Weekend links 171

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Jeune moine à la Grecque (1771) by Benigno Bossi. Via Monsieur Thombeau.

Victoriana: The Art of Revival is an exhibition which will run throughout the autumn at the Guildhall Art Gallery, London. Some of my steampunk work will be included. Related: Rick Poynor on Soft Machine’s Dysfunctional Mechanism.

• “The egg glows and hovers in the middle of a field of mesmerizing color. The spell is broken when the guard finally says, “Everybody up off the floor.'” Morgan Meis on Aten Reign by the amazing James Turrell.

• Mix of the week: a “heatwave mix” of psychedelic songs compiled by Jaime Williams. Anything that includes Vacuum Cleaner by Tintern Abbey gets my vote.

Because sex is so compartmentalized — it’s often considered separate from the rest of life and hidden away — porn performers, who have sex publicly, are in a unique position to consider and talk about integrating private and public aspects of life.

Writer and porn performer Conner Habib on the issue of nomenclature in the porn business.

• Still Hopscotching: Peter Mendelsund posts some unused cover designs for Julio Cortázar.

A Hymn For Megatron, an hour-long drone work, and a free download, by The Black Dog.

• Vagrancy and drift: Sukhdev Sandhu on the rise of the roaming essay film.

• A Flickr set of Peter “Sleazy” Christopherson’s musical instruments.

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“Whether flower-pressing in the garden, hallucinating in the summerhouse, fainting inside stifling sites of historical interest, pirouetting along the promenade, or even sea-cruise thalassophobia complications, barely a moment will pass that isn’t made all the sweeter by obsessively listening to Down to the Silver Sea.”

The TM Research Archive: sate yourself on Swiss graphic design.

• A Lecture on Johnson and Boswell by Jorge Luis Borges.

• Words, sounds and robots from Sarah Angliss.

Never Built Los Angeles

Nautilus (2012) by Anna Meredith | Nature Of Light (2012) by Isnaj Dui | Popcorn (Ealing Feeder Mix) (2012) by SpacedogUK (Sarah Angliss)

Contortions

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Much of the work I’ve been doing for the past few weeks has been steampunk-related so I’ve been searching for more antique reference material than usual. A recent delve unearthed this pair of vintage contortionists. The photograph above dates from circa 1880 and is from the George Eastman House collection at Flickr. Also at Flickr is a great set of vintage theatre posters which includes the example below. (And also at the Library of Congress.) More about the steampunk work in due course.

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