Saturday, December 29, 2012

Micro-sculpture

Haven't posted anything arty for a while so here's some microscopic artwork, by Willard Wigan, I was looking at not long ago.  They're pretty damn impressive work if you ask me.
 

Willard started making small sculptures a little over 50 years ago when he was 5.  Having dyslexia and other learning disabilities, he was teased in school when he was young and he turned to his art for solace.  These days the majority of Willards sculptures are usually displayed inside the eye of a needle or literally on the head of a pin.

They are so small that Willard has to go into a meditative state to slow his heartbeat, and he works between each pulse when his hand is completely still and steady. His artwork is of such minute proportions that it virtually can not be seen with the naked eye, and can only be seen clearly with a microscope.  Each piece is sculpted with grains of sand, dust fibers, cobwebs or even insect hair. Willards creations are so light eacho one can be lifted with an eyelash.
 
The average price for each of his micro-sculptures is around $80,000.  Prince Charles Elton John and Mike Tyson are some of the people who collect his work.  Once while he was working on an Alice in Wonderland micro-sculpure, his phone rang. When he answered the phone he sighed and he accidentally inhaled Alice.
 
 
 
Presently Willard is collaborating with two of the worlds finest watch makers, Robert Greubel and Stephen Forsey (www.timeartgallerygf.com), on a project to create the world’s most exclusive timepiece, Art Piece 1 is scheduled to be unveiled soon at the World International Watch Convention in January 2013.
 
 
As it is easier for a rich man to enter a camel than for a poor man to pass a needle, you can see more of Willard and his micro-sculptures at www.willard-wigan.com.
 

 

Tuesday, December 25, 2012

Silent Night Assassin

Happy Christmas. This years Christmas themed book is The Silent Partner by Anders Bodelsen.

Santa doesn't take kindly to his toy store debtors being late on their payments. He sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you’re awake and he's packing heat.
 
Watch out for the movie in the bargain bin at your DVD store.

Saturday, December 22, 2012

An Excess of Farrisses

If you listen to the song I Need You Tonight by INXS you'll realise it's about plastic surgery addiction.  One of the lines is clearly:
"Your boobs are so long
   They've got to hit your nose"
 
The lyrics to Biting Bullets have something to do with aquatic mythological battles in the lines:
"Fighting mermaids,
   fighting around!!"

While the lyrics to the song Mystify are clearly a reference to lead singer Michael Hutchence hiding behind his hotel door:
"Mister find, Mister find me
   Mister find, Mister find me"
 
 
The origins of the band that was later to become INXS, began in 1977 with Andrew Farriss convincing his fellow High School classmate, Michael Hutchence, to join his band called Doctor Dolphin.  It was a terrible name but even at this early age, Hutchence enjoyed playing with his pink dolphin.  With three Farriss brothers in the now seven piece band (Andrew, Jon and Tim) they decided to rename themselves as The Farriss Brothers.
 
 
In 1978, The parents of the Farriss boys relocated to Perth, taking Jon to continue his schooling and, as soon as Hutchence and Andrew finished school, the rest of the band followed.  In Perth, for some inexplicable reason, they briefly performed as The Vegetables, singing "We Are the Vegetables", before returning to Sydney ten months later.
 
At a chance meeting in a Sydney pub car park, Tim was approached by Gary Morris, the manager of Midnight Oil. The band began to regularly support Midnight Oil and other local bands again under the name The Ferris Brothers during which time Morris advised that a member of Midnight Oils crew had come up with a less crappy band name and he suggested they change it.  The name INXS was inspired by English band XTC and Australian jam makers IXL.
 

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Carl Sagan Doomsday Quote


Yep, this Friday is Doomsday.  The Deathstar Mimas has been hanging out around Saturn waiting for December 21, 2012 to charge up it's superweapon. 

Saturday, December 15, 2012

Moustache Power


With great moustache power comes great responsibility.

He can also uses his armpit hair for endurance.
 
 

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Nudiustertian

The latest uncommon word I have encountered is nudiustertian.  No, it's not an Austrian word to describe a nude citizen. It's the proper term to describe the time frame pertaining to the day before yesterday.
 
I think it's an important word because it's the pivotal point in history where memory starts to go fuzzy.  Remembering what happened yesterday is fine but the day before... may as well be the year before yesterday. Alternatively if you drink a lot it's where your last memory starts since you woke up.
 
I couldn't find a picture I liked depicting the day before yesterday, so here's one of some nude Austrians.
 
 
 
 

Saturday, December 08, 2012

Excreting Mozart


Mozart was absoloutely the first music super star.  If you can't appreciate his music, you really don't know music at all.  Sure there were other other famous composers but for super star status they really didn't compare.  It's sort of like comparing the guy who writes the opening title music for sitcoms to Elvis Presley.  Even Beethoven composed his own early works in the shadow of Mozarts talent.  Over his lifetime Mozart composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, operatic, and choral music.  Born as Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart in 1756, but like most rock stars, he preferred to be known publicly as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
 
When Mozart was three he would watch his seven year old sister, Nannerl, during her keyboard lessons with her father.  When he was four his father began to teach him a few minuets and pieces at the keyboard.  He could play faultlessly and with perfect timing.   At the age of five, he was already composing small pieces, which he played to his father who wrote them down.  In 1762, at the age of six, Mozart and his sister began his first concert tour across Europe which spanned three and a half years.  During this trip, Mozart met a great number of musicians and acquainted himself with the works of many other composers. A particularly important influence was Johann Bach.
 
Mozart was a big fan of excrement and had a fondness for scatological humour and poetry.  Something which is preserved in his letters, notably those written to his cousin Maria, but also in his correspondence with his sister and parents.  According to some research an estimate of 39 of Mozart's letters include scatological passages.  The majority of these are written to family members who occasionally included similar scatological humour in their own letters.  No doubt that if Mozart was alive today The Human Centipede would be pride of place in his DVD collection.

 
One of the surviving letters to his cousin Maria contains a fine example of Mozart's use of scatology: "Well, I wish you good night But first shit into your bed and make it burst. Sleep soundly, my love Into your mouth your arse you'll shove."  The German original is in rhyming verse.

Mozart even wrote scatological music, a series of canons that he sang with his friends:
 "Leck mich im Arsch" (Lick me in the arse)
  "Gehn wir im Prater, gehn wir in d' Hetz," (Off to the Prater, off to the Fun)
 “Difficile lectu mihi mars et jonicu” (Difficult thing for me is reading Mars and Ionian)
 "O du eselhafter Peierl" (Oh, you asinine Peierl)
 "Bona nox" (Good night)
As well as two canons by Trnka to which he gave new poo themed lyrics:
 "Leck mir den Arsch fein recht schön sauber" (Lick my arse right well and clean)
 "Bei der Hitz im Sommer eß ich" (In the heat of summer I eat)
 
An unusual phenomena occurs when listening to Mozart called, not surprisingly, The Mozart effect.  Mozart's music induces a short-term improvement on the performance of certain kinds of mental tasks known as spatial-temporal reasoning. If you look around, you will quickly realise that the opposite occurs when listening to Justin Bieber.
 
Researchers Shaw and Ky, investigated the effect of listening to music by Mozart on spatial reasoning.  They gave research participants one of three standard tests of abstract spatial reasoning after they had experienced each of three listening conditions: a sonata by Mozart, repetitive relaxation music, and silence.  They found a temporary enhancement of spatial-temporal reasoning, as measured by the Stanford-Binet IQ test.  What this shows is "that there are patterns of neurons that fire in sequences, and that there appear to be pre-existing sites in the brain that respond to specific frequencies."  Unfortunately, the research also showed that the enhancing effect of the music condition is only temporary, no student had effects extending beyond a 15-minute period.
 
So there you have it, listening to music about poo can benefit your brain.  Try it out yourself, here’s Leck mich im Arsch (Lick me in the arse). 
 
 
I'm waiting for the karaoke version to come out.
 

Wednesday, December 05, 2012

Bionic Yuletide Stripper

December again?
 
Six Million Dollar Man Christmas Adventures.
 

 
The four exciting adventures mostly involve Steve Austin breaking in to peoples houses, dressed as Santa, at midnight and performing a unsettling striptease as he wakes them at their bedside.
 
There's also some sort of reference involving a rocket thrusting up.