With all the mainstream news outlets presenting the “official” view of the 29th OLYMPIC GAMES in Beijing (including computer-generated fireworks and lip-synching 6-year-old body doubles), Supertouch brings you a street level look at the real haps around town from the back alleys to the 798 Arts District, you won’t see anywhere else. HAVE A LOOK: Read the rest of this entry »

Waterboarding: It’s still more fun than eating 200 Nathan’s hot dogs in 5 minutes…

As we previously reported, New York artist STEVE POWERS (aka: ESPO) has been working on a torture-themed art project for a while now and in conjunction with CREATIVE TIME as part of its national public art initiative “Democracy in America: The National Campaign,” he’s just opened the Guantanamo Bay-themed “Waterboard Thrill Ride” on Coney Island in the shadow of the legendary Cyclone roller coaster and Nathan’s hot dog stand in an empty storefront on West 12th Street. When a dollar is fed into a machine standing outside Powers’ mock jail cell installation featuring paintings by the artist inside and out, viewers can climb a short flight of steps to peer through cell bars and view an animatronic torture scene of a hooded jailer pouring water down the throat of an orange jumpsuit wearing Gitmo detainee. In creating the exhibit, Powers hopes to use the inherent spectacle of Coney Island to broaden public awareness of and spark debate about a human rights issue that has received minimal weight in the public sphere. Says John Sifton of Human Rights Watch, “In the process of waterboarding, a person believes they are being killed, and as such, it really amounts to a mock execution, which is illegal under international law.” As host of the project, Creative Time president and artistic director Anne Pasternak explains, “Humor has long been a strategy for speaking the unspeakable, and it is vital that we as a nation begin a dialogue about the implications of waterboarding. There has been a critical shift in American ideology, where previously it was unthinkable that the United States would condone the practice of torture.” Powers himself puts it more ironically: “It’s about time that this uniquely American ritual of intense water horror, a practice long reserved for New England witches and Al-Qaida brass, was made available to the people. This project will give some everyday New Yorkers the chance to experience—for a few brief, bone-chilling seconds—all the thrills of being a prisoner under interrogation at Guantanamo Bay. And the installation is fun for the whole family.” In mid-August, Powers will produce a private performance in an undisclosed location in Coney Island, wherein he and several lawyers will volunteer to be waterboarded by a trained professional. “Is waterboarding torture? No, say the administration and the courts. Yes, say human rights activists,” Powers says. “Now actual waterboard riders will reveal, in their own words, exactly what a taste of death by water feels like.” Meanwhile, the exhibit will remain on public view until late August when the show is reinstalled in the Democracy in America Convergence Center at the Park Avenue Armory from September 21 to 27. HAVE A LOOK: Read the rest of this entry »

The Independents Show on vimeo from Beautiful Losers

Bringing the low-fi art world of BEAUTIFUL LOSERS to the big screen with a full-length documentary on the movement is director and Losers mastermind AARON ROSE, who will debut the film in NYC this Friday, August 8th (aka: 08.08.08) at the IFC CENTER (see screening times below). Presented by NIKE SPORTSWEAR, the film chronicles the lives and creative process of artists including Shepard Fairey, Margaret Kilgallen, Mike Mills, Barry McGee, Jo Jackson, Chris Johanson, Harmony Korine, Stephen Powers, Geoff McFetridge, Thomas Campbell and Ed Templeton, among others, whose DIY attitudes informed the aesthetics and ethos of their generation. To celebrate the film’s release, Nike Sportswear is presenting a series of “MAKE SOMETHING!” youth mentorship workshops in NYC, LA, and San Francisco that will invite local children to participate in creative workshops such as sign painting, photography, skateboard graphic design, toy design, filmmaking, tattoo art, footwear design and zine making taught by featured Beautiful Losers artists including Barry McGee, Ed Templeton, Tobin Yelland, Eric Elms, Geoff McFetridge, Shepard Fairey, Mike Mills, Todd James, Cheryl Dunn, KAWS, Mr. Cartoon and Aaron Rose. The work created in each location will form a continually evolving exhibition, which will be open to the public to view. To further commemorate the film’s release, Nike’s Sportswear’s JESSE LEYVA has also created a series of 22 Beautiful Losers Dunks emblazoned with iconic stills from the movie using the company’s new high-resolution digital printing process. Says Aaron Rose of the project, “We went back to the documentary and pulled frame stills of what we felt were key moments in the narrative. We used these moments to tell the Beautiful Losers story using the shoes as a medium, with the end result being a collection of works of art.” Viewed together, the shoes reflect the overall narrative of the film, and after being exhibited at the NYC and LA “Make Something!” workshops, two sets of the shoes will be auctioned off with proceeds donated to the Children’s Aid Society. HAVE A LOOK: Read the rest of this entry »

Ah, the rebellious vigor of Norweigan Viking youth…

For those scratching their heads at the sight of the following images, in the last two decades a bizarre and violent musical subculture called Black Metal has emerged in Norway. It has its roots in a heady blend of splatter movies, heavy metal music, Satanism, Pagan mythology and adolescent angst. In the early-mid 1990’s, members of this extremist underground committed murder, burned down medieval wooden churches, and desecrated graveyards. What started as juvenile frenzy came to symbolize the start of a war against Christianity, a return to the worship of the ancient Norse gods, and the complete rejection of mainstream society. American documentary photographer PETER BESTE has spent the last eight years working in the milieu of this insulated and secretive community. Beste’s access and insight has been absolutely without precedent, resulting in an amazing photographic journey as he earned the respect and trust of this impenetrable, suspicious and often elitist community. With each visit Beste saw more, photographed more and eventually accumulated enough material for his new book “True Norwegian Black Metal,” ($60, Vice Books) a stunning visual testimonial to this subculture. In it, Beste and editor Johan Kugelberg have created a unique photographic narrative that explores black metal from a truly visceral perspective that offers an in-depth look at the amazingly-named key players and bands in the scene including Nocturno Culto and Fenriz of Darkthrone, Necrobutcher, Hellhammer, Blasphemer, and Maniac of Mayhem, Samoth of Emperor, Frost of Satryicon, Enslaved, Abbath of Immortal, Gaahl, Infernus, King, and Kvitrafn of Gorgoroth, Nattefrost of Carpathian Forest, 1349, Dimmu Borgir, Ildjarn, Aura Noir, and many more. Fas can keep their eyes peeled for shows of Beste’s black metal photos in Exhibitions in London, Stockholm, Oslo, Berlin, Los Angeles through 2009. HAVE A LOOK: Read the rest of this entry »

The world is David Byrne’s instrument…

Talking Heads founder DAVID BYRNE has had one of the most varied and original careers in rock, constantly vacillating between the worlds of music and visual art with rare grace. Throwing yet another curveball through the rarified air of NYC’s art world, Byrne presents music as art in “Playing the Building,” his new CREATIVE TIME-sponsored 9,000-square-foot, interactive, site-specific installation that transforms the interior of the landmark Battery Maritime Building in Lower Manhattan into a massive sound sculpture that all visitors are invited to sit and “play.” Consisting of a retrofitted antique organ placed in the center of the building’s cavernous second-floor gallery that controls a series of devices attached to its structural features—metal beams, plumbing, electrical conduits, and heating and water pipes—these machines vibrate, strike, and blow across the building’s elements, triggering unique harmonics and producing finely tuned sounds. Open to the public through August 24th, it’s definitely an experience that must be had firsthand to believe. Shedding some light on the methods to the artist’s madness is the show’s curator, ANNE PASTERNAK, who talks at length with Byrne in the following interview. READ ON: Read the rest of this entry »

Expecting mass attendance, Jeffrey Deitch hired a crack security team…

The two-headed Brasilian art phenomenon that is OS GEMEOS (Portuguese for “The Twins“) brought their fantastic art circus to NYC when their phenomenal show of new work “Too Far Too Close” opened at DEITCH PROJECTS as the art party of the summer on Saturday nite. In it, identical 24-year-old twin brothers GUSTAVO and OTAVIO PANDOLFO have created a sprawling cityscape within superstar downtown art dealer JEFFREY DEITCH’s cavernous Wooster Street space. Mirroring their psychedelic storybook street paintings that cover the city walls of their native Sao Paulo, Os Gemeos h