Lego House

Given the opportunity, I know a few people who would likely move to this house in a second...

$106.5 million will buy you this...

Apparently there's no such thing as a recession when you want to pick up a legit Pablo Picasso.

Nu au Plateau de Sculpteur is now the most expensive painting ever picked up in an auction.

Wouldn't you just love to be the guy who gets to hang that in his living room?

Modern Agave

Much to my family's dismay, I'm not much of a tequila drinker.

THAT SAID, if I were to down an occasional shot or two, wouldn't it be nice to get it from bottles as fun as these?


Check out the whole lot of these special edition 1800 Tequila Essential Artists bottles over at NOTCOT, where I found them.

They're pretty to look at. Just don't expect me to drink the stuff.

ABOVE on the Streets

In honor of Operation Rearrange ALL the Walls tonight, a nod to ABOVE, who set the art upheaval in motion today...

SOUTH CENTRAL TOUR 2007-08 (Full Length) from ABOVE on Vimeo.

Old School Music: Deconstructed

I think this one just speaks for itself. A neat desconstruction by Oliver Pasqual via Human Resources.

Old Stomping Grounds

I had a big anniversary to celebrate this past weekend, and it unexpectedly took us back to old stomping grounds of mine...

Some Chicago highlights from our surreptitious trip, in some particular order:

1) Millenium Park

This is a prime example of the city center park as a viable modern social mecca. I wish the wimpy NIMBY's hampering the redevelopment of Civic Center Park here in Denver would step a few feet into this bold reimagining of an urban greenspace. From the dramatic spitting fountains to the breathtaking Frank Gehry-designed bandshell, the park was a beating living environment. Had we known there was a concert that evening we would have shown up with a blanket and picnic on the grassy green and lazed away with some wine. Boldly, Chicago has served notice that it is still a magnet for cutting edge urban design.

2) The John Hancock Tower

Surprisingly in all my time in Windy City, I never once stepped foot in this landmark building. The Sears Tower, many times. My loss. If you pick one skyscraper from which to ogle the urban skyline I think the Hancock wins hands down. Your choice: the tourist experience or a cocktail on top of the world. Guess which one I chose...

3) Architectural River Cruise

Another thing I had managed to avoid all these years. We had the perfect sunny morning to explore the Chicago River by boat. It is a great way to see the city evolve. Frankly it was really odd to see the old Sun Times building replaced by a Trump palace. That said, the potential for a new corkscrew mega-tower designed by Santiago Calatrava was a tantalizing end to a tour of a city undergoing another transformation.

4) Neighborhoods

I can never emphasize enough to people that the real Chicago draw is just a little bit afar from the glitz of Michigan Avenue, and this trip just emphasized that. From dinner at a cute little place in Andersonville, to the usual haunts in Lakeview, to the cute strip of restaurants and boutiques in Wicker Park and Bucktown the best Chicago has to offer is in the urban neighborhoods. If you do end up amidst the skyscrapers, definitely make the time to wander a bit afield for the more approachable Chicago.

5) The L

Transit cards and clearly recorded stop information make a huge difference. I was amazed how two subtle changes went a long way towards making the L a friendlier transit system. It really is a convenient way to explore the neighborhoods and simply get around. I am glad I got to still use tokens in my younger days, but frankly, the CTA has put technology to good use making the system better.

6) Chicago Style Pizza

We skipped the line at Uno's for a pie at Due's and were not disappointed. There is something magic about a pizza that has to cook for 40 minutes to melt just right. It's a gooey calorie bomb of a meal, but it is oh-so-good.

7) The Art Institute in 45 Minutes

The grande dame of Chicago museums has a deal that is worth checking out, especially right now when many of the galleries are closed due to the museum's current expansion project. Entrance is half-off the last hour each day, which the friendly museum ticket vendor casually suggested would be a good idea. Perfect idea. While I know you could spend hours on a Picasso or a Seurat, we managed to see all we wanted to see, perhaps a bit rushed, in 45 minutes flat. Best $6 spent in Chicago.

8) Ed Debevic's

No we didn't make it to the landmark downtown diner, but if ever I needed a reminder that the more things change, they often stay the same, Ed Debevic's provided it. Just as we stepped out into the city from our hotel this weekend, a gaggle of young lost college kids asked me if they were going in the right direction looking for Ed Debevic's. I was once one of those kids, asking for the same exact directions, almost a lifetime ago.

9) Nemo Nisi Mors

A simple phrase at the end of the trip. In one swoop Chicago reminded me how fortunate I have been, and still am today.

Brute Strength, Wet.

People running through walls, swimming on mylar above you, all in a dream induced, thumping kaleidescope of strobe lights.

This is not quite the soothing new age spectacle of acrobatic circus showmanship. For starters, you are right in the middle of the chaos, being shoved and shuffled around by the action around you.

This is Fuerzabruta.



If you're in New York City soon, make sure to catch this adrenaline rush of a performance by the airborne geniuses behind De La Guarda, who wowed me in the same Union Square theater years ago.

It is spectacular, in the truest sense of the word.

Be prepared to walk out soaking wet, grinning.

The Intersection of Art and Commerce (with a ©)

A few weeks ago in New York City, I finally had the chance to go wander through the Takashi Murakami retrospective currently on view at the Brooklyn Art Museum. I had barely missed it when it originally hit in Los Angeles, so I made sure to make it my one priority amidst all the family chaos going on during that trip.

It is an impressive collection by one of the more unique pop artists working in the world today. Think Andy Warhol meets Japanese Anime chic, mixed in with a proportional share of commercial savvy.

With bold colors and an occasional adult sensibility (you'll never quite look at breast milk -- or for that matter, other bodily fluids -- the same way again) the ©MURAKAMI exhibit is a sensory experience like few others I have seen. A savvy mix of pop culture, high art, and -- yes, as the exhibition title clearly implies -- commercialism.

Having based his art around his Superflat concept, he has ambitiously set out to bridge the divide between high brow and low brow. While his pieces themselves command a high premium on the world art market, his anime figures are just as comfortable on a a mousepad, a coffee mug or a Louis Vuitton handbag.

Art to Murakami is an intersection between creativity and the real world we live in. It seems to breathe and change as you interact with it, in all it's technicolor glory.

I see clearly now that his motives for keeping a tagged billboard of his from the exhibition's first run in Los Angeles are very much in line with his philosophy of a world where nothing is necessarily sacred, including himself.

If you happen to be in New York City before July 13, make sure you go check out this fantastically modern exhibit for yourself.

Otherwise, check out this clever Louis Vuitton introduction to the genius that is Takashi Murakami:

Skullphone hacks it on the big screen

You know those cheesy computer virus animations Hollywood shows us when they want to make sure we understand that some nefarious hacker has just put our world (or at least a well-placed laptop) in peril?

This is what it would look like on a billboard for real:


It is the modern equivalent of spray paint for the animated billboards of the new millenium.

Find out more about Skullphone HERE.

The Art of Explosives

While in New York City last week, I did manage to escape for a few hours to check out the Guggenheim Museum's explosive Cai Guo-Qiang retrospective. A master in the art of pyrotechnics and explosives, Cai's art is genuinely breathtaking in both it's creation and installation.

The Guggenheim's unique spiral layout provides an ample canvas to discover the many facets of this unique artist. An installation of exploding cars cascading down the atrium greets you, providing a dramatic tease of what's to come.

While the cars are the centerpiece installation, there are others equally as striking including a myriad of cracked clay statues to wander past and a herd of lifelike wolves flying above your head. His paper art, elaborated through clever use of fire and explosives are some of the most-unique pieces of modern art I have seen in a long time. Clearly influenced by Chinese iconography, he expands the visual impact by searing his visions into his canvas.

Interspersed throughout are videos highlighting Cai's site-specific explosion events. It is in these snippets that you see the mastery the artist has of his unique tools, and the vision behind his art.

This is a tour-de-force multimedia installation that everyone should experience. If you can't make it to New York City in person, check out the museum's online exhibition HERE.

Delinquency, urban art and the ubiquitous hoodie

There is some context for this that you can find at Core77, but if parents really need a diagram like this, are taggers really the issue?

The Art of Tagging Art Promotion

Agenda Inc. has a neat little snippet about a billboard promoting a Takashi Murakami retrospective at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles that was tagged by a noted grafitti artist:

Two days later, to the chagrin of grafitti art connoiseurs, the billboard was gone.

Apparently Murakami himself loved it enough to have it shipped intact all the way to Tokyo.

Consider it a blessing of urban street art from one of Japan's leading graphic artists.

It is, clearly, a sign of the times.

Mixing conventional ingredients such as living, leisure, working, and shopping

Wandering our way back to SOHO after a quick stop at the Paul Frank store last weekend, we stumbled upon a neat exhibition at the avant-garde Storefront for Art and Architecture.

A study in urbanism, the gallery presented various modern residential solutions as a response to societal demands in Copenhagen, Denmark. Proposed by Danish design group BIG, the ideas are an attempt to find balance between competing, and often contradictory, environmental, social and economic demands. The reality of Danish urban planning and construction in the past century are a launching pad for new, intriguing concepts on how we live and commune with one another.

The models and videos presented in the exhibit were thoughtful in how they asked you to engage yourself in the overall question of what compromises you are willing to make in choosing a place to live. They open a conversation as to what a city can do to find new housing solutions in an ever crowded world.

The truth is, the conversation reminded me that I would have a hard time living in most of the proposed developments. While I adore the energy and vitality of urbanism, I also know that I value personal space and open air environments. It is why despite having spent time in major metropolises -- and finding myself ever drawn back to their energy -- I deeply value the open space on the canal I wake up to every morning here in Denver.

While the solutions envision open-space environments, you cannot disguise the sheer density of some of these proposals. Much more refined than other philosophical attempts to put entire live-work-social environments into single skyscrapers, these ideas at least attempt to find more realistic solutions for our ever-crowded cities.

I am firmly a proponent of density in urban cores, but at which point does density itself lower your standard of living?

Sadly the exhibit closed shortly after we visited it, so it is too late to encourage any of you to go find it. Storefront did succeed in presenting an intimate thesis on urban living that thoughtfully engaged one of the key questions facing humanity today:

With more and more of us migrating to cities around the world, where -- and how -- will everybody live?

Martin Puryear at the MOMA

I was blown away at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City this weekend.

The Martin Puryear retrospective was a surprising blast of fresh modern sculpture I had never seen. In my mind it far overshadowed the much more packed Georges Seurat: The Drawings exhibit next door.



Welcomed into the MOMA by a dramatic wooden ladder rising high above the main atrium, I already knew I was in for something special upstairs. The atrium installation was a tease, an amuse bouche, for the bold exhibit they put together encompassing the career of this enormous modern talent.

A master at working with natural materials, he makes wood deftly turn or curve in unexpected and enthralling ways. His mixture of materials clearly show a broad palette of global influences that he chooses carefully to convey feeling and spacial interaction.


I could have spent hours that I did not have that afternoon just going back to individual pieces and finding new surprises in them.

The beauty of a world-class museum like the MOMA is that in one afternoon I could go from sharing with my little brother the intricacies and depth of a Jackson Pollack splatter to discovering for myself a new -- and just as impressive -- sculptor that achieves much the same with natural, hand-manipulated elements.

For more on Martin Puryear, check out this PBS profile on him HERE.