Adieu Le Cactus

          Dense. That's what it was. That's what I was, too, come to think about it, for not going back more often, for not reading all the material. Because there's always so much in a Maya Paris build.
          Last night was the last night of Le Cactus on SBCC after an outstanding 2 years on the sim; this morning, there's just mist and Art Blue, still falling over dead drunk on a sky platform. But last night... Maya and Simotron Aquila (shown above) were dancing when we arrived, and together with Art Blue, cautious about putting on any attachments that might mess up his hair or teeth (teeth? he has attached teeth?) we were a group of five.

         

The Excellent I

What, then, shall we do?

John Cage

          What, then, does Machinima in Second Life do?

          Iono Allen makes machinima. He gained fame as a noob, with A Question Of Honour, in which long-time friend and colleague Larkworthy Antfarm also appears. It was shortlisted for an exhibition at MOMA, no less. The cinematic power of the film's unspoken story is even more remarkable since Allen had never made machinima before coming into Second Life. You will find 44 original uploads on his YouTube channel, with his latest short, Passion, notably available in full only on Vimeo, but more of that later.

Second Life Machinima is not fan-mod or art-mod, to borrow Rebecca Cannon's terms; it doesn't sit with the taxonomy of mainstream machinima with its professionally built sets and scripted or meta-scripted quests. It's quite easy to make a slick looking short when you have a game like Halo as a backdrop, and quite another thing with the homegrown props and lag of Second Life.

Method and Madness

Kenya's Feed A Smile is a great charity and Kiana the maddest pea of them all is trying to raise money for them in Second Life. The MadPea crew have set up a charity auction in a park at  Mad City among the wildly beautiful New York sims. The auction starts February 15th and runs through February 23rd.

The idea is that you bid on people offering goods or services or, in the case of the celebs, maybe just 'to spend time' with them. And there are some pretty well-known names up there, all the way from Bryn Oh to Drax. (OK you're expecting some comment like :"I would pay good money to have Drax pass 24 hours without spamming about himself and that bloody Fluffee", right? You're out of luck. This is 'don't mention the Drax' week. Thank God it's Thursday.)

Paris when it prickles

Art in Second Life may be undergoing some stress testing these days - no money means no art sims, unless you want to be swallowed alive by LEA, it seems. But never fear! Maya Paris is here to cheer and inspire us all to be more tickled pink and jazzy in our January outlook.

 I've been transatlanticking this week, which has kept me busy, but not too busy to see this wonderfully dark and musical exhibit - with lots of freebies, of course, and costumes. What would a Paris build be without them?
 Snowbody Cortes took these lovely pictures.

Unlike good hair and good shoes, most top-flight art in SL is free. That doesn't mean you shouldn't help pay for it. There are lots of ways you can contribute to artists - Maya, for example, supports her work by selling beautiful fans - so show the Linden love to artists, as you do to the Musicians, dressmakers and cobblers all. It's time we all paid to play, don't you think?
Le cactus is the Santa Barbara College venue for Maya's new work, but don't miss the Casino de Paris mini-version, on Virtual Montmartre, one of the richest sims in the Life. (Nish Mip's umbrella shop is there!)

You don't have to throw a banana on your head but if you did, just this once, don't you think it might be a laugh?

Looks like Wizzy 's having fun...

Turn up the volume,and get dancing. The music of Josephine Baker and Valaida Snow is guaranteed to delight, and you can't put your back out in vitrual worlds - so just let go. You'll be glad you did.

Crash, Bang: Mapping a Trollop

It's a big crash, and it's quite serious.

LUMINATRIX, Smack the Pony

What's a bod about? In our search for happiness, love, and success, what are we making of ourselves? Corporeal or corporate? which matters?  Crash Bang Trollop is the new build by Maya Paris, opening this afternoon at MetaLES.

It's a mad, bad, hilarious-to-know exploration of the prodding and primping that is so important in our commercial, superficial world. In addition to the Zap suit, there are seven

Suppose

Destinati a perdersi

In spazi troppo piccoli

In pezzi che non puoi riappiccicare

Negrita

Suppose none of it is real. Robin Moore's new build Playground of Love, which opens at Arte Libera on March 3rd, shows romance as a fun fair, yet wonders about both - the fun, and the fairness. Hearts don't do virtual, they just are, and this thoughtful install, built in collaboration with Prajna Seetan, runs rings around ideas of commitment, seduction, trust, and change.

Love as a merry-go-round; a Heath-Robinson build - Storm P machines, to Danes like Robin - it is full of poses and moving parts, none of which take you anywhere except back to yourself again; even the stairs, with their embossed promise of  'Love, Live, Learn', lead into a sky from which the birds have flown, leaving only their shadows, and an empty moon. This is no fairy-tale romance, but a reminder that, unlike our intentions, all we have done is a memory somewhere, and actions have a way of running full circle.

Meanwhile, at Maya Paris' Veparella, fairy tales have been stitched together seamlessly, from Rapunzel to Red Riding Hood.

Surrender to the Veparella kit; it is as essential to the story as Once Upon a Time. Turn up the mischievous music by March Macbain. 
Like Playground of Love, this is a joyful build, with jolly music and a sense of fun, full of poses. Here, choosing has consequences, mostly of a particulate kind, but beware, every click counts. Your head in calipers, and wearing your mother's stilettos, you get to be the heroine - not just Veparella herself, running with scissors, choosing, spiralling upward; suppose you can be all the Princesses of the story books. Find them for yourself.

If Playground of Love explodes the myth of real commitment in virtual relationships, it does so with bland serenity. It's all a game, where you come to please yourself, living the moment, confident that nothing and no-one around you has more substance than their pixels, so no harm done. Snapped memories float down gently, cushioning even the heavy hammer in one corner. Nothing matters, it's all happened before, and will again.

 Veparella suggests consequences somewhat spikier than that, one would suppose.
A classic tale.

When it sizzles

You know you were never really 'in' SL when an excitable Costa Rica resident launches into a chant of 'who told you that?' punctuated by a laundry list of alleged VIPs you've never met, with names like Harpic and Toxer, and it takes a good 15 minutes to remember that Mute has been renamed Block in 2.0.
In other more useful news, Mab MacMoragh has arranged for Oberon Onmura's meteorological instal Storm Cells to go on display again over at ::Soup:: it's really worth seeing.

Anyway, B2 opens tomorrow, as you  have already heard seen and smelt from everyone else.
It's the Pepsi to Burning Life's Coca Cola; smaller, essentially the same, but with more bacon taste.Traditions have been respected - sims have names such as Rabbit Hole and 12 Mile, big names rub shoulders with less well-crafted efforts, and there's plenty of lag to go around.
Plenty.

Whoot

There's no getting away from it, you can always recognize a Caerleon build. No matter who is in charge of the construction, or whether you're in SL or reactiongrid, they suggest the study of an absent-minded professor, a mess of precious manuscripts and useful equations jumbled about the place. The cardigan and pipe tobacco imagery fade, though, when you get down to the individual sections of the build, and the new show Identity is no exception. A work in progress for about a year, it will be up through the month of October, starting this Saturday.

Marshalled by the talented Freewee Ling, many fine artists have become involved with the project, I'm sure you can find a copy-n-paste to give you all eighteen names. Best of all, check out Botgirl's manly blog on the subject - OK, don't actually read the whole press release, it's like War and Peace, but there's a video presentation, Woot! It's a great introduction to the show, as well as a fine example of why voice morphing wins hands down as the creepiest idea LL ever came up with.

TeleOctoscopy: a Birthday Build

'Is there much more of it still to come?'
'Two hours of it. Why do you sigh?'
'Because I should like to see it all.'
'And why can't you?'
'I have to go - presently.'

Mark Twain, From the "London Times" of 1904 

It all started with hat envy.
Yesterday afternoon, Maya Paris and the ubiquitous otter Scottius Polke were sporting headgear that rather effectively burst the bubbles in Pop-n-Glo part of Oberon Onmura's new install at Fruit Islands Art on sim Mango. Maya responded to my hint about hat-sharing by cryptically asking if I had received the invite to the TeleOctoscope  her SL7B build, a joint project with the brilliant L1Aura Loire.
Then the otter passed out. (BTW if you click on the pictures, they get bigger.) Maya's build is here on sim SL7B Phenomenal.

It's inspired by a 19th-century long-distance communication device called a "telectroscope," a perfect metaphor for friendship and the close, long-distance connections possible in the metaverse, particularly celebrating the one between two women, one in Massachusetts, the other in far-away Kent, or vice versa, depending on your point of view.

Interactive, like so many of Maya's builds, you get to wear a uniform, including non-stick gloves and yay! the big hat! and join the ranks of mermechanics, powered by 'steam, chocolate and tea'. Not sure about the mustache; it makes me look like a goodnight-hating gun-toting guitarist.

We Mermechanics are sworn to keep the machine in perfect working order. Not sure what that involves; as you know, I never read notecards. Or write syllabi, until I absolutely have to, but that's off topic.

At the bottom of the structure, which gets slightly lost in the busy sky of the birthday build, I was absolutely enchanted by the 4 viewing pods showing films, including one about mermaids, and a nostalgia piece about the blowing up of Maya and L1Aura's eggy Burning Life build.

The very best one, though,  is 'Toggle' a short film in which L1Aura tells the story of her Lives, a "mixed-reality work-in-progress" as she puts it. She stands in her RL office with, on the screen behind her,  images of SL (hey, that's Filthy Fluno in the photo! - Side note, I think his wife makes him wear that hair, don't you? as a sort of contraceptive device).  L1Aura/Lori is a RL university professor in Boston, and this film tells of her investigation into the virtual world, and what her friendship with Maya Paris means to her, and what it led to... you have to see this one, it's just great, and is available for viewing here if you can't get inworld.

Oh and I have incriminating pictures of Kolor Fall drinking beer at a Japanese Rain Festival, if anyone would like to see them.

Cheep and Cheerful: Maya Paris' NightBirds

Fresh from the triumph of her bird-up-chimney chairs at IMPOCA, Maya Paris has a new exhibit on the lawn in front of the Omega Art Space and it opens today.

Set your world view to midnight and experience NightBirds, another interactive funscape, complete with beak, wings, eggs, animations, and sounds. Get a bird's eye view of Maya's spiky shiny imagination by roosting in the nests and embracing your inner egg - or beat a clutch of them and discover your own tune in the combination of their birdsongs, some supplied by Maya herself, others by folk singer and ornithological whistler, Man of Kent Nigel Hobbins. (Click and follow the links! He is hot and his new CD 'Out Of His Tree' sounds great... the accent is to die for!)

Maya Paris: Nigel is a friend of mine, and he provided the song of the yellowhammer and the chiffchaff, which is the first migrant bird we hear in the spring here in England. If you sit on an egg I can make you hop.
I like hopping. The nestiness was great fun, and all the eggs reminded me a little bit of Maya's Burning Life kitchen.
Maya Paris: Yes, eggy eggy. Try running around now and look at the grass behind you.

Lots of delicate white circles followed my footsteps and, being a dope, at first I mistook their meaning.
Maya Paris: I was thinking daisies...but if laying eggs works for you:)
Thirza Ember: For a moment there I thought you had invented the fried egg layer.
Maya Paris: It's pretty if you just spin.
It was.
Maya Paris: You can hear your egg?
Thirza Ember: Oh yes, it's whistling.

Maya Paris: Haha! Now click the eggs, and play me a birdsong tune! Oh there are two kinds of wings, feathery and pointy, and they have a flight assist, so if you ever need to fly really high, they will take you.
Thirza Ember: That is wonderful. I have a lot of wing envy.

Maya Paris: I can't wait to hear what this sounds like with a lot of people, I'm hoping it will sound like a flock of birds all chattering.
Just like your average vernissage, then, I thought.
Be at Omega tonight, there are lots of goodies in the globe, I liked Treacle Darlandes' 'The Storm' which is the pyramid installation in the foreground here.

And since we're on the subject of bluetits and loons, don't miss dear Gleman Jun's award-winning (oh my how he loves when I say that) 'Flame of creativity' and other artful and humourous pieces on Omega's top shelf.

Must fly.

bi-cycles

Rolling Shuffle, artist, photographer and musician, recently in SL but you'd never guess it, showed me some Loopy Love last night...
No, not kissing and telling - as if !!
We went to see - or rather accepted the invitation to "Come loop yourself silly in the 7 stages of LoopyLove." by Maya Paris (that's her blog link) at Project Z on sim Cetus, which is, well, look for yourself... mmm machinima!
Yes, Project Z is owned and run by musician and composer Zachh Cale - who also has an upcoming Jazz Festival, from 17/OCT-14/NOV 2009:

日本語の案内は後半になります。
Jazz & Art Festival 2009

Top SL Jazz musicians perform at 10 unique venues,

and 6 individual Japanese artists exhibit their work

with beautiful Jazz Music! Greatest ever musical event in SL Japan!

On Zachh's profile, these two pearls of wisdom, just thought I'd pass them along...

When you fully commit,

the universe conspires to assist you.
If something feels wrong, listen deeply without prejudice:

suffering is resistance to what is.

A girl can never have too many pearls. So these are some of the stages of loopy love, the fireworks bit, the dreamy bit, the jiggly bit, the wondering and talking and not talking bit. I am not sure at what stage your eyes pop out on stalks, maybe I'm doing it wrong... comments always welcome... You tp in to the gallery, it's important to read the notecard and remember turn off your A/O and music, and to wear the helmets provided for each room

not simply beacuse they allow you to hear the ...odd sounds and to be part of the animation of the spheres, but also because you get to look really funny wearing a cone-head hat. The sounds loop, the rooms loop, the animations loop, the cycle of rooms loops too, and you've that feeling, of having been here before, somehow. There is a funky offbeat slightly hysterical feel to the place, every sphere is a champagne bubble of emotions, some giddy some more reflective, some just slightly worrying. But in the end you float to the top, ready to go again. The colours are gorgeous and I am probably missing a lot with my usual woes, so as ever I recommend you go and see this for yourself... take a friend, of course.

So the other cycle, because I know you read the title and are wondering, is the Four Seasons exhibit at Tanalois, Gemini Isle, the Italian Art sim owned by my good friends Tani Thor and Aloisio Congrejo. Tani has just redone the whole land, and the results are spectacular. to celebrate the 'rebirth' of the island, they've a show with 20 artists divided into four seasonal areas, including Maryva Mayo, Shellina Winkler, Gleman Jun to name but three. There's too much to say about each of the artists to fit in this post, (apologies to those who didn't get a mention) but here are some of my faves... do TP over to see them properly, and show your Linden Love.

This is yer classic Italian Summer, Lion Igaly's people on the beach, ermm mummy why are those two people fighting ah happy days... interestingly, there is a bicycle in this picture... Builder Tani Thor has made four harmonious and complementary areas, it's a delight to go walking across the sim, and absorb the art along the way.

... and here next to his painting we have artist GIOBY Later with his very lovely girl Lauretta76 Carling - what's that, a proposal, Gio? Well, it is springtime at Tanalois... and there's an African summer feel to Zhora Maynard 's striking sculpture. I absolutely love the colours and the setting couldn't be better. I keep meaning to go to see Zhora's studio, so seeing her work here was an excellent reminder.
But my Best Bit award goes to the brilliant Nessuno Myoo. The classical subject matter, the delicacy of lines and the cleverness of perspectives leaving the whole work counterbalanced somewhere between two and three dimensions is so perfectly nuanced, you must check it out in person. TP to the 4 seasons show at Tanalois, you'll be glad you did.

... E no, ogg nn lo riscrivo... penso che le foto parlano da sé e cmq ti fa bene, ogni tanto, lottare con l'inglese. Dico solo che Nessuno Myoo è eccezionale, questo vale in qualsiasi lingua.