The Secret Life of Stormtroopers

Posted on | July 2, 2010 | No Comments

The most interesting things in life generally happen behind the veil of appearance. We like famous people, but we want to know more about who they are as people; what do they do when the camera is not on. We want to see the humanness behind the persona.

It is with much excitement that I present a photo series that reveals some of the most dastardly villains in the universe, doing what they do away from work: relaxing, shopping, campaigning, panhandling…just everyday stuff.

The mastermind behind the project is the Argentinian artist know as Marker.

Category: Art, Culture, Design, Installation Art, Photography
Tags: Star Wars > Stormtroopers > toys

Handwriting and You

Posted on | June 30, 2010 | No Comments

Last night one of my co-workers came up to me with a handwritten list of orders and asked if I meant to throw it in the recycling. He said he thought it looked like my handwriting. As we both took a closer look, at the same time, we said, “It’s Mari’s.” Then we had a laugh that we could determine who had created the list, by the style of their writing.

I spent the rest of the evening thinking about handwriting and how amazing it is that we all have uniquely different writing styles. Out of the 20 or so people that I work with, I think that I could pick out most of their handwriting styles with just a few words. And, there are people who I don’t even see anymore, whose writing I could describe to you because it made such an impression on me: there’s Gabe’s cool comic book print, precise and stylish, my great-aunt’s perfect cursive, an elegant link to the olden days, my old school-mate Krista’s artistic self-creation, which lacked vertical strokes of any kind and could be a bit challenging to decipher (but so cool to look at), and so on.

I know we don’t give it a lot of consideration, and that the uniqueness of handwriting is just one of those cool-but-under-appreciated things about life, but if you think about it, we have all essentially created our own typeface (or typefaces). Even the sloppy ones that are hard to read are somebody’s style. And how much do you love seeing a kid move from kindergarten structured print, into a style of their own? For me, this is a vital act of freedom that says to the world, I’m here, and I’m unlike anyone who has ever gone before!

There’s a lot more going on with handwriting than what first meets the eye.

wordage_img x

Category: Culture, Typography, Wordage
Tags: cursive > handwriting > type > Typography > written style

A New Take on Road Trip Music

Posted on | June 28, 2010 | 1 Comment

Last week, S and I took off for one of our oh-so-familiar trips to the Rocky Mountains. Believe it or not, these 13 hour rides in the car are considered sacred time in our family. We have the quiet magnificence of the Nevada desert, endless hours to spend in each others company and no cell phone reception. This is bliss.

For me, one of the great joys of road-tripping is the opportunity to listen to music, uninterrupted. About a week or so before a trip, I start thinking about where we’re going, and what music will create the perfect audio canvas for our trip, because as any experienced road-tripping music lover knows, just because you love an album at home, doesn’t mean that it will be good road music. Some things just don’t translate well to desert driving (think: the Slits).

The desert music that works for me is as spacious and expansive as the desert itself, with music that leaves me plenty of room for existing, and lyrics (or not) that relax and deepen my thinking, slowing my mind down to a more reasonable pace.

I generally take all familiar music; stuff that has proven itself to be road-worthy: Iron & Wine, Emmylou, Guy Clark, Lucinda, Mary Gauthier, Gillian and David, Whiskeytown…stuff like that.

This trip, however, I decided to try something new. I have, on my desk, a bottom-filling stack of cds that I need to listen to. Some of them are new releases, some of them are older albums that I missed the first time around, and some of them are hanging out on the keep-them-or-trade-them fence. Staring at the stack of cds, I thought, “what better time to check out all of these albums than on a road trip?” I threw them all on the new ipod (that was part of the problem, as there were no favorites already loaded onto it), and away we went, venturing out across the desert with no known music. This, I learned, is almost as bad as heading out across the desert with no water.

One of the things that I do like about ipods is that they are perfect for road trips. You have everything you want to take, without taking up any space. We plug in our little car stereo adapter, choose shuffle, and hit the road. Generally, this works like a charm. If you’ve chosen wisely, you pretty much have a customized radio station of all your favorite road-trip music, without any commercials. It’s great.

But, if of the 20 albums that you’ve loaded on the ipod, you only know two of them, it can be um, let’s just say a bit of a fail. I realized that I do not want to be asking, with every new song, “Who is this?” I also don’t want to be thinking to myself, “This album is terrible. Is there any way we can keep it from shuffling around again?” I also realized that what I love to do on the open road, is to sing along to all my favorite music, and it takes quite a few listens of a song to be able to sing along. My vocal chords didn’t get much play at all.

It wasn’t all bad. I realized that I do like Delta Spirit’s entire catalog, that the National write some really great songs, I do really dig the Carolina Chocolate Drops, and that Band of Horses is, at times, great.

However, the bad side of things went like this:

The National has a ton of songs, and I really like about 30 percent of them.

K’naan’s first album is a lukewarm prelude to Troubadour, which is amazing.

Arcade Fire’s EP is best played at home.

I’m still on the fence about Two Gallants.

It’s hard to hear the subtleties of Emily Jane White’s lyrics and delivery while racing across the desert.

And so it went. Don’t get me wrong. It wasn’t like we were miserable or anything, it was just that the music wasn’t quite right. Whenever a song came on that we knew, S and I would get a burst of energy, and sing and snap and tap our toes, until it ended. Then we were back to potentially hours of stuff we didn’t know.

So, consider yourself warned. If you head out across the desert, with limited music, make sure that you have mostly music that you know, sprinkled in with a few new things, rather than mostly new things, sprinkled in with a few that you know.

Category: Culture, Music
Tags: desert > on the road > road music > road trip

I’ll Be Back in a Bit

Posted on | June 18, 2010 | No Comments

Hi guys,

I’m taking a week or so off to spend time with some loved ones, so I won’t be updating House of Cat again until the 28th of June.

In the meantime, have a look around. There are bound to be posts, interviews and features that you’ve missed.

Also, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about what the best format is for a project like this, and I’m considering changing things around a bit. I would really appreciate your feedback on what you like, what you’re not that into, what you’d like to see more of…anything that you feel like sharing.

Hope you all are well!

Cheers,

Cat

Category: Culture

The Fine Art of the Crayon

Posted on | June 17, 2010 | No Comments

For most of us, once we graduated from grade school, our crayon art days were over. Christian Faur, however, was just getting started. Taking those oh-so-appealing sticks of colored wax (that is what crayons are made of, right?) and transforming them into something magnificent, not by using them to color with, but by using the crayons themselves as the color, Faur has pushed the boundaries of crayons and art, into a new and very colorful direction.

Here’s an excerpt from his artist statement:

“My studies in the natural sciences have made me aware of these hidden layers of complexity present in even the simplest objects. These invisible layers are seen most clearly through the lens of logic, which is used to decipher the underlying rules and laws that govern the physical world.

In my work, I try to mimic these elegant structures of nature by developing systems of my own with which to express my thoughts and ideas, so that the medium and the message appear as one.”

Category: Art, Design, Installation Art, Mixed Media
Tags: Christian Faur > crayon art > crayons

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