Link About It: This Week’s Picks
Zinedine Zidane’s bronze headbutt, MoCA Cleveland, Hotel Droog and more in our look at the web this week
1. Cultivate
Examining the natural world with unconventional eyes, print publication Wilder Quarterly recently joined the team at the New York Times with a regular column in T Magazine. The first installment, penned by WQ editor Abbye Churchill, covers MoMA’s current J. Morgan Puett exhibition, Common Sense, which highlights the artist’s creative “domesticating.”
2. Hotel Droog
Fans of Droog can now immerse themselves in the celebrated Dutch design studio’s conceptual lifestyle by reserving a room at the newly opened Hotel Droog in Amsterdam. The hotel combines all of Droog’s various facets—”from curation to product design, exhibitions and lectures,” explains Renny Ramakers—under one uniquely styled roof.
3. Silent Spring
This month marks the 50th anniversary of ecologist Rachel Carson’s epic book “Silent Spring,” a cautionary report still causing controversy today. While many of her peers felt the book took on an alarming perspective, a new biography written by William Souder speaks to Carson’s gentler critics and the absolute relevance of her work.
4. CW’s High-Tech Ad
The CW Network’s Fall television advertising campaign goes high-tech this season by embedding a fully functional smartphone within the pages of Entertainment Weekly. The Android-powered phone features a live-video display screen, a full keypad, USB port, camera, speaker and perhaps most surprisingly, an activated SIM card.
5. MoCA Cleveland
Cleveland’s Museum of Contemporary Art will reopen its doors next week in a stunning new building designed by London-based architect, Farshid Moussavi. With a history plagued by violence and a depreciating economy, Cleveland hopes to turn skeptics into believers through the revitalization of the great city.
6. Bicyclean
After watching people expose themselves to toxic materials while scavenging through a Ghanese e-waste dump, 22-year-old engineer Rachel Field created the Bicyclean, a standing bike modified to pulverize electronic waste into tiny pieces. Now in contention for a James Dyson award, the Bicyclean requires no external electricity and is built entirely from components that can easily be sourced in Ghana, making it an ideal solution for locals whose livelihoods depend on precious metals salvaged from the dump.
7. Zinedine Zidane Headbutt Statue
The infamous head-butting incident that ended French soccer player Zinedine Zidane’s career in 2006 is now immortalized in a new 16 foot high, solid bronze statue by Algerian sculptor Adel Abdessemed. On view from 3 October 2012 through 7 January 2013 outside Paris’ Centre Pompidou, the sculpture is part of a larger showcase of Abdessemed’s work including drawings, videos and photography.
8. Lockitron
Giving new definition to keyless entry, Lockitron is a new smartphone app that allows you to remotely unlock deadbolts or revoke access from anywhere in the world. Created by Apigy, the convenient keyless system is now available for pre-order for $149.
9. People vs. Places
In their new Tumblr People vs. Places photographers Timothy Burkhart and Stephanie Bassos take turns double-exposing rolls of 35mm film. While Stephanie aims her lens at “people,” Timothy focuses on snapping “things,” creating image overlays that—despite the randomness of their execution—are often eerily profound.
10. Blossom Coffee
The lovechild of Apple designers and NASA scientists, Blossom Coffee’s One Limited coffee maker is in a class of its own. Equipped with WiFi and a camera that can detect what kind of beans you are using, the One Limited has taken household coffee makers to the next level. Currently limited to a singular model, the new machine will run you $11,111.
11. Edge Effect
During an artist residency in Joshua Tree National Park, photographer Daniel Kukla placed mirrors along the edge of the Sonoran and Mojave desserts, capturing the startling contrasts between the two neighboring ecosystems—a phenomenon known to ecologists as the “Edge Effect.” The images—which look like photos-within-photos—juxtapose bushy terrain against empty desert, flat fields against mountain ranges and blazing sunsets against dark night skies.
12. Vertical Measures
The 19% of social media users who talk about politics and the 24% of Americans who learned about the presidential campaign through the Internet in 2008 are all statistics found via Vertical Measures’s Social Media Election, a well-designed infographic that tracks and measure’s each candidate’s social media engagement.
