Through my involvement with The Science Gallery, in Trinity College Dublin, I am privileged to see to some of the most interesting upcoming exhibitions in advance of their launch. I was at TED X 3.0 in the Gallery last week and one of the speakers was Margaret Wertheim. Margaret spoke about the great Reefs of the world and how they are being badly damaged by Global Warming. It was a candid and enlightening talk that really made me think about the effect that we have on nature, but also how amazing life under the sea actually is.

Margaret, along with her sister, Christine, have been creating awareness of both the beauty and the dangers that face our Coral reefs through their Crochet Coral Reef project.

‘Combining mathematics, environmental science and the art of crochet, the exhibition has been visited by over one million people in venues around the world, ranging from the World Financial Centre in New York to the Hayward Gallery in London. At each successive venue, the reef has grown through the contributions of local artists and crafters, and in the Science Gallery we will present for the first time the Irish Reef, created by myriads of crochet-hook wielding volunteers around Ireland.’

I’d suggest you go visit this exhibit in the Science Gallery when you get a chance. The colours and craftsmanship are quite something and it’s unlike any art exhibit I’ve seen.

The media and members preview starts at 18:00 tonight and the exhibit will run until June 11th. For more information, visit the Science Gallery website.

Here’s a few pics from the launch with none other than Sophie Merry (of Groovy Dancing Girl fame) modeling the reefs in a way that only she can. Don’t they look great

So I’ve not had a chance this week to post the many cool things that I’ve come across, so instead, I’m going to collect them in a single post which I have lazily named ‘The Corner of Cool’. Feel free to kick my ass for being just a little bit lame with it.

Film trailers that have me very excited

Excitement begins with an obvious choice, the Iron Man 2 trailer. I’m sure most of you have already seen it, but for those that haven’t, the movie is gonna rock:

Next up is a trailer that caught me by surprise. I’ve never seen the original Tron, I am ashamed to say. I am rectifying that this week. But I loved the new Tron: Legacy trailer. The movie focusing on Kevin Flynn’s kid finding out where his Dad has been all these years. It looks stunning, the soundtrack sounds awesome and it’s really tweaked my interest.

In terms of some film news:

Apparently one of my favourite TV actors, The Office’s John Krasinski, is close to signing on the dotted line for Captain America. Who’d of thunk it, huh?

And we have some fairly interesting casting news for MIB3

If I had ridiculous amounts of money I’d buy:

I know, I’m one big kid…but this toy…It does everything. Check out the link here for what it can do. It includes moveable eyes, changeable head’s and eyes that light up…like in the movie. Gulp.

Arty Farty

Finally, I loves a bitta pop-art I does. Particularly when it’s a Zombie re-imagination of Star Wars. Zombie Wars if you will. Found this thanks to Think Hero. See my favourite below:

Also thought I’d point out the Wired special post on variations of the Inglourious Basterd’s theme. Find it here. There’s some amazing stuff like this one to be found:

That is all

Raven Queen by ultradialectics – Creativestem.com

I came across a wonderful resource for digital artists today. Creativestem is fantastic place to check out some amazing material by talented digital artists. What a great idea for a community based website. It’s also linked to the very cool ‘Raster Group‘ which is a book featuring art from up-and-coming digital artists. How have I not seen this stuff before?

Do you have any links to sites with amazing art on show, digtal, pop-art or otherwise?

I had the great fortune to accidentally find Pogo’s music during my travels through hyperspace. He is an electronic artist based in Perth, Western Australia, who works with sounds from Disney movies, editing them into ambient mixes that are beautifully layered and expertly paced. Pogo first came to prominence with his track “Alice”, made with samples from Disney’s “Alice in Wonderland”. He gained some 4 million viewers on his YouTube upload of the video. He subsequently put together an album of four tracks called Wonderland, available here (free download) from last.fm.

The latest and coolest chillout track is “Upular”, featuring dialogue and sounds from Disney/Pixar’s “Up”. A friend on Facebook introduced me to Pogo’s work with this music video and it’s a great place to begin.

Happy listening compadres

We here at Venntertainment love Pop-Art but have sadly not posted much over the last few months. I received this one as an email forward so I can’t credit anyone, but if you know of where it came from, please let me know!

Artist assistants stand next to 3,604 cups of coffee which have been made into a giant Mona Lisa in Sydney, Australia. The 3,604 cups of coffee were each filled with different amounts of milk to create the different shades!

“I could do that”. That  most dismissive phrase regularly aimed at contemporary artists. In one fell swoop, calling the piece in question pointless, childish and, most insultingly to the artist, lacking in any skill. It is an easy remark to make. It is a remark we’ve probably all used at some point. It is, however, a remark that misses the point by a country mile.

Last night, Richard Wright, was awarded the 2009 Turner Prize for his gold-leaf frieze. The piece was a hit with the public. It is beautiful, delicate and intricate. It covers an entire wall and took five people four weeks to install. “I couldn’t do that”. It marks somewhat of a turn for the infamous art prize. Tate Britain and the Turner Prize are more used to making headlines of a derisive nature. Damien Hurst’s bisected cow, Tracy Emin’s unmade bed and Antony Gormley’s lights going on and off, did more to irk the general public than entice them and have since become clichéd references in the art-critic critic’s arsenal.

Wright’s installation, while modern in concept, was ancient in application. “The techniques are medieval,” he said after accepting his £25,000 prize, “I start from the most elementary drawing and I extend the drawing from the most basic thing and they get bigger and bigger”. The humble artist toiling away at the intricacies of his work, creating something beautiful. This is an image the average art lover is used to. One they can respect. It is the polar opposite of a found object casually placed in a gallery space. Or is it?

“I could do that”. Yes, you could. You could recreate Emin’s bed or Duchamp’s urinal – one of the first such pieces. But recreation isn’t art. You could recreate anything given time and the right tools. It is the creation that is art. The idea. The expression. Great symphonies are expressions of both beauty and skill. But do they inherently have less artistic merit than a man and a guitar? Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”, to pick a widely recognized example, is musically very simple yet has touched people the world over. Can an equivalently simple piece of art not do the same?

These things are of course the epitome of subjective interpretation. “Like” and “dislike” are indisputable personal reactions. “Good” and “bad” are often the same. But to equate vision with technical proficiency closes doors more than it opens. I was reminded of a piece this morning. Part of the Tate Modern collection, which unfortunately isn’t on show at the moment, IKB 79 by Yves Klein is a monochrome canvas. It is blue rectangle. “I could do that”. It is a piece regularly snickered at by the public. A virtually identical piece from the same series is part of the Centre George Pompidou’s collection in Paris. It is greeted with the same reaction there, so evidentially this is a feeling which travels. However, simple as this piece may be, it didn’t stop a 13 year old me being blown away by it. I was equally dismissive of art at the time, though “boring” was my preferred phrase. Yet it was this of all pieces that literally stopped me dead in my tracks. IKB, or International Klein Blue, was a one-off colour created by the artist. Is it the particular shade that makes the painting? I’m not sure. But what I do know is that I found that flat piece of canvas to be infinitely deep, absorbing and surprisingly dynamic. You are reflected in it and become a part of the piece; a part of hallowed art history, however seemingly innocuous. I also enjoyed watching other people look at it. Their reactions for better or worse, their oohs and ahs or snorts of derision, an entire art world in miniature. “I could do that”. You could do it, too. But we didn’t.

Art is no longer overtly narrative. It no longer depicts great scenes in lieu of books and newspapers. We no longer look to art to illustrate the past. The most respected pieces of today illustrate the present. Street art legend, Banksy, has captured the public’s imagination time and time again with his cutting satire in risqué locations. His tools are simple: home-made stencils and store-bought paint. Yet the technicalities go unnoticed against the the glowing success of vision and execution. The climate controlled halls of Tate Britain, sitting in the shadow of Conservative Party headquarters, may not be the meanest streets of central London. But this shouldn’t render simplicity a failing. To me, successful art is art that makes you stop. Makes you think. Makes you reconsider. A blue rectangle made me reconsider. Maybe a gold frieze will do the same for you. Next year’s Turner Prize will have pieces that will be loved and pieces that will be hated. But how many of us will be able to say “I did that”?

I know I’m back three days at this point, but I needed to gather my thoughts on the few days I spent in London from last Wednesday through to Sunday. So here’s a breakdown of what I got up to and some pics This post features some thoughts on Frightfest. I’ll be posting full reviews before the end of the week on the great Culch.ie and would like to thank Greg Day from Clout Communications for sorting me out with tickets for the weekend. It was a most enjoyable one.

Wednesday

Going Underground

We arrived in London around the 1 o’clock mark. It’s quite a trek out to Hyde Park where we were staying, and we didn’t arrive into our apartment until around 4. 6 hours traveling can be tiresome, so we bought some take-away and rested ourselves, before heading out to see the excellent ‘Wicked’ in Victoria. I’ve seen that show twice now and am still in Love with it.

Thursday

View from The London Eye

This was our day of tourist activity and we packed it full of interesting places. First up was London Dungeon, which was loads of fun as usual. We went to the Tate Modern museum in the afternoon, followed by the London Eye. We were absolutely wrecked by the end of the day, but still found some energy to meet friends for a meal at Wahacas.

Dr.Who?

Friday

The morning was spent shopping. We hit some great comic stores like Orbital Comics near Leicester Square and The Forbidden Planet Superstore which is absolutely huge.

We also managed to visit the great Hamleys and of course, not forgetting the Apple Store (where the Snow Leopard upgrade was purchased. It’s a brilliant upgrade BTW. Speeds up the computer nicely and creates lots of new space ) . There were so many more shops that I can’t even remember most of them. We headed onto Frightfest in Leicester Square for the evening where we watched two movies.

Colin was first. This one’s as Indie as you get, made on a budget of just £43 or something ridiculous like that. It’s a really valiant effort, but dies halfway through, only to be resurrected by a really good ending.

The second movie of the night was a French film called ‘La Horde‘. There’s an embargo on reviews until the film is released worldwide. But I will say this. It’s really French.

I’ll post about the rest of the weekend and have some more reviews from Frighfest too tomorrow

Thanks to Total Film for pointing me towards some more amazing Pop-Art, I know it’s been a while

Here’s Cakeyvoice, knitter extraordinaire.

Look at this one. Have you ever seen anything like it?

Dawn of the Dead

Folks,

Some news:

Design = Getting there, as you can see

Films = Remember the Who’s Watching YOU? video I told you about recently (the one i Produced?). Well it was placed 3rd in the Data Protection Commissioner’s Private I/Public Eye Competition, picking up a €2,000. Here’s the Press Release.

Writing = New Article on Culch.ie: Idiots Zombies Guide to Podcasting – 10 Tips
Also writing for UChoose.ie: Get Free Wi-Fi with Hot Java

Discovered this photo this morning via Twitter on pix.ie.

Why does it always rain on me?

It’s by a guy called Ronan Johns. What think ye? I think it sums up our climate (in more ways than one) perfectly!