From the press release:

These paintings are created using a technique that involves drilling small holes in the back of acrylic mirrors and filling these holes with paint. When viewed from the front, the holes appear as tiny colored spheres in a hermetic plastic surface. The images are composed of sub-pixels (similar to a television screen) arranged in a triangle arrangement, each providing different color intensity to complete the image. For the artist, the idea of painting using a method that mimics the look of a flat screen is very appealing. “Today, most people look at images today on a flatscreen, why can’t painting take from that?” The mirror provides a unique ground, as it actively engages the viewer and provides an ever-shifting context for the work depending on viewing angle and installation.

The paintings are created using a technique that involves drilling small holes in the back of acrylic mirrors and filling these holes with paint. When viewed from the front, the holes appear as tiny colored spheres. The images are composed of sub-pixels (similar to a television screen) arranged in a triangle arrangement, each providing different color intensity to complete the image.

Opening night is the 16th, with Betts delivering a talk at 6pm. Not to be missed.

—Andrew Simone (via Amanda Mooney)

Not doing enough of this as of late…

Conceived of by the boundary-defying minds over at Sid Lee and directed by new favorite director Nima Nourizadeh, the celebrity house party that has become an infamous element of Adidas’ promotional materials is once again gettin’ busy but this time with X-wing fighters buzzing the rooftops above.

“And that phone number once again is…” I ask, already knowing what she is going to say. She repeats back my own phone number.

“I’m sorry, but not only were you given the wrong number but I think that letter is a scam.”

“I think you are right.” She replies and we hang up.

And so it has continued. Around 6AM Pacific Time, my phone will start buzzing every 20 minutes or so for the rest of the day. 19 missed calls this morning from across the States: Arizona, California, Connecticut, New Jersey, Alabama, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, New York. I check my voicemail every few hours. It is always the same story repeated one after the other. I feel strangely voyeuristic, as though given a brief audio snapshot into the lives of people with whom I would otherwise never have crossed paths. I can only guess that I am connecting with America’s most naive, perhaps her most desperate. Lots of older people; plenty of thick smalltown drawls; a man who asks for assistance “cuz I can’t read so good”; another man who just keeps yelling “HELLO?” into my message box. I picture these people sitting in their homes, in their trailers perhaps, ubiquitous cliches of the American lower class inevitably flashing through my head as they cradle their phones against their shoulders, holding their cheques up in front of them like beacons of hope, convincing themselves that it is a sign from God, that in these desperate and trying times this is the break that they have been looking for.

At the same time, I picture “Tony Johnson”, who to his credit must have put a fair amount of time and perhaps even a significant startup investment into this scam — creating convincingly branded bank letterhead, envelopes and cheques; copywriting for all of the documents; acquisition of some form of database; and then the actual trans-American mail out — I picture him sitting in his apartment, staring at his phone and wondering why the hell it hasn’t started ringing. I wonder when he will discover the typo. I wonder if he has a boss.

Meanwhile, I am randomly caught in the middle of these two worlds. I call the police, mainly to assure that my connection to this mail fraud case is not going to result in swat teams smashing through my living room window. The officer assures me that she thinks I am safe. The phone company informs me that they are not able to block calls from the US. In fact, my only options are to block all calls or to get a new phone number, neither of which are all that appealing. So I decide to ride it out for a few more days in the hopes that the initial surge will die down. Afterall, how many dupes can there be in America?

In a similar pattern, the online newspaper has always adapted the traditional layout of its printed cousin. The better rags have introduced interactive components and with the onset of blogging, there has been, for better or worse , the ability for reader comments. But the overall structure has remained intact. Meanwhile, sites such as Facebook, Friend Feed, Twitter and, of course, the all-powerful RSS feed have turned our mode of consuming information from categorized columns into a constantly updating flow.

Today, the New York Times, in what is being heralded by the likes of Jay Rosen (@jayrosen_nyu) and Dave Winer (@davewiner) as a watershed moment, introduces the Times Wire, an at-a-glance view of the paper’s latest content, in reverse chronological order without any other weighting or sorting. As Winer states, “They’re now presenting their news flow as a flow. Gone is the pretense that news on the Internet works like news on paper. Welcome to the NY Times river of news”.

RSS has been with us for 10 years now. And unlike a number of other trends and technologies, it has survived and thrived and essentially become the backbone for the current information revolution. After a decade, one might ask of the NY Times shift in format “So what?” or “Why did it take so long?”. Or, to the more discerning observer, it is a moment to make note: of both the validation of the new form and the prevailing relevance of one of the older forms’ greatest champions.

–Paul Goldberger, The New Yorker

“Word has it that the building is close to explosion. Whole thing pretty much toast, all in all.”

–@DavidFeng

Strange times indeed. My thoughts tonight are further derailed by an advertisement, on the back cover of a magazine that splays itself across our couch. It is peddling a new car from one of Detroit’s Big Three who, less than two months ago, had been forced to send their top executives down to Washington in order to sheepishly sit in front of US Congress and shamelessly beg for their lives. In the time since, GM and Chrysler have already seen 17 billion come to them in government assistance to which they have responded with the promise of a “greener future”. All of which brings me back to that ad and one line in particular: “Smaller than your average SUV.”

Behold the seismic shift in messaging that the American auto industry is making after teetering at the edge of annihilation. Not an apology, or even any recognition of past mistakes. The SUV, which has spent two decades as the symbol of upward mobility still sets the bar. It is just “smaller” now. And while some may argue that at least this is a step in the right direction, I would counter that it clearly demonstrates a failure in understanding the sheer magnitude of change that is on the horizon for automobile makers and how much of the responsibility resides with them to redefine for their customers the “new symbols” of their trade.

What does any of this have to do with anything you might ask? Well cataclysmic changes tend to run in packs and social media, while not as dire as climate change or the global financial crisis, seems to hinge on this same millennial tipping point and demand similar paradigm shifts in our thinking and practices. Social media is the temperature inversion of the marketing industry in that the flow of communication has literally flipped itself on end. And like the Big Three execs, you, as a marketer have a decision to make: to become a leader in this brave new world or fade into extinction. The answer is not simply to try pushing your old square methods into these new round holes. It is not about tricks but rather, a new set of tools; new ways to communicate; “new symbols”.

Marketing in the social media era is about listening to and engaging with your customers; it is about believing in your product and doing everything you can to make it the best that it can possibly be; and not only that, but that your product makes the world the best that it can be. But more than anything, it is about honesty and passion. It is time to once again enjoy the journey and not just focus on the bottom line. And if you are successful at all of this, then you will be able to sit back and watch your customers promote the virtues of your wares and the integrity of your name. In short, there will be little need for what we currently consider “marketing” at all…

-BldgBlog