Take that to the bank

A couple random things, a little hodgepodge, if you will, before the weekend:

Luke Burbank and Jennifer Andrews at Too Beautiful To Live have been doing a series of interviews with a seemingly regular guy and fan of the show who used to be a bank robber. A very successful bank robber. From Bellevue. It is fascinating – catch up on the podcasts here starting with the Monday, January 19th episode. I have been somewhat obsessively listening to this radio show, TBTL, since it started last January. The Stranger's article on Burbank and the show is highly informative, and you can catch up on old episodes at toobeautifultolive.com. (Stranger photo by Curt Doughty.)

Chad put me up on a blog I've been enjoying called Archival Clothing. Today's post is on re-purposed Filson gear, using fabric acquired by dumpster diving outside the company's Seattle headquarters. Interesting.

I got the new Andrew Bird record. I like it a lot and I'm sure I'll get more into it, but I'm not flipping over it like I did the last one. I tend to like his warmer-sounding stuff (Plasticities, Lull) and the new record strikes me as purposely tinny-sounding. I also got the new A.C. Newman record. It's basically a collection of variations on the same themes and sounds he always hits (both on his own and with New Pornographers), and honestly that is just fine with me.
A.C. Newman Submarines of Stockholm (edit) MP3 via Matador

Agent Provocateur just issued Love Me Tender…Or Else, an extremely high-gloss short video reminding its customers not to forget Valentine's Day. Fashion films generally suck, and this one has a lot of annoying things about it, but hey…what, I'm a red-blooded American, what can I say. I believe I have encapsulated the plot fairly well with the photos above, or if you want to perv out, perv, watch it here.

The Times has a pretty fascinating story this morning about surf gangs of the North Coast. Approached by Pacific Standard for comment, Hawaii native SK Honda had this to say: "dude, it's gangsta up there." Read here. (Times photo by Marco Garcia.)

I like this salsa. It's only $1 a can. I'm not sure what the duck has to do with it but it's good.

Secret Meeting

This promises to be interesting, as anything affiliated with the Anne Bonny always is:

What We Do Is Also Secret: A needle-felted world
Installation by Coco Howard and Spencer Moody

At Vain, 2018 1st Avenue at Virginia, Seattle WA

Opening Saturday January 24th, 4pm–9pm

More info:
Vain
Soft Life Industry
The ol' Anne B.

Your Weekly Mr. Littlejeans

I had hoped to get a photo of Jeans in our new place, but he's still kind of freaked out – we decided to wait till last night to move him and Inez from my mom's house, since I left for New York the day after we moved in, and then we had a houseguest for a week. We thought it would just be too much new information for them to process. Now we have the place to ourselves and the cats are finally there, freaking the F out as they deal with their third house in 4 months.

Hey, buddy, right there with ya. A lotta that going around.

So instead, a photo from calmer times.
Herein, Fang surveys his former estate in Brooklyn:

Look at the power of those mousers, just waiting to strike when the sun goes down again. Soft and furry – yes – a truly handsome creature, and the picture of calm. But make no mistake: you are admiring the iron serenity of a deadly killer.

Anyway, there he is – pretty cute, right? I'm sure that soon he will love our new place as much as we do and the Seattle photoshoots will re-commence.

Read The Book That Wrote Itself

Last Thursday afternoon, my brother and I had a chance to cruise around the galleries in Chelsea for a couple hours.

My favorite show of the day, at Pace Wildenstein, was by Jim Dine (born 6/16/1935 in Cincinnati, moved to New York in 1957).

Hot Dream (52 Books) represents the content and ideas contained within a collection of books Dine put together, one for every week of the year.

To say the exhibition is densely layered would be to understate it a bit. I could have happily walked around in there for a day or more.

The actual books, all 52 of them, were published by Steidl in an edition of 500, and are available from the gallery for $480 (postage paid).

I opted instead for the smaller exhibition catalog – here are some spreads, click to enlarge:







More about Dine and the exhibition here and here.

Hot Dream (52 Books) is up at Pace Wildenstein (534 West 25th Street, NYC) through February 7th.
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President Obama

Emily and our friend Casey (visiting from Boston) and I celebrated Inauguration Day at Spitfire for the Seattle Weekly party. More party pics by the hostess with the mostest over at the bonks. It was a fun morning.

The speech was perfectly measured: pragmatism meets possibility. Everyone looked stunning and it felt like a great, momentous event in our history. My friend Jason was there in D.C. – I'm looking forward to hearing about it when he gets back.

Side note: I'm obsessed with trying to photograph the closed captioning at just the right moment so it becomes a description of what's depicted. It's always a little off but I find it hilarious.

Oh, indeed.

Time Brings On A Change

In celebration of both Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and tomorrow's history-making Inauguration Day, one of my favorite cuts of all time:
Leroy Hutson
Time Brings On A Change mp3 from Love Oh Love
(Curtom Records, 1973) buy here

More info on Curtis Mayfield protégé Leroy Hutson here.

And

I've just returned from a few days in ice-cold NYC for some client meetings, so most of this week's posts will be on the stuff I ran across during that brief whirlwind. Here are some photos to kick it off…

Marlene Dumas from her current show Measuring Your Own Grave at MoMA

Swoon in Chelsea

Birds in Bryant Park that reminded me of Littlejeans, both because they look like him, and because he used to stare at this particular fun-size species out the window and think murderous thoughts.

A little garbage rabbit, 22nd Street, Chelsea

53rd Street, Midtown

27th Street, Chelsea

People on 10th Avenue watching news of the crash landing in the Hudson.

My brother outside of Jones, where we had brunch before I left. They were playing the Cave Singers and Dead Moon as we sipped bloody marias and ate our sausage, eggs and grits at the counter. Seemed like a good way to end the trip.

…and here's what I came back to:


I will love and miss New York forever, but I'll be back a lot.
And Seattle? When it's sunny out? Absolutely stunning.

John Baldessari, Goya Series: And, 1997,
from Artist's Choice + Vik Muniz = Rebus at MoMA

Your Weekly Mr. Littlejeans

What's the Point?

Oops, I meant to post this last month as something I wanted for Christmas, but then I realized it was out of print. After that, the whole "what I want for Christmas" series got back-burnered (along with most of the other so-called "series," or "serieses," that I said I'd start).

In any case – I'm going to start looking around for an old VHS copy of Michelangelo Antonioni's beautiful and strange story of disaffected youth, Zabriskie Point. Check it:



I picked up the soundtrack at a flea market several years ago. Here's a sample:
Pink Floyd Heart Beat, Pig Meat mp3

Running, Jumping, Standing Still

Martin Munkacsi Peignoir in a light breeze, 1936

One of several shows opening January 16th at the International Center of Photography draws from a newly discovered cache of Hungarian photographer Martin Munkacsi's negatives. There was another exhibition of his work at ICP a few years ago and it was truly stunning. Munkacsi (my Hungarian friend tells me it's pronounced kind of like "Moon-Kashi") was one of the most famous photographers in the world in his day, influencing greats such as Henri Cartier-Bresson and Richard Avedon with his unique take on photo-journalism – and, later, on fashion photography through his work with Carmel Snow at Harper's Bazaar.

Left, Martin Munkacsi, 1933 / Right, Richard Avedon, 1969

Here are some of my favorite Munkacsi images:

Martin Munkacsi, Berlin vs. Budapest, ca. 1928

Martin Munkacsi, Greta Garbo on vacation, ca. 1932

Martin Munkacsi, Lucile Brokaw on the Long Island Beach, 1933

Munkacsi's Lost Archive runs January 16–May 3 at ICP. If you can't make it or want more images/info, Steidl released a great book on Munkacsi's life and work in 2006:


All images © Joan Munkacsi

Closed for Construction

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Emily and I are FINALLY moving into our condo on Capitol Hill (I'm sure I have mentioned this 800 times – we bought it back in October 2007 and have been renting it out) so posting is going to be light this week. I cannot begin to explain how excited I am to end four months of living out of bags and boxes! So excited that I used an exclamation point.

Above, Detail from Word Map of Seattle, 1971 via Seattle Municipal Archives

When He Offers His Hand

Wallace Berman Untitled (Single Verifax #44). 1964–1976.

More Wallace Berman, in case you find yourself in Paris between this evening and March 10th.

Wallace Berman: Verifax Collages
Galerie Frank Elbaz (click for more images)
7, rue Saint Claude
75003 Paris
Tuesday - Saturday, 11am–7pm
Opening party tonight, 5pm–9pm

Objects of My Affection

Objectified is a new film from Gary Hustwit, who was responsible for Helvetica, the excellent documentary on the ubiquitous typeface of the same name. This time out, through interviews with Hella Jongerius, Marc Newson, Jonathan Ive, and others, Hustwit explores the wide world of industrial design, taking a look at the creative processes responsible for mass-produced material objects, and at how those objects impact our lives and identities. Objectified premiers in March (go to the website for updates).

(side note, this logo strikes me as the anti-helvetica. clever though.)

AND… In celebration of refined materialism, here are three brilliantly designed objects at the top of my want list. They have been there for a long time and I still don't have them. Maybe I never will but it makes me happy to know they are out there somewhere.

1. Olivetti Valentine portable typewriter, by Ettore Sottsass (1969)

2. Tie! A Land Rover (above) and a Boston Whaler.

In this 1961 Life magazine photo, Richard T. Fisher, the guy who designed the hull of the Boston Whaler, smugly demonstrates that his boat is totally unsinkable, even if some crazed logger sneaks underwater and attempts to saw it in half. Beautiful utilitarianism.

3. Pretty much anything designed by Dieter Rams.

I also want this new gigantic Samsung TV – it's only an inch thick and it consumes 40% less energy than other HDTVs. It's not on the top three though because you're not supposed to get excited about a TV.
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