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Iraq War Ends: Fake New York Times

Fake New York Times - Iraq War Ends

When I first saw this pop up on the interweb a couple days ago, I kind of dismissed it. I clearly hadn’t realized the scope of this project, and how exciting it really was. The fake New York Timespaper is dated July 4, 2009, and consists of numerous articles on a brighter future where big box stores are evicted, the focus is on building a sane economy, and a maximum wage law is passed in congress.

There were 1.2 million copies of the paper printed at 6 different printing presses then shipped out to thousands of volunteers who handed out the papers for free on the streets of New York and other cities across the US. Incredibly, the printing was financed through micro-donations from the web, not unlike those collected by Obama. 

The spoof NY Times Website is well worth exploring, and the videos of the distribution are great. There’s also a blog post on the real NY Times that fill in some blanks on the background. The people behind the work include The Yes Men, Steve Lambert, and some NY Times employees.

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A City Renewal Project

A City Renewal Project from Dan Bergeron on Vimeo.

There are a lot more images of this work that better show the enormity of it and help to frame the reading of the description of it, but in some ways this video is a more interesting introduction (as time-lapse always is). 

A City Renewal Project is a project by fauxreel and Specter that recreates a neighborhood full of abandoned storefronts inside a 4000 square foot warehouse at 39 Lisgar Avenue in Toronto (which is going to be demolished to put up a new condo). The project focuses on the state of decay within the city, renewing these dilapidated buildings as artistic monuments and documenting their history amidst the gentrified frenzy of urban change. The Mr. Loogie building you see in the above video is the entrance off the street into the warehouse.

The article in the Torontoist spells out some of the specifics of the installation as well as some of the politics surrounding it (the work is sponsored by Gallery 381, which receives financial support from Red Bull). That argument is detailed in an article in NOW.

I enjoy the project as it exists as a partial, imaginary archive of the city, and I enjoy it even more because it’s housed in a warehouse that’s going to be torn down in favour of gentrified architecture and space, but the more I think about it, the less I enjoy the project for those same reasons.

[via]

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Office Hours

Broken City Lab office hours

We’re going to be holding office hours Tuesday, November 11th, from 7-9pm at LeBel, room 125. Feel free to drop by to contribute, engage, ask questions, and fix this city. We’ll be discussing upcoming projects, ongoing research, and our next demo/event.

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BCL Report – Nov 6, 2008

Broken City Lab's Tetris Tournament + Wheatpaste Demo + sticker making party

Our Tetris Tournament / Wheatpaste Demo / Sticker-Making Party went amazingly well—we successfully hijacked that big TV in the Lebel hallway, the tournament was filled with high-stakes Tetris 2 action (you can see Susan and Craig battling it out above), we demoed our wheatpaste recipe (hot water + flour until its a smoothie-like consistency) and lots of people made stickers for our commemorative plaque. Thanks to everyone who came out and made this thing happen!

Continue reading “BCL Report – Nov 6, 2008”

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Ambassador Bridge Website

Y’all know i love the bridge. The damn thing is tattooed on my back. So, I google searched Ambassador Bridge, and found it’s official website!

The history section of this website is pretty interesting but i think the photo section is lacking extremely.

Everyone takes pictures of the bridge! There has to be more historical ones lying around the city as well as new ones.

If you have some, send them to skip@canadiantransit.com with the subject “more bridge photos for your Ambassador Bridge website.”

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Highlighter

some street art in Windsor, near Indian Road, on Mill

I saw this on my way home from Lebel today. Earlier in the day, on my way to school, I had seen some bright yellow chunks of asphalt on the south side of Mill Street, where that little cul-de-sac is, right beside Huron Church. I didn’t think much of it, though remained curious about it. There are a few more pieces placed around the area, some purple-coloured sticks, other orange coloured garbage, and some more yellow asphalt. At first I didn’t like the idea of placing more garbage around there, but then caught myself—I hadn’t really noticed there was garbage there before at all. 

The more I thought about it and saw the pieces subtly (if bright orange plastic containers can be subtle) spread around, peaking out from the leaves on the ground, the more I liked it. Is this work from Advanced Sculpture?… I know they’ve been working with the idea of interventions.

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Economic Meltdown

the word ECONOMY as an ice sculpture

In honour of the 79th anniversary of Black Tuesday (the day the U.S. stock market crashed), artists Nora Ligorano and Marshall Reese installed this ice sculpture of the word ECONOMY in front of the New York Supreme Court building on October 29th. Over a period of several hours, the sculpture melted completely. The artists interviewed viewers on-site and also took time-lapsed photographs as well as video of the project.

Go Here for more information on this project!

 This piece is almost too perfect. We have been throwing around many ideas for upcoming winter projects with ice, and I somewhat wish we had thought of this first! It fits all too well with the current situation Windsor finds itself in, and what we, as artists, are trying to accomplish in the city. We can definitely learn a lot from this project.