airships and tentacles, oh my!

Part of this week was spent collecting the last documents required for Irish citizenship, my grandfather’s death certificate and a notarized affidavit of estrangement. Terrific, excepting that only two dollars and two cents remained in my bank account when I was done, an oddly symmetrical notation of poverty. I am very grateful to my friend Myke, who, upon discovering the details of my anemic finances, spontaneously sent me a spot of money, enough for the packet of eggs, bottle of milk, and bag of past-the-date oranges which should get me through most of next week. I’m not sure how I would have managed without him. In thankful return, I ask that you take a peek at his store and consider purchasing his lovely steampunk-y Airships & Tentacles Colouring Book, because seriously folks, that rules. Pass it on!

artpost: some inventions are more obvious than others

via Brass Goggles.


Steampunk Space Helmet, by Herr Döktor, entitled Vacuum Survival System
Build Progress Forum Thread

Recently recovered from the archive at Castle d’Arrogance, details of Herr Döktor’s Vacuum Survival System, or ‘Space Helmet’, have just recently come to light; this object was produced at some, as yet, undetermined time (due to the peculiar and labyrinthine method of personal dating) as a means for ‘personal safety while travelling the Ætheral Void between the Spheres, and for safe and comfortable promenading upon the Airless Planets of the Solar System’

Apparently it started as a large acrylic Victorian cloche-style garden propagator and a large polypropylene planter. Fantastic! (More pictures at Brass Goggles).

what’ll it be, doll? (damn unsupported formats)

I came up with a new movement yesterday while over at Duncan’s, Woodcut exploitation. Line-art tramps in skirts like tiered bandages and hands full of guns. Seventies trash with Edwardian aesthetics. Wondermark meets Grindhouse. Lowbrow graphic poster art as intricately executed as comics from the turn-of-the-century Strand Magazine.

I’m wondering if I’m really the first to think of it. Currently, the hip uchronia is Steampunk, (Jules Verne punk-tech, the appealing, ironic union of Industrial Revolution and Victorian-era engineering re-mixed with post-internet technology), with the occasional dash of Raygun Gothic, (think Metropolis meets Buck Rogers, meals as pills, flying cars), or Space Cowboy, (Farscape, Firefly) – I haven’t been seeing much else making the rounds.

Is there already a Woodcut Exploitation movement out there? Have I just been spending time in all the wrong places?

Actually – while I’m at it, I desperately want to know the name of the current design movement that’s all wickedly baroque curlique in elaborately juxtoposed layers with vines, text, skulls, and absurd machinery. It’s been all over clothing for almost a year and a half and yet I still haven’t found anyone able to tell me what it’s called.

Here’s a good example – The music video Jonas Odell created for The Hours, (download here):

some news is too good to sleep on? with? at?

George Clooney is working with the Sci-Fi Channel to make a six hour miniseries of Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age.

Heart of the World: Still Beating

The project continues!

Things have been far too uncertain for any solid updates in the past few days, but as of today, that’s been rectified. We have a mortgage broker and a realtor. We’re giving this a second try as of Monday morning.

that thunderclap threatehed to break my window

Alastair’s footage of inside the Raja theatre has been put up on YouTube.

I can’t tell if enthusiasm about Heart of the World is flagging because of the holidays or from the misconception that we’ve managed to get the down-payment together already. To clarify, we’ve raised the $48,000 deposit, not the $500,000 down-payment. Until we get it together, we’re dead in the water. I recommend writing anyone you think might be interested in financing the project. Every little bit helps.