The feathers aren’t just white and gray, there are nuances of pink and blue in there. It’s just stellar. I would let whoever did this paint anything they wanted on my van with shag carpeting anytime.

Continuing with the exterior art theme, I saw a video for some guys who painted a wall. What I liked so much was how they handled the shadowing, in repeating adjacent stripes. It’s a really lovely technique I have seen before.

http://vimeo.com/14375730

2. Various companies rent out Vanderbilt Hall in Grand Central to hawk their wares in a big way, and this past week it was the an office supply company, focusing predominantly on Post-Its. They had a bunch of schoolkids make collages using Post-Its, and they were fine. About what you’d expect.

But then off to the side were these Chuck Close-style portraits, you know, cropped really tight on the face, not necessarily flattering, made up of many, many small things.

You want to know what it’s made of? Pushpins. Red, blue, yellow, black and white ones. Pretty amazing, huh?

Here’s the other face on display.

I LOVE this kind of thing, where someone takes ordinary mundane objects, and through an insane amount of hard work creates something really beautiful.

Addendum: This is a photo of my “fancy and important” face. You have to imagine me making that face while nodding my head slowly up and down and making a “mmm-hmmm” sound in a pompous way. Spectacular, isn’t it? Awww yeah.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1zmfTr2d4c

Yeah. My favorite part is when part of his display tries to leave, and he’s like, “You’re ruining my vision! You go here!” Here’s another video of the male bowerbird in action.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFMXrBWswl0

PILLARS, people. The bird understands ARCHITECTURE. I’m so impressed.

So, anyway, I saw a photo the other day, and I was convinced it was a piece of environmental art by the famous artist Andrew Goldsworthy. Nope. Bowerbird house. I found some pictures by Andrew Goldsworthy and mixed the bowerbird photo in there, so you can appreciate how freakin’ awesome this bird is.

Be humbled, people. Be real humbled.

Getty, methinks your search parameters be too wide.

Now, some charts that make me happy.

In keeping with my chart theme, I saw this blog about three months ago, and I every time I go to the blog, I laugh and laugh and laugh and embarrass myself. The website is Hyperbole and a Half.

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/

This woman who writes this blog, Allie, she’s awesome. She makes truly evocative and emotionally powerful drawings in MS Paint that make me giggle unstoppably until I almost tinkle in me pantaloons. If that sounds like an oxymoron, I understand. You must go and experience for yourself. If you read only a few entries, these are the ones you should read. The first one even has a chart!

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/06/this-is-why-ill-never-be-adult.html

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/05/sneaky-hate-spiral.html

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/04/alot-is-better-than-you-at-everything.html

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/03/how-fish-almost-destroyed-my-childhood.html

The Mermaid Parade celebrates the sand, the sea, the salt air and the beginning of summer, as well as the history and mythology of Coney Island, Coney Island pride, and artistic self-expression. The Parade is characterized by participants dressed in hand-made costumes as Mermaids, Neptunes, various sea creatures, the occasional wandering lighthouse, Coney Island post card or amusement ride, as well as antique cars, marching bands, drill teams, and the odd yacht pulled on flatbed.

Each year, a different celebrity King Neptune and Queen Mermaid rule over the proceedings, riding in the Parade and assisting in the opening of the Ocean for the summer swimming season by marching down the Beach from the Boardwalk, cutting through Ribbons representing the seasons, and tossing fruit into the Atlantic to appease the Sea Gods. In the past, David Byrne, Queen Latifah, Ron Kuby, Curtis Sliwa, Moby, David Johansen and Harvey Keitel have graced our shores, presiding over the assembled masses.

Yeah, it’s similar to the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade. More on that later. But first, the aquarium!

I loved the weathervane on top of the cafe. It’s hard to see, but in the middle is a fish, and then for each direction there is a different nifty creature – an octopus, a seahorse, a dolphin and a penguin. I thought is was terrific and I want one in my living room.

Even though I have a regular average little Canon Elph camera, I got some really nice pictures of jellies in all their stinging diaphanous glory.

One of my favorite things about fish are the names they are given. My favorite of all time is the Picasso Triggerfish because, well, it looks like a Picasso painting and it has a little fin-thing on its back that it pops up and down. Genius. This adorable little feller also has a fun descriptive name.

There was a tank with seahorses and a cowfish. A cowfish is called a cowfish because it has horns. And I call it super-cute because it is super-cute, with its kissyface and its flat bottom. It was also extremely difficult to take a picture of the cowfish because it was in a dark tank and it moved around a lot. But I made a concerted effort.

Here’s a decent picture of two seahorses with the cowfish in the background. As you can see, one seahorse is blackish-brownish and one is much lighter. I learned that they can change color at will, like octopii.

I was very concerned at one point because I passed a tank that said “False Clownfish” and the fishies looked exactly like Marlin and Nemo from Finding Nemo. Then I passed another tank that said “Something Something Clownfish” and these guys were swimming in there.

And I thought, “Are these the real clownfish? Was Pixar not accurate? Is my whole life a lie?” I’m not joking. I had a little knot in my stomach and everything. It was a little touch-and-go there for a while. Today at work I looked it up and breathed a large sigh of relief because apparently there’s a whole bunch of different clownfish and some of them indeed look exactly Marlin and Nemo, so Pixar didn’t lie to me and all is right with the world.

Here is a nice picture I took on the boardwalk of Coney Island. If you close your eyes, you can smell the coconut-scented suntan lotion and the Nathan’s hot dogs.

Now, the Mermaid Parade. It’s not what you would call a real organized thing. It’s kind of like a bunch of art school students got together, picked a theme (the ocean) and made an impromptu parade. Lots of nudity and glitter and whatnot. Here are some of the highlights.

As always, there were a few people who were completely insane and possibly dress like every day but because there was a parade occurring they looked like they fit in. I think this man was one of these people. He was so weird I didn’t even notice the parrot on his head until I got home that night and looked at the pictures on my computer.

There were quite a few children marching, being pushed in strollers, etc. This was a favorite of mine: a child wearing an angry duck mask squirting the crowd with a water gun.

Another group costume I liked was the flea circus. I don’t know how well you can see it in the picture, but all the ladies have antennae on their heads and puffs of tulle on their butt, mimicking flea hinders.

There was rather well-painted fish float/sculpture/thing.

Also in attendance was Wallpaper Squid Man, Screaming Shark Girl and Oyster Boy with Strategically Placed Pearl.

But the reason everyone comes to see this parade is for the boobies. In New York a lady can’t show her nipple-y bits, but she can wear pasties or body paint. So many a lass was rockin’ the starfish coverup or something like it.

It was a fun experience, but I don’t think I’ll go again. It was a long trek getting out there and even longer getting back, so I think I’m good for now.

2. Pogo is a musician-slash-dj who takes classic movies and meshes some of the words the characters say with electronic music, and in the process beautiful music is made. Pogo is most famous for his Alice in Wonderland mix:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQuqeLBTetA

And he just recently came out with a Toy Story version, which I love:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbD5ke7xqww

3. I recently discovered an amazingly talented beader, Laura McCabe. She’s been around for a while, I just didn’t know about her. I remember when I was right out of college, I saw a necklace she designed that won an award, and I was like I WANT THAT. She is completely focused on making her pieces complicated and perfect, which I can appreciate, and she sometimes uses false eyes as focal pieces, which appeals to my macabre side. Also, one of her pieces is a dodecahedron, which is my favorite polygon to say. All-around fabulousness. And she makes a living doing this! Additional fabulousness.

How Laura makes her living is by teaching classes and selling patterns and kits, so if you want to make one of her pieces, you can find a bunch of them here:

www.beadpatterncentral.com

Bonus Thing totally unrelated to any other thing: This has to be one of the creepiest pictures I have ever seen. Courtesy of Awkward Family Photos.

Using the concept of the cabinet of curiosity, MAD created an exhibition of, well, dead things. It was very difficult not to think of this movie quote over and over again. (quote is at 1:25)

Being the somewhat gloomy goth-like creature that I am (you can review my Ossuary of Sedlec entry if there’s any doubt in your mind) I loved this exhibition. Actually, what’s even dorkier is that I have been following a few of the artists for years, and could make comments like, “Oh, she’s working with bone now! That’s a different medium for her, compared to the metalsmithing work she did in 2007.” I’m just going to cover a few of my favorite artists there. There was Jennifer Trask, the artist I was geeking out about above. I first saw her work at SOFA in 2007 or 2008. She did these amazing necklaces made with a beautiful marriage of the rare and the mundane. For example, snake skin that had been shed. Gold. Bone black. Raw diamonds. Silver. Butterfly wings. Charcoal. Leaves. Beetles. Here’s a picture of one of those necklaces.

Jennifer then went through a period where she made amazing pins. Here’s one of my favorites, using semi-precious stones, gold and some small animal’s vertibrae.

At the exhibition, Jennifer had a big wall piece, which I’m not used to seeing from her. It was great, though. She had a frame, and coming out of the frame were all these flowers, but all the flowers were made from bones. There were antlers too. I prefer her jewelry, but I like that she’s trying new stuff.

The other artist I was psyched to see was Alastair Mackie. He works a lot with owl pellets and the contents therein. In college, I wanted one of his mouse skull orbs so badly.

I was hoping to see a mouse skull orb in person at this exhibition but alas, it was not meant to be. Alastair had a piece where there was a loom, and next to it was a pile of mouse bones. Owl pellets, for people who don’t know, are the regurgitated inedible remains of their food. The owl can’t digest fur and bones, so his body makes a little packet out of it and he barfs it up. The loom had fabric woven on it with the fur of the mice, and the mouse bones were what was left of those pellets.

What delighted me more about this exhibition, more than the plethora of dead things, was the complete anal retentiveness of many of the artists. Sometimes I feel like I’m too nitpicky, but these artists made me feel right at home. “If it’s not tiny and perfect and complicated, don’t bother,” seems to be their motto. I was with my people, and it felt so good. Let me give you some examples. There was Fabian Pena, who makes collages of skulls and hearts and hands with tiny pieces of cockroach wings.

Or Tim Hawkinson, who made the pointy thing out of pieces of interlocking eggshell. He made a tiny bird skeleton out of fingernail clippings.

My personal favorite was the piece by Lonneke Gordijn, with the LED lights that had dandelion seeds painstakingly attached to each bulb to mimic a dandelion poof. These people are crazy, I tell ya. Crazy AWESOME.

There was also Kate MccGuire, who makes swirling writhing shapes with pigeon feathers.

But the big surprise winner for me was Jennifer Angus, who prints her own wallpaper and then makes installations in rooms where she covers the rooms in patterns of pinned dried bugs.

The best part of her installation was there was a dollhouse in the middle, and bugs were propped up on their hind legs pottering around the house, doing roofwork and fixing the porch and whatnot. I couldn’t find a picture of it, but I found a similar one to give you an idea.

The exhibition is on until October 24th, so if you get a chance, make an effort to see this. The permanent collection is pretty terrif too, and the store is stellar. All-around good stuff.

http://madmuseum.org/

Addendum: I totally forgot the light fixture made from silkworm cocoons, or the giant hairnet filled with milkweed seeds. Did I mention this exhibition is fantastical? Because it is.

http://www.doverpots.com/crystalline/article.html

Short version: The glaze has little flecks in it – zinc, I believe – and in the kiln SCIENCE!! happens, and twelve hours later, crystals. Luckily, small pieces of crystalline pottery aren’t that expensive, so I’ve collected seventeen over the years. I’m going to show some of my more special ones.

This is that first one that I mentioned. As you can see, the top bit broke off, but I don’t care. The crystals, they are so large and circular. I display it proudly with all my other pieces.

I believe the glaze was invented in China, so I bought a piece made in China. It’s nothing spectacular, but I felt I should reprezent (gang sign here).

These are my two largest and most expensive pieces. They’re by the same artist, Robert Hessler, who might be the nicest person I have ever met. What a delightful fellow. And he does wonderful work. The tube shaped one is pretty spectacular, the way the colors change from top to bottom. And you can’t really appreciate it from the picture, but the teapot is coppery/shimmery, with blue crystals.

This is my cheapest and crappiest piece that I bought on a street festival in Africa from a German potter. Even though the crystals are not-so-great and the dish isn’t even remotely circular, I liked how it looked like frost on a window looking out on a night sky. This is a perfect example of even if something is not well-made, it can still be evocative to the right person (that would be me).

Sometimes the crystals end with a totally different color at the edge, and I like that look very much. This vase is a good example of that, with the dark edges.

This is an ikebana holder. I bought it because I thought the top looked like creme brulee. I don’t claim to be fancy. Sometimes I buy art because it resembles a favorite food of mine. This is one of those times.

The same artist who made the ikebana holder, Joe Lorber, made the three pieces below. Also a really nice guy. He makes the stripes in the crystals by raising and lowering the temperature of the kiln every fifteen minutes. The last piece there is grainy because he fired it twice and copper started to come to the surface.

And this piece is my newest. I think it might be my new favorite. It’s also by Joe Lorber. He did something different with the temperatures on this one, and I think it’s a different glaze at the top and the bottom. It’s just stellar. I find myself staring at it sometimes, lost in thought.

I got really excited when I saw a car illustration in Wired magazine and I was like, “Hey, isn’t that Feric?” And it was! I was a happy camper.

The other artist I wanted to talk about goes by the name of McBess. Same story as Feric: His real name is Matthieu Bessudo, nom de plume is McBess, charming. His style is bringin’ back the 1920’s cartoon style, like this one. You know, the black and white people with all-black eyes and rubbery limbs.

And he’s in a band too, so he worked on a video for them. Just an FYI, there’s a couple less-than-work-appropriate shots in the video. Song’s real catchy, tho’.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cD1Rrfc0y-M