Cigarette Anyone?

There’s been a lot of talk lately about the efforts being made to hide cigarette packaging at point of purchase. As the cigarette package begins to drift out of view, its’ influence is being seen in far reaching places. Notice the similarities in naming conventions. A very interesting sales tool.

Christo and Jeanne-Claude

My introduction to the work of Christo and Jeanne-Claude came during the first of my many visits to Telegramme prints. On the East wall of Telegramme’s small but well adorned store, hung a print of a conceptual drawing for The Gates, a project Christo and Jeanne-Claude started  in 1979 and fully realized in 2005. I was immediately struck by the scale of what the drawing proposed to me, then the colours captured me, and I envisioned myself amidst the array of orange shown sailing through the barren trees of New York city in february. The print, although lovely, was well beyond my means. 

Christo and Jeanne-Claude are two remarkable artists. Remarkable on one hand, because of the sheer scale of their works, not only in physical size, but in terms of coordinative effort. Remarkable on the other hand, because of the beauty of their work, its relationship with its environment, and the fact that any fundraising for these projects (and these projects do need funds) is done by the artists themselves, without sponser, by selling conceptual drawings and other art done by Christo. 

Christo and Jeanne-Claude expressly ask that no images from their website be reproduced without permission, but they have lots of interesting stuff to view at their site. Check out the Common Errors section to get a feel for their fascinating convictions, and visit their Works in Progress section to see what they’re currently up to. 

Weekly Media Consumption

For my Contemporary Design Theory class, I’ve been asked to document a week’s worth of media consumption...mmm...media. 

Here goes:

Reading: I love to read for pleasure...mmm...pleasure (I’ll stop), but when school is on, there just isn’t a whole lot of time to indulge in a good book. I've been reading Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead for months now, and I’m not making a whole lot of progress, but I am into it. My week of reading breaks down into approximately 2-3hrs of pleasure reading, and 2-3hrs of reading for school.

Radio: Funnily enough, when I listen to the radio it isn’t to tune into music, in fact, I find much of what’s on conventional radio to be, well, conventional. When I do tune into a radio station, it’s usually CBC radio and I listen to catch up on the latest bits of relevant news. That being said, I have a friend who subscribes to Sirius satellite radio, and there is a program called Left of Centre which plays a great mix of new music. I am very tempted to sign up for it, very tempted indeed. My week of radio consumption amounts to about 2 hours in total. 

Music: So, while I don’t listen to a lot of music on the radio, I do listen to a lot of music. I’ve got a few wheelbarrow loads worth of Cd’s, and I keep buying them like they’re going out of style hmm...I guess they are. I listen to about 25 hours of music during a typical week. 

T.V. / DVD’S: I watch way too much television. If I’m home, and a baseball game is on, it’s pretty much a sure thing I’ll be watching it. I figure the typical game lasts about three hours. Since it’s currently baseball season and teams play almost every day, I’m pretty much watching a baseball game every day. Now, as sad as that sounds, I’m far from glued to the television for the entire three hours, usually I take the opportunity to have a nap, or cruise the internet, or flip through a magazine, or do some homework, or, or, or. There’s something reassuring about just having the T.V. on.  I probably have the television on for a misleading 30 hours a week. 

Email: I check that email thing rather often. It has become a habit. A greedy, needy habit. The ratio of emails I actually get to the number of times I check my email is way off - way, way off. I wish I were more popular. I have started sending out random emails to random email addresses, just to see if I get responses. No I haven’t, but send me an email, it'll make me feel better. I probably receive about 25-35 relevant emails a week, and send out about the same. 

Web: Email and web surfing go hand in hand in terms of sheer obsessiveness. I have my sites, and come hell or high water I am going to visit those sites. I will. I will. I will. I probably spend 15-20 hours a week on the internet - maybe more. 

Video Games: Me and my friend Muhammadali play video games constantly. He kicks my ass at just about everything we play, but he’s a good sport and never rubs it in. That’s why he’s so Mo. Actual time playing video games is near zero hours a week. 

Cell Phone: I will spend 2-3 hours talking on my cell phone per week, and I'll send and receive about 40-50 text messages per week. 

Merci!

Vent, Applaud, Vent

First I’m going to vent, then I’m going to applaud, then I’m going to vent again. 

Vent one: What is with the parity between Canadian and American prices on books and magazines? For those not in the currency exchange loop, the Canadian dollar has been doing quite well in comparison to the U.S dollar for quite some time now, and the two dollars are currently about par. So, why no change in the discrepancy of price? Some governing body needs to address this. As an example, STEP magazine sells its bi-monthly magazine to Americans at $7.95 a pop while us Canadians, deemed richer or simply naive, must dole out $11.50 per issue. What?

Applaud: CMYK magazine on the other hand sells its quarterly magazine to Americans for $8.99, and to Canadians for $8.99. Hurrah! Hurrah! Bravo! Bravo! but...

Vent two: ...if perhaps you’d like to make a commitment to the magazine, show your love and sign up for a year’s subscription, well then all bets are off. Americans get their yearly subscription for $25 per annum, while us Canadians, deemed better endowed or an easy sell, must cough up $38, and only U.S funds will be accepted thank you. What? 

Blonde Redhead / Mike Mills

I've been a big fan of the rock band Blonde Redhead since their 2004 album “Misery is a Butterfly”, and my devotion was only strengthened after the release of their follow up, and most current album “23”. The albums are constantly working their way onto my Cd player, and the band’s unique vocals and overall sound put me into a headspace I can’t normally find. Both albums also have a great design, which, of course, doesn’t hurt my appreciation any. 

Up until last week I hadn’t seen any of the video’s off of “23”, but I happened upon them when I was doing some visual research at Blonde Redhead’s label’s website (www.4AD.com). I was delighted to see that all of the video’s were done by Mike Mills, who has seen a lot of publicity over the last few years for being an extremely talented jack of all trades. From what I have gathered, Mills started out, or at least made a name for himself, doing graphic design work for musical acts such as Sonic Youth, The Beastie Boys, and Air. He found his way into making music videos and hasn’t looked back, graduating to direct his first feature film with 2005’s Thumbsucker, a somewhat recent favourite of mine. 

The interesting thing about the videos Mills does for Blonde Redhead, is how different they are from most music videos out there. You know the ones that feature endless edits of the band looking their “coolest”, or visually distracted videos that merely keep ones eyes active until the song is done. Of the videos for Blonde Redhead Mills says “What if I only had one element? How could I reduce that element to it’s composite parts? Could I reduce that again? If I kept reducing, would I get to the hugeness of the music?” 

After watching all of the available videos, I was impressed by Mills ability to let the songs breathe within the context of video. He manages to seduce the viewer into his visuals, while never overstepping his boundaries, all the while contributing to the power of the music. 

To check up on Mike Mills, and check out his videos for Blonde Redhead, head over to his website (www.mikemillsweb.com), and take a little tour. You'll find five videos from Blonde Redhead’s album “23”, each offering its own rewards; and, if you liked the movie Titanic, or even if you didn’t but feel in a giving mood, you should give the video for the title track “23” a play - very nice editing!  

Note: After investigating a little further, Art Direction for the album “23” was done by David Heasty, who a nice website featuring his impressive work at www.heasty.com (although I don't think Blonde Redhead is featured).

OCAD Student Showcase

What a full day it has been. Actually had breakfast, which was a pleasant change. Not much compares to syrup and bacon. Did a proper grocery shop Thursday night for the first time in possibly months, so now my fridge is stocked and I can begin to eat well, or... (looking in the fridge)... wait, I thought I bought more than that. 

Went to the opening of OCAD’s student showcase after breakfast. I wasn’t overly affected by much of what was on display, some of the paintings and illustrations were nice, but when I reached the 6th floor I did find myself impressed by the quality of the fourth-year graphic design work. There was a nice blend of creative and technical ability. I must admit to being a bit daunted by much of what I saw, but I took it as inspiration, and remembered that these students have five semesters of instruction on me. Note to self - get to work!

After OCAD, it was back home for a much needed nap. Sleep is zen. I awoke to the promise of a Blue Jay’s win, but realized this was not likely, and so went to the movies with friends. While waiting for Harold and Kumar to begin, I was, of course, subject to all of the advertising that pours forth before all the advertising for other movies starts.  I was happy to see a very strange, but terrific commercial for Coke Zero featuring two tongues and an eye. Do investigate. Harold and Kumar was funny. There were some close to awkward moments of political incorrectness, but the movie never dwelled on those moments, and moved about with an over-edited and over-dubbed good faith. 

I arrived home after the movie, ate some BBQ chips, reheated some pasta, ate a few pistachios nuts, finished with some yogurt, and wrote this post. OK, so maybe there is a lot of food.