Artist Paul McCarthy describes the improvisational process and performances behind the video work Piccadilly Circus (2003). Filmed at an unoccupied London bank before being renovated by Hauser & Wirth gallery in 2002, and shot several months before the start of the Iraq War, the work features costumed players in the roles of President George W. Bush, Osama Bin Laden, and the Queen Mum (in three versions).

Paul McCarthy’s video-taped performances and provocative multimedia installations lampoon polite society, ridicule authority, and bombard the viewer with a sensory overload of often sexually-tinged, violent imagery. With irreverent wit, McCarthy often takes aim at cherished American myths and icons—Walt Disney, the Western, and even the Modern Artist—adding a touch of malice to subjects that have been traditionally revered for their innocence or purity. Whether conflating real-world political figures with fantastical characters such as Santa Claus, or treating erotic and abject content with frivolity and charm, McCarthy’s work confuses codes, mixes high and low culture, and provokes an analysis of fundamental beliefs.

McCarthy’s current exhibition of drawings WHITE SNOW is on view at Hauser & Wirth in New York through December 24th, 2009. Works in the exhibition draw upon the 19th century German folk tale ‘Snow White’ (‘Schneewittchen’) as well as its modern interpretation by Walt Disney.

Paul McCarthy is featured in the Season 5 (2009) episode Transformation of the Art:21—Art in the Twenty-First Century television series on PBS.

VIDEO | Producer: Wesley Miller & Nick Ravich. Interview: Susan Sollins. Camera: Bob Elfstrom. Sound: Doug Dunderdale. Editor: Lizzie Donahue & Paulo Padilha. Artwork Courtesy: Paul McCarthy.

3040715    กระบวนการจัดการเพื่อพัฒนาสาธารณสุขมูลฐาน    Managerial Process for Primary Health Care Development

แนวคิดและบทบาทสำคัญของการสาธารณสุขมูลฐานที่มีต่อการพัฒนาชุมชนและกระบวนการจัดการเพื่อพัฒนา การใช้การสาธารณสุขมูลฐานเป็นกลวิธีในการแก้ปัญหาสุขภาพ และการสาธารณสุขมูลฐาน

(The concept and key role of primary health care in community development and its managerial process; all aspects of the primary health care approach to health problems; important issues on primary health care; the managerial process; wider coverage and community involvement, strengthened intersectoral action, resource distribution, managerial support-systems and information transfer, logistic, maintenance and supplier manpower development and essential drugs.)

(3040715 จุฬาลงกรณ์มหาวิทยาลัย)

i saw AS yesterday for lunch. i met her and became her intern at 24, 25…she’s known me for 10 years or so. she told me that a girls she met recently, who’s working with her on her new exhibition, reminds her of me. a younger me. full of confidence, fiery, ambition, but with a relationship that was like dead weight. AS said she doesn’t think the relationship will last. the young woman is coming to her own. she’s having some kind of awakening.

that’s what we go through, especially as women. women have awakenings. it could be in our late 20s, or early 30s, our mid 30s or late 30s. it could be an ongoing awakening…and i think for me, it’s been some kind of awakening journey since my 28th year. and i continue to have these moments of “ding ding ding…” i continue have these little tiny growth spurts, blooms, sprouts. they catch me off guard. but when i notice this growth, i am both surprised, happy, and confused. what do i do now with this new found information about myself? do i allow the growth to continue? or do i stifle it with my old, bad ways, bad habits?

today, i had one of those moments. after getting off a very brief 15 minute conversation with J, i hung up the phone and began to sob uncontrollably. i have many of those now. i attribute that to age, red wine, being alone and comfortable enough in my skin to sob. whatever…so after i finished sobbing, i was thinking how i am such an accommodating person! i have always been. on the one hand, i am very ambivalent about many things that i have no control over, like when someone will call me, when i fall in love again, when i’ll find that great job, etc, etc, etc. i tell myself i do my best and that’s all i can do and the rest is up to magic, fate, life, universe, etc. and on the other hand, aside from ambivalence, it’s just hard to be that stiff with people. to make demands of people, especially when it comes to relationships. i know i don’t want demands made of me, so why would i want to do that to someone else. but! i also know that i don’t want demands to be made of me because i always do my best. do other people also do their best? that…i don’t know…i don’t have as much faith in others as i do in myself.

so my gripe with J is that when we talk, our conversations are always, without fail, cut before i can finish my thought, have my fill of talking/catching up, or before i want to end the conversation. J usually calls me on his way to work. or on his way to somewhere. it’s like he uses me to fill the down time. and as much as i love to hear his voice and talk to him, i’ve come to just accept whatever little time he can give…i almost never ask for/demand for more. nor do i tell him to not call if he doesn’t have time. so, i take what i can get…i yield. and that just sucks! because now it’s habitual. now i only ever talk to him during these windows of downtime. and now the precedence has been set.

and this is the pattern that i want to break when it comes to my relationships with people, but mainly with men. i have a tendency to give off this very cavalier attitude, and i am…again because i am to a certain extent ambivalent. but at some point, when i think things start to get serious, i do put in more effort and i expect the same in return. and when i don’t see the same amount of effort put in, i let the guys get away with continuing to put in very to little effort. it’s a vicious cycle that gets me no where. it doesn’t even get me beyond ambivalence. and i really don’t need more ambivalence in my life.

so i wrote J an email letting him know that i don’t want to “fit” into his life anymore. i am either in it or not. make a decision! let the chips fall where they may.

if this ends. so be it. so the “ding” moment is i have to be good to myself. i have to look out for my needs. i try. but sometimes part of trying isn’t just hunkering down and doing your thing. it’s also setting boundaries, having definitions. and it’s ok to have boundaries to have definitions. i cannot be scared of them or avoid them. because, sadly, i’m usually the one who gets hurt when there aren’t any boundaries or definitions. i just need to set them and see what happens. if things don’t work out because of them, so be it. i will continue to grow. to be me…

Clearly, strategic planning is no panacea. Strategic planning is simply a set of concepts, procedures, and tools designed to help leaders, managers, and planners think and act strategically. Used in wise and skillful ways by a “coalition of the willing,” strategic planning can help organizations focus on producing effective decisions and actions that further the organization’s mission, meet in mandates, and satisfy key stakeholders. But strategic planning is not a substitute for strategic thinking and acting. Only caring and committed people can do that. And when used thoughtlessly, strategic planning can actually drive out precisely the kind of strategic thought and action it is supposed to promote.

Furthermore, strategic planning is not a substitute for leadership. There is simply no substitute for leadership when it comes to using strategic planning to enhance organizational performance. At least some key decision makers and process champions must be committed to the strategic planning process, or any attempts to use it are bound to fail.

In addition, strategic planning is not synonymous with creating an organizational strategy. Organizational strategies have numerous sources, both planned and unplanned. Strategic planning is likely to result in statement of organizational intentions, but what is realized in practice will be some combination of what is intended and what emerges along the way. Strategic planning can help organizations develop and implement effective strategies, but they should also remain open to unforeseen opportunities. Too much attention to strategic planning and excessive reverence for strategic plans can build organizations to other unplanned and unexpected—yet incredibly useful—sources of information, insight, and action.

The discipline necessary for strategic planning can be of two sorts. The first harkens back to Latin root of the word “discipline,” emphasizing instruction, training, education, and learning. The second embodies later interpretations of the word, emphasizing order, control, and punishment. Emphasis should be placed on education and learning, although there clearly are occasions when imposing order, taking control, and enforcing appropriate sanctions are appropriate. Certainly, key leaders, managers, and planners can best use strategic planning as an educational and learning tool, to help them figure out what is really important and what should be done about it. Sometimes this means following a particular sequence of steps and preparing formal strategic plans, but not necessarily. The ultimate goal of strategic planning should not be a rigid adherence to a particular process or an instance on the production of plans. Instead, strategic planning should promote wise strategic thought and action on behalf of an organization and its key stakeholders. What steps to follow, in what sequence, and whether or not to prepare formal plans are subsidiary concerns.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Québec City 2009. Copyright © Nailana Thiely. All rights reserved.

What we call the “blacksmith design” is the vernacular procedure, handed down form generation to generation, an evolution of  the design resulting in the optimal end product. There is no actual manual or drawn pattern, and an alteration of the design may cause a complete failure in use. The  vernacular design is closely linked to the making, and requires a longterm, stable demand for this type of design to be rewarding.

The modern concept of design is not linked to the making, it’s rather very separated from it, and more and more fragmented into subdesigners and submakers as we close up to our own timeline. The social status  of the designer, through the professionalisation, clearly draws a line between the maker and the designer, and this scheme is the basis of the current  technological environment.

“The artist’s self-conscious recognition of his individuality has a deep effect on the process of form-making. Each form is now seen as the work of a single man, and its success is his achievement only” (C. Alexander, Notes on the Synthesis of Form, 1964)

…ok maybe not completely out because old habits die hard. but it’s a great first step to identify our old ways and find ways to steer away from those bad, old habits that are clogging up our life’s arteries. as the year comes to an end, what negative feelings am i harboring and what negative feelings are weighing down my spirits?

talking to S and R about the holidays recently made me realize how quickly time flies. it was a year ago that we had our holiday dinner/gathering. i was still dating MC. things “seemed” to be going on the right path. i was holding tightly onto a new relationship and using it to help me forget the pain that i left behind in taiwan. i was running towards something new in hopes that it will distract me and i won’t have to think much about all the sadness that overwhelmed my heart at the time. as R and i talked about having another dinner this year and looking back on fb to see who was in attendance at the last one, we both sighed at how much has changed since. people got engaged, married, children were born, couples broke up, health renewed…so, so much has happened…yet how much have we grown as individuals?

i would like to say throughout this year, i tried to face each and everyone of my demons. i tried to be good about moving forward but also really learning from the process, from each situation. it’s been a mixed bag this year, a challenging but rewarding growth period. and with each event, i understand a little bit more about where i am, and where i’m going. i feel heartened with each step and am grateful that each person in my life has helped shaped my path. each person has contributed to my growth. this is my family. and at the end of the day, i don’t want to harbor any ill will or negative feelings towards anyone. i take them with me, wherever i go.

Copyright © Nailana Thiely. All rights reserved.

Copyright © Vanessa Monteiro. All rights reserved.

Copyright ©Paulo Gomes. All rights reserved.

Toxi (aka Karsten Schmidt) is one of the heros of the Processing scene. Apart from the wonderful Toxiclibs he’s written (and given away for free), he’s also produced some very inspiring work incorporating coding into various parts of his process, for example the cover for Print Magazine shown here.

Yippee! I am leaving it here. I have added a few touches with some basic Photoshop techniques. The soft shadow to give the cut out effect is created using good old Gaussian Blur on a solid copy of the whole figure dropped behind the main character.

I also couldn’t resist adding some soft shadow to his wonderful hair. The thing is with me, I could go on and on making changes, but what I tend to do is pretend I am on a deadline. This is a good exercise for illustrators as it keeps your brain active and able to make decisions about the direction of a piece as you work on it and within the time limit.

Including all the commentary on this process, this work has taken me about 8 hours.

I hope you like the finished result. I would love to hear your comments and if you are a budding illustrator with any questions on my process and own experience, please drop me a question in the comment section and I will be happy to reply.

Right! I think I am happy with the colour palette. I was tempted to leave the background in monochrome (all comments welcome of course!) but I am in a happy mood and thought let’s go for all colour everywhere. However, I have kept to a limited palette. This is really important in my opinion, when creating characters using a vector program like Adobe Illustrator. The strong, flat colours that this program is so good at producing gives a certain look….a bit like the certain look you get in CGI cartoons: no matter who is making em, Disney or Pixar or Dreamworks, they all have a certain quality about them that is defined by the technology being used as the tool. I find if you put too many “flavours” in the mix you lose the strength that is inherent in vector illustrations.

Right, now for some finishing touches and cropping in Photoshop…..

From the Globe & Mail July 23, 2009

“Last February, the town of Shapleigh, Maine, population 2,326, passed an unusual ordinance,” The Boston Globe reports. “Shapleigh sought to protect its aquifers from Nestle Corp., which draws heavily on the region for its Poland Spring bottled water…[The town] tried something new – a move at once humble in its method and audacious in its ambition. At a town meeting, residents voted, 114-66, to endow all the town’s natural assets with legal rights: ‘Natural communities and ecosystems possess inalienable rights to exist, flourish and naturally evolve within the Town of Shapleigh.’ It further decreed that any town resident had ’standing’ to seek relief for damages caused to nature – permitting, for example, a lawsuit on behalf of a stream.”

Dump Site 41 in Tiny Township on Georgian Bay might consider this too.

See also, Michel Serres: The Natural Contract

I like the pink for the face and hands as it contrasts in a nicely mad way with the lurid green of “serum X5″ which our man is quaffing.

I have also changed the colour of the outlines to a very dark grape. I like the way it lifts the image and gives it a bit of madness while still providing the punchiness of black, but with a richer colour effect.

I am fairly happy with the test tube and contents too and have made the bubbles change colour as their background colour changes, so they remain visible.

His hair – I had thought of adding some texture by painting in Painter or Photoshop, but having added the grape outline I am beginning to think it works as is – simple and wacky. I may do a second version with the textures just to see…

I was recently talking with the president of a SMB, and during that conversation he mentioned some technologies he was thinking about implementing to improve some of his internal processes.

It is a constant refrain.

Technology Takes Last Place

Technology should be a distant last place in your considerations.

Technology is a tool that can be used by people.

A tool used by people to generate business results by following business processes.

Read these two reviews by John Caddel, and Bob Sutton referencing the same study on improving medication processes in hospitals. To quote Mr. Caddel;

I’ve seen both these situations in action: the ability of front-line personnel to understand and fix problems with the processes they use, and the effectiveness of often-overlooked simple and low-tech solutions.

The SMB Takeaway

Technology tools can help standardize, they can help speed up existing business processes. But if those processes don’t even exist right now. Don’t think (or let vendors convince you) that a software tool will be a magic bullet that can do it all for you.

You can get updates to this blog by clicking the RSS icon on the Home Page!

Photo Credit bunchofpants via flickr

Work tables consist of sawhorses with doors on top. All visual artists get two of these plus a rolly tabera with a hasp in case you want to lock valuables up. No studio doors or bedrooms have keyed locks; only the exterior doors into each building have locks on them, and basically everything around here works on the honor system. From how you use the machine shop and buy sculpture materials, to borrowing books from the library and picking up mail. But I digress. I was going to share my work tables, which sounds boring, and it is, so I added some fun stuff at the end.

eye hooks, monofilament, goo gone, rolling pin, plasticine, buckets, alum flashing, fiberglass, respirator, safety glasses, nitrile gloves, dust masks, nuts and bolts, screwdriver, metal scraper, paint spatulas, chip brushes, utility knives, yucky scissors, tin snips, wood strips, power drill, towel

wine, sugar, fruit, food coloring, ring pops, electric burners, scavenged pots, alum foil, saran wrap, corn syrup, cooking spray, scavenged yucky towel, measuring cup, thermometer, funnels, timer, yummy scissors, heat gun, giant roll paper, cellophane, business cards, $5 thrift store polaroid camera, ginseng tea, VSC mug, water bottle, miscellaneous crap

Taberay turned sideways with laptop set in place with wood screwed to top for time lapse photography

This made me giggle, animal traps and pet cages side by side. Made me think about our weird relationships to animals...

Funny cat toy which may become a part of this project and will definitely be given to penny when I get home, even though she hates all cat toys that aren’t twist ties or wads of paper

I’m also on a weird writing schedule. Since there is no internet access in my room, I go home to write in the comfort of bed, pajamas and glasses at the end of the day and then get online in the main hall before breakfast to post. It’s different writing without the immediacy of the instant publish… I will have to think more on this. Or not. I have to admit, I find I haven’t been thinking much these last couple days and I’m really liking it…

Yesterdays Schedule: Up at sunrise, online time, breakfast, finish preparing plasticine, shopping at Johnson Farm and Garden with shop tech, Harlan, cover kickball in plasticine, lunch, add pour spouts and dividers in plasticine, cut flashing and insert for dividers, yoga, dinner, prep fiberglass, plaster first half of mother mold, back to room for blogging.

First colour try outs on the face and coat….