Mediacology

Like most things new, it took a month for Avatar to screen in Italy. I avoided reading any posts or articles about the film until I first had a chance to view it myself. Since seeing it here in Rome, I’ve been crafting my response. I haven’t posted because I keep thinking of things to [...]

“Gandhi on Non-Violence: Selected Texts from Gandhi’s “Non-Violence in Peace and War” (New Directions Paperbook)” (Thomas Merton)

In my summer reading list I forgot to mention this awesome little book of selected quotes on nonviolence by Gandhi. But the best part is the opening introduction by Thomas Merton who deconstructs the Western mind to reveal our [...]

Even though I haven’t been online that much this summer, I have still been pretty mediated, albeit old school style with books. I thought I’d share during this brief blogging pause what I’ve been reading.

“The Power of Place: Geography, Destiny, and Globalization’s Rough Landscape” (Harm De Blij)

So far so good, The Power of Place uses [...]

Written by a former Economic Hit Man, John Perkins‘ The Secret History of the American Empire takes you on an inside journey of “corporatocracy” empire building. The book is fairly simplistic when it comes to history, but it confers with all the more academic sources I’ve read about the subject. What is great about the [...]

The Pirate’s Dilemma is slightly maddening. The intention is valid: to steer people towards thinking about piracy in a new light. The “pirate’s dilemma” is whether to persecute and shut down piracy, or to recognize it as a kind of creative competition. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. The thrust of Mason’s argument [...]

“True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact Society” (Farhad Manjoo)

I just finished True Enough, which challenges the conventional thinking that new media democratize information and will lead to greater vetting and truth. On the contrary, the author argues that new media encourage the retreat into reality tunnels. The greatest benefit of the book is [...]

Not that Clark! Former counterterrorism czar, Richard Clark, has written a sci-fi thriller that apparently is loaded with grounded futurism. I listened to a fascinating interview with him on the Diane Rehm radio program. If you click below you can listen to the hour-long segment. I haven’t read Breakpoint yet, but it sounds like good [...]

[youtube]cwsgkurfCjE[/youtube]
It’s about time the pop culture produced a decent dystopic cult movie. Enter Children of Men, directed by Mexican filmmaker Alfonso Cuaron (Y tu mama tambien, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban), a post-Baghdad, Road Warrior-type movie sans the cheesy trappings of antiseptic sci-fi. Add one part Black Hawk Down, two parts Blade Runner, [...]

Be forewarned, a movie about magic employs the principle technique of enchantment: misdirection. Thus any film claiming to be about magic has as its subtext the fact of the film itself, which is a carefully constructed illusion, just as any Hollywood motion picture about spectacle is ultimately self-referential (such as Gladiator being a veiled commentary [...]

Few films are as gratifying as X-Men: The Last Stand. The effects are seamless, plot complex, emotions driven and social issues nuanced and prescient. The movie as dream is utterly captivating, and since most will focus on the entertaining aspect of the film, I just want to point out a few social aspects worth noting.
The [...]

Today there will be national demonstrations against revised efforts to “reform” immigration law that are expected to draw over a million folks. This is great news. In an effort to explain why this sleeping jaguar has awakened, some in the mainstream media have finally examined the debate from a Latino perspective. In particular CNN profiled [...]

Only the Flaming Lips would have the audacity to cover Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody,” but they did, and you would be remise to not immediately download/purchase/rip/borrow their super awesome epic, At War With The Mystics, containing said magnum opus sacred cow. Only crazy or egomaniacal artists would tackle such a task. Which criteria the Lips fall [...]

The Internet is all about tomorrow, but the way my schedule is, it’s all about yesterday. But like the pile of books growing in my flat like slime mold (if only they could pay rent!), it may take ten years to get through them, but when the time is right, they’ll get read. Which brings [...]

Here is an ambiguous short review of an ambiguous movie. Rather than spoil the plot, which is fairly nuanced, I’d say that first of all, V is for Vendetta is better than the Matrix Trilogy, the first follow-up by the Wachowski Brothers. The film is not dominated by action sequences, and is philosophically more complex. [...]

Read Part I here.

Dadadelica remixes the sublime: the awesome strangeness of the impermanent hybridreal that causes the human ego to flitter when facing the greater chaosmoses. Jim O’Roarke’s “Door 2005″ video installation does just that. On the peripheral walls are shuttering doors in stereo, presumably alluding to the doors of perception, and facing you is [...]

Read Part I here.

Read Part II here

Here is a note on the Fifth Floor Mezzanine Biennial subshow, “Down by Law“: Yeah, yeah, America (oh yeah, Amerika with a ‘k’) is a terrible dark place of torture, etc. Tell me something new, enlighten me. One piece that really deserves attention, though, is Kerry Tribe’s video of [...]

“Day for Night,” Whitney’s Biennial, is now available for scrutiny.

Unfortunately I saw the show in reverse, starting at the first floor and moving up, which is like starting in hell as opposed to getting there last (I suppose that actually is easier on the stomach, but sadly it didn’t work out that way because I [...]

War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning – Written by a former war correspondent, this beautiful little book explains succinctly why war is such a tragic waste of human potential, a necessary handbook on why war is stupid.

A Gradual Awakening This is by the dad of my meditation teacher and Dharma Punx writer Noah Levine. This is a great primer on mindfulness meditation. The best breakdown on how the mind works and how to transcend the limitations of suffering, written in a beautiful, succinct style.