UVSunSense Wristbands

by Karen Day

With an early heat wave hitting NYC, we're reminded once again of how intense the sun can be yet tend to forget how little time it takes to damage our skin. UV SunSense wristbands make for an easy way to monitor sun exposure with the simple color-changing gauge alerting when it's time to reapply sunscreen or to get out of the sun all together.

The recyclable wristbands work simply by simultaneously applying sunscreen to the band and your body. When the band's purple color fades, it's time to reapply. When the words "apply sunscreen to this side" disappear, it's time to find some shade. Because the bands sense the potency of the sunscreen, if sun-worshippers take a break, the bands do to.

Each pack includes seven bands and can be purchased from Amazon for $6.

Total São Paulo: A Guide to the Unexpected

by Karen Day

One of the world's largest metropolises, São Paulo can easily seem an overwhelming congestion of bare-skinned beauties, skyscrapers and an intense melting pot of culture. To help navigate through it all, "Total São Paulo: A Guide to the Unexpected," is a perspicacious guide and must-have travel resource from our own São Paulo resident Phuong-Cac Nguyen written especially for the creative collective's discerning eye in their search for distinctly authentic places located off the beaten path.

Covering ten essential neighborhoods, the 176-page paperback guidebook includes 11 illustrated maps, 17 interviews with top São Paulo in-the-know natives and provocative full-page features on notable highlights located within each neighborhood. The guide's magazine-format design is fitting for the smart, edgy tone and streetwise, first-hand information provided by Nguyen and her team of local adventure seekers.

Nguyen, an American journalist living in São Paulo for many years, contributes regularly to CH about what's happening around her beloved adopted city. Her inside knowledge can also be found among publications such as the LA Weekly and Anthem Magazine.

Published by Unhinged Jaw Press, purchase Total Sao Paulo for $27 through the site and at independent bookstores worldwide.

Both the book and the "local listing" website launch tomorrow, Wednesday, 29 April 2009. Be sure not to miss the launch party the following Saturday which will be an array of Brazilian musicians, capoeira and free caipirinhas.

Total São Paulo Launch Party
9 May 2009, 3-7pm
Carmichael Gallery
1257 North La Brea Avenue
West Hollywood, CA 90038
tel. +1 323 969 0600

Tokyo Art Beat Spring Tees

by Karen Day

We're always super excited to see Tokyo Art Beat's new limited edition tees, and this spring is no different. As usual, Tokyo Art Beat, the nonprofit website covering art events, reviews and creative jobs in the Japanese capital put out two tees with fresh graphics from the up-and-coming Japanese artist Teppei Kaneuji and American born, Tokyo-based type designer Ian Lynam. (Click on images for greater detail.)

Each shirt is available on the TAB website for ¥3500, where you can also read more about each artist and get a glimpse of what's going on in the Tokyo art scene.

Julia Chiang: My Rotten Apples

by Karen Day

Drawn to things considered unworthy and unwanted, artist Julia Chiang's sculpture series My Rotten Apples embodies her unmistakable ability to transform the undesirable into covetable objects.

This unique edition of 21, smaller-scale rotten apples stems from an upcoming large-scale floor sculpture entitled "Never Enough," in which Julia cast apples in porcelain and stacked the resulting "perfect" apples in a large pile to represent desire, excess and greed. Noticing that when removing the pieces from the molds at various stages of wetness she could let them droop and collapse in different ways, Julia was reminded of rotting or deformed apples and fell in love with the forms and their contrasting symbolic nature—desire and discard—also making clear why this is the perfect icon for New York City.

Julia's signed and numbered rotten apples are handmade of porcelain, coated with a 5% gold luster and can be purchased from the New Museum Store for $200. For more detailed images, see after the jump.

Beeple: Subprime

by CH Contributor

by Laura Neilson

Subprime by Mike Winkelmann—aka Beeple—is a music video, 3D animation exercise and spectacular visual commentary on America's socioeconomic situation all in one.

The two-and-a-half-minute animated video is a reflection on the current economic crisis in America, visually represented by the housing market and its escalating trajectory over the last decade or so. "The video was meant to illustrate the cyclical nature of the economy," explains Winkelmann, "which at its root is fueled by an insatiable push for 'more, bigger, better,' until it becomes no longer sustainable, and the bubble bursts—as we have recently seen."

The project, which Winkelmann created on Cinema 4D, is his first 3D animated film and took five months to complete. "It was a technical challenge for me," he says. To match his awesome visuals, he enlisted the Minneapolis-based band Nobot to produce the video's digitally-pronounced background music and sound effects.

Winkelmann's work has been featured at various film fests, including Massachusetts College of Arts' upcoming Dead/Live Video Festival.

To see more, check out the Beeple website, or his Vimeo page.