Hints on how A.E. Graves spends her imaginary spare time
I love this town. So much.
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More than ever, love is demonstrated with actions, to protect your family. When you wear a mask, you show that you love your loved ones. 40% of people with COVID-19show no symptoms. It is better to love from afar and protect them. Visithttps://t.co/cxFjh6Vhfs pic.twitter.com/0E2oCjOqK3
Stand up and be counted! There are just… five days left??
Home – Art + Action
The first iteration of the campaign was unveiled during Martin Luther King Jr. Week in January 2020, with 40 large-scale ‘COME TO YOUR CENSUS, S.F.’ posters-in the four official languages of San Francisco: English, Chinese, Spanish, and Tagalog-on JCDecaux kiosks along San Francisco’s Market Street corridor, and at the SF COUNTS 2020 Census launch with Mayor London N.
I wanted to see an old Idris Elba music video (Boasty), and my search unearthed an entire, hour-long, video-friendly, socially-distanced DJ set from Amsterdam in August.
It’s quite enjoyable! Very danceable (it got me off the couch and on my feet). Good variety of beats. Nice digital screen show impersonating an analog screen show. Restrained use of drone video of the landmark tower hosting the shoot and a bit of the harbor; having the sun set behind Elba gave a nice sense of time passing (especially for those of us who have been indoors too much, and haven’t seen the sky due to smoke!). Skilled use of camera angle/distance variety to capture Elba’s enthusiasm up close during this socially distanced party (which appears to consist of the film crew, remote-controlled cameras on tripods, and Elba).
This is a very effective example of how to provide a club-like feel without a crowd that has visual appeal, but without the overpriced drinks or uncomfortable shoes. 🙂
I watched Tron: Legacy before bed (mostly for the excellent soundtrack, which I also own), and had a Tron: Legacy-influenced dream.
It was about Flynn’s apartment off in the mountainous edge of the Grid. I was living in a gray-stone-with-diagonal-lines apartment, and found a secret wing that was occupied by men working on computers at desks (basically, game developers). They hadn’t wanted to be found. They were alarmed that I discovered them.
That was it. No glowing spaceships, no electronic dance music, no light-up clothes. I am just not impressed.
This article brought me great joy. I laughed so hard I cried. Either this is because I was exhausted beyond all measure, because the article is funny in a very British way, or (most likely answer) BOTH. Recommended if you like dry-yet-hyperbolic-British humor.
‘It looks like a haunted waxwork’: The Great British Bake Off bust cakes – ranked!
We never needed The Great British Bake Off more than we do now. This is partly because, in this age of frightening uncertainty, Bake Off’s spirit of good-natured fun feels like a warm tight hug. And also, based on last night’s episode, this year’s series is going to be flat-out barmy.
The United States’ death toll is now being casually measured in other disasters, like how many September 11, 2001 death tolls occur EACH WEEK.
This truly is world-changing. The lost people alone are world-changing – history will run a different course than it would have if they were here… Also, the esteem in which New Zealand, South Korea, and Taiwan are held has truly risen quite dramatically. (Good for them! I’m jealous of their leadership!)
It is difficult to resume anything near normal life, in part because of the feeling that your safety depends on the least considerate people around you. Yes 90%+ of the people I encounter on my once to twice a week essential supply runs are wearing masks and keeping respectful distances from each other, but the ones that are blathering away on their phones without a mask, chain smoking on the sidewalk without a mask (pretend it is for fire safety), or merely averting their eyes while walking past without a mask – as if I can’t see them if they don’t look at me? – are there. We’re outside, and the odds are in my favor, but they are negative advertising for any optional indoor activities.
The UK press articles I’ve read are wavering a bit on how we SHOULD be living right now. (One is based in the UK, where a dramatic case spike is causing the anti-restriction government to impose restrictions.) For officials and news writers, is difficult to write about what death tolls are “acceptable” without sounding terrible. (There is a very tidy venn diagram of people who are willing to sacrifice entire categories of people for the economy and people who are terrible. ) It is baffling (and upsetting) to look at photos of partying crowds in known infection hot spots.
There is too little progress on improving our treatment of essential workers.
I’m hoping to be lucky enough to live through this, but also fear that this will be “the new normal” for far too long.
You might already know I geek out over the experimental art/science of Studio Olafur Eliasson, which I’ve likened to the Exploratorium, but for fine artists, which somehow also has an amazing vegan restaurant for staff. (Ooooooo!)
The Studio has a new show in Japan right now, and the studio decided to avoid air freight by using land and sea-surface transport to get the exhibits from their current locations and/or Germany. The transport containers included art devices to make abstract, graphical records of the journey, and the show includes those results, and everything from water and light art to experiments in using kitchen and art studio scraps to make pigments and solid modules for future artwork.
It’s CLEVER and it’s ART. Such a happy combination!
Sometimes the river is the bridge – Studio Olafur Eliasson
Sometimes the river is the bridge – Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo – Studio Olafur Eliasson
The beautifully laid out pages, which include installation images of the exhibition, scroll horizontally. (On my computer do so rapidly, so be ready to use some fine motor control!). The studio’s layouts and images impress me, as they always do.
I love the images of the food-waste-derived pigments, especially. Plant pigments have an interesting history, and one I’ve dabbled with photographically: the alternative photography community (alternativephotography.com) uses plant pigments to make anthotypes, which are photographic prints using plant pigments. How? A positive transparency shields some portions of the pigment painted onto paper from fading, with some lovely results. (Malin Fabbri wrote a lovely textbook to teach you how!) It’s nice to see SOE’s technique, and the use of dehydration specifically.
The ‘materials lab’ section is where a lot of the innovation appears, and the experiments all look thoughtful. It’s nice to see the process-thinking behind the studio’s work, rather than only finished pieces.
If you need an art break from [*gesturing at the state of the world*] things, check it out.
… on this, one of the first days that the air quality is good, and not otherwise filled with smoke.
I have no words. And you don’t want to see the emoji that go with this feeling.
I’m one of countless people who admired and adored US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, and her death yesterday comes as a terrible blow in a year of terrible blows.
She was an ICON. A heroine. A legend. A force for progress. Someone for whom people without specific religious beliefs prayed.
She worked in law, and was LOVED.
Her work, even before she joined the Supreme Court, CHANGED THE WORLD FOR THE BETTER.
I recommend this tribute/history:
Ruth Bader Ginsburg changed America long before she joined the supreme court | Moira Donegan
The most important feminist lawyer in the history of the American republic has died. Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a supreme court justice and singularly influential legal mind, was appointed by President Bill Clinton in 1993, the court’s second-ever female justice, and served for nearly 30 years. She passed away due to complications from cancer on Friday.
I used to post quotes from her dissents to my office door, back when I worked in a law firm. I loved her writing! I loved her irrepressible fight do to right by people! And her writing was so sharp, so pointed, so clear, so well-reasoned…
This tribute is adoring:
Perspective | Ruth Bader Ginsburg gave us more than enough
A few weeks ago, Ruth Bader Ginsburg officiated the wedding of a family friend. She looked as brilliant as she always did, and as tiny. A photograph circulated on social media, Ginsburg in her white collar behind a lectern, and the responses were joy giving way to panic.
I especially like this excerpt: “A gay man once told me that he had an elaborate fantasy in which he and his friends could swathe Ginsburg in bubble wrap and then carry her, in a careful phalanx formation, up and down the steps of the court each day for work. He was laughing when he started sharing the fantasy, but by the end, he was crying. He needed to believe in this version of reality, in which there was a way to extend her life indefinitely, in which six or eight gentle gay men could somehow keep the person safe who kept the country safe, in which hope could be suspended above their heads in bubble wrap.”
This morning, to help me process the loss to my country, I went on Twitter and actually found comfort in the community efforts to celebrate her life. (You know times are hard if you turn to TWITTER for comfort!)
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Her rest is earned. It is our turn to fight.
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I know the popular analysis is going to be “we’re screwed,” and I *feel you.* But nah. RBG didn’t go out like that and neither are we. I’m not speaking that, and I’m not believing that. We gon fight. That’s what we’re gonna do.
One of the themes that came through Twitter among progressives is that our system is broken if one woman’s passing can create so much fear and dread for the future. Our future should not depend on any one person.
There is so much to fix, and so much work to be done. Go find a way to do your part. AND VOTE.
Here in California, where the climate crisis is literally hanging in the air, we are looking at ways to limit the remarkable damage that humans are doing to the environment. While individual responsibility is popular as a feel-good activity that makes some small positive difference (and which we should obviously all do), we could get ‘more bang for our buck’ by making big, systemic shifts. The usual obstacle is the business world and those who profit from polluting sectors. (We all know who those are.)
It’s always nice to look at data, though, and see whether the political battles over things like water use between the cattle farmers (VERY polluting & water sucking) and the almond farmers (less so, but they have a smaller lobbyist fighting force) are what should be taking up our attention.
Sector by sector: where do global greenhouse gas emissions come from?
Let’s walk through each of the sectors and sub-sectors in the pie chart, one-by-one. Energy use in industry: 24.2% Iron and Steel (7.2%): energy-related emissions from the manufacturing of iron and steel. Chemical & petrochemical (3.6%): energy-related emissions from the manufacturing of fertilizers, pharmaceuticals, refrigerants, oil and gas extraction, etc.
It’s nice to look at the breakdowns of this data, because something like “energy” isn’t just about the oil and gas companies operating in isolation: they have customers, and those industries are co-responsible. (Yes, this has been the oil industry’s go-to position for years, and I am reluctant to agree with them on anything, but they are selling their dirty products to other industries, and those buyers are also to blame.)
Our World In Data also has a breakout, which they link to here, about food. Food is a subject that is dear to my heart, and the environmental impacts of food have contributed to my commitment to a plant-based diet. When you look at this data, the reasons for this are obvious.
Food production is responsible for one-quarter of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions
When it comes to tackling climate change, the focus tends to be on ‘clean energy’ solutions – the deployment of renewable or nuclear energy; improvements in energy efficiency; or transition to low-carbon transport. Indeed, energy, whether in the form of electricity, heat, transport or industrial processes, account for the majority – 76% – of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
Human food production deserves so much more scrutiny. The industry is rife with politics and waste, and has a major impact on the health of the planet AND on our health. My government has a history of subsidizing tobacco, regardless of the cancers smoking causes, because it is a US agricultural product, and all such products were worthy of promotion with tax money! (Gaaaah!) The “four food groups” concept was not about human health, it was about product promotion OVER human health! (Gaaaah!) And then there are these animal-agriculture-sourced diseases, like bird flu and swine flu and COVID-19, or the terrible (and often fatal) e. coli outbreaks when plant foods are contaminated by animal waste, which threaten humans because some humans eat animals. We are all paying for that.
These visualizations are useful and informative.