Networks solve coordination costs. The cost of discovering a radical group has never been lower: combine search engines with anonymity tools with social media, and you have a way for people with extremely high-risk beliefs to discover one another, refine their views, attract more followers, and work together for their common aims. This is the force that gave rise to the pro-democratic “color revolutions,” the Arab Spring movements; the Occupy Movement and Anonymous — but also neofascist/hyper-nationalist movements; Al Qaeda; troll armies; and darknet pedophile rings.
Lowering coordination costs confers a disproportionate benefit to radical and fringe groups, and has a much less significant effect on mainstream activities. That’s because being in the mainstream means that you’ve already solved your coordination costs. When I was an anti-nuclear proliferation activist in Toronto in the 1980s, 98% of my job was figuring out how to pay for stamps, then address envelopes, then put the stamps on the envelopes — the remaining 2% was the time I had left over to figure out what to print on the things I put inside the envelopes. By contrast, the share of resources used for coordination by organizations agitating for more nuclear weapons (NATO, NORAD, arms dealers) was a rounding error — a line-item just below the coffee-and-doughnuts budget.
When you make coordination costs lower, the people whose work is most constrained by coordination costs get the biggest benefit. Thus the era of networked politics has seen profound shift and significant achievements for political fringes. In the 2000s, the Smart Mobs took to the streets — as in 2001, when the Philippines’ People Power revolution used SMS-coordinated demonstrations to topple Joseph Estrada’s corrupt regime.
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But netroots movements have always been better at tearing down than building up. Popular Power got rid of Estrada, but didn’t create the kind of lasting institutions that reformed the Philippines government — that’s why today the country is governed by a terrifying psychopath. Obama used the netroots to overcome the Bush legacy, but hit pause on the grubby street-level activists on day one in favor of a horse-trading, Chicago-Machine-style establishment politics where everything moved into the smoke-filled back rooms — and was fatally undermined by the Tea Party, a right-wing netroots movement (with mainstream financial backing, of course) that was nearly as effective at opposing Obama as Obama’s netroots had been at mobilizing against Bush. In Egypt, the netroots kicked out Mubarak — something the traditionally organized opposition failed to do in 30 years — but the country turned around and promptly elected an intolerant, authoritarian Islamist government that was then toppled in a military coup, leaving the country governed by murderers and torturers who are no more accountable than Mubarak was for his 30 year run.
Occupy was an attempt to force Obama to govern from the netroots, and it went further than anyone could have imagined, but it did not push Obama to the left; nor did it create an alternative power structure that was powerful enough to overturn the Democratic establishment (yet) or win the 2016 elections.
Which brings me to Donald Trump, and the Women’s March…
[Hyperrealistic painting tends to be pretty hit or miss for me (even in person), and his choice of palette isn’t one I’m typically into, but these are just gorgeous. -egg]
Brooklyn-based artist Kip Omolade creates large-scale oil paintings of chrome masks, depicting not only the subtle details of female faces, but incorporating the reflected environment of each piece. The series, entitled Diovadiova Chrome, makes reference in part to historical African sculptures, while exploring contemporary aspects of identity, luxury, and immortality. Each piece begins as a mold and cast taken from an actual model which is then utilized as source material for Omolade’s towering paintings which can measure several feet tall.
“Diovadiova Chrome portraits historically connect to ancient, realistic African sculptures such as Benin ivory masks and Ife bronze heads,” shares Omolade in his artist statement. “The oil paintings are psychological studies that investigate immortality, the universal masks we all wear and contemporary notions of beauty and luxury. The labor-intensive process involves making a mold and cast of each model’s face, reworking the cast plaster sculpture, producing a version in resin and adding a chrome layer with artificial eyelashes. The final sculpture then serves as a model for the hyper-realistic oil painting. This technique maintains the likeness qualities of portraiture while re-presenting a mask that serves as a conduit between the spiritual and natural world.”
The term Omolade uses to describe the series, Diovadiova, is a word he derived from a combination of the Italian word “Dio” meaning god, and the historical meaning of the word “diva” which is goddess.
Omolade first began his art career working as a graffiti artist while interning at Marvel Comics and The Center for African Art and went on to earn a BFA from the School of Visual Arts. His work was most recently included in the Re:Semblance exhibition at the Redbull House of Art in Detroit and last year’s FREAK OUT! show at Zhou B Art Center. You can follow more of his work on Instagram. (via Creator’s Project)
[This is definitely one of the more interesting installation audio/sculpture pieces I’ve seen lately. -egg]
Check out the video here: https://vimeo.com/169513538
Do stressed materials emit sound waves? Yes, definitely, as we learn from the existence of Ultra Acoustic Emissions, or “ultra high and ultra short acoustic waves that travel through materials in conditions of stress.” Christoph De Boeck has brilliantly used these in his piece “Golfvorm,” where he reflects on iron in its different embodiments. Salt vapor emerges from below a steel sheet. This in turn oxidizes the steel sheet, causing iron to emerge. Furthermore, the sheet is bent by the weight of several iron mineral stones. Sensitive microphones capture the acoustic emissions of this process, which are scaled down and amplified, while the microscopic cracks produce abrupt sounds. The ongoing tension of the work creates a mesmerizing piece – revealing a process that happens right in front of our eyes but in an almost imperceptible space. Here De Boeck assembles a micro-dynamic sense of sound, reflected in materials, shapes and induced acoustics.
In one part of Chicago’s Near West Side, the median household income is $104,000. In another—about a mile away—it’s about $20,000.
A recent data visualization maps out the city’s stark income inequality in diagrams that look like a skyline: The taller the “building,” the higher the income on that block.
“It was really important to me to create the image of a city, and create this kind of post-apocalyptic ambiance,” says Austrian designer Herwig Scherabon, who mapped income in Chicago, L.A., and New York City as part of a larger Atlas of Gentrification. “When you look at it, you start to explore. The street grid is still visible in the visualizations.”
Using height to illustrate differences, instead of a standard heat map, makes the problem even more obvious. Chicago wasn’t always so starkly divided: In the 1970s, nearly half of the households in the city were middle class. Over the next four decades, Chicago added almost four times as many wealthy census tracts, while extreme poverty also grew. By 2010, middle-income tracts made up only 16% of the city.
With dizzying wall graphics reminiscent of warped funhouse mirrors, artist Peter Kogler transforms ordinary galleries, transit centers, and lobbies into near hallucinatory experiences. For over 30 years, the Austrian artist has worked at the intersection of architecture and new media to construct both immersive environments and sculptural elements that seems to redefine physical spaces. By plastering walls with optical illusions he challenges a viewer’s sense of depth (and sanity) with his ambitious monochromatic installations of repeating patterns that incorporate pipes, ants, and bold snake-like patterns.
Kogler’s most recent pieces were on view at the ING Art Center in Brussels and at ERES-Stiftung in Munich earlier this year. You can see much more on his website.
As humanity turns its gaze increasingly outwards in search of life on distant planets, a Russian deep-sea fisherman has reminded us of the incredible biodiversity lurking in the inner depths of our own world – most of which we still know literally nothing about.
Working on a trawler based in the port of Murmansk, Roman Fedortsov has certainly seen a thing or two on his adventures in the icy waters of the Barents Sea. And while we shouldn’t be celebrating the fact that so many exquisitely unique deep-sea creatures have been accidentally caught up in the fishing nets cast by Fedortsov and his crewmates, his collection of alien-like fish does at least give us an opportunity to study some of the planet’s most bizarre creatures.
I’m really enjoying these miniature assemblages by sculptor J. Shea whose pinball piece, Magical Machine, was just on display here in Chicago at a videogame themed exhibit at OhNo!Doom. Tim Burton would approve. (via super punch)
Sky Villages, designed by James Paulius, is an interactive installation at the SPARK Brooklyn Children’s Museum. The play center features several stackable modules that can be rearranged as expanding homes—wooden dwellings floating between clouds in an aquamarine sky. The imaginative play area aims to educate children about our planet’s constantly evolving population, offering a space for airborne ideas.
“As Earth’s population increases, we may look to the atmosphere for inhabitable space,” said Paulius. “Sky Villages presents the possibility to dwell in the sky in modular architecture that can be added or removed as populations increase or decrease. Dwelling units are prefabricated with the intent of reuse rather than discardment. When a unit no longer fits the particular needs of its location, it can be moved elsewhere for a new family to reside in. Constantly evolving, these structures accommodate the ever-changing tendencies of humanity and nature.”
The toy homes for Sky Villages were fabricated from wood reclaimed from water towers in Manhattan. You can see more of Paulius’ block-based projects on his portfolio site and Instagram. (via Colossal Submissions)
