Alex Reid

Roaming Philosophy by Ted Mayer.

I’ve always loved Rick Mercer’s Rants and this reminds me of that. Ted Mayer is a brilliant friend of mine who knows the ways about reality. Toast, and cheers!

Here’s a great resource and source of inspiration for photographers and creatives:

http://www.500photographers.com/

500 photographers is a weblog that posts 5 active photographers a week for 100 weeks. The photographers can be from any discipline within the photographic range, but they have to be worth looking at and have a certain level of quality. When we get to number 500, we will have a deep database of great photographers.

And so far they’re only up to number 88.

Winnipeg artist Diana Thorneycroft’s current exhibition, Canada, Myth, and History, Group of Seven Awkward Moments Series, is being shown at the Winnipeg Art Gallery until August 22nd. The works combines the landscapes of Canada’s Group of Seven, Tom Thomson, and Emily Carr with current Canadian cultural icons using “dolls, toys, and other found objects”.

Diana Thorneycroft - Early Snow with Bob and Doug, 2005., 2007. - Chromogenic print. Collection of gallery Art Mur.

The Awkward Moments are fraught with contradictions and forced ambiguity, oscillating between fact and fiction, child-play and adult situations, comedy and tragedy. The landscape paintings of the Group of Seven provide a historical context for the theme of national and cultural identity, and a link to past or common ideological constructs of Canada.

Go to the Winnipeg Art Gallery on Thursday, August 12th at 7pm because it’s your last chance to hear Diana Thorneycroft speak about this exhibition.

On Wednesday, LOFT — a brand owned by Ann Taylor Inc. — posted pictures of a typical catalog model in the brand’s new silk cargo pants on its Facebook page. Soon after, several fans began complaining that they wished the fashion company had posted photos of “real women” to display their goods.

In response, the very next day, LOFT posted several photos of their employees wearing the same clothes. The female employees were picked from the company’s design, styling and marketing staff and their body types ranged from size 2 to 12, and heights from 5?3? to 5?10?.

Fans were instantly pleased that they were being listened to, even if some ironically didn’t think the clothes were flattering on the “real women”.

This is a great example of how companies should be utilizing the Internet, not just using the web to distribute information, but remembering that communication is a two-sided street – you have to listen, not just talk, to have an effective conversation.

We are losing our privacy slowly every day and not because of the government or big business. We are losing our privacy because we, as individuals, are the ones eroding it.

I call it ‘Little Brother’ and this New York Times article sums it up very well. It’s one of the leading reasons I started doing reputation management for artists.

“… the truth is that for a great many people, the permanent memory bank of the Web increasingly means there are no second chances — no opportunities to escape a scarlet letter in your digital past. Now the worst thing you’ve done is often the first thing everyone knows about you.”