Hasta La Ideas

“One must go through life, be it red or blue, stark naked and accompanied by the music of a subtle fisherman, prepared at all times for a celebration.” Words to live by (say what?)–and a line from a prose poem penned by Francis Picabia during his Dada phase. One of the most fiercely wacky of the Surrealists gets his due this evening as the visual art performance biennial Performa hosts a Hurricane Sandy-delayed gala. The bash is a tribute to “Relâche,” the 1924 ballet that Picabia created with his eccentric composer buddy Erik Satie, and Performa has tapped artist Ryan McNamara to re-envision the performance (we hear that a certain well-known arts patron will make a cameo, as will aerial acrobats). After a dinner inspired by Magritte and Dali, guests will be treated to a screening of René Clair’s “Entr’acte,” the short film (watch it below) that played during the intermission of the original Relâche, followed by a performance by pop songstress Sia–a 21st century version of Picabia’s subtle fisherman? Gala-goers can ponder this while sketching Exquisite Corpses and waiting in line for the “time machine” photo booth.

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Some 43 years ago this month, an art-loving (and still anonymous) Grumman engineer smuggled a ceramic wafer imprinted with sketches by artists such as Andy Warhol, Claes Oldenburg, and Robert Rauschenberg onto the Apollo 12 lunar landing mission. Today Trevor Paglen adds to that fledging extraterrestrial museum with “The Last Pictures,” a public project presented by Creative Time. The artist worked with materials scientists at MIT to develop his visual time capsule: a silicon disc encased in gold and micro-etched with 100 photographs selected to represent modern human history. The disc has been affixed to the exterior of the communications satellite EchoStar XVI, which launches into orbit today from Kazakhstan. Watch it live here at 1:15 p.m. EST.

Among the images that made it onto the disc is a shot of “Glimpses of the U.S.A.,” the installation designed by Charles and Ray Eames (at the request of George Nelson) for the 1959 American National Exhibition in Moscow. Team Eames compiled some 2,200 still and moving images of American life that flickered across seven massive screens under one of Bucky Fuller‘s geodesic domes. Does your head hurt yet? Mission accomplished! Paglen set out to create “a meta-gesture about the failure of meta-gestures, a collection of images that spoke to the Janus-faced nature of modernity, a story that was not about who the people were who built the dead satellites in perpetual orbit so much as a story about what they did to themselves,” he told Creative Time curator Nato Thompson in an interview. While aliens may be stumped by photos of gear used to make atomic bombs or of refugee children frolicking in the sea, you can feel superior by purchasing The Last Pictures (University of California Press). Notes Paglen, “The book contains explanatory captions and texts about the images that tell the viewer what they’re looking at; the disc in orbit does not.”
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Join us tonight at the Hand-Eye Supply Curiosity Club in lovely downtown Portland, Oregon as Chana De Wolf of Cryonics NW dispels myths and disseminates facts about life extension through Cryonics.

Tuesday, Nov. 13th
6PM PST
Hand-Eye Supply
23 NW 4th Ave
Portland, OR, 97209

What does the word “cryonics” bring to mind? Creepy scientists freezing dead bodies? Plumes of liquid nitrogen vapor as corpses are committed to the dewar? Dying people, desperately grasping at straws for another chance at life?

Chana will talk about these and other common images of cryonics as she leads a frank discussion of the history and the current state of cryonics as it is practiced in the real world. From “straight-freezing” the first human in 1967 to the development of carrier and vitrification solutions for optimal cryoprotection of the brain, cryonics advocates have made significant advances in cryobiological knowledge and cryopreservation technologies in hopes of extending and saving lives.

Despite these advances, cryonics still struggles to maintain credibility in the scientific mainstream and popular media. Chana will address this issue by inspecting how demographics have shaped the culture of cryonics and what cryonics organizations and members can do to get their image and message right.

Not in the greater Portland area? No problem! Join us live on our broadcast channel –the show begins at 6pm Pacific.

Chana de Wolf is a business manager and biomedical researcher in Portland. She holds a B.S. in Experimental Psychology, a M.S. in Neuroscience, and has extensive management and laboratory experience. She is a Director and researcher for Advanced Neural Biosciences, where she and her husband conduct cryonics-relevant research.

Chana became aware of cryonics while studying the neuroscience of aging and memory in graduate school circa 2003. She worked as a Research Associate at Alcor Life Extension Foundation in Scottsdale, AZ, from 2006-2008, where she also participated in human cryopreservation cases.

As a Director of the Institute for Evidence Based Cryonics, a 501(c)3 non-profit organization dedicated to supporting research, education, and information dissemination in cryonics, Chana is uniquely situated to answer questions, address concerns, and dispel the many myths surrounding the practice and purpose of human cryopreservation.

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Put down your digital device and step away from that glossy stack of design magazines to join us in person tonight at New York’s Center for Architecture, the setting for “Architecture and Media: Evolving Media Platforms.” The panel discussion, moderated by Molly Heintz (The Architect’s Newspaper), will explore technological advances and the proliferation of platforms forcing changes in architectural magazines, newspapers, trade journals, and design blogs. How is self-publishing and the multitude of micro-sites changing communications strategies? What are the most effective ways for architects to get their story heard? Find out this evening, when we’ll be joined by fellow panelists Susan Szenasy (Metropolis), Alexandra Lange (Design Observer), and Jenna McKnight (Architizer). The panel-based architectural fun starts at 6 p.m., and we hope to see you there!

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Once again, we are thrilled to bring Hot One Inch Action, the tiny button art show back to Portland.

Friday, Nov. 2nd
Admission is free. Mixed packs of 5 buttons are $5.
6PM – 9PM PST
RSVP on Facebook

Hand-Eye Supply
23 NW 4th Ave
Portland, OR, 97209

For those of you who missed it before—conceived by Jim Hoehnle and Chris Bentzen in 2004, Hot One Inch Action is the original, one-night only show of button art and social interaction from Vancouver, BC.

Hot One Inch Action reproduces the tiny art of 50 local artists on one inch buttons. At the show, we sell mixed packs of 5 buttons for $5. If you want a specific button, you’ll either have to take a chance and buy more mixed packs of random buttons OR trade with the other people at the event.

With none of the pretentiousness of a regular art show, everyone interacts out of necessity—”I want that button!”—and the evening becomes a relaxed and fun event for people of all-ages.

This year’s artists include: andyvanoverberghe, Audrey McNamara, Ben Bittner, Bryce Pedersen, Caprice White, Chris Bentzen, Chris Cilla, Chuck E. Bloom, Danielle Weiss, Darlene Schaper, DAVIE, Dick Mama, Emily Segel, Eric J. Millar, Erin Gibbs, Erin Nations, Far Sebastian, François Vigneault, Jackson Smith, Jacob Redmond, Jadah Goldblum, James Baker, Janette Ussher, Jennifer Winship Mark, Jess DeVries, Jesse Narens, Jill Bridgeford, K.J. Campbell, Kyley Quinn, Leda Zawacki, Mari Navarro, Marilyn Romaine, Matt Cosby, Matt Schlosky , Megan Carruthers, Murphy Phelan, Nicole Gartland, Patrick Woolworth, Peach MoMoKo, Pierre Leichner, Randall Cosco, Rose Thor, Starheadboy, Suzanna Wright, Tom O’Toole, Tyler Segel, Violet Tchalakov, White Swallows, Yo Mutsu, and Zachariah leBaron d’Avignon.

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