Uldus Bakhtiozina is a Russian photographer and visual artist who studied Photography at University of Arts, London, at Central Saint Martins College. She worked as a fashion and art photographer and is now back in Russia working from her own studio of visual arts.
Russ Land is a series of pictures inspired by Russian folk legends and fairy tales. Some of them remind me of stills from silent movies:
Hello my little Sugar Packets!
An arty type by the name of Sean Stubbs asked Bill and I if we fancied doing something towards a video for an arty event in London. Of course we said yes and wept and agonised for several years over our pieces. No, we were given a day to do it. So, yes, I suppose there was some weeping.
The event, if you feel so inclined to show your bright button faces, is here and the video is below. Our brief was ‘The apocalypse is coming but turns out not to be so bad after all.’ The end result is a bit Chris Morris, a bit Warp Records/Planet Mu and a bit Welcome To Night Vale, if I do say so myself.
When I get the full track list I’ll edit this post but for the time being here’s The Center Parcs Fun Time Gang episode 2:
Bill’s animation is at the 1.40 mark
My audio ‘Finding A Date After The Apocalypse Without Losing Your Skin Or Worse’ is at 13.20. Enjoy!
Morning my little plum berries! I’ve been experiencing my usual lady health difficulties this last few days so I’m afraid this will be brief, but I’d like to share the work of an artist called David B Earle.
The first, titled Dining Room or There Is Nothing, is intended to play on an endless loop and is fairly well known for appearing on ‘creepy youtube films’ lists.
His site says “This short film flips back on itself. At exactly the midway point, the film begins to run backwards, and the sound repeats itself backwards with it. The character (Lea Porsager), speaks the three words backwards as the film goes forwards, so that they can be deciphered at the end of the film when they are played backwards.
When looped, there is no actual beginning or end, and no real sense of where the beginning and end actually are.
This piece was inspired by a personal paradoxical desire for empirical proof that there is nothing on the ‘other’ side of life.
I wanted to blur the distinction between the two states, and to state the paradox by showing someone who is coming back from life (or death), and denies its existence, thereby fulfilling the paradox.”
This one, probably a glimpse into my future, is called Deleted Scene (From An Imaginary Film):
This one, probably my favourite, was uploaded only 7 months ago, Getting Off:
Surely not? You say. Such a thing is impossible. I’ll leave you to judge. Can a book composed entirely of animated gifs really have a cohesive structure? Well…no. Is it scary? Only you can say. Some of them are very graphic and disturbing to look at, sure. Some of them are also very silly. However it’s probably the thought that counts, and the idea is definitely an intriguing one.
Here’s an interview with the author Dennis Cooper, and here’s the site for you to download it free and see for yourself. Warning: As I said, some of the images are ooky.
Merry Spring! Tis the time for daffodils, blue skies and wildly raging hormones. But wait, get that poor nude fellow down from the Wicker Man, you can burn him later. First on the agenda is a new pile of extremely odd books.
1. The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington. One of the surrealist crowd and lover of Max Ernst, Leonora’s life seems as bizarre as any of her work. The book itself is intriguing and oddly refreshing – the main characters are all women in their 90s, an age group usually included in fiction to generate sympathy or to hilariously utter a swear word at the wrong moment. However these are real characters featured among the increasingly bizarre carryings on.
2. People With Holes by Heather Fowler. The nominal first story in this collection made my brain crackle, which is my way of saying I found the thoughts it induced exciting. I will say there were perhaps one too many ‘people turning into animal’ stories but that’s my own opinion obviously, and there are plenty of other varieties of story. For any fans of magic realism or anything a bit different this is for you, and the way she writes pulled me right in.
3. A Million Versions of Right by Matthew Revert. Definitely an odd’un, this is also very funny. If your mind can take the battering from this surreal short story collection (one character’s job is to insult walls) I promise you chuckles a plenty.
4. Haunted Air: ‘A Collection of Anonymous Hallowe’en Photographs America c. 1875 – 1955‘ by Ossian Brown. Haunting, weird, fascinating and a little disturbing, this is literally a bunch of photos from various sources on Halloween, and yet it’s much more than that. Who are they? What did they do just seconds afterwards? With photos reminiscent of Diane Arbus, needless to say the foreword is by David Lynch.
Well, there we are! A few books to be going on with until next time. In the meantime here is a post about some lovely pornographic actresses, including that nice Stoya Doll, reading poetry and prose aloud. NSFW, kind of.
Madeleine Swann 