Many of us have been in awe of this graffiti on an abandoned luxury hotel and condo project over the past few days. Is it the rebelliousness, the social commentary on capitalism’s failings, the daring of the artists perched on terrifying ledges, the enormity of this as a work of art – or just the riot of colour on a building that gleams in the LA sunshine? From grey, rainy London, this really does look like an object of beauty. Hyperallergic interviewed some the artists involved.
If Howard Goodall has got you interested in organs, last week a new chord was heard in John Cage’s Organ²/ASLSP (As Slow as Possible). This version of the piece started in 2001 and is expected to finish in 2640. This was the first new chord in two years. When John Cage wrote the score in 1987 he was probably a little more optimistic about our future.
To celebrate fashion month, we bring you this lovely article on codpieces:
“The first codpieces were limp triangles of fabric that were tucked in to cover the openings between each hose. But it didn’t take long for men to take full advantage of these new garments, and start padding them.
Within a couple of decades, these loose flaps had morphed into phallic objects of monstrous proportions.”
And in celebration of teen girls, let’s all try to employ some of their latest terms, because they are leading the development of language according to this article. Bussin. CEOs of slang.
“Women lead up to 90 percent of linguistic changes, sociolinguist William Labov observed in the early 2000s. In fact, he wrote, women are often linguistically ahead of men “by a full generation.”
Now women are leading the charge online. Though Oxford University Press’ 2023 word of the year, “rizz,” meaning charm or charisma, was coined by a man, several runners-up, including “situationship” and “Swiftie” were inspired or first used by women. The term “goblin mode,” which refers to self-indulgent, lazy behavior, was Oxford’s 2022 word of the year and appears to have been first used by a woman on Twitter in 2009.“
GILDED BIRDS 