Archive for October, 2004
On this day...
by Suzanne G. on October 28th, 2004
According to the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, a 15-year-old girl, born without a vagina, had given birth (presumably by caesarian section) in Lesotho, Southern Africa. Unable to have sex in the normal way, the girl was having oral sex with her boyfriend when, at his climax, an ex-boyfriend burst in, catching them in fellatio delicto. The intruder stabbed the girl repeatedly. One blow pierced her stomach and fallopian tubes, allowing some of the ingested sperm to seep into the open tubes. Thus she became pregnant.
(via ForteanTimes)
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ADDITIONS TO THE FORTEANTIMES ARCHIVE:
• Magic Goes to War - Gordon Rutter on the role of magic in bringing hostilities to a satisfactory conclusion.
• The Modern Mentalist - Derren Brown: psychic or master manipulator?
• Eye Spirits - Macular degeneration: an eye disease of particular relevance to forteans.
• Dreamer of the Dark - Was HP Lovecraft a believer in the paranormal?
Enlightening reading! 
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FUR CARE CHINCHILLA KEEPING 101
CHINCHILLAS CAN DIE FROM HEAT STROKE VERY EASILY!
Always keep 'em cool & fluffy!
Oh, and don't forget to knit wooly hats for 'em!
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VOLUPTAS
(MEOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWW!)
Neeeeeed to get the new Calendario Romano 2005 for immediate wanking praying purposes!
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CONFESSIO
When I'm old and crumbly, I want to die like a real blogger...
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CELEBRATIO
(© Monster Fetish - click to enlarge)
WebZen has posted an exquisite selection of nifty Halloween links. However, they forgot Amy Winfrey's Halloween game which is almost as addictive and stimulating as Shrunken Heads
Basic Bollocks
by Suzanne G. on October 28th, 2004
© Margot Knight: "Torso"
For over ten years, Paul Verhoeven and the corrupt film mafia have been trying to convince us with expensive movie posters and ever so secret bonus material DVDs that Basic Instinct is a subtle and arousing erotica thriller. Well, they failed. Horribly. It's neither erotica, nor a thriller. It's not even a sock. It's nothing!
However, there's this one scene that hasn't left my mind ever since I saw it for the first time. And it has become one of my top 10 movie scenes - not just because I can relate to it, but because it's raw, archaic and honest:
CATHERINE
(a long beat)
Do you think I told her to kill you?
NICK
(softly, with intensity)
No.
CATHERINE
(after a beat, near tears)
Everybody that I care about dies.
NICK
(soothing)
It's OK. It's OK.
CATHERINE
(quietly, almost begging)
Make love to me.
Now, Mr Verhoeven, listen very carefully: This is it! That's cinématographie sensuelle, filled with piquanterie and suspense! That's brilliant, psychologically intense script writing that does more to ones libido than hours of vulgar pseudo-lesbian cocaine sniffing toilet nonsense. Reduce and focus please.
I realized that another favourite sex scene of mine can be found in one of the crappiest movies in the history of film making ever: Enemy at the Gates.
Yes, I'm talking about the grotesque piece of mute spastic masturbatory shagging amongst corpses, mines and mud in the middle of the movie. Performed by Vassili Zaitsev (a.k.a. Jude Law) and Tania Chernova (a.k.a. Rachel Weisz) in the most ridiculous yet arousing manner. You're gonna like that even if you're not a necrophiliac. I guess.
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ANTIQUARIAN FIND DU JOUR
(click image to enlarge)
Give her ten years and she'll be the hottest girl in town.
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METAPHORICAL VISUALIZATION OF MY MOOD
(click image to enlarge - © Jean Bailly)
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THINGS THAT MAKE YOU GO "AWWWWW!"
(click image to enlarge - based on this image)
The insanely talented Dave Youkovich turned me into a rather Magrittesque cartoon! Thank you ever so much, Dave...
♥____________________________
VARIA OBSCURIA
If you liked CookieThievery and DickCream - which have both been shut down *sniffy* - you might be pleased to hear that BananaMilk is now online. It's less braindamaging though.
Buried Dreams
by Suzanne G. on October 24th, 2004
© Alessandro Bavari (1)
(click on thumbnails for detailed view)
La Comtesse de Sang
Your seeds of madness
The colour of eternity
They blossom in torture
In an autumn of fear
In a harvest of pain
In a garden of evil
La Comtesse de Sang
Can you recall
The faces
The bodies
The voices
The blood that flows each dawn
A chemical nightmare
Just look in the mirror
Stain of your image
Burnt into metal
- Excerpt from "Buried Dreams" by Clock DVA (... who are still as brilliant as almost 30 years ago!)
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IN CLOACA
Archaeological sensation of the century:
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IN LITTERIS
Please sign the online petition to save the French Imprimerie Nationale - a unique and priceless historic collection of books, letterform and character punches from the 16th century to the present.
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IN CELLULOIDO
I'd be very grateful if someone could point me to an online gallery with good quality publicity shots of Theda Bara in "A Fool There Was". Thanks.
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VANITAS
(click image to enlarge)
I'm currently looking for an experimental Switzerland-based photographer who doesn't run away the first time he sees me for various projects involving gasmasks, power-tools, chainsaws, guillotines and horse carcasses. Oh, and lemons! that I have in mind. Please email me if you are a photographer or know of one.
I also updated the gallery section with some new images and removed old and dusty ones.
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RES FAMILIARIS
I put my brother's little portfolio website online.
It's still a test version - please let me know whether it shows up correctly on your browser(s). Cheerio!
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(1)
PICTURE INDEX
(From top to bottom, left to right)
A. Bavari: CD booklet for JANUS
A. Bavari: Insecta Queen
A. Bavari: Il giardino di Jerome
A. Bavari: Tre Voyeur
A. Bavari: Citta' di Gomorra
Alessandro Bavari is currently exhibiting new works at the Salon Art Paris - held at the Carrousel du Louvre. Other selected artists include Aurélie Ben Barek, Katrin Fridriks, Eric Bottero, Tashi Bharucha, Cyril Anguelidis and Gianluca Fratantonio.
Candy-coated Vanitas
by Suzanne G. on October 22nd, 2004
© Fuco Ueda
(click on thumbnails for detailed view)
... The beautiful girl from Maruhashi’s, now dressed in pink fashion-camouflage had just turned the corner and was walking toward me.
She hadn’t seen me, but I saw her. Her eyes were on the street and you could only see the dark lashes slashing through the soft brown surrounds like treachery.
I started half-running down the street to the building where Honda was doing whatever.
If it had been anyone else would I have had the same reaction: heartbeat as heart attack?
She was amazing in her pink camouflage, like she would come for you at sunset...
- Excerpt from "My Tokyo Death Cult"
(a.k.a. "Tokyo Zero") by Marc Horne
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VISUAL DESCRIPTION OF MY CURRENT MOOD
(click to enlarge - via The Horus Archive of
Found Photography)
Parasitäre Synthese von ribosomischen Eiweißmolekülen im vorderen Nukleoluslappen
by Suzanne G. on October 18th, 2004
WATERMELON LOVE - Sweet strangeness by Joji Koyama.
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QUESTIONS YOU NEVER DARED CARED TO ASK
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VARIA
Presenting part I of the deadly boring ever successful series "Suzanne And Her Favourite Toys":
Suzanne & Her Pen ov D00m(1)
Oh, yeah... university started again. I fear blogging will become even more random in the next few months. All intellectual and financial contributions to my paper on Christian Metz's essay "Photography & Fetish" are highly welcome!
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(1) N.B.
It's only a PEN, Corran... only a pen...
It's October - Get Your Tweeds Out!
by Suzanne G. on October 16th, 2004
© Detlev von Liliencron & Suzanne
In other foggy autumn news,
my favourite avant-la-lettre gentlemen's magazine - the overly British The Chap - celebrated Oscar Wilde's 150th birthday today with a march against vulgarity in the City of London - with all due exclusivité, honnêteté & élégance scilicet.
Ben - a splendid chap & gentleman in personal union
• More on Oscar Wilde's birthday over @ BBC
• Messrs Temple & Darkwood's essential book
"Around the World in 80 Martinis"
• The Chap Manifesto
Finally, here's some extremely useful sartorial advice from cher monsieur
Lukás Kándl:
(via Cipango. Cheerio!)
Murder. Redux.
by Suzanne G. on October 13th, 2004
1.jpg)
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© Corinne May Botz
(click on thumbnails for detailed view)
In the 1940s, Frances Glessner Lee constructed incredibly-detailed and spooky crime scenes in dollhouses to teach forensics to a homicide investigation seminar.
The founder of Harvard's Department of Legal Medicine, Lee was named an honorary captain of the New Hampshire state police.
"The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death" is a book collecting Corinne May Botz's fantastic photographs of Lee's macabre miniatures.
(via BoingBoing)
→ Online gallery of Corinne May Botz's works
→ Scan of last week's NYT article on Frances Glessner Lee
→ "The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death" on Amazon
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P. TO THE S.
I've been given the privilege (... and the movie pass! Yay!) to represent Usama Alshaibi (more here and here) and his movie "Convulsion Expulsion" at the LUFF tomorrow. Abnormal blogging will resume never shortly.
Thanks, Usama! ♥
The Solar Anus
by Suzanne G. on October 11th, 2004
© Usama Alshaibi
(click on thumbnails for detailed view)
An abandoned shoe, a rotten tooth, a snub nose, the cook spitting in the soup of his masters are to love what a battle flag is to nationality.
An umbrella, a sexagenarian, a seminarian, the smell of rotten eggs, the hollow eyes of judges are the roots that nourish love.
A dog devouring the stomach of a goose, a drunken vomiting woman, a slobbering accountant, a jar of mustard represent the confusion that serves as the vehicle of love.
- from Georges Bataille "Visions of Excess - Selected Writings, 1927-1939" - via SolarAnus
→ Usama Alshaibi - previously featured here - will be presenting his short film "Convulsion Expulsion" in the "Courts métrages expérimentaux" competition at the Lausanne LUFF 04 on Thursday, 14th October 2004, 8.30 PM.
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AND IN OTHER ECOLOGICAL NEWS...
Dave Walsh is out on Greenpeace's Esperanza blogging on bottom trawling.
.... and meanwhile, WWF Japan discovered an extremely rare new Domo-Kun species...
RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWRRRRRRRRR!
(Click here for 977 x 1476 resolution!)
Meinem lieben Bruder...
by Suzanne G. on October 7th, 2004
© Cornelius Huyberts & Frederik Ruysch
(click on thumbnails for detailed view)
Ruysch made about a dozen tableaux, constructed of human fetal skeletons with backgrounds of other body parts, on allegorical themes of death and the transiency of life [...]
He built the "geological" landscapes of these tableaux from gallstones and kidneystones, and "botanical" backgrounds from injected and hardened major veins and arteries for "trees," and more ramified tissue of lungs and smaller vessels for "bushes" and "grass."
The fetal skeletons, several per tableau, were ornamented with symbols of death and short life - hands may hold mayflies (which live but a day in their adult state); skulls bemoan their fate by weeping into "handkerchiefs" made of elegantly injected mesentery or brain meninges; "snakes" and "worms," symbols of corruption made of intestine, wind around pelvis and rib cage.
- Stephen Jay Gould in "Finders, Keepers:
Treasures and Oddities of Natural History"
→ Click here for more information on Ruysch
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CURIOSITÉ DU PASSÉ
Victorian roller-skating:
(via Dark Victoria - click to enlarge)
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EDITO
I created a new forum link button that matches perfectly with my dear friend PieceoPlastic's beautiful website button. So please use the following buttons to link back to me:
Dankeschön!
Oh, and don't forget to come to our KÃœHLSCHRANK/FRIGIDAIRE #3 party in Lausanne tomorrow night.
Have a lovely weekend.
See you next Monday!
Mechanical Mirage
by Suzanne G. on October 6th, 2004
© Almacan
(click on thumbnails for detailed view)
Cyberspace. A consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators, in every nation, by children being taught mathematical concepts... A graphic representation of data abstracted from banks of every computer in the human system. Unthinkable complexity. Lines of light ranged in the nonspace of the mind, clusters and constellations of data. Like city lights, receding...
- William Gibson: "Neuromancer"
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Picture index:
(From top to bottom, left to right)
Almacan: Monorogue
Almacan: Floating of Antlion
Almacan: Shell in the Darkness
Almacan: Spiral Memory
Almacan: Triceratops
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Note to Self:
Don't go to that fancy dress party tonight...
(via The Onion)