Image of the Day

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Photography by Jeff Luker, from a series called Blank Stares. Luker is from Bellingham, assisted Ryan McGinley in New York, and is now based in Portland. See more work and order his limited edition book The World Is Saved here.

Welcome to the Johnson's

I found this coin in the alley by our house on the way to work yesterday.
Seems like a good excuse for a roadtrip.

Bird of Music

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Via a comment from photographer Valéry Lorenzo, a musical piece by Céleste Boursier-Mougenot – beautifully filmed and such a cool idea. Get more info here.

Your Weekly Mr. Littlejeans

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In our old apartment in Brooklyn, Jeans would often stare intently at something, but when we looked, there was nothing there. There was one time when I was out of town – Emily was in bed and called me because Jeans was staring at something, and then a weird hazy light appeared in the corner of the bedroom he was staring at. We always kind of thought that place was haunted. It made me dread going into the basement to empty the boiler – when we first moved in, there were all these old dusty children's toys down there, and a ouija board, and a box of textbooks that were all about schizophrenia and stuff like that...I'm not making this up, it was creepy. A great apartment though, and nothing bad ever happened, so the ghosts must have been friendly.

Dudes In Flannels That Are Dirty And Drink A Lot Of Beer

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Eirik Johnson: Missy Barlow's Dryer Lint Landscape, Lower Hoh River, Washington

Alright, this will be the last of my various posts about Eirik Johnson's show at the Henry, I promise (it closes at the end of the month anyway). I just wanted to mention that tomorrow night Tiny Vipers is going to be playing with Crystal Hell Pool in the gallery where Johnson's work is on display. Aside from playing in the actual woods or at the confluence of two rivers or something, that setting seems like just about the best possible match for their music.

Here's a video where Jesy Fortino (Tiny Vipers) talks about growing up in the woods (at 2:40).



(If you want to watch the rest of that odd little documentary about Seattle bands and/on Sub Pop, here are parts one and three.)

Visit the Henry's website or Hankblog or for info about the show tomorrow night– it starts at 7pm. More Tiny Vipers at Sub Pop and MySpace. Crystal Hell Pool here. More Eirik Johnson at eirikjohnson.com. The end.

Handi-Van

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The other day we drove by this truck in my mom's neighborhood (Madison Valley) and I had to stop and take a picture. The scale is not really translated in the photos but it's a tiny little van, like a toolbox with wheels. You see a lot of vans this size in Europe but not so much in the States anymore.

If 'graphic designer' was the kind of profession that required house calls, this would be a good company rig.

Image of the Day

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Pacific Standard generally does not gossip, but Pacific Standard is also big fans of Kate Moss and Jamie Hince, so we feel it is worth mentioning that the the couple is engaged. Aside from just being a cool-looking duo and seeming like extraordinarily nice people, Jamie Hince and Kate Moss seem like they're from another era and in their own world, and Pacific Standard thinks that's kind of...dreamy.

Say Cheese

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Photography explained.
Littlejeans is not amused.

[via SLOG ]

Serve the Servants

.Layout by yours truly from an article on Kurt Cobain, with photography by Charles Peterson, in VMAN magazine

During one of my frequent visits to Best Of recently I read that curator Michael Darling, who curated Target Practice last year at the Seattle Art Museum, has a new exhibition going up at SAM this May called Kurt.

Grunge music is arguably Seattle’s greatest cultural export of the past 20 years, and Kurt Cobain was that movement’s central figure. The historical impact of Kurt Cobain cannot be denied or overestimated. During and after his brief career—which came to a premature end in 1993—his life and work have reverberated across the globe. Kurt celebrates that influence, in particular the effect he had on the creative lives and thought processes of artists.

Kurt Cobain symbolized the ideals, aspirations and disappointments of the ’90s generation, and a diverse array of artists have incorporated his image into their work to comment on those issues. International in scope, the works on view in Kurt range from straightforward portraiture to pieces that show a more subtle assimilation of Cobain’s ethos and idealism in a broad range of media. With works from the early 1990s to the present, by artists such as Rodney Graham, Douglas Gordon and Elizabeth Peyton, among others, this exhibition will cause viewers to question why and how Kurt’s visage and his gestures came to mean so much to a generation.

I don't care how cynical you are – you will want to get down off your bar stool at the Comet and march your Pumas downtown for this. It will undoubtedly include some great work, and some not-bad-meaning-bad-but-bad-meaning-genius work.

Another thing I find interesting about it: museums are constantly trying to find new ways to pack people in, and SAM, for its very survival, needs downtown tourists to stop on by during the summer. What better way to attract people than to embrace that most stereotypically Seattle topic? A lot of great artists have addressed Kurt in their work, so it's win/win. A show of this nature has a chance to find that perfect middle ground between the commercial and critical needs of the museum.

Info at sam.org.

Dum It Down

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More cuts, this time from newish Sub Pop signees Dum Dum Girls.

When Dee Dee needed a band to take her songs out of the bedroom, she looked to her friends: Jules, a San Diego-based furniture designer; Bambi, a non-profit worker in Austin; and Brooklynite Frankie Rose, a former Vivian Girl and Crystal Stilt.... It was an instant girl gang.

This is out now on 45:

Dum Dum Girls Jail La La mp3 [via Sub Pop]

...and the full-length, I Will Be, drops March 30.


Go here for more info dum dum

Image of the Day

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William Eggleston's photograph Sumner, Mississippi, c. 1970, on the cover of Spoon's excellent new album Transference, which is in stores now.

Here's my favorite cut from their last album
(posted previously but whatever).
Spoon The Ghost of You Lingers mp3

Go to Merge Records for more Spoon stuff.

Totally Does Your Head In

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David Shrigley for Pringle!

More David Shrigley here.

Pringle of Scotland also commissioned a film by Ryan McGinley, featuring Tilda Swinton – you can see it on their website.

Someday I will visit my ancestral homeland.

The Shape of Things to Come

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For the past couple of years I couldn't get enough of the strong shoulder and severe silhouette. I'll always lean toward clean lines, but the easy drape and fold is what looks fresh to me right now.

Lanvin

YSL Spring 2010 RTW

MaxMara Spring 2010 RTW

Burberry Prorsum Spring 2010 RTW

Calvin Klein

Stella McCartney Spring 2010 RTW

Maybe I'm just looking forward to the lightness of Spring.

Image of the Day

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Caleb Larson A Tool To Deceive And Slaughter, 2009
(8"x8"x8" acrylic box, custom electronics, programming, internet connection, online auction).

The artwork is described by the artist as follows:
This object perpetually attempts to sell itself on eBay.
Click here to get more info and place your bid.

See more of Caleb Larson's work through February 13 at Lawrimore Projects.


[via Jen Graves at SLOG]

Puffy

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This weekend Bill Cunningham's street fashion photos in the New York Times focused on the evolution of the puffy down coat. Apparently the first one ever was designed by Charles James in the 1930s, shown above as worn in the '60s by Juan Ramos (left) and Antonio Lopez (right), who I posted about here. [I'm mainly posting about this because it's relevant to a project Emily and I are working on right now... more about that when it's done.]

Watch Bill Cunningham's latest "On the Street" slideshow (and archived editions) at nytimes.com.