IWR - Art and Culture Archive

January 2010

Monday 01/25/2010

Art Links For 01/25/2010

Byam Shaw - The Garden of Kama (1914 edition)
British artist Byam Shaw was born in Madras India. He was a Pre-Raphaelite influenced painter and illustrator. His illustrations for The Garden of Kama (1901 first edition) are outstanding. I would like to have a copy with Shaw's illustrations.

Frontis

Temple Dancing Girl

Less Than Dust
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Pipapiep's Photostream via TokyoBunnie
These are great!!!

Monster with Many Eyes

Monster Attack!
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Hiroshi Nonami 1 and Hiroshi Nonami 2
I like these, but I wish the images were larger.

Untitled
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Pakistan's Decorated Vehicles via Everlasting Blort
There are amazing colors and images on these Pakistani buses.

Pakistani Bus #1
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Gilbey's Gin Ad for the Japanese Market
I'll drink to that! ;-)

Gilbey's Ad (1979)
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Music Video Links For 01/25/2010

Robert Johnson - Love In Vain
Another great song by blues master and visionary Robert Johnson! Below I included a great 1972 live version of the song by the Rolling Stones.

Robert Johnson

Rolling Stones (1972)
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George Harrison - Here Comes The Sun (Live)
The sun came out yesterday after a many day hiatus, and it made me think of George Harrison's great song. This is a great live version too.

George Harrison
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The Ramones - I Wanna Be Sedated
This song seemed an appropriate antidote to the past strange week.

The Ramones
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Depeche Mode - Everything Counts (Remastered Video)
This song is dedicated to the SCOTUS, and their hideous ruling on campaign finance restrictions, which was a big win for the oligarchs who control the world.

Depeche Mode
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Oingo Boingo - Dead Man's Party
This a great song by Danny Elfman.

Oingo Boingo
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Weezer - Island In The Sun

Weezer
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Priscilla Ahn - Rain
The rain is back again today...

Priscilla Ahn
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Monday 01/18/2010

Art Links For 01/18/2010

KMR.IMG
This Kyoto student is a very talented artist. I love the painting below.

Separated (2010)
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Hayv Kahraman via AJR My Skull
These are great.

Domesticated Marionettes Series
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Fred Tomaselli via ArtSlant
He also has a magnificent tapestry version of the beautiful photo-collage below.

Migrant Fruit Thugs, 2006
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Thomas Moran
I happened to see a rerun of Ken Burn's National Parks. I've been to Yellowstone before, and I want to go back again someday too.

Green River of Wyoming (1878)

Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone
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Nam June Paik
These are amazing. What a whimsical imagination this artist has.

Enlightenment Compressed, 1994
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Katarina Vavrov� via Akubi Zone
Nice prints.

Freakish Woman (print)
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Music Video Links For 01/18/2010

Bessie Smith - Yellowdog Blues (1925)
This is great song by The Empress of the Blues - Bessie Smith.

Bessie Smith
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Banjo Girls - Banjo's blues... (1928) via Little Hokum Rag
This is real gem.

Banjo Girls
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Muddy Waters - Honey Bee (Live 1970)
I like this song by Muddy Waters.

Muddy Waters
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Amanda Lear - Queen of Chinatown (1977)
Here's a live version of the same song. "Lear began her career as a fashion model in the mid 1960s and was also the muse of Spanish surrealist painter Salvador Dal�." - Wikipedia

Amanda Lear
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Grace Jones - Pull Up To The Bumper (1981)
Kind of a catchy little tune by Grace Jones.

Grace Jones
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Kseniya Simonova's Amazing Sand Drawing
This is absolutely stunning visual art. I've never seen anything like it before. I would like to see her show in person. Wow! Thanks Steve.

Kseniya Simonova
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The White Stripes - Seven Nation Army
Nice.

The White Stripes
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Joanna Newsom - Sprout and the Bean
I found this video, song and music extremely enchanting. I love it. I need to listen to more music from her.

Joanna Newsom
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Pantha Du Prince - Saturn Strobe

Pantha Du Prince
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Metric - Sick Muse [Official Music Video - HD]

Metric
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Rodrigo Blaas - Alma - The Movie via Cgunit
Last, but certainly not least, is this wonderful animation. Here is the movie site.

Rodrigo Blaas
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Monday 01/11/2010

Art Links For 01/11/2010

Alphonse Maria Mucha
I really love Mucha's Art Nouveau lithographs. He's really in a class by himself.

Moravian Teachers' Choir (1911)

Savonnerie de Bagnolet (1897)
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Louis Rhead
I really liked the newspaper ad below.

Morning Journal (1900)
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Virgil Finlay
More images by Finlay are available at Trixie's Treats, Pulpartists and the Author Robert Weinberg art collection.

The Sea-Witch by Nictzin Dyalhis (1937)
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Naked Cycling
There's a category for everything at the Wikimedia. This is the best of the bunch.

Gladiator Cycles (1905)
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Music Video Links For 01/11/2010

T-Bone Walker w/ Jazz At The Philharmonic - Live in UK 1966
T-Bone performs "Woman, You Must Be Crazy" (Aaron Walker) "Goin' To Chicago Blues" (Aaron Walker) accompanied by Dizzy Gillespie, Teddy Wilson, Louis Bellson, Clark Terry, Coleman Hawkins, Zoot Sims, Jimmy Moody, Benny Carter and Bob Cranshaw.

T-Bone Walker
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Fever Ray - When I Grow Up
Great song.

Fever Ray
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Florence And The Machine - Drumming Song
She's kind of sexy don't you think?

Florence And The Machine
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The XX - Teardrops
I like these guys.

The XX
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Kahimi Karie - Elastic Girl
And now for a little Shibuya-kei.

Kahimi Karie
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The Dodos - Fools via Motel de Moka
Good tune.

The Dodos
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Norah Jones - Bessie Smith (Live)
I love Norah Jones.

Norah Jones
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Lukeywes1234 - Ghost Hunter
This video is too funny by the 8 year-old kid that YouTube Suspended.

Lukeywes1234
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Burumaaku Toy Commercial via PCL
This company made the Ultraman bowling game and the Godzilla pitching machine shown in the video, which is just a few of the many monster games that they made.

Burumaaku
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Front Fell Off
The bald guy (satirist John Clarke) kind of reminds me of Rudy Giuliani. I had never seen a mock interview by these guys before. Funny stuff.

Front Fell Off
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Monday 01/04/2010

Art Links For 01/04/2010

Great Blue Heron
I was walking yesterday around the Lafayette Reservoir when a little girl pointed to something she saw in the trees to her father. It turned out to be a beautiful Great Blue Heron sitting in a tree looking for something to eat most likely. What a treat! I love seeing these majestic birds! BTW, the reservoir also hosts the a lot American white pelicans from Salt Lake this time of year.

Great Blue Heron on the beach at Point Lobos State Preserve
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Yosemite in Art
Scientist John Muir preferred black and white photographs to paintings of Yosemite, but these paintings mostly by Albert Bierstadt are gorgeous.

Liberty Cap, Yosemite (1873)
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Olivier Zappelli
These are fanciful and colorful.

Diana (2008)
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A Passion for Nature: The Life of John Muir

A Passion for Nature: The Life of John Muir by Donald Worster
After I watched The National Parks: America's Best Idea: by Ken Burns, I became very interested in the learning more about the life of John Muir, who was featured prominently in the series.

Also, for about 9 years, I lived only a stone's throw from John Muir's residence in Martinez, CA and passed his house on the way home from work. I had an excellent view of Mt. Wanda from the cottage I was renting. I didn't know until after I read this book that Wanda was the name of Muir's oldest daughter. In addition, one of my favorite places in the Bay Area is Muir Woods (I even have a framed poster in my dining room), but I really didn't know anything about the man or life of John Muir.

Theodore Roosevelt and John Muir - Glacier Point Yosemite (1906)

Donald Worster's book does an excellent job of chronicling John Muir's life from his Scottish roots in Dunbar and the influence on the Romantic Movement had on him via Robert Burns and William Wordsworth to his remarkable life in America.

Worster for example covers John Muir the engineer, who invented the alarm clock bed. The contraption would throw Muir out of his bed every morning! Muir could have easily ended up in manufacturing but one day he had an accident in Indiana which almost blinded him and during his recovery Muir decided that he would pursue his first love of botany and nature.

The rest is history.

Muir was an environmental, conservation and scientific visionary who loved nature and all it's creatures and was very influential in creating national parks and Yosemite in particular. Although he had many friends in high places, he was not an elitist and many friends from all walks of life. Muir was not very political and remained a pacifist throughout his life.

One thing that I thought was funny was that originally some Marxists proposed naming the General Grant Tree (the biggest tree by volume in the world) the Karl Marx tree. Thank God that didn't happen or Joe McCarthy would have chopped it down in the 1950s!

I also really enjoyed the Alaskan story of John Muir and the dog Stickeen.

In short, I really enjoyed this book from start to finish and heartily recommend it for all those interested in Muir's life.

I now consider John Muir as a hero of mine and one of my favorite Americans up there with A. Lincoln, Benjamin Franklin and Mark Twain.

Next I plan to read some of Muir's books.

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Music Video Links For 01/04/2010

Little Walter - Juke (1952)
This song has Little Walter (Jacobs) on harp; Muddy Waters and Jimmy Rogers on guitars; and Elga Edmund on drums. Not too shabby, right?

Little Water
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