I Killed My Mother (J’ai Tue Ma Mere)

I watched the phenomenal film "I Killed My Mother (J'ai Tue Ma Mere) last night. It has been made by a 21 year old Montreal filmmaker who has already won three top prizes at Cannes Film Festival as well as sold his film to tens of countries around the World.

The film was made using his savings and his contacts. It is an inspiration to me and artists who want to see their projects completed despite all odds.

Five stars! This kid will soar.

Playing here with English subtitles.

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Show Explores Internet Amateur Photography

Sexuality as a tool for change? Porn as political statement? Check it out in TORO magazine.



http://toromagazine.com/?q=node/1911

Bazgasht: A phenomenal Art Exhibition in Mississauga

I was volunteering at MOSAIC Festival in Mississauga over the weekend and came across the most fantastic Miniature Art show ever presented in North America. Works of artists from all over North America, Europe and South Asia were selected.

http://www.cre8iv80studio.com/bazgasht.asp

Some artists like Tazeen Qayyum were at the festival explaining the entire technique behind the highly labor intensive art of miniature painting. She explained how miniature art students sometimes learn how to catch a squirrel in order to pull some hair out to make the brushes. The artist drops some water on each strand of hair and the ones that curve are discarded and the ones that remain straight are kept for the brush. A feather and some quills are used to complete the head of the brush.

In order to create the flat effect on the paper, the artist must paint several layers and make the natural pigments assume and unreal and almost plastic or acrylic smoothness. All the paint pigments are made from natural dyes.

The show itself was unbelievable. Highly charged and political works were displayed in the show which helped enlighten my sense of pride in South Asian art practice.

Noam Chomsky on Media

During my research for my exam I came across this fantastic article by Noam Chomsky on the media and how news is created. The article also speaks about the creation of "propaganda" and how Hitler learned from the U.S.

Here is an excerpt:

The first World War was the first time there was highly organized state propaganda. The British had a Ministry of Information, and they really needed it because they had to get the U.S. into the war or else they were in bad trouble. The Ministry of Information was mainly geared to sending propaganda, including huge fabrications about "Hun" atrocities, and so on. They were targeting American intellectuals on the reasonable assumption that these are the people who are most gullible and most likely to believe propaganda. They are also the ones that disseminate it through their own system. So it was mostly geared to American intellectuals and it worked very well. The British Ministry of Information documents (a lot have been released) show their goal was, as they put it, to control the thought of the entire world, a minor goal, but mainly the U.S. They didn’t care much what people thought in India. This Ministry of Information was extremely successful in deluding hot shot American intellectuals into accepting British propaganda fabrications. They were very proud of that. Properly so, it saved their lives. They would have lost the first World War otherwise.

In the U.S., there was a counterpart. Woodrow Wilson was elected in 1916 on an anti-war platform. The U.S. was a very pacifist country. It has always been. People don’t want to go fight foreign wars. The country was very much opposed to the first World War and Wilson was, in fact, elected on an anti-war position. "Peace without victory" was the slogan. But he was intending to go to war. So the question was, how do you get the pacifist population to become raving anti-German lunatics so they want to go kill all the Germans? That requires propaganda. So they set up the first and really only major state propaganda agency in U.S. history. The Committee on Public Information it was called (nice Orwellian title), called also the Creel Commission. The guy who ran it was named Creel. The task of this commission was to propagandize the population into a jingoist hysteria. It worked incredibly well. Within a few months there was a raving war hysteria and the U.S. was able to go to war.

http://www.zmag.org/zmag/viewArticle/12757

Critical Media Literacy in times of War

http://www.ncr.vt.edu/mediaproject/home.htm

Gordon Lightfoot's music

Giving Colonization a make-over

My favorite new person is New York based interdisciplinary artist Coco Fusco. Check out her profile on thing.net. It is just incredible.
Stay tuned for my article on her work in collaboration with Mexican artist Guillermo Gomez-Pena.

http://www.thing.net/~cocofusco/

Call for Submissions of YOUR work!

Great Wall of Brooklyn

www.greatwallofbrooklyn.org

Carl's work

"Home Project" trailer

Brazillian Reverse Graffiti Artist

Art and Neoliberalism

The Raza Group’s “Art for love and freedom”.


As much as I am enjoying going back to school after years and my new Visual and Performing Arts in Canada course, I have to say that the guest speakers so far have been disappointing.

Our professor is Dr. Craig Morrison of the Concordia University music department. His lectures are thought provoking and quite inspirational. When I tell friends that have taken the course previously how much I am enjoying it, I am told that I am lucky because they all found it to be utterly boring. I shared this with Prof. Morrison and he gave his signature smile in response.

Our guest lecturer today was a Canadian artist named Scott MacLeod; a very nice man. His early works are bold, loud, powerful and engaging (Art for Love and Freedom 1988). All the new work he showed us left something to be desired. MacLeod, a handsome white Canadian thoroughbred mentioned his interest in hockey along with some socio-political "dabbling". His trip to Mexico in the 80's left an indelible impression on him because he met artists and environments of openness and an art-celebrating culture amongst the Mexicans. Mexican mural influences imbue his work. Along with two other artists he formed a group called the "Raza Group" inspired by Mexico. MacLeod explains that "raza" means "race" in Spanish, but I still do not understand the reason for that name.

MacLeod showed slides of how he along with his Canadian Raza group members have reached out to the First Nations in B.C., the "marginalized" peoples of Newfoundland and worked on some kind of "abused" women's program. It all seemed like superficial "dabbling" into issues without any real commitment or full appreciation for them. I understood the fun of their Newfoundland visit to mining towns and the hospitality of the people. That was real and did not feel like art "tourism". Next MacLeod showed us slides of famous classical art works that his "Raza group" have copied as restaurant decor for some restaurant in Montreal. I yet again failed to understand the significance of that work. MacLeod introduced some work with a First Nations artist that will be at the opening ceremonies of the Olympics, without a mention of the overwhelming criticism of the Olympics coming from Native activists all across Canada.

I asked MacLeod about contemporary issues facing Canada such as the war in Afghanistan to which he replied that the dangerous situation in that country prevents him from going and working with school kids in Kabul. Do you have to go to Afghanistan to critique Canada's role in the war? And he never mentioned any interest in a critique of the government or the status quo for that matter. The guy didn't even so much as make fun of Harper and his "arts gala" comments. Is that the trait of an activist artist?

MacLeod also showed us his first 22 minute documentary on the fall of the Berlin wall entitled "After the war with Hannelore- A Berliner war child's testimony 1945-1982". He interviewed a woman named Hannelore who was born in the mid fourties about her life around the Berlin wall. The film started with images from the holocaust museum in Berlin. A student rightly asked what the holocaust museum had to do with the Berlin wall? His response was that "it moved him". There was great animation and composite work in the documentary no doubt, however there was also a complete lack of recognition of the "other" wall that is being built as we speak and destroying peoples lives in the same if not even bigger way. MacLeod also failed to mention "that" wall until I grilled him about it and then too his response was unenthusiastic and vague. I liked the subject he chose for his documentary but the best thing about the film was still the quote "first comes food, then morals". I pondered upon the irony of using that quote. I would use it in a film in defense of the Hezbollah, the Iraqi resistance or even the Taliban and their defense of their homeland.

I think perhaps the lecture was not properly titled. Instead of "Art and Activism" it should have been called "Art and Neo Liberalism". I questioned Prof. Morrison about his choice of neo-liberal artists for our class. He felt that this might be enough material for a first year art course. However, I disagree. In my first year at Ryerson I had the privilege of taking an amazing Philosophy course that really challenged my entire way of thinking and helped me grow. That is what university education should be all about. Challenging the mainstream and growing. Otherwise we can already get the same brain washing nonsense on TV, in the news, in magazines, in Hollywood movies. Why go to school for it?

www.macleod9.com

www.no2010.com

Art Threat competition winner

"Art Threat is pleased to announce the grand winner of its national Framing Harper portrait contest. The goal was to portray Harper’s appreciation of the arts. The 100+ submissions were hilarious, cutting and poignant. The $1000 grand prize will be awarded to Jack Dylan at an exposition of submitted works on Monday, June 1 at Montreal’s Eastern Bloc Gallery, 7240 Clark St."

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Aberaldo Morell's artwork.