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CREATION MYTH
I chaperoned a class trip to the NYC Hayden Planetarium to see Worlds Beyond Earth, during which it speculated that a meteor was responsible for bringing the first life to the planet in the form of an amino acid. There it was: The origin of all our division, insanity, quest for power, worship of money, petty selfishness and hatred (and yes, all our grace and beauty and intelligence too, but that was not what was bombarding the news that week) reduced to a speck of lucky dust that by some miracle landed on our goldilocks planet which supported it’s evolution...into us. What happened along the timeline of our existence to have come so far and yet still be so ignorant of our miraculous fortune? Bring Back the Good Old Days (G.O.D.) is not pro or anti-religion. It is an anthem to the myth of our imagined importance, power, and ignorance as a single race, how we worship ourselves, and where it might lead. “Never forget where you came from, kid”.
The music is a generic iMovie soundtrack I slowed down 4x and set lyrics and vocals to underscore the irony of the above. Then I built a hypothetical instructional story in the style of filmstrips I used to view in grade school. Due to the limitations of the programs I use, it has the most detail and problem-solving I’ve used to date. The aliens will not be coming to destroy or rescue us.
#1 in the Asymmetric Warfare series. More to come.
DOCUMINTARY
2021 was already ancient news in the time-lapsed universe of NFT/Crypto/Web 3 when I made this. Still, no one wanted to talk about it—yet. A friendly documentary was needed. I wanted the first minute to be exactly as I remembered the beginnings of parts in Ric Burns’ brilliant 1999 New York documentary. In that magnificent work, each episode’s beginning narration would sum up the previous epoch and set the stage for the next one in the opening sequence. I purposely didn’t rewatch any of the series, since its stylistic impression on me was so strong. I needed an off-beat, lilting staccato version of a quintessential American folk song to set the mood and provide the arc for the first half of my story. I recorded my version of Steven Foster’s Oh Susanna in a style I hoped would fit the setup. In the New York episodes during the opening music, usually one initial grand image starts the episode, as the narrator sums up the previous part. The camera then begins a slow zoom and pan to reveal a hidden part of the scene that sets the stage for PART II (as I interpreted to be the punk acid trip we found ourselves in later on). A Black Mollies song I wrote long ago called Nobody Understands fit nicely into that musical transition into chaos. If we knew then what we know now, and so on...
A LOVE LETTER TO OUR LORES
This was an abstract mashup of ideas in need of a story until I spontaneously googled Michael Figge, the mastermind behind 10KTF. Who was this man? What made him tick beyond the scant social media information available? I found nothing. Then, on a memorial website, I found an incredible journalistic obituary of Mike’s dad, written by Mike. It was a lovely testament to what appeared to me a remarkable life: The son of an original Homesteader of the Tuscon Mountains, who throughout his life faced and overcame challenges the kind that defines the Greatest Generation. I don’t know Mike, or claim to know what has driven him to his success, but I am acutely aware of the effect that our lores have on us, and how they can directly or inadvertently affect the trajectories of our lives. I thought of my parents (my dad appears in the film) and their effect on me—for better or worse. If Web 3, NFTs, and digital humanity are the war you were going off to fight for, then LOVE LETTER would be the note I would slip into your pocket before you left. “Get yours now” is an ode to incessant Twitter ad bursts that appeared in my timeline. I pilfered a song I wrote 20 years earlier (that I finished during Covid) for the Hammond organ line build-up to the end. Tempus Fugit when you're having fun.
THE POWER OF CULTURE COMMANDS YOU
Believe it or not, there was a time when pretty much one meme alone dominated Web 3. Everything was for the culture—a phrase we’re still trying to decipher. For the culture. What exactly is this relatively young culture? Anti-culture? A culture of revolution? Exclusivity? Kool-aid that everyone drank? What exactly goes on inside the confines of the Everything Pepe Academy? I was exhausted, but curious to imagine.
But growing tired of a Pepe meme is like getting sick of water, whether you like it or not—it's not going anywhere. I wanted the opening to be Exorcist-like, so I created my animated version of that film's famous eerie opening tableau and composed appropriate music to go with it. It then morphs it into a rock n roll orgy where everything ends up in flames. Mona Lisa kidnapped and Clockwork-Oranged into accepting the inevitable—the last remnants of Web 2 exorcised from her soul? Probably not. It may be the chicken who kicks over the gas can, but Pepe's the one who burps out the match that ignites the flame. Interpret to taste, but never say I didn’t participate in the culture.
WE SAY ALL THE RIGHT THINGS
It’s said that language is the forerunner of culture (see above) and the cornerstone of our civilization. This piece grew out of my early musings on the nature of our Web 3 dialect, and the near obsession to identify and separate this thing of ours from previous…culture. Words form code—handshakes to one another that get you into the Web 3 clubhouse. Are you of the body? I borrowed the opening tableau from an obscure, rhetorically bizarre (yet well-intentioned) Civil Defense film my father was contracted by the US government to direct in 1949 called Our Cities Must Fight, tweaking its opening typewriter-written directive to fit our current mission. How will we teach the next generation our language? Make it more accessible with even sillier recognizable words and images. Cue tap dance music. We are all tap dancing, aren’t we? Web 3 needs more jingles. Slam Bam Booty Ham Mighty Web Three-O.
Fun facts:
1) If you look closely at the girl you might recognize the stare in a well-known meme (fire in background).
2) This was the forerunner/inspiration for the Elements series.
DIRECT MAIL DREAM
Years ago I was tasked with designing fashion designer Gemma Kahng’s website. I used different tableaus that featured mannequins for each landing page in a unique style. The design was never used due to certain personal...complications. But I re-imagined one image as an ode to a looking glass focused on another former life: my tenure as Senior Art Director for BMG Direct. In a 2-day “audition” period, I was tasked with coming up with a fresh derivative of the company’s long-running Direct Mail campaign. Their most successful bundle to date had been a plain envelope with no graphics. Written on the front was Plain and Simple and on the back 12 CDs for the Price Of 1, and Nothing More to Buy, Ever. You may have even received one (or hundreds) of these yourself, or at least the Columbia House version. I chose a retro imagining of promoting Laundry detergent, only with CD’s on the Box. I was hired, and they used my design. Two years later I was downsized along with sixty other people in the dot com crash of 2001. The TV features several Mods of the the DM envelope. Music is courtesy of my high school choir in 19XX, mashed up with various samples. Also see in JPEGS: NFTstock, which was the first re-design of the original envelope.
A CHICKEN WALKS INTO THE OTHERSIDE
Not sure this whimsical adventure into the “otherside”has aged well—but perhaps in the prophecy dept it has. Time will tell, and possibly soothe our ETH gas tears. That aside, my intention when I made this was whimsical optimism. Little did I know. What is the Otherside? What happens when a chicken armed with a ledger full of ETH and enough gas to buy a small country enters that domain? Why does the road stop? Where is everyone? Why is it so crowded? What happened? What happens now? What happened to the goddamn chicken (see: The Power Of Culture Commands You)? Did it really begin? At the time, being sucked into the vacuum cleaner was merely a sight gag. Feels more symbolic now. Life is full of ironies. And yes, those are samples from the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Bee Gees with some Wile E. Coyote thrown in. In retrospect, it’s all about venturing into the unknown but discovering we all have a sh*tload of company there.
BLOCK OR CANCEL?
This began as a large collection mint I was toying with doing based on hundreds of screenshots I took each time I blocked someone to get them off my Twitter feed. Did I mention I adore my timeline? Some of the blocked were more recognizable than others. For instance, popular people and political figures, large corporations, and just about any entity who felt the need (with the help of Twitter’s algorithms) to spam my feed, including entire countries whose ad campaigns were a tad too aggressive/repetitive at the time (it's funny blocking a whole country). Banning things often made me laugh, and seemed a statement in itself. I loved seeing the postscript: “XXX” will no longer… But was I also canceling them in a way? Was I inadvertently jumping on the popular bandwagon by simply filtering my choices? Or just exercising my right to insulate my Twitter neighborhood from unwanted iinterlopoers? Now that was an idea worth lampooning. Can we navigate Web 3—let alone life without being bothered by @nything? Improbable, but a sublime thought and a goal devoutly to be wish'd...
DO I HAVE ENOUGH?
Bragging about sweeping the floor has diminished in recent years due to those floors...ahem. Were these the modern version of obnoxious Yahoo finance posts of yesteryear? My greeting card to those broski floor-sweeper alpha kids with not enough or too much testosterone. Cuts hard, bra.
Note: First time introducing the yet unnamed ape that came for the bananas then wouldn’t leave. Last seen as the Candidate in Documintary, then as the uninvited guest at Villa Medici (see below).
WELCOME TO THE FACTORY
Begin. If I knew why any of the 49 editions sold I’d be a genius, but most likely because peeps suspected I was connected to a larger collection’s alpha (not just a solo artist), and that there would be some later reward. At least I caught the last twelve seconds of open edition mania. Welcome to my factory. Due to the disclaimer in the film of no utility, refunds will not be issued, but you may have a collectors item in the event of my timely death. Hint: Haste Thee Nymph
AN UNEXPECTED GUEST 1&2
I’ve pictured myself hobnobbing with the 1% since I was a kid, and the tradition goes on. And who better to hang out with than the mysterious Cozomo de Medici having a late lunch on Lake Como at Tremezzo, or in his royal bedroom?
The monkey is an amalgam of multiple Steve Buschemi roles—most notably the smart-ass
idiot in Michael Bay’s classic popcorn thriller Armageddon who asks the inappropriate questions inquiring minds want to know. Original Music by Oggi in both (aside from the Vivaldi).
