Cool Hunting
| 14 May 2007view entries from: this week | this month | view previous day | view next day |
John Arsenault: Filthy Gorgeous
by Ami Kealoha
For a photographer whose work is full of the best kind of contradictions—fiction and fact, banality and exoticism, sexuality and domesticity—the title "Filthy Gorgeous" is apt for John Arsenault's upcoming solo show. A series of self portraits, the work is unabashedly self-focused showing a range of emotions, scenarios and levels of undress.
A playful kind of humor runs throughout, almost as if Arsenault's sharing an inside joke with the viewer. It's an effective tactic, offsetting what would otherwise come across as mere solipsism. Other images have a more sober tone as well, touching on vulnerability and loneliness.
Overall, the mix of flash-lit snapshots, elaborately staged scenes and Arsenault's unrelenting gaze has a loosely kinetic feel; it's a show that gets as much meaning from varied subjects and techniques as it gets from its themes.
Filthy Gorgeous: Self Portraits by John Arsenault
Opening reception: 17 May 2007, 6-8pm17 May-23 June 2007
ClampArt
521-531 West 25th Street
New York, NY 10011 mapmap
tel. +1 646 230 0020
Also on Cool Hunting: Kathy's Beauty Nook
Symbol Caddy and Corporate Ipsum Widgets
by Evan Orensten
Brian Haslanger is a designer who has created two handy freeware widgets for Apple's OSX.
Corporate Ipsum creates placeholder text according to your length and paragraph specs.
Symbol Caddy is a widget I use all the time when writing posts—a click on a symbol or letter copies the HTML code to your clipboard, making quick work of posting symbols, accents, em dashes, etc.
Blackminton
by SummerSeventySix
Looking like Tron picked up a racket, Blackminton is a faster, nighttime version of badminton where players covered in fluorescent paint hit a glow–in–the dark shuttlecock on black–lit courts. The sport is a spin–off of Speedminton©, which combines elements of tennis, badminton and squash, and was created in Berlin in 2002 to combat the stuffy image the original, slower game had. Now they've upped the stakes. Blackminton players might resemble refugees from an '80s rave, but as you can see in this video, it looks like a laugh to play.
Rebound Notebooks
by Fiona Killackey
Brought up in "book–ish households" surrounded by the likes of children's classics such as Paddington Bear and Trixie Beldon mysteries, Aussie duo Natalie Crupi and Ben Mason quickly realized their mutual appreciation for well–designed classic book covers. The pair came up with the concept of using the covers to create blank notebooks after sifting through piles of texts at thrift stores, the couple stumbled upon book after book created from beautiful covers but, according to Crupi, filled with incredibly dull contents. "It seemed a shame for them to sit on a shelf gathering dust in Op Shops a greater shame to buy them for the covers alone and have them gather dust on our overflowing bookshelves." Researching recycled paper options they sourced a stock made from denim off cuts and scraps—the perfect modern interior for classic, vintage exteriors. "It all fell into place," says Crupi, "we invested in some binding equipment, made enough books to have a market stall and sold out of stock that day."
Aptly titled Rebound Books, the pair create notebooks and journals for "people who need space to be creative, who want a place in the world that is all theirs that they can explore their own ideas and thoughts, where they can keep information and always have that space when something new and exciting comes to mind." Notebooks start at $25 AUD from Rebound Books.
It's Pop It's Art: Imagine by John Lennon
by SummerSeventySix
Someone once said to me if "Imagine" by John Lennon was never played again, it wouldn't matter, given how deeply embedded in popular culture it is. Love it or hate it, I bet all of you could sing it to yourselves right now.
Me, I'm a lover, which is why I'm really pleased this print from Airside is now finally available as part of the "It's Pop It's Art" collaboration we wrote about at the end of last year. Apparently, it's taken so much longer than the other songs to be made because a certain Ms. Ono had to cast her approving eye over the design.
Luckily she okayed it, because I think designer Chris Rain has created something that perfectly reflects the songs utopian theme. Lennon's lyrics are debossed onto either blue, gray or white art paper, so they fade in and out of sight as the light, or the viewer's perspective, alters. Each color is limited to 100 signed and numbered prints that cost £150 each.
