banksy pokes at the invisible eye.

[-from the UK Daily Mail]
read the article here.

when we watch one another, do we insure safety or do we enforce conformity;
discipline or fear and suspicion.

this cctv-implanting in every nook and cranny and line, circumventing our entire public lives (and some private areas) reminds me of jeremy bentham's panopticon- his revolutionary idea of a prison where one sees all without being seen.

this created the first true invisible overlord. there is no blue sky above us now, but instead, implicated in our daily lives and then, implicit in our unconscious imaginings, a higher status wielding 'law', 'righteousness' and 'power'.

"... Hence the major effect of the Panopticon: to induce in the inmate a state of conscious and permanent visibility that assures the automatic functioning of power... power should be visible and unverifiable."
- Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison. 1975.

i look up to see- a flogo?

[- from livescience.com]

that is a flogo, a floating/flying logo created from "soap-based foams and lighter-than-air gases such as helium" ...finally bringing into reality childhood daydreams of messages and signs in the lofty sky.

talk about taking innovation to new heights- since the sky is one of the last canvases for man to leave (in this case, temporarily- flogos last for about fifteen minutes) his imprints on.

since i have a love-hate relationship with TVMobile installed on our buses (more hate than love, even after all these years), my heart immediately screamed possible platform for propaganda. ads confront us from left to right, and around, in the form of adverts on buses, in buses, at bus stops, on buildings, between radio songs, among the pages of our magazines. it would indeed complete the loop to have messages of influence in our wide open skies too.

a "marry me" or a "peace" sign seems benevolent enough. but imagine a whole series of mcDs emblazoned across your evening sky. or daily soap (literally huh) operas bringing back the literary form, except you get to read a line a day in a kind of fast-food-fiction... bldgblog has a good post exploring some fun implications.

...messages from above?
it'd be a cruel irony if corporations, that lord over us in every way -economic, political and social- do make regular (and heavy) use of this form to advertise. the invisible hand of our capitalistic gods!

in the under-waters.

id once posted on ethereal beauty, whether manifested in nature itself or conjured through the imaginations of photographers... heres another stream of simply aesthetically pleasing (in quite an ecstatic manner too) photos from zena holloway:






[all images from zenaholloway.com ]

appearances may be superficial, and hence seem... superficial.
but not all that glints are merely articifial coating, good for applause but not too consequential. sometimes you see a narrative which takes seed inside and grows outwards into tangibility; you get enraptured by a scene which forces you to take pause, and consider.

you get inspired, caught up in sheer delight,
elevated above ordinariness and mundanity.
it infuses you, and sets you on a course (necessarily positive?).
it sits there, but it moves worlds.

that, to me, is most utilitarian. and when aesthetics meet utility, it marries existence and purpose at the highest level.

love, in celebration and ceremony.

[- all images from. snippet and ink]




[julie and kaori's wedding day. - all images from. snippet and ink]

when one can
-and is able to-
say,
i love you,
regardless of your quirks, your failings
and their quirks and failings.

...that is the right to love.
and to celebrate that love.

flight.

yes. there are helpful people out there who put their talent and info on youtube and their own blogs, like creature comforts.

... looking at rounded corners immediately made me think of this series ive been keeping for a while.
i dont usually alter or decorate my pictures, preferring to leave them as clean records of a place/event in time
- with both aesthetic warts and technical flaws (both photographer and camera, usually due to ineptitude of former to exploit to advantage the latter).

but borders here isolate and frame the relationship between crane and temple, a foreboding process of construction and reconstruction threatening the obsolete and uneconomical. borders give nostalgia, and importance.

borders remind us to close in on to, pay attention, and draw its meanings imbedded within its delimited area.

looked up and saw contrast.
contrast hints at mutability and change;
inter-influence,
or that one would dominant the other.



[singapore. bugis. kwan im thong hood cho temple]