BBC Jesus Christ, Superstar

And you thought Mel Gibson’s Passion was gonna hasten The Apocalypse:

The BBC plans to mark the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ this Easter with an hour-long live procession through the streets of Manchester featuring pop stars from The Stone Roses and Happy Mondays and featuring songs by The Smiths and New Order.
In the programme, called Manchester Passion, a character representing Jesus will sing the legendary Joy Division anthem Love Will Tear Us Apart before dueting his arch-betrayer Judas on the New Order hit Blue Monday, according to senior church sources involved in the production.

There is so much to quote in this article, you absolutely must read the whole thing.
This is not a drill, people. If you have lamps, I suggest you fill them with oil, cuz the bridegroom cometh, and it ain’t gonna be pretty. But just in case the world doesn’t end, I’m setting my TiVo right now.
BBC’s Jesus sings Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now [mediaguardian via tmftml]

Crowbars: 2, Maybach: 1

Football team owner Gigi Becali [aka the Woody Johnson of Bucharest]’s car got sideswiped. So he and a henchman opened the door like they do in the old country: with a couple of crowbars and a sportsnews camera crew watching on.
A Maybach hasn’t been subject to this kind of mitteleuropische humiliation since the Bulgarian-born Christo wrapped himself in one during “The Gates.”

Video: Maybach schadeherstel [autoblog.nl via jalopnik]

Artnet Dorks Out Over Dorkbot

Wow, Artnet associate editor Ben Davis got just what he wanted for Christmas: the chance to write at length about art and technology. He covers the video game-inspired show at Pace Wildenstein in Chelsea last month [generally, eh] and better-reviewed shows like Bit Edition‘s multi-artist animation collaboration in Brooklyn with vertexList, and a Dewan Brothers show at Pierogi [they’re like the Harry Partch of synthesizers, very DIY.] But he saves most of the love for Dorkbot, aka Gearhacking: The Gathering, that monthly rendezvous of people doing wack stuff with gear.
Technical Knock-Outs [artnet]

Cleanup Crew: 1, Entropy: 0 At The Spiral Jetty

From The Salt Lake Tribune, 1/21/06:

Spiral Jetty cleanup: Utah officials last month removed several tons of junk from Rozel Point, the area along the Great Salt Lake’s north shore that is home to Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty.
“Anyone who has made the trip to see the famous Spiral Jetty . . . has passed through the area and certainly noted that it was an eyesore,” says Joel Frandsen, director of the state Division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands, which supervised the cleanup along with the state Division of Oil, Gas and Mining.
Workers removed 18 loads of junk and plugged more than a dozen abandoned oil wells.

I spoke to someone at Forestry for some more detail. Included in that list of eyesores are the burned out trailer, that weird amphibious tank thing, the abandoned cars, basically most of the industrial detritus that fed into visitors’ sense of Smithsonian entropy. [Todd discusses this and has pictures of the now-gone junk on From The Floor.]
And about those oil wells, it turns out the oil is quite viscous, kind of tar-like, and it pools very slowly over the years. Some might say that for Smithson, that’s not a bug; it’s a feature. Well it’s moot now.
The project took a couple of weeks and supposedly focused only on sovereign land: state-owned shoreline, which is determined by elevation [i.e., the land, below 4,201′ I think, which is about four feet higher than the Jetty itself. Depending on the terrain, a 4′ change in elevation can take you quite a ways inland, although I can’t see it going all the way up to the trailer…hmm.]
There was also talk of negotiating an easement for parking, so that visitors won’t have to park on the road or trespass when they park beyond the “end of road” sign.
I didn’t get the sense that the Dia Center was involved in the project in any way, but we’ll see. I have some queries into them at the moment. The deadline for bids for a concession to operate a capuccino-and-smoothie cart during the peak Jetty months of June-October will begin March 15. OK, I made that last one up. I hope.
SLTrib Visual Arts [sltrib.com, thanks to Monty for the heads up]
Previous greg.org-on-Jetty action

It’s All About The Benjamins, Baby

agonzales_bfranklin.jpg ap-Charles Dharapak via yahoo
Yesterday Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was shooting some b-roll at Georgetown Law for this week’s WH production [working title, according to the AP: “Bush to Visit NSA for Pep Talk”], but it looks like they ran into some problems with the extras.
You know, when leafblower-wielding hustlers were driving around, disrupting shoots in LA, the studios got some anti-nuisance legislation passed. Makes you wonder if WHP isn’t thinking that’d be pretty handy right about now.

Elmgreen & Dragset Blitz London [sic]

My boys Elmgreen & Dragset are opening their show, The Welfare State, at the Serpentine tomorrow, and there’s a conference related to the show at the Goethe Institute on Friday, and there’s a fat catalogue on every day, whenever you like. [oops, actually, it’s not out in the US until March.]
Kultureflash has images from the show’s first incarnation at Kunsthall Bergen, Norway.
pradamarfa.jpg
Meanwhile, here’s a photo they sent me from just before their Prada Marfa project opened last fall. That there’s Boyd on the left.

Gentlemen, You Can’t Threaten In Here, This Is The Threat Operations Center!

gwb_nsa_wide.jpg
Gotta admit, the rather mundane, unimpressive visuals of the NSA’s Threat Operations Center are a boost to the secretive agency’s credibility. The place looks like utilitarian Government, right down to the bald-ponytailed sysadmin on the front row.
gwb_nsa_screens.jpg
The TOC had enough wallscreens plotting enough suitably important-looking, real-time metrics that the WH advance team only needed to dress a media meeting point for GWB–which turned out to be a hallway.
gwb_nsa_backdrop.jpg
Looks like the doors were taken off their hinges, and the transoms were filled with blackout WHP graphics. Other than that, Sforza’s lighting buddy Bob DiServi swapped out a few floodlights to fill out the back, and that’s it. All in all, very narrowly focused, limited scope, and only what’s absolutely necessary. [which, conveniently, is identical to today’s message]. And the whole thing was authorized by the 9/11 congressional resolution.
A bonus set dressing tip: How do you get the flags to furl just so? A wire hanger, bent into a diamond and duct-taped to the flagpole underneath.
images: reuters/todd black; ap/evan vucci via yahoo

Pink Lady = Jeff

For the autumn sports festival season, many schools and kindergartens sang out “oh-ha!” and danced along to Shingo Mama’s song. The word was awarded a grand prize for trendy word of 2000. In the twenty-first century, “oh-ha!” just might become a standard morning greeting among the Japanese.

First shiny mud balls and now oh-ha. The near-instantaneous global dissemination of Japanese flashtrends is one of the hallmarks of the new Internet Century.
Meanwhile, between Shingo Mama and Turner Prize winning potter Grayson Perry, I predict large, doll-like cross-dressers will rule the world by 2010 at the latest
Shingo Mama no Oh-Ha [google video via tmn]
WHAT’S COOL IN JAPAN: July-September 2000: Shingo Mama [web-japan.org]

The American Dream: Astroturf And A White Picket Fence

Wow, we have entered the Sforzian Baroque period.
gwb_fences_astroturf.jpg
A GWB “townhall-style meeting” at a moving company in Sterling, VA took place on one of the most soundstage-like sets we’ve seen in a while. These screened supporter-packed events were very popular during the campaign. Here, the classic “Sforzian Backdrop” gives way to a more spatially complex theater-in-the-round composition, complete with white picket fences, white white people [oops], and on-message Astroturf [oops again].
But wait, there IS a Backdrop, a pop-out house, complete with shingles and clapboard siding. [and on-message banner, of course]. I’d be interested to see if WH Prod. built the house, or if it was pre-existing, and thus served as a source for the WHP design.
gwb_fence_house.jpg
Whether it was intentional or not, you have to give the White House credit; this through-the-fence angle is a thoughful gift to the powerless liberal Photoshoppers clamoring for impeachment.
gwb_behind_fence.jpg
Or those dreaming of a good old-fashioned showtrial.
saddam_behind_fences.jpg
Images: top two: AP/Evan Vucci, bottom: Reuters/Jim Young via yahoo]
Shoutout to lowculture Matt for the Iraqi Defendant Crib reference.

Needed: 6 Containers Of Pistachio-Colored Drywall

On Saturday, the Rem Koolhaas Prada store in SoHo was either engulfed in flames, soaked in water and smoke, or both.
The ostentatiously exposed drywall was Prada green and imported, if not actually manufactured to spec. [What’s the stock color of Italian drywall? Anybody?] Watch for the just-arrived merch to show up, freshly drycleaned, at a TJ Maxx far from you, very soon.
And what’s this? The Guggenheim is still hanging out in the building? Did landlord collector Peter Brant get his forever for-sale Warhol Last Supper out of their gallery in time?
Verbose Coma has pictures,, Gothamist has roundups, and modernartnotes has a draft checklist of art in the building [verbosecoma via gothamist]

Is This The Coup?

Because there have been helicopters flying over the house in DC every five minutes for the last hour, apparently. Maybe we’re in the flight path to Camp David, or maybe we’re too close to Cheney’s house, which is where I’d imagine any coup would start.

I See Tori Spelling As The Witness

When will E! stage a Jackson Trial-style re-enactment of the Paris Hilton deposition transcript? Because seriously, there hasn’t been a 200-page, skank-related legal document this readable since the Starr Report:

Q. Let me just take a step back because I didn’t ask about what Val Kilmer had said about Zeta, if anything. did he speak negatively towards her? You might have said something.
MR STEIN: She reported that he said she was a crazy bitch.
THE WITNESS: That she was insane. She was a bad person.
MR BERRA: Did he ever provide any specific things that she had done or was it just a general–
A. No. We were just like walking in the lobby of the hotel. No, it wasn’t the lobby of the hotel, it was the lobby in the boat.
Q. There is a lobby in the boat? [Paul Allen’s boat, anchored at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival]
A. It’s like a 500-foot yacht. It’s insane.
…
Q…Do you recall sending Rob and e-mail before this one?
A. Maybe. I don’t even remember.
Q. Okay.
A. That was the whole thing. I needed a dress– I mean, I needed jewewlry and a dress.
Q. You had a dress, though?
A. Yeah, I did have a dress.
MR BERRA [the questioner, attorney for the plaintiff, Zeta Graff]: Marking the next exhibit in order, No. 6.
THE WITNESS: (Witness yawns.)
MR. BERRA: We have to do this every day.
THE WITNESS: I’d kill myself.
…
Q. [In an e-mail about a Graff diamond necklace, publicist Rob Shuter] refers to it as the “biggest f***off necklace you have ever seen.” Do you remember receiving this e-mail?
A. Yeah.
Q. And you received it right around the same period of time?
A. Uh-huh.
Q. And then you responded back, adn correct me if I am wrong, “Love it! Zeta Graff will be so pissed.” Do you recall writing that?
A. Yep.
Q. What was your–what was the reason that you wrote that?…
A. Just paris told me — Paris’s maid Kula told me that she knows all the jewelry and she would, like, freak out if I was ever wearing Graff jewelry. She had said that at some point. And then wehn i told paris, I was like, “Graff is bringing jewelry over.” And was like, “Oh, she’s going to be so pissed.”…
Q. Okay. Can you read that back, Pam. (Record reads as follows: “Answer: Just Paris told me– Paris’s maid Kula told me that she knows all the jewelry and” –)
THE WITNESS: Not maid. Can you take “maid” out. That’s rude. She’s not a maid. Sorry. I don’t want her to think that I called her a maid. She’s not. Assistant.
MR STEIN [Hilton’s attorney]: A keeper.
MR BERRA: Now she’s not going to do any more housework.
…
MR BERRA: I believe that’s it. Just give me 30 seconds.
(Discussion held off the record.)
MR STEIN: We will stipulate that the original can be delivered to our offices and if not signed and returned–within 30 days?
MR BERRA: That’s fine with me.
MR STEIN: –it can be used as if it were signed for all purposes.
THE WITNESS: This is not going to the media, right?

pdf’s of the deposition and email transcript are available in the sidebar at tmz.com

Or On Par With The First Time Seeing “Hungry Like The Wolf”?

“When I originally posted the video on the site I likened watching it to a life-changing experience ‘on par with losing your virginity or seeing Garden State for the first time‘…” [emphasis added]

sigur_ross_glossoli.jpg

That’s part of Derek’s description of #1, “Glosoli,” a Sigur Ros video, which is pretty gorgeous. Obviously, it might be that I’m just waaay too old and outside the demo anymore, but if Beck’s boring-ass breakdancing robot video is #47, I guess there really aren’t 65 good music videos made each year.
M3 Online: Top 65 Music Videos Of 2005 [gwfa via robotwisdom]