AT&T Plagiarizes Christo & Jeanne-Claude

Sunday, June 27th, 2010 | Contemporary Art, Pop Culture Notions, Power & Politics, Under The Patina of Knowledge | 21 Comments

Dear AT&T,

Please take the money you shower upon the hacks at your advertising agency ( BBDO Worldwide ) and instead install more cell phone towers or hire more nerds or do whatever it’ll take to improve your stinkpie of a network. I can’t make calls from my studio in Redhook, Brooklyn so that’d be a good place to start.

love,
Tonky

Background:

2005-
Artist duo Christo and Jeanne-Claude finally realized “The Gates,” a massive ephemeral art installation covering NYC’s Central Park with thousands of yards of flowing orange fabric suspended from orange plastic gates.

The concept was 20 years in the making and was funded entirely through the sale of concept sketches/collages rendered by the artist.  In the words of the artist, “an expression of joy and wonder.” No corporate funds, no government sponsorship, just pure aesthetics ( open to argument of course )

2010-
AT&T steals the work to sell its snake oil to the masses as part of its sponsorship of the World Cup soccer tournament. Despite a disclaimer stating, “The Artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude have no direct or indirect affiliation or involvement with AT&T” the advertisement is a straight forward pillaging of Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s intellectual property.

Old SNL Potuses Advocate Consumer Financial Protection Agency

Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010 | Pop Culture Notions, Power & Politics | No Comments

BUAHAHAHA!

MainStreetBrigade.org has teamed up with Funny or Die to put a muzzle on the snouts of corrupt Wall Street Bankers with the founding of the CFPA.

I snort laughed when George Bush 1.0  mistakenly calls President Obama Borat… then Barbar.

CAST:

Fred Armisen: Barack H. Obama
Will Ferrell: George Bush II
Darrell Hammond:  William Jefferson Clinton
Dana Carvey:  George Bush I
Jim Carrey:  Ronald Reagan
Chevy Chase:  Gerald Ford
Dan Aykroyd:  Jimmy Carter

Enjoy:

TINY: Art From Microscopes – UW Madison

Monday, January 18th, 2010 | Contemporary Art, Pop Culture Notions, Power & Politics | No Comments

Welcome,

There is a delicious show in the gallery at the airport (Truax Field) in Madison, WI that features photographs and rapid prototypes (3D objects “printed” layer by layer) by scientists from UW-Madison’s various research departments in collaboration with Tandem Press.

The exhibition text surveys the history of medical illustration and explains how “as early as 13,000BC, drawings of body parts aided Egyptians during the mummification process.”

The fancy colored 3d objects shown above and in the gallery below (click image to see larger) are upscale versions of such tiny molecules as DNA and RNA and also molecular motors that will some day propel themselves through our body to perform repairs and deliver drugs  like chemo to affected regions.

The grey electron microscope image of a tree-looking tendril is a “trichome” on a mustard plant leaf. These structures are what make a leaf feel “fuzzy”

The crystalline image shows nanorods – a material being developed for use in solar cells.

This show is stimulating beyond the aesthetic joys these images provide because we are reminded that we live in the future. These scientist are inventing tiny robots that will repair fatal aneurysms and new materials that will allow us to harvest sunlight for energy and thus avoid wars cause by lust for the buried sunlight that is crude oil.

-Tonky

Health Care Propaganda: Public Option Please

Friday, October 30th, 2009 | Pop Culture Notions, Power & Politics, Tonky Graphic Design, Tonky Limited Editions | No Comments

Just wrapped up some health care advocacy propaganda for PublicOptionPlease.com. I designed these in the spirit of those great WPA posters advocating everything from worker safety to supporting the war effort.

The contest winner gets a cold $1000 and national distribution. The contest is being judged by Arianna Huffington, Margaret Cho, Aaron Rose, Jesse Dylan, Robbie Conal, Marshall Ganz, and Arlene Holt Baker

Hopefully they like the work!

I am selling an extremely limited edition of each design.
20″ by 30″ – Archival Ink Jet Prints
$50 ea. ( framed – $105 )
<CLICK HERE>

Every penny of profit gets donated to PublicOptionPlease.com. So feel comfortable voting with your wallets.

Click the thumbnails to see larger images:

-Tonky

WTC Fence – Design Competition Submission

Wednesday, September 30th, 2009 | Contemporary Art, Pop Culture Notions, Power & Politics, Tonky Graphic Design | No Comments

This is a rendering from my submission to the design competition being hosted by The NYC Department of Transportation in collaboration with the Port Authority of NY & NJ to transform the currently drab construction fence that lines the WTC perimeter to something a little more amicable to tourists and local gentry.

Gound Zero is the more colloquial name for the World Trade Center construction site, no doubt the most politically charged patch of land in the country.

Project Statement:
The organic super graphic meanders through an underlying colorful grid along usable sections of fence. The viewer identifies with the flourish and in it sees their own navigation of the city. In this way, the composition reflects the vitality of the bourgeoning downtown commercial and residential neighborhood.

The rebuilding has proven slow due to infighting between powers that be: Larry Silverstein (leaser of the site) NY & NJ Port Authority (owner of the site), and victim’s families, to name a few.

The challenge it seems is to find a development solution that properly honors the lives of the victims and that also utilizes that highly valuable downtown real estate in a way that is best for the city’s future. Is the 1,776-foot Freedom Tower really the best we can come up with? ( USA founded in 1776, get it? )

Proposals due Oct. 5 – Get yours done now! $7500 design fee.
Submit Here

“Blank” Insurance Card

Wednesday, September 16th, 2009 | Pop Culture Notions, Power & Politics | No Comments

Teeheehee,

After receiving my new health insurance cards from Freelancer’s Union, this unintentionally delightful card accompanied the perforated set. They must have bought the blank templates and needed to print only 3 cards not 4.

I would love to have heard the copy editor argue that leaving a card unprinted may have alarmed their customers and led to unnecessary customer service costs to explain the situation.

-Tonky

[UPDATE]: Apparently I’m not the only one – click below to see a similar insurance card that my DC based artist/designer friend Ben carries.

Chinese Storm Troopers vs. Terracotta Soldiers of Xian

Wednesday, July 8th, 2009 | Pop Culture Notions, Power & Politics | No Comments

The New York Times published this picture of Chinese Storm Troopers accompanying their coverage of the government crackdown of Uighur ethinic minority group. Their armor reminded me of the Terracotta Army at emperor Qin Shi Huang’s burial site.

Read the NYtimes full coverage here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/09/world/asia/09hu.html?hp

The Bush II administration detained 13 Uighur men near the border of Afghanistan and they are only now being released from the Guantanamo Bay detention facility. They were innocent men, but some feared that if released and returned to China the communist regime would imprison, torture, or kill them.

Nytimes covered the release of a handful of the detainees to sunny Bermuda: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/15/world/americas/15uighur.html

-Tonky