This wonderful graphic paean to the printed book is the work of Australian freelance illustrator Gavin Aung Than. His entertaining and educational website, Zen Pencils, was launched earlier this year and was inspired by quotes from famous figures as diverse as Neil Gaiman and Rudyard Kipling. This cartoon was prompted by the Carl Sagan qoute, “A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic”.
Image © Gavin Aung Than
Shooting from open helicopters, Hollywood-based photographer Gray Malin has been documenting beaches around the globe, from Miami Beach to Rio and from Europe to Australia. Seen from above, a crowded beach or hotel pool becomes a blank canvas that allows the viewer to see the world as art. “People and objects become patterns creating repetition, shape and form. These photographs are a visual celebration of color, light, shape—and summer bliss.”
You can see more from Malin’s terrific series “A La Plage, A La Piscine” on his website Maison Gray, where you can also purchase prints.
All photos: © Gray Malin
I continue to be intrigued by clever, fact-filled infographics. So, here’s a well-researched one that explores the comparative details of the world’s main English language ebook markets. Who knew that there were more than 400 million ebook capable devices in the U.S., Canada, the U.K. and Australia. Or that 20% of U.S. adults have downloaded an ebook. I didn’t think 20% of U.S. adults still read books at all.
Way back in 2010, when The New Yorker released its first iPad app, Jason Schwartzman was the pitchman. For the brand new, updated version of the new iPhone app, and it’s Jon Hamm and Lena Dunham doing the honors. The new app has “every story, every cartoon, every em dash, every illustration” found in the magazine, plus extra audio and video features. Anyone with an iPhone can download this week’s issue for free. In the future, readers subscribing to the magazine in print, iPad, and Kindle Fire formats will receive full access to the mobile app. Android users, looks like you’ve been dissed again by the NY elitists.
São Paulo, Brazil now offers a reason to use a public phone rather than your mobile. Sponsored by Brazilian telecommunication company Vivo, Call Parade is a collaborative art project that uses public phone booths as its medium. One hundred phone booths throughout the city have been reimagined by 100 different artists. The shell-shaped covers of the phone booths make a terrific canvas, with both an interior and exterior surface to display the art. The range of artwork spans the simple and graphic to the realistic and intensely complex. One design treats the booth as a frog’s mouth, the outside a speckled green with protruding eyes and the inside a watermelon pink. Another sports an eerily lifelike depiction of the human brain. Not only do the designs cover much artistic geography, but they also honor a variety of cultural icons, Japanese daruma, and comic strips. Vivo has uploaded images of each design with its given title, the artist’s name and bio, and the location of the booth.
I never met David Rakoff, but like so many other readers and NPR listeners I felt that I knew him. And, like so many fans of the author and humorist I was deeply grieved by the sad news that he had lost his long struggle with cancer.
Regular listeners of the radio show This American Life have probably heard the recording of Rakoff’s last appearance on the show when he read his story “Stiff as a Board, Light as a feather”. But even if you never heard of David Rakoff, you will surely be moved by the video of the performance that was recorded on May 12,2012.
By now, we are all too familiar with the ubiquitous double-decker tour buses that clog the streets of every significant tourist destination around the world. But these neat Parisian models from 1950 actually look like fun to ride.
Built on a Citroen truck chassis by the coach builder Currus, these pre-Space Age behemouths were operated by Groupe Cityrama until the early 1960s. I say bring them back.
Irish novelist John Banville has been contracted to write a new novel about Raymond Chandler‘s iconic private detective, Philip Marlowe. Henry Holt will publish the book in 2013 under Banville’s pen name, Benjamin Black. Banville promises to create a “slightly surreal, or hyper-real, atmosphere” for the novel, exploring some of Marlowe’s Los Angeles.
Along with Marlowe, Banville will also revive Bernie Olds, the shamus’ cop pal. The novel will have an original plot and take place in the 1940s. The setting will be in Bay City – Chandler’s fictional stand-in for Santa Monica, California – and feature Chandler’s hallmark noir ambience.
What do you think? Personally, I’m weary of all these publisher gimmicks. It’s one thing to “revive” the Bond franchise, but messing with Chandler is just plain heresy.
The Vienna, Austria based Urbanauts have started a movement that they have dubbed Das Horizontale Hotel. This project is converting vacant neighborhood storefront shops around Vienna into single-room hotels. Their first mini-hotel is housed in a former tailor shop near the fabulous Belvedere Palace Gallery. The amenities include a king-sized bed, tv, coffeebar, computer and two bikes. Breakfast is served at a nearby café. The daily rate is €120.
The Urbanauts —Jonathan Lutter, Christian Knapp and Theresia Kohlmayr—aim to encourage travelers to engage with the local neighbood institutions and to help support local business at the same time.
Travel Between The Pages 