Art

Making People Laugh in The New Yorker

- Adam Clare

The New Yorker is one of my favourite magazines and the first thing I do when I open it is to read all the cartoons. Some are hilarious and others just don’t resonate with me and in the TED Talk below you can see that having a mixed bag of humour is important. Regular readers will already know the benefits of laughter so here’s a meta-analysis of what works in making us laugh.

The New Yorker receives around 1,000 cartoons each week; it only publishes about 17 of them. In this hilarious, fast-paced, and insightful talk, the magazine’s longstanding cartoon editor and self-proclaimed “humor analyst” Bob Mankoff dissects the comedy within just some of the “idea drawings” featured in the magazine, explaining what works, what doesn’t, and why.

Lovebots Invade Toronto

- Adam Clare


Lovebots are a fun art project that aims to fill Toronto with little concrete robots. The goal is to remind people that the city is a lovely place filled with nice people.

No fewer than 100 2′ tall concrete statues of Lovebot will be put on display in “secret locations” across the city. Like humans, each statue is connected to a specific story of love, kindness or compassion that the curators have collected from the public. The call for submissions is still open,too. Pay Lovebot a visit on Facebook, or the Feel Good Guru on Queen West, Atomic Toybot on Queen East, Serpentine on Cumberland or A&C Games on Spadina. Happy lovins!

From BlogTO.

Thanks to Liz!

Community Canoes to Help Bees and Butterflies

- Adam Clare

A new initiative in Toronto is trying to help the local ecosystem and bring people closer to nature through canoes. Not by paddling, but by bringing bees and butterflies to the canoes.

The core idea is to help pollinators in the city survive by creating little sanctuaries on land using old canoes filled with plants. Humans will be drawn to the canoes too, but for different reasons. People can learn about the local wildlife and environment by additional information provided by the context of the canoe placement.

WHY ARE WE DOING THIS?

Well, we love canoes. And not only do they look awesome filled with native plants and flowers, the Community Canoe Garden network will support local bees, butterflies and other pollinators that help ensure our fruits, veggies and herbs are abundant and healthy.
Please join us in this project. Together, we can build the Community Canoe Network.
And please note that the Community Canoe Garden Network is just the beginning. Working with residents, community groups, the city, and local paddling businesses, our grand ambition is to establish Community Canoe as a service similar to bixi bikes, but for canoes. We want to help make it easier for residents to explore Toronto’s waterfront and waterways. Imagine adding a paddle down the Humber or the Don to your commute, or taking a canoe trip along the waterfront!

Read more and contribute to the project here.

Thanks to Shea!

Band of the Month: Kira May

- Greg

Friday….What a day!

Today’s band is Kira May. A Toronto musician whose
hypnotic and soothing loop mastery quiets and captivates entire rooms upon her first breath.

Powerful, layered vocal harmonies, and slow, softly haunting melodies keep you listening to every word. And at live performances she’s known to have appropriately intense visual projections, adding depth and colour to the stage as Kira tweaks her effects on bended knee.

Here’s a little taste of Kira May’s work below. See her live at an art gallery opening or another DIY venue as soon as you can.

Band of the Month by Greg O’Toole

Suburbia Gone Wild

- Adam Clare

The idealized version of the American suburb has spread around the world and can be found in nearly every country. The banality of the spread has been ignored by artists, at least that’s the feeling of Martin Adolfsson who set out to document this changing global landscape. For example, it’s hard to figure out where the above photo was taken.

In the book Suburbia Gone Wild, you can see the varying takes on sameness throughout the world. It’s a fascinating look at the spread of the suburbs. It’s good to see artists explore the global impact of hegemonic aesthetics and forcing us to ask: is this development the kind of development we want?

Swedish born turned New York City native; photographer Martin Adolfsson has shifted the focus of the camera lens from conventional portraits to dynamic vivid impressions of the urban upper middle class. Having noticed that artists had failed to address the changing panorama of economic shifts all over the world, Adolfsson decided to highlight the issue of social metamorphosis through an innovative array of environmental portraits.
…
The eight countries featured represented “the dream of American Suburbia that is being copied and pasted and sprinkled with some Hollywood stardust” (Adolfsson). Additionally, with the conscious choice to omit “all these traces of signs and different languages and people”, Adolfsson has effortlessly encapsulated the uniform homogeneousness between these global hubs.

Read more at Trendland.

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