So the top 10 lists never happened. I have them done but was too busy to post them and now sadly I fear it is too late. I was also going to do the 365 challenge…we can see how that has worked out. I’ve been busy both at work and at home. Making art and building web sites can get pretty time consuming. So here are some pictures to catch you up on what is new in my world.
and the Cowboys failed for the 12th year in a row to win a game in the post-season…better luck next year tony…
Soon I’ll be posting my top 10 lists for 2007. Yes it’s cliche but I really don’t care…stay tuned avid readers.
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It’s here tomorrow people…what is sure to be one of the greatest football games played by humans. Both teams at 10 and 1, Favre vs Romo…I can’t wait…They look the same…they look so damn much like the same person…I ask them if they want ice cream cone…both of them say yes…this is going to be fun.
I am a person that enjoys music. For me no matter what is going on in my life, there’s always a song about it (I take comfort in that fact). And for some reason the sad songs always do it best. Music is a huge part of who we are personally and culturally (except for those who really don’t get in to music, and there’s just no hope for them). Music taste is a strange animal as well. Recently I’ve noticed that I can track my musical tastes back through not only my friends but my family as well. My mother always said “you always like the ones that sing your life,” I got The Beatles (pop tracks with something to say), James Taylor (really pretty songs about being normal), and Jimmy Buffett (all is not lost, we’re flawed but we’re happy stuff) from her and her twin sister. My folk influence came from my Mom and my aunt, the reason I like stuff like Iron and Wine, John Vanderslice, and Sun Kil Moon probably has nothing to do with the fact that I’ve heard “Tea for the Tillerman” from beginning to end over a hundred times. My Grandmother gave me country (not that new-fangled stuff they try to pass off as country these days, real songs, about hard living). Some of mine and her favorites were always; Patsy Cline (why do I love you again, love songs), Willie Nelson and Johnny Cash (epic songs about damaged people, not unlike themselves). The other thing I got from my grandmother was the Crooners (sure none of them wrote their own stuff but they’re renditions were always the best). Frank Sinatra (the chairman of the board, he made you love the girl he was singing about as much as he did), Nat King Cole (does it get any better that “unforgettable”?), and Ray Price (Another great voice from that period of our musical heritage). This love of old “true” country is what brought me into the arms of bands like Bright Eyes, Jenny Lewis, and Band of Horses, and my entire addiction to sad songs in general. My Uncle bestowed on me the rock. I’ve always been a rock and roll kid but I truly learned the way of rock from this guy. Metallica (think black album, and “master of puppets” those guys are totally guilty of laterday douchebagery, I know, but at one point they rocked your face off), The Rolling Stones (another band guilty of some douchebagery as of late but a great band in their day), and of course Jimmy Hendrix (the space rock and post rock bands I listen to today owe their careers of the voodoo Jimmy wielded). To this I owe my taste for things like Reggie and the Full Effect, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, and Modest Mouse (bands that just plain rock). My other aunt and uncle were always into new wave, having grown up in the 80’s. from them I aquired a taste for The Talking Heads, and Devo (silly sounding songs with strong social commentary layers), and They Might Be Giants (a band that may very well need to be credited with the indie music scene, and more silly songs that really have a deeper meaning) and the Clash (I still have my aunts copy of Combat Rock on vinyl and listen to it regularly). The influence of new wave and punk got me into bands like The Vandals, Vampire Weekend, and The Flaming Lips. From this foundation I have built, what I believe to be a very well-rounded taste for music. It’s funny how one can trace taste through not only themselves but through those around them. So now you know more about who I am. and here are my top 5 albums right now. comment with yours…or be destroyed…cake or death.
1. Wolf Parade – Apologies to the Queen Mary
2. The Arcade fire – Neon Bible
3. Cold War Kids – Robbers and Cowards
4. Two Gallants – Two Gallants
5. The National – Boxer
Wow. It’s been a while since I posted last. It’s been a busy couple of weeks. I feel I should preface this post by saying that I am an analog preservationist. I like the digital revolution, but think that some are way too gung-ho to replace everything with digital technology. I believe that would be detrimental to society. I was thinking this morning about how computer technology has affected the tangibility of the written word…and all that is analog for that matter. My hard drive handed in it’s resignation the other day.
It was thankfully the one that holds my operating system and not the one housing my photos and music and such. But what if it had been? At my mom’s house we have all of these boxes just filled with old photos. I have a hard drive…and the hard drive is much less reliable than a box under the kitchen counter…or in a closet…or in a photo album…or where ever you keep your photos. The digital format has not only affected photography (a profession in which the new trend is digital photography over traditional) but the written word as well. As the printed word hurdles headlong toward extinction I wonder if a completely digital world is the best course of action. And what will it do for the concept of nostalgia? Is the nostalgia of photos, books, newspapers, etc in the information being delivered or is it tied more to the tangible object itself? Or is it a combination of the two? I do get those nostalgic feelings when I look back in my collection of digital pictures, but it is nowhere near as intense as the feeling you get when you find photographs in a drawer or a box that you forgot about. Is it the act of finding and rediscovering these things that creates the emotional attachment we have to these objects? There is something to be said for the aging of these tangible objects as well. When photos are old they should look old. When one looks at a picture from the 1970s it looks like something from the 1970s the color is off, it looks earthy, sepia toned almost, there is a haze in the picture that lets the viewer know “hey this is old, that means it’s important”. When I look back at the photos on my computer 10, 20, 30 years from now (provided of course my hard drive doesn’t stop working , and my back ups don’t become corrupted), they will look the same as the day I took them. Something about that doesn’t sit well with me. I want my kids and grandkids to be able to connect with the photos I take in the same way that I connect with those of my parents and grandparents. Those photos, especially the one’s from the 1920s and 30s seemed more like precious objects. I have a photo of my grandfather and his army buddies that is a small photo booth size picture encased in a flimsy metal frame. I hold it very dear to me. The subject matter is very important but what is more important is that I connect with my grandfather (who is no longer with us) every time that I touch this object because that is the common relationship he and I have with this object. The object serves as a link to the past. It is precious. Can digital information accomplish the same thing? 
Can Walgreens digital prints and photos that don’t age really conjure up the same emotions? Books are the same way. eBooks is a concept I just don’t buy. The importance in passing a book on is having the physical object. It’s about the yellow pages, the dog-eared corners, the creases in the spine, the underlined passages, the intimacy of graphite on paper. All of these things make a book what it is. Magazines are only good for one thing, being in a pile in a doctor’s office, or on the back of the toilet, or on a shelf on a bookcase. I love my collection of Artforums. The arrangement of them on my bookshelf acts as a time line through which I can track the last 4 years of my life. With all of this importance that resides firmly in the act of these “things” being tangible objects how can people go around making claims like “the printed word is dead” or “digital is the wave of the future”? These objects exist because we need them. If we give up these objects do we also forfeit our history? In a purely digital world all is without age, and when all is ageless even nostalgia is obsolete.
So I’ve been thinking a lot lately about pink Hummers…Yes…They paint them pink now…Paris Hilton pink. This is the bottom line for me with these things. Is there a more pretentious, self-involved vehicle on the road right now (I think the Escalade takes a close 2nd). What you’re saying about yourself when you decide to buy and operate a Hummer is thus. “I have no regard for the environment and I don’t have to care that I get 7 miles to the gallon because I’m special”. Now add to that equation the fact that you’ve painted a “look at me I’m really cool and special” car bright pink…well…my friend you must be really important and cool and cool and important. Hummers really are an obscene waste of resources, not only because of the abysmal gas mileage but also the resources that it takes to manufacture these monstrosities. Bam Margera has one because he’s an idiot, everyone else should know better. Why do I see Hummers parked in front of my local Whole Foods market…that just seems to be a conflict of interests. Does anyone ever wonder about vanity plates? Some of them are very straight forward THE-NO1, IMA-JRK, etc. Others are really cryptic I saw one this morning that said DBT-LSS. What does that mean? Do you not have any doubts? If so, about what? Why put an inside joke on your license plate? I don’t have the answers to these questions…I just ask them.
Thank you avid viewers for continuing to search for new content on my blog I assure you a new post is in the works. I’ve just been swamped lately at work. Thank you for your support and something significant and amazing is coming soon. Until then enjoy these links and cool stuff.
The Photography of Lori Nix at www.lorinix.net I saw some of her work in an exhibition at the University of North Texas a few years ago and it is some really cool stuff. She really manages to set up some beautifully surreal “train village” type landscapes and I really dig the sense of dark humor each one conveys. There is something sinister here and I like it.
The art/illustration of Kozy and Dan at www.kozyndan.com. This couple makes a great team of artists. The panoramics are what are really amazing here. Some of the actual drawings I can take or leave but the panoramics have always and continue to amaze me. Very talented and very creative if you’re a postal service fan you may also find some work that you recognize here.
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – Baby 81 One of, if not THE standout rock offering so far in 2007. This album is amazing and everyone should own a copy.
The Dallas Cowboys www.dallascowboys.com
we’re 6-1 have mounted one of the greatest comebacks in football history, have done better against the pats than most so far and Tony Romo is some kind of wonderful magic jedi ninja…guy. This just may be our year.
This work is really amazing. Sze makes these strange objects out of familiar and not so familiar debris. They seem awkwardly familiar. They are just vague enough to be interesting and whimsical enough to be fun. For me they beg exploring if you follow the link to her site check out the exhibition called “Powers of Ten” it’s like some kind of surreal archaeological dig. Her sculptures remind me of my childhood and making “set-ups” with my action figures in the basement. Some of the most inspiring work I’ve come across recently, Sarah Sze makes me want to make my art better.
I haven’t been posting as much as I should lately. I’ve been busy at work and developing my own site (justin-strickland.com) as well as some other personal projects. That being said I will be trying to post new content on a more frequent basis. I will leave you with this question (in hopes of maybe generating so comments as well). What roll have social networking sites played in our lives and where are they going? Will they become a replacement for human interaction (looking 5-10-20 years down the line) or will they continue to be a tool for maintaining casual relationships? Is the web 2.0 any kind of a substitution for real life?
Is the meta-narrative something that is still valid in our society today? Part of what post-modern thought implies is that the recent trends have traded one meta, or all encompassing, narrative of society and culture for many local-narratives in which the focus is upon individual experience. Abstract Expressionism (Pollock, Gottlieb, Rothko, de Kooning) I think was the last death rattle (at least here in America) of the Idea of a meta narrative. They had embraced this idea of the meta-narrative in their work, which is still referred to as being “heroic”. Their themes are that of redemption, aggression, and the transcendence of the medium, coinciding with the end of a primarily industrial economy in the west. The “hero” has since become an obsolete idea. Not only in the way we look at art but also in our culture. The new primary focus being a highly individualized service based economy fueled by the rise of the web, and now the web 2.0. In this realm of the web 2.0 the meta-narrative is almost non existent, with the advent of the blogosphere, countless social networking sites, file sharing, etc. We no longer exist as one large community, or a single entity, and instead our focus is on that of individual experiences and opinions. Post-modernity rules the internet, and it deconstructs itself as we build upon the ideas and concepts of it. It offers every user a unique and tailored experience. The individual chooses what information to ingest, which information to present, and has full creative control of both. If you don’t want to look at some part of it, you don’t have to. If you choose not to divulge a piece or pieces of information you just don’t offer it. And in doing so individuals have the ability to create themselves as the person they want to be. The walls have all but come down and the histories of geographical areas and cultures become ever-increasingly less important. The web 2.0 has become the country that the last few generations have adopted as their homeland. The internet has become the new meta-narrative and it serves as a canvas on which the children of the digital age paint their own local-narratives onto. It still amazes me that the deeper I dig the more of an argument I can make for the internet as a microcosm of modern society. The scientists are working on cloning and creating life in labs, when the web is so much closer than anyone cares to realize.
