Nature cities. Stacked houses. Half-suburb half-zoo hybrid where your terrace is above an elephant and the wolves are just around your backyard slope. Well… wow. Last summer, five interdisciplinary teams of “architects, urban planners, ecologists, engineers, and landscape designers” got together for public workshops at MoMA PS1 and re-envisioned “housing” in light of the ongoing foreclosure crisis. See their pipe dreams and brilliant schemes as renderings, models and animations at “Foreclosed: Rehousing the American Dream,” Feb 15 – Jul 30, MoMA, NYC

Waiting is giving me flashbacks. The museum layout is wrong, but the endless queue is right on, minus the crowd of early birds stampeding through the museum and the VIPs being sauntered in to the soft hiss of teeming, sitting masses on the edges of Marina’s square.

The creator — Copenhagen arty type Pippin Barr — wishes he included Pablo Blancos, “prolific weeping guy.” Also, Lou Reed. Click here to play.

It’s like Pee Wee’s Playhouse for brilliant geniuses at MoMA’s special exhibit Talk To Me, rounding up a whopping 194 communication-themed works, interfaces, devices and visualizations. There’s a finger implant that reads aloud into an ear implant, a plastic wide-open-mouth prosthesis for awkward mumblers, a Muslim prayer robo-rug that lights up neon when facing Mecca and so much more, oooaghgh…

Check out “projects that establish an emotional, sensual, or intellectual connection with their users,” from the ’60s to the present with neat stuff from Post Secret and ANIMAL favorites Eric Fischer’s maps, Aram Bartholl’s Dead Drops and Evan Roth’s Graffiti Taxonomy. “Talk to Me: Design and the Communication between People and Objects,” Jul 24 – Nov 7, MoMA, NYC

Fight the urge to add “Don’t” captions to these heartbreaking photographs of homeless alcoholics in late ’90s Ukraine. There are 400 photos in master photog Boris Mikhailov’s seminal Case History series documenting the social and economic fallout after the collapse of the Soviet Union — 20 life-size prints are now view at the MoMA. The devasting but charismatic models were posed and partially stripped with just a slight Herzog-ian nudge.

The Ukraine-born fine art photographer is considered one of the most important artists to emerge out of USSR where he was nearly imprisoned by the KGB. Twice. In an interview with Svoboda News, he salutes our favorite anarchist art crew Voina:

I like Voina. I like their actions and I like that they were awarded the [Innovation] prize because right now, heroic actions are more important than art made to be sold. Their message and their play on heroic activism are serious.

“Case History,” Boris Mikhailov, May 26 – Sep 5, MoMA, New York

[Clap clap clap]

And now, Greg.org shows you how anamorphically distorted skull in Hans Holbein’s The Ambassadors isn’t only in Hans Holbein’s The Ambassadors, haaa…

With all respect to robust cultural institutions and all the mindgasms and souljobs I’ve experienced at MoMA, the Art World is all this and that, so it’s not surprising that artists rebel. Ethically, we know who our heroes and villains are. Streaking Marina Abamović (NSFW) and shooting seeds into Seeds is what hacking museums is all about. Aram Bartholl is just a little niftier than most about it.

See also: Bartholl’s Flash Drive ‘Dead Drops’ Installed in NYC’s Holes

Linda Yablonksy reports:

He didn’t thank anyone…  “Look at me, Marina,” he began. “Listen to me, Marina,” he went on. “Why don’t you look at me? You know,” he then said to the guests, tossing aside his prepared remarks, “she can’t see anyone without her glasses,” thereby negating the experience of all those sitters who thought she was paying special attention to them. This brought loud murmurs. “Will you stop talking and listen to me?” he said. “OK, don’t listen. I don’t care. Marina? Are you listening?”

And so the art tycoons and famous folk choked on their chocolate-covered, gold Marina Abramović mouth-molds (real). “I could kill him!” Abramović responded, but thanked him anyway.

The thought of all those faces and tears having been nothing but eager blur to the artist is a total bitch slap. Then again, hugging and greeting her repeat sitters with recognition at the post-exhibit MoMA symposium, Marina Abramović didn’t seem at all visually impaired. This could just be rants from a German lover scorned. Or are they? WELL??? MARINA??? ARE YOU LISTENING???!!!

Photo: Marina Galperina.