Arts

“There was never a good war or bad peace.” –Benjamin Franklin

This book is a small collection of anti-war images as well as quotes from a wide range of people including political fi gures, authors, activists, and artists.

Dennis King has assembled a collection of recent rock posters in Mini #2 that all include females, often nude, and sometimes with guns.

Compiled by staff and contributors of Swindle magazine, Street World is a collection of over 1,000 photos and around a half dozen essays. The book awkwardly attempts to define street culture, with moments of insight clouded by pandering to readers nostalgic for a mythological ‘80s New York City.

Author Kip Fulbeck presents an assortment of photographs where each person is presented next to a handwritten note about his/her tattoo.

Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel De Homem-Christo wrote and directed the 74 minute robot epic, Electroma, as a conceptual complement to the duo’s 2005 album Human After All (Virgin). Composed of five set-pieces and shot on 35 mm film stock in the California deserts, the film follows the leather clad avatars of Daft Punk, Hero Robots #1 and #2, down perpetual highways and endless deserts in the pursuit of humanity. Devoid of dialogue and anything from the Daft Punk catalogue, the film floats on the potency of lingering camera sequences and stark cinematography.

Chris Eichenseer will be exhibiting some of his photographs at the Threadless Gallery in Chicago. The exhibition, Cry Me A River, is the first show of its kind by Chris in over eight years. He spends his time at Someoddpilot Design, one of our favorite indie design shops in Chicago, and is responsible for most of the good parts of PitchFork’s website.

In the text that accompanies this bilingual book (which is better left unread) artist Barry McGee claims that in the past 10 years, it would have been impossible for any resident of Milan to miss the work of graffiti artist Dumbo. Though the book presents no evidence of the prolific efforts it would take to meet that claim, it does offer an enjoyable photo-essay of Dumbo’s life and Italian graffiti culture.

Punk music, and its surrounding culture, has always been most effective with a simple, straightforward approach. Author and musician Timothy Findlen, along with photographer Abby Banks, spent three months driving cross-country to visit and photograph sixty-five punk houses—communal, low-rent houses typically crammed full of punks, squatters, and artists. The end result is PUNK HOUSE, a collection of 300 full color photos and three short essays.

Guitar-playing illustration geeks feast your eyes on Josh Kenyon’s (Enyo Creative) illustrated guitars.

Dave Thompson is trying to seduce you. And it’s not with restless nymphomaniacs or yielding flesh; it’s with something a lot more potent—nostalgia.

In Black and White and Blue, he laments, “in the stags as much as the real world, it is the relationship between two people that flavors the sex that follows…in latter movies [the lovers] are simply objects on the end of their genitalia.”