Author: Florence EMA Blanchard

Hedonistic Cloud

| Florence EMA Blanchard

This past weekend I worked on a mural installation called Hedonistic Cloud for the Chocolate & I New York week, which is currently happening in Chelsea. The whole event is about chocolate and offers various workshops and activities available from $0 to something like $85 per session. Several artists from various background are showing their artwork too. I’m showing new and old works as part of the installation.

All the info is below

Food for Art. Art for Thought.

Feb. 8-14, 2010

Chocolate & I, New York
511 W. 25 Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY10001

Chocolate & I, New York is excited to showcase recent works from both established and emerging artists revolving around the relationship and characteristics society attributes to chocolate and the way it affects us on a personal level. Join us on February 11th and view the work of Elim Chen, Ema, C&T, Jason Krugman, Michelle Mayer, Carolina Vallejo, Asli Sevinc & Charnan Lewis.

Reception: Thursday Feb. 11, 9p-11. Music performance by Rifle Recoil.

Hours:
Mon, Tue, Wed, Fri: 4p to 7p
Thur: 4p to 11p
Sat: 2p to 11p
Sun: 2p to 9p
Internet Press:

Jim Avignon on the Neighborhood Public Radio

| Florence EMA Blanchard

On this episode of Bohemian Biology, you’ll hear Jim Avignon aka Neoangin talking on ArtSci Fridays, a show I hosted on the Neighborhood Public Radio back in 2008 as part of the Whitney Biennial.
Jim is a German painter and performer based in Brooklyn, who at the time, just had a new album out titled ‘The Happy Hobo & The Return of The Freaks’.
As I just attended his even more recent album release party a couple of days ago I thought I would revive this piece for the occasion.

To give you a taste here is how his bio starts:
‘1994 marks the beginning of the whole story: Berlin painter and „pop-art“ activist Jim Avignon spots a one-man-entertainer-keyboard in the sales bin at the hardware store, right next to the cash register.
He wastes no time and purchases the instrument. In the ensuing months he will dedicate quite some time to his new keyboard. The instrument has funky accompanying rhythms and a snazzy sound but unfortunately there is no feature to save the songs. Not knowing how to read music Mr. Avignon develops his very own method to memorize the numerous melodies and chordal sketches which he had composed in no time.’

Jim’s next performance will be at Monkeytown, 58 N 3rd St. Brooklyn
His new album is ‘Say High To Your Neighborhood’ and is available on http://neoangin.info/
Happy holidays!

Run Time: 21:33

Episode 6: Jim Avignon on Art Sci Fridays (Neighborhood P…

A new header, yes!

| Florence EMA Blanchard

I finally managed to design a new banner for my blog!

I actually used one of the illustrations I made for Petite et Jolie holiday compilation.

Litterally meaning ‘short and cute’ in French (which I’m not sure really translates well), Petite et Jolie is an online music label and collective of graphic artists specialized in cute 8-bit/electronic music and graphics. The compilation should be available on 12/24/09 on their website for FREE and will include musical and visual works from a dozen of artists.

Aiolo, Ema, Flashbacker, Hamayu, Julian Winter, Kaneel, Makunouchi Bento, Nimrod, Pam, Quasimojo / Dean Williams, Relativ q, Valzi, Windy Hill Mill.

    BioTalk – Emerging technologies in stem cell biology

    | Florence EMA Blanchard

    For the 5th episode of Bohemian Biology Podcast I uploaded one of the podcasts I produced for BioTechniques. It was originally published on biotechniques.com June 25 2009. Run Time: 32:48

    Although the ban on funding embryonic stem cells was recently lifted by President Barack Obama, the controversy over this research still remains.

    New types of pluripotent stem cells have recently emerged as alternatives to embryonic stem cells. These include induced pluripotent stem cells (IPS cells) and parthenogenic stem cells.

    In this episode of BioTalk, Kent Vrana (1:25) , Ph.D., chair of the department of Pharmacology at Penn State University College of Medicine, and Ken Aldrich (21:55), CEO of International Stem Cell Corporation, discuss the current state of stem cell research.

    NYC Cricket Crawl

    | Florence EMA Blanchard

    CClogoV2_75

    On Saturday September 12, 2009, New Yorkers were invited to ‘stop and listen’ to the nocturnal chirping of crickets. The goal was to survey the presence of several species of crickets and katydids across the five boroughs and beyond. The collaboration between several hundreds of volunteers and scientists based at the American Museum of Natural History and U.S. Geological Survey Patuxent Wildlife Research Center allowed the construction of a preliminary map showing the distribution of 7 species of Crickets and Katytids spanning over 300 localities. This type of event is termed ‘Bioblitz’ and provides instant snapshots of the natural world, which can later serve as baseline in ecological studies.

    ‘Cricket Crawl’ is a 32:19 long audio documentary about this event, which aired for the first time on free103point9 internet radio as part of the Giant Ear))) ‘back to school sounds’ show on Sunday, September 27 at 7pm.

    Back to School sounds was curated by sound artist Mikhail Iliatov, a member of New York Society for Acoustic Ecology.

    The official NYC Cricket Crawl event’s webpage is available here.

    NEW YORK CITY GIRLS at RAKKAUTTA & ANARKIAA

    | Florence EMA Blanchard

    Back in 2005 I met Yseult Digan, a French film director, street artist and music producer from Paris. Yseult contacted me because she was looking for protagonists for a documentary project about empowerment of female New Yorkers in urban subcultures. For 2 years, she went back and forth between Paris and New York to follow the lives and works of 7 New Yorkers including myself, shooting and editing sequences until completion of her project in 2008.

    The film is titled ‘New York City Girls’ and was selected at RAKKAUTTA & ANARKIAA festival which will happen this month in Helsinki (09/17-09/27). I pasted the synopsis and trailer below.

    French Touch Selection / Director: Yseult Digan

    New York City Girls

    Often, the urban said scenes are predominantly male occupation. The ”street” was considered for a long time as a dangerous playground where girls were excluded. Today, we fi nally see young ladies who by means of work and perseverance offer quality propositions and new approach of their discipline.

    ”New York City Girls” is a journey in the heart of the city. Through several portraits of women living in New York, we discover their respective universe; graffi ti, skateboard, breakdance, handball, bike messenging, fashion and music. Far from the feminist demands, those young followers of urban culture live their passion simply, without asking the question of a possible legitimacy of gender other than their talent.

    Beyond the cultural aspect, ”New York City Girls” is also a social documentary; Due to the diverse cultural background of the characters, this film is a eulogy of social diversity. These women are the emblems of what is New York today; A cosmopolitan city where the cultures meet and exchange to create a new lifestyle.

    Trailer available below.

    Jeremy Slater at Governor Island Art Fair 2009

    | Florence EMA Blanchard

    As the second annual Governor’s Island Art Fair is kicking in this month, a couple of friends and I hopped on the ferry at the DUMBO station on Saturday early afternoon to check it out. The sun was hitting really hard that day. This made waiting for the ferry quite hard to endure, but made the boat trip and short distance get away even more enjoyable. Once on the island I came across an interesting sound installation by Jeremy Slater.
    In this third episode of Bohemian Biology you’ll hear Jeremy Slater talk about his installation located in the attic of one of the art fair’s buildings.

    Bushwick is Beautiful

    | Florence EMA Blanchard

    A couple of weeks ago I followed my friend Jenevieve to work.

    Jenevieve works for Big City Walls, an institution, that coordinates murals with youth organizations in schools across New York City. She recently completed a mural at the corner of Knickerbocker and Myrtle avenues with teenagers and young adults aged 13-21 from the Bushwick area of Brooklyn. The mural took four weeks to complete, from conceptualization to realization and was funded by several organizations including Make the Road New York, CopWatch and Big City Walls itself.

    The role of such community outreach associations is to bring awareness and help to kids and their families on topics such as educational, immigration and housing justice, youth programs and police brutality, which are relevant to the Bushwick population.

    In this podcast episode you will hear Jenevieve Reid, her coworker Emilia Wiles and their students discussing the themes pictured on the mural and how they apply to their personal lives.

    beautifulbushwick
    Thanks go to Jen, Emilia, Patrick, Bryan, Nathalie, and the rest of the people who accepted to be interviewed.

    Neighborhood Watch and Stop Motion

    | Florence EMA Blanchard

    Two nights ago, I was at the screening of the 4th episode of Neighborhood Watch. This event is organized by the Compound Eye, a collective of three brooklynite filmmakers based in Williamsburg. Launa Eddy, Daniel Olshansky,  and Brian Russo put together and edit tons of short visual sequences from various sources ranging from cult cartoons from the 30’s-80’s, beautiful, weird and sometimes disturbing films excerpts and animations, to absolutely non-politically correct hilarious home-made comedy. It is funny, interesting, and beautiful.

    Neighborhood Watch also aims to promote community awareness, and exhibits sequences shot in the streets of Williamsburg, where store or restaurant owners and regular passers-by are asked to take part in their delirious endeavors.

    The Compound Eye screens its +/- monthly production in the backyard of Kenny’s Trattoria for free. Next one will be sometime around Halloween.

    As they are open for submission, I sent them a short stop motion animation I made for them, which they included in this past episode of Neighborhood Watch. I meant to try stop motion animation for while, especially after seeing a couple of amazing videos made by professional stop motion artists. Below is my animation and here are a few links to VERY good videos from other people totally worth checking out (but only AFTER checking out mine!):

    The Misanthrope music video by Yukihiro Taguchi (which totally inspired my own little animation)

    Her Morning Elegance music video by Oren Lavie

    Muto by Blu

    Annie Poon’s website