New art from old

Posted on May 20, 2007 by cicada

One of my favorite authors (read Winter’s Tale if you read nothing else of his), Mark Helprin, has written an editorial (NYT) arguing that the copyright on works of art should extend indefinitely. Helprin’s arguments seem logical – art doesn’t make much money to begin with, art is hard work, the creator deserves to be rewarded for that work. I’m an artist, so he’s preaching to the choir. Except – since when is anything involving art logical or simple?

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Posted in Artists & Art, Books | Comments Off

One thing I want: not to be a toad

Posted on May 19, 2007 by cicada

“How many twigs in a bird’s nest?” asked the enchantress suddenly. “Answer quickly. There, you see,” she added. “Poor chicks, you don’t even know that. How could you be expected to know what you really want out of life?”
“One thing I want,” retorted Eilonwy, “is not to be a toad.”

-Lloyd Alexander, The Prydain Chronicles


Lloyd Alexander, author of the Prydain Chronicles, died of cancer Thursday.

I think children’s books break naturally into in two phyla: the kind you return to reread over and over, even as an adult; and the kind that sink away half-forgotten, never to be revisited. My regular destinations include LOTR, The Blue Sword, Madeleine L’Engle’s Wrinkle in Time trilogy, and Patricia McKillip’s Riddlemaster Trilogy. But Prydain was one of the latter for me: I didn’t even remember reading The Book of Three until I recently found an old report on it, complete with a plot diagram and a hand-drawn pig. The story of pig-herder- turned-hero Taran, bossy Princess Eilonwy, and their companions, it was a fairly standard coming-of-age tale.

Looking back, I got more than I realized out of Alexander’s books. They gave me a basic outline of Welsh myth (sufficient to make the Mabinogion awfully familiar a few years later). And more importantly, they gave me a proto-Hermione: Princess Eilonwy, quick-tongued, sharp-witted and attractive (when she bothered to clean herself up).

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A little late for Mother’s Day, but. . .

Posted on May 18, 2007 by cicada

mother1.jpg

Mother
David Hochbaum, 2006

David Hochbaum rocks. Enough said.

Posted in Artists & Art, Cephalopodmania | Comments Off

Cannibalism, Then and Now

Posted on May 16, 2007 by cicada

Where else but in the blogosphere could one learn that the medieval practice of consuming powdered human corpses has experienced a questionably legal (and questionably real) renaissance?

A testimonial from the Modern Man-Eater website:

“My bones were just plain getting eaten up by the osteo-porosis. But after eating all the calcium from my mother, I feel SO much better. My bones are strong again. I can feel my mother’s spirit within them making me strong again, just like she did when she was alive!”
-Ota Mae Wilson, NY, NY

Oh, my. It says something about the Internet that I can’t tell if this is a hoax or not!

For the genuinely adventurous, the book Gastronaut reportedly includes some cannibal recipes. . .

Via Curious Expeditions
and Table of Malcontents

Posted in Biology, Blogs and Blogging, Frivolity, Science | Comments Off

Our chances become slightly less remote

Posted on May 15, 2007 by cicada

The venerable lit journal Poetry has the following invitation on its site:

In June, July, and August 2007, POETRY will only consider work from poets who have not previously appeared in the magazine. We encourage writers new to these pages to send work to:

POETRY
444 N Michigan Ave., Ste. 1850
Chicago, IL 60611

Of course, it’s still Poetry, so one’s chances of acceptance are still very low. But why not? Now is the time to submit something, if you have it.

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Getting the point without seeing the big picture

Posted on May 13, 2007 by cicada

notkingiftdetail.jpg

detail of “The Gift”
Ceramic tile
Richard Notkin, 1999

Last Friday I visited the Portland Art Museum. It was eerily quiet, so I was able to linger over individual pieces without feeling pressured to move along. Lingering is good; on the other hand, there was no “flow of traffic” to guide me. In empty galleries, I tend to wander inefficiently around, and inadvertently approach pieces from the least effective direction – I’m the kind of haphazard visitor that curators dread. And when I rounded a corner and encountered Richard Notkin’s 1999 sculpture, “The Gift,” sideways and from an arm’s length away, at first I didn’t register what I was seeing.

“The Gift” is a large grid of individually cast ceramic tiles depicting stylized skulls, heart tissue, ears, bricks, what looks like brain tissue, and dice. This is what an individual skull tile looks like:

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Posted in Artists & Art, Museum Lust | Comments Off

That explains it

Posted on May 13, 2007 by cicada

Why I’m always posting to this blog in the middle of the night: I’m a mutant.

Oh, I can’t make such an irresponsible overstatement. This is just a mouse study, and we have no idea if it applies to humans. Yet.

An article with some more science on this topic, from The Scientist.

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An old classic

Posted on May 13, 2007 by cicada

We were just discussing Myers-Briggs tests, and it occurred to me I hadn’t taken one in a while. I am always INF, usually INFJ, and this time around was no different. Apparently Myers-Briggs is more reproducible than most of the data I got in grad school.

INFJ – the counselor

Your type is best summed up by the word “counselor”, which belongs to the larger group of idealists. Only 2% of the population share your type. You are so empathic that you often know what others need before they know themselves. You are a complex person who can deal with complicated issues and people, almost prefer to, as you love problem solving. You can be something of an idealist or perfectionist, and should try to take yourself a little less seriously.You are a supportive and insightful romantic partner, encouraging your mate to have dreams and work hard to make those dreams come true. Because you are so creative, you have a wealth of ideas to help them toward those goals. You need harmony so much that you are driven to resolve conflict quickly, as long as the terms don’t violate your ethics. You feel the most appreciated when your partner admires your creativity, trusts your inspirations, and respects your values. It is also vitally important that your partner be open and emotionally available – in other words, that they be willing to share themselves completely.

Your group summary: idealists (NF)

Your type summary: INFJ

Link: The LONG Scientific Personality Test written by unpretentious2 on OkCupid

Posted in Frivolity | 4 Comments

Typosperma

Posted on May 10, 2007 by cicada

typosperma.jpg
Typosperma
Oded Ezer

Typographer/artist Oded Ezer says,

The main idea of the ‘Typosperma’ project was to create some sort of new transgenic creatures, half (human) sperm, half letter. These imaginary creatures are cloned sperms, that typographic information has been implanted into their DNA.

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Posted in Artists & Art, Words | 2 Comments

Breaking up with my laptop

Posted on May 10, 2007 by cicada

I finally acquiesced to the inevitable, and am posting from a new laptop. My Powerbook G4 is still alive, but it makes an intermittent clicking sound like a Japanese beetle, freezes up routinely, and has a battery life of ten minutes. It’s been running virtually nonstop since I bought it in 2002, so I don’t blame it at all. I’m significantly slower than I was in 2002, and my joints click too.

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Posted in Department of the Drama | 2 Comments