Winterfest 2007

The SF Bicycle Coalition and SF bag company Rickshaw Bagworks are putting on "the biggest and baddest bike party of the year": Winterfest 2007, SFBC's 12th Annual Auction, Art Show, Party & Fundraiser.

Up for bidding will be bags and bikes, restaurant gift certificates, 60 pieces of local art and dates with "local celebrities". Meanwhile, enjoy New Belgium Brewery beer, snacks and entertainment by the Extra Action Marching Band.

Proceeds from this fundraiser go directly toward improving biking conditions in SF (more bike lanes?). Looks like a smashing good time to me! Plus, if you're not an SFBC member yet, $25 gets you entrance to the event and an SFBC membership.

Where: SOMArts Gallery (Brannan @ 8th St)
When: Dec 2nd from 6-10:30pm
SFBC members: $10+ (Sliding scale)
Non-SFBC members: $25 (incl new SFBC membership)



Benefits of being an SFBC member:
• Discounts at more than 35 local bike shops & merchants
• 10% off at Rainbow Grocery when you ride your bike there
• Urban Bicyclists' Survival Kit: SF Cyclist/Pedestrian street grade map, transit guides, safety advice, reflectors, more
• Admission to SFBC's Cultural History Bike Tours and invites to SFBC parties

With 7,500 members, SFBC claims to be the largest bicycle advocacy organization in the country. Efforts in the past decade have doubled the number of bike lanes including those on Potrero, Market, Valencia, Polk, Alemany and Howard Streets.

Marnie - 'suspenseful sex mystery'

So I was overzealous and thought that the Chronicle Books grand opening party was happening yesterday, but it's not actually until December 1.


However, "Marnie" was playing as scheduled at MOMA, fortunately -- a 35mm print! This 1964 Alfred Hitchcock film stars Tippi Hedren (also leading lady of The Birds) and Sean Connery, and is decidedly different from the other Hitchcock films I've seen, which admittedly, is nowhere near the whole portfolio. The cinematography, colors and costumes are, of course, impeccable, though the film dragged in some parts - mainly some overly lengthy dialog scenes. Sir Connery sure was a swarthily handsome man in the 60s! Still handsome and virile, but so dark and delicious in the 60s.


"Marnie" was showing as part of MOMA's film series True and False: Jeff Wall on Cinematography in conjunction with the Jeff Wall exhibit.

Of this series I'd also like to attend:

Thursday, December 20, 2007

Persona
1966, 85 min.
Direction: Ingmar Bergman
Cinematography: Sven Nykvist
6:30 p.m.

The partnership between Bergman and Nykvist is perhaps the most famous one between a director and a cinematographer in the entire history of film. Persona centers on the relationship between two women spending days at a summer retreat on an island in Sweden: Elisabeth (Liv Ullmann) is an actress who has become unable to speak, and Alma (Bibi Andersson) is the nurse who cares for her and tells her stories. It's a scenario that yields deep, dark, and complex psychological meanings. Persona has become a landmark in the history of cinema, not least for the ways in which Bergman and Nykvist self-consciously foreground the very process of filmmaking.

Thursday, December 27, 2007
The Mother and the Whore
1973, 210 min.
Direction: Jean Eustache
Cinematography: Pierre Lhomme
6:30 p.m.

Eustache died young but left us one incomparable classic: The Mother and the Whore, an epic study of sexual politics in the aftermath of the failed French revolution of 1968. Jean-Pierre Léaud plays the troubled intellectual at the center of a love triangle. It is a dramatic, witty, erotic, and emotionally powerful film, and a late masterpiece of the French New Wave. In addition to working with Eustache, cinematographer Lhomme collaborated with Jean-Luc Godard, Joris Ivens, Chris Marker, Jean-Pierre Melville, Jean-Paul Rappeneau, and many others. He received major awards for many films, including Cyrano de Bergerac and Camille Claudel.

Timbuk2 Artist Originals Event & Ride

Tomorrow, SF bag company Timbuk2 is hosting a bike ride followed by a Timbuk2 Originals Event - LA meets SF.

5:15pm: meet at Hotel Des Arts, 447 Bush St. @ Grant

Ride to TImbuk2 store: 506 Hayes St. @ Octavia.
I went to the Timbus2 store opening last April and did a piece on the lovely Hayes Valley shop.
This event is sure to feature some interesting one-of-a-kind bags, and a portion of the proceeds will go to a charity of the artists' choice.

25 hours in NYC

Phew. Returned today from a 25-hr whirlwind trip to NY for a tech blogger function. Monday evening hopped on a red-eye, landed at 7am Tuesday and hit the ground running. Culminated in the event that took place in the posh basement of plush Flat Iron Lounge on 19th. But the best part of the trip, I would have to say, was having dinner at 1am at the Blue Ribbon on Sullivan Street in SOHO. Within 15 minutes we stopped by four Blue Ribbon locations, each a slight variation on the last. Two locations sit across the street from each other on Bedford Street, and two are located on Sullivan Street within blocks of each other; one is a sushi joint.

We started with raw oysters, then onto steak tartare (I feel gross about eating raw beef, but it was kind of tasty), fried chicken, but the queen of the evening was the Chocolate Bruno, a flourless chocolate cake flanked in triangle formation by one scoop each of vanilla, peach and chocolate ice creams.

Along the way I ran into a sad bicycle with only one handlebar:

After that it was off to bed for an hour before wrenching myself up to catch a 7:55 am flight. Landed at noon and went straight to the office, didn't leave until 6. What a day. I can't believe it is only Wednesday.

There are a few things, however, that I am looking forward to this weekend:

Saturday - Chronicle Books (one of my absolute favorite publishers - and local!) grand opening party, as well as the showing of Marnie at SFMOMA:

"Marnie stars Tippi Hedren as a disturbed kleptomaniac terrified of the color red and Sean Connery as the businessman who becomes obsessed with her. It has a psycho-sexual intensity that is rare even for Hitchcock. Burks started out producing special effects for Warner Bros., specializing in forced perspective miniatures, before becoming a full director of photography in 1949. Marnie is the last of 12 films that he shot with “the master of suspense.” Burks's clean and sharp, deep-focus approach came to define the classic Hitchcockian visual style."

Sunday - Isis & Big Business at Slim's! I definitely prefer GAMH to Slim's, but am so excited to see Isis again. Big Business was great with The Melvins...

Katsushige Nakahashi - Kaiten

After the "There is Always a Machine Between Us" exhibit at SF Camerawork, a non-profit artists' photography organization, I added myself to the mailing list for opportunities like the one I just signed up for: a three-hour volunteer shift to help assemble a full-scale replica of a Kaiten, a one-man submarine exclusively designed for suicide missions by the Japanese in World War II. This replica will consist entirely of taped-together photographs; the artist, Katsushige Nakahashi, photographed the surface of a toy model taking on average 27 photographs for every square centimeter.

Volunteers will tape the photographs together to construct the full-scale replica. This project, named "Zero Project Kaiten" took place in Japan in 2006. Nakahashi's Zero Projects pertain to his father's experiences in the war.

Arts and Culture Free4All

Today saw the first-ever Arts and Culture Free4All: 12 cultural institutes located within the 3-block Yerba Buena Neighborhood opened their doors to the public for free. The rainy day made it a perfect day to spend in museums, but everyone had the same idea so the establishments were all mobbed. I went back to MOMA for the Olafur Eliasson exhibit again and also fell in love with the Joseph Cornell boxes and Jeff Wall's story-filled photographs. Below is one of my favorite photos from the Jeff Wall installation.



Afterwards I made my first visit of what should be many to the Cartoon Art Museum for Edward Gorey's Dracula exhibit: "August 11, 2007 - January 20, 2008 The Cartoon Art Museum is proud to present Edward Gorey's Dracula, an amazing exhibition of the master cartoonist's original set and costume designs, rare production photographs and memorabilia from the Tony Award-winning Broadway production. Museum visitors will have a unique behind-the-scenes look at the creative process, from Gorey's initial notes and sketches through his completed concept artwork." Having become a fan of Gorey's work from his opening animations for PBS' Mystery series, it was something else to see his detailed works up close. Also charming were works by Mary Blair who was a concept artist for Walt Disney Studios from 1940s onward. I picked up a rendition of Cinderella illustrated by Blair to gift to my sister, as Cinderella was always her favorite Disney princess film.

RVCA!

Last night was the big night: grand opening of the new RVCA store in Upper Haight. Very awesome.

Handsome exterior with works in the display window by Ed Templeton and impeccably designed and outfitted interior make for one of the best retail spaces I've seen in a long time. I haven't been so impressed with a shop since travels to Europe. The octopus chandeliers and pictorial displays are amazing.



The back room serves as a gallery and houses an amazing art installation complete with rusty bike frames, surfboards, photographs and awe-inspiring paintings. Phil Frost himself was working on some canvases. Wonder what he was listening to while his hand worked the white-out pen.

crammed week again

SF Station writers get-together tonight. Was contemplating going to see Jesu, These Arms Are Snakes and Oxbow at GAMH afterwards, but that is an ambitious plan. I haven't seen or listened to much Oxbow but Snakes are a spectacle (in the best way possible) and Jesu is Jesu, aka beautiful. Plus, Oxbow are on Hydra Head Records, a label that can do no wrong in my eyes.

Tomorrow night is Ingmar Bergman's "Fanny and Alexander" at the Castro theater. I hope the organist is in attendance.


Thursday: RVCA official opening and Barry McGee + Phil Frost are two of the artists showing!! So excited. KALX is also having an anniversary party at Rickshaw.

"phone fingers": how bizarre.

I got sent a link to a product called "Phone Fingers". Meant to be used with the fingerprint-prone iPhone, these are literally finger condoms meant to keep your phone smudge-free. SO UGLY.

These are practical because...? Who would want to keep these on all the time? It would be way too much hassle to put on and take off when you're not using the phone... Ugh, so gross looking.

If you don't believe me, just click here.

Kingpin, Eastern Promises & edIT

1. Article on "When Electronics Become Art" is up. Definitely not my finest work to date, but the exhibit is really neat. For all the stuff that he's done, the artist Joe Grand (hacker alias Kingpin is pleasantly down-to-earth and open. The installation is up through the first week of December, so poke your head in.

2. Saw Eastern Promises tonight. Not exactly what I was expecting, being told it was Russian movie, but by no means disappointed! It's pretty gripping in spots, but Naomi Watt's character has some dumb moments. Viggo Mortensen provides some delectable eye candy.

3. edIT - I just purchased edIT of Glitch Mob's "Certified Air Raid Material" off iTunes. I don't normally buy from iTunes but the instant gratification was hard to argue with. Lots of "dancefloor smashers" on this album. He's playing at Get Freaky at 1015 on Friday... might have to go peep the live thing.

Klaus Nomi

The Nomi Song, a documentary on New Wave wonder Klaus Nomi, was on On Demand. It would have been quite amazing to have seen him perform in person -- his filmed performances are quite surreal, with very imaginative costuming. His voice and style are strikingly different from other New Wave acts of the time and still stand out today.

The documentary includes a clip from the episode of SNL with David Bowie performing "The Man Who Sold the World" and there's the elf-like Nomi on backup vocals. I'd have to say from what I've heard, "Simple Man" and "Nomi Song" are my favorites.

In searching for images of the man I stumbled across this really cool Dalston Oxfam Shop blog on which "Dalston Shopper" posts once a week on digital recordings of cassette tapes purchased at Dalston Oxfam Shop in East London. Here's the fantastic post on Klaus Nomi in concert.

RVCA & Barry McGee

I was really excited to stumble by happy accident upon the very new, very good-looking RVCA storefront that's replaced the old Gap in Upper Haight (it's about time Gap vacated the neighborhood!). Apparently they had their "soft launch"in September and VASF is the first of what will be several flagship stores for this cool label. Definitely planning on writing about it for SF Station.



Barry McGee is currently exhibiting at the REDCAT gallery, another accidental discovery I made while perusing San Francisco artist Lisa Congdon's Flickr, as she is down south for her solo exhibition titled Charming Creatures at Firefly in Venice. Regretfully, I missed the Beautiful Losers exhibit when it came to SF a few years ago. I'd really like to take a trip down to RECAT to peep this installation. It's up for 3 more weeks. The photo above is taken from Lisa's Flickr postings on her visit to REDCAT.

monday again

Yesterday I checked out the Olafur Eliasson exhibit at SFMOMA, and wow. That exhibit is my favorite that I've seen there as yet. The breadth and variety of his work (he's only 40!) is pretty astounding. I don't want to ruin the installation for people who haven't gone yet, but the minute I stepped out of the elevator onto the 5th floor entering the exhibit, I was blown away. There were so many moments during this exhibit that I felt like an eight-year-old again, just filled with childish delight. Another reason I really loved this exhibit was the scientific, mathematical nature of many parts of the installation. Cause and effect, the study of light and angles -- geometrical concepts lead to visually stunning results. The kaleidoscopic portions of the exhibit are glee-inducing! The 2nd floor BMW project applies interesting methods involving ice carving.

It was a weekend of firsts for me: first mass ever attended at the beautiful St. Ignatius for my charming coworker Phil was was recently diagnosed with pancreatic cancer... first bicycle ride over the Golden Gate, first ride through Golden Gate Park. I was kind of insane and rode to Upper Haight through Twin Peaks. Needless to say by the time I got to Sausalito I was swearing off exercise for the rest of the weekend.

inaugura

Whew, this week was the most draining I can remember in recent history.

My boss and mentor had his last day with the company yesterday. Over the course of the last three years he has come to mean so much more than a boss to me. I've gone to his office countless times to discuss work of course, vent, lament my love life, complain about hangovers, for advice on snowboard and bike gear, talk music... He is the kind of person everyone wants to be around. After over 15 years with this company I'm happy he'll be moving onto a lucrative venture that will give him so much more room to grow and really do what he's capable of while giving him more time with his family. Hopefully we'll make good on our pledge to continue our mentor-mentee relationship and really, our friendship. In his stead my new boss is the best I could ask for from the pool of people I work with so I'm looking forward to seeing how everything pans out.

On the moonlighting side, I wrote an article on Rare Device that was published today on SF Station and can be read here. I haven't gotten a chance to meet the proprietress Rena yet, but she was a doll to talk with. Rena opened the Brooklyn Rare Device in 2005 and just celebrated her San Francisco store opening this week with a gallery reception for Los Angeles artist Kelly Lynn Jones last night. I really would have liked to have gone, but I can't complain about seeing Pinback at Bimbo's. Though their new stuff is catchy, I am still a sucker for their older material. I'd say Tripoli is my favorite track with Loro a close second. I was a little disappointed by how sped up their songs sounded.

Wednesday night was my boss's farewell dinner with a few close coworkers, which meant never-ending sangria and double tequila shots topped off with a martini. Tuesday night was even more exhausting; I worked a press event at the Metreon from 5-10 after a full day at work, shmoozing with tech bloggers, journalists, and analysts.

Tomorrow if I can face my demons, I'm going to ride to Sausalito. I haven't biked over the Golden Gate yet! Eek.

That will be followed by a gallery opening at my friend Chris's gallery 20 GOTO 10. This newest exhibition looks really intriguing, featuring the impressive works of the super-talented Joe Grand.