How to Do Visual Comedy

How to do visual comedy like filmmaker Edgar Wright.

via kottke

Interview with multi-media artist Russell Mills - video

(via WN)

russellmills.com

LINE SEGMENTS SPACE (2013) - video

Video of digital artists Elliot Woods and Mimi Son’s ‘LINE SEGMENTS SPACE’, a beguiling light and sound sculpture installed at the Seoul Art Space in 2013.

A tectonic equivalent of Ryoichi Kurokawa’s Oscillating Continuum.

Jacqueline Mina: Gold

A lovely, four-minute film about contemporary British goldsmith and jeweller Jacqueline Mina OBE and her unorthodox use of traditional goldsmithing techniques. ‘Gold’’ has a contemplative feel of beauty, wonderment and tranquility.

(via Crafts Council)

Short film: Internet Machine - trailer

Trailer for Timo Arnall’s multi-screen film, Internet Machine, which documents the massive Telefónica data centre in Alcalá, Spain.

(via The Verge and elasticspace)

URME anti-surveillance mask

(via CNET and Leo Selvaggio)

‘Inside New York’s Art World’: Interview with Chuck Close, 1979 - video

Television interviewer Barbaralee Diamonstein talks to renowned American photorealist Chuck Close, whose paintings eschew ‘elegant or meaningful or powerful art marks’ in favour of a rational system of incremental marks and colour.

In this archive interview, Close speaks openly and in detail about his work and process, revealing his unique sensibility, vision and adeptness to hold several apparently contradictory ideas in harmony.

You can browse the collection of artist interviews from ‘Inside New York’s Art World’ here.

Cento Lodigiani’s fun animated take on ‘The Illusion of Life’

New York-based motion designer Cento Lodigiani takes inspiration from Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston’s 1981 animator’s bible, Disney Animation: The Illusion of Life, in creating his visual exposition of the basic techniques of classical animation.

(via Cento Lodigiani)

Matthew Carter’s TED2014 talk: My life in typefaces

Type designer Matthew Carter speaking at TED2014 conference.

The question is, does a constraint force a compromise? By accepting a constraint, are you working to a lower standard? I don't believe so, and I’ve always been encouraged by something that Charles Eames said. He said he was conscious of working within constraints, but not of making compromises. The distinction between a constraint and a compromise is obviously very subtle, but it’s very central to my attitude to work.

(via ted.com)

Computer simulations teaching themselves to walk

That’s one small step for an ill-proportioned human, one giant leap for slapstick biological cybernetics.

Impressive natural-looking motion based on 3D skeleton interaction and muscle geometry — triumph and failure in equal measure.

(via asbradbury)

This entry was updated on 25 April 2014.

Artist Simon Bouisson’s nine-hour film of a man walking backwards through Tokyo

In this nine-hour sequence of long takes, photographer Ludovic Zuili seems to be walking through a city moving backwards in time.

(via Simon Bouisson and France 4)

This entry was updated on 18 May 2014.

Video: Black Francis narrates children’s storybook ‘Lost Sloth’ by J Otto Seibold

[In this video] Lost Sloth — illustrator J. Otto Seibold’s fantastical picture book about a narcoleptic sloth trying to make it across town in time to claim his prize of a shopping spree; and, fanboy Black Francis (aka Frank Black) — Pixies’ left-field frontman who wrote this song about an alien lost on holiday. Perfect match.

Wait, there’s more: Francis and the Guardian cartoonist Steven Appleby are reportedly collaborating on a graphic novel titled ‘The Good Inn’, to be published early next year by SelfMadeHero (UK) and Harper Collins (US). The synopsis. is. bonkers.

Watch Bridget Riley at work: Arts Council of Great Britain film, 1979

Great half-hour film on British Op art painter Bridget Riley. The queen of perceptual disruption speaks about her work.

Part I, Part II and Part III above.

George Maciunas: Piano Piece (1962) — an outrageous absurdist composition in 12 movements

(Referenced in Jon Henricks’ Fluxus Codex.) Instructions on how to perform all twelve movements of Piano Piece, the 1962 absurdist score by Lithuanian architect and graphic designer George Maciunas (then-leader of the avant garde collective Fluxus):

No. 1: Let piano movers carry piano into the stage

No. 2: Tune the piano

No. 3: Paint with orange paint patterns over piano

No. 4: With a straight stick the length of a keyboard, sound all keys together

No. 5: Place a dog or cat (or both) inside the piano and play Chopin (hell no!)

No. 6: Stretch three highest strings with tuning key until they burst

No. 7: Place one piano on top of one another (one can be smaller)

No. 8: Place piano upside down and put a vase with flowers over the sound box

No. 9: Draw a picture of the piano so that the audience can see the picture

No. 10: Write ‘piano composition no.10’ and show to the audience the sign

No. 11: Wash the piano, wax and polish it well

No. 12: Let piano movers carry piano out of the stage

Watch several of the movements, (including Carpenter’s Piece — No. 13, 1964, an ancillary composition in which performers hammer nails into piano keys) successively staged by artists and musicians in 1985 at Denmark’s Festival of Fantastics, below.

Let the racket begin …

Music video: Aphex Twin — ‘On’ (1993), stop-motion dir. Jarvis Cocker

(via)

PBS short: Is Code the Most Important Language in the World?

What is code and why does it matter? In this persuasive PBS Arts episode, several programming evangelists hold to the opinion that ‘everyone should learn to code’.

But as interface designer Bret Victor, in his 2012 essay ‘Learnable Programming’, points out:

Programming is a way of thinking, not a rote skill. Learning about ‘for’ loops is not learning to program, any more than learning about pencils is learning to draw.

You can read Victor‘s incisive essay here.

Video: Buster Keaton stars in silent short ‘High Sign’ (1921)

Masterly. Enjoy.

Actor Ernest Borgnine was no Johnny-come-philately, a 1978 30-second TV PSA on collecting stamps

Best public service announcement ever. Beefy actor Ernest Borgnine — known for villainous roles — clobbers a punter in a bar-room brawl scene, right before he breaks character, steps off camera and blows the lid on stamp collecting.

Watch Tate Gallery’s ‘Unlock Art’ episode on performance art

Educational Tate web short, sketching out the origins of time-based art. Written by art critic Jessica Lack.

(via Tate)

Video: Richard Feynman’s words spliced into moments of soul-stirring beauty

Reid Gower produces short, inspirational films to raise awareness of science education. It’s a job that he does well: the Sagan Series of science videos has so far been viewed by millions worldwide. By recently making the project ‘open source’ however, Gower is hoping that others will contribute.

Watch his latest media creation, the audaciously titled ‘Think Like A Martian’, above — which borrows the words of the late theoretical physicist Richard Feynman, one of the great voices of popular science. Or browse the entire Feynman Series here and its aforementioned companion series dedicated to astronomer Carl Sagan here.