Salavat Fidai is an artist in Ufa, Russia. Among other media, he paints tiny images on pumpkin seeds. He features famous works of art, such as the above version of Van Gogh’s Starry Night, as well as characters from pop culture, such as the Star Wars characters below.
Here’s a time-lapse video showing how Fidai made the Starry Night seed. With a nearly microscopic brush, he applies layers of paint from the background to the foreground.
(Photos: Thanko)
Some people are born slackers. Everyone else, though, has to learn that skill through determined and sustained effort.
Technology can help. In the past, we’ve seen padded napping desks, desk with built-in beds, emergency nap kits, and padded helmets designed specifically for sleeping at work.
These are all good if you want to sleep. But what if you don't want to sleep, but also not, you know, work. Rocket News 24 reports that the Japanese firm Thanko offers a brilliant new product called the Chin Rest Arm. It’s a adjustable clamp-mounted padded arm. You can use it to nap, if you wish. But you can also use it to just slouch, thus preserving precious energy for other, more important tasks once your shift ends.
(Images: Steven Holl)
The plan was an ambitious one. The Copenhagen Gate would provide a crossing between two skyscrapers at the mouth of one of Copenhagen’s harbors. People would be able to ride or walk across the glass-walled span while getting a glorious view of the city below.
Steven Holl, an American architect, first proposed the idea in 2008. Sadly, after much discussion among city planners and architects, the project has been cancelled.
Why would they cancel such an awesome idea? Although it looks cool, Copenhagen’s government figures that people won’t actually use it. It would be easier to ride around the harbor than to take a bike on two different elevators to access the crossing. The Guardian reports:
“It would be fun, and a landmark, but it would never be something that would be used every day,” said Klaus Bondam, formerly Copenhagen’s mayor for roads and the environment and now the chief executive of Cyklistforbundet, the Danish Cyclists’ Federation. “You wouldn’t want to cycle, get in a lift with your bike, get on your bike and then get in another lift on the other side. It would be quicker to cycle round the harbour.”
-via Dornob
(Photo: Rijksmuseum)
You’re at the Rijksmuseum, a world-renowned art and history museum in Amsterdam. Is it time to extend your selfie stick and take a picture of yourself?
The museum staff gently suggests that the answer is “no.” They want visitors to experience what they see in the museum instead of documenting their visits online. So the staff asks visitors to put away their cameras. Instead of taking pictures, visitors, who are given pencils and paper, should draw what they see. Like previous generations of artists, they should try to copy the famous works of art or even create their original pieces. You can see pictures from the museum’s efforts here.
-via Colossal
(The No Face t-shirt on sale at the NeatoShop)
Every few months, after watching more anime than is probably a good idea, I make viewing recommendations and ask Neatorama readers to suggest their own. Let's do it again!
When I first heard of School-Live, I didn't bother with it because, at only a glance, it looked like an insipid schoolgirl slice-of-life comedy.
Boy, was I wrong!
I'm glad that I took the advice of one of my students and watched School-Live. It's a brilliantly conceived and perfectly directed story. I don't want to say too much because it will give away the premise. But at the very end of the first episode, viewers realize something very important.
The main character, through whom we encounter the story, is an unreliable narrator. Her world is anything but happy and joyful.
The three lions are playing ball--just barely. In contrast with a fast-paced game of human soccer, the trio remain firmly affixed to the floor. To make it worse, the lion on the left appears to be gesturing for a substitution. He needs a breather.
-via Tastefully Offensive
Your life could serve as an inspiration for others. Or it could be a warning.
But no matter what you do, in even small ways, you can help other people find fulfilllment and joy. So go out and do good in the world today.
(Photo: Cameron Butler/Washington Post)
This is Devon "Bosco" Farr. He's a manager at BookPeople, an independent bookstore in Austin, Texas. Every day for the past year, Farr has eaten a taco.
He's part of an emerging trend among creative people. It can be hard to fit in artistic work while trying to earn a living and going about the other chores of normal life. In response, many artists, as a disciplinary practice, create a small object or perform an inventive task every day for an entire year.
We've already seen the fruits of this labor. Every day, Noah Scalin created a skull-themed piece of art. Stian Korntved Ruud made a wooden spoon. Tanaka Tatsuya made a miniature diorama. And there are many more. Gillian Brockell of the Washington Post talked to several artists engaging in 365 projects, including Lauren Rapp, who makes little chairs out of many different media:
For Rapp, it all started in December 2014 with a failed attempt to finish the “The Artist’s Way,” the 1992 self-help workbook that’s supposed to jump-start your creative side. Rapp, who was frustrated and barely getting by with freelance Web consulting gigs, had been meeting with friends to do the workbook, hoping accountability to a group would push her through to the end. Something, anything, to break the procrastination.
“We made it through three or four sessions,” she says, laughing . “And then, you know, people get busy. Life gets busy.”
The book encourages meditation, so after what ended up being the last group session, she sat for 10 minutes, “which to me can be an eternity.”
“And during the meditation, during my wandering thoughts, I just thought it would be cool to make a little chair for my bookshelf, for a decoration,” she recalls. “Then I thought, ‘Well, you’re supposed to be meditating, not thinking about this!’ ”
Eventually, Rapp realized that her way of mediating was to make chairs.
-via Marilyn Bellamy
It was time for the City Council of Santa Clarita, California to open the floor to public comments. No one expected anything of note to be said. Then this young Demosthenes stepped up and called for the restoration of civilization. Specifically, she wants the 10 McDonald's restaurants in Santa Clarita to bring back their famous McRib sandwich.
The mysterious hero, who begins speaking at the 1:01 mark in the video, described the history of the McRib, provided statistics on its distribution, and explained why the McRib is central to having a meaningful life:
To be honest, the removal of the McRib from the menu has affected my family because every Thanksgiving my family would order a 50 piece chicken nugget meal and 10 McRibs, and now my family’s holiday spirits are messed up and broken. I come to you in this matter. I tried calling the hotline and they don’t take me seriously.
I can't quite make out the audio when she introduces herself to the council members, but her first name sounds like "Zanthy." Zanthy speaks for us all.
-via First We Feast
(Photos: Suma Aqualife Park)
Rocket News 24 reports that railroads in Japan have a problem: turtles wander onto their tracks and get stuck between the switching rails. When the switches flip, they fail to close completely due to the turtles' bodies. This causes train accidents.
It's an unpleasant experience for the turtles, too.
For a solution, the West Japan Railway Company teamed up with the Suma Aqualife Park in Kobe. They designed and built tunnels that allow turtles to walk under the rails completely. Since this system was implemented in April, people have spotted at least 10 turtles using the tunnels.
Like the replicants on Blade Runner, it's hard to spot a fake Emperor Penguin. The task requires careful study by a specialist. But if you watch carefully, you'll notice that the second from the left in the group doesn't move like a normal penguin.
For the BBC nature program Penguin--Spy in the Huddle, zoologists and, presumably, invasion planners, planted 50 cameras among a colony of Emperor Penguins in Antarctica. Many of these cameras were disguised as penguins themselves, thus gathering information and sowing distrust within the justifiably paranoid penguin community.
-via Twisted Sifter
(Photos: Chinese Cultural Relics journal)
In 1974, farmers in China uncovered the tomb of Emperor Qin Shi Huang. Since then archaeologists at the site have found well-preserved grave goods dating back 2,300 years, including 8,000 terracotta human and animal figures known as the Terracotta Army.
In 2004, archaeologists at the site uncovered the remains of a mysterious board game. They published on their findings in 2014. Their article was recently translated into English in the journal Chinese Cultural Relics. The gaming journalism site Killscreen describes the game, which appears to be a surviving set of the long-lost game of "Bo":
The game’s pieces consist of a 14-sided die (carved out of an old animal tooth), 21 numbered rectangular game pieces, and a slab of broken tile, thought to be a piece of the game’s board. The reconstructed tile was decorated with two eyes, which were painted amongst stormy cloud and thunder sketches, as archaeologists reported in their findings.
The game’s pieces are reported by archaeologists to potentially be of “liubo,” mostly called “bo” for short. “Bo” seemingly vanished from the history of ancient Chinese board games around 1,500 years ago, and researchers have remained at a loss as to how the game was played, as well as being unsure if the rules of the game even varied from generation to generation of players. The closest clue is that of a 2,200-year-old poem by Song Yu, which recounts a game with similar pieces to the ancient board game’s artifacts found over the years.
The 14-faced die is where this ancient game gets particularly interesting. Twelve sides of the die are numbered one through six in the ancient Chinese calligraphy of zhuan-shu, or “seal script,” which existed as the formal script for all of China during the Qin dynasty. However, the remaining two sides are blank – entirely vacant of any marks. Even with this new discovery, “Bo” remains a mystery to all.
-via Ace of Spades HQ
sexy_bum82 and Angeldemons of the educational website reddit reveal to us a cultural expression that those of us in North America and Europe may not be aware of. Yes, this is how Australians assemble a Christmas tree while in their homeland.
Australia is well within the southern hemisphere. So science teaches us that December 25 is during Australia's summer, so a fan is useful. Also, everything is upside down. And there are venomous snakes and spiders everywhere--probably wrapped inside these presents.
(Photo: Kelli Anderson)
Kelli Anderson is highly skilled at making functional machines from paper. In the past, we've seen her paper record player. Her latest project is called This Book Is a Camera. That's because it is.
The camera takes the form of a pop-up book. Inside is an unfolding camera, 5 sheets of film, and a lightproof bag to develop them in. Just follow the instructions to take clear black-and-white photos using just the contents of the book.
Kim Jong-un, the dictator of North Korea, is noted for his unusual coif. His hair is shaved or cut short on the sides, but rises to a big puff going straight up. Recently, his government ordered that its subjects copy the style.
Mike Faille of Canada's National Post drew these illustrations of celebrities and politicians wearing the same style. I think that Justin Bieber looks pretty good in it.
-via Jeremy Barker
