好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 44 : playful scales// miniature calendar Tatsuya Tanaka

好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 44 : playful art ; playful scales 

Tatsuya Tanaka : http://miniature-calendar.com/

http://www.designboom.com/art/tatsuya-tanaka-miniature-calendar-08-04-2015/

since 2011, tatsuya tanaka has been engaged in his ‘miniature calendar‘ — a project which has seen the art director create a pocket-sized scene of everyday life, on a daily basis. what initially started as a means of photographing his collection of diorama dolls amongst familiar settings constructed to scale, has now unfolded into a long-term venture… one that he’s not likely to stop anytime soon. we spoke with the japanese creative about what fuels his ideas for 365 days of the calendar year, and of the more than 1000 scenes he’s made, which ones he’s particularly fond of and have a personal meaning for him.

diorama dolls

‘bamboo forest’

Yukinori Dehara: Tiny Little Objects//

Christopher Boffoli //

http://www.demilked.com/minimiam-miniature-figures-food-pierre-javelle-akiko-ida/

Pierre Javelle and Akiko Ida have been photographing a series of playful dioramas, called MINIMIAM

好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 45 : youthful Mona Lisa with fly away hair

好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 45 : youthful Mona Lisa with fly away hair

I like this Mona Lisa, she has been outside playing on the swings and just got back to get a drink of water.

好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 43 : Miroslav Tichý + Handmade cameras + his peeping tom photos

好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 43 : Miroslav Tichý + Handmade cameras + his peeping tom photos 

The Reclusive Peeping Tom Photographer and his Cardboard Camera

By MessyNessy

6TH JUN, 2013

 229

Charming eccentric or tolerated local boogyman? The townspeople of Kyjov in Czech Republic could never quite decide. Miroslav Tichý took nearly a hundred photographs a day with his homemade camera, wandering around the streets of his hometown, often spotted at bus stops, the main square, the park and the swimming pool, although he was frequently arrested for lingering around the local pool taking pictures of unsuspecting women.

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When he returned to his chaotic and cluttered home afte a day of shooting, he would develop and print his pictures, sometimes crudely frame and decorate them, but ultimately cast them aside into a mess of untitled, undated and unseen photographs. For more than twenty years, his work would remain secret until a childhood friend and neighbour discovered his prints amongst the chaos of undeveloped rolls and cardboard cameras. His work has since been celebrated at museums and galleries across the world including London, Paris and New York.

Born in 1926, Tichý could have become one of the prominent painters of the modernist Communist regime. He was accepted to the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, but after the Communist takeover in 1948, he grew defiant of requirements to draw socialist workers in overalls rather than female nudes and quit the prestigious school. Tichý was quickly identified as a rebel by the oppressive regime who began making attempts at “normalizing” him (whatever that entailed). After his compulsory military service, Tichý became more eccentric.

He ceased to care how he looked, dressing like a vagabond, possibly expressing his rebellion through his personal appearance. The state often tried to keep him out of sight, snatching him up and sending him to psychiatric clinics for days at a time over Communist patriotic holidays. Removed from society, it was around this time in the 1960s that he stopped painting and began making his intentionally imperfect cameras and experimenting with photography.

Tichý certainly preferred his subjects to be women, most of whom were completely unaware that they were being photographed. Some just didn’t realize that his camera made of plywood and tin cans was even real, and would smile simply to be kind to the crazy local man with the long beard and his toy camera.

When he was banned from the local pool, he made telephoto lenses with cardboard tubes to snap his clandestine photographs from a distance, which is why a wire fence can sometimes be seen in his pictures.

In 2010, after an exhibition at the International Centre of Photography, The New York Photo Review described his work:

We see women photographed from the rear, from the front, from the side; we see their feet, legs, buttocks, backs, faces, as well as complete bodies [as when drawing a nude at the Academy]; we see them walking, standing, sitting, bending over, reclining. There are a few nudes, though the poor image quality sometimes makes it difficult to determine if we are looking at a nude or a woman with not much on. […] Whatever eroticism is present is limited to that of the voyeur; these women are not inviting us into their world.

Tichý lived off a small disability pension and took photographs for his own amusement, paying no attention to the standards of fine print. Sometimes he drew on his photographs to accentuate the contours of his subject’s fleeting glimpse or her bikini strap. When his work was finally discovered, most prints were damaged and exposed to the harsh conditions from being improperly stored in the squalor of his studio.

In 1981, Roman Buxbaum, Tichý’s neighbour and friend found his prints strewn around on the floor and began collecting them over the years. He was for a long time, the only person other than Tichý to see the prints, which were often gifted to him in stacks by his eccentric neighbour.

In 2004, Buxbaum’s collection of his photographs was shown at the Biennial of Contemporary Art in Seville and the following year, the works won the Rencontres d’Arles 2005 New Discovery Award. Then came major retrospectives of his work, celebrated for its poetic imperfections, in Zurich and Paris. Tichý was 71 by this time and Buxbaum had set up a foundation on his behalf to preserve and exhibit his work. Of course Buxbaum was also making handsome commissions from the galleries where he placed his collections.

Rather suddenly in 2009, Tichý severed all ties with his childhood friend and the foundation he had set up. In a published statement, Tichý announced that “he made no agreement, written or oral, with Buxbaum to propagate his works, that Buxbaum exploits his works without authorization and violates his copyright, and that only he, Hebnarová and his lawyer have the right to decide on the use and propagation of his works”.

In 2010, Tichý had a solo show at the International Center of Photography in New York City which featured 100 splotchy photographs, strewn around in a glass box as they would have been in his disordered studio, along with his makeshift cameras and rolls of undeveloped film.

Since his discovery, Tichý never once attended an exhibition and remained an outsider for the rest of his life. He died in the same village where he was born in 2011 at the age of 85.

Tichý is pictured here with one of his long telephoto lenses. He ground lenses out of plastic with toothpaste and ash, putting them together with cardboard toilet paper tubes, dressmaker’s elastic and old camera parts he found.

Tichý famously once said, “First of all, you have to have a bad camera”, and, “If you want to be famous, you must do something more badly than anybody in the entire world.”

For exhibition news, the Miroslac Tichý Facebook page is here.

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好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 44 : "如山" // 如山古琴 vs 如山小店. Like a Mountain; Boltanski

好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 44 : "如山" // 如山古琴 vs 如山小店

==

如山古琴 a Buddhist/Taoist spiritual guqin player/ concert.

The name of the guqin player who is a monk.

==

I like this name "如山" and I have named a little shop in 2009 in Beijing "如山".  It was a name that I had given privately for one of my favorite cycling stops in Beijing in 2009.  

Everyday in 2009 for one month, I rode my bicycle to a guqin school at Dongzhimen.
The boulevard sidewalk was and still remains wide and clear.  Clean.  You just ride along the 8 lane street, and stop anywhere you like.  Park your bike, get a nice honey yogurt in a ceramic jar, drink it up fresh cool through a straw, through the paper cover.  Look at some bookstores, cinema cafe shops.  Banks.  And you also could stop when you see interesting shops.  Like sample bag shops, sample clothing's shops, dotted all along this huge avenue running from Xidan all the way to DongZhimen.

==

如山 was the secret name I gave to a clothing shop in Beijing - which was a shop with no name.  It was housed in a traditional courtyard space - these houses that might be up for demolition very soon.

Its a shop off the main street of Beijing.  I took a bus one time, and it passed by these small shops lining up the main streets.

Bus no109, i think.

---

All the clothes were piled up as a mountain, taller than a person.  Many piles, lined wall to wall.  A real working installation.  Not an aesthetic artistic installation event of a famous artist at famous artist studios.  

Many years ago, in Paris, maybe 1993?  There was an installation of Boltanski at the Quai de la Gare Artist Studio - a Parisian squat.  There were many piles of donated clothing, with a plastic bag at 10ff, you could fill it up with any items.  There were a lot of immigrants who got many bags.  It was fun.  Beautiful lighting shone onto the piles.  

At 如山, the shop owner, and assistants were all women.  Its a sample/overstock/whatever shop.  It had the freedom and joy of scavengers.  The clothing were new, and often designer wear all made in China, exported, and returned after the seasons over?  Are these jobbers lots?  What is the life experience of a piece of clothing?  

Last month 2015 now, I tried to find this shop again, but is has disappeared.  All the little shops have disappeared.  Its now mainly regular shops with fast foods that lining this stretch of the street.

I like to listen to the vendors chatting, while they sit on top of the piles, sometimes interchange w shoppers.  They joke around.

They talked about going to Shenzhen buying these clothes on a per ton basis.

You feel free inside this shop, the owner is free, the shop assistants are free.

The owner told me sometimes in the afternoon that it was so hot, they had to close for siesta because nobody comes out when it hot like that.  So they close the shop for a few hours, and she just sleeps on top of the pile of clothes.  

So i call this shop "如山".  Like a mountain.

And the clothes are all scattered everywhere, t-shirts, shorts, pants, silk blouse, jackets, running jog suits, windbreaker, hats, fashionable outfits, dance wear, debardeurs, bustiers, skii wear, overstock, return stock, name brands from somewhere, sometimes with old price tags from around the world.  Made in China and returning to China w a foreign price tag.

I always wonder, where do these clothes come from.  Where have they been?

And the women, whats so interesting about them?  They, everyday, they get up, wash face, go to work - on the bus or on their bike - one whole day after another day, day in day out, what could they possibly know about interesting things in the city or about the world?  Their jokes, what so funny about them?  But no, I find their humor and their joy about being in this shop - instead of back in the villages working also at some other repetitive jobs or taking care of elderly, or young children - their world has opened, its a window to the city.  Their joy is genuine, joy and challenges the same.  When the challenges becomes too much, not worth it, they probably go on to other things.

Like what Elvis Presley sings, Lord, this time you gave me a mountain… how high are mountains?

Guqin player's mountain, lofty, quiet, spiritual, symbolic.

Clothing mountains, earthly, fun, unimportant for a society of huge consommation and discard (whats one more t-shirt or one less bustier?)  

Unlike the buyers at Boltanskis show, they were mainly immigrants finding a good deal. They were mainly Africans and people like myself - poor student, visitors, buyers all mixed.  I would buy one or two bags, and others might buy 20 bags.

I did not see any regular white person buying for fun.

(pictures of similar shops today in HK, or "fouille" in Paris)

好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 42 : gem corn experiment 2015

好奇藝術 Kunstkammer 42 : gem corn experiment 2015

7Aug2015, Gem Corn
planted on 1stApril2015 -
there is a wheat like stem coming from the cob.  this corn has both silks and stem within the cob.
Apparently its a primitive corn similar to Curzco.  We will see what happens next.
Genetics of mixing corn, cross breeding is v interesting.

Kunstkammer Gem corn :: Hand pollination / abnormal corn ears / primitive corn Cuzco from Bat Caves Mexico

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wikhr33AEc

How to hand pollinate the corn to ensure non-contamination of other pollens.
Clear explanation. Cut back silk the day before
1// Scientific no nonsense University research method.

2// General method

3//Easy going method

http://gardensouth.org/2011/07/09/you-can-avoid-corn-pollination-failure/

Tassel just emerging on corn stalk; in the next few days it will produce 2-15 million grains of pollen

The pollen is produced inside the anthers:

Hollow anthers hang down on threadlike stalks; pollen is produced inside

Gardeners generally have pollination problems for the second reason – pollen doesn’t reach the female flowers at the right time:

Corn silk is the female flower, which is receptive when fresh and green

The silk is the female flower which can be seen at the tip of the incipient ears on the side of the cornstalk. Each thread connects to a single incipient kernal on the ear. When it is green and tender, it is receptive, but it will turn brown in just a few days and the opportunity to pollinate is gone.

Pollen that falls onto the silk adheres

When a grain of pollen falls and sticks to one of the silks, it begins to grow a pollen tube down inside the silk strand, right to the incipient seed, which it then fertilizes.

The problem with garden pollination is that there are usually few plants; not a whole field; there is a limited amount of pollen available – and it may blow the wrong way. New gardeners are frequently advised to use four short rows, rather than one long row, for this reason. Corn planted in blocks does pollinate a bit better.

For even more pollination insurance, do it by hand – it only takes a minute. When tassels first appear, pollen shed is only a day or two away. If you look at the tassels in early morning light,  you can see the pollen, if you look toward the sun. If you shake a tassel there will be a visible dust from it, if it’s ready. If you shake it too hard, of course you’ll shake loose the anthers themselves.

So, when the tassels are ready, in the morning just after dew is mostly dry, bend a tassel over the silk (on another plant) and shake it.

http://www.robinsonlibrary.com/agriculture/plant/field/corn.htm
info on corn, history of corn...

https://slate.adobe.com/a/Z0xaA
(made w adobe slate... interesting page w large zoom
abnormal corn ears


My gem corn on 7Aug2015

And...answer to why my corn has silk and some wheat like thing in the middle?
http://affluentpeasant.barkie.net/cornrst/CornBreedingBeta.htm

The Results Of Crossing Locally Adapted Traditional Corns With An Origin Corn Like Cuzco

The only way to describe the crop we saw emerging as we grow out the crosses was awesome. The variations between plants were beyond any of our imaginings. We have some of 8 to 10 footers scattered among the 6 to 5 foot average heights in the rest of the crosses. But the real variation was in plant form. We could see the beginnings of almost every imaginable variation between all the forms we started with. From the large heavy robust stems of Cuzco to heavily tillered short Mandan types with Flint, Dent and Flour ears. There were plants with thick stems with and without tillers, all shapes of tillered plants with 1, 2, 3 or more tillers. (see pictures) Ears were forming on various leaf axils of the main shoot and on various leaf axils of the side shoots. The genetic diversity was as such a fundamental level that we even had occasional small ears the size of your thumb with tassels on top of the ear closely resembling primitive ears of corn found in the Bat Caves in Mexico thousands of years ago. [ See photo primitive like corn Right ].

http://hexell.livejournal.com/65313.html?thread=937761
pictures of many varieties of corn, diff colors

More...
http://www.crownjewelgourmet.com/popcorn_line.html
tiny popcorn, many colors

cleaning artery drink, one tbsp per day