Ghost Bike

To raise awareness of bicyclists’ right to safe travel, Visual Resistance, an activist art collective, has begun installing these unique memorials to bicyclists killed on the streets of New York.

Last week, a collective of artists called Visual Resistance began using bicycles that have been spray-painted white, called “ghost bikes,” to designate spots where bicyclists have died.

“I feel an affinity with any cyclist who has fallen,” Mr. Caplicki said. “I hope that people can make a connection when they see a riderless bicycle and think about a life that's gone.”

It’s working: quote above from today’ NY Times article “On Roads Where They Fell, Bicyclists Are Remembered.” Photo from Visual Resistance.

delete!

delete!
Uploaded by Caramdir on 19 Jun '05, 2.15am PST.

Update: Wooster Collective points to more photographs and even a Quicktime VR of the event.

In an indictment of the overwhelming amount of advertising cluttering the landcape in and around Vienna, artists Christoph Steinbrener & Rainer Dempf have created delete! The artists wrapped every advertising sign, company name, and logo, and slogan on Neubaugasse, a Viennese shopping street, in yellow monochrome.

Dempf and Steinbrener argue there’s too much advertising in Vienna, where billboards line many streets and where scaffolding — even on historic buildings such as the famed St. Stephen’s Cathedral — often is covered by oversized ads. Giant rolls of hay serve as stands for advertising signs on fields near highways leading to the city.

“You can’t see the landscape anymore. It hurts the eyes,” Steinbrener said.

Still, the artists did not set out to just conceal the ads — they want to create awareness about them.

“It was important to us to have a bright, highlighting color. Not black or white ... that would have made the signs disappear,” Steinbrener said. “Aside from the visual impact, we wanted to create a discourse about the environment in the public space, and that's happening now.“

Sadly, the installation was removed on June 20, but more photographs can be found on Caramdir's Flickr site and by searching for ‘delete!’ on vienna.metblogs.com.

First seen on Stay Free! Daily, most recently on the Wooster Collective’s blog. Quote from MSNBC’s article “Artists ‘delete’ ads to provoke discussion.”

Fluid form, frozen light

An interesting idea. FutureFactories, the product of a collaboration between the School of Design Technology at University of Huddersfield, UK, and their former Designer-in-Residence, Lionel Theodore Dean, conceptualizes using CAD and Rapid Prototyping technologies for what Dean calls the “mass individualisation” of a line of pendant lamps.

Using rapid prototyping techniques, it costs the same to produce similar parts as identical ones, so why produce two products the same?

Envisage a future with ’living‘ consumer products, forms that grow, change, and mutate on screen.

At any given moment a product may be frozen creating a unique design, digitally manufactured and delivered to the door.

Via Future Feeder by way of del.icio.us/blackbeltjones.

Long Exposure

More lovely, simple artworks–this time it’s landscape photography by Frank Grisdale. He uses long, hand held exposures to simplify his subject and reveal the basic elements beneath. Also via Land & Living.

The Long View

One of the more beautiful satellite images I’ve run across is this Ikonos satellite image of Robert Smithson’s “Spiral Jetty”. The Dia Center is debating if and how best to preserve the work for future generations, but it seems that nature is doing some of the work for us.

For nearly three decades Robert Smithson’s “Spiral Jetty” lay underwater in the Great Salt Lake. Since 1999, as drought has lowered the water level, this famous American earth sculpture—a 1,500-foot coil of black basalt rocks—has slowly re-emerged. Now it is completely exposed; the rocks encrusted with white salt crystals are surrounded by shallow pink water in what looks like a vast snow field.

Quote from Melissa Sanford’s article, “The Salt of the Earth”, in the NY Times. Via Pruned, via Land & Living

Unexpected images

It's not a bug, it's a feature.

Until last August when he fished his camera and tripod from the bottom of a New Mexico pond Eaves owned an ordinary Nikon Coolpix 990 digital camera.

After five days of trying everything but mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, the lens and viewfinders cleared. He popped in four new batteries, slid the once-wet Sandisk flashcard into place and turned the camera on.

"It fired up like it knew where it was going," the excited former Korean War photographer said.

But when he looked at his Coolpix monitor, the colors were streaked, halos magically appeared, and every time he moved the camera the colors would change. When he photographed a subject, no two photos were alike.

Article at the Lawrence Journal-World. For more photography by Farrell Eaves, go to Bruce Dale's website. Via Make.

The Pizza Connection

Maybe I'm a little slow on the uptake, but today is the first I've heard of the “Pizza Connection”. Apparently, since the 1960’s the price of a cheese slice and the price of a ride on the subway have paced each other “with uncanny precision.” The bad news is that the price of a slice has recently jumped above $2.00, as the NY Times observes.

Not to alarm New York City subway and bus riders, but a pizza shop around the corner from our Times Square office is charging $2.20 for a plain slice. At a Famous Famiglia parlor a few blocks north, the price is up to $2.25.

This horrifying discovery left us no choice but to place an urgent phone call to Eric M. Bram. He confirmed our worst fears for the subways.

“Are you going to get another fare increase?” he said. “I guess it’s inevitable.”

On this score, there is every reason to heed Mr. Bram, a Bronx-born patent lawyer who moved to Westchester some time ago.

In 1980, he articulated what we have since come to call the Pizza Connection. He noted that, from the early 1960's, the price of a pizza slice - we’re talking here about a no-frills wedge of mozzarella and tomato sauce, unmarred by toppings - matched the cost of a subway ride “with uncanny precision.”

Read the rest of the story in the NY Times article, “Digging Deep for a Slice of the Pie.”

5 story fireball

So imagine this: You're walking down West Houston Street by the Angelika Theater. It's just about dinner-time. It's a lovely summer evening in New York. Then, just in front of you, a BANG, and a 5 story fireball shoots up out of the subway grate!?!? That's what happened to a friend earlier this week when a ConEd Transformer exploded in front of 18 West Houston Street.

The cause of the transformer explosion that caused the fireball has yet to be determined, according to the paltry news coverage this story is getting. Here's the story from New York Newsday.

Con Edison is still investigating the cause of a transformer explosion at the corner of Mercer and West Houston streets yesterday that left a man injured with second-degree burns and scorched a portion of a 13-story building.

A spokesperson for Con Edison, D. Joy Faber, said that a Con Edison crew was at the site inspecting the vault. "How it happened, that's what we're trying to determine right now," Faber said.

As my friend said, the lack of interest from the media makes you wonder how often this really happens. Scary.

Blogger, Hermitude, was also nearby.

...all of a sudden there's this noise behind me. It sounds like thunder, only up close. I turn around and something has exploded not 10 feet away from me. Along with everyone else, I start running away from the huge ball of fire and smoke. People are yelling something about a bomb.

See the rest of her post here.

The shadow knows

Ellis parking meter
Uploaded by jeanphony on 19 Jun '05, 4.34am PST.

Street artist ©Ellis G. knows how to control his fear... with chalk. His shadow outlines have been turning up all over the neighborhood, particularly on Smith Street. The back story is classic New York.

About a month ago, artist, Ellis Gallagher, 31, was mugged in the foyer of his Cobble Hill home. "I saw this shadow on the front door," he recalls. "It was this guy with a two-foot-long machete saying 'Gimme your money!'"

The thief made off with $82. Gallagher called the cops, who caught the perp later than night. End of story, if not for an admitted case of posttraumatic stress. "I'd jump every time I saw a shadow," Gallagher says. "That's when I started the drawings–as self medication."

Stop into Apartment 138 for a peek at some of his canvases. Quote from Howard Halle's story in Time Out New York.

New Eats on Smith

Gravy
Uploaded by jeanphony on 19 Jun '05, 4.06am PST.

A new restaurant called Gravy appears to be nearing the finishing stages on Smith Street. A peek inside showed a full length counter with stools–old school diner style–and a fairly large beer garden with a bar out back.

Who wants to bet that this is yet another Alan Harding project. He seems to be on a mission to open one restaurant for every style of cuisine in the borough. (i.e. Patois, Schnack, Pacifico, La Rosa, Gowanus Yacht Club, Zombie Hut, Sonny's, and formerly Uncle Pho, and Red Rail). Smith street is turning into his own personal food court.

I won't complain too loudly though, since his restaurants are some of my favorites in the neighborhood. And any place called Gravy is O.K. by me.

Grolsch Massacre

I don't know the story behind this photograph, but it's a shame, a real shame. Via del.icio.us/Moment.

Wooster

My new favorite site. Lots of insiprational, beautiful, and just plain fun images of street art submitted by readers from all over the world. I have to have some every day! Wooster Collective rocks!

Adilette Blowout

My favorite pair of sandals just blew out. I guess I saw it coming... I've had them since about 1995. If you've never had a pair of Adilettes I highly recommed getting one. They are, quite possibly, the most comfortable things you can put on your feet in the summer. Buy some at Amazon.

Mysterious X&Y

There seems to be some DaVinci Code level mystery surrounding the cover art of Coldplay's latest album, X&Y. My favorite explanation so far is this, from Marcus du Sautoy writing for The Guardian. Via Design Observer.

If you don’t want me to spoil the excitement of working out Coldplay’s new album cover, look away now. First, the colours are irrelevant. The cover translates the album title into a binary code where each block of colour represents a 1 and a gap 0...

The first column of colours on the cover shows a black and grey block representing a 1, followed by a gap representing a zero, then three more blocks of colour giving three 1s. The first letter in Coldplay's title is the letter X. The last column gives us 10101 or the letter Y.

Scooter-parking obsessed man leaves nasty note

I'm a dick Actually This Guy is a dick
Uploaded by jeanphony on 12 Jun '05, 6.54am PST.

So I got my scooter back and less than 24 hours later This Guy left the note above on it to welcome me back to the neighborhood. Nice, huh. He wants me to meet him for a "showdown at high-noon" on the newyorkscooters Yahoo Group. Get a fucking life, dude.

The thing that gets me is that he made the effort to actually go home , type it up, print it out, and return with some scotch tape to stick it to my scoot. Wow. I can just picture him storming down the street with his little note and his little tape dispenser.

Apparently This Guy does this all the time. check this out. He even used the same font and color (ooohh... pink is my ANGRY color.) For more laughs, check out this thread on Yahoo groups, or this one.

Amphicar

There was one of these boats cars contraptions in my hometown when I was just a youngster. I thought it was the coolest thing ever. I did my best to talk my dad into buying one for the family so we could cross the Savannah River wherever we wanted instead of using the bridge. Via We make money not art.

Pity the fool

This sounds fun. Greg Rivera's “I Pity The Dolls!: A Collection of Contemporary and Vintage Mr. T Dolls” opens tomorrow at Orchard Street Art Gallery on the Lower East Side.

"I Pity The Doll!" features over 150 handmade vintage Mr. T Dolls that were all the rage (a la Cabbage Patch Kids) back in the '80s. In addition to Greg’s collection of vintage dolls, the show features dolls designed by a group of some of our favorite comtemporary artists including Magmo the Destroyer, MCA of Evil Design, Ssur, 360 Toy Group Freaklub, and the BA Team.

Seen on NY1 between diaper changes. Quote above from Wooster Collective.

Atlantic Art Walk

It never fails. Whenever I go out of town, there is some kind of festival on Atlantic Avenue. Via Cool Hunting by way of Brownstoner .

p.s. I hate the name "Bococa."

Ebbets was here

On Thursday of last week I went out to get a couple new tires for the car (gotta be safe what with the new addition to the family and all). To kill time while waiting for the service manager to upsell me 4 new tires, a realignment, and a brake job, I walked around the neighborhood and took a few photos. While walking, I stumbled on the apartment complex above. It didn't strike me at first, but then I did a little digging, and it turns out that it's not just named after Ebbet's field, it's on the former site!

So, if you find yourself roaming around Brooklyn one day, and you have time to kill, roam on over to 55 Sullivan Place, squint your eyes, and imagine what it must have been like to have our own Major League team just two blocks from the Prospect Park subway stop in Flatbush.

If it's cool enough for him...

Today, I wore a sling baby carrier in public for the first time.

I've been wearing it (and the kid) around the house for the last few days, but I just hadn't gotten up the nerve to go outside wearing something as questionably masculine as a sling baby carrier. I've always thought they were more or less mom-specific unless they were brightly-colored and had a North Face logo on (you know... for men). But I sucked it up and wore it simply because it's the most comfortable baby transport device I've used so far. Masculinity be damned!

Imagine my delight when I got home to find the above pics and this Daddy Types post on Stephen Malkmus wearing the same sling baby carrier to a recent gallery opening. That's him on the right, by the way.

To bolster my own self-opinion, I'm going to say that this isn't simply another example of fatherhood turning a rock star into a big ol' wuss. Instead, let's say it's an example of what a trend-setting guy I really am :)