A recent touring exhibition is turning a long held common belief on its head. The common perception is that the great statues and buildings of ancient Greece and Rome were all pure unpainted stone or green tarnished bronze, but researchers have been arguing that this may not been what these classic monuments really looked like back in the era of their creation.
That, in fact, these statue’s were quite alive and vibrant, full of color.
Researchers believe, particalurly Vinzenz Brinkmann who has been doing this research for the past 25 years, that artists used mineral and organic based colors and after centuries of deterioration any trace of pigment leftover when discovered, would have been taken off during any cleaning processes done before being put on display, washing the historical art clear of its true colors.
Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus addresses young people who want to make change in the world. Yunus is answering a question from Stephanie Kinnunen, founder of humanitarian magazine NEED. www.needmagazine.com
The Brooklyn Free Store is exactly what it sounds like. The large white tent on Walworth Street houses a huge variety of items, along with a sign that says, “Take what you want. Share what you think others may enjoy (not limited to material items).”
Don’t go looking for anything in particular there: you’ll never find the same thing twice. Merchandise can range from canned vegetables to flashlights; books to fur coats. Along with taking what they like, visitors are encouraged to drop off items they no longer want. Because there is no need to hire a cashier, and no risk of theft, the store is never locked, and is open at all hours.
The store opened in early July, and is proving to be a smashing success, with customers coming in at all hours to sort through the collection and drop off their own donations. And, even though the Brooklyn Free Store is the first of its kind, it’s not likely to be the last.
“New York is world renowned for having the best garbage,” Myles Emery, an organizer of the store, told the New York Times. “There could be free stores everywhere.”
The inescapable cycle of life, death and decay will have its way with us all, and virtually everything else on earth… and while most people find this reality of nature less than pleasant, others seek to magnify and exploit it. Because while decay can certainly be disgusting – as some artists have portrayed with rotting animals – it can also be beautiful, like allowing the sea to etch a pattern into metal.
No collection of decay-themed art would be complete without the inclusion of Dieter Roth, whose entire oeuvre challenged the notion that art is immortal. Bananas, sausage and dung are just a few of the items Roth used to create pieces that blossomed with maggots and mold, falling victim to the relentless cycle of life and death even under the harsh lights of exclusive art galleries. Certainly the bust of chocolate that he made of himself, covered in birdseed and threw into a courtyard as a feast for birds looks very different than it did when he created it.
The sea is a great and mysterious artist, carving rocks and scouring patterns into sunken man-made objects with its relentless tides and currents. Bermuda artist Dan Dempster submerged pieces of steel into the ocean and let it etch patterns into the surface with a rusty, dreamy and utterly aquatic result.
Many artists whose work is displayed outdoors dread the process of weathering; they lacquer and protect their work as much as possible to defend it against fading, rust, and other hazards of wind and rain. But Nathan Slate Joseph intentionally leaves squares of steel outdoors to “empower nature by allowing it to have a hand in the making of his art.” He even applies acids to facilitate the breakdown of the pigments he applies to each square, letting them age and change naturally before soldering them together into one cohesive piece.
Renowned British artist Damien Hirst is known for making death a central theme in nearly all of his works, the most notable – and controversial – of which being a series made from animal corpses. One work featuring a rotting cow and bull was banned from gallery exhibition by New York public health officials for fear of “vomiting among the visitors”. Another, “A Thousand Years”, consisted of a rotting cow’s head in a glass case, covered in maggots and flies. But not all of Hirst’s dead animals are left to the ravages of nature – some are preserved in formaldehyde, like his iconic (and somehow simultaneously iconoclastic) shark.
Rust is a powerful pigment, with its vivid hues of red and orange that it lends to all sorts of metals, whether desired or not. British artist Tony Reason must see a great beauty in rust, because he has made it the center of much of his work: giant metal panels with rust designs and even rust mixed with wax and painted on canvas.
Few artists enjoy being told that their work looks like a bunch of trash – but Kathy Kelley knows that that’s exactly what her sculptures are. Kelley, who holds an MFA in graphic design, turned to “revaluing objects of refuse” with her large-scale found-object sculptures, saying “I am drawn to the symbolic and formal elements of decay, the way in which an object has been altered by its mere existence. The worn, broken, torn nature of the aged object seems to make it more real, more honest. So I collect decayed urban refuse. I hold onto it for awhile. Cogitate. Eventually the formal and symbolic elements of the materials and my current research meld. Then I make.”
Take one dead shark a la Damien Hirst, throw in some drawings that have been embellished by the sea over a period of a few months a la Dan Dempster, and you’ve got the strange collaborative project “The Blood of Two” by artists Matthew Barney and Elizabeth Peyton. Some of Peyton’s nautical-themed drawings were placed in a glass casket which was submerged in the ocean for months; the casket was ceremoniously lifted from the sea and taken on a funeral-like procession to a slaughterhouse where the drawings were removed and replaced with a dead shark. The shark was later served to onlookers. Barney is also known for his performance art videos featuring sculptures made from uncooked tapioca, which were left to decay as they would.
Did you ever imagine that a dead fish could be so beautiful? Rosamond Purcell collects such natural and man-made curiosities for her assemblage art, which pays tribute to decay in all forms, from the remains of dead creatures to worm-eaten books and rusted metal. Purcell sources most of her materials at a junkyard in Maine and turns them into art installations, sculptures, collages and other collections as documented in her book Bookworm: The Art of Rosamond Purcell.
Artist Joseph Beuys worked with all sorts of unconventional materials, but they were never randomly chosen. Beuys used edible items like butter, sausage and chocolate in some works, knowing that they would transform and decay over time, changing the way that people reacted to each piece. Fat in particular played a large role, used to signify “chaos and the potential for spiritual transcendence”. The images above show how the work ‘Fat Chair’, which featured a triangular slab of butter on a wooden chair, evolved as it decayed.
Zhang Xiaotao
(images via: saatchi gallery)
Perhaps hang Xiaotao’s art isn’t made directly from putrefying objects, but nearly as unusual is the desire to produce art that holds up decay as a subject worth portraying again and again. Xiaotao depicts moldy strawberries, rotting birthday cake, heaps of trash in the subway and ants feasting on forgotten food as lovingly as if they were stunning landscapes and beautiful models. “I am creating something that is disappointing and yet has great hopes – a cycle of positive and negative energy that is in a constant state of renewal,” he told China Daily.
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Entrepreneur and Carr Foundation President Greg Carr lectures Mozambican MBA candidates on “Social Entrenpreneurship” and his foundation’s project to restore Gorongosa National Park.
These odd circles may look like messages from aliens or the humorous graffiti of penguins, but it’s actually the ephemeral snow and ice art of earth artist Jim Denevan, best known for his temporary beach masterpieces. The snow circles are somewhat of a departure from Denevan’s usual medium, but he’s no stranger to large-scale natural art. This nine-square-mile snow drawing currently holds the record as the world’s largest snow drawing; the record before that belonged to a sand drawing created in the Nevada desert by Denevan.
Jim Denevan’s art is all about impermanence. His large-scale artworks are meant to exist only for very short periods of time, after which they will be washed away by waves, wind and weather. This massive art was created on Siberia’s frozen Lake Baikal, the world’s largest lake.
Because of the constant threat of losing the entire piece to a sharp gust of wind, a team of helpers assisted in the creation of the gigantic masterpiece. Eight people in all got out onto the ice and used brooms to sweep the snow into simple, elegant circles. The work was chronicled on The Anthropologist, a site that features new artwork for Anthropologie.
The crew slept in a yurt on the ice, warming themselves by a fire in the lake bed that re-froze each morning in the brutal temperatures. The expedition was filmed by a documentary filmmaker and captured by a photographer; both of these documentation methods are necessary when creating art in a medium as temporary as ice.
The tundra warmed up, Lake Baikal thawed, and Jim Denevan’s lovely circles melted away forever. But the artist isn’t losing any sleep over his lost masterpiece; his goal is to create beautiful and inspiring pieces of art that only exist for a moment in time. His ephemeral art reminds us all to savor every day, to find beauty in even the most fleeting moment.
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An old war bunker in Yorkshire, England sits empty, an unused memorial to the immense cost of war, particularly in lives, land and resources. But if Leeds Metropolitan University graduate Charlotte Wilson had her way, the RAF Bempton bunker would become a sacred space honoring the role of women in wars past, present and future, befitting the intense natural beauty of the seaside setting.
“Women . War . Peace’ will be a new and exciting war museum with the pure focus of Women and War,” says Wilson. “Journeying through the exhibition will illustrate the compassion, realism, horrors and bravery seen and felt through the eyes of women during war time, both on the front-line and behind the scenes. This museum interrogates the creativity of learning through emotional and experiential spaces and details.”
Four stages of war will be represented within the reclaimed bunker: past, present, reflection and remembrance, and future. In the ‘Past’, the main exhibition stage, museum visitors will learn the stories of ‘women at war’, told within the bunker walls, and ‘women at home’, displayed in spaces outside but connected to the bunker space. The ‘Present’, located within the courtyard spaces, will illuminate the lives of women of war from the year 2000 through the present day.
‘Reflection and Remembrance’ will make up a viewing platform that extends beyond the cliff in which the bunker is embedded to provide a vista of the sea, while ‘Future’ takes visitors high above the bunker onto a viewing platform that serves as a space to contemplate what they have seen.
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Most of us have heard that “TV is bad for you.” Perhaps because it disconnects us from ourselves – we “zone out.” During a particularly difficult period, I’ve come to honor that “zone out” time and don’t think it’s as detrimental as its often made out to be.
Going through a divorce is not for the weak at heart. Every day brings forth a new complication, a new dilemma. Here you are, trying to iron out major life decisions with a person who you innately have problems with! By the end of the day, I’m exhausted and drained.
So I’ve chosen a few TV programs that I watch in the evening. It’s my zone out time. But as an artist, it’s a zone out with some creative perks. Some programs offer me a chance to runaway to another time (such as The Tudors) or imagine myself in a strong, powerful position (such as Damages.) Others help me vent my frustrations (Breaking Bad) and others have simply educated me (Criminal Minds, Lie to Me.)
Sure, too much television is a bad thing. But for me, some of my programs have given me an opportunity to venture off into an imaginary world and take a break from my real life. Perhaps there’s a chance that some of the qualities I like in these televised characters enhances underserved parts of myself. Who knows?
But even if it doesn’t, that time out of mind feels good on an overworked, tired mind. I don’t overdue it – one show an evening. And I can’t help but feel some of these TV shows have become therapeutic – not the evil I’ve always heard they could be.
I don’t know anyone who has been in a hot air balloon, but I know a lot of people who would love to give one a shot. Even the biggest hot air balloon haters would be intrigued by these delightful creations. In wacky and wonderful shapes, and out of personal pleasure and love for the craft, or for commercial gain, a variety of hot air balloons have graced balloon festivals around the globe. Here are some of the best of the best:
Animal balloons seem a little dull until you see the tiny box holding the hot air balloonist at the controls. One is quickly awed by the gigantic form of a polar bear as it soars slowly past its smaller, garishly colored peers.
Interesting hot air balloon shapes are limited only by the creativity of the designer. Enter a hot air mystic that looks suspiciously like Jesus, a wonderful cactus, space shuttle, and… Van Gogh’s head. Oh, don’t forget the bagpiper, at over 150 tall.
Monsters in the skies! Giant dinosaurs and ferocious faces are a bit more terrifying when blown up to colossal proportions. They soar over fields, delighting onlookers and making children cry out in fear.
Some of our favorite characters have been featured in this exciting medium. Darth Vader makes an appearance, along with Sonic the Hedgehog, and Michael Wazowski from Pixar’s “Monsters, Inc.”
Companies love to find creative ways to push their products into the limelight, and hot air ballooning isn’t an exception. From alcohol to batteries, companies will find a way to catch your eye, even if they have to cruise the skies to do it.
Everyone loves beer! At least, at hot air balloon festivals. Here are some of the coolest beer-shaped hot air balloons. I personally think bottles are the coolest, because they’re so different from the conventional hot air balloon shape.
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