The way I see it, it's not just the powerful visual at the end, but the buildup tension and release structure of the whole video that makes it so powerful. Unlike some other music videos that really hit me initially and then fade, I actually find the Rabbit in Your Headlines holds up under repeated viewings quite nicely.
But I'm also a big DJ Shadow fan, so....
Yeah, I agree with the flex comment (see for yourself here) [YouTube]. Also, any mention of Jonathan Glazer should include a link to my all time favorite music video [YouTube].
AS, I'm in a similar position and am dealing with similar questions. I graduated a little over a year ago with a BA in Art (painting), and have been struggling to justify my existence as an artist. It's probably worse in the visual arts than in any other field: painting/drawing/prints/etc have gotten absurdly over-priced, and most of the work ends up snatched up by hedge-fund billionaires and hollywood mavens. Maybe .001% of the population ever sees the art shown in Chelsea galleries, and only the tiniest fraction of those can afford it. How can I in good conscience push myself into a field that is simultaneously increasinly materialistic and increasingly irrelevant?
Well, for one, I love it. I spent last year working for an Americorps program in Philadelphia, and I was miserable. And because I hated it, I was also extremely bad at my job. I made it through the year, but only barely, and I felt proud of almost nothing I'd accomplished (well, quite frankly, I felt I accomplished almost nothing).
But then, at the beginning of this year, I got myself some studio space, and started drawing again. And pretty soon after, I was able to say to myself, "this feels right. This is what I should be doing right now." And because of that, and probably that fact alone, I'm a MUCH better artist than I was activist. And I still ask myself those questions every day: how is this relevant? Does your work help people? Can you justify doing this? I don't have any answers, I don't expect to get any soon. Right now, I'm just concentrating on making my work as good as I can - and I'm confident that as long as I keep asking those questions, some things will start to work themselves out.
But it should be even easier in design - you may not have the level of creative control that you'd like, but you CAN have a direct, positive influence on the world around you. Design for Social Impact is a Philadelphia-based company that provides low-cost web/graphic/print design for non-profits, arts organizations, NGOs, and other do-gooders who need the design abilities but can't afford super-high desing prices. They do great work, and provide these organizations with the kind of visibility that comes with great design. Could you think of an equivalent use for Industrial Design? Is there a company out there doing it already?
There are some fields that provide public services that may intersect slightly with your industrial design training, as well. What about civil engineering? Once again, not the most creative field, but you'd probably get a lot more satisfaction out of, say, building a bridge, than from building a high end light-fixture.
Or what about Architecture, as someone already suggested? There's certainly a commodity aspect to building structures, but you're also designing people's space, which has an immense effect on their psyche and the way they live their lives. There's also plenty of room for exploration in terms of the relationship between architecture and sustainable living (such as places like Arconsanti). Be warned, low-level architects are basically slaves, but it has potential to grow to an incredibly satisfying (and potentially world-altering) occupation.
Oy, I rambled a lot - hope you can find something useful in there. In any event, I wish you luck. These are hard questions, but you should be proud you're asking them. It's too easy to settle in complacency.
Also, in response to Wurwilf - the playlists/tracklists of everyone in my group from the last exchange can be found here. A pretty eclectic mix - I'm really glad I participated.
Just out of curiousity, what's the general time frame for this swap? I rather enjoyed the last one, and would like to participate again - but I might not be around when the swapping goes down. Do we have a schedule set?
Throwing some more self-promotion into the mix - I have a little bit of animation experience, and a fair amount of drawing/painting, though not much illustration. Browse my website in my profile, and drop me an email if interested - I'm looking for a side project or two to take on for next year (since I'll be out of school). My most recent work is unfortunately not online yet, but it gives you an idea of what my stuff looks like.
1) I guess I'm pretty much Lefty McLefterson. I have a few particular pet issues, such as the environment and our woefully inadequate education system. Putting my money where my mouth is - going to teach next year.
2) My views are somewhere along the lines of Buddhism meets Nietzsche. I don't really think of it as an issue of god/not-god - such things are unknowable and therefore irrelevant (I have the same feeling about the whole free will debate). I believe total Truth (with a capital T) is unknowable - but that we keep getting closer and closer (usually by ruling our wrong answers, rather than getting right ones). This is true of all forms knowledge - be it science, spirituality, art, morality, or anything else. To limit yourself solely to one perspective isn't to find the right answer, it's to deny you although the other mostly-wrong ones. Just cause we'll never get all the way there is no reason not to keep searching/acquiring. But hey, all of this is probably mostly wrong, too.
Also, I don't believe in agnostics.
3) Still a college student, so not only do i not have an income, I'm still subsidized by my parents. Will be a poor Not-for-Profit employed teacher next year, though. Plan on being an even poorer artist after that.
During the summers when I was younger, I used to go to a soccer camp in my area. During lunch breaks we'd go watch films of great soccer moments and stuff like that - mostly it was clips from various World Cups. However, one day we were watching this video of Pele juggling - it was amazing, just like the ball was an extension of his body. The part that really sticks in my head was when he kicked away the ball and someone tossed him an orange, and he kept juggling with it without missing a beat. I wish I could find that clip.
All that said, I think Adbusters as a publication has some serious problems. Their heart is in the right place, but they have a habit of spewing vitrol without giving any evidence to back up their claims. Kind of like what I just did, except I'm not a widely read publication. I'm just some shmoe on the internet.
Can we do it, path? I'd say we've done a remarkably bad job. I mean, we buy Nike shoes despite them being made with sweatshop labor halfway around the world - kids being paid subistence wages or less (and in conditions that were outlawed in the US one hundred years ago). We have the meatpacking industry, arguably the worst working conditions left in the US, running full-steam ahead because we gobble down McDonalds and Burger King. Yeah, fast food is cheap (but Nike sure isn't), but advertising also plays a HUGE factor in keeping those things the way they are.
Ads DO NOT help me scope out the competition for a product - they're designed to sell stuff to me, not to give me accurate information to make informed decisions. If I wanted that kind of information, I'd look at things like consumer reports, trade journals, etc, or just rely on word of mouth. If you want to make informed decisions, you have to educate yourself - relying on ads, which too many people do, does NOT constitute education.
I'm not "anti-income" - I'm for paying directly for the things you want rather than having this bizarrely circuitous system. I mean, this is anecdotal and subjective - I don't watch HBO that much, but from what little I've seen the quality of the original programming is slightly above the rest of what's on the tube. Why? Because they have to answer directly to the subscribers.
An interesting book i read along these lines a few years back was Affluenza. Ironically, the book is based on/a follow up to a program that ran on PBS by the same name. It touches on some of these issues, as well as a few others. It's a fun read, at least.
I mean, maybe a full systematic switch would be impossible, or be even worse than what we have now. I don't know. I would LOVE to see schools start adopting media literacy programs or something of the sort - if the buyer is gonna make the best decision, they really should be able to make those decisions intelligently.
hmmm, if advertising were that innocuous, it wouldn't generate the billions of dollars worth of revenue. But I'll let someone else with more expertise on the subject deal with that one. Besides that, though, my point had less to do with the commercials and more to do with the fact that the advertisers end up controling the content, not the viewers. You don't vote with your wallet like you do with some other forms of media (newspapers and magazines have advertising costs mediated with subscriptions - i mentioned radio in my above post) - so the control of the content comes from somewhere else. Amongst other problems, i just think that system produces utter crap in terms of content
But I'm not mandating what you do or don't do. Watch away.
I'm hesitant to jump into the fray here, but I think there's a few things that have gone unsaid that are worth mentioning. I've personally given up TV - I try not to get on my high horse about it, lord knows I waste enough time on the internet. However, I think that there is one thing that separates TV from a lot of other media, and that is who is paying for it. With the exception of PBS and those premium channels like HBO, etc, TV stations get the majority of their funds from advertising. The more I think about it, the more ridiculous it seems to me that it is a system totally driven by people trying to sell us shit. Is it any wonder that the major news channels are all going conservative? It's businesses that's bankrolling them, through advertising - and he who has the buck determines the content. Yeah, there's the Nielson ratings and all, but when it comes down to it it's the advertising dollars that are the bottom line.
I think that this is the core behind the Adbuster's campaign, too. Adbuster's is an anti-capitalist/anti-consumer-society publication, and I think that's what they're trying to call attention to with their TV Turnoff Week. No, TV doesn't cause all the worlds problems, but the system of which it is an extension certainly contributes to a lot of them.
I mean, all of the above could also be said about radio, but then again, the only radio I listen to is NPR. It's easy for me, though - I'm enough of a pretentious asshole that watching too much TV makes me want to jump out a window, anyway.
I have a friend who used to go by the handle goatripster. He's a big trance fan, so it was meant to be read as Goa Tripster. I think he stopped using it when everyone was reading it as Goat Ripster, though.
Jb- I am so down. Have you been to Best Video in Hamden? I think they literally have every Kurasawa film. It's pretty insane. But I own Rashomon, Ran, and Seven Samurai on dvd, which would be a pretty good jumping off point. Drop me an email, maybe we can fit something into my always ridiculously busy schedule.
Oh man, I am so down for this. Until we get a forum going, here's what I've got that I'd be willing to trade:
Gamecube: Smash Brothers Melee and Metroid Prime
PC: Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind and Total Annhilation
PSX: Dragon Warrior VII
All of the games have the original manuals. Mostly looking for PC or Gamecube games. In particular, Half-Life 2. Oh, and I'm in the US of A.
shotsy, I also don't think I got the email. I'll double check to see if I accidentally deleted it, but if not it hasn't shown up yet. I can figure it out when the board is working again, though.
The way I see it, it's not just the powerful visual at the end, but the buildup tension and release structure of the whole video that makes it so powerful. Unlike some other music videos that really hit me initially and then fade, I actually find the Rabbit in Your Headlines holds up under repeated viewings quite nicely. But I'm also a big DJ Shadow fan, so....
posted by TheRoach 17 years ago
Yeah, I agree with the flex comment (see for yourself here) [YouTube]. Also, any mention of Jonathan Glazer should include a link to my all time favorite music video [YouTube].
posted by TheRoach 17 years ago
In "Curious George: What should I do in life?"
AS, I'm in a similar position and am dealing with similar questions. I graduated a little over a year ago with a BA in Art (painting), and have been struggling to justify my existence as an artist. It's probably worse in the visual arts than in any other field: painting/drawing/prints/etc have gotten absurdly over-priced, and most of the work ends up snatched up by hedge-fund billionaires and hollywood mavens. Maybe .001% of the population ever sees the art shown in Chelsea galleries, and only the tiniest fraction of those can afford it. How can I in good conscience push myself into a field that is simultaneously increasinly materialistic and increasingly irrelevant? Well, for one, I love it. I spent last year working for an Americorps program in Philadelphia, and I was miserable. And because I hated it, I was also extremely bad at my job. I made it through the year, but only barely, and I felt proud of almost nothing I'd accomplished (well, quite frankly, I felt I accomplished almost nothing). But then, at the beginning of this year, I got myself some studio space, and started drawing again. And pretty soon after, I was able to say to myself, "this feels right. This is what I should be doing right now." And because of that, and probably that fact alone, I'm a MUCH better artist than I was activist. And I still ask myself those questions every day: how is this relevant? Does your work help people? Can you justify doing this? I don't have any answers, I don't expect to get any soon. Right now, I'm just concentrating on making my work as good as I can - and I'm confident that as long as I keep asking those questions, some things will start to work themselves out. But it should be even easier in design - you may not have the level of creative control that you'd like, but you CAN have a direct, positive influence on the world around you. Design for Social Impact is a Philadelphia-based company that provides low-cost web/graphic/print design for non-profits, arts organizations, NGOs, and other do-gooders who need the design abilities but can't afford super-high desing prices. They do great work, and provide these organizations with the kind of visibility that comes with great design. Could you think of an equivalent use for Industrial Design? Is there a company out there doing it already? There are some fields that provide public services that may intersect slightly with your industrial design training, as well. What about civil engineering? Once again, not the most creative field, but you'd probably get a lot more satisfaction out of, say, building a bridge, than from building a high end light-fixture. Or what about Architecture, as someone already suggested? There's certainly a commodity aspect to building structures, but you're also designing people's space, which has an immense effect on their psyche and the way they live their lives. There's also plenty of room for exploration in terms of the relationship between architecture and sustainable living (such as places like Arconsanti). Be warned, low-level architects are basically slaves, but it has potential to grow to an incredibly satisfying (and potentially world-altering) occupation. Oy, I rambled a lot - hope you can find something useful in there. In any event, I wish you luck. These are hard questions, but you should be proud you're asking them. It's too easy to settle in complacency.
posted by TheRoach 17 years ago
In "MoFi CD Swap 4!"
Also, in response to Wurwilf - the playlists/tracklists of everyone in my group from the last exchange can be found here. A pretty eclectic mix - I'm really glad I participated.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
Well, since I brought it up - I can do it up till the end of May. After that, I'm out.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
Just out of curiousity, what's the general time frame for this swap? I rather enjoyed the last one, and would like to participate again - but I might not be around when the swapping goes down. Do we have a schedule set?
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "<b>Curious George: Finding An Artist</b>"
Throwing some more self-promotion into the mix - I have a little bit of animation experience, and a fair amount of drawing/painting, though not much illustration. Browse my website in my profile, and drop me an email if interested - I'm looking for a side project or two to take on for next year (since I'll be out of school). My most recent work is unfortunately not online yet, but it gives you an idea of what my stuff looks like.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "Curious George: Tactlessness"
1) I guess I'm pretty much Lefty McLefterson. I have a few particular pet issues, such as the environment and our woefully inadequate education system. Putting my money where my mouth is - going to teach next year. 2) My views are somewhere along the lines of Buddhism meets Nietzsche. I don't really think of it as an issue of god/not-god - such things are unknowable and therefore irrelevant (I have the same feeling about the whole free will debate). I believe total Truth (with a capital T) is unknowable - but that we keep getting closer and closer (usually by ruling our wrong answers, rather than getting right ones). This is true of all forms knowledge - be it science, spirituality, art, morality, or anything else. To limit yourself solely to one perspective isn't to find the right answer, it's to deny you although the other mostly-wrong ones. Just cause we'll never get all the way there is no reason not to keep searching/acquiring. But hey, all of this is probably mostly wrong, too. Also, I don't believe in agnostics. 3) Still a college student, so not only do i not have an income, I'm still subsidized by my parents. Will be a poor Not-for-Profit employed teacher next year, though. Plan on being an even poorer artist after that.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "R.I.P. Mitch Hedberg"
Complete and utter shock. .
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "Mr. Woo juggles a soccer ball."
During the summers when I was younger, I used to go to a soccer camp in my area. During lunch breaks we'd go watch films of great soccer moments and stuff like that - mostly it was clips from various World Cups. However, one day we were watching this video of Pele juggling - it was amazing, just like the ball was an extension of his body. The part that really sticks in my head was when he kicked away the ball and someone tossed him an orange, and he kept juggling with it without missing a beat. I wish I could find that clip.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "TV Turnoff Week"
All that said, I think Adbusters as a publication has some serious problems. Their heart is in the right place, but they have a habit of spewing vitrol without giving any evidence to back up their claims. Kind of like what I just did, except I'm not a widely read publication. I'm just some shmoe on the internet.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
Can we do it, path? I'd say we've done a remarkably bad job. I mean, we buy Nike shoes despite them being made with sweatshop labor halfway around the world - kids being paid subistence wages or less (and in conditions that were outlawed in the US one hundred years ago). We have the meatpacking industry, arguably the worst working conditions left in the US, running full-steam ahead because we gobble down McDonalds and Burger King. Yeah, fast food is cheap (but Nike sure isn't), but advertising also plays a HUGE factor in keeping those things the way they are. Ads DO NOT help me scope out the competition for a product - they're designed to sell stuff to me, not to give me accurate information to make informed decisions. If I wanted that kind of information, I'd look at things like consumer reports, trade journals, etc, or just rely on word of mouth. If you want to make informed decisions, you have to educate yourself - relying on ads, which too many people do, does NOT constitute education. I'm not "anti-income" - I'm for paying directly for the things you want rather than having this bizarrely circuitous system. I mean, this is anecdotal and subjective - I don't watch HBO that much, but from what little I've seen the quality of the original programming is slightly above the rest of what's on the tube. Why? Because they have to answer directly to the subscribers. An interesting book i read along these lines a few years back was Affluenza. Ironically, the book is based on/a follow up to a program that ran on PBS by the same name. It touches on some of these issues, as well as a few others. It's a fun read, at least. I mean, maybe a full systematic switch would be impossible, or be even worse than what we have now. I don't know. I would LOVE to see schools start adopting media literacy programs or something of the sort - if the buyer is gonna make the best decision, they really should be able to make those decisions intelligently.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
hmmm, if advertising were that innocuous, it wouldn't generate the billions of dollars worth of revenue. But I'll let someone else with more expertise on the subject deal with that one. Besides that, though, my point had less to do with the commercials and more to do with the fact that the advertisers end up controling the content, not the viewers. You don't vote with your wallet like you do with some other forms of media (newspapers and magazines have advertising costs mediated with subscriptions - i mentioned radio in my above post) - so the control of the content comes from somewhere else. Amongst other problems, i just think that system produces utter crap in terms of content But I'm not mandating what you do or don't do. Watch away.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
I'm hesitant to jump into the fray here, but I think there's a few things that have gone unsaid that are worth mentioning. I've personally given up TV - I try not to get on my high horse about it, lord knows I waste enough time on the internet. However, I think that there is one thing that separates TV from a lot of other media, and that is who is paying for it. With the exception of PBS and those premium channels like HBO, etc, TV stations get the majority of their funds from advertising. The more I think about it, the more ridiculous it seems to me that it is a system totally driven by people trying to sell us shit. Is it any wonder that the major news channels are all going conservative? It's businesses that's bankrolling them, through advertising - and he who has the buck determines the content. Yeah, there's the Nielson ratings and all, but when it comes down to it it's the advertising dollars that are the bottom line. I think that this is the core behind the Adbuster's campaign, too. Adbuster's is an anti-capitalist/anti-consumer-society publication, and I think that's what they're trying to call attention to with their TV Turnoff Week. No, TV doesn't cause all the worlds problems, but the system of which it is an extension certainly contributes to a lot of them. I mean, all of the above could also be said about radio, but then again, the only radio I listen to is NPR. It's easy for me, though - I'm enough of a pretentious asshole that watching too much TV makes me want to jump out a window, anyway.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "MoFi/MeFi Meetup in Philly!"
Damn, I'll be moving to philly at the end of the summer, so we'll have to do another round next fall.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "Schwarzenegger wants to ban junk foods in schools."
I have a friend who used to go by the handle goatripster. He's a big trance fan, so it was meant to be read as Goa Tripster. I think he stopped using it when everyone was reading it as Goat Ripster, though.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "Japanese Movie Posters for each of Akira Kurosawa's films."
Jb- I am so down. Have you been to Best Video in Hamden? I think they literally have every Kurasawa film. It's pretty insane. But I own Rashomon, Ran, and Seven Samurai on dvd, which would be a pretty good jumping off point. Drop me an email, maybe we can fit something into my always ridiculously busy schedule.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "Curious George: GAMESWAP"
Oh man, I am so down for this. Until we get a forum going, here's what I've got that I'd be willing to trade: Gamecube: Smash Brothers Melee and Metroid Prime PC: Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind and Total Annhilation PSX: Dragon Warrior VII All of the games have the original manuals. Mostly looking for PC or Gamecube games. In particular, Half-Life 2. Oh, and I'm in the US of A.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
In "MonkeyFilter CD SWap III"
got the resend, thanks
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
shotsy, I also don't think I got the email. I'll double check to see if I accidentally deleted it, but if not it hasn't shown up yet. I can figure it out when the board is working again, though.
posted by TheRoach 19 years ago
(limited to the most recent 20 comments)