We have all seen the standard mummy coffin like the one above ever since we were little kids. When you look at the coffin compared to what we bury our dead in today there is of course the differences of the jewels and the whole face carving on the mummy coffin but what is also different is the way the corpse is positioned, with the arms across the chest.

The difference in corpse arm placement might seem insignificant, but it’s little differences in past cultures that reveal other things about them.

Now why would they cross the arms? Present day people usually put the cadavers arms at their sides because they seem more like they are sleeping then dead. So did egyptians sleep like idiots or did they just want their dead to look tough as sh*t?

What I feel is more likely is something called the Lazarus Sign or Lazarus Reflex. Remember going to the doctors when you were a little kid and the doctor hit you on the knee with that queer little hammer? Your leg kicked out because of a reflex circuit. There’s a bunch of these all over the body and they are controlled by the spinal cord for quick responses. You can obviously resist most of these reflex circuits but when your brain is removed, which is the case with beating heart cadavers (people brain dead but kept alive on ventilators to keep their organs fresh for donation), your body still runs these reflex circuits. When the Lazarus Reflex is triggered we get something that looks like this: [Warning Graphic]

Now again these people are d.e.a.d. dead but their body’s are kept alive on ventilators and such to keep their organs fresh.

With this shown it’s easy to connect the dots to possibly why the egyptian mummies all have crossed arms the same way the Lazarus Effect takes place. This is remarkable because as you remember from earlier, the way this is triggered is when the brain is dead and the body is being kept alive artificially. The egyptians removed the organs during mummification because they believed they were each protected by a different god. So it would make sense that they would keep the body artificially alive to harvest the organs fresh just like we do during donor transplants. Maybe the mechanism they used to keep the body alive connected into the spine at the lazarus reflex point causing the body to do it automatically during mumification. (they must have browned their loin cloths the first time they saw that)

I’m not a doctor or an archeologist. I just notice things.

happy mummys day

Engineer/artist/inventor Alan Sailer is our type of guy. By day he’s an engineer but by night he’s a highly creative and innovative high-speed photographer. With a high-speed flash and photo rig which he designed himself with help from old do it yourself magazines, Alan is able to capture brilliant photos of moments never fully witnessed. His flash rig runs about 20,000 volts and could potentially kill a man. Why such a powerful flash? Because the photos he takes have to be super fast. How fast?

It’s hard to put into words how much we love this guy. He doesn’t even consider what he is doing as ‘art’ and detests all the attention. In an interview with sparks and ashes he said “At its best, good art makes me feel like I want to go out and try to do something just as good… My work, for the most part, is just well crafted entertainment.” He also went on to point out that a lot of modern art focuses more on the concept, sacrificing the visual beauty and quality which he admires in what he refers to as ‘real’ art. We would still consider him and artist and it’s a beautiful thing when an artist does his work for kicks, not to be kewl.

His DIY/cheap angle to his photos has steered his work into very creative set ups. Most of the objects he destroys are items he can get cheaply at yard sales or what he finds along the road. The red goo you see in the goat head picture as well as some of the others is actually gelatin. The destruction happens a variety of ways, from using an air rifle firing pellets to firecrackers. By using equipment built himself he doesn’t have to worry about damaging it with such violent subjects. An equivalent flash would cost about $4000, and would probably deter many people from exploding anything near it.

Alan Sailer is a humble guy who makes beautiful work with science and explosions, whats not to like. Check out the work below and pay attention to the titles of the pieces, they’re pretty perfect. Also take into consideration the 2 colors he uses for the background in each shot. How could you not consider this art? For more on how Alan does this stuff along with tons more photos check out his Flikr stream.

(his work shop)

Vintage.Gif is a project where we use old multilens film cameras to generate animated gifs. When the oldest form of internet video, the gif, mixes with film we generate video similar to Eadweard Muybridge‘s animal locomotion. Like Muybridge, we use independent lenses but instead of using multiple cameras we use cameras with multiple lenses. The two cameras used in the animations below are done with a OKTOMAT (fig.1) that has 8 lenses and an ActionSampler Flash (fig. 2) that has 4 but can also fire off 4 independent flashes.

The problem/bonus we ran into that Muybridge may have as well, was that when you use multiple lenses at once, each one has a different position in relation to the others therefore giving a different angle of perspective. This is why in some of the animations you see a bullet-timey-3D movement. This perspective can add an interesting movement but can also disorient during playback if not lined up correctly. To compensate for the angle, we aligned the next photo/frame with a focus object common in all of the pictures. This focus object helps the eye+brain quantify the movement of the other objects in the picture, making it easier to understand.

You should get involved
submit you Vintage.Gif here

It was 18 years ago today Kurt Cobain killed himself. So now that he can buy cigarettes in the after life we thought we would celebrate by reading his suicide note. Ever read one before? No? well it’s your lucky day then. [full text below]

Is it just us or does it seem like a letter about leaving music and not a suicide note till that last lame ‘I’ll be at your alter’ part thats in a different handwriting? And honestly doesn’t that last part seem too corny for him to say anyway? Theres been talk about the fish smell around the case for awhile.

Basically the story as it stands goes something like this:

(hopefully not us)

Lets all write suicide notes! That would be kewl.

Wait!… you wanna see it? [click here]

Mock Suns is an airy lo-fi drone pop three-piece from Philadelphia that has a sound perfect for the background of a summer day. They have been doing some unique things to promote their fourth coming album ‘Here Nor There’ which we’re lucky enough to have this exclusive stream of.

One tactic they’ve been using is leaving advanced copies of the new album throughout Philadelphia. This same tactic was used by another artist we’ve covered, Adam Neate, and it’s what first started to propel him into the spot light.

Another unique form of promotion they’ve been doing is selling they’re faces. If you’ve seen the video to the single (watch), you saw the eatable faces in action. The first 25 people to redeem the download code for the new album were entitled to their choice of 3 candy faces:

Cookies ‘N’ Steve
Dulce De Greg… Che
Chocolate Tom-Tom

Check out more on their site www.mocksuns.com and make sure you go buy this album today from their bandcamp .

Ricardo Leite knows just how to merge analog and digital. He is a Barcelona-based artist who has a compelling and unique style. Visually his pieces rang from the ultra complex to the simplistic with both carrying the same large impact. What we find most interesting is his film photo warping. They almost looks like film poorly developed on accident but then on purpose. In his “Unknowen Doors” pieces he highlight the empty spaces in sculpture and architecture with fields of color that highlights the negative space as it’s own object.

He also does client work which you can see an example of in the album artwork below. Needless to say Ricardo and a multifaceted artist that is constantly reinventing himself. His main grind seems to be a small visual arts boutique called byebyehome, so be sure to check that out. Another great way to keep up with Ricardo is on his behance network page because his personal website, rl85.com, is still under construction.

It been over 30 years since Voyager 1 and 2 left earth never to return. Attached on it’s back was a golden record containing the ultimate mixtape of music and photos as a friendly gift from humans to what ever may find it.

Of the 200 million stars in the Milky Way galaxy, some—perhaps many—may have inhabited planets and spacefaring civilizations. If one such civilization intercepts Voyager and can understand these recorded contents, here is our message: This is a present from a small, distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours. We hope someday, having solved the problems we face, to join a community of galactic civilizations. This record represents our hope and our determination and our goodwill in a vast and awesome universe.”-Jimmy Carter

Voyager 1 has been kicking ass in space since 1977 and has only just recently reached the end of our solar system. It’s in an area called the Heliopause and it’s the boundary between the edge of the suns solar winds and unbounded interstellar space. Currently over 11 billion miles away from the sun, Voyager 1 has enough power to continue investigation till 2020 and should remain functional for another 5 years after that. Even after Voyager looses all power it will continue to travel space and if by some super f’n lucky chance aliens find it they will have a well rounded view of mankind (well at least 70s mankind).

The Golden Record was thought up an commissioned by astronomer Carl Sagan. It was to be the mixtape to end all mixtapes and to act as a gift from mankind to show our good intentions. What really stands out as you experience the disk is not only the attention payed to picking the right material but also the sequencing. They take the viewer through process like conception to birth, harvesting grapes to inside a grocery store, airplanes to rockets and so on. In the beginning of the picture section you see diagrams to convey our math/science and how we use it. This helps the viewer understand measurements on some of the pictures to help quantify the size of the objects. And of course, they threw in a nudie for good measure.

The music section opens up with a greeting from then UN Secretary General, Kurt Waldheim, in which he says probably the perfect message. After that it goes into 50 different greetings in 50 different languages, starting with Akkadian, an ancient Sumerian language. The greetings are not all the same and give a tone to the area they are speaking from. The greeting in Amoy goes something like this “Friends of space, how are you all? Have you eaten yet? Come visit us if you have time” where as the greeting in Rajasthani is a little bit more of a veiled warning “Hello to everyone. We are happy here and you be happy there.” From there it goes kind of wild, starting off with personalized introductions from each of the UN delegates that later gets mixed in with whale calls. Then it immerses the listener into a soundscape of sounds from earth leading finally into a group of some of the best music in human history. Where’s the Beatles you might ask? Well Carl had actually asked them to put “Here comes the sun” on the record which they agreed to but EMI said “No”. Another example of greed stifling humanity.

Sadly, in more recent NASA missions we aren’t doing anything as cool. On the New Horizons mission the space craft carries with it the ashes of the man who discover Pluto, an American flag, and for some reason a CD with 430,000 names of people who probably paid to have it on there. So much for an ice-breaker.

Below are highlights from the collection encoded on the disc. To find out more on the Voyager disk
go here.

Bernardí Roig has just the right amount of weird darkness to his work. He is a modern multimedia artist who explores moods of loneliness, desire, death and immortality. Originally a sketch artist, Roig went on to explore sculpture, photography, and video to create what is now being referred to as the new conceptual minimalism. The human figure is the conceptual center of his work, what he calls his solitary man. These are casts of real people combined with light in a variety of ways. Very often the figure depicted is of what many could consider the “average” balding overweight american. This also gives a byproduct of realization that this is what a contemporary man looks like.

What is also very striking about his work is the placement of his statues within a space. You may find them in a stairwell or in a court yard and when you do it’s hard to tell where the art piece starts and stops. It is as if you are within and apart of the piece soon as you observe it. In his early pieces you find many of the figures have eyes of fire, this signifies a deep burning within the mind of the man. “This man knows what he has lost and, still possessing the memory of culture and intellectual curiosity, clings to the hope its recovery. ” -Lipanjepuntin. In his more recent pieces you see the raw fire evolve in the florescent light tubes. check out more on Bernardí Roig on ClaireOliver.com

Bradley Douglas Jordan is a designer we’ve been keeping an eye on for awhile and now he’s turning some heads in the fashion industry. His unique style has personality and makes a point. We were lucky to catch up with him through Skype while he was in the studio working hard to get ready for his show this weekend called LOVE + ROCK & ROLL.

Bradley?
Yooooo.

Yoooo whats up man?
Nothing man just doing a little sewing.

Are you in the studio?
Yea, I’ve been sewing like crazy dude. Just had a fashion show.

The one that was on the 14th? (Feb 14 2012)
Yeah, It was Valentines Day. It was called Love Sick 5 [in San Francisco] and I was pretty much a walk on at the last minute but things have been going crazy since then.

How did you end up in San Francisco?
Well i just took a chance and dropped everything from the east coast and just decided to take that leap.

Did you know anyone out there?
No, just did it solo. I moved to Vermont that way and kinda concord up there and said now’s the time, I got to move to San Francisco.

Rad, so what can we expect from this show, Love + Rock & Roll, coming up this weekend?
I recently presented my Spring collection, this is completely separate collection with new styles for Fall/Winter 2012.

You design clothing for men and woman but do you prefer doing one over the other?
Well I get a lot of enjoyment out of creating mens garments that I can personally wear. Mainly because no one else in the world has it and it just feels good to wear something I just made. But I really enjoy seeing garments come to life on female models. Being a heterosexual designer naturally I’m attracted to beauty and so thats a bonus for sure. The main thing always is to create beauty whether what I’m making is for a man or a woman… or at least trying to achieve that haha.

Is it weird being a straight male fashion designer?
Yea, I mean collectively I think that’s one of the things thats working for me. Generally you don’t see that to often in the industry. I’m a little blown away with every experience with any individual that automatically assumes I’m a homosexual because of the career path I choose, so it’s pretty exciting to see how people react when they get to know me and realize that I am a heterosexual.

How did you get started?
It was snowboarding fashion for myself, so going back to making garnets to wear. My passion at the time was snowboarding and I was snowboarding pretty hard in what ever parks I ended up in and ripping cloths was not uncommon. So I just decided to start making my own cloths and that stems from childhood summers with grandma as she’s doing arts and crafts.

What is your creative process like?
A lot of the newer digital/electronic music keeps me in a mode where I can be creative and still make things cohesive. It’s tedious work sitting behind sewing machine stitching garments together so that monotonous work is easily paired with repetitious beats.

Do you Usually sketch out your ideas or just dive in?
Well it’s funny, I can see my past clothes on a person change in my mind, so I’m at the point where I’ve reworked my patterns so much that I can just imagine something and know which pattern from which garment I can use to help make it happen.

I saw you were getting into jewelry now too?
Yea, I’ve always been into it, gold chains were big for me back in the day. I remember my grandfather giving me my first gold chain and I was like… WOW 14k of gold! I’ve always appreciated accessories so I make a lot of jewelry during down time or if I’m waiting for the next inspiration. I’ve also started working with furs in my accessories too and will be showing those at the fashion show this weekend.

Are your clothes available yet?
They will be available, my goal is to make these clothes available to everyone, unfortunately right now I’m the only one making them. People can get at me for now through my website BradleyDouglasJordan.com and Facebook. If somebody really wants something they can contact me and I’ll make it for them. I try to use recycled and earth friendly products and that’s why I haven’t outsourced production of any garments yet. I don’t know whats going on in these factories and I do want to make sure that anything I do is making a positive effect on the world.

Photography by Shaun Tiangsing