Short Circutz

If you were growing up and watching YTV in the early to mid 90's, you might remember these shorts that were played on YTV instead of commercials at times. The Mind's Eye and Beyond The Mind's Eye were a collection of animated shorts and music files put together. I thank Jax184 on youtube for making me remember something from my childhood that I must have seen a good hundred times but still managed to completely forget about. Enjoy (if you would like to see more, just do a search on youtube for Mind's Eye)

Japanese Power Puff Girls

Hey ever ask yourself, "Hey, the Powerpuff Girls were great and they should bring it back, but what if we made them japanese, wouldn't that be great?" Hell, I didn't but somebody did.... so here's the intro to what they came up with!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fo-8LkzC9U

School Has Finished!

....until summer school on monday! woo. haha. Either way, this calls for a celebration.

A Note of Encouragement

Hey There Blog,

Its been a while. To all my readers I have (my friends and the random person that passes by every now and then hahah) you probably know the reason why I haven’t contributed to my blog in a while. I took too many classes in a semester of school that proved to be particularly challenging. I worked and set up an exhibition at the same time as well; I’m actually at the gallery right now writing this. It has been a hectic 2 months… and I’m amazed I’m not done yet. My school work is going all right, I don’t have a reason to fret per se, except for the lack of time. I handed it, or am going to hand in, quite a few papers late; I promised myself I wouldn’t but under the time constraint I had it’s proven to be impossible. That in turn made studying for tests difficult too. Once again, I’m not sure if I can boast about having a good mark in exams this semester, because I honestly don’t know how accurate my answers really were, and if the teacher will cut me some slack and provide me with partial marks for the answers I knew I couldn’t answer completely (like picture for woman (1969) by Jeff Wall for example and how it relates to ---- by Manet…)

The gallery for me has been a mixed bag of feelings. To be honest I was iffy from the start. I had a negative attitude about the whole affair, and I found many faults and no answers. It’s a big step to go in a gallery; what if no one comes? What if everything blows up in our faces? Ridiculous fears to be sure, but they were there… until we got a grant of course. The fact the university found in us a project worthy enough to warrant a grant, no matter how small, filled us with hope. From that point on it became a question of not if, but when and how often. We worked incredibly hard on it. I found my lack of experience in the gallery world troublesome, and my schoolwork made me stay in the west island, far from the downtown core, so I completed advertising and anything I could do from home to help. Jean Marc and Eunice really showed their colours here, and I learned so much, even from my far away position.

Then during this week we finally opened it up. There were so many people, and everyone had a great time, myself included. It was essentially a celebration to the end of school, before school ended. I felt good mingling with people, thinking to myself all the while ‘We did this! People are here because of us.’ The only real disadvantage came from learning that while many people enjoyed the works on the wall, no one seemed inclined to buy anything. The advertising we made seemed insufficient. At this point we haven’t sold works yet, and this has been a blow. I started thinking about my future again. Apparently art history is a hard field to go into! I started wondering what future I’ll have without a master’ degree… if I’ll be able to get anything in terms of work, and if I’ll have to go back to school to get another degree… it’s a terrible prospect… I feel like I’d have wasted years of my life learning nothing practical.

I did get to talk to Emily though, and as always she made me feel better. It is not the end of the world. This was in the end a wonderful experience, and I have to admit I enjoy coming down to the gallery every morning. It’s a good feeling knowing you own something as amazing as a gallery… this is a dream. Art history as a field is amazing in the sense that the program has such vast possibilities. I can end up in the arts or I could go work for magazines or websites etc. The knowledge I’m gaining is opening my eyes in terms of art… and in the end I chose this program because I truly enjoy it. Emily will be a cook, and chances are she’ll have much stabler employment then I will. That might just be a big advantage for us in the future, and it made me feel better. I just need to stay positive about everything. That’s the bottom line. I’m accomplishing a lot. By getting a degree and getting work and volunteering we all are, and that can’t be a bad thing. I will tell myself that if I believe in myself, others will believe in me, which in turn will make me believe in myself. I can’t feel negative, because that just breeds negativity. The semester is almost done guys, then we can just stay at home in our undies and play video games, watch tv or exercise (hein Eunice and Jean Marc?? Nudge Nudge) I for one plan on playing that complicated world war 2 game several times, with different countries. Be the bad guys and see how fast Germany can conquer the world, and for a challenge, manage to be Japan and hope for the best against the U.S. and play Italy to try and recreate the Roman Empire.

We’ll see guys, this is just a step in our lives. It’s simply the beginning of a new chapter, and at least we know that we have each other to help out and work with. We are a group of incredibly resourceful, varied and smart people. Some have great talent in their work, some are incredibly intelligent and quite frankly you people all are kind hearted. We’ll all go far in life, there is no reason we won’t be. So get this shit done, and let’s enjoy summer! I for one plan to walk up mount royal again through the back way and get mauled by mosquitos! The view was worth it. 

JMEC AD!

Here we go! The final ad is done and ready for printing!

Save the Arts in The Uk

The Campaign to save the arts industry from severe tax hikes of up to 30% has a new video by David Shirgley... Seen from my crafts class, I enjoyed this so much.

So fantastic...

Funny Volkswagen Commercial

Darth Vader was evil... even as a child

Tan or Ayran

Taken from Wikipedia:

Ayran or dhalla is a yoghurt-based, salty drink popular in Albania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iran, Pakistan, the Republic of Macedonia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. It is made by mixing yoghurt with water and (sometimes) salt. The same drink is known as doogh in Iran; tan in Armenia; laban ayran in Syria and Lebanon; shenina in Iraq and Jordan; laban arbil inIraq; majjiga (Telugu), majjige (Kannada), and moru (Tamil and Malayalam) in South India; lassi in Punjab and all over Pakistan. A similar drink, doogh, is popular in the Middle East between Lebanon, Iran and Afghanistan; it differs from ayran by the addition of herbs, usually mint, and is sometimes carbonated, commonly with carbonated water.


... carbonated. ok there's things even I won't try.

Growing up in Montreal

I've been interested with architecture for as long as I can remember. Ever since I was young I looked at how buildings worked, and I wondered why a McDonalds looked the same, no matter where in the city it was. I lived in a tall building in St. Laurent, and since school was nearby and all the students lived nearby, there was no reason to travel outside the city and explore back then. All I knew was that I lived in a nice big concrete building. It was strong and I felt safe... I remember our balcony and the fact there were openings on both side large enough to dangle my foot out of. It sacred me when i peaked out and looked at the ground from the 11th floor... I liked the height because it amde me feel powerful. It was fun being able to see so far away! I was close to a highway too, and I could look out my window and watch the cars pass by on their daily commute to and from work. There was the footsteps of the people above us. Being in the city made me feel like I was never alone.

As I grew up and the brother came along, we moved to a suburban house, and I stayed there for many years. I'd go downtown very rarely maybe a handful of times during my teenage years. I ws always impressed by the architecture. It looked so old, and I never realized how old it was until I started my life in art history, and I could see in a photograph the montreal that was. I don't think people are as impressed and awe struck as I am when i see a picture from the late 19th century, or the mid 20's for example, and people are walking around in suits and house carriages and such, and the only thing I could recognize, the only thing I could see that would prove to me that the location of this photograph is really in that part of the city was the building in the background. It looks the same today, the road leads up to it, just like it used to! I can even read the painted ad on the wall, which is worn or partially blocked today. I think every time I go downtown (and that's essentially every day, I go to school downtown now) that i had some way to go back to that time, when the photograph was taken. I'd do anything to see the tramways pass, to see the men in their suits and the women in dresses, and to see everything in colour, with my own eyes. I'd love to experience it, instead of just seeing a black and white picture. don't get me wrong, I'm glad it's here, to show me what was... as proof that this time was real. I just feel like it's teasing me... it gives me a taste, but doesn't let me in more then that.

I found this movie on the National Film Board Website titled The Memories of Angels. It's not the first one I've posted focusing on Montreal and this wasn't even what I was originally planning on putting up ( an interview with Jean Drapeau about his plans to build a highway infrastructure way back in '55.) It's a cutup of different scenes, put together by Luc Bourdon, from the many movies the NFB did over the 50's and 60's focusing on Montreal. Apparently I'm not the only one who imagines how the city used to be (or perhaps he's just reliving his childhood?), but seeing montreal moving like that made me happy.

I haven't had the chance to watch the entire thing, I scrolled through certain screens, but the last 15 minutes were saddening to me, especially the part where they tear down buildings. I've always found that each building we tear down today, robs our children of a piece of Montreal's beauty. I might be afraid of change but I don't find Postmodernist architecture all that beautiful on the most part (the Concordia buildings are in fact quite nice; the art history auditorium is actually a really nice place, apart from all the stains on the seats.) Realistically, if we want the city to grow, there's two ways; expand upward, or outward. If we expand outward, we contribute to urban sprawl... it takes us longer to get to work, clogs up our infrastructure and is bad for the environment. If we go upwards, well, we can't save as many buildings as we'd like. The truth is Montreal is kind of a low city, at least towards its center, and we'd have to demolish old buildings to create the high rises we'd need to have to avoid urban sprawl. Either way the answer is not easy, and most likely a combination of both will have to be done. So Enjoy the movie and I guess we'll see where Montreal will be in the future

The Memories of Angels by Luc Bourdon

Laptop Abuse

Everyone who knows me and my laptop think that my relationship with it is hunky dorry right? Well, lately I think the stress of school is getting to me. A some of you may know, I have my laptop tell me the time at every hour. it's a mans voice that goes *it's 6 o'clock* very calmly and it's great when I'm doing work or I'm getting ready to go somewhere. But when I'm procrastinating, it gets scary. it goes a little something like...

- It's 11 o'clock
- NO IT ISN'T! FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU DIRTY LIAR! ARRRRGHHHHHH
... and thats usually followed by crying at the fact another day's gone by with nothing to show for it ....

The start of a mental disorder? simply stress... or both.
(that having been said, I'd never take the voice off... and I'm not sure I remember how I turned the feature on in the first place... maybe I enjoy the abuse)

Van Gogh on Webcam

If only they would've saved their recordings...

Kia Commercial Song

Usually when I'm on the computer I have the tv on for the noise. Commercials only interest me when they have something funny going on (like the Old Spice commercial! and not like the yogurt commercials!) Anyway, one that actually stops me everytime is the Kia 2011 sportage commercial, part of their "share the road" campaign. The commercial itself isn't what impressed me.. but it was the song they played. After some searching, I found it! it's called start now by Marco Solo featuring Crow's Nest. It's a lot of fun and the band has a page on facebook. 

I haven't been this excited about a commercial song since Shiny Toy Gun's adaptation of Major Tom for the lincoln commercials

I want a rocket ship.... without ending up like Major Tom

Minecraft Ad

If you can explain to me the link between a game where you mine cubes of different materials... and a rapper getting fucked up by a child... you get a cookie.

by the way...

Emily has a blog! Pretty cute :)

To Be Asim

Steve Page at The Olympia!

Last Wednesday, I went to a concert with a friend to see the GooGoo Dolls. It had been years since I've heard of them, but she was excited to see them, and I thought it would be a great chance to catch up. So I said what the hey and went. Little did I know that the opening act would be the one I would be more excited for!

I have to admit as a sidenote, that the theatre itself was a lot of fun to be in. I just love the old theatres and I think we're lucky to have so many in Montreal that still exist. Although I feel bad that the metropolis gets its ass kicked every time there's a mosh going on during a concert (although I seriously doubt that was the original intent of the builders, it has stood up well..), I do think it's kind of a good fit to have concerts there. I mean, it's either that, a dollar for a movie theatre... or a porno movie theatre. it's.... the best of the three. (also, I need the light fixtures inside the Olympia. they are huge and red and metal.. and they look like they came out of some carnival and they rock :) .... they have 4 and it lights up the whole theatre! really powerful)

Anyway, so I was incredibly surprised to see Steve Page as the opening act. At first I though the barenaked Ladies we're playing but I soon remembered that they had broken up. Nevertheless, he played a lot of their old songs! I was incredibly happy since I grew up with them :) The newer songs were mixed into the performance, and they were pretty good too but not as much as the older ones I found. The GooGoo Dolls were pretty fun too, and my friend enjoyed them a lot, so it helped. It was the first time I haven't been in the mosh in the front, I was sitting down towards the back but honestly, that was fine since there wasn't a lot of moshing going on anyway. Overall it was a fun night!

An incredible amount of things to tell you

So it's been about 2 weeks since my last post. The reason is procrastination mostly, but I also spent the time to hang out with friends and rest, something I don't do often. Since I have so many classes and a constant fear that I SHOULD be doing work, this week has been a great break change, and I spent a lot of time with friends, and a bit of time home alone, enjoying time by myself too. That having been said, I've been thinking of what to write for the blog for a while, and I have quite a bit, so what I'm going to do is divide my post into 3 or 4 separate ones, divided by subject.

Obama Hitting Kid With Snowball! (He probably deserved it)

I found this off a website called Superpoop.com. I think I found a new website to go to for my procrastination needs!

My poor blog...

Allright So i've totally ignored the blog and I'm terribly sorry. I've had a ton of homework and its probably going to be this way until spring break two weeks from now... I know it's not march so its not march break... its not technically spring either... break break?
Anyway, so I should be posting a few things up really soon. For now, I have a few things that I've wanted to post for a while now and haven't had the chance, starting with...

Oiligarchy
This is the kind of game that you can spend a few minutes on and you don't need to wait until you download or install it... it just plays. This one is from website Addicting Games and is about creating your own oil company after ww2. It's great because it makes you think about the role of oil in today's economy, as well as a worst-case scenario of what could happen if we don't change our way. Just a heads up from someone who has spent WAY too much time playing this thing there are in fact multiple endings, gauging from ww3 to the fall of your company... Enjoy!
http://www.addictinggames.com/oiligarchy.html

The Crucial Man: Art Appreciation
Taken from College Humor.com... another website I spend way too much time on... It's an interview by the curator of The New Museum on how an average joe can appreciate art
http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1925029

Then and Now in Montreal
When I have a few moments to myself, I like to look up old photogrpahs of the streets of montreal from the Mccord Museum. Thousands of photographs are ready to be searched and with the help of google street view, you can get an idea of how the city looks today. I learned about the archive while creating a project with friends on the Victoria Bridge and I've enjoyed the resource ever since.

As for the images... I really do love this city. I never cease to be amazed at the fact that the same building I pass by everyday is in a photograph of people in horse drawn carriages, tramways and men in top hats! It's the most awe-inspiring thing. You can stand in  the same position as the photographer had when he took the picture over 100 years ago and the building hasen't changed. It's builders died, its tenants changed, and the passer's by too. Even the street and it's surroundings did. That building (or buildings) remained the only constant throughout Montreal's history. So when I don't have the time to post a full blog or when I feel like adding an extra piece here and there, I'll try to find an old historical photograph, and I'll relate it to today... I hope you enjoy! (click on it for a closeup)

Corner St. Catherine and Stanley Streets, looking east, Montreal, QC, 1915

Once you're done enjoying it, and focusing on the details, check out how it looks today!

(note: The image seen here is copyright Mccord Museum)

Eaton's 9th Floor

For those of you that don't know what the 9th floor is, it's an old art deco style restaurant that was built when the Eaton's Center was built in Montreal in the 30's. It's modelled after the restaurant of a cruise ship and was a popular spot for the people who went shopping in the giant mall. Since Eaton's demise, and the take over of the Eaton's Center by Les Ailes de la Mode... (the original Eaton's part of the shopping centre is now Complexe Les ailes, a mall with 60 stores and a ton of offices) The restaurant has been closed off to visitors and a good 6 floors were converted to offices.

The Inside of The Restaurant

Well a few years back, people who have a website up with pictures they took while exploring Montreal's abandoned, unoccupied or ignored buildings and locations tried to gain access to the interior of the restaurant and document it. The group (called Urban Exploration Montreal) failed to gain access inside the place itself, but took some great pictures of it's lobby, surroundings and the converting process from old 'The Bay' style shopping building to boring white offices. To view a small summary of the 9th and 10th floors of the building, as well as the photographs and videos (although they didn't work for me,) check out the link here.

Interested in some of the abandoned buildings in Montreal? Explore UEM's website and also check this one out! Unlike UEM's website which seems to have had it's last update in 2009, Abandoned Montreal seems to still be updating. The comments made about a sign in an old pumping station made me laugh...

Enjoy :)

Stupid Goldeneye...

I've been doing great for the last, like 4 months not getting distracted by video games, but this game is just too addicting! It's the new Goldeneye 007 game on the Wii. On top of finally being a reason why  should turn on the machine, the game is great and challenging, and it looks good too. It's a remake of Goldeneye on the n64... I game I personally loved growing up and has been a very popular game for anyone that enjoys first person shooters! Here are some videos comparing the two.. Can you spot the differences the video game industry has come up with in 14 years? (the original came out in 1997)

This is the video for the new came, which came out in late 2010 (I find it kickass... except the singers yelling at the end of the sequence.. it kinda gets to me)

This is the Intro of the game which came out in 1997

If you've played the game or seen the movie... I want that satellite :) Birthday's in May.. just sayin'