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Culturejamming
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Edited
by Chris Zahn
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ID FORUM ARCHIVES
THE HYPERINSTRUMENTS The Hyperinstruments (also known as Opera of the Future) Group explores concepts and techniques to help advance the future of musical composition, performance, learning, and expression. Through the design of new interfaces for both professional virtuosi and amateur music-lovers; the development of new techniques for interpreting and mapping expressive gesture; and the application of these technologies to innovative compositions and experiences; we seek to enhance music as a performance art, and to develop its transformative power as counterpoint to our everyday lives. The scope of our research includes musical instrument design, concepts for new performance spaces, interactive touring and permanent installations, and "music toys", and rangers from as extension of traditional forms to radical departures such as the Brain Opera and Toy Symphony. http://www.media.mit.edu/hyperins/ FUTURE GAP COLORS The Color Marketing Group - an international not for profit association of 1600 color designers - have released its forecast of the hottest new color trends for 2001. They include:
NEW TRENDS IN URBAN PLANNING
The 3d City
100 Wozocos HADAKA MATSURI This photograph, taken shortly after World War II, depicts a hadaka matsuri ceremony held at Saidaiji Temple in Okayama, Japan. The ceremony involves hundreds of young Japanese men in a room grappling in total darkness to find camphor-scented batons tossed into the fray by the temple priest. http://www.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/flashback/0009/ THE TOP 10 WORST CORPORATIONS
Avonale
From The Multinational Monitor CHNDOGU Chindogu is a make-believe Japanese word coined by comedian Keni Kawakami (chin means "weird" and dogu is "tool"). Chindogu's are "almost" useless objects, but not all almost useless objects are Chindogu's. Got it? A Chindogu refers to an object/invention that cannot be for real use. They are offerings to the rest of the world. They cannot be patented. Here are some Chindogu's:
A fan with 18 blades as sharp as knives. A lead-lined lifejacket to encourage those who cannot swim to swim because sinking would help to make them swim Books with glow in the dark letters printed with florescent ink so you don't have to turn on the light to read in bed. Great for blackouts. Anti-theft jeans with back pockets that go from the waist to the ankle to prevent pocketpickers from stealing your wallet A light plastic disposable raincoat cover so the raincoat doesn't get wet and dirty Eyebrow toupees for women A wine glass with one rim on one side "lower" like in a V shape so your nose doesn't bump into the side while you drink. http://info.pitt.edu/~ctnst3/chindogu.html ARTIST OF THE MONTH: YAYOI KUSAMA Yayoi Kusama appears to be the ultimate manifestation of the tortured, driven artist. Clinical textbooks list her condition as obsessional neurosis. Kusama has been plagued by it since her early years, haunted by a childhood hallucination of a kitchen scene in which everything was covered by a red flower pattern. This hallucination has evolved into her signature obsessions of dots and an extended pattern dubbed "infinity nets". Along with Yoko Ono, she was part of the New York avant-garde art world. She began carving out a name for herself for her confrontational work. These included the 1000 Boats Show, a cloth row boat constructed of, and stuffed with, cloth phalluses against a wallpaper backdrop of multiple penises. Determined to shock, Kusama shifted to performance art, rivaling Andy Warhol for notoriety with a succession of increasingly outrageous public "happenings", invariably involving mass disrobings. The events look incredibly dated now, a relic of the weird and wacky 1960s. But Kusama garnered plenty of attention with such stunts as her Grand Orgy to Awaken the Dead, in 1969, a protest at the number of dead artists then featured in the Museum of Modern Art, and a rant against "capitalist bulls---" in the Naked Event at the Stock Exchange. Kusama art does have its destructive side. Physically and emotionally wrecked (she recalls torrid sessions at which she would work uninterrupted for 40- or 50-hour stretches before dropping from exhaustion), the artist returned to Japan in the early 1970s. Derided as a has-been and "Miss Dotty", she voluntarily entered the experimental Shinjuku psychiatric hospital that has been her home for more than 20 years. Ever resourceful, she churned out a string of psycho-dramatic stories and poems, including the lurid Woodstock Phallus Cutter, before being rediscovered a decade ago. Kusama insists that she is driven by a vision of dots "multiplying and wrapping the world". "My style and my objective is simply to repeat the same patterns. I will keep on creating this work until I die," she says.
http://www.schott-media.com/pix_kusami.html BUILD YOUR OWN CAR No need to wait for the year 2525 for a futuristic car. For less than $100, Robert Q. Riley Enterprises will send you blueprints with instructions to build your own space-age vehicles with snazzy names like the Tri-Magnum, Doran, Centurion and Trimuter. http://ww.rqriley.com/plans.html MAKE WINE JELL-O The Joy of Cooking suggests boiling one cup water, mixing with gelatin powder in a bowl until dissolved, then adding one cup red wine. Stir well, then refrigerate for four hours or until mixture gels. Serves four. http://www.wackyuses.com/uses.html DOGGY BALLS More than 36,000 masculine American pets now sport artificial testicles known as "Neuticles." Neuticles are artificial testicles for dogs, cats and other animals. Their slogan: "Looking and feeling the same". The doggie models come in three sizes and a variety of styles, all FDA-approved. The low-end models are plastic shells with the company's trademark etched in the side, available to vets for less than $100. "It's marshmallowy soft," says inventor Gregg Miller. "Lots of pet owners want to give their animals the most comfort possible." When President Clinton had his black Lab Buddy neutered two years ago, Miller sent the White House dog a free pair along with a Neuticle necklace. http://www.neuticles.com/nnpages/navindex.html ROUND SOUND The fashion guru of affordable sound-Anthony Gallo--delivers stylish sound with his Nucleus Micro Satellites speakers. The engineers at Anthony Gallo's labs spent five years designing the ultimate circular speaker. Their patented S2 technology allows the backsides of the internal drivers to decouple from the air inside the spheres for a full rich sound. HEATHER HAS TWO MOMMIES This year marks the 10th anniversary of the controversial children's book, Heather Has Two Mommies. Banned by many schools and bookstores, this picture book illustrated by Diana Souza is all the rage now. Unfortunately, they edited the artificial insemination section. http://www.lesleanewman.com/heather.htm TALKING HOUSES A fairly-new concept catching on in a big way is "The Talking House". Real Estate agents across the country are broadcasting property narratives on local radio frequencies using cheap $200 transmitters. They run around the clock and you never have to leave your car. Take the guided audio tour. The narratives usually last 1-3 minutes and some are quite sophisticated using sound effects or celebrity voices to enhance the moment. In the late 80s, Wisconsin-based real estate agent, Scott Matthew rigged a tape recorder and a yard sign to create the first 40 talking houses. In 1994 they started marketing a radio-based version of their invention. Today, there are Talking Houses in some 100,000 homes across America. A 24-hour commercial Many motorists find out about homes from just driving around so savvy real estate salespeople put signs on the property indicating what local station to tune into for more details. DEAFLEGGING Bootleggers have found another group to exploit: the hearing impaired. The RIAA said recently that pirates have been using assisted listening devices, available to the hard-of-hearing at concerts, to make high-quality recordings. Bootleggers simply request an ALD headset-which provides a near-pristine feed of a live show via a low-level FM frequency broadcast inside the facility-then steal the headset feed. The recordings are devoid of the usual problems like random crowd noise. Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan concerts are among those that were illegally recorded via the devices. RODEN CRATER Roden Crater is a natural cinder volcano situated on the southwestern edge of the Painted Desert in northern Arizona. Since 1972, American artist James Turrell has been planning to transform the crater into a large-scale artwork, that relates, through the medium of light, to the universe of the surrounding sky, land and culture. It is scheduled to open to the public shortly. WEB SAMPLERS
Are clouds really just UFOs?
Exploding Whale
Star Wars Name Generator
Japanese Name Generator
Dumb Catalog Items
Scary Clown Page
Bad Trips
Obscene Hand Gesture Checklist
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[Editor's note: This banner appears as per Chris' request. If you have a fervor/cause/impulse that you wish to manifest right here free of charge contact chris@discobiscuits.com]