Garrett Lynch's Quote Me

Every good artist has at least one quote, aphorism or soundbite attributed to them, yet the new media artist barely has time to keep up with the rapid change of technology let alone spend time thinking of witty aphorisms.
Garrett Lynch's Quote Me is a work, triggered by users to its web page, that reuses quotes and the date they were expressed from various online sources for the busy new media artist who hasn't time. Quotes are relevant comments to current political and social events, both nationally and internationally, taken from the current headlines of a handful of global newspapers via their respective rss / xml feeds, yet placed without context or explanation.
more about the work here

Chinese Crackers and Irish art

Art Forum has a fascinating account of the burgeoning Chinese contemporary art market (image from Chinese Crackers, 2006 film based on Ed Ruscha's 1969 Crackers) booming with new money and I can't help but compare it to the Irish contemporary art scene. Throughout art history important periods of development in contemporary art have tended to coincide with economic booms as new money got into new art, think of the Renaissance, the Impressionists, abstract impressionism etc.. It's obviously happening in China right now so it would make sense that with all the new money in Ireland that there would be an almost Frieze-like unseemly scramble for the latest cutting-edge art, right? Well... not exactly. Have a look at the results from the latest record breaking Adams Irish art auction and it becomes obvious that there is a boom in the Irish art market alright but it's not contemporary art that's selling. I wonder what is about the Irish that sets us apart from this particular historical trend?

Art Stars vs local artists virtual soccer challenge

As part of the all hawaii eNtrées / luNar reGGae exhibition opening tomorrow at IMMA Pallas studios in the spirit of global and local exchange and by way of introduction to the artists of Dublin City, has invited the international artists from All Hawaii Entrées / Lunar Reggae, to select a Best XI of artists, for a Virtual football challenge, off-site in the Pallas studios. Participants include from the local side Brian Duggan, Mark Cullen, Gavin Murphy, Gillian Lawlor, Vanessa O'Riely, David Beattie, Mark Cullen, Niamh McCann, Seodin O'Sullivan, David Beattie, Vanessa O'Reilly, Conor McGarrigle,Tim Redfern, John Buckley and LIVE commentary from Nevan Lehart and on the art star side Anri Sala, Carsten Höller, Jorge Pardo, Dominique Gonzalez Forester, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Doug Aitken, Douglas Gordon, Liam Gillick, Sarah Lucas, Alighiero e Boetti, Sarah Morris, Cerith Wyn Evans and Michel Majerus. Kick off is 3pm Thursday 30th at Pallas Studios 17 Foley St Dublin 1.

I give up you're on your own

Minister of Justice Michael "rottweiller" McDowell backs a report which recommends giving people more power to defend themselves from intruders in their own home, presumably on the ground that given his inability to maintain law and order the only solution is the indivualisation of law enforcement aka taking the law into your own hands. What's next, arming the law abiding people of Moyross so they can defend themselves against the drug gangs?

John Gerrard at the RHA Dublin

John Gerrard's new exhibition Dark Portraits opens at the RHA Dublin this Thursday and includes the sublime (pictured)Smoke Tree III. Highly recommended.

Conor McGarrigle @ Reno Interdisciplinary Festival of New Media

I'm exhibiting in the 1st Reno Interdisciplinary Festival of New Media at the University of Nevada, Reno until December 15th. RIFNM 06 highlights an international selection of work by graduate and Phd students working with new digital technologies for the creation of art. Artists working in and across disciplines were invited to submit works to be considered for five interrelated events/venues: exhibit, netart, perform, project(full-dome) and present. The resulting festival schedule of events presents a unique opportunity to directly experience innovative work being created by a diversity of emerging artists exploring digital systems for visual and experiential production.

Participating Artists/Affiliations:
-Arthur Elsenaar and Remko Scha, Sheffield Hallam University, United Kingdom
-Gudmundur S. Gunnarsson, Mills College
-Sabrina Berryman, University of Utah
-Margaret Noble and Edyta Stepien, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
-Jolanta A Lapiak, NSCAD, Nova Scotia, Canada
-Martin Machado, San Francisco Art Institute
-Suzanne Yo Martinsen, University of Central Florida
-Pete Froslie, Massachusetts College of Art
-Alejandro Duque, European Graduate School, Switzerland
-Jamie Timms, University of California, Santa Barbara
-Mike Godwin, University of California, Santa Barabara
-Conor McGarrigle, National College of Art & Design Dublin, Ireland
-Stephanie Jeanjean, Graduate Center of CUNY (City University of New York)
-Melissa Grey and Robert Kirkbride, The New School, New York City
-Pamela Kray, The New School, New York City
-So Jung Kwon, Otis School of Art and Design, Los Angeles
-Si Jae Byun, School of Visual Arts, New York City
-Walter Nelson, Griffith University, Australia
-Stephen Cady, University of Illinois, Chicago, School of Art and Design
-Jeanne Jo, Rhode Island School of Art and Design
-Jake Lee High, Massachusetts College of Art

Smart Telecom the final chapter

Smart Telecom the disaster that keeps on screwing you. I had my broadband with BT and my line rental and phone with Smart, when Smart went bust I switched my phone to BT where I was already an internet customer, this was on the 5th. Almost two weeks later after many phonecalls, many excuses and promises including Eircom refusing an application to transfer my line (even though I haven't been an Eircom customer for years)complaints to Comreg (who promise to ring back and don't) I'm still not connected and Smart lines are going tomorrow. It's more then likely that I'm going to be cut off and I have no idea when I'll be reconnected. Judging by the sheer scale of ineptitude by BT and their complete we-don't-give-a-shit attitude it may never happen or it may only be a day away so I'm left wondering should I cut my loses and dump BT and restart the entire saga with someone else or stick with it on the basis that they can hardly screw it up anymore and on balance I'll have my line sooner this way, tough one. Then to top it all off Smart send me a letter (the first official communication from them )saying screw you loser (roughly paraphrased)we'll be sending you a bill. Lovely.

George Galloway vs Eamonn Delaney

From the Late Late Show, Eamonn Delaney editor of Magill takes on George Galloway (the exchange starts at around 9 minutes in) By any standards Delaney gets trounced and loses the crowd (again). You have to wonder why, if Delaney fashions himself as the champion of the invasion of Iraq, is he so ill prepared for such an encounter? Is he really the best they can come up with back at Castle Greyskull?

If you are interested in US support for Saddam have a look at these documents about Donald Rumsfeld's meeting with Saddam. The documents ( which are all declassified US Government documents obtained by George Washington University under the freedom of information act)show that during this period of renewed U.S. support for Saddam, he had invaded his neighbor (Iran), had long-range nuclear aspirations that would "probably" include "an eventual nuclear weapon capability," harbored known terrorists in Baghdad, abused the human rights of his citizens, and possessed and used chemical weapons on Iranians and his own people. The U.S. response was to renew ties, to provide intelligence and aid to ensure Iraq would not be defeated by Iran, and to send a high-level presidential envoy named Donald Rumsfeld to shake hands with Saddam (20 December 1983).

Smart Telecom bust?

Looks like Smart Telecom have gone bust, when I try to dial a number I get a message your smart telecom service is no longer available and telling me to contact Comreg for alternatives - I knew they'd been having financial difficulties but just dropping service with no warning is a bit much. Luckily my internet is elsewhere but looks like I'm back on the market for a phone service.

Update: According to RTE it's a dispute between them and their wholesale supplier Eircom about credit issues which pretty much amount to the same thing.

Hellfire

I was at the launch of newest Irish literary sensation Mia Gallagher's first novel Hellfire last evening. Hellfire is the big autumn Irish book from Penguin Ireland, the weekend papers were full of reviews and interviews, and you can't miss it in all the bookshops. It's great to see books of this calibre get the attention they deserve. IMO this is a major new Irish literary voice and Hellfire is an important novel about where Dublin is now that everyone should read. Recommended.

Google Bono in El Pais

Google Bono was featured in Spanish daily El Pais yesterday in an article about artists working with surveillance cameras.

Google Bono at Media Art Friesland

Google Bono is being exhibited at Media Art Friesland in the Netherlands opening today and continuing until October 1st.

Vending Machine art

The art vending machine at the Project Arts Centre, Dublin. I attended the opening at Crawdaddy last night where it was an almost complete sell out but there should be still work left in the Project and Connolly Station.
More pictures at my Flickr

The Vending Machine Project

The Fringefest Vending Machine Project launches tomorrow at Crawdaddy 6pm, all are imnvited. The machines will be in the Project Arts Centre, Crawdaddy and Connolly Station and there's a full list of all the works available. Some pretty good stuff there and all for a fiver! Methinks you'll have to move fast to get your hands on some of those. I must mention that my work whereismyart.com - a limited edition of 12 - will be for sale in the Project Arts Centre machine.

Capoeira at Dun Laoghaire festival of world cultures

A dazzling display by Oficina da Capoeira at the Festival of World Cultures, more at my Flickr page

Dun Laoghaire Festival of World cultures

Ferris wheel going up for the Dun Laoghaire Festival of World Cultures which is on this weekend . There's so much going on it's practically impossible to give recommendations but check out the schedule here. That said Trans-Global Underground & Trio Bulgarka on Sunday look particularly good.

A portrait in Google Earth

A collection of over 100 placemarks for Google Earth showing locations mentioned in Joyce's A portrait of the Artist
via Google Earth community

Turn me on dead man

Turn me on dead man an exhibition by Paul Murnaghan at the Basement Gallery Dundalk open this Friday the 18th 7.30 pm
The title of Paul Murnaghan’s latest exhibition refers to a reversed message embedded in a 1960’s vinyl album, it could also be read as an elastic mantra applicable to varied factions through the ages. This new body of work comprises of drawing, installation, video and sound. The drawing is a necessary device, used only to reference places and people from a past life accessed through hypnotic regression.

Murnaghan acts as documenter, illustrator and guinea-pig whilst exploring elements of cultural phenomena such as glossolalia 1 and reverie. By aligning diverse psychologies, he leads us to a place of obsessive yet common conviction, that allows the seemingly neurotic to be declassified and returned to the norm.

His practice is process-based, it often involves the construction of mnemonic devices and immersive research within disparate environments. The results when gathered, documented and positioned, display an intricate and potent sense of inquiry into the mechanics of memory and belief.

Basement Gallery Town Hall
Crowe St. Dundalk 042 9396437
basementgallery-at-dundalktown.ie
Opening Hours: Monday - Friday 10 - 4:30 Saturday 10 - 1

GoogleBono at FILE 2006, São Paulo, Brazil

Thge 2006 edition of FILE Electronic Language International Festival opens today in Galeria de Arte do SESI São Paulo, Brazil. I'll be showing the Bono Probability Positioning System version 2 AKA Google Bono. The exhibition continues until September 3rd.

Memorius at Birr Arts Festival

Paul Murnaghan is restaging his project Memorious (mentioned previously) at the Birr Arts Festival in Co. Offaly this Saturday and Sunday (12th & 13th August) using advertising space to offer for sale, part of his memory capacity. The time and place of meeting is decided by the 'activator'and the chosen memory is then monumentalised' in the artist's brain, sealed in wax and returned to the individual.

Graffiti

Graffiti project at the Palais deTokyo in Paris, a few minutes later I saw this guy get what looked like a crit which kinda sucks the fun out of it all.

Art Vending Machines

The locations for the Vending Machine Project which is taking place this September as part of The Dublin Fringe Festival 2006 have been announced. The machines will be selling art in Connolly train station, the Project Arts Centre and Crawdaddy (Harcourt St) and the participating artists will be:
Mark Beatty (IRL), Clare Louise Bligh (IRL), Cyril Briscoe (IRL), Alan Burns (IRL), Robert Christian (IRL), Declan Clarke (IRL/UK), Brian Coldrick (IRL), Roisín Cunningham (IRL), Niall de Buitlear (IRL), Nuisance Bears (IRL), Neva Elliott(IRL/UK), Tristan Fennell (IRL), Dermot Finn (IRL), Grainne Finn (IRL), Niall Flaherty (IRL), Damien Flood (IRL), Stephen Gaughan (IRL), Cliona Harmey (IRL), Joan Healy (IRL), Leah Hilliard (IRL), Barry Jacques (IRL), Annika Johansson (IRL/Finland), Frankenstyles (IRL/USA), Anthony Kelly (IRL), Tara Kennedy (IRL), Dogmedia Productions (IRL), Marina Kessopersadh (IRL), James Kirwan (IRL), K Bear Koss (IRL/USA), Lee Sang Hong (Korea), Hazel Lim (Singapore), Sarah Lincoln (IRL), Paul McCann (IRL), Conor McGarrigle (IRL), Caroline McNulty (IRL), Mark Garry/Nina Hynes/Karl Burke (IRL), Caitriona Moore (IRL), Eli Normal (IRL), Padraic E. Moore (IRL), Ben Mullen (IRL), Charlotte Murray (IRL), Paula Naughton (IRL), Barbara Nealon (IRL), Fergus Niland (IRL), Seamus Nolan (IRL), Jane O'Sullivan (IRL), Alex Pearl (UK), Christian Reeves (IRL), Sheila Rennick (IRL/UK), Emma Robertson (UK), David Roche (IRL), Ben Roosevelt (IRL/USA), Nina Tanis (IRL/USA), David Stalling (GER), Jason Taylor (UK), Keith Walsh(IRL), Robin Watkins (IRL/Sweden), Conor Wickham (IRL), John Younge (IRL).
via Blackletter.ie

James Coleman at IMMA

Don't miss James Coleman's slide-tape installationI N I T I A L S (which I'm glad to say is beautifully installed) at IMMA until the 3rd September. James Coleman is probably the most important and certainly the most influential contemporary living Irish artist whose work is bizarrely rarely seen in the country.

I N I T I A L S Coleman uses a slide-tape format (multiple transparencies projected with synchronised audio tape) in his continuing investigation of the psychological, social and historic conditioning of perception. We see an unusual assortment of people in what could be a hospital setting, but might, with equal relevance, refer to a TV drama studio, with the attendant preparatory rituals for both settings. As the piece progresses, the voice of what appears to be a child spells out words or utters disparate statements, diverging more and more from the sequence of events depicted visually, calling into question photography’s traditional claim to documentary authenticity.

A further element of uncertainty is introduced through the variety of different genres in which the artist chooses to present the images, from popular television soap opera style to the serenity of a 17th-century Dutch portrait. Cocooned in a darkened and carpeted space, the work challenges the viewer to move through the space and find their own vantage point, thereby becoming part of the core experience of deconstruction and reconstruction. Lynne Cooke in a recent essay on Coleman’s work describes the process whereby “weaving references drawn from film, from drama and from painting, Coleman situates his trilogy in a hybrid realm, one that allows him to comment obliquely on these canonical art forms and their traditions without, however, fully subscribing to any.”

What they think of us

Thanks to TCAL for this gem,right wing US blogger Debbie Schlussel takes issue with the Ploughshares acquital and decides that the growth of Islam is the cause. Does this mean we're next to be invaded? She's been on Fox News, doesn't Fox decide US military strategy these days? The comments are particularly hilarious, still we have our own version who has an obsession with Mary Robinson (still our best loved President ever, why does he hate Ireland so?) and alarmingly teaches at UCC.

Blackletter.ie Irish art portal launched

Blackletter.ie is a new collaborative workspace for Irish contemporary art created by Alan Butler, Cliona Harmey and Niall Flaherty the site features news, articles, an art calender with a self publishing feature but their opening project a google maps mashup showing ephermal, temporary and location based artworks around Dublin shows that this is going to be a lot more clued in then art.ie for example. Of course the success of projects like this rely on users so go sign up now!

Interview in the Sunday Tribune

While I was gone Eimear McKeith interviewed me about the Net Art Open for The Sunday Tribune and the article (which was excellent) appeared last Sunday (23rd July. I'll scan it and put on the site shortly. The Net Art Open also featured in Italian paper L'Unita and on two of my daily reads Rhizome and Random Magazine. Needless to say traffic to the Net Art Open has been pretty crazy since.

Summer Plans

I'm going to be taking a break from blogging until August.

I won't be completely offline though as I'm participating as a guest in the - empyre - soft-skinned space discussion on 'Bare Life' as part of the Document 12 magazine project, maybe you can join me there. Full details below

July 2006 on -empyre- soft-skinned space: "Bare Life"
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Subscribe at http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Net Art Open 2006 launched

I'm pleased to announce that the Stunned Net Art Open 2006 launched today. Now in it's fourth edition the Net Art Open takes a different approach to the curation of Net Art online. Rather then present a single event based exhibition selected by a curator or panel of selectors the Net Art Open is an ongoing blog based process which will unfold over the next six months. Curatorial bias has been removed by accepting all work which meets the criteria. The result is a true reflection of the state of Net Art now.

The emphasis in this edition will be bringing the exhibition to the audience, taking account of the changing way people access the net. With so much new work being produced all the time even with the best will in the world it's difficult to keep up so the Net Art Open will be blogged one work at a time with RSS feeds for newsfeed readers and blog aggregators, each entry will be tagged for technorati and del.icio.us and a flickr pool will be created. In addition each entry will feature on the front page of Stunned.

The net art open was started in 2002 by Conor McGarrigle and Arthur X. Doyle as part of the Irish Museum of Modern Art.com intervention, subsequent editions were in 2003 and 2004-5..

This Way Up

Issue three of the excellent collaborative Dublin Comic This Way Up is now available for download and should be hitting the streets in print format before too long

Darklight Events

The Darklight Film Festival kicks off this Thursday at Filmbase in Temple Bar starting at 6.30. Two events that caught my eye on Saturday a public interview with John Thompson of Electronic Arts Intermix conducted by John Gerrard 2.30-4.45 and Straylight Curator Mark Cullen presents an Al and Al artist talk at Filmbase 5pm

Happy Bloomsday

Barry McGovern reads from Ulysses on top of the Joyce Tower in Sandycove.

Bloomsday cancelled

Bloomsday events at the James Joyce centre in Dublin have been cancelled because of the state funeral of former Taoiseach Charlie Haughey. There will be still events at the Joyce Tower in Sandycove where Barry McGovern will be reading the Oxen of the Sun chapter from 9am and at the James Joyce House on Ushers Island, more information here And of course there will be a State funeral making it's way through the city.

NCAD Graduate Show

K Bear Koss's robot and friends at the NCAD Graduate exhibition opening last night. The exhibition continues until the 18th, post grads are at the Digital Hub 10-13 Thomas Street and under graduates at NCAD 100 Thomas St.
Opening Hours
Saturday 10.00am to 5.00pm
Sunday 2.00pm - 5.00pm
Monday to Friday 10.00am to 8.00pm

What you myspace will be held against you

The New Scientist reveals that the Pentagon's NSA in the form of ARDA (Advanced Research Development Activity) are interested in the information people post about themselves on social networking sites like myspace and are funding research into it's mass harvesting. A paper entitled Semantic Analytics on Social Networks presented at the W3C's WWW2006 conference revealing how data from online social networks and other databases can be combined to uncover facts about people was part-funded by ARDA. ARDA according to New Scientist is an organisation whose role is to spend NSA money on research that can solve some of the most critical problems facing the US intelligence community principally the problem of how to make sense of the massive amounts of data they collect.

Bye Bye Bebo

My 14 year old daughter - an early adopter and trend barometer - has deleted her Bebo account, they are so over.

Better then the real thing

Opening tomorrow 6pm at Four Gallery Dublin Better Than the Real Thing? is an exhibition-in-progress featuring Saoirse Higgins & Simon Schiessl, Enda O’Donoghue, Martin Shannon and Jürgen Simpson that enables endless reinterpretation of ideas by sidestepping the creative limitations of copyright, each of four original artworks by the artists explores separate aspects of reproduction and re-telling of a story and each work discloses different information about the mark of authenticity in art of the present day.

The opening clashes with the Dun Laoghaire IADT School of Creative Arts Graduate exhibition opening also at 6pm, the DLIADT exhibition continues 'til the 8th June and the Four Gallery until 22 July both are worth checking out.

Google Bono

Google Bono has been getting a spectacular amount of visitors since it was launched here last Tuesday thanks in no small part to all the sites that have carried it including (but not limited to) u2.com, u2star.com, U2twilight, rhizome.org, googlemapsmania, nitenichiryu.org, random-magazine, turbulence, pajamasmedia and updaters. A big thank you to all these and everyone else who helped spread the word.

Google Bono

Stunned is pleased to announce the Bono Probability Positioning System version 2 : Google Bono

We know that for a visitor to Dublin an important attraction is the possibility that they may see U2 frontman and international celebrity Bono.

The Bono Probability Positioning System version 2 Google Bono (beta) is a mashup utilising Dublin's extensive surveillance camera network in conjunction with facial recognition software, Google Maps and advanced probabilty techniques to allow visitors to determine the probability of seeing Bono in any of the most probable locations in Dublin's city centre in real time.

Seoul Net Festival

The 2006 Seoul Net Festival kicked off yesterday with lots of good work including my own project Cyclops which is a finalist in international competition in the webwork category

Eat your TV

The Virgin Prunes on the Late Late 1979

Here's a bit of Irish music history the Virgin Prunes on the the Late Late Show in 1979, a curiosity piece. Check out this if you want to see the legend in action.

Fun with CCTV

This is an oldish gem from Tuppenceworth from the Data Protection Commissioner's report. He received a complaint from people whose back garden was overlooked by LUAS CCTV cameras rather then remove the cameras

Connex (LUAS operators)then modified the system so that the camera /monitor was now showing a black screen when moving over the private property in its range. They also said that these settings cannot be changed by the personnel who are using the cameras and monitors in the Central Control Room of Connex.

Even more Eurovision

Thanks to Darren for pointing me to Silvia Night, Iceland's Eurovision entry, now that's Eurotastic!
More YouTube of Lordi,so bad it's good and Brian Kennedy so bad it's embarrassing.

Kathleen McNulty

Irish born pioneering computer programmer Kathleen McNulty Mauchly Antonelli who programmed the ENIAC and the first UNIVAC died recently. A fact that got strangely little coverage in the Irish media and blogosphere. Dún-na-nGall.com have a very nice tribute page.
via boing boing

Finland RWROCKS

Lordi Finland's entry to the Eurovision, now why can't Ireland do something cool like that?

Exhibition Opening Wednesday

I am taking part in an exhibition of work in progress by MA students at the NCAD which opens this Wednesday 6pm at the Backloft Gallery. Augustine St(off Thomas St).. It should be a really interesting show and I'll be showing something quite a bit different from my usual so I hope you'll all make it along. Full details below and please note that it's a short run exhibition ending Sunday the 30th.

You are invited to the opening of
MAPLESS
Backloft Gallery,
7 - 11 Augustine St.
Dublin 8

Wednesday April 26th, 6-8pm
to be opened by
Mick Wilson

Samantha Corcoran,Ed Cunniffe,Shea Dalton,Francis Fay,Barry Foley,John Graham,Rory Greenan,Sarah Kenny,Barbara Knezevic,Katharine Lamb,Aissa Lopez,Jonathan Mayhew,Conor McGarrigle,Grainne Nolan,Aiseling Noone,Emer O Boyle,Sarah O’Brien,Michael O’Hara,Magnhild Opdoel,Dominic Thorpe,Lorraine Walsh

Weds 26th to Sun 30th April 2006
Continues through to 5.00 p.m. Sunday April 30th.
Opening times 11.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m. daily.

Mapless is independently organised by M.A. students from the National College of Art and Design

Art vending Machines

Here's an interesting call for submissions for art content to be sold via art vending machines during the Dublin Fringe festival, how can you resist?

DUBLIN FRINGE FESTIVAL 2006 VISUAL ART EVENT

'THE VENDING MACHINE PROJECT' (curated by Alan Butler and Lola Rayne Booth) are seeking submissions from artists/designers/musicians to create small works to be sold in vending machines around Dublin for the duration of the Dublin Fringe Festival 2006. As part of the Dublin
Fringe Festival, The Vending Machine Project will offer an alternative space for artists to exhibit, engage with the public and promote their work. Selected artists will be required to make 10 small works under the dimensions of 15cm x 15cm. Proposed artworks can be multiples, editions, originals, photos, CD, DVD, etc.

E-mail submissions:
thevendingmachine -at- gmail.com .

- 3-6 images of previous work (.jpg only)
- current C.V .
- short proposal (no more than 300 words)3-6 images of previous work (on CD or prints – NO SLIDES & DO NOT
SEND ORIGINAL WORKS AS SUBMISSIONS WILL BE KEPT ON FILE FOR FUTURE
REFERENCE)
- current C.V.
- short proposal (no more than 300 words) THE VENDING MACHINE PROJECT c/o Studio 5, Temple Bar Galleries & Studios, 5-9 Temple Bar, Dublin 2, Ireland.
DEADLINE: 31st May 2006.

The 1916 Military Parade

Some images from the first 1916 military parade the first since 1969. While as a once off it's OK I don't think I'd want to see it every year. I saw the Bastille Day parade in Paris the year before last and it was truly a bizarre militaristic affair tied into a colonial past, not really something we want to emulate here. Interestingly while we all know that we have a numerically small army it appears from the evidence of todays parade that the army is also, well, small. At 6'1" I felt like a giant.

1916

I was at the celebrations of the 90th anniversary of the 1916 rising in Dublin today and I thought this banner on Liberty Hall caught the true spirit of 1916.

Beckett Centenary

On the centenary of Beckett's birth, his grave in Montparnasse Cemetry, Paris.

Beckett centenary

Now that the Beckett Centenary Festival has kicked off a few things around town that caught my eye. Start with I not I, Samuel Beckett, Philip Guston and Bruce Nauman at the RHA gallery which includes the Bruce Naumann's great Clown Torture installation

and the Neil Jordan directed Not I. The exhibition was having a few teething problems at the opening with monitors on the blink and the sound from Not I being drowned out by another piece but I loved the rooms constructed in the main gallery to show the shorts.
Also check out John Minahan's iconic Beckett photographs at the National Photgraphic Archive and I see that Dublin is going to get a Beckett themed series of projections by Jenny Holzer

Dublin Art openings

Get your art shoes on for this week's crop of Dublin openings

PALLAS HEIGHTS
Pallas Heights have four exhibitions opening this Friday 24th 6.00 - 7.30pm which'll also be the last exhibition there before the building is demolished.

Fergus Byrne, Fiction, flat 25
Clodagh Emoe, Metaphysical Longings, flat 28
Vanessa O'Reilly, SWARM, flat 29
Via, flat 30

Pallas Heights, 29 Sean Tracey House, Buckingham St, Dublin 1.
Exhibition continues March 28th - 15th May.

LUMENS
Lumens a light based public art work by Seamus Kennedy based at Newtownsmith in DunLaoghaire is being launched today at 6.30 in the County Hall Marine Rd, Dun Laoghaire.

SAMUEL BECKETT, PHILIP GUSTON & BRUCE NAUMAN AT RHA
To celebrate the centenary of Samuel Beckett the RHA exhibition combines two of America¹s most outstanding artists of the twentieth century together with three recent films of Beckett¹s shorter plays. The three Beckett plays chosen are from the recent productions by Blue Angel Films/ Tyrone Productions. The British artist Damien Hirst directs Breath, Neil Jordan directs I Not I and Karel Reisz directs Act Without Words 1. These plays will be shown as continuous video projections in three separate rooms in the Academy¹s main gallery.

They will be punctuated by six of the late paintings of Philip Guston
(1913-1980). Bruce Nauman (1941) shows Clown Torture, 1987 and Slow Angle Walk (Beckett Walk). Nauman will also be represented by a major sculpture South America Triangle, 1981, where the lexicon of Nauman¹s and Beckett¹s props overlap.

Opening Thursday 23rd 6-8pm at the RHA Ely Place

MARIE FALKSTEN AT THE LAB
An exhibition of photographs by Swedish artist Marie Falksten opens at the LAB Foley Street, Dublin 1 on Friday 24 March to 22 Apri at 6pm

RAYMOND WATSON AT THE JAMES JOYCE HOUSE OF THE DEAD
Hands of History opens Thursday 23 March 2006 at 6.30.
Exhibition continues until the 23 April. James Joyce House of the Dead, 15 Usher¹s Island, Dublin 8.

Bebo madness

This Bebo thing's getting out of hand even the Minister for Justice Michael McDowell has a Bebo page now and I see Dave Fanning's trying to convince people that he's 26 years old on Myspace (use an old photo Dave!).

The Net Art Open 2006 call for entries

I have just launched the 2006 call for entries for the Net Art Open. The Net Art Open is an open submission exhibition for internet based artwork which accepts all valid entries. I first created it with Artie Doyle in 2002 as part of the Irish Museum of Modern Art.com intervention subsequent editions took place in 2003 and 2004-5

Click here for more information on how to participate

What the F**k !

This has to be seen to be believed it's the Irish Internet Association (the interweb has an association now?) Net Visionary Awards ceremony - many pictures of middle aged men in dress suits accompanied by a young woman in a leopard costume and demented 50s housewife glasses and it's not even performance art. Hmmmmm.

Star Wars Kids

This is the funniest thing I've seen in a while, when I first saw it I thought some joker had hacked the Young PD website but no, the Star Wars kids did it to themselves. Normally I'd add some amusing put down but I know when I'm beat, this is the most unintentionally hilarious things I've ever seen - it's beyond parody. I notice my local TD, the gaffe prone Fiona O'Malley, is missing but I guess she'd have to be Jar Jar Binks

Plastic Paddies

Niall O'Dowd wags the Irish American finger at us all saying enough of the knee jerk anti Americanism , I say enough of the whining, paddywhacking, St Patrick's Day parade gay banning, green trouserswearing, provo financing, irish stereotype perpetuating plastic paddies. If Ireland is becoming anti American, and I agree it is, maybe these Irish Americans should reflect on why the most pro-American country in Europe doesn't like them anymore. Alternatively they could just complain.

Is the Freedom Institute reaching the endgame?

I've mentioned The Freedom Institute Ireland's best pranksters before but haven't checked in with them for a while so I was amused to see that they're still going strong and as an experienced watcher of prank sites (and occasional prankster) I think I can see the endgame in sight with this post intolerance of fundamentalists. As I've said before the genius of the FI is in the details, the post takes the form of a freeform rant which nicely captures the tone of victimhood so common in right wing American blogs (you know how it goes -Brownie becomes the victim of those flood victims who refuse to save themselves and so on). But the tour de force is this segment
“First they came for SUV drivers ... but I did not speak up because I was not an SUV driver”.
where they equate SUV drivers with the victims of the nazis, a claim so outrageous and offensive that it's a blatant attempt to up-the-ante to get readers to question what they're reading and provoke a response - a technique obviously borrowed from the Yes Mens' defence of the free-market character of Hitler’s economic policies after the international trade law conference failed to respond to their voteauction scheme. It'll be interesting to see how it plays out, the difficulty is that it's very hard to parody rightwing American opinion but perhaps easier to parody those who think that their wacko far right opinions should be taken seriously in Ireland.

To Err is Vulcan

Young Fine Gael call their magazine the Vulcan, no seriously they actually call it The Vulcan. It's almost too easy.

Four Courts planning

At Tuppenceworth they're running a campaign to object to the erection of railings in the front portico of the Four Courts in Dublin. The Four Courts is a beautiful building and it's quite extraordinary that they would try and make such a half assed addition to it and that's even before you take into consideration the implications of railing off such a symbol of Irish Justice. Go and add your support

Revenge of the crazy right wing nutcase

The crazy right-wing nutcase now accuses me of being a religious nut. I think I might have made my arguements too subtle, next time I'll have to use MORE CAPITALISATION. OK, I know I'm new to right wing nuttiness but I'm a little confused, isn't religious fervour a good thing?

I'm sorry but there's something very cartoonish about the raving right (see!) that makes it hard not to respond in kind.

Still I think our friend misses a point, in Ireland we don't have advocates of evolution because there is no creationism vs evolution debate anymore then there is debate about Archbishop Ussher's calculations or for that matter how many angels dance on the head of a pin. You're not in Kansas anymore, Dorothy.

Crazy Irishblogging right wing nutcase

The great thing about blog aggregators is that you get to read blogs you wouldn't normally. A case in point is Atlantic Blog the blog of an american economist working in UCC. I previously mentioned his wacky free trade ideas but now he's taken up against evolution and disproved it with some well argued crazy talk. Now I'm an old school lefty who believes we should tolerate all ideas even the nutty ones and that emigrants to our country are especially welcome when they bring with them cultural diversity. But then I had a thought, isn't that a bit disrepectful? Shouldn't I try and empathise with this guy and see things from his point of view? So I did a little research into right wing thinking and have discovered that they believe that emigrants should integrate into their adopted countries, abandon their foreign culture and adopt that of their adopted homeland and if they they don't like that culture they can always leave. So in this spirit of empathy I say to Mr Atlantic Blog believe in evolution or get the hell back to where you came from you crazy right-wing nutcase.

Those crazy Freedom Institute kids

The freedom institute is rapidly becoming my favourite scam site, I thought they'd jumped the shark with their hilarious posts defending Irish Ferries paying employees €1 / hour which were very close to the Yes Men's WTO scam but they got away with that too. The key clues, of course, continue to be the brilliantly written spokesmen profiles such as the one for Mr Waghorne (c'mon even the name) bold mine;

Freedom Institute Spokesman on Economics & Infrastructure Mr. Waghorne is reading Philosophy and Politics in UCD, where he seats on the Academic Council (polling 23% on the first count). He was educated in Gonzaga, and is a keen chess player. A former member of the National Youth Orchestra, he regularly attends concerts in the National Concert Hall. He is the Auditor of the UCD Philosophy Society, and also was the co-ordinator of the Campaign to Re-Introduce Coca-Cola, which narrowly failed to overturn a ban on the product in UCD. He has been the subject of a profile in the Phoenix Magazine, and has appeared on a number of media programmes, including Liveline on RTE Radio One.

So who's the joker behind the site, well the domain is registered to David Cochrane Freedom Institute c/o OEPN, who also runs politics.ie and OEPN which has only an ad based holding site of the type preferred by domain name speculators is registered to Madhu Sudhan Rao of nellore, AP India. The plot thickens.

Where's Bono

For all you who thought that the Bono Probability positioning system was some kind of joke there is now a where's Bono site complete with many, many pictures; my favourite being the Bono walking by sign of sex shop shocker.
But Bono Probability positioning system is still #1 in a google.ie search for Bono

Irish blog awards...hmm

Normally I'm a little underwhelmed by blog awards but apparently there are now Irish Blog awards which are awarded by none other than the Freedom Institute (must be good we all love freedom unless of course it's the american kind that involves marines blowing up your house). The Freedom Institute is Ireland's Centre for Social, Economic and Political Studies sounds important, I wondered why I'd never even heard of it.
Then I looked a little closer and while it looks good I've decided that it's a scam in the Yes Men tradition. What gave it away was the fact that their chief economist is currently studying for a Bachelor of Business Studies (Economics and Finance) award at Waterford Institute of Technology. He strongly advocates liberty.. Yeah, nice one, very subtle, almost believable, I like it.