Photography – Page 5 – Monocultured

you would not believe the day i’ve had. litterarly.

seriously, there’s some messed up crap going on that i’m not going to go in to. i can’t relate to it because it’s bloody surreal, and if you can relate to it i’m very sympathetic to your fucked up situation.

as an alternative i present some images to you from my previous saturday that left me hung over and slightly concussed all of sunday. in no apparent order:

this was the spring party at valand and it took place at berg 211 – it was a bit too far away from the city center to become a staggering crowd of stinking artists, but we made do. and the locale is stunning.

four days ago i was dreaming about loosing a tooth, and the more i poked at it with my tounge, the bigger it became and the more it split into fragments. it became so bad that i had trouble talking. when i finally started pulling pieces out, they turned out to be glass fragments – such as you might expect from a broken bottle.

any interpretations?

det stora sveket – alla mina gamla mac-prylar ska bort

this is a repost of a ad i put in for all my old apple stuff. i post it here mostly because i put too much time to let it linger. if you’re interested, i refer you to this page: www.99.se/mac

–[snip]–

ack ja, ack ja. min mor ska flytta ut ur sin fyra och har bett mig och min bror att tömma lägenheten på våra gamla saker. det mesta jag haft där har redan rykt – mina hemgjorda tshirts, en samling serietidningar och reklamblad från -92 jag av någon anledning trodde skulle komma till nytta.

det enda jag hade sparat var mina gamla mac-prylar. det var med ett tungt hjärta jag slängde skalet till en mac plus förra året (jag hade så storslagna planer), och nu är det dags för resten av bohaget. jag har inget lager eller annan plats jag kan stuva undan allt i, och i ärlighetens namn så vet jag innerst inne att jag aldrig kommer att restaurera det och göra en raid av de 20MB scsi-diskarna jag har liggande. den med vuxendomens bittra insikt växande uppgivelsen gör att jag nu vill bli av med alla de här klenoderna till någon som bättre kan ta till vara på dem. jag ska försöka redogöra för mitt uppskattade värde av prylarna, samt det (förmodligen mer realistiska) värdet, men jag vill ha något för det oavsett – jag har suttit på mac sedan farsan köpte en plus -86, och vill inte bara ge bort det till någon som i sin tur slänger allt utom strömkabeln.

det här är en illustrativ bild av mig när jag skriver dessa rader:

om vi tar och börjar med datorerna, så har vi först och främst en pimpad mac plus. pimpad i det här fallet innebär att den utbyggt minne (fyra 512kb moduler om jag minns rätt) för att assistera en 8Mhz processor. den saknar skruvarna som håller fast baksidan (jag plockade isär den på fyllan för att komplettera med delar från en annan plus, och tappade bort skruvarna), men funkade nicely när jag senast bootade den in i OS 6.0.7.

minns att jag spelade leasure suit larry och dark castle på den när farsan inte var hemma, samt möjligtvis hade jag någon sorts prepubertal upplevelse med ‘mac playmate’, men det kan ha varit senare.

min första egna dator fick jag ta över när farsan köpte en quadra till sitt tryckeri: IIsi. med tillhörande a4-skärm (16 gråskala!). ack alla de retusheringar i photoshop 3 som jag gjorde av mina klasskamrater! jag minns bäst en bild av clara i min klass som jag var kär i där hon står iklädd en handduk, och jag med sexton grå-toner lyckades få henne att se oanständig ut. dessa minnen!

när jag började jobba som apple-tekniker fick jag ett bra pris på ram och maxade ut det till fenomenala 17Mb (1MB sitter på moderkortet) från föregående 3MB. jävlar vad det gick fortare, särskilt med ett nubus-kort med fpu (inkluderat!)

vänligen notera den fina smuts-gula färgen som de riktigt klassiska datorerna har. det kallas för patina.

sen har vi en IIcx som jag inte ens minns var jag fick tag på. möjligtvis från en kille som sålde på mig hela sin gamla mac-samling. (bland annat min första 14 tums färgskärm som kackade ut efter två månader)

en scanner är vad varje modern människa behöver, och med en state-of-the-art scanner för 256 gråskalor kan du inte misslyckas! jag har även programvaran i orginalkartong! (vänligen notera den gamla quicktime-loggan)

om du råkar sitta på en av de kanske fem IBM mainframe-datorer som finns i landet så uppskattar du säkert det här: ett 7 tums nubus-kort med interface och drivrutiner för att integrera vilken kompatibel mac som helst med militärens mainframe (tänk wargames). kostade på sin tid en sjuttio tusingar, men värdet kan ha minskat något sedan dess.

lagringsmedia är något självklart i dessa dagar, och det kan inte gå fel med externa scsi-diskar. tre chassin innehållandes två 20MB och en 40MB disk, och dessutom en syquest-enhet! mer utrymme än du någonsin vet att göra av med! (lådorna är i alla fall väldigt snygga) några syquest-skivor på 44MB följer med, och innehåller förmodligen min samlade kollektion av abandonware och de dikter jag skrev som deprimerad tonåring. (en guldgruva av ångest och underhållning alltså)

sen har vi så klart en hel drös med kablar; adb, scsi, nät, local-talk, audio, video. dessutom några möss, tangentbord, scsi-terminatorer, mikrofoner och två lösa scsi-diskar av okänt ursprung (förmodligen plockade ur den IIsi jag konstant uppgraderade)

jag gjorde några halsband av ram-minnen när jag var inne i min cyber-nörd period, och det är fritt fram för dig att göra samma sak. minnen finns i storlekar från 64KB upp till 256KB, och de är väldigt fina.

om du känner någon som jobbar på landstinget och är paranoid så kanske de skulle uppskatta att kunna låsa sina diskettstationer mot olaga uppdateringar av solitär. det här floppy-låset är nog det fulaste jag har i samlingen, mest för att det känns väldigt mycket pc. den perfekta presenten till någon du inte älskar särskilt mycket.

vad ska du då göra med dina nufunna skatter till datorer? frukta intet! till att börja med så kan du programmera lite i hypercard (väldigt snygg orginalkartong – apple har verkligen återvänt till sina rötter med de senaste macbook-lådorna), leka med aldus pagemaker, eller spela spel.

sim earth var det första spelet jag köpte. rent tekniskt sett så var det det första spelet jag övertalade min lillebror att köpa trots att han bara var sex år och inte gillade datorer. kommer på två floppys (en färg- och en sv/v-version), men den största behållningen är nog manualen, som väldigt ingående beskriver klimat, oceaniska strömmar och livets evolution. helt tokigt komplicerat. “spore” från början av nittiotalet.

en juvel i samlingen är såklart prince of persia i orginalkartong. ett av de snyggaste spelen någonsin, och enligt ryktet så är förpackningen så snygg att den ökar din sexuella dragningskraft med 400%.

allt det här är nerpackat i en låda från en rev-a imac:

och här är hela högen med grejjor. du behöver ett fordon för att forsla det här, alternativt kan tio personer dela upp allt mellan sig och bära det likt myror som just dödat en oskyldig och vacker fjäril och styckat upp kroppen. your choice.

hursomhelst. min mor ringde just och sa att hon har hyrt in en målare som kommer imorgon (2/6), och att hon förmodligen kommer att slänga allt då. om någon nappar på det här och vill ge en peng (vilken peng som helst nästan) så kan jag be henne flytta in det i vardagsrummet några dagar eller så.

om ingen är intresserad så kanske någon på återvinningsstationen kan gå förbi det i nästa vecka och få en flashback till sina egna gamla trolovade burkar och bli lite nostalgisk.

så: posta i tråden om ni har kommentarer, frågor, eller vill buda. alternativt kan ni ringa och motivera er. om jag inte svarar i telefon så sitter jag på krogen och begråter förlorad historia. jag är nere i göteborg, så om en go gubbe här ser mig på stan kan ni gärna klappa mig på axeln medömkande.

mateusz: 0739-474652

ps. allt det här finns i kungsängen, en liten bit från stockholm.

creationism and the evolution in my fridge

i don’t know what the percentage of ~~creationist~~ intelligent design believers there are in sweden, but it seems to be quite popular in the more religiously fundamentalist countries out there.

should you ever find yourself debating one, there is an informative rant here that could guide you on your way.

Mögel_skål

speaking of miracles of nature, here’s something i found in the fridge – anna was away in sthlm and i thought i’d clean something. please notice the small pebbles of fat that have formed on top of Herbert (the thing had developed sentience and named itself Herbert) (ha, ha. old food joke)

mögel_närbild

also: a couch and erotic horseplay between randy men.

randig fåtölj manligt aggrohångel

stallman, work and hookers

i just returned from a lecture by richard stallman. i tried to get some friends of mine to go, any friend actually, but when not even those who i thought were into computers and free and/or open software knew who he was i felt a bit crestfallen.

so i crammed into the draken cinema alongside a crowd of 99% sweaty men and listened to rms preach about gnu/linux and the four basic human rights as they relate to computer software. i’ve read most of it before, but it’s nice to see the man himself deliver. i had to leave when the q&a started, but caught enough to hear him berate the questioners as more or less imbeciles. he’s such an adorable geek in that way – if you don’t do your homework or ask silly questions he’ll call you on it.

(a photographic curiosity is that a guy at the other side of the room took a flash photo at the same time as i took mine, so i actually caught his flash. not that big odds of that happening.)

as of two days back, i’m a working kind of guy. from eight in the morning until five in the evening i’m behind the counter at the photo store, trying to imitate someone who actually knows what they are talking about. ok, most of the time i know more than the person asking me, but it’ll take a while to get the hang of it.

the past two days have been spent learning the antique system that they use for shipping and receiving. the stupidity of the system employed (which entails printing out seven different papers, using two printers, and a bunch of different computer apps) is baffling. if computers, and especially computer applications, can be said to have developed over the years, then the applications used in this instance are technically retarded. if you think i’m using the expression in a derogatory fashion you might want to refer to a dictionary.

at the same time, i’m filling out a questionare about chewing gum of all things. a gum manufacturer has given me a bunch of gum samples and thinks that they will benefit from me answering questions like:
I feel refreshed while chewing this gum
I feel refreshed after chewing this gum
I can imagine chewing this gum while reading or studying
I can imagine chewing this gum while walking, driving, using public transportation and/or bicycling.

me and a coworker (whom i gave one piece of gum out of the alotted six) agreed that this gum was best suited for “standing around” and/or “talking”. it was also a bit too soft. i can’t begin to imagine the amount of money the manufacturer has to shell out to get this nonsensical information that somehow will end up with yet another type of regular, fucking, gum.

seeing as i might appreciate some cheering up, anna and jan suggested they make dinner yesterday. awfully nice of them since my eyes lack a certain zest if not outright will to live after working (people work nine hours a day for a living? insane!)

anna has family visiting as well, so the dynamic duo decided to swag it up a bit and do a non-vegan concoction that would be esthetically pleasing, taste good, and (i imagine) be really cool and elaborate. so they dug out some cheese and bacon and chicken, had fish and shrimp for starters, and actually put the work in to make their own mayonnaise.

besides going out to get some pepper and lemon, i sat comatose in my room until someone calls out to me. tired, but glad that i don’t have to cook anything, i step innocently into the hall. the aroma sort of stops me in my tracks. i check to see if all that working and biking in the day has turned me into a walking pile of sweat, but sweat doesn’t smell like that. this is the smell of death. somehow the combination of fowl, egg, rotten cheese, fried chicken and whatnot has melded into something from CSI. you know when grissom or one of the others step into a room and immediately throw their hands up before their faces, saying Oh, God! What is that?. it was the smell of three hookers and their pimp left dead in a shipping container. and not the “pretty woman” type of hooker.

my food was very good once i stopped breathing through my nose though. tomorrow is a day off, and i plan to sleep until eight. at least

demonstration & deconstruction

let’s do this in pictures and videos, shall we?

in stockholm i went to the first of may demonstration with the anarcho-syndicalists. strenght in numbers is a good thing, and it feels good to be reminded that there is a political alternative and that other people might not be as absent from it as i am. after that i saw a bunch of wild rabbits in a tiny park – how they manage to thrive in downtown stockholm is beyond me, but there you go. my david attenborough moment. bonus material: taking the last commuter train home, some ants eating an apple, and me doing the drunk-look-in-the-mirror routine at a hff get-together.

i came back to gothenburg last saturday to help with taking the exhibition at konsthallen down. this is a time lapse video i made of it using the built in camera and gawker. the first video is of the deconstruction and painting of one corner, the second video is of the packaging of all the prints and thingies. a mad amount of work. one image every fifteen seconds in both vids:

in order of appearance:
– error message on the bus. blurry picture because i’m drunk.
– mom, brother and i. from a series of fifteen pictures.
– this is the reason you don’t keep open razors in the same bag pocket as your cellphone. it happened on the train back from sthlm, and some other passangers freaked because of all the blood. it’s still raw and i can’t type properly.

and last but not least: don’t even bother watching the new spiderman movie. it sucks in obvious ways, and more subtle ways. it’s not worth even downloading – i ended up fast forwarding through most of it. these people don’t even know how to use special effects properly fer crying out loud. oh, and tell me that this isn’t a freudian slip on the behalf of the director: spiderman is battling sandman and black spiderman with the american flag as a backdrop. i mean, c’mon. is this a too obvious reading?

kungsängen & bålsta – babies & food

kungsängen. there’s an odd quantum effect here that makes me revert to being a teenager; i’m on the couch, drink soda, eat like a pig before slaughter.

moms boyfriend had a birthday party during the weekend (watch the video) and tomorrow i’m off to demonstrate my lazy solidarity with other working class folk, and meet some friends. too bad it’s so cold. but hey, if one day of marching a year is what it takes to keep the world just and equal, so be it.

home, mellow home.

whenever i visit mom in kungsängen i slump back into the worn, white leather couch, sleep late and eat a lot. also, i usually go and check on my teeth. no cavities this time, which was surprising. but yay how encouraging.

other than that, some buildings have been torn down, others have been built. met up with childhood friend matilda “you-are-wrong-by-default” baraibar and her sister carolina, and we took their kids for a stroll and then they left for the city. i just borrowed a bus pass from a neighbour (mass transit is prohibitivly expensive here) and am meeting up brother in stockholm proper later tonight. let’s see how many beers i can squeze out of him.

also, this is a good post on slashdot about the metaphore “information highway”. click the text below to go to the original post:

“Suppose the highways were like the net…

A highway hundreds of lanes wide. Most with pitfalls for potholes. Privately operated bridges and overpasses. No highway patrol. A couple of rent-a-cops on bicycles with broken whistles. 500 member vigilante posses with nuclear weapons. A minimum of 237 on ramps at every intersection.”

In vino veritas

ok, it’s getting late, and i’m tired and supposed to get up early to be moral and technical support for anna who has her examination tomorrow. yay for her.

the opening was spectacular. someone counted the number of people showing up, and 666 people turned up.

just the day before we’d been busy building the blessed thing, and come saturday i was walking around with one camera in each hand, trying to get something to drink before the art-peasants would swill it all up. i wasn’t fast enough, and the bastards drank everything and ate all the sausages-on-a-stick (not that i’d have any use of them, but still).

the stress didn’t go away all together, and because the show brought so many people together that otherwise might have stayed clear of each other, well, there were issues that probably will mess up the human relations here.

the first image is the 1000 yard stare of andreas on friday – digesting the horror (the horror) of the shitload of work that we still had. the rest of the images are from the opening and the ensuing party. scroll down for video.

as aside, i’m utterly freaked out by my bank statement, which at the moment reads “fuck you, you destitute beggar.” i got a letter from the student loan ~~evil henchmen~~ people (using the term loosely and generously) saying “yes we know you only have two months left, but we thought we’d help you loose some weight by not approving an extension on your loan. have an awesome life!”

so i’m 28, soon 29, and will borrow money from mom. i like the idea of family helping each other out and all that, but i’ve never lived much by it and can’t help but to shake the feeling of being an utter looser. plus this whole thing is making me feel like a mooch. if you have money, it’s not troubling to have someone else pick up the bill at a bar or for a cab, but if you’re broke it’s something you’re acutely aware of – it’s not a good feeling. then again, a recurring nightmare i have is that i’ll end up in a gutter somewhere. (a pre-emptive self pity, and a perfect excuse for not doing anything to avoid it)

speaking of nightmares, i had two dreams the past month that have stuck:
1 – somehow, there was a pool of young people that had to do service as sex workers for widows and older people. for some reason i was involved and set up a meeting with two older ladies for a rand-y-woo
2 – i won the world championship in sucking dick. literally. i don’t recall any actual sucking taking place in the dream, but i did recive a diploma.

speaking of which, looki what warren ellis found: [click image]

threetic

1) this is either friendly or a stab at someone slightly overweight. “dear brita! try this!! i got it from daniel but it’s too big for me. kisses / e”
2) house restoration – sometimes the old ways are perfectly fine.
3) these are lean and mean times. “gold bought. also tooth gold!”

to know in a biblical sense, pt. 2 & flossing

hannas exhibition was well received, and it was fun watching some children trace the lines on the wall, asking their parents what it was all about. the parents said that it was a map of who had kissed whom. if those children only knew.

before coming to the show, people were quite upset about the whole thing – a sense of privacy and betrayal tainting phonecalls, emails and sms-s that was telling that the idea struck a chord with the memories of people you’ve woken up next to and rather not advertise as knowing you intimately. once there though, most people found it interesting and rather harmless.

there’s another exhibition coming up in a few days, and washing the walls of the ink is a slight pain in the ass. not that i’m doing that, mind you; i’m fervently trying to get my shit together and render the video from my mfa presentation. i’ve been looking into building a render farm for the home, and that would kick ass, but as usual i’m more interested in that than i am of actually using it, so there you go.

oh, and in case anyone in my audience has the same misconception of flossing as i had, let me set things straight: flossing is something that you should do not only when your teeth hurt and there’s blood involved, but might be a good idea to add to that daily routine that people are talking about. goddamit i ended up butchering my own mouth.