Consumerist: Art

Artists To Stage Literal Meltdown Of American Economy

Ben Popken — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 12:46:58 EDT

On October 29, the economy will melt down. Not the general economy per se, but a 5 foot tall, 15 feet wide, 1,500 pound ice sculpture of the word "ECONOMY" in Manhattan's Foley Square, relatively near to Wall Street. Artists Ligorano/Reese say, "this sculpture metaphorically captures the results of unregulated markets on the U.S. economy." October 29 also happens to be the 79th anniversary of Black Tuesday.

Main Street Meltdown - New Ice Sculpture - Oct. 29, 2008 [voices4demoracy]

Hot Topic Likes Your Art So Much... They're Selling It!

Meg Marco — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 11:44:22 EDT

I'm glad I'm bad at everything so I never have to worry about anyone plagiarizing my work. Sadly, this is not the case for Nina Matsumoto. Whoever is in charge of "designing" Halloween merchandise for Hot Topic is apparently a big fan of Nina's.

Above is a temporary tattoo that's on sale at Hot Topic. Here's some art by Ms. Matsumoto:

The tattoo was spotted by a guy who had the original art tattooed on his leg. Here's what the artist had to say about the incident:

As I've said countless times before, I don't consider reposting my artwork somewhere else to be art theft... When someone takes my art without permission and makes any sort of profit from it, that's when something should be done.

Yikes. Sounds like a job for your friendly neighborhood lawyer.

Space Coyote [DeviantArt] (Thanks, Brandon!)

Despite Your Manly Bits, Art.com Signs You Up For Working Mother Magazine

Meg Marco — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 10:52:10 EST

Reader Brian doesn't have a womb, so when he saw a copy of Working Mother magazine in his mailbox, he was pretty sure that he didn't order it:

Last December I placed an order at art.com for a framed print which I intended to give as a Christmas present. I placed the order well within art.com's recommended time frame for delivery in time for christmas. During the order they promised delivery by December 17th. Well, as you may guess December 17th came and went with no package (they shipped it on the 15th via DHL.) December 24th came and went with no package. DHL finally delivered it on the 26th after I had been forced to go out and purchase another gift to replace the one that had not arrived.

In the end I let it slide. I had no desire to deal with telephone customer service the week after Christmas to get my shipping money refunded from art.com. I had better things to do with my vacation time.

This week I come home and find an issue of "Working Mother" magazine in my mailbox. Thinking it was delivered by mistake to my box I check the address label. To my surprise I find that it is addressed to me. Having all the correct Male parts it is anatomically impossible for me to be a working mother so I was puzzled as to how I ended up with this subscription. I refused delivery of the magazine by writing "refused" on the label and leaving it in my mailbox with the flag up. Next I visited their website and put in an inquiry via an online form. Surprisingly they got back to me very quickly. The verdict? Art.com had signed me up for a complimentary subscription for one year. I certainly don't remember clicking anything during my order with them indicating that I might be interested in 12 issues of a magazine that I will throw directly into the trash every month. If I did leave a box checked or something it must not have been very conspicuous because I usually catch stuff like that.

Working Mother magazine canceled my "subscription" in response to my message to them.

As a postal customer I'm bombarded with a pile of junk mail every month. Shame on art.com for adding this mountain of waste.

Brian

Attention Art.com: People do not like unsolicited magazines randomly showing up at their door. Seriously. We are not making this up.

Polaroid Instant Film Is Dead

Meg Marco — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 08:31:36 EST

Polaroid has announced that they will no longer manufacture instant film or instant cameras and will instead concentrate on TVs, digital cameras, and printers, says the Chicago Sun-Times:

''We're trying to reinvent Polaroid so it lives on for the next 30 to 40 years,'' Tom Beaudoin, Polaroid's president, chief operating officer and chief financial officer, said in a phone interview Friday.

Polaroid failed to embrace the digital technology that has transformed photography, instead sticking to its belief that many photographers who didn't want to wait to get pictures developed would hold onto their old Polaroid cameras.

Global sales of traditional camera film have been dropping about 25 percent to 30 percent per year, ''and I've got to believe instant film has been falling as fast if not faster,'' said Ed Lee, a digital photography analyst.

''At some point in time, it had to reach the point where it was going to be uneconomical to keep producing instant film,'' Lee said.

Polaroid instant film will be available in stores through next year, the company said — after which, Lee said, Japan's Fujifilm will be the only major maker of instant film.

Jessie, the reader who sent in this article says:

Ahh!!! This is so upsetting and yet I absolutely cannot find an e-mail address for ANYONE on their website. I need to revolt. We all need to revolt!! Do you know of any e-mail addresses or anything so I can obsessively write letters?? I would really appreciate any help you could provide.

Google Finance says:

1265 Main St., Bldg. W3
Waltham, MA 02451
USA - Map
+1-781-386-2000 (Phone)
781-386-8588 (Fax)

Sorry, Jessie. This is pretty sad. Polaroid film is pretty cool stuff, and is beloved by art nerds.

Polaroid won't make Polaroids any longer [Chicago Sun-Times]
(Photo:Tubes.)

Cruise Ship Art Auctions Scams

Ben Popken — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 10:24:57 EST

Here's a fun scam: buying art at auction on cruise ships. In one case, a woman paid $20,000 for what she thought were high-value Salvadore Dali, but when they got shipped to her, an independent appraiser told her they were worth maybe $700 each. The business is conducted on international waters, so there's no consumer protection laws to throw you a lifesaver. Consumerama says they're not even run under real auction rules, but are instead, "coordinated inebriated sales hysteria."

Cruise Ship Art Auctions: Disasters at Sea [Consumerama]
(Photo: jimg944)

Man Builds Secret Apartment At Mall, Gets Away With It For Four Years

Chris Walters — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 07:10:22 EDT

An artist in Providence, Rhode Island was apprehended the other day by mall security as he left the secret apartment he'd built almost four years ago, in an unused utility space in the mall's parking garage. The apartment had no running water (they used mall bathrooms), but it did include "a sectional sofa and love seat, coffee and breakfast tables, chairs, lamps, rugs, paintings, a hutch filled with china, a waffle iron, TV and Sony Playstation 2," according to the Boston Globe.

The man built the apartment with the help of seven other artists, and various people have lived in it over the past few years for up to three weeks at a time. The artist's website about the project offers both an explanation of the "installation," and a couple of long-winded apologies that sound suspiciously court-ordered—or to help him avoid getting the crap beat out of him the next time he's pulled over for speeding, and includes this "thank you":

Thank you mall. I have grown exponentially from having this opportunity and it has been a major and most valuable part of my life and imagination. In the future I hope to share some of my experiences and observations with a wider audience and can only say that living in the mall is great. I am saddened that I am not allowed to ever return to the mall again, but I understand. The mall made me think very carefully about what we buy.

The Apartment at the Mall [Artist's website and apology]
"Artist gets probation for building secret mall apartment" [Boston Globe via BoingBoing]

Whether or not Paho Mann's pictorial taxonomy ...

Ben Popken — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 11:13:23 EDT

Whether or not Paho Mann's pictorial taxonomy of all of his and his partner's personal possessions, sortable by color, cize, material, location, owner, cost, use type, and use amount, cause you to reevaluate your personal politics of consumerism is up for debate, but it's unquestionable that his site is neat. [Sort]

Should Airports Use Art To Improve Their Image?

Carey — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 09:40:39 EDT

Airports throughout the nation are stocking up on art to entertain bored passengers and promote the local economy. Atlanta already has 300 pieces of art, including "a large display of stone sculptures from Zimbabwe," a collection rivaled by Phoenix's 500 pieces, such as "strands-of-light-reflecting-glass artwork." Are these cultural offerings pleasant distractions, or intrusive nuisances? Vote in our poll, after the jump.

Art programs taking off at airports [AP]
(AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

Roadside Blasphemy: Walgreens Replacing Chicagoland Icon

ashley — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 16:38:38 EDT

"The Spindle," sometimes known as the Car-Kabob, a giant sculpture in the parking lot of the Cermak Plaza strip mall in Berwyn, Illinois, is set to be destroyed as part of a strip mall reconstruction. Instead, drugstore megachain Walgreens, apparently not content with its near-complete saturation of the Chicagoland landscape, will replace the legendary sculpture. Goodbye, quirky art, hello, homogeneity! (You might remember the 1989 sculpture by artist Dustin Shuler from the movie "Wayne's World.") But fans of the art and the citizens of the Chicago suburb of Berwyn aren't sitting still: The website SaveTheSpindle.com has launched, and there's a resolution in the Illinois House decrying the teardown. Will the sculpture survive? Hit the supporters' site and show 'em your love.

Save the Spindle
(Photo: Seth Tisue)

For Nearly Free, Man Eats Almost Only "Satisfied Or Your Money Back" Food For 8 Years

Ben Popken — Wed, 23 May 2007 13:55:18 EDT

Have you heard of Matthieu Laurette? From 1993 to 2001, he fed and cleaned himself by buying almost only products with "Satisfied or your money back" or "Money back on first purchase" items, then filing the rebates or writing to the companies and saying he wasn't satisfied.

Laurette then leveraged being a skinflint into an art project, Produits rembours s/Money-back Products (1993-2001).

Now that's thrift for ya! — BEN POPKEN

products [Laurette.net]
Matthieu Laurette [Your Daily Awesome]

UPDATE: To alleviate commenter concern that this post indicates we're dry-humping Satan...

Companies put satisfaction/money-back guarantees on products, earning good-will feelings and trust from shoppers, yet the makers know an extremely small percentage of people will ever take them up on the offer. While Laurette's behavior may strike one as fraudulent, it's intellectually interesting to see someone take these guarantees to the logical extreme and live nearly entirely on rebated products, allegedly in a perpetual state of dissatisfaction, calling into question whether one can truly find "satisfaction" in today's consumer culture.

Advertising Equals Graffiti

Ben Popken — Mon, 14 May 2007 22:39:23 EDT

New York City has these special video billboards at the top of subway stops playing silent movies for Lexus, Chanel, and NBC. It's kinda beautiful, and kinda annoying.

The Graffiti Research Lab and the Anti-Advertising Agency did an interesting project back in January where they cut out phrases into stencils and taped them over these ads. The moving light behind the letters illuminated phrases like "Graffiti," "Advertising = Graffiti," piggybacking on the very message-dispensing machine it attacks. Click the picture above to see the movie.

A cool art project and way to reclaim the urban space, if only temporarily. Just don't do it in Boston. — BEN POPKEN

Light Criticism [The Anti-Advertising Agency]

The Hellraiser Sneaker

Ben Popken — Tue, 27 Jun 2006 00:05:51 EDT

Just do it.

It is made of latex and human hair. There's also motors inside that make it vibrate and bend. Disgusting. We're going to make our own sweatshop dedicated to sewing together monsters that will search and destroy these shoes. We will pay fifty-cents per day. Our monsters will double as mp3 players.

[Adam Brandler via Screenhead]

Gas by Dash Snow

popkin — Fri, 28 Apr 2006 09:42:08 EDT

Your pain at the pump is palatable, but what ring of the underworld inferno should we consider this?

Well, if the price-gouging has its way and we can't afford to heat our homes anymore, perhaps it's the final ring of hell, the one where Satan is stuck upside-down in a lake of ice.

Polaroid by Dash Snow. More of his work here [NSFW], reflecting a gritty (like the crunching of cat litter under your feet) underbelly of anti-consumer youth culture. Spotted at aptbroadcast.

Banksy Pranks British Telecom with Bloody Telephone Booth

popkin — Mon, 10 Apr 2006 16:18:40 EDT

This retro British Telecom (BT) telephone box, pierced by pick axe, was a recent unauthorized outdoor art installation by guerrilla artist Banksy in London's SoHo square. It was removed shortly afterwards by the London City Council.

BT later jokingly offered to purchase it and place it in their lobby, describing it as a, "stunning visual comment on BT's transformation from an old-fashioned telecommunications company into a modern communications services provider."

Somehow we think the PR spin proffered by BT deviates slightly from Banksy's artistic intent.

"Can you hear me now?" [Collision Detection]

HOWTO: Turn the Shopping Mall into a Nativist Paradise

popkin — Wed, 05 Apr 2006 18:21:16 EDT

A panel from an instruction manual on creating a Shangri-La within the shopping mall. As the video game Civilization taught us, all revolutions undergo a period of chaos and anarchy, also known as "the fun part," illustrated below.

After that, the recidivist Eden.

The image appeared in a pamphlet surreptitiously distributed at a shopping mall. The project is the work of Packard Jennings. His latest project, done in the style of an instruction manual for mail processors (think "Business Reply Envelope" sifters) for inducing a utopia in their workplace, needs your donation of business reply envelopes. You can send them care of the Catherine Clark gallery, where the work premieres this Thursday, April 6, from 5:30-7:30pm in San Francisco.

Packard Jennings at Catherine Clark Gallery, SF [StayFree!]

Nike Air Jordans as Shoe Sculpture Porn

popkin — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 11:01:46 EST

Nike Air Jordans repurposed by artists Brian Jungen into sculptures, pointed to us by ObsessiveConsumption. Some of these resemble dinosaur skulls. Some of them are analogues for the route it takes to get a human on telephone customer service.

We can recall these shoes being the high priced Nike Air Jordans as being the raison d'etre for many a young lad back in the day. Even those without hoop dreams were lured by the selective mystique of the red, black and white shoe's siren song. Their proverbial minds would've been blown to see so many of the shoes gathered together, let alone ripped apart and restitched together for art.

There's a consumption/desire critique going on here, but we can't figure it out, can you help?

More pix after the jump...

The fossil remains of the creatures that conquered Planet Reebox?

More of his work here.