Did you know Canada has something called the Juno awards, for musical Canadians, and Celine Dion is contractually guaranteed at least four every year? Did you know Canadians can't vote for Barack Obama, but a Cannuck named Esthero snuck across the border into the Obama Yes We Can video to corrupt our Election of Freedom? It's all true! Also, Canadian Ellen Page starred in the movie Juno, and is on the cover of Entertainment Weekly and everything, and the Canadian Perez is very, very excited. Finally, Taylor has managed to get interesting pictures of otherwise boring Canadians, like Grudge and Batman star called "Edison Chen," hanging out with a friend in the thumb up top and in the original IsThisHappening item, which links to uncensored original, here.
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Source: CNN.com - Entertainment | 6 Feb 2008 | 4:06 am
Rebecca De Mornay gets probation for DUI
Read full story for latest details.Source: CNN.com - Entertainment | 6 Feb 2008 | 3:09 am
Oscars Strike Out with Vanity Fair
Global warming may have gotten Hollywood revved up last year, but it's the chilly shadow cast by the writers' strike that has stars rethinking whether to venture outside in 2008.
Vanity...Source: E! Online - Top Stories | 6 Feb 2008 | 2:48 am
Restraining order against Spears manager
Read full story for latest details.I'm a reasonable chap, and I'd be willing to meet the Islamists halfway on a lot of the peripheral stuff like burqas for women, nuking the Zionists, beheading the sodomites and whatnot. But you'll have to pry "Baby, It's Cold Outside" from my cold dead hands and my dancing naked legs. A world without Frank Loesser and "Baby, It's Cold Outside" would be very cold indeed.
Fuller context:
Frank Loesser isn't as famous a songwriter as Irving Berlin or Cole Porter, but, unlike them, he's apparently responsible for this whole clash-of- civilizations thing. A few decades back, a young middle-class Egyptian spending some time in the U.S. had the misfortune to be invited to a dance one weekend and was horrified at what he witnessed:
"The room convulsed with the feverish music from the gramophone. Dancing naked legs filled the hall, arms draped around the waists, chests met chests, lips met lips . . ."
Where was this den of debauchery? Studio 54 in the 1970s? Haight-Ashbury in the summer of love? No, the throbbing pulsating sewer of sin was Greeley, Colo., in 1949. As it happens, Greeley, Colo., in 1949 was a dry town. The dance was a church social. And the feverish music was "Baby, It's Cold Outside," written by Frank Loesser and sung by Esther Williams and Ricardo Montalban in the film "Neptune's Daughter." Revolted by the experience, Sayyid Qutb decided that America (and modernity in general) was an abomination, returned to Egypt, became the leading intellectual muscle in the Muslim Brotherhood, and set off a chain that led from Qutb to Zawahiri to bin Laden to the Hindu Kush to the Balkans to 9/11.
I'm a reasonable chap, and I'd be willing to meet the Islamists halfway on a lot of the peripheral stuff like burqas for women, nuking the Zionists, beheading the sodomites and whatnot. But you'll have to pry "Baby, It's Cold Outside" from my cold dead hands and my dancing naked legs. A world without Frank Loesser and "Baby, It's Cold Outside" would be very cold indeed.
Loesser isn't a household name, but he wrote household songs ("Two Sleepy People," "Heart and Soul") and household shows ("Guys and Dolls," "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying"). Had he enjoyed a typical American life-span....
[Wall Street Journal, Mark Steyn]
The motivation for this selfless act of advocacy? After the jump, listen as many times as you like!
Right now, Digg's front page includes election news, iPhone tips, clips from last night's Conan O'Brien, a video of a panda, and the story of a drunk driver who put a seat-belt on her beer and not her baby. Art is presented the same way: One story at a time, usually focusing on a single work, surrounded by unrelated items.
This format has encouraged five aspects of the Diggbrow aesthetic:
The Lowest Common Denominator
Most of Digg's favorite items are, well, crap. The all-time top Digg item described as "art" is just a composite photo of a tree:
It's pretty, but it's more "cute photo illustration" than "high art." Still, over five thousand Digg users voted for the item (headlined as "1 Tree, 1 Picture, 4 Seasons. (Pic)" and described only as "A beautiful piece of art work"), and over 240 thousand people saw it on Flickr.
The second-favorite artwork is a gallery of desktop backgrounds. The third-favorite is this custom-painted Lamborghini:
This barely even works as a paint job, much less art. And Digg commenters hated it. But 3800 of them still voted for it, driving tens of thousands of people to look at it.
So far, Digg fails at appreciating and promoting art. But the fourth all-time favorite art on Digg, while nowhere near highbrow, at least demonstrates an artist's attention to craft and an appreciation of artistic tradition. It's the work of three sidewalk chalk artists, Edgar Mueller, Julian Beever, and Kurt Wenner. Wenner particularly seems to transcend the medium's trompe l'oeil novelty:
Accessibility and Novelty
Of course, those are just the crowd-pleasers. Plenty of worthier art gets onto Digg. But just like Clinton makes it to Digg news not for her fiscal policy but for crying, art gets onto Digg not for its value to traders and artists but for novelty reasons. A recent link featured this YouTube video of a sculpture that makes eerie noises in the wind:
It's not that Digg rejects the traditional measures of good art, but it focuses on the novel bits. Duchamp could make it here if an author focused on the "he put a toilet in a museum" aspect. Art stories from online newspapers come from the "offbeat" section of the news as often as "Arts and culture." The work must have an immediately catchy effect, as above, or a "what'll they think of next" quality in its creation, like the photo-realistic drawing below, composed freehand in ballpoint pen:
Artist Juan Casas told the Daily Mail that his ballpoint drawings "started off as a joke," and though he's now serious about them, he worried that serious art competitions would write him off.
Post-post-modernism
The Diggbrow crowd also appreciates a good prank. Art with a populist, ironic meaning has an advantage, which helps post-modern artists with stunt-like work.
This playful recontextualization of Damien Hirst's "For The Love Of God" made Digg as "Prank on Artist Who Created $100 Million Diamond Skull." Diggers appreciated the turnaround and criticized Hirst's work.
Among household-name artists, the most obvious Diggbrow hero is Banksy, who, while lacking nuance and arguably not worthy of canonization under traditional terms, is still a Digg favorite for his lucid messages and his reputation as a renegade. This street cred puts his work on the same scale as the Lamborghini art and "Hammer time" stickers on stop signs, though at the opposite end.
Personal expression
Diggbrow has a low barrier to entry; while some works earn their place in its canon because they represent hundreds of hours of labor, others make it despite minimal effort because of their novel concept. One encouraging aspect of that thirst for novelty is how Diggbrow appreciates the artistic value of personal expression.
At first, the work below (linked on Digg at one of the site's favorite sources, Neatorama) might seem worthless: some kid drew on herself. But here Diggbrow shows an unexpected appreciation for the context of the work, showing that sometimes these kids can actually read a paragraph instead of flicking through an image gallery.
Artist Ariana Page Russell explains:
My own skin frequently blushes and swells. I have dermatographia, a condition in which one's immune system exhibits hypersensitivity, via skin, that releases excessive amounts of histamine, causing capillaries to dilate and welts to appear (lasting about thirty minutes) when the skin's surface is lightly scratched. This allows me to painlessly draw patterns and words on my skin, which I then photograph.
Diggers might even click through to Russell's web site, which shows she's not just screwing around but an artist whose work ranges far beyond these skin drawings.
If Digg readers can follow stories past the initial link, they may learn about an artist's entire body of work, its themes, the movement into which it fits, and about the tradition that gives context to every wind sculpture and skin drawing. Which leads to Diggbrow's final redemptive theme.
Piecemeal Art Education
The Internet is a tough place to learn about art. There's little structure, and there are too few high-quality images. The online galleries of major museums only carry as much explanatory information as the real-world exhibit. Serious guides to art are hard to search for.
But piece by piece, blogs are picking out art history and explaining it, so that reading enough could amount to a skim through an art textbook. One great example from Digg is this exploration of Frank Gehry's first deconstructivist building. Diggers are also particularly fascinated with scientific advances in art, such as a new device to detect painted-over paintings.
Internet culture isn't the end of art. It's not exactly a classical education, but it's instilling some artistic value in viewers. And after enough time figuring out what the hell Damien Hirst's point is, I can appreciate a little Diggbrow.
Source: E! Online - Top Stories | 5 Feb 2008 | 10:21 pm
'Fugitive's' Lt. Girard dead at 89
Read full story for latest details.Source: E! Online - Top Stories | 5 Feb 2008 | 9:18 pm
The Tragedy of Britney Spears
|
She was a pop princess. Now she's in and out of hospitals, rehab
and court. How Britney lost it all. Click here to track Britney Spears' career through a guide to all twenty-four of her videos, from "... Baby One More Time" to "Piece of Me," and click here for our comprehensive Spears photo gallery. A pop star at the mall is an eternal cause for happiness, especially on a Sunday afternoon in the Valley. One moment, shoppers in the Westfield Topanga mall are living in the real world, monotonously selecting a new shade of eye shadow or rubbing perfume on wrists, but upon the rapture of... |
Source: Rolling Stone: Features | 5 Feb 2008 | 8:58 pm
De Mornay Rocks Probation
She's not exactly guilty as sin, but Rebecca De Mornay has owned up to her risky drinking and driving.
The "Risky Business" vixen pleaded no contest Tuesday morning to driving...Source: E! Online - Top Stories | 5 Feb 2008 | 8:18 pm
Fun-loving '1234' singer has breakout year
Read full story for latest details.Source: CNN.com - Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 8:11 pm
Will Writers Strike End in Time for Oscars?
Sources say H'wood writers and studios could soon cement an agreement.Source: ABC News: Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 8:01 pm
Brandy's Mom Accuses Kardashians of Overcharging
Apparently, Brandy's mom had some trouble keeping up with the Kardashians' credit card bills.
Sonia Norwood, mother of the R&B singer, filed suit against Kim Kardashian Monday,...Source: E! Online - Top Stories | 5 Feb 2008 | 6:52 pm
One of the Berlinale Bears, the prize to be awarded at the Berlinale film festival
One of the Berlinale Bears, the prize to be awarded at Berlinale film festival, is prepared by a metal worker in Berlin. The Berlin Film Festival will start with a bang Thursday with the premiere of a...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 5 Feb 2008 | 6:33 pm
A woman reads the film festival program
A woman reads the film festival program as other film enthusiasts stand in line to buy tickets for the films to be screened during Berlinale, Berlin's film festival. The Berlin Film Festival will start...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 5 Feb 2008 | 6:33 pm
Film enthusiasts stand in line to buy tickets for the films to be screened during Berlinale
Film enthusiasts stand in line to buy tickets for the films to be screened during Berlinale, Berlin's film festival. The Berlin Film Festival will start with a bang Thursday with the premiere of a Rolling...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 5 Feb 2008 | 6:33 pm
People walk past advertisements for the Berlinale film festival
People walk past advertisements for the Berlinale film festival in a shopping center in Berlin. The Berlin Film Festival will start with a bang Thursday with the premiere of a Rolling Stones documentary...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 5 Feb 2008 | 6:33 pm
A waxworks model of German Chancellor Angela Merkel
A waxworks model of German Chancellor Angela Merkel is unveiled at Madame Tussauds Museum in central London.Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 5 Feb 2008 | 6:25 pm
Ritter's diagnosis at center of $67M lawsuit
Read full story for latest details.Source: CNN.com - Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 6:16 pm
Super Style: Barack vs. Hillary
Which of the Democratic candidates can bring fashion back to the White House?Source: ABC News: Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 5:39 pm
Sources: Writers strike may end soon
Read full story for latest details.Source: CNN.com - Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 5:03 pm
From Daddy to Diddy to Actor
Sean Combs ditches his rap roots for a starring role in "A Raisin in the Sun."Source: ABC News: Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 4:36 pm
Ledger Burial, Cause of Death Loom
Closure for the family of Heath Ledger is starting to come closer to reality.
On the expected eve of toxicology results--and with them a cause and manner of death--for the late actor, the...Source: E! Online - Top Stories | 5 Feb 2008 | 3:53 pm
Pimp C overdosed on 'syrup' ingredients
Read full story for latest details.Source: CNN.com - Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 3:52 pm
Britney Spears: The Complete Video Guide
|
Nowadays a "Britney Spears video" means shaky paparazzi footage on
a celebrity Web site — but there was a time when Spears ruled
the small screen. Here's a guide to all 24 of her official clips. " ... Baby One More Time" (1998, from ... Baby One More Time) Best Known For: Being the most iconic clip ever set in a high school. Plot: Liberated by the school bell, a Catholic-schoolgirl-clad Spears has an elaborate daydream that involves grooving in the hallway, doing back-flips outside of school and rocking out on the basketball court. Even the grumpy teacher feels the beat (sorta) by the end. Exposed Midriff?: Thanks to creative tying of her school uniform, a short pink tank... |
Source: Rolling Stone: Features | 5 Feb 2008 | 3:40 pm
Heath Ledger's Family Returns Home to Prepare for Funeral
Heath Ledger's family evaded scores of photographers Tuesday as they returned to Perth following the Oscar-nominated actor's death in a Manhattan apartment last month.Source: FOXNews.com | 5 Feb 2008 | 3:28 pm
FOX411: New Paris Movie Not So 'Hottie'
New Paris Hilton movie proves she's no actress; Vanity Fair produces Oscar shocker by calling off its annual post-Academy Award party; Billy Joel set to turn out the lights on Shea Stadium.Source: FOXNews.com | 5 Feb 2008 | 3:23 pm
Ledger's Remains Finally Return Home?
Heath Ledger's family returned to Perth, Australia to plan the actor's funeral.Source: ABC News: Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 3:21 pm
Play a foul-mouthed mother, earn fame
Read full story for latest details.Source: CNN.com - Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 3:20 pm
Willie Nelson: I Question Official Sept. 11 Story
Singer Willie Nelson told a radio show host on Monday that he doubts the official story of the Sept. 11 terror attacks in New York City.Source: FOXNews.com | 5 Feb 2008 | 2:22 pm
'General Hospital' actress dies at 49
Read full story for latest details.Source: CNN.com - Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 2:01 pm
Pop Tarts: Alba Likes Obama; Paris Confused by Primaries
Jessica Alba is a young woman whose power extends far beyond the Hollywood Hills. In fact, it goes all the way to Capitol Hill as she joins a slew of stars supporting presidential candidates.Source: FOXNews.com | 5 Feb 2008 | 2:01 pm
'General Hospital' Actress Shell Kepler Dies at 49
Actress Shell Kepler, who for years played the gossipy nurse Amy Vining on the TV soap opera "General Hospital," has died. She was 49.Source: FOXNews.com | 5 Feb 2008 | 1:51 pm
Vladimir Putin on a fishing trip
Russian President Vladimir Putin is seen here during a fishing trip in the Republic of Tuva in 2007. In a rare move, new Russian film "A Kiss -- Not For the Press" marks a fictional portrayal of the ultra-secretive...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 5 Feb 2008 | 1:24 pm
Is 'Fool's Gold' a Box Office Treasure?
The romantic comedy starring Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson opens Friday.Source: ABC News: Entertainment | 5 Feb 2008 | 1:21 pm
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