Cold Hands, Warm H(Art)

It was in the middle of the room, which I circumnavigated to look at the rest of the art on display, most of which does not remain in my memory now. It has dominated only buy that one piece of art, which I never completely could turn my back on, which I never came closer to than 10 feet. I simply couldn’t.

Through Jobu’s steady rollout of outrageously outfitted personas, Kurata subverted and reclaimed Asian-centric tropes as well. Aided by discussions with writer-directors Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, Kurata sent up the “stereotype of the ‘perfect Asian’ who’s ‘good at sports’ ” through the “wholesome” pink argyle vest- and socks-wearing Golfer Jobu. Goth Jobu, in all-black and a vinyl A-line miniskirt over a sheer tulle petticoat, puts a twist on anime cosplay’s Victorian doll-inspired Elegant Gothic Lolita. […]

For the trope-upending Jobu K-Pop Star, Kurata lent her own Jeremy Scott neon floral teddy bear-sleeved cardigan while taking inspiration from the popular music genre, plus individualist Harajuku street style, featured in photographer Shoichi Aoki’s FRUiTS magazine and the work of Moroccan French designer Jean-Charles de Castelbajac.

For Jobu’s big reveal to the audience, Kurata paid homage to practical Asian matriarchs through their favored protective — and face-obscuring — visors and masks. Kurata enlisted New York-based designer Claudia Li to create the tartan cape-trench, exaggerated visor and mask. […] “For a brief second, Jobu’s an Asian grandma, wearing a gray wig and visor,” explains Kurata […]

In the finale showdown with Jobu, Evelyn not only tries to save all universes, but also her fraught relationship with Joy. The multi-colored, patterned and textured Jumbled Jobu, which Kurata hand-draped, is an audacious amalgam of Kurata’s appreciation of avant garde Commes des Garçons runways and remnants of Jobu’s myriad personas, like Bagel Universe queen’s white ruff around the calf and a silver driving glove from her dildo nunchuck-wielding luchador stint. “It embodied the confusion and helplessness that you get just being in this world, with so much information and chaos going on,” says Kurata. The yellow and red plaid speak to the Jobu-Joy crossover, while the worn-in Converse Chuck Taylor sneakers are actually Joy’s.

When AI samples images from us without permission, they’re not just taking data. They’re taking a lifetime of dedication and putting it into a program, just to spit out some amalgamation of what is supposed to mimic human expression.

up until that point, during the day lily continued to dress in masculine clothing and even attended galleries showing gottlieb’s paintings of her. which was kind of iconic. she got to stand in a room full of people who were marveling her beauty, not knowing she was right next to them. it must have been such a cute little secret for them as a couple.

here’s gerda and lilly together

not to mention that for most people there is no real “after” to a transition. especially for these trans historical figures who had to balance identity and safety at all times.

i think having a wife paint these portraits must have felt really amazing for lily. to be able to see herself through the eyes of someone who loved her. i’m very much seconding op on the getting teary eyed.

here are some of my favorite gottleib lily paintings

I wish people would stop feeding the panopticon their face-data so they can get generated artwork stolen from the artists whose paintings were plugged into the Art-Stealing-Algorithm without their consent. It’s really a terrible awful vile direction for art to be heading— both in that any art created by a mindless algorithm mashing pixels together is inherently soulless and devoid of care and intent and is guaranteed to be a generic copy of things that already exist, and also in that it threatens the lives of workers who are already overworked and underpaid.

The more time passes, the more I agree with Miyazaki when he was introduced to the concept of AI a few years ago:

The answer is dollmakers and avatar games. Hero Forge, Picrew, Doll Divine. Make a free account on Second Life or IMVU and use their character creators. Download the Sims 4 now that the base game is free. You have a lot of options, and they make great reference images if you save up to commission an artist later on. They may be limited, but are they any more limited than the AI generation process?

AI art is bad because it's art theft, not because it "has no soul" or whatever. People aren't trying to shit on your fun just for shits and giggles, or because they're trying to be elitist; people are upset because the AI is pulling from stolen art and stolen photos.

(fairly standard Imminent Drowning situation. we love to see girlbosses winning)

took it off view in 2018, with the intent to retire it for good. all merch depicting the painting was also removed from the gift shop

then-curator Clare Gannaway and collaborating artist Sonia Boyce claimed this was removal of “objectifying” artwork, citing its ~problematic~ depiction of women as femmes fatales and calling the nymphs “pubescent [ie teenage] girls-” an interpretation I personally don’t see any particular evidence for in the painting

as a staunch feminist (and, you know, a woman), I can honestly say that I have absolutely no idea who on Our Side would be offended by this painting. the whole situation rather reminds me of the Campaign For Equal Heights in Discworld:

“In fact the CEH now had to spend so much time explaining to people that they hadn’t got enough rights that they barely had any time left to fight for them.“ -Terry Pratchett, Hogfather

gods know there are plenty of battles left to wage against misogyny (for all of us, and doubly for women of color and trans women). but I’m not sure a satisfactory explanation exists for why this piece in particular should draw our ire

There are still millions of people, right now, who speak Quechua, Nahuatl, and Maya in all their dialects, and I'm just talking about the three most well-known civilizations here... there are millions of Native Americans who still speak their languages and practice their culture and beliefs alive, both thriving and struggling today.

Talking about the "Ancient Inca" or "Ancient Aztecs" makes as much sense as talking about the "Ancient Dutch" or the "Ancient Swedes", and it's another way of erasing them, saying that they just aren't around anymore just like say the Sumerians, or that they just weren't relevant to world history. They were contemporaries to modernity and they're still alive today.

define hole / is a hole a real thing? / Marco Poloni, Black Hole, from The Majorana Experiment, 2010 / Flatfields Fotografien / What We Talk About When We Talk About Holes / Dark (2017-2020) / post / Disco Elysium / Twin Peaks: The Return (2017) / Donnie Darko (2001) / Kaveh Akbar, from “The Miracle,” Pilgrim Bell / post / Weizmann Institute of Science / Mathworld / post / post / post / post / Anne Boyer, from “Woman Sitting at the Machine,” in A Handbook of Disappointed Fate / Dennis Patrick Slattery, The Wounded Body: Remembering the Markings of Flesh / The Incredulity of Saint Thomas, Caravaggio, 1601–1602 (detail) / The Incredulity of St. Thomas, Bernardo Strozzi, 1582-1644 (detail) / Don McKay, from “Twinflower,” Field Marks: The Poetry of Don McKay, intro. Méira Cook (Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2006) / thierryetherve / post / Gregory Orr, from How Beautiful the Beloved / Tomas Tranströmer, tr. by Robert Bly, from a poem titled “Track,” / Disco Elysium / Anne Carson, Economy of the Unlost / Pathologic 2 / Disco Elysium / Carl Phillips, from “Givingly”, Wild is the Wind / post / The Juniper Tree (Nietzchka Keene | 1990) / John Banville, Eclipse / Twin Peaks / Disco Elysium / VectorStock / True Detective / Night in the Woods