OVERUNDER Appreciates Beauty When He Sees It
Not content with just letting a pretty gate sit there lonely, graffiti writer OVERUNDER offered it company by way of some charming vandalism in Bushwick. (Photo: ANIMALNewYork)
The NYPD’s prolonged battle with bikes is starting to take its toll on officers as they continue to lose their mental bearings when it comes to any incident involving a cyclist, even if circumstantially related. Read more »
Predictable Street Art Show at MOCA, RIP Balloon Girl
MOCA Los Angeles officially unveils its “Art in the Streets” exhibit on April 17th and judging from the press opening, looks like there’s a great roster of talent… but nothing groundbreaking. The artists are all gallery-ready or Deitch-associated and despite its highfalutin claims, this exhibit appears to be less about showcasing the “history of graffiti and street art” and more about setting the market. But hey, it is inside a museum after all. (Image: Arrested Motion)
The Chinese gov’s latest accusations of detained artist Ai Weiwei are: “tax evasion” (even though Ai’s company is registered to his wife Lu Qing), “destroying evidence” and “distributing pornography.” “Porn” refers to this self-portrait from Ai’s blog of his half-nude leaping through air with a stuffed animal covering his crotch. It’s an untranslatable pun that mocks government censors, but porn it isn’t.
The dean of a fancy private school on the Upper West Side was cited by the NYPD for cycling while a tote bag was hanging from her handlebars reports the New York Post, a tabloid now forced to acknowledge the ridiculousness of the anti-bike atmosphere it helped create. Claire Lecomte du Nouy assumed the officer was joking when he asked her to dismount, but then started writing out the ticket, even though he told her it would likely be dismissed: “Don’t worry, you can go to court. The judges always throw these out.” Which is really true in this case, since there’s no law against what she was doing.
Just off his 3-month jaunt in Melbourne, 
Closing out our impromptu bit of nostalgia week here at ANIMAL, here’s a look back at the fashionable Greenwich Village when free love was in the air and couples gingerly rode bikes together. Gothamist uncovered this narrated gem from the ’60s. Read more »
Illustrator and designer Chris Parks created this “12-skateboard deck shout-out to Leonardo da Vinci’s ‘The Last Supper’ with Jesus Christos and his 12 Luchador apostles getting down one last time” for his solo exhibit Saints & Sinners at Pale Horse Studio in St. Petersburg, Florida. The details! The colors! The full myriad of Mexican beer! Mmm.
Wealthy asshole and possible presidential contender Donald Trump has no problem with African-American voters and on Fred Dicker’s radio show, told the political reporter: “I have a great relationship with the blacks.” However, he did characterize their alleged blanket approval of President Obama as “frightening.”
According to a new report by a researcher at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, growing weed indoors sucks up a lot of resources, mainly electricity (1% of the country’s supply), and generates a huge carbon footprint. Read more »
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