yesterday's headline is indicative of where things are going in Iraq, tho hearing Secretary of State Clinton recently tell Iraqis, and the consuming American public, "We won't abandon you," we might want to have our diplomat-speak antenne up.

Sources:

Art Credit: Wood burning, Tsalagi.

Associated Press, Iraq wants US forces out of Mosul on time, April 27, 2009.

The Blossoms are Here

Sources:

Alegas

Argentina's Shame in Paired Photos

File this under "pictures say a thousand words." A set of paired photos of friends and family "before" Argentinian's dirty war disappearances and "after"...

Disappeared thanks to the Ten Percent blog for sharing the artistic work of Gustavo Germano.

One of the photo pairs below (click to enlarge):

Argentine photographer Gustavo Germano’s exhibition, “Absences”, explores the universe of the victims of “disappearances” during Argentina’s “Dirty War” (1976-1983). Photos are juxtaposed in pairs, one old and one recent. On the new one, a person is missing. Disappeared for ever, without leaving a trace.

Coincidentally, I sat at a bar in Washington, DC just over a week ago and chatted with a young guy from Argentina. We discussed Argentina's dirty war among other topics.

War Slave

Click on the image and look more closely.

Sources: Art by Myztico

GDAE Podcast Episode 6

Episode 6 - February 17, 2009

• How the wireless cell phone companies overcharge for our text messages.
• Music from the front porch, Guitar and Harmonica.
• Art meets Music with Baltimore's High Zero Music Festival.
• Political farce with Dick Army and Phil Gingrey..
• Prosecution of Bush: Voices of Truth Seekers Podcast host Dani, Obermann and Obama.
• How the economic stimulus initiative relates to financial system bailout and where our voices fit in.

GO TO GDAE Podcast

Happy Valentine's Day

Graphic Credits:

Valentine eye by phlezk

Her Valentine Dragon by Zilla

Steampunk Valentine by rsandberg

Valtentine box held by depart

Valentine on hip by li bra

Art: Shoot an Iraqi

Last night I enjoyed an event sponsored by Red Emma's, a Baltimore radical book store and cafe. The event is described below:

Iraqi-born artist Wafaa Bilal has been behind some of the most amazing critical artistic practice addressing the US invasion and occupation of Iraq. When his brother was killed at a U.S. checkpoint in 2005, he responded with "Domestic Tension," an unsettling interactive performance piece: for one month, Bilal lived alone in a prison cell-sized room in the line of fire of a remote-controlled paintball gun and a camera that connected him to internet viewers around the world. Visitors to the gallery and a virtual audience that grew by the thousands could shoot at him 24 hours a day. Bilal's experiences with this exhibit and the theory behind it are chronicled in his new book on City Lights, Shoot an Iraqi: Art, Life and Resistance Under the Gun.

Two interesting tidbits. First, on day-10 the paintball gun stopped; popularity of the website had crashed the webpage server. Wafaa, who for ten days had been completely preoccupied with staying out of the line of fire, was finally able to let down his guard. When he did, the grief of loosing his father and brother to Bush's Iraq war washed over him and his suppressed emotions were released.

Second, after Wafaa had been assaulted non-stop one day, because his site was #1 on Digg.com, a group of 39 people organized to take turns clicking on their key board to make the gun aim to the left. This gave Wafaa some relief and generated interesting dialoge via the chat feature of this performance art piece with those who wanted to shoot him.



Psssst... Do Something

• Contact the Broadcast Media
  
• Contact the Newspapers
  
• Contact the US Senate
  
• Contact the House of Representatives

Sources:

Flattened by the Blues

If you want to see this blue montage right-side-up, you'll have to Click Here for a little repliderium.

Psssst... Do Something

• Contact the Broadcast Media
  
• Contact the Newspapers
  
• Contact the US Senate
  
• Contact the House of Representatives

Sources:

My First Podcast Dec 2008

In less than 30 minutes the GDAE Podcast brings you...

• Music by Ryan Harvey, "It's Not Just Bush," on hard-driving acoustic guitar
• WakeUp Am podcast satire on the Bush presidential library
• Rick Back Book Bock (Ricky) on art and other things
• Van Jones on Green Jusice
• GDAEman sings "This Old Man" (humor)

... all for the price of your time, which I know is valuable. So, don't waste it. Be sure to get pissed off and make your voice heard in response to this podcast. We certainly can't depend on Obama to get us out of the mess we're in.

Episode 1 - Click Here

Psssst... Do Something

• Contact the Broadcast Media
  
• Contact the Newspapers
  
• Contact the US Senate
  
• Contact the House of Representatives

Sources:

Ahhhh... Fall

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Photo Credit: Boodie

Nov4

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Photo Credit: Boodie

Autumn Mood

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Photo/Art Credie: Aimelle

Swirling Autumn Leaves

Side note: According to my web page statistics, people are conducting google searches on the phrase "will Bush declare martial law?"

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Photo/Art Credit: ph33lth3lov3

Autumn Magic

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Photo Credit: Sortvind

Prismatic Gyre

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Image Credit: Prismatic Gyre by Gabrielxavier

Molly and Joe: Bush is an Idiot

Wow. Cool Blue Crescent Fractal Art.

... We return to our regularly scheduled program:

Joe: Sheeez, Bush, the cancer, is a frigg'n idiot.

Molly: No he's not. Bush, the cancer, has gotten his friends rich, and is about to corner Iraq's oil for them too. He's even gotten the damn Dismalcrats to spew his talking points: "Iraqi's have to meet baselines...".

Joe: Like signing a petroleum law...

Molly: ... that gives two-thirds of the Iraqi people's oil to foreign corporations. And, "We can't cut off funds to the troops."

Joe: OK, so, he's a corrupt idiot.

Molly: ... and the Dismalcrats are letting him get away with it. "Steaming pile of vulture droppings," maybe, but not an "idiot."

Joe: It's too hot out for vulture shit to steam.

Molly: You're missing my point.

Joe: No. I get it. Bush, the cancer, is an idiot.