You are currently browsing the monthly archive for April 2010.
Convert old public payphones into audio archives of local poets reading their work. A list of the poets with the corresponding numbers could be beside the phone, i.e. press 3452 to hear poems by Ray Hsu, etc. It can also be organized by style, theme, press * for random, and various other options. The archive could be updated or changed frequently to have more featured writers.
The service should be free, but people can donate coins through the slots if they wish to.
A series of portraits of the deities from major mythologies. Each photograph would be shot in the same way, but with models dressed up and decked out as a deity. Could be done in a serious manner, high-school yearbook style, or otherwise.
– Jordan Crick
A sound-proof room with padded walls is built in a public space. Attendants are locked inside the box for a set amount of time. Before they enter, they are required to write, on a chalkboard displayed outside the room, a complete list of the items they are taking into the box. Including clothing, jewellery, everything. Once inside attendants are encouraged to act in ways that they are not normally able to in urban environments. Yelling, thrashing, sitting in complete silence.
For the public outside, it is a mystery what is happening inside. They are encouraged to stand around and conjecture, based on the list of items and whether they know the attendant or not.
***
To encourage more submissions we’ve decided to put out monthly “calls” with themes or prompts. I had the idea for this first one because I was sent a great band name as a submission to Cloud Farm but wasn’t sure if cool band names is something we do here. But a list of them? Sure! Send one or two names to cloudfarming at gmail dot com or comment below. Include musical genre and any other relevant information. There will be extra points for including badly-photoshopped cheesy album cover art. I’ll make a list of the best 10 or so.
Deadline is May 15th, 2010.
***
For fun: here’s an extensive flow-chart showing how metal bands fit into various categories.
Idea for a novel: Imagine a world where the graffiti artists were more than juvenile delinquents, but practicers of a magical art that involved tagging our modern world. Spray cans instead of magic wands, cryptic writing instead of magical sigils, and all the while, everyone else is oblivious of the magic involved as epic turf battles go on.
– Jordan Crick
Find a building or house in your city slated for demolition. After it is torn down cover the entire demolition site with a white linen shroud. Try to arrange things so that those concerned (city, contractors, etc) let it remain that way for as long as you would intend the piece to be shown.
This may be done as a series.
“In conceptual art the idea or concept is the most important aspect of the work. When an artist uses a conceptual form of art, it means that all of the planning and decisions are made beforehand and the execution is a perfunctory affair. The idea becomes a machine that makes the art.”
“The idea itself, even if not made visual, is as much a work of art as any finished product. All intervening steps –scribbles, sketches, drawings, failed works, models, studies, thoughts, conversations– are of interest. Those that show the thought process of the artist are sometimes more interesting than the final product.”
“Ideas can be works of art; they are in a chain of development that may eventually find some form. All ideas need not be made physical.”
“Irrational thoughts should be followed absolutely and logically.”
-Excerpts from Sol Lewitt’s “Paragraphs on Conceptual Art” and “Sentences on Conceptual Art”
A shelf with 12 square sections, each corresponding to a month of the year. For each month choose a small object or two to place within it, representing that month in your memory.
Write and record a poem to be read over this video loop of a large asteroid that sailed past Earth on the night of January 13th 2010.
More information about the asteroid here.
(The image is probably copyrighted it, so please contact Patrick Wiggins if you plan to do anything serious with this video)
An apocalyptic folk rock album inspired by “When the Man Comes Around” by Johnny Cash. A few songs could be about apocalyptic events from other religious backgrounds. Another could be a love song duet from the last two people on earth, looking to find companionship and an opportunity to repopulate the planet, yet find out they wouldn’t sleep with each other if they were the last two people on earth. Possibly a song about being stranded and having to eat your dead companions, but sung in a morbidly funny and depraved way.
– Jordan Crick
Raoul
Ray
Cloud Farm 
