Two great things that go great together: books and cities. The art (architecture?) is really appealing, but I also like the way it makes me think about the connections between cities and books—how you don’t get books until you have cities, and how cities have a powerful influence on the books that come out of them.

Grist

I’ll admit that I attended one TINY textbook fire as a teenager. It was somebody’s math book, and we just stuck it in a park barbecue and then melted some cups over it, nothing particularly Fahrenheit 451. But there are better ways to dispose of textbooks that you hate, or just don’t need anymore, but for whatever reason can’t sell back. Chinese artist Liu Wei, for instance, does it by making spectacular carved-book cityscapes.

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Filed under: Art, books

Book Launch: “Another Science Fiction: Advertising the Space Race 1957-1962″

Another Science Fiction: Advertising the Space Race 1957 – 1962
By Megan Prelinger • Published April 2010 by Blast Books

“A brilliant tour through the iconography and literature of America’s grandest corporate dreamtime, the Space Age.” — William Gibson

Read about it at: Another Science Fiction.

The book launch will be held May 4, 2010, at The Booksmith in San Francisco. Other book tour appearances follow, including one at Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.

(thanks to Boing Boing for the hook-up)

Filed under: Art, Pop Culture, Tech, books, science fiction, space

Artist Promotes ‘Subway Etiquette’ With Guerrilla Campaign

“Riding the subway in NYC is cheap, efficient, and often, highly irritating. It’s like a concentration of the most inconsiderate and rude people know to man, but hopefully one graphic designing prankster can help.”

via Artist Promotes ‘Subway Etiquette’ With Guerrilla Campaign — ANIMAL.

Artist Jay Shells has produced ‘Subway Etiquette’ poster campaign – a series of posters based on people’s pet peeves about behaviour on the subway, and has been posting them, guerrilla style, through the system.

(ta, Laughing Squid, for the hook up)

Filed under: Art, NYC, Urbanismo, graffiti

Paris, May 1968

Paris, May 1968: icônes de la révolution / Icons of Revolution.

Filed under: Art, 1960s, Politics

Tenderloin – Tourist Destination and Art Project

“Tenderloin Dynamic is a project developed by San Francisco-based Stamen Design. a series of interactive and printed pieces that allow visitors to explore the Tenderloin through a series of different maps and mappings. Using data from the Uptown Tenderloin Historic District, public data made available by the City of San Francisco’s datasf.org, and other data sets, the project will provide a unique view on this fascinating neighborhood.”

more, more, more – how do you like it, how do you like it – at GAFFTA – Tenderloin Dynamic.

Filed under: Art, San Francisco, Tech, digital, Tenderloin