Phish posted this warning in my Whatever forum earlier today, and I felt that it deserved to be read. I know that I say it a lot, but I thought it might to young practitioners good to read it from someone other than me, and someone who's been there:
When are people going to learn how much the general media is a detrement to this industry? Artists seem so eager to get into the mainstream media that it seems they don't think before they do it. If you want to be well known, have it be because you do what you do well... Not because you're ballsy enough or stupid enough to do something that the local news chanel sees as another freak show that they can put on the five o'clock news for people to gasp at.
I spent three years working for the king of all media whores and ninety percent of the time they cut the piece up so much that he came off looking like some demented home surgeon. Before some of you jump down my throat, and you will, I don't mean any disrespect toward his work (much of which I wear).
So for those of you who havent heard this before from me here it is one more time: THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA IS NOT YOUR FRIEND!! We have plenty of outlets for our work to be displayed without using the straight media to do it. So when they call and ask if they can film you doing anything, SAY NO! If they ask you if you know anything about dangerous and illegal procedures be humble and say no.
The fact is that the media — all media, and that definitely includes BME to some extent as well — has an agenda, and the vast majority of the time, it's not going to be the same as your agenda, and they're perfectly willing to harm you if it serves their purposes.
At a minimum, that means if you want to talk about ANYTHING in public, make sure that you'd be comfortable doing both of the following:
- You must be willing to say it in front of the police.
- You must be willing to say it in front of your parents and family.
It's not complicated!
My queue of videos is starting to get short (especially since the last two videos were just posted here on IAM, not on BME itself), so I think I need to do some editing later today. Anyway, today I have for you a dermabrasion scarring done by Eizo Mamiya out of Tokyo:
On Japanese skin, the procedure leaves a “shadow” type scar, almost like selective tanning — it's really quite something, and represents a unique contribution to the scarification palette. You can see more photos of Katsuyuki's scarring and other body modifications in the ModCon book.
Anyway, enjoy the video. It's available for download now on the main BME page. Oh, and a warning: if you don't want to be embarrassed by gangsta rap coming out of your speakers, turn down the volume before clicking!
First, I just had the most fun that you can have in fifteen minutes (and no, that takes longer!)… Chasing the dog with my rather poorly put together (my fault) remote control car is enormously pleasing. I've got to fiddle with it a bit still to get things running just like they should, but it still ran extremely well.
Anyway, I'm off now to cook pizza with Rachel and Saira at Ryan and Danielle's house… And as luck would have it, I picked up a pile of Unibroue, and some little stubbies as well (that's beer too, not a drug or weiner reference).
I've been throwing around ideas for a hepatitis shirt for a while, largely in response to the overwhelming media claim that there is a link between tattooing and hepatitis. Now, there might be such a link, but what they fail to mention is that a link between responsible tattooing and hepatitis is extremely difficult to make a case for…
We met with our architect yesterday to see his early ideas on the house — really wonderful stuff, and he's made some wonderful improvizations on the earthship/passive-solar theme. The current design is a series of organic curved rooms, fronted with interior garden and a massive all-glass faceted front using surplus skyscraper panels. The building is two stories, with the second story constructed using rough logs and supporting a third story balcony and observation deck.
I've put some tiny teaser images on the site (scroll down to the “progress” section), and probably in about two weeks I'll post some more final plans… It's really looking nice, and it's very compact, so there's no reason why we can't finish most of it this summer.
