three masterpieces of détournement

02May13

Admittedly, only the last of these three works — the unparalleled Can Dialectics Break Bricks? — is truly an example of détournement in the classic sense, but all three of them do engage in the practice of using borrowed material for purposes wildly different than those they were originally intended for.  Détournement is a technique […]

Filed under: cinema, culture, film, poetry, politics, video   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: "A User's Guide to Détournement", "Building a Human", alienation, aliens, Can Dialectics Break Bricks?, capitalism, Chariots of the Gods?, David Blaire, detournement, Erich von Daniken, experimental video, film, Gil Woman, Gulf War, Guy Debord, haiku, independent film, kung-fu, Marx, Mizuta Masahide, moai, movies, Peter Serafinowicz, revolutionary thought, Robert Popper, Situationism, subversion, the mark of Cain, video, Wax or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees, William Burroughs

honeyland and alienation — a cartoon rhapsody

18Nov09

Múm’s video for Rhubarbidoo (off Go Go Smear The Poison Ivy, their latest album) is one of the most re-enchanting videos that I’ve seen for a long time.  If, as Max Weber has argued, Enlightenment rationalization, especially as it manifests itself in the bureaucratized capitalism of Western society, results in a disenchanted world where we […]

Filed under: animation, art, cinema, culture, film, history, music, nature, philosophy, society, technology, video   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: Adorno, alienated labor, alienation, American farming, animation, Aya Yamasaki Brown, bee society, Beholden, capitalism, cartoons, childhood, consumerism, creation, creative destruction, Dialectic of Enlightenment, disenchantment, Disney, Enlightenment, Enlightenment thought, exploration, Fantastic Planet, fantasy, Flowers and Trees, Gulliver's Travels, hive as factory, homo ludens, Honeyland, Horkheimer, imagination, industrial militarism, industrialism, industrialization of American Farming, Ingibjörg Birgisdóttir, invention, iron cage, Jason Malcolm Brown, Lilliputians, Max Weber, Múm, montage, natural world, nature, play, re-enchantment, Rhubarbidoo, Rockwell, science fiction, social control, social unconscious, They Made Frogs Smoke 'til They Exploded, totalizing systems of control

What’s the smell of crisis?

08Jul09

What’s the smell of capitalist crisis?  It’s the smell of new carpet, freshly laid linoleum, and fiber-board cabinetry being released into the wind as homes that are so new they haven’t even been lived in yet are ripped apart by demolition tractors.  The absurdity of new homes being ripped to the ground immediately after having […]

Filed under: culture, society, architecture, politics, economy   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: homelessness, housing, capitalism, absurdity, capitalist crisis, demolition, bailout money, financial crisis, subprime lending, mortgages, Hoovervilles, banking, Cold War, Soviet Union, propaganda, health care, health care system, human needs, Harper's Index, bureaucracy, Victorville, Orwellian logic, Orwell

Road Trippin’ with Yo-chan: Mt. Kongo

09Apr07

A month or so ago I went to Mt. Kongo with Yo-chan and members of the Osaka Daigaku Photography Club. Kongo-san is most famous for the hoarfrost and icicles that cover its forested peak during the winter, but we were too late for hoarfrost and came for the view instead. The weather had been threatening […]

Filed under: culture, eating, Japan, Kansai, museum, nature, Osaka, philosophy, photography, travel   |  4 Comments
Tags: allergies, alternate temporalities, きのこの山, cable lift, capitalism, cedars, chocolate mushroom candy, commerce, exploration, 金剛山, fog, forest, gondola, hawks, hiking, improvisatory capitalism, Kongo-san, looming, mechanism of exchange, Mount Kongo, mountain towns, museum, nature museum, Osaka, Osaka University Photography Club, pollen, reforestation, ropeway, temporality, trees, weather, winter, 冬, 大阪大学写真部, 大阪府, 森