chumpchampion

The final Inception post (for now).

For those still pondering the impossible dreamscape Christopher Nolan and crew concocted, here’s a nifty infographic that visually breakdowns the movie’s rise (starting in the flight from Sydney to Los Angeles) and fall (the van crashing over the bridge for that final kick). Via deviant artist dehahs.

Also…(SPOILER!) did the film’s costume designer, Jeffrey Kurland, just drop a massive knowledge bomb on those who maintain the film’s open ended-ness? He recently stated that “the children’s clothing is different in the final scene…look again…” leading many to believe that Cobb (DiCaprio) was indeed not dreaming that final scene. Read the entire interview from our pals at The Playlist who boldly go the extra movie mile.

More on the incredible Inception:

• The Inception of Edith Piaf’s Music in the Film Inception
• Dora the Incepcîon Explorer
• Hans Zimmer’s Sounds of Inception
• Inception is an Instant Classic (Also a Prequel Comic Book)

Tweet This Post 

Early last year we followed up our documentary Beautiful Losers with a short film just as inspiring and heartfelt about Sister Corita Kent-a revolutionary nun who shared her unique vision of creating art with her friends and students in 1960’s Los Angeles. During a time when the Catholic church was none to pleased with these new and off-beat ideas, Sister Corita excelled. The film, titled Become a Microscope-90 Statements on Sister Corita, was created in association with the Corita Art Center in honor of what would have been Sister Corita’s 90th birthday.

An excerpt from the film is now available to view on the Nowness by clicking here or any image below.

Crafted by most of our Beautiful Losers crew, the film was deftly directed by Aaron Rose; produced by do-it-all-man Jon Barlow; features a hauntingly beautiful original score by Money Mark and Becky Stark; great graphic design by our great pal Keith Scharwath; stellar sonics by sound designer extraordinaire Eddie Kim; Corita’s work come to life through a small After Effects army including Alex Dervin, Max Erdenberger, Miguel Bautista and a ton of other skilled individuals; and edited by yours truly-me (Lenny Mesina).

Graphic design created by Keith Scharwath. See more of Keith’s “90 statements” here.

The film’s “ABC” sequence visualized by Max Erdenberger featuring the music of Money Mark and Becky Stark.

Corita’s art also received the After Effects treatment courtesy of Alex Dervin, Miguel Bautista and many, many more.

We were also very fortunate to have access to an archive of material made about Sister Corita including films by Haskell Wexler, Baylis Glascock, Cal Bernstein and Alex Singer.

Tweet This Post 

Our pal Keith Scharwath has been on a roll as of late: art directing GOOD’s Neighborhoods Issue; designing for Unique LA’s Spring Show; works at Monster Children in Australia and Manifest Equality in Los Angeles; and most recently guest editing for Coudal Partners for the month of May.

Now our favorite Silver Lake based Beautiful Losers graphic designer who looks exactly like Paul Rudd has teamed up with Poolga to create (free!) digital wallpapers for your favorite Apple and Palm Pre devices.

Get your radical Scharwath designs here!

From Scharwath’s Carwash:

“A few months ago I was invited by my friend JC to create a few wallpapers for Poolga, a site dedicated to providing quality original artwork for iPads and iPhones.

It became the perfect opportunity to point out the similarities between all the boards (planks, slates etc.) in my life. Head over to Poolga for the free download and never forget to be thankful for the board under your feet (or fingers).”

(Click each image below to download each)

More on Keith Scharwath:

• It’s a GOOD Day in Keith Scharwath’s Neighborhood
• SAT & SUN (April 24 & 25): Unique LA’s 2nd Annual Spring Show
• THURSDAY (March 25): Aaron Rose Curates Simulacrum at Monster Children
• COVERAGE: Manifest Equality
• Do GOOD
• SATURDAY: The Beautiful Shorts of Beautiful Losers
• Design, Inspiration and Free Money at the Scharwath Carwash

Tweet This Post 

With artist/skateboarder Ed Templeton’s show The Seconds Pass passing through Los Angeles tonight, I thought it would be apro-pro to point you towards WKE and Aaron Rose’s ongoing D.I.Y. America series which is currently focusing on skateboarding and creativity.

(click corresponding images to view episodes)

• Skate and Create: Part 4 The Artists features icons who’ve taken lessons learned from skateboarding into their respective crafts such as Geoff McFetridge, Thomas Campbell, Andy Jenkins, Ray Barbee, Kevin Ancell, Thurston Moore, Tony Hawk and more.

Tweet This Post 

For the denizens of design: My dear design-minded Gelatobaby friend Alissa Walker has been selected to co-curate The Pasadena Museum of California Art’s fourth annual California Design Biennial and is looking for a few good like-minded contributors for the Industrial Design portion of the show. Details and info below and remember, entries due by March 1, 2010.

From Ms. Alis:

“I’ve covered the PMCA’s design biennial for the last few years and it’s always served as a great survey of the state’s design. This year, however, we decided to theme it in a way that was appropriate to these times:

“Americans today live in a world of transformation and upheaval; we are facing a national economic  crisis and worldwide political uncertainties and are becoming increasingly attuned to environmental issues. The designs in California Design Biennial: Action/Reaction will address how designers are responding to these issues and how the products they create reflect the influences of our changing world.”

So, I am looking for a range of industrial design pieces, from furniture to gadgets, which evoke these principles:

1. Visually excellent (this goes without saying)
2. Initiated or furthers positive change:  economic, political, environmental, or social (creates an Action/Reaction, if you will)
3. Designed in California between January 2008 and early 2010 (as in by now)

To help me out, add worthy products—either your firm’s, something you own and love, or maybe something you spotted in a magazine or blog—to the CA Biennial Industrial Design Flickr group (or you can email directly to me, but uploading to Flickr would be really great). And if you’ve got something in the Graphic Design, Fashion, Architecture or Transportation fields, be sure to pass it along to my cohorts. We must receive all submissions by March 1, 2010.”

Tweet This Post 

Beautiful Losers graphic/poster designer and my good buddy Keith Scharwath is now also a good art director as he guest art directs the upcoming Neighborhoods issue of GOOD magazine. In his new do-gooder role he’s looking for a few good contributors and that’s where you good creative types come in. Get in while the gettings good!

From Keith’s Carwash (obvs cover deadline has passed but content submissions ongoing through Feb 15!):

“Are you an artist or a photographer? We’ve opened up the issue to the greater creative web community through Society6 for visual artists, and Pictory for photographers. What this means in a nutshell is if you are interested in having your art in (or on the cover) of the magazine, you can participate on these sites and your art may be chosen.

The Society6 deadline is end of day tomorrow – Feb. 9th. Click here for more information about participating on Society6.

The Pictory deadline is Feb. 15th. Click here for more info about submitting a photo to Pictory.”

Tweet This Post 

New is old and old is new again with Robert Penney’s CVS 2600 video game box art of recent films, including one for something called Avatar(?) Reminiscent of graphic designer Spacesick’s clever “I Can Read Movies” series-an ongoing collection of film-based retro book covers.

Click here or a game below to see the entire set.

And for kicks, here’s a couple of the Spacesick’s latest “books” from the aforementioned “I Can Read Movies” series.

Tweet This Post 

Attention creative types: the collaborative project Artists Wanted has come up with a self portrait contest for you. Depicting yourself through “Fine Art, Painting, Sculpting, Drawing, Installation, Print Making, Graphic Design, Glass, Book Arts, Performance, Video Art, Street Art/Graffiti, Photography, Tattoo Art” and be judged by an esteemed panel of judges (Steve Buscemi?!) The grand prize winner will receive $7007 or 6 months free living in NYC. Submissions are due by January 14th, 2010.

Read on below or click Dali for more info.

From Artists Wanted:

“You are invited to participate in “The Power of Self” an international competition celebrating the vitality of self portraiture. A panel of judges including actor Steve Buscemi, director Chris Weitz, Guggenheim curator Helen Hsu and Flavorpill founder Sascha Lewis will award one artist a package of incredible prizes including six months of free living at The Edge in New York City or $7007 in cash. The most popular portfolio as voted by the public will also receive $1,000 cash. Your images have power. Now is your moment to reveal them to the world.“

Tweet This Post 

Yes, you read that right, free money! Courtesy of my bearded graphic designer buddy Keith Scharwath in commemoration of the grand opening of his blog Carwash, Keith will be giving away 100 free Gocco prints on dollar bills with a special message printed on each hand numbered bill. In addition to designing the beautiful poster for Beautiful Losers (which is always up on the left side of this site), Keith has worked on a wide variety of design projects ranging from album covers; logos corporate and non; good work for GOOD; and various Nike projects amongst many others. Please help welcome Keith’s new blog, Carwash, to the interwebs by clicking over for some visual stimulation, inspiration and a “free print (or a free dollar)” while supplies last!

Tweet This Post 

A solid first weekend of November with friends in art shows, friends being crafty, and Pac Man going up against Kitty. I got my money on Manny.

• Fifteen years strong, Marsea Goldberg’s venerable New Image Art Gallery keeps banging out the hits with the help of special human being Amber Abramson (who herself is often busy-being) as they present the group show 14 Artists. And these aren’t just any artists, they’re heavy hitters Judith Supine, Cleon Peterson, Skullphone, The Date Farmers, Richard Colman, and Erik Foss among others. Party starts at the gallery and continues on to the after-party at the Cha Cha in Silver Lake.

• Get your craft on at the Contemporary Crafts Market in Santa Monica as my dear old friend Tianna Osborne will be displaying (and selling) her art through her uniquely beautiful purses through the weekend. Flyer below is good for free admission for two!

• Want more Manny? Of course you do! So I suggest you start waiting in line now at Hollywood’s Montálban Theater as Nike Sportswear presents Under the Hood with Manny Pacquiao, a send off celebration and Q&A with the man himself and his team of Freddie Roach, Buboy Fernandez and Alex Ariza. RSVP is mandatory and capacity will surely be reached, but if you can’t make it in person the event will be streaming live on Niksportswear.com, Complex.com, and Facebook.

• The HVW8 Art+Design Gallery on Melrose reunites three old designer friends with the show Michael, Kevin & Geoff. Those three amigos would be: Geoff McFetridge who was of course in Beautiful Losers and whose work you’ve most recently seen in the title design of Where the Wild Things Are; graphic designer Michael Leon whose work with Nike is well documented; and Kevin Lyons who’s well, Kevin Lyons.

• Ever wanted to know how to blow yourself up? If your answer is yes (or if you just want to see some good art) then you’re in luck as WK Interact teaches you how to do so at Echo Park’s Subliminal Projects with his solo show aptly titled How to Blow Yourself Up.

• Speaking of blowing stuff up, the Three Apples Exhibition Celebrating 35 years of Hello Kitty continues at the Royal/T Cafe in Culver City with limited edition print releases, live painting, and meet and greets with some of the participating artists of this never ending event. Along with my Hit+Run homeboys silk-screening gear, Buff Monster and Plasticgod will be among the artists on hand from 4-9pm. Presented by Juxtapoz and Japan LA.

• And finally, another celebratory show as the clothing line Blood is the New Black celebrates their five years of existence with a group show and party at Silver Lake’s JÜNC Gallery. And what would an art party be without my talented friends, the lovely Jesse Spears and the sometimes bearded Dan Monick, among the many participating artists.

Tweet This Post