The afroed baby who appeared on the cover of Biggie Smalls’ debut Ready to Die album turned 18 and decided to reveal his identity, how much he was paid to pose ($150) and the iconic image’s significance for him/hip hop.
Montreal/Brooklyn-based artist Marc Séquin’s new ash and charcoal works are all about failures – church ruins, powerless popes and captured assassins. Portrait of note: Russia’s top gas and oil billionaire (and dater of major art wheeler/dealer Dasha Zhukova) with a rough, goopy glob of tar dripping from his furrowed forehead across his calculating mug, shining all the way down. He should totally buy it. “Failures,” Marc Séquin, Mar 24 – Apr 30, Mike Weiss Gallery, NYC
Ukrainian FEMENistas back at it, despite that Japan fiasco… with another one. A topless 63-year-old activist protests raising the retirement age for women over the next 10 years from 55 to 60. The argument: Due to their statistically lower wages and “housework” pressures, government “bitches” shouldn’t make women’s retirement age equal to that of men’s, which is now 60. Read more »
Cyberutopia skeptic and political journalist Evgeny Morozov of RSA has some sound points – internet connectivity and gadgets don’t bring inevitable democracy, authoritarian oppressors can also use the internet, people mostly watch porn and funny cats, not civil rights. He makes these points with the help of animated mice diagrams. Read more »
While he’s no Epic Beard Man, lacks the pizazz of an angry pasta eater responding to a nosy lady, and is not nearly as vocal as Bloody Loco, this “old guy” does a good job twisting up this “young buck,” like the title of the YouTube video suggests, although I’d hardly call it a beating. It’s more of a weird wrestling action. Read more »
Parting Shot
A humongous red “super moon” rose over the Bronx this past weekend, which was nice, but it really popped in the sky above the Parthenon. (Photo: Vincent Ferrari/flickr)
As the reactors at Fukushima continue to deteriorate, Japanese officials have enforced a minimum safe distance of 50 miles, leading many to reevaluate Indian Point, located on 25 miles from NYC!
When a planned Islamic cultural center in Lower Manhattan became divisive political rhetoric that could be capitalized on, Republicans of all stripes chimed in for maximum effectiveness. This chorus included Congressman Mike Simpson and Senators Jim Risch and Mike Crapo of Idaho. Like others in the GOP high command, they came out very strongly against Park51, claiming it would be the ultimate mark of disrespect, making this next bit of news, ironic. Read more »
When Wyclef said he got mildly shot on Sunday during Haiti’s election day confusion, I didn’t bat an eye. Having never traveled there and only hearing about the country through the voodoo lens of the western media, I thought it sounded about right, hell, it is Haiti after all. Luckily, Reuters was more skeptical. The news agency spoke to an official who said the artist is full of shit. “We met with the doctor who saw him and he confirmed Wyclef was cut by glass,” said Petionville Police Chief Vanel Lacroix, police chief in Petionville, a suburb of Port-au-Prince.
Famous appropriation art maker Richard Prince was sued for mildly transforming 41 Patrick Cariou photos from the Yes Rasta book and using them for his Canal Zone exhibit at the Gagosian gallery in 2008. He just lost his “fair use” argument. The judge decided Prince’s work was just too derivative of the original. Read more »
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