Recently, we read that The New York Times has started an ongoing Tumblr project to post their photo archive; it’s called the Lively Morgue and it’s pretty swell. We found this treasure right away: a little bit of 60′s fashion brilliance: a dress that can become a poster. Here’s the description:
March 4, 1968: “Don’t call them paper dresses,” began a report about a line of disposable dresses that could be reimagined as posters. The one seen here features Cape Kennedy. Another? An Allen Ginsberg poem.
An Allen Ginsberg poem???? We HAD to see THAT dress with a Ginsberg Poem and found it here (it was designed by British fashion designer Harry Gordon): read more…
(Video link here.) Last week, Open Culture ran two incredibly illuminating videos in tandem: the first, below, is the comedian Louis C.K telling of being at a low point in his career, having done the same old comedy routine for 15 years and getting nowhere, when he happened to hear George Carlin talk about how he came to figure out who he REALLY was, and the work he was really meant to do. Carlin’s example totally changed Louis C.K.’s life, eventually bringing him massive success. The second video, above, was Carlin telling part of the story C.K. heard. The story of Carlin’s process of becoming is interesting and valuable; as usual we notated the essential bits.
I realized…that I didn’t fit. And here’s what was missing: I was missing who I was.
What I really was was an outlaw and a rebel…I didn’t give a shit. It’s important in life if you don’t give a shit. It can help you a lot. read more…
We love of images of people jumping and leaping and have posted quite a few: they seemed like apt visual metaphors for a life principle, of being willing to take leaps…risk…or just jump for joy. In 1959 , photographer Philippe Halsman published a series of famous people jumping. Our favorite is Eva Marie Saint, leaping with such joyous abandon.
It’s clear to us that when you jump, no matter who you are, you jump -if only a little – out of your usual stance, witness Halsman’s picture of the Duke and Dutchess of Windsor. read more…
We were completely smitten with this wondrous PINK staircase, wondering how we’d feel if we had it to walk down/up everyday, when we came across a video by Minute Physics explaining why pink doesn’t really exist. read more…
(Video link here.) The great Waylon Jennings singing “I’ve Always Been Crazy.”
I’ve always been different with one foot over the line Winding up somewhere one step ahead or behind It ain’t been so easy but I guess I shouldn’t complain I’ve always been crazy but it’s kept me from going insane
His words describe just about every great, creative person we know…“different, with one foot over the line”.
(Video link here.) A reader sent us this lovely little video her friend Julia Warr made. It is about 95-year-old Maia Helles, a former Russian ballet dancer who she met on a plane four years ago. Warr became convinced that Maia “remains resolutely independent, healthy as a forty year old…through the benefits of her daily exercise routine, which Maia perfected, together with her Mother, over 60 years ago, long before exercise classes were ever invented.”
Towards the end, Maia reveals the keys to her long life:
“My secret for a long life is simplicity and work and enjoyment. “
Ever since we found this quote by the legendary choreographer Martha Graham on Elephant Journal the other day, it’s been haunting us, because we relate to SO much to it and because we DON’T relate to some of it, a curious mix.
“I believe that we learn by practice.
Whether it means to learn to dance by practicing dancing or to learn to live by practicing living, the principles are the same.
In each, it is the performance of a dedicated precise set of acts, physical or intellectual, from which comes shape of achievement, a sense of one’s being, a satisfaction of spirit.
One becomes, in some area, an athlete of God.
Practice means to perform, over and over again in the face of all obstacles, some act of vision, of faith, of desire.
Practice is a means of inviting the perfection desired.” read more…
(Video link here.) Ekso Bionics, creators of a robotic exoskeleton that enables paraplegics to walk, has created a compelling video about their remarkable invention. Much of the video is of Amanda Boxtel, an early product tester, who has not walked since she sustained an spinal cord injury 20 years ago (though she has mastered – and taught – many sitting-down sports.) Watching her, and listening to her speak of her experience, is to be reminded of – and really “get” - the little ordinary things that we take for granted…“putting my heal on the ground…being able to bend my knee..taking a step and then another step…a walk in nature.”
(Video link here.) We were just getting disgruntled at Pandora’s “Bjork” stream when “All Is Full Of Love” came on. We WOKE UP, amazed at what we were hearing and went looking for the lyrics. They are beautiful, somehow making us think of the creative process as much as love. “You have to trust it, despite wrong turns. It’s there.”
This video of a young Bjork performing the song is a bit unfocused until 1:20 when it really picks up steam. At 2:30 she holds a note – the word “love” – for a stunning 17 seconds. It has an utterly forthright, courageous quality that reminded us read more…
We don’t know what we’d do without Cara de Silva, who almost daily sends us something moving and interesting. Even if we don’t post it, we feel like she threw a gift our way: something we would have otherwise missed. This weekend she alerted us to a stunning piece in the New York Times written by novelist Henning Mankell (famous for his dark and beautifully-rendered crime novels). Mankell writes about the art of listening and the importance of story-telling in everyday life, his great lessons from living in Africa for nearly 25 years. It is a quick, essential read: a perfectly written story in itself, rich with images and wisdom Henkell learned…by listening.
“…It struck me as I listened to those two men that a truer nomination for our species than Homo sapiens might be Homo narrans, the storytelling person. What differentiates us from animals is the fact that we can listen to other people’s dreams, fears, joys, sorrows, desires and defeats — and they in turn can listen to ours.
Many people make the mistake of confusing information with knowledge. They are not the same thing. Knowledge involves the interpretation of information. Knowledge involves listening.
So if I am right that we are storytelling creatures, and as long as we permit ourselves to be quiet for a while now and then, the eternal narrative will continue. read more…
“Sculptor and designer Harry Bertoia was just 15 when he moved from Italy to the United States. Two years later, struggling to assimilate in school, he made this list of personal attributes as part of a class project. After high school he attended the Cranbrook Academy of Art, in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, where, along with his neatness and accuracy, he developed a fluid sense of sculptural form that made him a leading designer of modern furniture.”
These two images, with their amazing statement, are from a series of twenty posted on the blog Rolu recently, in which the late fashion designer Yves St. Laurent gives an unexpectedly candid speech announcing his retirement. In a few words, the famously private man reveals the impetus for his immense creativity – his “fatal lineage” and concertedly shatters the illusion of a seemingly charmed life.
The images-with-statements are taken from the first minutes of L’Amour Fou, a documentary about St. Laurent by Pierre Thoretten. They take about a minute to read and are a revelation. They seem brave to us, though at the time, the media seemed to avoid quoting them directly. We are still pondering his last line: read more…
. It’s read by 
:
, a documentary about St. Laurent by Pierre Thoretten. They take about a minute to read and are a revelation. They seem brave to us, though at the time, the media seemed to avoid quoting them directly. We are still pondering his last line: 
