take a bite out of composition

, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

DCist, a popular local blog, presents an annual juried photography show, *DCist Exposed*, designed to encourage the work of professional and amateur photographers. The exhibition showcases new talent as the artists reveal the city through the eyes of the people who live and work in the DC area. The show is community-based and works are affordably priced to develop the next generation of arts patrons. Music by DJ Ten, Fewsion Media and sound provided by Hedrush Music.

Emerging collectors are invited to join us for *Emerge Exposed, March 3, 7 - 9 pm* featuring a panel of experts sharing tips and ideas on how to begin collecting art. Co-hosted by DCist, the Cultural Development Corporation, and the Pink Line Project.
More information at: flashpointdc.org .

Check out the winners on DCist

*Opening Reception*: Friday, February 20, 5-9pm
*Exhibition*:February 20 - March 7, 2009
*Gallery Hours*: Tuesday - Saturday, 12 - 6pm or by appointment

mad north north-wences

mad north north-wences, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

play "Deeffeecult for you - easy for me" - by Senor Wences:

get down with a hamster christmas

get down with a hamster christmas, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

from the filmstrip HAMSTER HOLIDAYS.

PixTour: brought to you by FotoWeekDC

PixTour: brought to you by FotoWeekDC, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

from the press release:

PixTour brings art to the people who are out and about. Take a walk, have a drink and a meal, and see the art of photography in Dupont, Adams Morgan, Columbia Heights, 14th Street, Anacostia and More. PixTour is an informal showing of photography on local walls and windows.

PixTour, a project of FotoWeek DC 2008, is showing the work of area photographers at 40 bars, clubs, restaurants, theaters, and shops around DC. The project was organized by Molly Ruppert and the Warehouse, with many photographers suggested by Ten Miles Square.

You can find Ten Miles Square curated shows at the following venues:

Big Bear Cafe -- Cesar Lujan
Wonderland -- Pat Padua
Red Rocks Pizza -- Marie Kwak
Sticky Fingers -- Parikha Solanki Mehta
DC9 -- Jack Whitsitt and Paivi Solonan
Velvet Lounge -- Angela Kleis
Nellie's -- James Calder


Warehouse is also featuring more PixTour at their gallery (with one photo from each photographer who volunteered for the project), along with an exhibit by Byron Peck, famed Washington muralist, with a reception on Friday, November 21, 6 to 10 p.m.

memento mashi

Monster Mash Singer’s Daughter Turns His Cremated Remains into a Diamond.

Los Angeles, CA October 31st, 2008 – Bobby Pickett who co-wrote and performed "The Monster Mash", died at the age of 69 on April 25, 2007 in Los Angeles, California, due to complications from leukemia. His daughter Nancy Huus was at his side when he died.

After his death, Nancy had a .44 ct colorless LifeGem diamond created from his cremated remains. She wears it in a white gold solitaire ring. Pickett was diagnosed with leukemia 5 years ago, and he and his daughter Nancy talked openly about death. “I saw a show about turning cremated remains into diamonds,” said Nancy, “I immediately called my father and told him that I wanted to make a diamond from his cremated remains; he loved the idea.”

On Halloween Pickett used to say “They dig me up every year.” This year for Halloween his daughter is wearing him as a LifeGem Diamond Ring. “Bobby was a minimalist, not elaborate,” said Huus. Her simple solitaire ring reflects that personality.

About LifeGem
LifeGem developed the world’s first certified, high quality fancy colored diamond created from the carbon of a loved one in 2002, to help family and friends memorialize the life of the deceased. Headquartered in Elk Grove Village, Ill., the company creates the LifeGem in varying sizes and colors through a worldwide network of certified partners. For additional information visit www.LifeGem.com or call 1-866-LIFEGEM.

FRIDAY FRIDAY FRIDAY

FRIDAY FRIDAY FRIDAY [note time change], originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

[original photo here]

Come for photography, stay for America!

Pat Padua bridges high-brow and low-brow to form a distinctive American pan-browism. He hears the voices cry out from the Western Canon to Justin Timberlake, and, with an arsenal of optical tools ranging from disposable message cameras to the sharpest Hassy glass, he coaxes out the voices with a visual acuity akin to shamanism. "A talented, if quirky, photographer," in the words of the Washington Post, Padua has exhibited his work in San Francisco and Baltimore, as well as in his home town of Washington DC.

For more information, go to: www.tenmilessquare.com and bloombars.com.
Thanks to Heather Goss for putting this together!

That's No Ladies of the House, That's My Wife!

The Hallmark Channel takes pride in providing “quality family programming,” a welcome antidote to the age of irony. But if you scratch the belly of their latest feel-good movie, you’ll find a barely disguised contempt for the very audience they want to reach.

Ladies of the House is an ensemble piece of no small complexity. In a cinematic tradition that reaches from Stagecoach to The Jane Austen Book Club, characters from diverse backgrounds - in this case, from middle to upper class - come together to meet a common goal, and learn something about themselves in the process. The ladies, Rose (Florence Henderson), Elizabeth (Donna Mills), and Birdie (Pam Grier), are led house-ward by their pastor, who calls a meeting of his best donors and asks them to give not their money but their time - and their hearts. Their charge: to fix up a run-down house to raise funds for the church’s day care center.


Florence Henderson has long been an icon of family entertainment, but her activities outside the Bunch have frequently revealed a sensuous side. Who can forget the sultry chanteuse-in-black whose “That Old Black Magic” brought sexy back to The Paul Lynde Halloween Special? What Brady Bunch-admiring pre-teen did not blush when she took off her blouse for Robert Reed in a very very special episode of The Love Boat? Now in her golden years, Henderson still keeps a touch of vixen underneath layers of pancake makeup, and lets it shine straight through her characterization of Rose. She takes a line like “I think an older body is more interesting than a younger one” and embraces not only the words but herself, literally, caressing her torso as she coos, perhaps at the memory of a very special cruise. Rose’s marriage to Frank (Lance Henriksen) is the most nurturing of the ladies of the house, and the best relationship for a Baskin Robbins product placement — which makes their ultimate fate that much more bittersweet.

Pam Grier has come a long way since Coffy and Jackie Brown, and her Birdie fully laments the salad days - “I used to have tone and muscle!” As the movie opens, she celebrates the retirement of her husband Stan (Richard Roundtree). He worked long and hard towards days which he thought he’d be spending with his wife, but now that he’s retired he finds Birdie thoroughly absorbed in a new project. Birdie also happens to be a textbook example of what I call “get-downism”, as she not only teaches her white sisters to get down with the rap “buy it fix it sell it!” but goes so far as to coax out of a boom box the rousing sheet-rock-laying groove “Get on down.”

With Elizabeth, Donna Mills plays to her prime time strength: the spoiled rich girl. But this time she’s got a heart of gold. Her wealthy husband Richard (Gordon Thomson) gives her everything but love and respect. Elizabeth has the farthest to go to find herself, and designer dresses soon give way to flannel shirts and jeans - she even trims down her manicure! Alone among the ladies’ husbands, Richard does not encourage or support Elizabeth’s efforts. In fact he treats her like an idiot who doesn’t know a hammer from a handsaw.

Therein lies the problem with the film. Richard’s estimation of his wife is exactly the filmmakers’s estimation of the Ladies — they’re not called Women, they’re called Ladies. As the women struggle with their assignment, we’re treated to scenes of infantilized women who can barely take care of themselves. Sure they learn and grow into their roles and find a kindly Latino hardware store salesman who treats them with respect, unlike the burly white permit office clerk who laughs them off when they ask for help. But when it comes time for the final exam, Birdie enlists the help of a strong (but soft-spoken) African-American to softly browbeat the burly permit clerk into scheduling the inspection. Sisters doing it for themselves? Not if the filmmakers can help it. Ladies of the House promises empowerment, but if the inner strength of the lead actresses finally evokes great pride in their accomplishment, it’s no thanks to the script. See the Hallmark Channel Original Movie Ladies of the House, premiering Saturday, October 18 (9/8c).

the birthday party

the birthday party, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

through a Brownie, softly at Artomatic

through a Brownie, softly at Artomatic, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

come see the yermy elite at Artomatic - I'm on the fifth floor behind the roadblock (you'll understand when you see it).

Opening night is Friday, May 9 and the show closes on Sunday, June 15, 2008

Capitol Plaza I
1200 First Street, NE
Washington, DC

Wednesday
5 pm – 10 pm

Thursday
5 pm – 10 pm

Friday
noon – 2 am

Saturday
noon – 2 am

Sunday
noon – 10 pm
Closed on Mondays and Tuesdays

moutons

moutons, originally uploaded by pilllpat (agence eureka).

springfield bible college showdown

just got oke

bless the bollywood beasts and children

Allison Fonte ( I Love You)

your friend in carthage

your friend in carthage, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

Carthage, Missouri.

laughter is the best medicine

(blank) generation

(blank) generation, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

Blue Eye, Missouri

profiles in kodachrome

profiles in kodachrome, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

From a box of kodachromes postmarked April 1942 and bound for Hopewell, VA. Found in Carthage, MO.

up with carthage

up with carthage, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

Family Affair lunchbox, Carthage, Missouri.

a merry carey christmas

a merry carey christmas, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

how to get down

human sexuality

your windsong stays on my mind

your windsong stays on my mind, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

when the trains ran on time

you're just a sensuous bigfoot

With ol' sasquatch back in the news, it behooves me to give the info-hungry community a brief run-down of my recent cryptozoological-themed viewing.

BIGFOOT TERROR collects four count-em four motion picture features on Sasquatchian themes on a single two-sided DVD. At least half of it is worth the time of the connossieur of bad film.

The title THE CAPTURE OF BIGFOOT (dir. Bill Rebane, 1979) is a bit of a misnomer, since the arctic-furred protagonist seen here is more often known as a Yeti or Abominable Snowman. Sex-craze skiiers and fuzzy-browed bounty hunters are caught in a blanket of snowy acting and writhing with a beast - or two! - on the loose. CAPTURE's is the best-dressed beast on the marquee, but really, what makes this picture worth saving for me can be summed up right here:


In SHRIEK OF THE MUTILATED (dir. Michael Findlay, 1974), a pair of fey professors lures a team of coeds to the woods for a weekend of expanded consciousness and exposed cartilage. This motion picture unleashed Hot Butter's smash disco hit "Popcorn" on the world, except that the company that released this DVD couldn't get the rights for it so they subsituted some other generic electronic disco of the time for the unforgettable party before the storm. Redeeming qualities? Probably not, but it made for compelling bad cinema for reasons which I don't recall at the moment.



Lacking both redeeming and compelling qualities is THE SEARCH FOR THE BEAST (dir. R. G. Arledge, 1997) a straight-to-VHS mediocrity unworthy to wash the big feet of even the mediocrities that accompany it. Of some note are a Bigfoot sex scene and what is perhaps the least sexy shower scene ever photographed. Bad Bigfoot!


Last but not least is THE LEGEND OF BIGFOOT (dir. Harry Winer, 1976) ... which I admit I didn't finish after being warned of a tremendously manipulative and off-topic love story concerning two squirrels. 300 minutes is a lot of Bigfoot, and I had some Bresson next in queue. Still: two mangy thumbs up for the A-side of this quadruple bill; you can send it back with the other side unwatched.


Tangentially related - and alas, the extent of its tangentiality was unknown to me until the program's teleevangelegraphed ending: THE LEGEND OF DESERT BIGFOOT (Dir. Robert Vernon, 1995) an episode of LAST CHANCE DETECTIVES, a series which follows the adventures of pre-teen Christian seekers of truth. High production and family values aside, this was not about Bigfoot at all, but about doing the right thing.

mama he's makin' eyes at me

mouse-trap armor for caddies

Treasures from the Library of Congress.

fairfax federal credit union commercial

, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

I like you
I like you
You're very nice

L'année dernière à Malcolm X Park

L'année dernière à Malcolm X Park, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

any bigger and i would be in a circus

any bigger and i would be in a circus, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

the pop singer's fear of the pollen count

the pop singer's fear of the pollen count, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

hotter than fire

Demis Roussos - Because

rabbits grow

a Jam Handy filmstrip

, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

Partridge Family - Somebody Wants To Love You

Swell Maps 'HS Art'

IX. after the great northern expedition

IX. after the great northern expedition, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

IX. After the Great Northern Expedition

That rings, with faithful tongue, its pious note
As if your human shape were what the storm
Or else, like us, sunk into some long gaze
A frame of glided twilight
In stone waves and rock waters, far from day.

XXI. Flying in the Arctic

This perfection, this absence.
Event, the end of the painted road ends up
Grateful, I know, for just such compensations,
Cuts out of its width

(81). Unfair

I seek, above all, in the wandering
Between the vertex that the far-lit gray
Is it almost honey, is it snow?
Brush the lone giant in that somber pall.
Through the back of the picture at the patch of white
The place the road
ends, that patch of white paint

III. Earliest Recorded Northern Explorers

The Greeks and the Vikings
That only you and I can know.

--Les deux

the manilow dreams room

see you later dylan thomas

see you later dylan thomas, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

tico tico by ethel smith and the smithettes

Hana Zagorová - Ahoj léto 1984

Wait for the drummer.

Počitadlo lásky

liberace boogie woogie

american thighs

american thighs, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

timothy carey

, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

just an old fashioned love song

ferrante and teicher - midnight cowboy

and my copperopolis

and my copperopolis, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

the teeming minions of roger williams

slide projector by harry eigipt

for silver spurs

for silver spurs, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

I plugged my address into the Historical Washington Post database and found letters that a little girl wrote to the paper's kids' page. A number of them were written under the pen name SILVER SPURS. As an adult she had watercolors shown at the Washington Art League and won $100 in a competition to design dust jackets for EP Dutton's Everyman Library imprint

The Post's boys and girls
Oct. 1, 1916.

Dear Aunt Anna and Pets:

May I join the pets' corner? I am a turtle,
and I wear a fine coat of mail. My
story is this: One day as I was crawl-
ing along the ground a tall man picked
me up and carried me to his home. I
was very scared, and crawled into my
house. About two weeks later my mis-
tress threw out some bread for the
birds and I, being very hungry, quick-
ly ate it up. After that she put out
bread and water for me every day and
sometimes raw meat. May my two brothers
join also? Love to you and all
the pets from RAYMOND.
(Owned by Elizabeth Langenbeck.)
Yes, indeed, Raymond. you may join.
We have several turtle pets in the pets'
corner. --A.A.

i love the highway thiiiis much!

i love the highway thiiiis much!, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

I can paralyze

I can paralyze, originally uploaded by one man safari.

stars of the industry

IMG_0071, originally uploaded by indiana_hotel_and_lodging.

inspired by flickr user butterfig's favorites, I will occasionally search for the kind of anonymous corporate user whose photostream gives up such random gems as this.

signed, puppy

signed, puppy, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

i lost it at the bull pit barbeque

i lost it at the bull pit barbeque, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

I don't know if this was made by the restaurant or by a crafty traveller, but this snapshot came wrapped around a souvenir matchbook (hence the crease) from the Bull Pit Barbeque in Glendale, CA.

chinatown

chinatown, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

san francisco

new york girl (for zoe strauss)

new york girl (for zoe strauss), originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

I had the great pleasure of meeting Zoe Strauss at her excellent Chelsea show this weekend. I've wondered how she approaches her subjects but when you meet her that combination of toughness and sweetness makes you understand. And she had such nice things to say about my own work (which she knows from flickr)! She's really awesome and if you don't know her work you will. Anyway I was inspried to approach this woman who I saw on the bus. "May I take your picture Miss?"

hotel chelsea

hotel chelsea, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

from www.hotelchelseablog.com/


Board-Directed Coup Topples Chelsea Hotel’s Famed Manager Stanley Bard

The breaking news at New York’s famed Chelsea Hotel is that managing partner Stanley Bard, and the rest of the Bard family, have been forced out by their board of directors. Starting Monday, an as yet unnamed new management company will take over the day-to-day operations of the hotel. The beloved Stanley—everyone calls him by his first name—has been in charge of the hotel for over fifty years.

It was he who fashioned and maintained the unique creative dynamic of the hotel, presiding over the sixties when Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen wrote some of their greatest songs here, and Andy Warhol filmed the famous Chelsea Girls. Since then, nearly everyone who’s anyone in the New York art, music and writing scene has lived here at sometime or another, including Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe, Madonna, Dee Dee Ramone, and more recently Ethan Hawke and Ryan Adams. Stanley has always managed to keep rents low for the creative people living here, most of whom—unlike the stars listed—don’t have much money, but all of whom are just as important in maintaining the famous Chelsea spirit.

rahsaan

where ya at mule?

dr john, the night tripper

, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

z

z, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

san francisco

die-cut pups

die-cut pups, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

the winter's tale

the winter's tale, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

Muir Woods, California

what i did on my vacation

what i did on my vacation, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

me and richard kiel

the central nervous system

the central nervous system, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

from the filmstrip BRINGIN' HOME THE BACON (1939)

sandie shaw on rte 66

The Sandie Shaw Supplement, Ep2
Uploaded by richardjgibson

the great outdoors

the great outdoors, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

baby-vac

hi, it's bernice here, we should catch up

hi, it's bernice here, we should catch up, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

I found this in a vending machine ca. 1999. I wish I had a better scan but the world needs to know.

babies makin' babies

bacon babies, originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.